Titles not clear on swap

"Mother" parcel to be transferred

By: Stephanie Brown
   MONROE — The township is awaiting title to the final parcel of land to be swapped with the county in the Thompson Park land trade.
   The township plans to trade that parcel and several others totaling about 171 acres to Middlesex County for 35 acres in Thompson Park, said Peg Schaffer, an attorney with Shain, Schaffer & Rafanello, the law firm of Township Attorney Joel Shain.
   Lafayette Knolls. Inc., will transfer title of a 3.83-acre parcel to the township after the developer settles a lien in the amount of $3 million, said Ms. Schaffer. She said Monday she expects the title to be transferred within the next week or two.
   Township Engineer Ernie Feist said the 3.8 acres was dedicated to Monroe as part of a subdivision of a larger 27.6-acre parcel owned by Lafayette on Spotswood-Englishtown Road. The Township Council passed an ordinance last month accepting the dedication.
   Ms. Schaffer said Lafayette Knolls owes a $3 million mortgage to Wachovia Bank on the 27.6-acre "mother" parcel. She said title transfer is subject to Lafayette getting a release of part of the mortgage, in which the 3.8 acres will be released from the mortgage. She said Lafayette would still owe $3 million on the remaining parcel.
   The Board of Education will use the parkland to build a 365,000-square-foot high school. Township voters approved an $82.9 million referendum in December 2003 for the high school.
   In January, the state granted conditional approval of the land swap, which calls for the Green Acres restrictions on the Thompson Park parcel to be lifted.
   As part of the executive order, the state Department of Environmental must first review the deeds and environmental surveys of each parcel.
   Ms. Schaffer said she sent all the required documents — with the exception of the Lafayette Knolls parcel title — to the DEP on Oct. 13. Ms. Schaffer said she explained to the DEP that the title transfer was a "technical detail" and would be resolved shortly.
   The Rutgers Environmental Law Clinic, on behalf of the New Jersey Conservation Foundation, New Jersey Public Interest Research Group and local group Park Savers, have appealed the Statehouse Commission’s decision to approve the swap.
   Richard Webster, the attorney for the appellants, said Monday that he is awaiting documentation that several other parcels have be cleared of liens.
   In a letter to David Smith, Bureau Chief of Legal Services and Stewardship for the Green Acres Program, dated Nov. 14, Mr. Webster suggests that the DEP receive a clear summary of each title’s status from Monroe, including any encumbrances.
   "Although the status of all titles is not yet clear to me, what is currently clear is that the Township does not currently have clean title to all of the proposed exchange properties," Mr. Webster wrote in the letter. "Therefore, even if the Environmental Impact Statement submitted on October 13, 2006 met the requirements of the Executive Order 215, which it does not, the land exchange could not proceed."