Published October 20, 2014
By Phil Gregory

In a surprising turn, the state Council on Affordable Housing has failed to adopt new rules on how many homes each New Jersey town should have for lower-income residents.

The council deadlocked by a 3-to-3 vote on the proposed rules. Some members said they wanted changes after getting complaints about the plan.

Adam Gordon is the staff attorney for the Fair Share Housing Center. He says the rules were flawed.

"Thousands of parcels of land that were in Monmouth County actually the rules located them in Ocean County incorrectly which meant that a lot of towns had very low obligations because they weren't taking into account land that they had mischaracterized."

Arnold Cohen is senior policy coordinator for the Housing Community Development Network of New Jersey. He hopes substantial changes are made to the plan.

“It doesn’t take into consideration where most of the housing is taking place, which is redevelopment. It only looks at vacant land. Very little housing is taking place there. And it ignores the needs of substantial populations of lower income people who need housing, people with special needs, low income families who need rental housing.”

New Jersey Sierra Club director Jeff Tittel says the plan also raised environmental concerns.

“These rules not only undermined affordable housing in New Jersey, they actually targeted open space and environmentally sensitive areas for development.”

The state Supreme Court ordered the council to approve new rules by mid-November. There's no indication when another vote will be taken.

Mike Cerra is the director of governmental affairs for the New Jersey League of Municipalities. He says it’s not clear what happens next.

“There might still be an opportunity to move on regulations perhaps with some deference from the court. The message here today is that it’s never been clearer that there’s a crying need for legislative reform to the Fair Housing Act.”

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