PRINCETON: Hospital site demolition expected soon

Developer, council reach agreement on hospital site

By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Developer AvalonBay said Monday it expects to begin demolishing the old Princeton hospital site some time after Labor Day, the next big step toward the company building a 280-unit residential development there.
The company this week secured a critical agreement with the Princeton Council that allows the project to proceed and ends a lawsuit between the two sides. AvalonBay was fighting the town in Superior Court about having to perform additional environmental soil testing, something that council made part of a developer’s agreement with the company back in April.
At a special meeting Monday, the council voted, 5-0, to approve an amendment to that agreement removing some of those requirements but mandating other steps that go beyond what AvalonBay is legally required. The agreement is the byproduct of court-ordered mediation both sides participated in this month.
In particular, five air monitors will be used during demolition; four inches of topsoil of grass areas on the property will removed, which can then be reused on the site in places where it cannot come in contact with people. A floor drain in an old incinerator room will be televised to determine if there are any breaks. Also, three feet of soil under the incinerator room will removed and reused on site.
Councilman Patrick Simon said from the dais that the agreement accomplishes "substantively" everything officials asked AvalonBay to do in April.
"I believe it is our obligation to protect the public safety," he said.
The town said it plans to have municipal staff on site monitoring work, including representatives from the engineering, health and building departments."We are eager and look forward to moving forward with the demolition of the hospital site with the protections that we are required to provide to both the immediate neighbors and the Princeton community at large," said AvalonBay senior vice president Ronald S. Ladell after attending the meeting.
Officials felt it was the best deal they could reach, given their tenuous legal standing. Municipal attorney Trishka W. Cecil told the council that the judge handling the AvalonBay lawsuit, Mary C. Jacobson, indicated last month there was a "very strong likelihood" that she would rule in AvalonBay’s favor.
The judge, Ms. Cecil continued, could find no legal authority to support what the town had done back in April.
Councilwoman Jo S. Butler, who participated in the mediation on behalf of the town, said officials had received email from residents urging them to continue the legal fight against AvalonBay.
"But if you’re really interested in public safety, you have to see that we needed to make a deal," she said. "We could not risk, given the information that we had from our attorneys, that we would likely lose this on appeal. We could not run the risk of jeopardizing public safety in that manner."
Ms. Cecil said AvalonBay had filed a summary judgment motion, a legal step to have Judge Jacobson resolve the case in its favor Sept. 6. Ms. Cecil also said AvalonBay had an incentive for wanting to settle. She said the company’s demolition contractor, Yanuzzi Wrecking & Recycling Corp., is nearing the end of the preliminary work it can do without demolition permits.
"AvalonBay has every incentive to keep the work going, so it needs demolition permits as soon as possible. That’s what’s driving AvalonBay to come to the table and agree to what it is agreeing to," Ms. Cecil said.
The meeting drew a crowd of residents who live in the area of the old hospital. Paul Driscoll, a plaintiff in a failed lawsuit to stop the AvalonBay project, urged council to delay a vote.
"I don’t understand the rush," he said.
But officials felt they could not wait. Ms. Butler said the mediator, Eric Max, was clear that "we needed to move expeditiously, that this was in our best interest."
Councilwoman Jenny Crumiller said she felt it would "irresponsible to risk losing those protections" contained in the agreement through "further delay." She felt the town got a "pretty good deal."
Mayor Liz Lempert and Councilwoman Heather H. Howard participated by phone in a council closed session that preceded the meeting.