By DONALD WITTKOWSKI
In 2021, Mary Jane Gleeson tried to sell the three-story building that once doubled as her family’s residence and business – the old Mazzella’s Bakery.
Despite Sea Isle City’s sizzling real estate market, Gleeson said she received only one offer, and it was far below the asking price of nearly $3.7 million.
“It was an insult for the property,” she said.
Now, two years later, Gleeson has different plans for the property that overlooks the corner of 50th Street and Landis Avenue.
She is teaming up with her brother, Silverio Mazzella, on plans to redevelop the site at 4914 Landis Ave. into a new mixed-use project that would combine commercial space on the ground floor with eight condominiums on the second and third stories.
The project is scheduled to come before Sea Isle’s planning board at the June 12 meeting. Gleeson and Mazzella, under their corporate name, Silverjane Inc., will be seeking preliminary and final site plan approval.
According to their application with the planning board, they will also seek zoning variances for minimum rear yard size, minimum commercial frontage along 50th street, the amount of glass for the commercial frontage and the number of signs.
The same project was given the green light by the planning board in 2013, but those approvals have since expired. Silverjane Inc. must return to the board for new approvals.
The existing building would be demolished to make room for the mixed-use project if the planning board gives its approval again in June.
An architectural rendering included in the planning board application depicts a modern-looking building, containing 15,582 square feet of space, for the mixed-use development. In addition to the eight condos that are proposed, the project may have as many as four commercial units, according to the application.
Gleeson, who is a Sea Isle real estate agent, explained in an interview Friday that the existing building will likely remain standing until next year. There are tentative plans to begin construction on the new project in 2024 and have it completed later in the year, she said.
“This project isn’t going forward for a while,” Gleeson noted.
The building once served as the residence and bakery owned by Gleeson’s late parents, Silverio and Josephine Mazzella, Italian immigrants who settled in Sea Isle at the corner of 50th Street and Landis Avenue in the 1950s.
Mazzella’s Bakery closed in 1999, but the building currently serves as leased office space for a real estate company and a catering business.
The property is in the midst of a two-block commercial district along the Landis Avenue corridor between 49th and 51st streets. It is an enclave of restaurants, a bakery and other businesses.
“It’s beautiful there,” Gleeson said of the surrounding neighborhood.
Mazzella’s Bakery was one of the anchors of the neighborhood when it operated between 1953 and 1999. Gleeson’s father built the bakery in 1953.
However, the maintenance that is required now on the old building is challenging, Gleeson noted.
“It’s difficult keeping it up,” she said.
The property includes two full-sized lots with parking. There are currently eight parking spaces. The mixed-use development would include eight parking spaces, the number that is required for the project, according to planning board documents.
The property is zoned for mixed-use construction – the type of development that has become popular in Sea Isle ever since the city changed its zoning laws in 2008 to encourage projects that combine commercial and residential space.
In recent years, a number of old homes in Sea Isle have been demolished to make way for mixed-use projects. Typically, mixed-use projects combine commercial space such as restaurants and retail shops on the first floor with condos on the top two stories.
