6 events in Passaic County with a date

Affordable housing law spurs building

NJ towns, developers rush for deal approvals

By: William Wsthoven
Morristown Daily Record
USA Today Network - New Jersey

..... The residential building boom transforming New Jersey's landscape is set to accelerate into the new year [2026] - and likely into the next decade - after many towns scramble to approve deals with developers in the waning days of 2025.
..... Across New Jersey, from Teaneck to Mahwah and Parsippany, in Paramus and Hawthorne, at the Jersey Shore and elsewhere, municipalities engaged in down-to-the-wire legal fights and negotiations to resolve disputes with builders and housing advocates.
..... The catalyst was a December 31 [2025] deadline in a state law that mandates each town provide its "fair share" of affordable housing, as determined by a formula devised in Trenton. The landmark 2024 law could spur the construction of tens of thousandth of new units over the next decade for low- and moderate-income resident - but often alongside huge additional of market-rate housing, which developers say is necessary to make the projects viable.
..... "We didn't want this," Parsippany council President Paul Carifi Jr. said at a December 16 [2025] meeting where the Morris County town approved the near-doubling of an existing 600-unit project to help meet its affordable-housing quota.
..... "This is the state cramming this down our throat," he said. "If we don't approve this, [on] December 31 [2025] it's over. It's going back to the courts."
..... Housing advocates, led by the nonprofit Fair Share Housing Center in Mount Laurel, see things differently. They say the process is helping New Jersey address what most agree is a crisis in affordability in the housing market. Another nonprofit, the National Low Income Housing Coalition, has estimated that the state faces a shortage of about 205,000 housing units attainable for low-income residents.
..... "This law has transformed the affordable housing landscape in New Jersey, with hundreds of municipalities now actively planning to cerate homes they long resisted,: said Adam Gordon, executive director of the Fair Share Housing Center. "Mayors and councils are buying in because affordable housing strengthens local economies - and because the law gives towns wide latitude to design solutions that work for their communities."
..... Communities had until year's end [12/31/2025] to settle challenges or explain to a court why they needed more time. The law also sets a March 15 [2026] deadline for towns to adopt their housing plans and adjust local zoning as needed.
..... The push-back continues nonetheless from suburban communities, many in North Jersey, who say they are being forced to accept over development and increased burdens on local school systems, roads and municipal services.
..... Local Leaders For Responsible Planning, a 29-town coalition what has challenged the housing law, announced that a federal judge has agreed to hold a hearing on January 7 [2026] consider its arguments. It's a new venue for the group, whose lawsuit was rejected twice in state court last year. [2025]
..... "I look froward to testifying about the harm caused by the state's upcoming arbitrary deadline to implement high-density housing in my community,: said Montvale Mayor Mike Ghassali, whose Bergen County town is a member of the coalition.
..... As the legal fight drags on, many municipal governing bodies worked into the last week of December [2025[] to approve the proposed projects they needed to complete affordable housing plans. Some of those deals included tax breaks known as PILOTs, or payment tin lieu of taxes, as incentives for building willing to reserve a portion of their units as affordable.
..... Franklin Lakes, Ridgewood, Saddle River and Denville were among the other North Jersey towns to OK development plans by the deadline. As of December 29, [2025] Demarest was awaiting a judge's ruling on a complaint brought by a developer seeking to have his project included in the brought plan. The proposal seeks to raze the 19th century home of the town's founder to make space for 10 town-home units, two of which would be designated as affordable.

'Fair share' or 'high density?'

..... The system traces back half a century to the state Supreme Court's Mount Laurel decision. the 1975 ruling outlawed "exclusionary zoning" that the court said was designed to keep the poor and minorities out of some towns. The Mount Laurel ruling, expanded in subsequent cases, directed municipalities to change local laws to allow for the constitution of their "fair share" of affordable units.
..... The state eventually cerated a Council of Affordable Housing to enforce that doctrine. But after 15 years of non-enforcement, the Supreme Court again weighed in 2015 and shifted oversight tot eh courts. It allowed "builder's remedy" lawsuits that could compel towns to accommodate projects as long as they offered a minority of the units - often as little as 20% - at below market rates.
..... A further evolution came in 2024 when state lawmakers passed a law to codify and steam-line that process, laying out deadlines for local governments. Towns that comply gain immunity form builders' remedy suits.
..... "We face a somewhat perfect storm o flow housing inventory and escalating pricing, which leaves thousands of working families all across our state with no viable options," sate Senator Troy Singleton, a Burlington County Democrat ans sponsor of the legislation, said at the time. "Without securing the most basic human needs - a place to live -the other policies we press cannot be as effective."
..... But crises like Ghassali and Parsippany Mayor James Barberio have railed at the big housing complexes they say the have to approve to satisfy the state mandate.
.... "High-density housing may seem like a solution, but it raises serious concerns about our infrastructure and budget," Barberio said at a 2024 meeting of mayors that blast the state's housing rules. "It seems like the state wants us to sacrifice quality for quantity."
..... In July, [2025] Hawthorne councilman Michael Sciarra said he was "disgusted" about having no better alternative than to endorse a plan designating two sites for construction of 111 new units, including 23 affordable.
..... "Does anyone ever get the feeling down you're getting something shoved down your throat?" he asked his colleagues. "Well. that;s this going on right now. I can't tell you how sick I am that we have to digest this, and take the bitter pill, because it's the lesser of two evils."

Tax breaks for developed

..... His ire was still evident on December 22, [2025] when the Hawthorne council met again to approve a final deal with one of those developers.
..... "Too often, the state checks boxes by meeting quotas," Sciarra said. "Developers make money, and municipalities are left to deal with long-term consequences."
..... In some cases, like in Parsippany, existing projects already under construction were later awarded PILOT tax breaks after developers said they needed additional finical help amid soaring construction costs.
..... The PARQ site in Parsippany, a prominent project at the crossroads of interstates 80 and 287, was originally slated for 600 apartments and townhouses and has already opened its first 275-init phase. But the town agreed to sweeten the deal when the developer agreed to expand its project to 1,100 units, helping the municipality complete its affordable housing plan by the year-end [2025] deadline.
..... Of those, 120 units would be classified as affordable, while the rest will sell for market rate. Those 120 units, and 80 "credit points" earned for building on redeveloped property, would fulfill the town's latest obligations.

Pursuit of PLOTs

..... Next door to Parsippany, Denville also passed a PILOT incentive in December [2025] for an existing 60-unit project. In a resolution, the Township council said it needed "to improve the feasibility of the redevelopment operation, and maintenance of the project."
.... The construction along R Route 53 is one of several efforts tied to Denville's affordable housing goal. A court-appointed special master warned that failing to move forward with the Station Village project could result in a judge stepping in or imposing stricter requirements, Township Attorney Fred Semrau said at a December 2 [2025] council meeting. Of the 60 units, nine would be st aside as affordable. Semrau said the project was approved without a PILOT in 2020, and he acknowledged that granting one after construction has already begun was unusual. but the legal risk could not be ignored, he said.
..... "As [the developer] started to complete construction, they started really pressing: 'Well, where's the PILOT?'" Semrau said. "Our opinion was too late - you started construction. So with that, they got the special master involved."
..... The special master, he said, indicated the town was required to assist the developer in completing the project since it was part of the housing plan.

Some towns 'are buying in'

..... Not every town that sweated out the year-end [12/31/2025] deadline was critical of the mandate. Around New Jersey, hundreds have cooperated, noted the Fair Share Housing Center. The nonprofit was a party in numinous challenges around the state where it pushed towns to meet Mount Laurel requirements.
..... Gorden, the center's executive director, was recently appointed to Governor-Elect Mikie Sherrill's transition team. He criticize the latest efforts by municipalities seeking relief in court.
..... "This small group of wealthy towns have filed lawsuit after lawsuit trying to block the affordable homes New Jerseyans desperately need - and they have lost at every stage, including several state court decisions emphatically rejecting the lawsuit's claims," he said in a statement. "We're confident the federal court will once again reject these efforts and uphold a law that is already working."

Which communities are suing?

..... Municipalities in the Local Leaders For Responsible Planning lawsuit include:
* Bergen County: Allendale, Closter, Franklin Lakes, Hillsdale, Montvale, Norwood, Old Tappan, Oradell, Washington Township, Westwood and Wyckoff.
* Morris County: Denville, East Hanover, Florham Park, Hanover, Mendham, Montville, Parsippany-Troy Hills and Wharton
* Essex County: Ceder Grove, Millburn and West Caldwell.
* Hunterdon County: West Amwell.
* Monmouth County: Wall and Holmdel.
* Passaic County: Little Falls and Totowa.
* Salem County: Mannington.
* Somerset County: Warren.

..... Staff Writers Marsha Stolz, Philip DeVencentis and Stephanie Noda contributed to this article.

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