They didn't break the mold with Mount Laurel decision

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They didn't break the mold with Mount Laurel decision

Lawsuit led way to troubled Greenwich homes.

Sunday, February 23, 2003

By KATHERINE BLOK The Express-Times

GREENWICH TWP. -- Greenwich Chase, a housing tract off Dumont Road, was built in the mid-1990s after the developer sued the township.

Toll Brothers Inc. of Huntingdon Valley, Pa., sued Greenwich Township in the late 1980s over a zoning dispute, according to current and former township officials. The suit was filed under the builder's remedy option of New Jersey's affordable housing regulations -- commonly called the "Mount Laurel decision" after the court cases that established some of the regulations.

The builder's remedy option allows a developer to construct affordable housing units as part of what is often a higher-end development.

The statute was recently challenged by West Windsor Township in Mercer County, but the Mount Laurel decision and affordable housing laws were upheld by the New Jersey Supreme Court.

Closer to home, the lawsuit against Greenwich Township bore the fruit of a 570-home development, which contains 70 affordable housing units.

Now some are saying the fruit is rotting.

Owners of the lower-cost homes have complained of a black substance throughout their rooms that could be mold. Toll Brothers maintains the substance is soot that accumulated because of poor air circulation. The homeowners have retained an attorney and did not return calls seeking comment.

In Greenwich Township, the 100-acre tract purchased by Toll Brothers was zoned for 1-acre lots, said planning board secretary Elva Pomroy.

"The Mount Laurel (decision) is the reason why there are smaller lots. The developer was going to satisfy the township's Mount Laurel (obligation), but they want smaller lots," Pomroy said. "It was mandated by the state, so the planning board had no choice The zoning was changed (to quarter-acre lots) to accommodate that."

The Greenwich lawsuit came about because the township had not made plans for affordable housing, Pomroy said. The township did rehabilitate some homes, but that only brought the township into compliance with a portion of its affordable housing obligation, she said.

"By the time it got to the planning board, the decisions had already been made. Toll Brothers was in negotiations with the township committee. I'm assuming they exhausted all their other avenues. This is what the committee came up with and this is what Toll Brothers presented to the planning board," Pomroy said. "What is there now is the result of a Mount Laurel settlement."

Planning Board Attorney Edelston, who began working with the township after the settlement, said the number of affordable housing units was set in the settlement.

"They basically got to construct the number that the law allowed," Edelston said.

It could be argued that the development is larger than it needed to be, said Lyn Aaroe, the former planning board attorney who settled the Toll Brothers suit. Common practice is for a 20 percent set-aside, Aaroe said. But 20 percent of 570 is 114. A 350-home development with 70 affordable units would have provided a 20 percent set-aside.

"It was more of a favorable result from Toll Brothers' perspective," Aaroe said. "The ratio was higher than it would have been today. The number of market units probably should have gone down."

Aaroe said he hopes other municipalities have learned from Greenwich Township's experience and are more active with satisfying their affordable housing obligations.

"We didn't do what we were supposed to do and here's the consequence," Aaroe said. "No one particularly liked the (regulations). No one liked the way the Mount Laurel doctrine resulted in the density windfall to developers."

One person who really doesn't like the builder's remedy option is Greenwich Township resident Devane. He was a member of the planning board in the mid-1990s and said Toll Brothers "raped" the township.

Another area that might change is Union Township in Hunterdon County. That township recently settled a lawsuit brought against them by Toll Brothers. Similar to Greenwich Township and many other New Jersey towns, Union Township was sued by Toll Brothers under the guise of the Mount Laurel decision.

Planning board Attorney ph Noval and township Attorney Jost could not be reached for comment on the settlement.

The planning board recently granted preliminary and final subdivision approval for the project, said planning board Secretary Grace Kocher.

Union Township likely ran into the same problem Greenwich Township faced more than 10 years ago -- a fight with the developer over zoning changes. Union Township Planning Board Vice Chairwoman Nargi would say only that the vote to settle the lawsuit was very close.

In Greenwich Township, "Toll Brothers came into town, bought the property, brought their attorneys with them and proceeded to tell sville what they were going to do," Devane said. "They came in, built all these homes and everybody is screaming, 'What's the problem?' It's simple what the problem is. A developer comes in, builds the houses and saddles the rest of the community with the cost of educating all the children that come in I understand people need a place to live, but the state of New Jersey better wake up and put a halter on these developers."

Property taxes generated from one household generally pay for only one child, Devane said. Though Toll Brothers donated the land for the new township elementary school, the expense of building the school and educating the children of new homeowners overburdens township residents, he said. The township also had to finance an expansion of its police department because of the increase in residents and commerce.

"I don't have any love for Toll Brothers or any developer because I've seen what they did. I moved up here (from North Brunswick) to get away from all of that," Devane said. "They basically came in and raped the whole county. It's a snowball effect. Once they come in, they all come in."

Devane said Toll Brothers and other large developers also use cheaper materials to construct the homes, then charge a lot of money and walk away with a large profit.

"I don't know what they call quality, but it's not what I call quality. It's made out of chip board. Just because it meets code -- it's like a herring in the moonlight. It shines, but it stinks," Devane said.

Aaroe offered a less strident opinion. All developers, said the former planning board attorney, especially publicly-traded developers like Toll Brothers, are out to make a profit, Aaroe said. But they also care about their reputation.

Quality "depends on how much profit you want to make," Aaroe said. "There's a lot of room for margin of error with respect to the quality of the product. There's vast differences I've seen first hand."

He would not comment on the quality of the Greenwich Chase development because he represented Toll Brothers in selling units in the Greenwich Chase development.

Greenwich Township Engineer Finelli said there are no deficiencies in the project from an engineering perspective.

"I never thought, through the course of the development, that the project was being handled differently than any other project," he said.

Devane said the state should implement "real stringent guidelines" on the construction of affordable housing developments. But the state will likely not do anything because of the strong developers lobby, he said.

"There's nothing you can do about it because the laws are in their favor. They doubled the size of this town. So who loses in this? The little guy, the retired people It's nice that we can provide places for people to live, but I don't know that it's so nice."

Devane said the section of Greenwich Township that contains the newer, larger housing developments is "a completely separate town" from the small farming village of sville.

"It looks like an army base. There's not even windows on the sides (of the houses)," he said. "I walked away after my term was up totally disillusioned on how a community can save itself."

Edelston, the planning board attorney, said, "It obviously has changed quite a bit. That area has changed forever." Reporter Blok can be reached at 908-475-8184 or by e-mail at kblok@....