is April 16th at 7:30. This meeting is called to order in accordance with the Open Public Meetings Act. Notice of this meeting was provided to the Home News Tribune, the Star Ledger, and the Highland Park Planet on January 12th, 2026, and was posted on
the Burough website at www.hpbau.com hpbaro.com and on the bulletin board at Burough Hall, 221 South Fifth Avenue, Highland Park, New Jersey, and has remained continuously posted as required by law. Fire exits are to the left and right. And please, as always, remember
to speak into the microphone. Okay. Uh, first of all, please. Miss Ham, >> yes. >> Mr. Brusher, Mr. Chen, >> I'm here. >> Minhazi, Mr. Hail, >> here. >> Mr. Ho, Mr.
Mr. Malay >> here. >> Mr. Pearlman >> here. >> Mr. Stern Cardinell >> here. >> Mr. Williams >> here. >> Mr. Gibbons. >> Uh, yes. Thank you. >> Mr. Cosenza, Mr. Robinson. >> Okay. Very good. Thank you so much. Yes.
our uh board uh experts, our planner, our engineer, and our our zoning officer, our I'm sorry, construction officer are not with us tonight because the item on the agenda that we have here is a consistency review on your ordinance. I'm going to preemptively
skip ahead, skip past the approval of the minutes, and if we have time later tonight, we'll come back to them. Uh but for right now, since we have a guest this evening to go over the ordinance with us, we'll bring her up first so she doesn't have to listen to us go back and forth over our minutes. So, we're going
to turn to the consistency review for ordinance number 26-2127, an ordinance amending chapter 86 entitled fair share affordable housing to implement the fourth round of affordable housing in accordance with the fair share housing act of 1985 as
amended. So, if you would please do you swear me? I think well let's just be safe. >> Okay. >> Microphone. >> Pardon me. >> I'm going to take that mic. >> Okay. Do you so long before the testimony you're about to give in this
proceeding will be the truth. So I hope you got it. >> I do. >> Please state your name and spell your last name for the record. >> I'm Ela Kusham. C L I S H A M. I'm a professional planner with Clark Katon H. >> Good evening and welcome. >> Thank you.
You have the floor. Thank you. So, this ordinance as >> Thank you. >> Think you can take it off. >> You're going to make me hold it for 20 minutes. Easiest for you. >> You do the Johnny Carson thing. Hold this.
>> This works. >> God, I'm dating myself. Johnny Carson, >> you know, I know who he is. Thank goodness. I'm glad someone still died. >> Yeah. Alvin and Dan. >> All right.
>> Does this work? >> Yeah. >> All right. Great. Um, you all currently have an affordable housing ordinance as part of your code. It is the third round affordable housing ordinance. What you are looking at tonight is just an update to that to bring you in line with some
new regulations that go into effect with the fourth round. So, >> I'm sorry. I'm just gonna pause and make a note that Mr. Ho has joined us at 7:35. All right. Thank you. Please continue. >> So, 90% of what you see here, you have in some form already. It is not new.
What I'm going to do is just walk through some of the things that are new because even though most of this is administrative and it's really Terry Hov's problem or your administrative agents problem, there are some things that it's going to be useful for the planning board to know um because it may
involve action on the part of the planning board. So, the first thing I want to point out is on page nine, there is a definition for prior round unit. And that becomes important because you still have some third round units that are approved
by the court but have not yet been built. And if they ever do get built, they will be subject to third round rules. And the big difference between third round and fourth round in that case, I think it is a rental unit that's supposed to come online, is the length of controls. It would be a 30-year
control if it's a third round unit, a 40-year control if it's a fourth round unit. So, the definition of a prior round unit becomes important when we're talking about the third round units you don't yet have online. Page 14. We've already started to have
this discussion with our friends at Garden Communities. Under number three, these rules are the if there are four sale units as part of a development number letter C, they can be of different product types than the
market rate units, but you have to have at least one of each market rate type as an affordable type. So if you have all town houses as market rate, you have to have at least one townhouse that's affordable, even if all the rest are flats, for example. So that is a new
regulation. The next page, page 15, and Mr. Zingaro and our office went back and forth on this language quite a lot. Number four, C, D, and E. This involves the bedroom distribution of family units where you are only allowed so many onebedrooms and
you have to have at least a certain number of two and three bedrooms. They've now built in some flexibility typically for small infill development projects where strict adherence to those regulations might not be feasible. We put this wording in here so that this
is always the burrow's decision, not the developers. The developer has to justify why they cannot do the bedroom distribution that the rules require. how all these so nicely marked. Uh the next page 17, this is just a description
of the regulations for each of the types of affordable housing that you have. It's they're just really for Terry and for your administrative agent. It's interesting reading if you have trouble sleeping. Um but it just describes what keeps each type of affordable housing
unit affordable. Um, on page 21, I'm not sure this will apply specifically to you, but I want to point it out. Under paragraph 866 C, the
maximum average rent can be increased for developments that provide additional very low income units. So, on its surface, it looks like it's a stop to the developers so that they get some money back on the top end for doing more on the bottom end. If you ever had a tax
credit project here, a 100% affordable tax credit project, that may very well come into play. I don't know if any would be coming here. Can't think why they wouldn't. This would be like would score full points, I would think, if anybody wanted to build a tax credit project here. But if they deliver more
than their required, very low units, they can raise the maximum affordability level at the top end. Page 24. This is one of the things the planning board is going to need to know. Right above the paragraph that says occupancy
standards, you all just passed your affirmative marketing resolution. And some of the affirmative marketing has costs. This says that the affirmative marketing costs will be borne by the owner of the affordable units unless you all decide otherwise.
So, for example, the owner of the habitat unit on South 10th Street, you may decide that the burrow will pay the cost if that person ever decides to move out. >> The burrow retains that option. >> Yes, bur retains that option. Um, however, if the developer, if the owner
must pay the cost, you have to put it in a resolution of approval. Page 25, letter F. This is true for you'll find this in two places. One for rentals and one for for sales and I'm kind of sorry your construction
officer isn't here because prior to the issuance of any building permit they have to provide a draft deed restriction. That is new. I have never seen a developer provide a draft deed restriction when they pull building permits.
for both for sale and rental units. They must do that before they can get a building permit. And it has to be recorded with the county. >> Yes. >> To be replaced by the final deed restriction once C they come in for CO >> and proof has to be proof has to be provided of the recording.
>> Yeah. >> What mechanism does the county have for recording such a document? >> It goes it be it's it's a deed restriction. It's like a deed. No, no. I meant if you're it's going to be replaced by the actual final deed. What is this interim deed logged in as? >> Right? Because because there's a lot
>> 206 like what would that even be? I guess >> it there's a lot of abuse of the system. >> So, >> well, I do understand why it's there. I we're still chasing down deed restrictions for projects that came online in 2005 where nobody just made
the developer do the deed restriction. So, the units are affordable. >> They've all been administered, but there's no documentation. I understand why they're doing it. I'm not sure this was the right solution, but here we are. >> I've had to chase attorneys down trying to get them to do it. So, I mean, I can
tell you I think it's a good idea. >> So, um, page 28, paragraph 8617. Here's where the fourth round rental unit controls are. If it's a third round unit, it has 30-year controls. That's paragraph A.
Paragraph B. If it's a fourth round unit, the rental controls are for 40 years. For sale units, controls are still 30 years. And paragraph E, here's the draft deed restriction requirement again. Page 34, this also I think is something
that may involve the planning board at site plan review. This is a new brand new section 8625. These are the things the owner of a development containing affordable units must do and a lot of it is provide fully
engineered drawings identifying each unit by bedroom count and affordability level etc etc etc. So a lot of it can be accomplished at site plan if they know ahead of time and with we do not do your planning reviews but for
towns where we do we try we will try to put this in that these things will be required and should be sought at site plan >> projected construction schedule is very uh interesting. Yeah. And you know, if it's a private
inclusionary development, I don't know how you ask that, but there it is. There is um the big thing I want to make sure everybody knows. So, those are primarily that's just the administrative end of making sure your affordable units remain
creditworthy. But on page 38 begins the section on development fees. My understanding is you all adopted your first development fee ordinance in like 2019 something like that and it was only non-residential fees which were
statutory since 2008. Um you the burrow has now decided that they are going to implement a residential development fee. So there are some restrictions, there are some exemptions, there are things that are not um subject
to the fee, but it's essentially one and a half% of the increase in equalized assessed value. And the tax assessor is who determines that has nothing to do with what it costs. If you put a fabulous extension on your house and it costs $200,000, but it only increases
the equaliz assessed value by $50,000, that's the basis for determining the fee. It gets calculated I think at building permit but I think here you have decided you're going to collect all of it at CO.
Some towns collect 50/50. I think you have determined you're going to collect all of it. So that is new. The benefit to that is you will have money in your affordable housing trust fund and as your redevelopment projects come forward.
Any non-residential portion of that will also be subject to the non-residential redevelopment fee. So there will be development fees in your trust fund and that helps pay for some things that right now the borrower is paying for. Um you can do some affordability assistance. For example, you there are a
bunch of things you can do. you can pay your affordable housing attorney and your affordable housing planner, stuff like that. So, it's a source of funds that you don't currently have. Uh 86-32 on page 40 is the collection
procedures. So it sounds like the planning board must notify the construction office at approvals that they should be looking they should be trying to calculate the fee prior to the issuance of a building permit. >> I believe that collection forcement
activity would be in the hands of the uh burough attorney's office rather than the board attorney. >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I would think I would think >> because it's a it's it's a municipal right >> uh obligation board
>> obligation that's right that's right but they don't know to collect it without some notification from this board so that's a that's a new function um page 42 letter D is a whole list of things DCA can do to you if you don't
administer your trust funds correctly and then page 44 is a completely separate chapter in your ordinance. This is your mandatory set aside which basically says if you have a project that produces five or more multifamily units, let me go back to the development
fee, for example, for one moment. Those houses along Cleveland, for example, had this development fee ordinance been in place, they would have paid a fee. I understand you've got an application coming in for the property between Harrison and Cleveland, um, where the house got knocked down. they will pay a
fee. Any project that generates affordable units will not pay a fee. So you pay a fee or you build the units but not both. This set aside again says if you have a multif family project that generates at
least five new units, one at least one of them 20% must be set aside as affordable. So this is in your code at the moment. It expands it a little here. One of the things that is in in here now
is what do you do with a partial unit? If you calculate 20% of eight units, you're not going to get it. Well, you probably are. Bad example, nine units. What do you do with that fractional unit? Many towns have a requirement that if the fraction is 0.5 or more, they
have to round up and do an extra unit. Par paragraph F on page 45 gives the borrower the entire option. You have the choice whether you make them round up or you let them round down and put a partial unit payment into the trust fund.
But other than that, this set aside is in your current ordinance. It doesn't change that. Just says here's how you calculate a fractional set. So those are the things that I highlighted that are new or that the board is going to need to know. Um, essentially this is an administrative
ordinance to make sure that the affordable units for which you're claiming credit are administered properly and remain creditw worthy. So I'm happy to answer any questions. >> Thank you so much. And just to clarify, the standard we're going for tonight is not inconsistent,
>> correct? >> With the with the town's master plan. >> That is correct. >> All right. Just to keep that in mind. >> Just one Oh, go ahead. I'm sorry. >> Oh, I just meant so that the board could keep the standard in mind when they ask their questions. That's correct. I did review I mean you this is a very
thorough review. Uh I took the opportunity to review it as well and I believe that everything is certainly legally sufficient as to form and content and that the board could reasonably adopt this if they choose to do so.
>> Thank you. Okay, I'll open it up to members of the board with questions and comments. Matt, you want to start us off? >> Sure. Um I just wondered on the page 14 where we talked about the requirement for one affordable for each type of project um >> each type of unit. Yeah.
>> Type of unit one affordable. Could you just explain to us that that um does that have an effect on the potential for total number of units or are they if you have to have one for each of those might that affect the number of total >> could I you know it sounds like that's a
project specific question but I'll make again make these numbers up pretty easy math if you have 30 units coming online so that's six units that have to be affordable
If now some towns are making are insisting that it be proportional. So if half of the units are going to be townous, half of the affordables have to be townous. This I think says that at least one has to be a townhouse. So it's a question of what will fit onto the lot
depending on your other zoning regulations or redevelopment plan. Um but >> again it provides the flexibility to think those >> Yeah. Well, that's why we said at least one that's why Yeah. So >> to have >> gotta have one, >> right? >> Yeah.
>> Um and then just for the board's um information, we did an estimate on the amount of money that we would have gotten had we implemented development fees three years ago. Um and it's about $77,000. Um if we had if we had done this three
years ago and implemented the 1.5% on residential fees, NAR did a calculation and it came out to about $77,000. Wow. Just to give us some size and scope of of what had happened in the past, >> I think in your spending plan, we
calculated I don't think we put in any residential development fees because we had not had this conversation yet, but we did calculate a certain amount in non-residential fees from your projected redevelopment project. So, I forget how much it was like 25,000. I don't think
it was a lot. Um, and there's money in there now. There's 70 something,000 in there now. It was a payment in lie from the Highland clips project. >> That's all I have. >> Uh so mentioned at the beginning you mentioned the differences in the kind of
the rules governing the third round versus the fourth round. So, uh, what I'm wondering right now is how much of what we just went through is kind of statutoily required versus kind of, um, something the pro has discretion over in
terms of these things like, um, the fees, for example. >> So, you mean the the development fees? >> The development. Yeah. >> Yeah. Residential development fees are entirely at the borrower's option. >> Uh, non-residential development fees are statutory and have been since 2008. you
probably didn't have a lot of non-residential development. We worked we had a one of our court adjudicators worked in a town in North Jersey that did never charged a non-residential development fee and they were made to go back to 2008 and calculate what it would
have been had they done that and put that money into the trust fund. >> Yeah. option. >> Um, and I have one more thing um, related to actually Matt, thank you for
the kind of the retroactive looking at what the prior developments would have brought in with this bee. Did that include uh, any kind of modeling or calculating or anything? if it's going to cost x amount more for a developer to
do it, they're going to build a little bit less and then on net that's going to reduce the revenue from the fee because you're getting fewer you you know was there any kind of that part of that at all? >> Well, I our our discussion I raised not exactly the same point but a a similar
point. Um as you said that that the 1.5% is on the change in the in the value. So it's it's that if you go from a $500,000 to a $750, it's on the 200,000. And so it was
our sense that a one and a half% just on that change was unlikely to to not discourage >> right. I was I was concerned initially that to go higher than that to go that we would be discouraging people from
doing that. One and a half seems to be what st standard is probably not the right word but it's a very common fee that is >> it's the maximum actually. >> Yeah. And and most towns who have the residential development fee do have the 1.5%. So with those two things taken in mind
we thought that this was going to be a reasonable fee would be able to put more money into the the trust fund and not discourage people from making the improvements or making the changes. um if it was one and a half percent on the total new value that you know that it's
not that it's just on the change in value that was a reasonable way to go. >> Yeah, it's on the increase in value and I will say should you decide if you do this for a year or two years and you decide it needs some changes again residential development fees are entirely at the discretion. So, you can
say, "Oh, we're not going to charge a fee if the change is less than $20,000, or we're not going to charge a fee unless the square footage increases." Or there are things you can add to that if you need to add more nuance. >> Is the residential development fee
imposed at the time the permit is issued? That's what it's listed here. >> It's that's when it's calculated. I think your collection procedures are actually at CO. >> Yes. So my my question was I having lived in this town for a long time. Um I
I have seen many houses get rebuilt and and work done and our assessment and reassessment process for the tax assessed value has not been what I call swift in catching up to people and the actual values of their house after they've done improvements. know I think
it's gotten a lot better since the whole town got reassessed in one shot and we are now on a new playing field but I'm a little concerned about practically what that's going to mean for people applying for cos while they're waiting for their new tax assess value to come out just as a
practical consideration >> and it's a tax assessor function the tax assessor I think is required to do the calculations so they can get their say so just on that one property they have to do it and um
we don't want to be that again want to wait for for to wait 25 years for doing the preassessments. So we have hopefully learned from our previous not doing it and we we were hoping that we
can continue to do a regularly scheduled assessment that will not get us as far behind as we were in the past and I think that's Certainly a goal that the council has. >> Jeff, >> yes. So just just to clarify, so the residential development fee is you
mentioned new development, but are you saying even existing development, a single family home in addition that there would be >> as I read the way your ordinance is written? Yes. Um let's look.
If we ever had EDU, >> so new would have a 1.5%. >> That's correct. That's good. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. I think that goes back to Matt's point that, you know, where's the pain point where we're discouraging the missing middle development that we've
been trying to encourage people to engage in here to increase livable space but not over overburden the town. >> Yeah. So, if for example, you're anticipating a whole bunch of tearowns and, you know, mansion rebuilds, those
that's a prime example of where you can collect on the increase in value. If somebody's going to redo their kitchen or or update their, you know, maybe you don't want to do that and maybe it doesn't generate enough to to worry about. Those are the nuances that you can incorporate into the ordinance if you need to.
>> Anyone else want to make a comment? Questions for the record? Okay. In that case then really okay then I'll solicit a motion based on our conversations on whe that the ordinance
is not inconsistent with our master plan if that's how you feel about it. >> I move to find this uh ordinance not inconsistent with our master plan. >> Thank you. >> Second. >> Second. All right. Take a roll call
vote, please. Oh, wait. Before I do, did I mean to open this up for public comment? >> You >> Okay. I I mean, I'm a public comment, but I understand legally you're not >> You are not required. >> I I public hearing. >> I'm one of those dinosaurs
who who tends to do that. And I just came from a town that is not as um amendable, shall we say, and where they did make the mistake of opening the consistency hearing up to public comment. It is a very long night. >> Well, I'll just make the observation
that I don't see any members of the public here with us tonight. >> And and no one's watching us on Zoom. >> Such a shame. >> Zoom at all. Oh my goodness. I mean, I you know, we
can we can wave it, I think, in in light of those circumstances. Um, no, I look, I'm I'm I'm a cautious lawyer. That's what you That's what you're asking me for. So, yes, but I think we can we can wave it.
>> Like, but if somebody was here clearly wanted to talk, we would open it up. >> Exactly. I I would probably say, "Madam or sir, do you have any comments? But they're not here. There's no one. >> No one's here. So I think we can move. People are out and about enjoying the
lovely weather. So with that, we can do a roll call. Mr. Chen, >> yes. >> Mr. H. >> Yes. >> Mr. Ho. >> Yes. >> Mr. Malay. >> Yes. >> Mr. Pearlman. >> Yes. >> Mr. Spartan.
I'm concerned about the the that the fee is going to discourage residential development. Um, and given the the kind of prominence of that in the master plan, I'm actually going to vote no. I think
the fee is inconsistent. >> Mr. Williams? >> Yes. >> Miss him? >> Yes. And I will comment whether while I don't disagree with your concern, I think master plans overall recognizes the need for the bureau to
earn some money to keep us compliant with our affordable housing regulations, which is definitely definitely consistent with the master plan, but I hear your criticism very strongly. All right. Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciate everybody's attention.
>> All right. Now, quickly switching to our final issues. We have approval of our minutes. I'm going to uh unilaterally take the February 12th, 2026 minutes off tonight's review just because we've had some comments and changes from several people that we're
going to incorporate and we're going to come back to them. So instead, we'll just do our November 13th, 2025 and our January 8th, 2026 minutes. Um, starting with the November 13th minutes, I had one comment that on page two in the
first substantive paragraph reciting where Roger Thomas is is restating the ordinance. It it says 25-12 that I think I think he was just stuttering a little bit and he meant to say 25-2117. And then
on page five, third paragraph down it says, "In terms of its relationship to all the plans, our local master." Okay.
And then on page six, the second to last paragraph, and maybe somebody remembers, as I was going to ask Kyra, um, but she's not joining us tonight. It says that's the last set of words are that's raritin basis. Did anyone know what she was getting at when she said that?
Would you be considering >> uh page six, the second to last paragraph that says, "Would you be considering combining all events, one large parking lot that's accessible on both South Fourth and South third, but consist of parking spaces for all the buildings on that stretch between South
Third and South Fourth? That's maritan basis. No, I don't think Yeah, I think that >> I I don't know what that was supposed to be >> relationship to that. So I >> I I think we can just take out the last three words because the sentence makes
sense otherwise. >> I suspect she meant th those are facing in some way, but without her to clarify, I would recommend taking out the last >> I would remove I would remove for a period after child. >> Yeah, put a period.
So, those were those were my comments on the November 13th minutes. So, if anyone else has any comments, changes, or questions. >> I have uh another small typo. I you caught one of them, but um we're on page
seven. Um the second under my uh summary of my comments. Um it says I second third sentence I guess maybe council just council as in legal counsel versus Yeah. That's all. >> Legal.
>> No, I guess maybe council mean the town. The town. >> I meant legal counsel. I meant Roger Thomas. I was legal. I was asking Roger Thomas. I'm referring to Roger Thomas. Can you correct me if I'm wrong? And I That was my >> So that's C O U N S E L. I believe
that's >> Thank you. I'm >> correct. All right. Anything else? Anyone else? All right. With that, I'll solicit a motion to accept our November 13, 2025 minutes subject to the amendments we just went through.
>> Motion second. >> Seconded by Ch. >> We do roll call vote for this one. Yes. >> All in favor? I >> I. >> All oppose. Any abstensions?
Uh Patrick, did you want to abstain? >> I read it. So, >> oh, never mind then. Very good. All right, then. So, the motion passes. Those are November 13, 2025 minutes. That takes us to our
January 8th, 2026 minutes. And I'll I'll start the ball rolling with um on page two, give you a second. H2 in the middle of the page under
setting of 2026 meeting dates in the middle. Wait, no, we're not on the same page. This is my Oh, do I have a different version? >> The bottom of the page. Well, my version says Highland Park
Planner instead of Highland Park Plan. It's >> our official newspaper. We got news. I know what we're talking about. And then under the review of the minutes from our August 14th regular meeting,
my version here under Yeah, the extension list says three abstensions, but the number says zero. With that, does anyone else have any comments or changes to our January 8th reorganization meeting?
>> Oh, it doesn't should be well three abstensions because they weren't here. They were absent. >> I guess maybe it's not obstension. So, maybe change to three absent. Is that more appropriate? Uh, I think that if
they were not if they were not in the room, they should be they should be as or they intentionally abstain. I guess that's >> No, they they weren't present. So, I guess it's not extension. >> That's >> so zero abstensions. So, you guess technically it's at the
three changes because it's zero abstensions. They >> There were four absences. >> Says three. >> Oh, it says three, but then there's zero next to it. >> Yeah, but Chin Lar. >> Oh, yeah. But there's four people, so it's really just zero abstensions instead of three abstensions. That's
really the only the only >> more appropriate >> Okay. Sorry about that. Any anything else from anybody? >> Seeing none, we'll solicit a motion to accept our January 8th, 2026 minutes
subject to these changes. Second. >> Uh, Alvin, right? I got that right. Dan motion. Alvin. Second or the reverse? No, we got it right. All right. All in favor? I.
>> All opposed. Any abstensions? >> I Yeah, I was not here on January. >> Okay. Jeff abstain and Alvin. >> Yes. >> Okay. Very good. So, that's all the minutes we're going to review this evening. If you do have any comments on the February
12th draft minutes, just email Jen back with them and we'll revisit them at our next meeting. Moren, sorry. Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. I No, Jen answers the email. All right, email one of them. They'll they'll figure it out.
Okay, since none of our burough officials are here, um, oh, opening up the meeting to members of the public who wish to be heard on any member anything not on the agenda. Seeing no members of the public, I will close the public portion of the meeting. Just confirming
no one on Zoom joined it. All right. Um, with that, does anyone have anything they want to bring up and talk about? No. All right. Who wants to adjurnn? >> I do. >> All right. Motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> Second it. All in favor?
>> I. Thank you very much everybody. Always a pleasure. >> Thank you everybody.