Heather McCurdy to assist Villas Homeowners

First, thanks for all your phone calls and emails. As you can see, the natural gas main is being installed at a pretty good clip and we’re collecting applications from homeowners who live along the installation route. It looks like the folks on Freedom Drive and Sheridan Drive are pulling together to make sure their streets are one of the first to have natural gas. If you live on either of these roads and you haven’t yet contacted us, give us a call and we’ll get you squared away.

For your convenience, Heather McCurdy has been formally announced as the South Jersey Gas sales representative assigned to assisting Villas homeowners with their natural gas conversions. While she’s working out of our Swainton division, she’s becoming rather well known in the community already. Many of you have spoken to her over the phone and if you visited us on the Community Information Day a few weeks ago, you may recall meeting Heather in person.

She’s very familiar with Cape May County as she, her husband and twin daughters, Madeleine and Paige, reside in Dennis Township. If you have any questions, give her a call at 1-877-458-9566 or send her an email at hmccurdy@sjindustries.com.

We're On Our Way!

Thanks to all the residents who have expressed interest about switching to natural gas. We’re definitely on our way. We now have just over 3,000 feet of 8” main installed on Breakwater Rd. Once we have a tee in place at Breakwater and Fishing Creek, the pipe laid so far will be fed with natural gas and will be ready to serve the homes along the way. We anticipate this to be within two weeks after another 2,000 feet of 8” is installed.

Please be aware that due to bends in the road and the increasing number of cars travelling along the site, local police may be assisting with traffic control to assure the safety of drivers and work crews in the area. This will only be necessary if we need to shift the south bound lane over the center line and the North bound lane onto the shoulder.

We’ll keep you posted as we continue to move closer to Bayshore Road.
- Paul Zuccarino

Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm-Flailing Tubeman greets visitors as they arrive for the Villas Customer Information Day. (All photos courtesy Jacqui Tate)

The popular Buy Shore Real Program broadcast live from the event at Town Hall.

SJG Sales Representative Heather McCurdy provides informaton to residents about how they can save energy and live comfortably for less money.

Wow! What a day Saturday turned out to be! Our very first Villas Customer Information Day was a fantastic success. With nearly 400 people stopping by, we were able to meet so many wonderful people who shared their stories, asked great questions and expressed genuine support for our main extension project. It seems that many of you have been waiting decades for natural gas and now, here we are. All of us at SJG are looking forward to helping each of you save energy and live more comfortably for less money.

We thank the township for allowing us to use their facility and we appreciate Mayor Beck, Township Manager Kathy McPherson and Councilmen Tom Conrad and Glenn Douglass for dropping by the Community Information Day to show their support of this community-wide money-saving effort.

What’s the next step?? Well, we’ll continue to collect applications from residents interested in switching to natural gas and identify those streets that have the highest level of interest. As streets with the most interest will be the first in the community to receive natural gas service, it’s very, very important to turn in your application if you haven’t already and encourage your neighbors to do the same.

Keep in mind, as this is an on-going process, we’ll be reaching out to everyone in the Villas who wants to switch to natural gas. It’s our aim to provide all residents of the community with a money-saving fuel option!

Learn more about natural gas service to the Villas at tonight’s Township Council meeting held at the Town Hall at 7pm!

Hello, Villas! My name is Michele Lamb and I’m responsible for the marketing side of bringing natural gas to South Jersey residents and business owners just like you.

We’ve got some great things in store for you starting with a groundbreaking ceremony this Thursday, March 12th at 2:15pm to mark the beginning of this fantastic project. All are welcome to join SJG representatives and elected officials on this monumental occasion as we literally put the shovel to the ground in celebration. The event will be held at the entrance of the Cape May Airport Complex (on the corner of Breakwater Road and Lexington Avenue, just past the Erma Fire Station).

Plus, mark your calendar for this Saturday, March 14th, as we’re holding a Customer Information Day at the Town Hall on Bayshore Rd (next to the library) from 10 am to 1pm. We’ll have representatives on hand to answer your questions, provide you with information about free estimates, State rebates and federal tax incentives, and help you complete an application for natural gas service. Join popular radio hosts Bob Maschio and Buddy Tarbotton as they broadcast their Buy Shore Real Estate Show live from Town Hall during the event!

Don’t miss this opportunity to learn how you can save money, lower your energy costs and live comfortably for less!

Hope to see you there!

My name is Paul Zuccarino, Director, Construction Services for South Jersey Gas. In my role, I oversee our contractor for this project which is J.F. Kiely Construction. You may be familiar with their trucks as they have an office in Swainton.

All indications, weather permitting, point to work beginning late this week. We anticipate seeing some construction activity on Thursday, March 12th, with crews starting at 7 am and typically working until 3:30 pm. At this point, you can expect to see yellow pipe along the side of the road being put together for underground installation.

There will be a number of blue and yellow trucks identified by the contractor's name "JF Kiely" present in the area. In addition, SJG inspectors will be on site to assure quality control. They will be identified by white trucks with the SJG logo. There will be appropriate traffic control efforts consistent with the MUTCD standards and in accordance with the local authority's requirements.

Please pay particular attention to the safety of our dedicated workforce who will be working along the roadway. We will make every effort to cause the least disturbance to your neighborhood. Thanks and it is a pleasure to serve you.

Welcome to the Villas Blog!

This is the first time we have used this forum to communicate with our customers, and we are interested in hearing from you as to its effectiveness.

First, let me introduce myself. My name is Bob Fatzinger and I am the vice president of customer and distribution operations for South Jersey Gas. I want to personally thank you for visiting this site and for taking interest in our project to provide natural gas service to the Villas. All of us at South Jersey Gas are very excited about extending natural gas into the Villas, and we want your conversion experience to be as easy as possible.

During the course of this year, you'll hear from several of our team members on this blog -- from Sales and Marketing to Installation Crews and Customer Care. It's our intent to keep you updated on our progress, provide you with useful information and share with you observations along the way.

As you know, this has been a project that's taken awhile to get off the ground. But with a system upgrade completed last year, we're now able to offer residents and business owners in the community the option of having natural gas as their fuel of choice. While this news is fantastic in itself, I want to assure you that this is just the first of many steps that we're taking to help you lower your energy bills and live comfortably for less.

To give you an idea of what we're doing, right now, we've requested approval from the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities to offer a series of five programs to help customers save more energy, reduce their carbon footprint and create jobs in the southern portion of our State. This will give every Villas resident the opportunity to lower their bills substantially. Check back to this blog for more details as we move forward.

Again, thanks for visiting and we look forward to having you join the SJG family of customers. If you have any questions about switching to natural gas, call our hotline at 1-877-458-9566. We welcome your feedback to this site and invite you to email your comments to mailto:villasblog@sjindustries.com Also, please be sure to visit southjerseygas.com for tips and information on energy efficiency and savings.