Proms have been cancelled.
While high schoolers will miss the big party, fancy dresses and tuxedos, for some students, the real party takes place after the prom with a weekend-long house rental or stay in a hotel with a big group of friends.
That was the plan for students from Lacey Township High School and Toms River North High School before the coronavirus shutdown.
Dozens of students from Lacey made reservations at the Twilight Motel in Wildwood for the weekend of June 5. Nearly 100 students from Toms River North made a similar reservation for the weekend of May 29, according to parents from the two schools.
But when the pandemic canceled the proms, many of the kids and their parents wanted a refund from the motel.
From Lacey, 68 students made reservations for $150 each, said Robert Lawrence, the father of one of the students.
“The confirmed total was $10,200,” he said, noting he was still surveying other parents.
Michelle Rosenthal, the mom of one of the Toms River students, put the cost at $14,550 for her school’s 97 students.
Both parents said the motel’s owner, Kathleen Mangini, refused to give refunds but instead offered the students a new but unspecific date in the future.
Mangini says she has been accommodating and the virus isn’t her fault.
“I gave them prime season. Do you know how many dollars I have lost?” she asked. “The point is I’m making the ultimate sacrifice here.”
The parents disagree, and now it’s a dispute that crosses town and county lines and has the two sides telling conflicting stories.
MAKING THE RESERVATIONS
Lawrence, the Lacey Township parent, said students started making reservations in January.
“The Twilight Motel owner started taking ‘cash only’ deposits for the full amount of the stay — a definite red flag for any adult,” Lawrence said, noting the students, not parents, handled the payments.
Most of the students were 16 or 17 years old at the time the reservations were made, he said.
“Most students received small pieces of paper for their deposits with no dates of stay, just an amount collected and a room number,” he said, adding that none of the parents or students he spoke to signed a contract. “No parent signed off on this procedure with a signature to my knowledge.”
He noted online listings for the motel say guests under age 21 “can only check in with a parent or official guardian.”
When Gov. Phil Murphy shut down the state, the students took a wait-and-see approach, he said. But when the governor announced school would stay closed for the rest of the academic year, students started to ask for refunds.
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“She refused, saying she spent all the money on her Mercedes payments — yes, she actually typed this as a response to a parent — refurbishments and a new hotel office, among other things, and stated there is no money left for refunds,” Lawrence said. He shared with NJ Advance Media text messages that support his claims.
Lawrence said when he contacted Mangini on May 8, she “accused me of being selfish and heartless.”
Later that day, Lawrence said, Mangini told him she was working on a plan to split the students into two groups to come down on future dates, depending on the governor’s guidelines.
A few days later, Lawrence said, Mangini left him a voicemail saying she had offered the kids a June 29 date while others received a July 1 assignment.
“The only problem is she hadn't contacted most or all of the kids,” Lawrence said. “Most of the kids and parents just want a refund now.”
Lawrence said during a May 11 phone call that he recorded, Mangini said a refund wasn’t part of the contract, although Lawrence says there was no contract.
The students and parents from Toms River North shared a similar story.
Michelle Rosenthal, a Toms River parent, said their first contact about a refund was on April 26.
“The owner denied a refund stating that `she spent the money already,’” she said, noting they also sent a refund request in writing.
She said none of the parents and students she spoke to said they have a contract.
“A number of the receipts have 17-year-olds as the recipient,” she said. “How is it legally possible for them to enter into a contract if they are minors? How did she allow this if her motel policy is that a parent/guardian must be there to check in if the person is under 21? No parents were going.”
Rosenthal said she realizes the motel is in a bad situation because of the virus and it’s no one’s fault that this is happening, but she believes the students are due a refund.
She said the future is too unknown to book another date.
WHAT THE LAW SAYS
Businesses across the country are suffering, trying to figure how they can open under modified shutdown rules.
That’s clear on the Jersey Shore as much as anywhere. Most Shore businesses — motels, restaurants, amusement parks and more — make most of their annual income during the summer.
While Gov. Murphy is allowing a modified opening for beaches on May 22, exactly how people can socially distance is still in question.
Any delay in opening could be devastating to Shore businesses.
That includes prom weekend outings attended by seniors, many of whom are still minors. Some establishment require a parent to cosign or otherwise take responsibility for the students.
The age of majority in New Jersey is 18, said Andrew Berns, chair of the commercial litigation and employment department at Einhorn, Barbarito, Frost & Botwinick in Denville.
He said there are some exceptions to minors entering into a contract, such as for medical care, food and housing. But other contracts with minors, he said, would usually be unenforceable, he said.
“A minor can also repudiate a contract he or she entered into before turning 18,” he said.
“It is nice to offer the kids other weekends but if it is not workable for the group or even if it is acceptable for some of the kids and parents, if someone cannot or does not want to participate, they should be offered a refund, even if they have to wait for the payment,” Berns said.
NJ Advance Media showed Berns the receipts the students received when they made the reservations, and Berns said they are “unlikely to be construed as contracts.”
A BUSINESS PERSPECTIVE
When reached about the dispute, Twilight Motel owner Kathleen Mangini she was offering alternative dates to the groups but she also cited a contract that she refused to provide.
The parents told NJ Advance Media the students only had receipts, not contracts.
Mangini later said in a text: “I actually don’t have a contract with them… Mostly with them it’s a verbal contract that is in line with the written contracts I’ve had with other groups.”
Mangini said her business, and others in the town, are in grave financial need.
“This is Wildwood. Here we don’t get stimulus packages. We are seasonal. We don’t qualify for stimulus or bailouts or nothing,” she said.
She confirmed the money she collected from the students was already spent on “winter bills.”
Mangini said her cash flow is hurting because spring is the time when she usually takes reservations for the summer and fall, but “the phone stopped ringing” after the coronavirus outbreak.
She said she’s trying to make it right and that families are trashing her business on social media and on sites like Yelp! and Trip Advisor. An examination of those sites found reviews — dating before the pandemic — in which some consumers complained Mangini would yell at customers and more.
“They’re actually coming. They have a date,” she said.
Of the Lacey students, “Out of 81 kids I have 69 kids coming and there are three other rooms that told me 99% they are coming,” she said.
"I was told to give Toms River a few days," she said, noting she will contact them on Monday.
The parents disputed that, reporting that Mangini had previously been unclear about dates but an hour after Mangini talked to a reporter, parents started getting texts with assigned dates.
They also disputed the numbers.
Lawrence, of the Lacey group, said he tallied the responses of the Lacey students and parents: 12 said they would take a new date but not one dictated by the owner; 12 said they were undecided; 12 hadn’t responded yet; 32 said they wanted a refund and none said they had given the motel a firm yes. He said rooms for the June 29 replacement date normally go for $99 online, so the owner would “still be making out by charging my group $300 a night for the same room.”
Of the Toms River North group, Rosenthal said some students reported Twilight set a new date for June 13 without asking if the students were available.
“I have not had any parents saying their seniors are going,” Rosenthal said. “Parents I have spoken with do not want their seniors going during this time with the COVID-19 restrictions in place and kids not being able to hang together.”
So what happens next? It’s a scene we will see all across the Jersey shore.
How many residents — and their children — will be ready to hit the boardwalks and beaches?
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Karin Price Mueller may be reached at bamboozled@njadvancemedia.com.
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