Beachwood Ready To Resume Fireworks Over Toms River

BEACHWOOD, NJ — When the Beachwood fireworks committee had to put out the word last Fourth of July that the decades-long display over the Toms River were being canceled just hours before the show was to go off, it was an awful feeling.

"We were devastated," Beachwood Mayor Ron Roma said recently. "We felt like we let people down, even though it was out of our control."

"It was a giant letdown," Roma said.

The fireworks committee is hoping to put make that bitter memory just a blip in an otherwise happy history when the fireworks show returns this Fourth of July, complete with music by WOBM. The show is being put on by Fireworks Extravaganza, and Roma said there are contingencies to make sure last year's cancellation is not repeated.

The donation-funded pyrotechnics show dates back to 1922, when flare guns were used to send the fireworks into the sky. It draws thousands to the banks of the Toms River every July 4, from Island Heights on the north bank of the river to spots in Ocean Gate and Berkeley Township farther downstream. In Beachwood and neighboring Pine Beach — the epicenter of the event — vehicles jam Route 9 as spectators swell the towns to nearly twice their combined population of 13,000. Side streets fill with parked cars and pedestrians, who turn the riverfront beaches into mass picnics.

"This is as much of a tradition as the (Toms River) Halloween parade," Roma said.
"Everyone has their spots," he said, from the beachfronts to backyards near the river to boats that anchor up in the river for the evening’s show.

Parking lots along Route 9, including the site of the former Beachwood Shopping Center, turn into impromptu bandstands, with people bringing beach chairs and coolers and cornhole games to pass the time until the fireworks begin. That was once Roma’s spot of choice.

"Years and years ago, when my kid was little, we would camp out by Jerry's truck," he said, referring to the Wunder Wiener hotdog stand that Councilman Jerry LaCrosse operated for years at the shopping center. LaCrosse’s stand was destroyed and he was seriously injured last June when an SUV smashed into the stand one morning, while he was doing maintenance. LaCrosse has said he hopes to be back in business sometime this year.

"The atmosphere is electric," Roma said, especially down at the beachfront. "We walk down to the beach and it’s the most crowded you see it at any time all year."

"It’s a good time. It’s a happy day," he said.

It’s what he and the borough’s fireworks committee are hoping to see return this year, and he said the committee has worked closely with Fireworks Extravaganza to ensure happens.

Fireworks Extravaganza was contracted to provide the 2018 show, and it was the company that took intense heat last summer on the heels of the cancellation, which happened when a driver called out sick and there was no backup available to deliver the display from a Maryland warehouse to Beachwood.

John Sagaria, president of Fireworks Extravaganza, issued public apologies to Beachwood and to Milltown, in Middlesex County, which also was left without a display on the Fourth of July.

"I told Mayor Roma, in all my years in business, I have had to deal with a couple of irate people," Sagaria said in one of his apologies. "I have no experience in dealing with such disappointment. ... this is truly my first time."

Not unlike the pyrotechnics his company fires off at hundreds of events each year, as word of the cancellation exploded across social media, it showered both Sagaria and borough officials with white-hot anger.

Sagaria’s been working to make amends ever since. And Roma said everyone has taken extra precautions to avoid a repeat.

"There are contingency clauses in the contract," Roma said, "and I’m sure they have contingencies upon contingencies."

Sagaria refunded the deposit the fireworks committee paid last year immediately, and is providing this year’s show at no charge. But Roma said the fireworks committee — which was created in 1984 by then-Mayor William T. Hornidge and included the mayors of Pine Beach and Island Heights along with Bill Scott of Adelphia Cable to take over fundraising from the Beachwood Volunteer Fire Company — is continuing to actively fundraise to ensure the future of the display, to guard against times when donations diminish due to economic conditions.

"It gives us a cushion," he said. Plus the fireworks committee feeds the volunteers who help with the set-up and cleanup that go along with hosting thousands of visitors.

WOBM is scheduled to be on site again this year, providing the music to go along with the show, and Roma said as the days count down to the show, the committee is crossing its fingers for things to go off without a hitch this year.

"Councilman LaCrosse gets us good weather every year," he said. "Hopefully nothing happens."

Roma said the committee will be collecting donations in Beachwood and anyone who would like to contribute can contact him at mayorroma@beachwoodusa.com.

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