Fifty years later, N.J. celebrating open-space program

Compared with today, open space was plentiful in 1950s New Jersey, but even then a post-World War II demand for Cape Cods, split-levels, and strip shopping centers was quickly changing the landscape.

"It became obvious there was a threat of New Jersey's character being consumed," said Howard Wolf, one of the state's first directors of local land acquisition.

With the exception of buying property that would become Island Beach State Park and Wharton State Forest, the state largely depended on private donations to conserve land.

Farsighted planners and politicians, including Gov. Robert B. Meyner, who served from 1954 to 1962, realized gifts soon wouldn't be enough to stave off hungry bulldozers.

The Meyner administration devised a plan, dubbed Green Acres, to borrow money for land purchases meant to protect watersheds and enhance the state's historic, scenic, and recreational resources for public use. The Legislature offered bipartisan support.

In November 1960, voters approved selling $60 million in bonds — the first of 13 referendums that have approved a total $3.1 billion in the nation's oldest continuous state-supported open-space program.

In 50 years, Green Acres has directly protected 650,000 acres, and its matching funds have helped build or improve outdoor recreational facilities in every county and most municipalities.

The program's ubiquitous green-and-white signs — which bear a silhouette of the famous Mercer oak from the Battle of Princeton — are posted on more than 1,000 properties in Burlington, Camden, and Gloucester Counties.

Projects have ranged from preserving bird migration habitat along the Delaware Bay to developing suburban Little League and football fields to restoring the 1930s classical grandeur of Eldridge R. Johnston Park near Rutgers University-Camden.

With public and private partners, New Jersey has preserved 1.4 million acres, including land under state and federal management before the Green Acres program.

The program is completing approval of project applications for the first half of $242 million authorized by a 2009 bond act from the latest referendum.

The state Department of Environmental Protection is marking the program's golden anniversary with hikes, canoeing, seedling giveaways, and other events at Green Acres sites throughout New Jersey. The official celebration will be June 3, the date Meyner signed the first bond act.

For more information, visit www.state.nj.us/dep/ga50/

Contact Cynthia Henry at 856-779-3899 or chenry@phillynews.com.