Speaking Frankly

By Frank Hannan

High density mixed use low-income housing is Democrats’ plan

Last year in my column ‘The State of New Jersey Vs. The State of New Jersey = we lose’, I predicted that the state Council on Affordable Housing’s goals (COAH) would trump the mandates of the Highlands Act and result in high density mixed use low income housing being built in our town. Recent news coming out of Trenton, have brought that prediction closer to fruition.

At the June 11th West Milford Township Council meeting, Republican Council Candidate Dan Jurkovic brought the issue to the forefront and implored the mayor and council to be proactive and join with other municipalities to challenge the new COAH thresholds coming out of Trenton. Our neighbor, Ringwood has already contributed $500.00 to a legal fund created by the League of Municipalities to fight the new quotas.

Championing Governor Jon Corzine’s campaign promise to build over 100,000 low income housing units statewide in the next decade COAH did him one better by upping the total to 115,000 units. Municipalities covered by the Highlands Act are not exempt.

Back in 2004, along with tax relief for watershed host communities, exemption from COAH obligations was one of the veiled promises made by state politicians and environmentalist when selling the Highlands Act to local politicians and communities. The West Milford mayor and council, all of who at the time were Republicans, didn’t buy into the promises. Before supporting the Highlands Act, they wanted those assurances in writing. History has shown that they were right to do so.

Because the Highlands Regional Master Plan promotes high-density mixed-use low income housing, combined with the new COAH regulations, I predict that we will have more development in Highland’s towns like West Milford than before the Highlands Act was enacted. There was never a building boom in Passaic County Highlands’ municipalities. The Highlands Council’s own statistics showed that only 811 units were built between 1990 and 2000.

“ Based on actual growth, from 2004 through 2007, there is an affordable housing obligation of 3000 units in the Highlands region,” said Jennifer Monahan, COAH spokesman. The obligation grows when you figure in job growth. Locally we will get whacked for additional 4 units when the new Wallgreens building is done and occupied.
COAH does not give exemptions to what is essentially a tradeoff/redevelopment of the previous building.

Even though BI-partisan action was taken to try and stop Eagle Ridge and Valley Ridge, local Democrats have campaigned on the fact that ‘they stopped them’. (Just like the ‘vote for us and we will stop Wallgreens’ promise last election) As township council executive session agendas will attest, that is not true. Eagle Ridge is still alive and with these new COAH regulations and promotion by the Highlands Regional Master Plan both projects may eventually be mandated by the state with little or no input from the municipality. The big push will come when the real estate market turns around.

As state Democrats are pushing for us to build low income housing, Republicans like former Mayor of Wayne, Assemblyman Scott Rumana are fighting to prevent that from happening. He introduced Assembly Bill-2888, which will exempt municipalities that can prove they have less than 10% developable land, from future COAH obligations.

At a recent event for Congressman Scott Garrett, Dan Jurkovic and I talked with Rumana about the bill. At first we thought that it only pertained to built out communities like Wayne, but as Rumana explained the bill, he showed us that it also works for Highlands Preservation municipalities like West Milford. Even before the Highlands Act the estimate of unconstrained developable land in West Milford was about only 3.5%. With adoption of the Highlands Act that number is now much lower.

Jurkovic also spent time with Congressman Garrett and will be exploring some of the federal options presented by the Congressman to help us fight the COAH battle. He will be following up on those suggestions with Garrett’s legislative staff.

It is easy to see what party is fighting to keep us lean and green. It isn’t the party lead by Democrat Governor Jon Corzine. If he gets his way, all of New Jersey will look like his beloved hometown of Hoboken.

Reprinted With Permission (c)Aim West Milford