HIGHTSTOWN: Boro eyes ‘more realistic’ housing numbers

By Matt Chiappardi, Staff Writer
   HIGHTSTOWN — State housing projections, and thus Council on Affordable Housing requirements, for the borough during the next decade are “irrational,” says Borough Planner Tamara Lee.
   And the Planning Board agrees, solidifying that sentiment by voting 9-0 Monday to introduce a draft of revisions Ms. Lee made to the borough’s Master Plan and setting a public hearing on those changes for its next meeting, Dec. 8.
   The revisions counter the state Department of Community Affairs projections for both housing and jobs created through 2018.
   According to Ms. Lee, the DCA expects housing in the borough to increase by more than 60 units through 2018, and for jobs to increase by more than 700 in the same period.
   ”More realistic projections,” she said, would be an increase of two housing units and six jobs annually in the borough for a total of about 20 new units and about 60 new jobs through 2018.
   New COAH rules adopted earlier this year require municipalities to build one affordable housing unit per every five market-value units. They also require one affordable unit per every 16 jobs created.
   A municipality’s COAH obligation is determined by the DCA projections, and communities are obliged to make their COAH plans based on the state’s data. However, municipalities may have their obligations altered over time based on actual data about housing and job growth, DCA spokesman Chris Donnelly said.
   Municipalities are not compelled to provide affordable housing, but satisfying COAH requirements protects them from lawsuits predicated by the Fair Housing Act of 1985.
   ”We need to make it clear that this is not one of those elitist exclusionary communities full of McMansions,” Ms. Lee said.
   Planning Board members reacted to the DCA projections with some surprise and exasperation.
   ”Have they even been to Hightstown?” said board member Nancy Walker Laudenberger referring to COAH officials.
   In order for the DCA to consider the borough’s proposed revisions, they must be submitted to the state by Dec. 31, Ms. Lee said. That doesn’t give the borough much time to push the revisions through required procedures such as holding the public hearing and having the revisions ultimately approved by the Borough Council.
   However, if those conditions are not met by the end of the year, Ms. Lee suggested sending the revisions anyway.
   ”It would show we did our due diligence,” she said.
   If the borough does make an incomplete submission by the deadline, they would have 45 days to complete it, Ms. Lee said.
   In the meantime, she suggested inviting COAH Executive Director Lucy Vandenberg to the borough, to show her the conditions firsthand and plead the borough’s case.
   Mr. Donnelle said COAH officials would welcome a meeting with officials from the borough.
   ”We realize that towns may have more accurate data locally. If they can come to us and back up what they’re saying with local data, we can certainly work with them,” he said.