New Housing Bill will create sprawl

From the Press of Atlantic City, 6/15/2010, Jeff Tittel, Guest Columnist

The Sierra Club supports the elimination of the Council on Affordable Housing, but S1, which just passed the Senate, could make the situation worse. It's open season on more than half of New Jersey's municipalities with a bill that gives power to developers to determine how towns will meet their affordable-housing obligations.

The Sierra Club finds this bill outrageous. It unfairly targets rural and environmentally sensitive towns. It includes no environmental criteria and puts our natural resources at risk. The bill exempts growing, suburban towns from affordable-housing requirements, encouraging sprawl and overdevelopment.

The Sierra Club strongly supports affordable housing in New Jersey, but it should not be used as a tool to undermine environmental protections or promote growth in inappropriate places. Housing should be located where the jobs are, helping to prevent sprawl and pollution while providing people with economic opportunities. Affordable housing should not be used to promote development in rural and environmentally sensitive areas.

Under this bill Mullica Township and Dennis Township are among the inclusionary, non-exempt towns. This means that these rural towns will be required to build affordable housing. Towns in the Pinelands are targeted for development, while Atlantic City, Galloway Township and Hamilton Township are exempt. Growing, suburban communities and cities where development should be encouraged will not be subject to the requirement, while environmentally sensitive areas will be.

Inclusionary development, as designated by this bill, just needs to be in a sewer service area, regardless if there are actually sewers on the site or not. Many sewer service areas go back to the 1960s and may not even have sewer plants or sewer lines in them. This bill would allow sewers to be extended into environmentally sensitive areas, one project at a time. Some of the worst sprawl projects in New Jersey happened because of this type of situation.

Towns that comply with their affordable housing requirements should have legal shield, but this bill takes those rights away. This legislation gives all the power to the developers and allows them to take advantage of the "inherently beneficial" designation. Under this legislation, developers can go to the planning board for a D-variance to change zoning to much higher densities. If the planning board turns them down, developers would win in court because of the "inherently beneficial" designation. This applies to more than half the towns in the state, mostly those in rural and environmentally sensitive areas.

While the elimination of COAH is positive, this bill gives all the power to the developers. It's an employment act for developers' attorneys.

If one-third of the town is attached housing, including townhouse and condo developments, that town is not required to zone for affordable housing, while the towns that do not have attached housing will be required to. Former Gov. Jon Corzine's $3 million townhouse in Hoboken may be considered affordable under this bill since it is attached housing. Many growth communities that are fairly wealthy do not have to comply, but many rural areas that have a lot of single-family homes do.

S1 gives power to the developers and prevents good planning and appropriate development.

Jeff Tittel is director of the New Jersey Sierra Club.