By Philip Sean Curran
HIGHLANDS – From the time he was 12 years old washing pots and pans in an Italian seafood restaurant, Cliff Moore knew he wanted to go into business for himself.
Now 61, he will put his experience as a businessman to work for Highlands as the borough’s economic development officer, a part-time role he began filling last week.
In an interview April 1, Moore wore a Mickey Mouse tie, red shirt and jacket that had his name written on it in script below the words “Economic Development Consultant Services.” He discussed a career that has brought him to the Bayshore region of Monmouth, talked about the ways businesses need to operate in the 21st century and spoke of the challenge of attracting people to the community.
“I wanted this job because I saw it as an opportunity,” Moore said. Highlands has “a great reputation with restaurants (and) businesses that have been here for a long time. But like everyplace else, they’re struggling.” Moore attributes some of the struggles to the challenges of getting people off Route 36 and into the borough.
He said he thinks food or events are what get motorists to get off the highway. He also touted how the community has free beaches. He said every time another community raises its beach fees, Highlands will advertise that people can use the beaches there at no cost.
“If you want the sand, you want the smell of the ocean, you want to be able to go into the salt water, why would you go anywhere else?” he asked. “Free beaches are few and far between.”
Moore is a native of Bergen County. In 1984, he opened his first restaurant in the Mall at Short Hills in Essex County, the first of 36 he’s owned. When he came to the Bayshore area in 2004, he got involved in the business community and later became the president of what was then the Northern Monmouth Chamber of Commerce.
Today he lives in Hazlet and has a hamburger restaurant, Kazia Rae’s, named after his daughter, located in nearby Keansburg. He also serves as Keansburg’s economic community development coordinator, a role he has held since October 2016 and will continue to hold. He spoke about the businesses that have come to Keansburg during his tenure and the similar problems that community faces.
“Each one of these towns operate in a silo,” he said. “They all have the same problems, they all have the same restaurants, they all have the same opportunities. They just don’t know how to market themselves. And they don’t know how to work well in a sand- box. They try to prevent each other from succeeding.”
In outlining his first steps in the Highlands job, Moore said he wanted to talk to businesses and residents. He made no promises of overnight fixes and spoke of using the coming months before presenting a plan to the governing body on how to move forward.
“People don’t like change,” Mayor Rick O’Neil said. “And that’s going to be the big thing.”
Highlands, a borough of around 5,000 people, is a coastal community located along Sandy Hook and home to a ferry that goes to New York City. But like other communities along the Jersey Shore, Super Storm Sandy wreaked havoc here in 2012 and the town is still recovering.
“Not as many businesses left as you might think after getting ruined,” O’Neil said. “A lot of people left. But I think at the time when it happened, we had a large transient population. There was a lot of rentals going on. Now there’s not so many. The housing stock, since Sandy, has increased vastly.”
Local government is investing in its infrastructure to help remediate the local flooding problem, a concern the town hears from the business community.
“You need businesses, you need services in towns like this,” Moore said. “But you also need the population that can support that. So it’s a fine balance.”
The community has a nonprofit group, the Highlands Business Partnership, that aids local businesses and promotes the community. Through the year the organization, which is the management corporation for the borough’s business improvement district, will have special events like a clam festival and an Oktoberfest.
Jay Cosgrove, president of the Partnership, declined this week to comment on Moore’s hiring.
But O’Neil spoke of wanting to attract people to businesses in town year-round, not just when there are events happening.
Moore finds himself in the business of promoting economic development at a time when retail stores find themselves struggling against online competition.
“We don’t have much retail,” said borough administrator Kim Gonzales. “There’s not a grocery store in town. There’s not a place to buy produce.”
“We need things here,” she said.
To Moore, businesses need to partner with other businesses, for practices like using social media and advertising. He said small businesses face challenges from new regulations and competition against chain stores.
“I’m excited,” he said as he begins this job. “I want to take things that I’ve learned in the past and be able to apply it here.”
