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BY MICHAEL OLOHAN
OF PASCACK PRESS
Trenton, New Jersey—Call it an obligation, call it overdue, or call it a headache: affordable housing units and other developments are taking shape in Montvale, Park Ridge, Woodcliff Lake and statewide—under a controversial judicial interpretation of the New Jersey State Constitution that requires municipalities to provide a “fair share” of housing affordable for low and moderate income households.
At a statehouse hearing on July 25, Montvale Mayor Michael Ghassali and Park Ridge Mayor Keith Misciagna testified against the current system requiring high-density, multi-family developments to satisfy court-mandated settlements that often dramatically impact local communities.
Ghassali and Misciagna both addressed the state Assembly Housing and Community Development Committee, which is chaired by Assemblyman Benjie Wimberly (D-35) and will hold three more hearings on affordable housing issues.
At the hearing, Misciagna and Ghassali both came under fire from a Fair Share Housing Center representative who alleged some suburban towns use zoning to exclude people with disabilities as well as Latinos and African Americans.
Kevin Walsh, an attorney with Fair Share Housing Center, pointed out the demographics of towns whose mayors testified, noting all had low percentages of African American residents.
Walsh cited the towns by name: Far Hills, Montvale, Colts Neck, Bernards Township and Park Ridge. Both Republican state Assemblyman Jon Bramnick and state Assemblywoman Holly Schepisi objected to Walsh’s mention of race as a factor affecting affordable housing.
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Race ‘has nothing to do with it’
Reached July 26, Ghassali said race “has nothing to do with” affordable housing and stressed Montvale is a diverse community with residents from 44 countries and 22 languages in a four-square-mile borough. Ghassali said he suggested a committee of mayors, including him, be formed to provide input to the Assembly committee.
“We [mayors] were trying to find a way to work together,” said Ghassali. He said he favored providing funding to urban areas to help them rehabilitate housing, embodied in a legislative proposal reintroducing the concept of regional contribution agreements. The Legislature discontinued the use of regional agreements in 2008.
“It’s no secret that many towns in the state have low high school graduation rate, higher crime and high unemployment rates. And there are towns in the state that are really good at keeping crime low, lower unemployment rate and higher standard school system,” Ghassali said in Trenton July 25. “Rather than doubling the size of some towns, like Montvale, and moving families around from different part of the state to accommodate the affordable housing act, we can work to help the towns in need of help and keep families where they are, close to their community, houses of worship, friends, and schools.”
At the hearing, Misciagna spoke against high-density housing in Park Ridge.
“A developer came in with one of those projects. They asked for a density much more than we’re comfortable with. Park Ridge has 9,000 residents with 3,500 doors,” Misciagna testified.
“They said give us roughly 1,000 units and if you don’t we’ll go to a judge and ask for 2,000 units. And we’re going to build affordable—that’s not what this affordable process was meant to do. It’s not meant to hold a gun to our heads,” he said.
In a statement addressing affordable housing impacts released July 25, Schepisi said the state Legislature should address the issue and that affordability is the issue, not forcing more high-density housing to be built across the state. She said high-density housing planned statewide would require a 30 percent population increase. “This demand is a fantasy,” she writes.
“Neighborhoods defined by boarded-up homes should be the target of our redevelopment. In fact, the state is flush with vacant homes—nearly three times more than the national average. Yet, much of those foreclosed homes are in urban areas that are exempt from affordable housing requirements.”
“These boarded-up neighborhoods directly affect the livelihood of those who are left. Poor housing quality and residential instability are the top two indicators of emotional and behavioral problems for low-income children. When houses remain in foreclosure, the entire neighborhood suffers from the blight,” writes Schepisi.
‘Revitalize communities’
“We should revitalize these communities for low-income families and millennials who need easy access to public transportation and jobs. Building on every last parcel of open space is not the way,” she added.
Walsh later noted that since the state Supreme Court’s Mount Laurel decision in 1975, approximately 80,000 units of affordable housing have been built statewide.
At the Assembly hearing, some suggested reforms included: reinvigorating the Council on Affordable Housing; restarting the use of “regional contribution agreements” allowing municipalities to pay another community in their region to build affordable housing; ending “builder’s remedy” lawsuits, a process created by New Jersey’s Supreme Court for a builder to sue a municipality who has not met its affordable housing obligation.
Other suggestions included: increase the ratio of affordable units that must be built along with “market-rate” units to 30 percent (from 20 percent) to reduce the number of total units to be built; and implement a moratorium on affordable housing obligations until the Legislature develops new rules.
Committee hearings are scheduled for Kean University in September; Camden County College in October, and in the Passaic-Bergen county area in November or December, a Wimberly spokesperson said.
Here’s where things stand in all three communities:
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Mercedes-Benz site a prize in Montvale
In Montvale, developer S. Hekemian Group has proposed construction of more than 300 units at the former Mercedes-Benz site, at 1 and 3 Mercedes Dr., as part of a mixed-use planned development.
The units are proposed as helping the borough meet its affordable housing obligations under its third-round settlement, approved in January.
That agreement approves 615 new homes in Montvale, which includes 106 for low- and moderate-income families.
In addition, Planning Board hearings on development of the former A&P property—another part of Montvale’s affordable housing settlement—would place 80 townhouse-style homes on the 13-acre site, Mayor Michael Ghassali said July 18.
Officials note both developments, along with the overall impacts from 600-plus housing units, will have major impacts on the borough, including increased enrollments in local schools and at the regional high school.
The S. Hekemian Group, as SHG Montvale, sought preliminary site plan approval July 9 for components of its proposal, including a 40,500-square-foot, four-story mixed-use office building, including 11,500 square feet for retail, site-related and access roads from Mercedes Drive and Grand Avenue, parking for up to 504 vehicles, and other site improvements.
The project’s proposed second phase includes a pharmacy and hotel and conference rooms.
As the housing units come on line, the borough anticipates pulling in up to $4.5 million in new tax revenues to help defray costs incurred in extending municipal services and accommodating additional students.
Ghassali said the borough is likely to use a proposed feasibility study on joint withdrawal from the Pascack Valley Regional High School District, with Woodcliff Lake, to explore potential fiscal and educational ramifications on Montvale from the new affordable-housing mandated developments.
He said the new developments on Mercedes Drive should reduce traffic, as opposed to the previous corporate parks.
The development is adjacent to the Shoppes at DePiero’s Farm, which Wegmans anchors.
Following the affordable housing settlement, Ghassali informed residents that a school committee had been formed “to plan ahead the infrastructure needed and to maintain the high level standards our schools are known for.”
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Park Ridge fights
Meanwhile, under one of the largest developments being contested as part of affordable housing litigation, Park Ridge has consistently opposed Hornrock Properties’ efforts to develop the former Sony property, with Hornrock twice slapping the borough with builder’s remedy lawsuits.
Hornrock has proposed building 700 to 900 units on the 30.25-acre former Sony site.
Park Ridge’s affordable housing plan, submitted to Superior Court March 21, awaits a required fairness hearing.
In its affordable housing plan, Park Ridge states of 209.9 acres of vacant land in the borough. Only 3.86 acres qualify as potentially developable due to the presence of environmentally sensitive features or lot sizes too small to accommodate inclusionary development.
Although it includes the Sony property in its vacant land adjustment calculations, it only calculates the site as possibly yielding 45 “realistic development potential” units based on a presumptive density of 12 dwelling units per acre, and a 20-percent set-aside.
Special counsel Scott Reynolds said in March that the affordable housing plan may wind up back in court if any of the four intervenors, including Hornrock and the Fair Share Housing Center, challenge the plan or methodology used in the plan.
In May, the governing body approved a budget including a $320,000 line item for a special counsel hired last year to fight Hornock’s efforts to build large-scale multifamily housing in town.
That amount equaled about half of the budget’s 4.8 percent increase in 2018 property taxes. The 4.8 percent increase costs an average taxpayer $68 a year.
Mayor Keith Misciagna said then he was committed to fighting high-density development and would “defend our town from overdevelopment.”
Misciagna said July 19 that affordable housing should be sited near the railroad and Kinderkamack corridor, not on the former Sony property.
He said negotiations between Superior Court Judge Gregg Padovano, Hornrock, the Fair Share Housing Center, and Reynolds are ongoing.
Sixteen units might go up in Woodcliff Lake
Pascack Press reported July 23 that 16 affordable housing units might soon rise in Woodcliff Lake in now-vacant lots along Broadway and Highview Avenue as one of two locations recently approved as areas the Planning Board and Borough Council say need redevelopment.
By building the 16 units of affordable housing on North Broadway, Woodcliff Lake Borough Administrator Tomas Padilla said the borough avoids having to permit 80 units of inclusionary multi-family housing elsewhere in the borough.
Residents at the Planning Board meeting expressed doubts about the new units and a restaurant proposed, but Mayor Carlos Rendo said the new development would improve the area.
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