Neighbors: Redevelopment designation could lead
to eminent domain
BY ELAINE VAN DEVELDE
Staff Writer
TINTON FALLS — On the subject of the slated redevelopment of the long-blighted former federal Communications Electronics Command (CECOM) site, what officials see as giving to the community, one family views as a threat to taking away rights and adjacent property.
The Borough Council unanimously adopted a resolution Oct. 5 accepting the Planning Board’s recommendation to declare the 39-acre Tinton Avenue tract on which CECOM sits “an area in need of redevelopment.”
Most residents who have voiced an opinion on the slated redevelopment are in favor of it, citing the strain on municipal services and a waste of a potential tax ratable.
But representatives of one family who has lived near the tract for 60 years staunchly object to the designation and its implications.
They are Harris and Nancy Newman who say they represent the Newman family of 135 Wayside Road, near CECOM.
The Newmans presented the council with an eight-page document read into the record stating their objections and citing alleged inconsistencies with Tinton Falls’ approach to redevelopment and that which is on the books as law.
For one, “oral objections must be received and considered and made part of the public record,” the document said.
They have been, and there just really are virtually none, protested Council President Jerome Donlon in a separate interview.
“I allowed Ms. Newman to read the lengthy correspondence in the interest of letting her air her family’s differences. It extended well past the time normally allotted for public input. But that’s OK, her comments were duly noted. The truth is, that this issue has long been aired by the governing body, in public notices, at meetings and in the press. Most people have expressed that they want to see something done in the way of redeveloping and improving the CECOM site. That is what we have been trying to do — take into account those wishes.”
The site of the 373,000-square-foot CECOM building which used to house thousands of U.S. Army employees, has not been viable for close to 10 years.
It was sold to Abraham Leser, Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1997 for $14.75 million. When Leser’s plans to revamp the building into an office complex and lease it failed because of the condition of the building, officials looked for another development option for the site.
The new master plan of last year recommended active-adult housing for the site as a less invasive use, and to meet the need for more adult housing.
The council decided the best way to accelerate development prospects was by declaring the area in need of redevelopment.
The designation, according to the state Redevelopment Act, opens the property up to more state and federal funding to subsidize the redevelopment. But it also paves the way for the town to condemn, or take by power of eminent domain, property for the “greater good of the public.”
With their family’s property so close to the site, this is one thing the Newmans say they fear, not only for themselves but for others as well.
Ultimately, the Newmans say they fear “the worst-case scenario, which is an unfortunate reality of a failed redevelopment process, [is] the property in question has the risk of being frozen in litigation for a considerable period of time.”
But “we have no intention or need to use eminent domain,” Donlon said. “Even if we were to, which we are not, the only property affected by the redevelopment is the CECOM site — period. Nothing else at all outside of that.”
And there are other concerns the Newmans have, which Donlon and other officials have said do not apply.
The PRC Group LLC, of West Long Branch, has expressed an interest in developing the site, in partnership with Leser, into an active-adult gated community of 160 detached upscale homes for people 55 and over with no children. They have presented no solid plans. Such a development, officials said, could bring in close to $3 million a year in taxes.
The borough has drafted a zoning ordinance to zone for that use as an “active-adult redevelopment zone,” which Donlon says is consistent with the master plan recommendation.
The Newmans say, in their document, that it is consistent with one developer’s wishes since the redevelopment designation “empowers the municipality of Tinton Falls to lend or donate money to make grants or subsidies to any redevelopment entity.”
And giving Leser “the right to develop this property with the financial incentives provided under the umbrella of redevelopment has the potential to enable Leser to exit his investment in the CECOM property profitably at the expense of Tinton Falls taxpayers,” the Newmans’ statement contends.
If the town is not going to afford Leser these benefits, then “why undertake the process of redevelopment?” they asked.
Because the area simply qualifies as one in need of redevelopment, Donlon said, “it clearly meets the criteria to make the designation and people have clearly expressed that they want something done with the area in the interest of making it viable for the community.”