By Joanne Degnan, Managing Editor
ROBBINSVILLE — The Township Council has set an Oct. 27 public hearing on an ordinance giving a five-year property tax abatement for commercial and industrial improvements in the proposed Matrix redevelopment zone on Route 539.
The council also will hold a public hearing that same night on the proposed adoption of the Southeast Industrial Area Redevelopment Plan for the same 176-acre Matrix property near the township’s border with Upper Freehold.
The mostly vacant land, located between Gordon Road and Interstate 195, is currently zoned Planned Commercial District where offices, warehouses, light manufacturing and flex-buildings are permitted. The proposed redevelopment plan, which was approved by the Planning Board on Sept. 28, expands principal permitted uses in the redevelopment zone to include solar farms and data processing centers.
Both ordinances were introduced at the Township Council’s Oct. 13 meeting. The pubic hearing and adoption vote will take place at 7 p.m. Oct. 27.
The proposed ordinance requires Matrix to make what’s known as payments in lieu of the full property taxes owed under a phased-in five-year schedule. There would be no payment in lieu of taxes required in the first year. In the second year, 20 percent of the property taxes otherwise due must be paid to the township, and by year five, 80 percent of the property taxes otherwise due must be paid to the township.
John Ruch, of Spring Garden Road, questioned the need for a five-year tax abatement, noting Matrix properties in the 434-acre warehouse district have “become a huge base” of Robbinsville’s commercial inventory in the past 16 years.
”I hope we’re not rushing to give away the farm with five-year tax abatements for something that has grown very quickly and very successfully,” Mr. Ruch said.
Councilman Rich Levesque emphasized the tax abatement only applied to the nine lots in the redevelopment plan, not the entire warehouse district.
Council President Christine Ciaccio and Township Administrator Tim McGough said the township was collecting very little tax revenue from these particular Matrix lots on Route 539 (Old York Road) in their undeveloped state because most of the parcels are assessed as farmland.
”The numbers that I was provided by the tax assessor are that we get about $200 a year now because it’s farmland,” Mr. McGough said. “We really do believe that the abatement is something we should do and will bring in a ratable.”
The township’s economic development coordinator, Mary Caffrey, said the abatement was needed because a costly environmental cleanup is required in one section of the redevelopment area, which has made the property difficult to market. The proposed five-year tax abatement program provides a way for the developer to mitigate the cost of the environmental cleanup, she said.
According to a report prepared in July by professional planner Christine Cofone, a 64-acre Matrix lot along Gordon and Old York roads near the Cliffwood Estates neighborhood in Upper Freehold is contaminated with arsenic, dieldrin and chlordane associated with pesticide use from farming in the 1940s. The cleanup of this parcel is estimated at $813,000, according to the report.
Two Matrix lots fronting Old York Road contain unoccupied homes and old farm outbuildings that would be razed under the redevelopment plan. The 1.29-acre property at 1624 Old York Road is assessed at $150,000. A 0.89-acre Matrix property at 1634 Old York Road has a dilapidated home and is assessed at $447. The Cofone report describes this particular structure as being unsafe and unsanitary with an “overwhelming putrid smell” inside.
Between the two Matrix-owed houses are privately owned land and homes at 1628, 1630 and 1632 Old York Road, which all are excluded from the Matrix redevelopment area.
