OCEAN CITY — The city’s year-round population is getting older, a demographic study presented to the Board of Education recently found, with a median age over 57 in the most recent census.
Everybody gets older, right? But the study presented by Richard Grip of Statistical Forecasting LLC indicates people in Ocean City are aging in place, and few young families are moving to the community, where statistics show the year-round population declining and housing prices climbing.
That’s going to mean fewer students in the district in the future, and right now the city’s three schools are already operating below their capacity.
“When you have an older community, guess what? You don’t have that many kids in the school district,” Grip said. His presentation did not take place at a school board meeting, board President Kevin Barnes made clear.
The board did not have enough members present for a quorum at the most recent scheduled meeting, meaning it could not formally meet.
But because Grip had traveled from Vermont to make his presentation, the board members present listened.
A video of the presentation has been posted to the district website, but there was no formal opening or adjournment, and the board was unable to take any action.
Historically, the population of Ocean City grew steadily from 1940 until 1990, climbing from 4,672 people to more than 15,500. The next 10 years leveled out, census data included in the report shows, and then began to slide, with 11,229 year-round residents. There was a drop of almost a quarter of the population in the decade between 2000 and 2010, the report shows.
But it projects the population will not decline more over the next 20 years, projecting essentially the same population by 2040.
In many ways, Grip said, Ocean City is unusual. He cited the large percentage of retirees living in the community year-round, and the high number of homes not occupied year-round, not unusual for a Jersey Shore beach town but an outlier for many school districts.
Another unusual element: The largest age group for city residents falls between 60 and 69, with few people under 5 years old.
“I do hundreds of these kinds of studies. I don’t see stuff like this,” Grip said.
The high cost means fewer families in the community, he said.
One slate of candidates in Ocean City says politics has no place in school board elections. The other is aligned with Jack Ciattarelli for governor and Moms for Liberty.
His report put the median price in Ocean City for an owner-occupied residential unit at $719,000. Recent city data put that number even higher, with an estimated market price of a single-family home at about $1 million.
“Look, this is a beautiful pace to live, if you can afford it,” Grip said. “I don’t know too many 30-something people, 20-something people that can buy a home to start in the 700s median.”
There is not very much room for further development in Ocean City, Grip said, and a few new homes built on the remaining empty lots or larger homes built where a current home has been demolished will not likely make a significant difference in the school populations of the future, but new affordable units could mean families coming to town.
“In total, there is the potential for 60 non age-restricted affordable apartment units in one development, Peck’s Beach Village, which will be located on Haven Avenue,” reads the report, which projects the possibility of 37 additional children attending public schools because of the residential development.
The city has three schools, the Primary School, Intermediate School and Ocean City High School, which also educates the students of Upper Township in a sending-receiving agreement.
Sea Isle City students also attend Ocean City schools. There are 1,701 students in the district this year, a decline of 441 students over the past decade.
The Primary School has 275 students, the report shows, which is 252 students below the capacity of 527. As those students advance through the district, it will likely mean smaller class sizes in the other schools in the future.
There are 1,104 students in the high school, the report found, with a projected enrollment of 940 in the 2029-30 school year.
“In the last five years, enrollments (PK-12) have been declining in the Ocean City School District. Looking ahead, enrollments are projected to continue to decline in the next five years,” the report states. “However, the projected enrollment decline is not expected to occur equally across the three grade configurations, as the largest enrollment decline is projected in the high school grades as the district’s existing smaller intermediate school cohorts move through the system.”
Contact Bill Barlow:
609-272-7290
bbarlow@pressofac.com
X @jerseynews_bill
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