Zoning Board approves affordable home in city
Project to be part of low-income program for first-time homebuyers
BY CHRISTINE VARNO
Staff Writer

LONG BRANCH - An Asbury Park social services agency will be making one family's dream of owning a home come true in a city neighborhood.

Applicant Interfaith Neighbors Inc. received approval from the Long Branch Planning Board on Sept. 19 to construct a single-family home on Norwood Avenue for first-time, low-income homebuyers.

"You see a family that has struggled just to make rent, and now they have a home with its own yard and laundry facilities," said Joseph Marmora, executive director of Interfaith and principle in the project, last week. "It is just incredible."

The board granted approval to subdivide a 14,217-square-foot lot where an existing two-family home stands, according to the application filed at the Planning Board office.

Plans call for the existing home to remain on a 7,108.5-square-foot lot and the new home to be constructed on an adjacent 7,108.5-square-foot lot, according to the application.

The area is zoned as R-4 single-family residential, and the board additionally granted one variance to allow a side-yard setback for the existing home to be 2 feet where 10 feet is required, according to the application.

Interfaith Neighbors provides various programs to Monmouth County families and residents in need of assistance, Marmora said, adding that the two homes are part of Interfaith's affordable housing program.

"People come to [Interfaith] who are homeless, and we help them get housing," Marmora said.

The new home will create affordable home ownership in Long Branch, Marmora said.

"This will be the 13th or 14th house of its kind," he said. "We have built them already in Neptune and Asbury Park.

"The new home will be for low-income households. It will have four bedrooms and two-and-a-half baths," he said.

The existing two-family home is also used to house low-income families, according to Marmora, who said the families pay rent to Interfaith while they are staying in the home, and in return the organization deposits the rent money into escrow.

"It is a very unique program," Marmora said. "The families stay in the house for about one to one-and-a-half years and then we return the money to them as a down payment for a home.

"There are six families living in homes because of this program," Marmora said.

Other programs Interfaith offers are rental assistance for homelessness prevention, nutrition and the Monmouth County Youth Corp.

New Jersey Natural Gas (NJNG) provided Interfaith with a $50,000 grant to help construct the home, which Marmora said should be finished by the end of next year.

"We hope to get started after the winter," he said. "It usually takes us five months [to construct the homes]."

For more information on Interfaith, visit, www.Interfaithneighbors.org.