OCEAN VIEW, Del.- Intersecting properties in Ocean View are at the center of a restaurant proposal and the future of the area's trail head and local business.
Tom Fowler owns the Ocean View Marina on Elliott Avenue. Part of the marina is on his land, but a section of the marina that includes his building, boat ramp, gas pump and dock is on property that is owned by the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control (DNREC). Fowler says he is on an interim lease from the state for that section of the property.
Fowler says the state wants to extend the Assawoman Trail, which currently ends on property adjacent to his. If that happens, Fowler says he wants to build a restaurant where his current office is to make ends meet.
"I am going to give up a lot of land forever if I give them the trail on my property," he says. "I just want something in return. The place is getting old. It's starting to show its age. It's falling down. I need a reliable source of revenue to be able to upkeep the marina."
But DNREC has denied the request twice. In a statement, a DNREC spokesman explains: "Mr. Thomas Fowler was advised that his proposal to place a bar and restaurant on DNREC property was denied by DNREC's Division of Parks & Recreation initially in 2012 and again in 2017. Mr. Fowler was informed that his proposal had been denied because DNREC found it unfeasible to put a bar and restaurant on DNREC-owned land in an area zoned residential, with neighbors in close proximity, limited parking, and because of a town ordinance and conditional-use restrictions specific to pleasure boating and non-commercial fishing, crabbing and clamming."
But Fowler says the idea helps give him some leverage if indeed hikers and bikers make their way around his business.
"All the folks will be walking the dock. They'll be looking around, they'll be wanting to park here if we don't do a trailhead parking. I'll literally turn into a policeman trying to help people get on my dock or what have you," he says. "If this is a little restaurant and again seasonal outdoor restaurant, I don't care who is coming."
On Tuesday, Delaware State Parks Director Ray Bivens told WBOC the state has scrapped plans to move the trail towards Fowler's property, and instead all future expansion plans are in the other direction.
"In our agreement that we had had signed with him, he was to work with us on that trail," he says. "He actually stopped that and put up a fence."
Bivens says the state has no problem with Fowler building a restaurant on his land, but building a restaurant on the state property that Fowler currently leases is unfair to other businesses.
"We are very pro business and we try to work with everyone but we want everyone to have the same opportunities to bid," Bivens says. "It can't be to benefit just one particular business."
Fowler tells WBOC he feels he is being treated unfairly, as restaurants exist on other state parks, like the Big Chill Beach Club in Delaware Seashore State Park. But Bivens says those were selected after a public bidding process.
Fowler says he will subdivide the larger portion of his property for development if an agreement cannot be reached.
