Legislature, not court, should craft affordable housing policy
Your Turn
Guest Column • Mary Pat Angelini

For years, New Jersey's municipalities have dealt with strained budgets, rising costs, higher property taxes and reduced state aid. Now, the Democrats running Trenton have crafted what could be a knockout blow not only to the budget plans of local mayors and town managers, but to the state's middle class as well.

The new affordable housing policies coming out of Trenton will have a devastating impact on the hard-working property taxpayers of New Jersey. But it doesn't have to happen. The state Legislature could reconsider the current rules and craft an affordable housing policy that would not force more of our residents out of state. It should be noted that no other state in the country is as misguided as New Jersey on this issue.

This latest attack on taxpayers takes the form of recently enacted affordable housing legislation that will essentially hurt our towns in two ways. First, it leaves in place COAH regulations that threaten local open spaces, while considering spaces such as military bases, highway rest areas, airport runways, reservoirs and private backyards as suitable lands for affordable housing

construction. Second, it forces property taxpayers to pay for the construction of subsidized housing in their communities.

With regard to the open space preservation issue, the new legislation and revised COAH regulations essentially only prohibit development on vacant lands where development is prohibited by a state or federal agency. Technically, development is not prohibited on even protected farmland and open spaces, which leaves municipalities vulnerable to court decisions that will allow the constitutional mandate to build affordable housing to outweigh the need to preserve farmland and open space.

In addition to threatening to reverse the progress towns have made to provide parks and reserves for their residents, the revised regulations also have the potential to cripple municipal budgets and hit taxpayers hard. The reason is that the new regulations prohibit towns from meeting their affordable housing obligations by transferring some of their obligation to developed urban areas with the infrastructure in place to absorb additional dwellings. Instead, towns will be required to pay a 2.5 percent tax on any new residential and commercial development.

The tax on commercial development is to be used to replace the monies that towns used to send to urban areas while the tax on residential development is to be used to pay for the additional affordable housing mandated by Trenton. The problem with this arrangement is that, unlike the former system, the 2.5 percent tax is mandatory and can only be paid through one source — property taxes.

One town hit particularly hard by these new rules is Wall Township in Monmouth County. It has been estimated that Wall residents will face a $20 million tax increase to fund the construction of nearly 700 new affordable housing units the town is obligated to build under the new COAH regulations over the course of the next 10 years. Clearly, Wall taxpayers cannot bear this burden, or the strain on the town's infrastructure and school system. It's a problem a majority of municipalities will face if these regulations go unchallenged, which is why more than 230 towns have already filed suit in court to stop them.

The Legislature can also do its part to ensure that the affordable housing legislation and new COAH regulations are reversed. Along with my colleagues Sen. Sean Kean and Assemblyman Dave Rible, I have sponsored several pieces of legislation that will limit the state's power to impose these unreasonable mandates upon our towns by restoring the Legislature's ability to establish reasonable and realistic affordable housing policies in New Jersey. Most importantly, these measures will take these decisions out of the hands of the state Supreme Court, which has once again usurped the authority of both the Legislature and the municipalities.

While I will continue to advocate for a legislative solution to overturn these illconceived affordable housing rules, I am heartened to see indications that the Democratic leadership has acknowledged the disastrous impact these policies will have on our towns and the middle class.

In fact, they have recently made a statement that they will hold hearings over the next few months to receive input from key stakeholders. If the hearings are anything like the one I held in Wall Township recently, they will be getting an earful from mayors and taxpayers. In fact, last month nearly 300 concerned residents attended this town meeting to join the fight to overturn these disastrous rules.

While I am pleased the Democrats have begun to hear my concerns and the concerns of hundreds of mayors and scores of taxpayers, it is unfortunate that a thoughtful and deliberative approach did not occur in the original drafting of this ill-conceived law. In the meantime, I will continue to push for passage of legislation to return zoning control to our towns and sanity to our affordable housing laws. I also urge taxpayers to participate in the upcoming hearings to have your voices heard. It's your money, it's your town, and it's our future.

Assemblywoman Mary Pat Angelini represents the 11th District.