http://www.courierpostonline.com/news/southjersey/m010204b.htm
Conservation group buys DeMarco tract for $12M
By LAWRENCE HAJNA
Courier-Post Staff
WOODLAND
A $12 million deal preserving 9,400 acres in the heart of the Pinelands National Reserve has been finalized.
J. Garfield DeMarco, president of A.R. DeMarco Enterprises, confirmed Thursday that the transfer of his family's cranberry farm to the New Jersey Conservation Foundation was completed late New Year's Eve - the deadline for signing the agreement.
"It was a very long, intricate, tedious and complicated settlement," DeMarco said.
"But the attorneys and the parties worked at it diligently all day. It's certainly a great result for the conservation foundation, for the people of the state of New Jersey, for Burlington County, for Woodland Township, certainly for the environment, and for the DeMarco family. It ended well."
Officials with the Far Hills-based New Jersey Conservation Foundation, could not be reached.
The deal is believed to be the largest ever by a nonprofit conservation group in New Jersey. This area is home to Pine Barrens tree frogs, bald eagles, pitch pine forests and 600 acres of century-old Atlantic white cedar forests.
The purchase links more than 200,000 acres of state forests and wildlife management areas in the Pinelands.
The foundation expects to open the property to the public for passive recreation, such as hiking and bird watching.
It will be named the Franklin E. Parker Preserve in honor of the conservation foundation's past president. About 800 acres of cranberry bogs will be known as the DeMarco Family Cranberry Meadows Natural Area.
Although most environmental groups supported the purchase, the deal was not without controversy.
DeMarco, once chairman of the Burlington County Republican Party and current chairman of the county Bridge Commission, has long been a controversial political figure.
And the Democratic-controlled Department of Environmental Protection balked at contributing to the acquisition because the administration of former Gov. Christie Whitman, a Republican, already paid A.R. DeMarco Enterprises $7 million for deed restrictions preventing development.
The conservation foundation, however, felt the land could still be logged and its cranberry bogs expanded if the family sold the land.
It raised more than $5 million in donations from private foundations and individuals to exercise an option to buy the property in August. It must raise the $7 million balance by January 2008.
Once the state's largest cranberry operation, A.R. DeMarco Enterprises hasn't released a crop since 2001. DeMarco and his brother, Mark A. DeMarco of Hammonton, and their sister, Anna Lynne Papinchak of Washington state, have no heirs interested in running the farm.
Their father, Anthony R. DeMarco, started the farm in the 1940s.
Conservation group buys DeMarco tract for $12M
By LAWRENCE HAJNA
Courier-Post Staff
WOODLAND
A $12 million deal preserving 9,400 acres in the heart of the Pinelands National Reserve has been finalized.
J. Garfield DeMarco, president of A.R. DeMarco Enterprises, confirmed Thursday that the transfer of his family's cranberry farm to the New Jersey Conservation Foundation was completed late New Year's Eve - the deadline for signing the agreement.
"It was a very long, intricate, tedious and complicated settlement," DeMarco said.
"But the attorneys and the parties worked at it diligently all day. It's certainly a great result for the conservation foundation, for the people of the state of New Jersey, for Burlington County, for Woodland Township, certainly for the environment, and for the DeMarco family. It ended well."
Officials with the Far Hills-based New Jersey Conservation Foundation, could not be reached.
The deal is believed to be the largest ever by a nonprofit conservation group in New Jersey. This area is home to Pine Barrens tree frogs, bald eagles, pitch pine forests and 600 acres of century-old Atlantic white cedar forests.
The purchase links more than 200,000 acres of state forests and wildlife management areas in the Pinelands.
The foundation expects to open the property to the public for passive recreation, such as hiking and bird watching.
It will be named the Franklin E. Parker Preserve in honor of the conservation foundation's past president. About 800 acres of cranberry bogs will be known as the DeMarco Family Cranberry Meadows Natural Area.
Although most environmental groups supported the purchase, the deal was not without controversy.
DeMarco, once chairman of the Burlington County Republican Party and current chairman of the county Bridge Commission, has long been a controversial political figure.
And the Democratic-controlled Department of Environmental Protection balked at contributing to the acquisition because the administration of former Gov. Christie Whitman, a Republican, already paid A.R. DeMarco Enterprises $7 million for deed restrictions preventing development.
The conservation foundation, however, felt the land could still be logged and its cranberry bogs expanded if the family sold the land.
It raised more than $5 million in donations from private foundations and individuals to exercise an option to buy the property in August. It must raise the $7 million balance by January 2008.
Once the state's largest cranberry operation, A.R. DeMarco Enterprises hasn't released a crop since 2001. DeMarco and his brother, Mark A. DeMarco of Hammonton, and their sister, Anna Lynne Papinchak of Washington state, have no heirs interested in running the farm.
Their father, Anthony R. DeMarco, started the farm in the 1940s.