Housing mandate upheld by judge
Towns face deadline on plan for affordable units
By: William Westhoven
Morristown Daily Record
USA today Network - New Jersey
..... A judge in Mercer County has rejected a second attempt by more than two dozen New Jersey towns to pause implementation of the state's affordable housing mandate, leaving municipalities to face a deadline this week [01/31/2025] over how many units they need to build.
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With the ruling by state Superior Court Judge Robert Lougy, released on Monday, [01/27/2025] the state's 564 municipalities have until Friday [01/31/2025] to either accept housing obligation numbers released in October [2024] by the Department of Community Affairs or present alternative calculations, which must be consistent with a new state law passed last year. [2024] the towns then face a June 30 [2025] deadline to adopt specific plans for how to address that number.
..... The department's calculation estimate that municipalities, many of then in North Jersey, need to allow for the construction of 85,000 more units over the next decade, along with the renovation of 65,000 existing residences, to meet their "fair share" of affordable housing. But about 25 communities in Bergen, Moria and Essex counties and elsewhere have sued, arguing the process fuels over development and strips them of local authority.
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On January 2, [2025] Lougy rejected the towns' request to freeze the law while the litigation works its way through the courts. On Thursday, [01/23/2025] he turned aside a second bid.
..... "Plaintiffs have failed at every turn to get injunctive relief on the claims properly plaintiffs seek again brush there deficiencies aside as mere 'procedural frustrations,' that is not the way litigation works."
..... A series of landmark New Jersey court decisions known ad the Mount Laurel doctrine requires municipalities to provide housing for low- and moderate-income families. Governor Phil Murphy and state legislators enshrined that goal in a law adopted last year, [2024] over the objections of towns that blame the doctrine for over-development.
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The towns challenging the implementation of that law say the formula sued by the Community Affairs Department is flawed and that residential constitution already underway is straining their infrastructures and damaging the character of their towns.
..... In most cases, that new construction consists mostly of market-rate units built by developers who gain court favor for their projects by agreeing to sell or rent a small portion of their inventory at rates considered "affordable: by the state.
..... Adam Gordon, executive director of the nonprofit Fair Share Housing Center, which has successfully opposed the lawsuit, said the plaintiffs represent "a small group of wealthy towns" that are expending :tremendous amounts of taxpayer dollars attempting to block the affordable homes New Jerseyans desperately need."
..... More than 200 towns, he said in a release citing Lougy's decision, have already field to participate in the process using the department's figures.
..... Far more municipalities, many of which supported the new law's passage, are moving forward with creating homes under the new law, Gordon wrote.
..... Efforts to reach the plaintiffs were not immediately successful Monday. [01/27/2025] the municipalities that sued, collectively as the Lola Leaders for Responsible Planning, said this month [01/2025] that they planned to appeal Lougy's earlier denial and take additional legal steps to challenge the "unconstitutional and unfair" housing requirements, which they called "an unprecedented grant of power that not even the Legislature was willing to give."