Mobile park units help toward COAH quota Planning Board amends affordable housing in boro master plan BY DANIEL HOWLEY Staff Writer EATONTOWN - The Planning Board took action last week to designate housing units in the borough as affordable housing in order to comply with regulations set forth by the state Council on Affordable Housing (COAH). At the April 28 Planning Board meeting, the board voted 9-0 to approve an amendment to the Eatontown Master Plan's Housing Element and Fair Share Plan. The amendment calls for including 100 units at the 130-unit Pine TreeMobile Home Park on Route 35 in the borough's affordable housing plan to meet the affordable housing quota as determined by COAH. "The amendment includes the Pine Tree Mobile Home Park conversion to affordable housing, which will become part of our affordable housing plan," said Planning Board member Mayor Gerald Tarantolo. "What we are doing is essentially recognizing [the mobile park] as being a component of our affordable housing," Tarantolo said. The borough took steps in January 2007 to include the Pine Tree Mobile Park in its affordable housing plan when the mobile park was purchased by the Eatontown-based Affordable Housing Alliance (AHA). As a condition of the purchase, the borough asked that the AHA consider having the site designated for affordable housing. In December 2007, the Borough Council approved a resolution awarding theAHA$250,000 to perform renovations and upgrades to the park. As a term of the monetary award from the borough, the borough would be permitted to designate 100 of the 130 mobile home units as affordable housing, according to Tarantolo. COAH is a state agency that determines the amount of affordable housing units that each municipality in the state must provide. Its affordable housing obligations are the result of a 1983 state Supreme Court decision that called for municipalities to take action to meet their fair share of low- and moderate-income housing needs. COAH calculates each municipality's affordable housing obligations by taking into account the town's fiscal capacity, employment, wealth and vacant land availability. Each municipality is subsequently mandated by COAH to provide that number of affordable housing units. In order to meet its requirement, Tarantolo explained that the borough has the option of identifying specific areas or projects, such as the Pine Tree Mobile Home Park, as a part of its COAH plan. "What we did was we accepted the Pine Tree project formally as an affordable housing project, which will be included in the housing element of our master plan and become part of our COAH plan," Tarantolo said. Tarantolo explained that COAH has determined that 100 of the 130 units at Pine Tree qualify as affordable housing. "We are essentially saying that we are taking credit for those 100 units," Tarantolo said. "Now, somewhere down the line, the other 30 units may qualify under COAH's criteria. "What we are doing is saying that we reserve the right in the future to also declare those 30 units as affordable housing through a 'buy down' program," Tarantolo explained. Under the buydown program, the municipality could pay COAH to have the remaining units recognized as affordable housing. In order to do so, the borough must pay $25,000 per unit from its COAH fund to the agency. "We are stipulating in our COAH housing plan that we may potentially use those units in the future," Tarantolo said. "We are just providing for the possibility, that's all," he said. COAH had determined in its rounds one and two guidelines that Eatontown was required to provide 92 units of affordable housing. Under COAH's most recently proposed round-three guidelines, the borough's obligation jumped up to 447 units. With the addition of the 100 units from Pine Tree Mobile Home Park, the borough will have a surplus of affordable units under the previous round one and two guidelines. The borough has chosen to reserve the right to buy down the remaining 30 units at Pine Tree due to the new regulations proposed in COAH's round three. According to Tarantolo, the New Jersey League of Municipalities is planning to challenge the new roundthree guidelines if they are approved by COAH. Should the league's efforts prove unsuccessful, Eatontown will have to present its own case to the state Appellate Court on the basis that there is not enough free land to develop the affordable housing obligation proposed by COAH, Tarantolo explained.