TRENTON — Housing advocates today took aim at the Christie administration's long-awaited guidelines for how many affordable homes New Jersey needs, calling the plan inadequate and arguing that it violates a mandate from the state Supreme Court.
They also accused the administration of secretly making changes to the proposal after it was introduced in April.
The state Council on Affordable Housing held a public hearing today on the regulations, which would govern how many homes each New Jersey town should make available to low-income residents.
READ THE GUIDELINES HERE
The plan — which the council introduced only after being ordered by the state Supreme Court — replaces quotas that expired 15 years ago and calls for an additional 110,000 affordable homes across the state by 2024.
But critics today said that's not enough to cover a state with 8.8 million residents and growing poverty. They also said the plan provides no requirements for rental homes — which they argued is essential in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, because many victims need new or temporary shelter.
"This council proposed rules that will result in many, many fewer homes for hard-working New Jerseyans who make our economy and our community hum," said Staci Berger, president of the Housing an Community Development Network of New Jersey.
Affordable housing has been a contentious issue in New Jersey for years. In 1983, the state Supreme Court ruled that the state's municipalities must provide for a "fair share" of affordable homes for their poorest residents. While studies show up to 60,000 such homes have been built in the state since then, the last few decades have been riddled with a string of legal challenges.
The council, known as COAH, carries out the program. But the last quotas expired in 1999, the council had not met regularly since 2010, and six of its 12 seats are vacant.
Gov. Chris Christie tried to disband COAH — which is headed by his state Department of Community Affairs commissioner, Richard Constable — last year. But the state Supreme Court stopped him and ruled that the board had to write new rules.
The Republican governor responded by calling the affordable housing system "a failed experiment now continuing to be promulgated by an out-of-control court that can never admit its mistakes."
Under the Supreme Court's ruling, COAH has until November to finalize the new regulations.
Kevin Walsh, president of the housing advocacy group Fair Share Housing Center, said the court also told the council to use the same methodology it used for determining housing numbers in the 1980s and 1990s. But Walsh and other advocates today said the new guidelines ignore that order.
Walsh also accused the council of voting on the rules in April and then changing them before today's hearing, reducing the number of homes called for by 40,000.
"Was there a vote taken? Something in which board members secretly met?" Walsh angrily asked the council. "The process was possibly the least transparent the administration has ever done. When people show up to comment, they should at least know what they're commenting on.
Constable told Walsh that the council would only hear public comment today, not respond to it.
"Is what you're telling me that you're not going to answer that question?" Walsh asked.
"Yes," Constable replied.
Tim Doherty, the sole council member who voted against the guidelines, said he too was curious about any alterations.
"Sooner or later, we need to get these answers," said Doherty, the executive director of Project Freedom, a nonprofit organization that builds affordable housing. "I feel offended that I haven't been told why or to what measure these rules have been changed."
Constable noted that residents can still mail comments to the council through Aug. 1.
A spokeswoman for the council said members would not be available for comment after the meeting.
Critics had a number of other concerns, as well. David Fisher, president of the New Jersey Builders Association, said the rules also leave hundreds of towns without an obligation to provide housing.
"The state cannot afford more years of ineffective regulations that frustrate the constitutional obligation to assist in providing desperately needed affordable housing," Fisher said.
Tom Carroll, a Princeton attorney, argued that the guidelines will lead to an even larger number of lawsuits than the state has already been saddled with regarding affordable housing.
"Is this going to be the Council on Affordable Housing, or the Council for More Litigation?" Carroll asked the board.
Jeff Tittel, president of the New Jersey chapter of environmental group the Sierra Club, said the regulations also change housing formulas to favor developers, encouraging them to "pave over" environmentally sensitive areas.
Under the old rules, he noted, a developer would be allowed to build four housing units to sell at a regular cost for every affordable unit they constructed. Under the new rules, they would be permitted to build nine.
"These rules are the biggest giveaway to developers in state history," Tittel said. "They will promote sprawl and overdevelopment, while increasing pollution, taxes, and traffic. There is no economic basis for these rules except to make builders and developers richer."
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