I call to order this special special meeting of the township committee of the township of Mars this Monday, March 9th, 2026. The time is now 6:02 p.m. This meeting is being held in accordance with the Open Public Meetings Act, and
adequate notice of this meeting has been provided as required by law. Specifically, notice of this meeting was emailed to the daily record, the Mars Newsby, and the Star Ledger on February 27th, 2026, and posted on the Township
of Mars website. The agenda and resolutions for the meeting are available on marswp.com under the agenda center. Certain portions of this meeting may be closed to the public for the purpose of personnel and/or other matters as outlined in the sunshine law. Notice to
members of the governing body and the township staff. Any use of electronic devices during this meeting shall be used solely for the purpose of township business and any communications are subject to the open public records act. Madame clerk, roll call, please.
>> Mr. Griselle, >> here. >> May I suggest you? >> Mr. Ravitz >> here. >> Mr. Janatada >> here. >> Mayor Griglia >> here. Ju >> I I just want to make one more announcement that to anybody coming in
there are the room behind us. There's seating and the TV screens are in there. So you're hearing and seeing everything that's happening in this room. There are some empty seats up here in the front two rows. Um we do have to be able to get in and out though and the door has
to remain open. Thank you. At this time, if you're able, please rise for the pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation
under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Let's mute to it. >> Thank you. And if when we get to the part when you want to come up to speak at the podium, if you haven't signed in,
just sign in if you speak so that we have a record of everybody who uh approaches the podium. We take notes here as well, but if you sign in, we have that as well. Good evening and thank you for being here tonight. We appreciate the time
residents have taken to attend this special meeting of the township committee. This evening's meeting is focused on the township's fourth round affordable housing obligations and several ordinances that would establish zoning overlays associated with the
specific affordable housing projects. Before we begin, I want to briefly explain and review how tonight's meeting will proceed so everyone understands the process and everyone has an opportunity to participate. First, earlier on the agenda, the
township committee will consider several administrative resolutions related to the fourth round process. These are required by state law and establish certain procedural and compliance measures, but they do not involve the
zoning or approval of any individual development site. Our affordable housing attorney, Steve Warner, and our township planner, Elizabeth Laney, will give an overall presentation on the township's fourth round affordable housing plan.
The purpose of the presentation is to provide context and to address many of the questions you have regarding the township's obligations and how the proposed ordinances fit within the broader plan.
Following that, the committee will move to the individual ordinances, each of which re relates to a specific zoning overlay tied to a particular project. Each ordinance will have its own public meeting. For each ordinance, the process
will be as follows. The township planner will provide an overview of the specific ordinance and project. Next, we'll open the public meeting hearing for that particular ordinance. Any member of the public who wishes to speak will have the opportunity to do so. To ensure that
everybody has an opportunity to be heard, each speaker will be limited to three minutes. During the hearing, the township committee and the township's professionals will be listening carefully and taking notes. Once the public hearing for that particular ordinance is concluded, the township's
professionals will respond to questions and comments that were raised to the extent possible before the committee proceeds to consider a vote on that particular ordinance. Because each ordinance is separate and must be considered individually, we ask that
comments during the public hearing be limited to the ordinance currently under consideration. There will be an opportunity to speak during each hearing as it occurs. We also ask that everyone maintain decorum and respect throughout
the meeting. Please address all comments to the governing body. We understand that this topic is important to so many of our residents and we welcome your input, but we ask that everybody remain respectful so that we can conduct the meeting in an orderly manner. I also
want to briefly explain the broader context for tonight's meeting. These ordinances are part of the township's fourth round affordable housing obligations under New Jersey law. Through the hard work of the township committee and our professional team,
including our planner, attorney, and other adviserss, we believe the proposed projects represent the most appropriate way for the township to fulfill its constitutional obligation to provide its fair share of affordable housing. This
pro process is largely driven by state legislation and court requirements. Municipalities are required to comply with these mandates. If a municipality fails to adopt a compliant plan, it can become subject to what are known as
builders remedy lawsuits, which could allow developers to seek courtorder projects with far less municipal control. Our goal has been to maintain as much local planning control as possible while
meeting the requirements of the state. Finally, I just want to address the timing. The township is not rushing this process on its own accord. The state legislature has imposed a firm deadline requiring municipalities to adopt these
measures by March 16th with no extensions permitted. For that reason, we are holding this special meeting so the township can meet the state's deadline while also providing the public with a full opportunity to be heard.
We appreciate everyone being here tonight and we welcome your comments and participation as we proceed through the agenda. We do have five administrative resolutions on tonight's agenda related to affordable housing. These will be considered together and voted on by one
motion. May I have a motion to approve resolutions 62-26 through 66-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Rabbits? >> Yes. >> Mr. Janata? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gazelle? >> Yes.
>> Yes. >> Mayor Griglio? >> Yes. Resolution 62-26-6-26 is approved. At this time, I will first ask our affordable housing attorney, Steve Warner, to address the legal notices
provided for the public hearings on the affordable housing ordinances, as well as the legal process the township was required to undertake in connection with the fourth round affordable housing plan. Mayor, see before you get started, folks standing um on the sides or in the
back, there is seating and screens in the uh back the adjacent room. So, if you make want to make yourselves comfortable, what's happening here will be on the screens. So, you don't have to stand. Sorry. >> No. Thank you, Committee Rabbits. Again,
everything that's happening in this room is also on the screens right behind us if you'd rather be sitting down. Mr. Warner. >> Thank you, mayor. The uh for the record, the notice of the public hearings on
these affordable housing ordinances was published in the daily record on February 22nd and the ordinances themselves and the notices were posted on the website on February 19th. Both of those dates being
well more than the 10 days required by law for prior notice of this evening's meeting. In fact, they're almost twice uh the required notice time frame, and those notices went out uh immediately after the introduction of these
ordinances on February 18th. Also, all eight of the affordable housing ordinances that are on for adoption this evening were master plan consistency reviewed by the planning board on March 2nd. And each and every
one of them was found unanimously by the planning board to be consistent with our township's master plan and such report was made back to this township committee. Also, notice of the public hearings for each and every one of the affordable
housing ordinances was provided to all affected property owners pursuant to section 62.1 of the municipal land use law and sent at least 10 days prior to tonight by certified mail uh as required under that
section of the municipal land use law. I believe some 1,000 or more personal notices were certified mailed to not only property owners within 200 ft of the perimeter of each and every one of
these sites, but also within 200 ft of the perimeter of the broader existing zoning district within which each and every one of these uh sites and zones are uh uh proposed inclusionary zones
are located. Finally, with respect to notice, it's my understanding that the certified mail notice to property owners inadvertently referenced Wednesday, March 9 rather than Monday, March 9. However, it's my understanding that the notice posted on
the website and published in the official newspaper of the township reference Monday, March 9. And also, it's my opinion that since the date March 9 was correct, the notice was sufficient to ensure that citizens
interested in the ordinance would know the date, time, and place of the public hearings. And this inadvertent clerical deviation did not mislead any interested member of the public and the township sufficiently comply with the open public
meetings act. Uh parathetically I would observe that uh in light of the number of people present uh both in this room the room behind this room and on the zoom uh I would submit that any argu uh
this would bely any argument to the contrary >> 64 people are on zoom as well. >> Thank you. Uh so that is all I wish to put on the record with respect to the notice of the public hearings. Uh with respect to the process,
uh it's been about a two-year process. Uh we're just shy of two years from March 20, 2024 when the amended when the Fair Housing Act was amended. Uh and uh a new process was established for the fourth round uh for the benefit of
members of the public. Uh, and I know we've done this before by way of explanation in town halls and and planning board and governing body meetings, but the fourth round is a 10-year period. Uh, it started back on July 1, 2025,
ends June 30th, 2035. uh and the amended act uh which uh takes further the Mount Laurel doctrine and the constitutional obligation that was recognized in the Mount Laurel one case
now more than 50 years ago in 1975. uh uh that constitutional obligation. Uh it the amended act two years ago provided a process through the court system uh known as the affordable housing dispute resolution program which
essentially provided for what I refer to maybe others do as well as two phases. The first phase I refer to as the number phase or the numbers phase. And back in the fall of 2024, the state through the Department of Community Affairs
established our township's number, what's called our prospective need obligation, the number of affordable housing units we must satisfy for our fourth round 10-year period
uh at 571 units. uh through the fall and spring of last year. Uh we as a township were successful in reducing that number to our fair share, I would submit uh from
571 to 375 affordable units, almost 200 units less, which would translate to approximately 1,000 total units less than what we might otherwise have been
obligated to provide for Since the for inclusionary developments, it's generally recognized that 20% is set aside for affordable essentially a 4:1 relationship between market rate units and affordable units and therefore that
much higher number of about 1,000 units. Uh that was a successful process by this township uh through that first phase, the numbers phase. The second phase uh began in earnest uh in June of 2025 this
past year when our planning board adopted and our township committee endorsed a housing element and fair share plan for the fourth round uh that was prepared by our professional planners.
uh that plan was prepared uh in order to satisfy that 375 unit obligation. It was filed with the court back in June and in August by a at the end of August in 2025 several
developers challenged that plan. Fair Share Housing Center challenged that plan and in fact there were other developers that sought to be included in that plan in order to uh address in part
our 375 unit obligation for the next 10 years. Uh I'm pleased to also advise that throughout that process in the fall and the winter uh we were successful in negotiating settlements and litigating
successfully where we could not negotiate settlements uh in order to satisfy our obligation which resulted in sever uh every one of the developers getting respectfully to them much less
than they sought uh to uh uh achieve. by way of development and densities of development. Uh and uh also some developers did not get in the plan did not challenge us. Uh one developer that did get in the plan did not get in
the plan, excuse me, that did not get in the plan did challenge us. We litigated with that developer and the program judge and ultimately the Mount Laurel judge sided with us and that developer whose development was found to be most
undesirable was left uh was uh excluded from and uh we were upheld by the court in excluding that developer developer from our plan. a couple of uh and in fact uh in February on February 5th, we
received from the affordable housing dispute resolution program judge an order that recommended uh that our plan be approved as effect almost exactly as drafted. I'll explain that in a moment. uh and uh approving
the settlements and approving our exclusion of that one developer I mentioned on February 24th just I guess not even two weeks ago uh the Mount Laurel judge who presides over this visage in that regard approved and ordered our housing element fair share
plan as recommended by the program judge to proceed also ordered that we maintain our and will maintain our immunity from builder's remedy lawsuits for the next 10 years as long as we adopt the housing
element fair share plan, which our planning board did back on March 2nd, and our governing body this evening has endorsed that adoption. Uh, and as long as we adopt the ordinances necessary to
implement and the resolutions necessary to implement the fourth round affordable housing plan, fair share plan. uh that is what is before the governing body and before the public this evening. I just wanted to briefly because I don't want
to steal all of our professional planners planners thunder but I'm probably stealing some uh address three or four points with respect to our fourth round plan overall. Number one, as she no doubt will explain
in further detail, that 375 unit obligation for our township over the next 10 years. 23 of those 375 units
are satisfied. That's more than 50% well more than 50% without requiring the construction of a single unit ever. And the reason I say that is we have 134
extensions of affordability controls which extend the time frame by which existing affordable housing will remain affordable housing and also 69 bonus credits. We maxed out as they say on the
bonus credits. That's 203 out of 375 units. uh well more than 50% of our obligation will not require the construction of a single unit in our township. As to the balance of those units,
we did not uh proceed with a vacant land adjustment. That will be explained in further detail later. But the reason we did not have to do so was we lowered our number so sufficiently and we were going to effectively have to have a certain
number of developments and units such that it made sense for us to protect the township over the next 10 years by not having what's referred to as an unmet need. So that now if we remain compliant with our plan over the next 10 years, no
developer can come in and say you have an unmet need as a township and therefore you must allow me to build even if you are immune from builder's remedy lawsuits. Also, all but one of the inclusionary
developments that are uh set forth for a public hearing this evening, all but one of them are on sites that either have or had existing structures on them. So, they are effectively
adaptive reuses of office buildings or other structures rather than vacant land. So, I think those are a few points overall regarding the township's fourth round plan that are important for people to understand and remember when looking
at the context of this process and the fact that every virtually every township in the state of New Jersey uh is required to meet a constitutional obligation for its fair share of affordable housing over the next 10 years. Uh, I firmly believe this plan is
the best plan. Not only that this township, but I I I defy anyone to find a plan overall that was better for any other municipality in the state of New Jersey that had a constitutional obligation. That's my own personal opinion. Uh, let me make that clear.
uh affordable housing just so people understand the context uh in our region region two which includes Mars Union Warren and Essex counties as an example
uh for a household of four persons a low income housing price for an affordable house for an affordable uh uh unit owner occupied unit is over $67,000.
For a moderate, that's over $108,000. Uh and the rentals uh for two bedrooms are 19 for moderate income are $1,900 per unit. Uh for a three-bedroom rental,
20 approximately $2,200 per unit. Point being that for the most part, this is housing for work for workforce housing. it's sometimes referred to uh the the moderate income
numbers are calculated based on 80% of the median or effectively average income of all all of us uh in this region low income being 50% very low being 30%.
Uh these are significant outlays of funds for owning even an affordable home and significant outlays of funds to rent an affordable apartment. So I hope that gives some context uh to the residents who need
this housing and who would ultimately occupy this housing. And as always in my opinion, I spoke more than I needed to or should have. Uh so I'll stop uh and I'll uh defer back to our mayor.
>> Thank you, Mr. Warner. Appreciate it. Well done. At this time, I will turn this over to our township planner, Elizabeth Laney, who will provide an overview of the township's fourth round affordable housing plan. >> Okay. Thank you, Mayor. Uh let me just
bring this closer. Uh so, good evening. I'm Liz Laney. Uh, and I am the township planner. Uh, and I want to just I I'm a partner at Phillips Price. We're a planning and real estate consulting firm located in Hoboken. Um, I have with me
tonight Mr. Paul Phillips, uh, who's my colleague and was the township planner for 15 years. Um Paul attempted to retire at the end of March um but remained on for Morris uh to help Morris um navigate this fourth round affordable
housing process. Uh and Paul and I worked very closely over the last year um with the other township professionals including Steve Warner, the planning board and um affordable housing council, Joe Vu, the township engineer and Jared counts uh Jared Caner council to the
township committee and obviously uh we worked very closely with the township administrator Tim Quinn who is our liaison to the township committee. Um, I'm going to go through this presentation tonight, this PowerPoint that has been on the township website
for the last few weeks and will remain on the township website. Um, the mayor asked me to just sort of go through the presentation and explain, but if I go too quickly or you miss anything, it will be up on the website and you can uh
review it at your own leisure. So, just I'm going to touch on a few things that Steve has already uh touched on, but you know, some background that there was the Mount Laurel court decisions in the 70s and then the Fair Housing Act in the 1980s and since then
there have been several rounds of affordable housing. um in each round the state or or a court uh assigned each municipality a number of affordable housing units that they had to provide within the the time frame of the round.
Um we are currently in the fourth round as as Mr. Warner mentioned and that is uh runs essentially from July 1st of last year 2025 and it will run through June 30th of 2035.
So this these are all the deadlines that we have had to meet. Um this was in March 2024. The legislature adopted an amended fair housing act and it set forth very strict uh schedule of deadlines for the fourth round. And
failure to meet those deadlines uh meant potentially a township losing its immunity to builder's remedy lawsuits. So what is a builder's remedy lawsuit? that essentially is a suit brought against the township by a prospective developer. Um, essentially accusing the
township of not providing for its fair share of affordable housing units. In the event that that happens and and the township is unsuccessful in defending itself, in essence, the township loses control over its zoning and a developer can come
in and provide affordable housing along with any other development um at their densities of their choosing, heights of their choosing, locations of their choosing. So, it's always in the township or any municipality's best interest to avoid a builder's remedy
lawsuit. Um, but as I said, there were very strict deadlines set out in the Fair Housing Act. And and quite honestly, when the Fair Housing Act was adopted in uh March 2024, I thought there was absolutely no chance that these deadlines would ever be met.
But here we are. And um as are many actually hundreds of other municipalities in New Jersey who are going through this process and having to meet these deadlines. Um, so this is, and Steve also touched on this. This is sort of Morris Township's um, participation in the
fourth round, and I'll I'll try to kind of breeze through it because Steve talked about it. Um, but in October 2024, the state said we had an obligation of 571. We uh, countered um, by the January
31st, 2025 deadline that our obligation was 307. um objectors had until uh the the end of February 2025 to object to our number which we did. We had two objectors, Fair Share Housing Center and the New Jersey
Builders Association. We then spent the month of March uh negotiating or mediating um or having sessions in front of the um program judge um mediating what our number is before arriving at an agreed upon
obligation for the fourth round of 375 units. We then had between April 1st and essentially actually the end of May to come up with a fair share plan uh just because the plan had to be noticed and given adequate time to be adopted by the
planning board, endorsed by the township committee and submitted to the court by June 30th, 2025. So it's a very accelerated schedule. Um we then have the a few months off uh
and the um but the summer um there's a summer deadline August 31st 2025 when entities the deadline for entities to challenge our fair share plan and as Steve mentioned we had three entities challenge us there were a couple of de
couple of developers as well as fair share housing center we then spent September October November really almost the bulk of December going back and forth in front of the judge and um the courtapp appointed
special adjudicator to get to a uh settlement agreement which was uh recommended by the program judge to the Mount Laurel judge. Mount Laurel judge just, you know, a week or two ago um gave us an order supporting our
approving our fair share plan uh and directing us essentially to adopt these implementing ordinances and adopt an amended housing element and fair share plan. And I I think Steve noted that the planning board adopted that amended plan last week and we're here tonight with
regard to the implementing ordinances. So, you know, as I indicated, um we had to put together a fair share plan relatively quickly. And I think one of there are a couple things that were important to us. Uh one was to maximize
um the bonuses that are available to municipalities with different afford uh different project types. So, because those bonuses are essentially free credits, you're not having to create additional units. you just are using bonus credits. We also were in favor of
redevelopment, redevelopment of um and in in this instance, there are three projects that we have that involve sort of uh I don't want to call them failing office buildings, but office buildings that were experiencing um vacancies and were sort of ripe for
redevelopment. Uh we also use special needs and supportive housing because the unit of credit is the bedroom and um the bonus potential is one for one. But probably uh the greatest um portion of
our plan was the extensions of affordability controls. And as Steve mentioned, this is extending the deed restrictions on existing affordable housing units that already are here in Morris. Um they're primarily projects from the prior round. It's a Rose Arbor
Village at Convent Station, More Estates, James Street, uh etc. And it was um if if the property owners agreed to extend the affordability controls on their units, uh we were able to take a
credit for that. And this was obviously quite beneficial to us because we this did not involve any new construction. Um and we were able to really meet over 50 you 50% of our obligation without
construction of new units which is somewhat significant. Um okay so what we have here today are the implementing ordinances um which we will discuss in greater detail as part of
each public hearing. Um and the ordinances involves 40 old turnpike road which is a group home 100 Southgate Parkway 300 Madison Avenue 291 James Street 60 Colombia 220 227 Sussex
Avenue. We also have a redevelopment plan tonight that's an amended redevelopment plan. It's a third round site and the redevelopment plan was in our third round plan. Um, and this is amended uh for the site, but the site
would still be used to meet our third round obligation. And that I'm ready to turn it back to you. Thank you very much. And again, I hope everybody listening, you understand and heard the amount of effort, the hard work, and the strict timeline everybody
was under to try to get this done. Thank you very much. This evening we have eight ordinances scheduled for public hearing and adoption. Each ordinance will be read into the record separately after which the public hearing will be opened for that particular ordinance. For each
ordinance it we will first take comments from those that are present here in the room followed by participants on Zoom. If you're on Zoom, please raise your hand to indicate that you would wish to speak. As a reminder, the public comment will be limited to three minutes per speaker per ordinance. Please limit your
comments to the ordinance that's being under consideration. Administrator Quinn will notify you when there's 30 seconds before your time expires. After all ordinances have been heard and acted upon, there will be an additional 3minut
general public comment period for any township matters. Madame Clerk, please read the title of ordinance number 04-26 into the record. 04-26 amending chapter 95 zoning of the code of the township of Morris by adding the
MFT th zone and adopting associated regulations 60 Columbia Road block 9301 lot 8. >> Miss Laney, you'll give a brief review of ordinance 04-26.
>> Yes, thank you mayor. Uh so as mentioned this is 60 Columbia Road block 9301 lot 8. It is 15.4 acres. Uh it is currently improved with two office buildings and associated parking. Uh it
has frontage on two roads or access on um and frontage on two roads Colombia and Whippy. Uh it's surrounded sort to the west by the bear um office complex, to the east by the Morris Museum, to the
northeast by the Holy Root Cemetery, and further to the north by the uh Freeling Eisen Arboritum. Uh across the street, directly across the street is the athletic complex. Uh it's currently in the O15 zone and it's proposed as as noted to be
in the MFT AH zone. Uh this it would permit on the 15.4 acres 382 units including 300 multifamily units and 82 town homes. Of the 382,
84 would be affordable. That's a 22% set aside. And because it is a redevelopment of an office building, we were under the amended fair housing act able to take 42 bonus credits from this project.
Thank you very much. Once we open the public hearing again, we'll begin with inerson people first. If you would approach the podium, um we'll take you one at a time and then after that we will go to Zoom. Everyone on Zoom, please raise your hand if you would like
to speak. May I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number 04-26? >> So move. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I I >> I. Is there anyone from the public who would like to speak to this ordinance?
And let's see. Is there anyone on Zoom? >> Nobody. >> Oh, we have one person. >> Hi, I am Regina Grich. I live at 47 Columbia Road, which is right there. Um, this road, I have no idea how you're
going to add 130ome homes. There is no traffic light anywhere around here with how much traffic that enters the sports complex with the amount of buses that go through there. It's
unreal. I do not know how you're going to have traffic, especially when the most dangerous road to cross right now in Mars Township is the road at um Normandy Parkway and Columbia Road. So, I don't know how you're going to add
another traffic light in the middle of it for people to make left and rights out of their housing. I think it's adding of a lot of people into this area. Um, also what's it going to do to the
schools um at Woodland because this is where Woodland School District and it is a very small school as is um for the public schools. I want to know what your what your thinking on this cuz I do not
it is that is not a safe road to cross. There's no crosswalks. If you're adding people who are affordable housing and they don't have vehicles, okay, then where are they going to walk? There's no crosswalks anywhere and you can't put crosswalks on state roads because
Columbia Road is a state road. It's not a county road. So, and I know this because I live on there and I couldn't put a crosswalk on my um when we built our house, we couldn't put crosswalks in or a sidewalk. So, I
just wanted to know what your specific planning was. If you're going to add all these people and you're thinking about their safety, how are they going to walk on that road? There's no crosswalks on either side and for the traffic for coming in and out.
It's just I don't see it happening. Thank you. Is there anyone else here? I don't see any hands raised on Zoom on this particular ordinance. >> Hi, my name is uh John Mustin. I live on
24 Laura Lane. Um I actually have a question on another one, but I wanted to ask here with the housing units you proposed, is there a developer that actually has proposed those 382 or are you just doing it based on the size of the lot? >> We're going to answer all the questions
at the end, but yeah. >> All right. Thank you. >> Uh George DeMarco, I don't live near this one. I live near the one at Sussex Avenue, but some of my questions pertain to the um the fourth round in general. So, specific to this location,
uh who owns those buildings? Are they compelled to sell them to you? um or is it eminent domain that you just take them for this developmental purpose? And the other question I have is we mentioned a couple of times set aides. I noticed that nearly all of the
locations for this development have a set aside that's 20% or very close to 20%. How did that number come up? And a related question is if we by virtue of um Mount Laurel have to provide a
certain number of uh lowincome homes, why don't we just build the homes? Why are we building five times as many homes? Because that's what you get with that 20% ratio. >> That's my question. >> Thank you. If there's not anyone else in the room
that would like to speak, we will take PR on Zoom. My name is um I'm curious to know if there's any um studies done for traffic because I believe that there's often major uh car
accidents between Columbia and Normandy right over there at that traffic light. So, I'd like to know um what's going to be done to keep those people safe. >> They need your help. >> Okay. Thank you. Seeing no other questions, no other
hands up on Zoom. Uh, Miss Laney, or would you >> Oh, I thought we're answering the questions. >> Oh, after we close the Okay, >> I move we close public public hearing on on 04-26.
>> Is there a second? >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I. >> Okay. And now we'll answer the questions on this particular site first. to you. >> All right, I'll start. Um, I understand the concerns about traffic. I understand
the concerns about schools. Um, in New Jersey, we have a constitutional mandate to provide affordable housing. and the courts and I I defer to my more uh learned attorneys um on on the deis and and at the table next to me. Um but the
courts have repeatedly held that these cannot be um impacts that mitigate or prevent a municipality from having to provide affordable housing. In other words, the traffic impacts the traffic the impacts on the school and
other infrastructure is um not a consideration towards lowering our obligation >> and that and that's everybody not just the township that's everybody. >> I think it's important to clarif >> the last the last resident who spoke and
I think this is important >> everyone >> the township isn't building any of these projects or doesn't own any of this land. This is all this is all developer driven and affordable housing driven. So the comment why are we why are we are we using eminent domain to buy these or
sell these? We're not buying or selling anything. This is all private entities and the 20% set aside is actually statutory. Um every development in town that goes up over I think it's 12 units has to have a 20% set aside of affordable. Um so that's statutoily
driven has to be at least 20%. Um and typically um what we've heard to make these projects financially feasible they build them at the 40 to the 4 to1 ratio the 20% ratio which makes I think that's how they came up with that number and that's the number that's in the statute. So all that is predetermined uh by the
state legislature. Sorry I didn't mean to cut you off. >> I just think that was important. >> If I if I can add as well as affordable housing council I concur both with uh Miss Laney and and and Mr. Caner uh with respect to trafficking in schools. Uh uh
that is the constitutional mandate and now a legislative mandate as well uh for all municipalities uh that we are governed and restricted by. Uh none of these sites and to be specific the Columbia Road site individually. These
are developerdriven. They're owned. uh the owner of the uh uh uh office buildings and the site uh I believe this is a and please correct me if I'm wrong uh my colleagues but uh uh this is with the consent of the owner the developer
contract purchaser would be developing this we are uh we are none of these sites involve eminent domain none of these sites involve the township purchasing the sites or the buildings um the 20 Mr. Caner is correct with respect
to the minimum 20% set aside. I think one of the questions was how did we get 22% here on this one and frankly you negotiate as best you can. You get as high as you can where and when you can. I believe it was primarily as a result of the density, the number of units on
this site which was also ultimately agreed to uh because of the location of the site uh and the fact that uh uh it is topography if I recall correctly is almost like a bowl uh so that you the site was determined by planners uh uh to
be able to accommodate more units than might otherwise if it were a flat or a burmed uh surfaced or topography. Uh so, but specifically the 22% was ultimately negotiated visa v the developer
purchaser uh and the township. If we could have gotten more than 22% we would have >> as far as the I'm sorry. >> No, no, go ahead. >> I was going to say as far as the uh why can't everything be 100% affordable? Uh there is one project that's 100%
affordable that's not related to our fourth round plan uh that many in in in the municipality are familiar with. Um but in order to get a 100% affordable project among other things, you need the land in that particular case that I'm
referring to that's not part of this fourth round plan. Uh we got that land for a dollar. uh the uh this land none of this land would we get for a dollar or anywhere near close to it. Uh you would also uh need a 100% affordable
housing developer. You'd also need what's referred to as lowincome housing tax credits which are very competitive uh to obtain if you can ever obtain them. And if you don't obtain them, the township bonds for the tens if not more
of millions of dollars that we would be on the hook for that we as residents would have to pay. Uh along for the millions of dollars that the land would cost. Um so unless we had somebody to give it to us, which we don't. Uh so
those are good ideas. Those are ideas that are not lost on anyone here. Those are ideas that are pursued by everyone here. Um where they're possible. Uh but where they're not possible, we can't do it.
And uh like everything else in life, um the pluses have the minuses associated with them. Uh benefits have costs in realistically. And they were uh with respect to 100% affordable. We got one that we could do. We we couldn't get any
here. Thank you. And mayor. >> Yes. Go ahead. Go ahead. >> Thank you. First, I apologize to the uh community that I'm not there in person. I had a pres-scheduled uh trip planned when we had to schedule the special meeting. Uh so I apologize for not being
there in person. Uh but Mr. Warner, just to clarify further, uh the uh property on Ultra and Pipe Road is 100% affordable even though it's a very small project and it's purchased by the municipality. Correct. >> Thank you, Councilman, and I apologize
for that. Thank you for pointing that out. >> I think I sold by the municipality. >> I'm sorry. Yes, >> it was sold by the municipality, not >> Oh, that's correct. So So I was wrong when I thought I was incorrect. I was actually mistaken.
Right. But but but uh yes. Okay. So I I I was correct, but but but that's still a good point. We did it uh we did sell that property. We had it at one time, but not not anymore. But it is it is a supportive housing. Uh and we do get uh
I think we have five bedrooms and 10 credits if I'm not mistaken. >> And it is 100% affordable. Uh >> well, supportive housing. So in essence, yes. There there's no market rate component. Correct. Sure.
And >> go ahead, Mr. Phillips. >> Thank you. So, I just want to address if I can, there were a couple of questions about uh traffic and I know it was addressed by other professionals. What I will say is that if this ordinance is is is ultimately adopted and at some point
in the future, a developer comes forward with a site plan application before the planning board, they will be required to do traffic studies at that time. And one of the things that in selecting this site for this development which was attractive to us was there's two means
of access both from arterial roadways. And I think a member of the public indicated that there was no traffic light at this intersection which is correct. And a determination as to whether there's a warrant or will be a warrant for traffic light at either of those roadways will come up during the
site plan application. And depending upon whether or not there's a warrant, there could be a signalized intersection, a new signalized intersection on one or both of those roadways. But that will be determined later on. I think another member of the public asked about, you know,
accommodation for pedestrians, which is an absolutely legitimate community concern. That is also an issue. If this ordinance is adopted and there's a development plan filed at some point in the future, that's another um issue that
will be addressed properly at the totally legitimate issues, but would be addressed that site plan application. I think a gentleman asked whether or not uh there was a development proposal uh for this site and there and there was. It's not the owner of the office
building. There is a contract purchaser uh who presented a concept plan which was basically discussed and debated with the township professionals and the township uh administrator and um there is no contemplated use of eminent domain. I think that was one of the
questions on the site. This would strictly put in place zoning uh and the township basically would only respond to an application for development if that is made. is taking no other affirmative actions visav this reasonzoning. >> Thank you.
>> And mayor, if I will, I pro promise we'll end this at a so we can proceed with other hearings. But but but Mr. Phillips makes an excellent point that I apologize for neglecting to mention earlier and it has global application to all of these uh uh uh sites and all
these hearings. And that is that this is the zoning stage. Uh and uh if and when there are developments that proceed under this zoning for each and every one of these ordinances, uh there will be a
site plan application at a minimum. It will be before the planning board of which I have the privilege of serving as the planning board attorney. uh and there will be public hearings and a hearing process and a full application
process uh that will take several months if not longer for each. So, and that applies, I believe, to to each of these applications, most if not all of them. Anyway, >> thank you, Mayor. >> Thank you, Mr. Warner. And I just wanted to say to the the resident, too, on the
sidewalks, crosswalk, same thing. Once these projects come before the planning board and once they're in place, anyone who lives in town knows what we have been. We've been putting in more sidewalk walks. It's a a big discussion. We more connectivity, better crosswalks.
We're doing all kinds of traffic calming. So on all these that will pertain when we get to that piece of it, those questions will be discussed, answered there, and ultimately probably a lot of those will be put in. This is
just we're not at that phase yet. Any any other comments from anybody on the deis? >> Yeah. Yes, mayor. Thank you. Just real quickly, I I want the public to to understand that the governing body, the planning board, our township professionals. One of the things that we
strive to do in visioning the future of the township so we leave the township in good hands when we all move on is to distribute the uh highdensity housing all throughout the town and within the highdensity housing we distribute the
low and moderate income units. So we don't segregate the the units um to one area as some towns might do. We don't segregate them within the community. We integrate them. And I think that that's when we see the
uh developer plans coming to the planning board, we're going to see um that realized in in writing. So, I just wanted to make that uh that point known. >> Thank you, Committeeman Rabbitz. And uh Sarah Schulen, I see you on Zoom, but we
have closed the public hearing on this ordinance. So, I see your hand up. I'm not ignoring you. um you will be able to speak on the next or any of the other ordinances as well as at the end. Uh seeing no other questions or discussions, may I have a motion to
adopt ordinance number 04-26. >> So moved. >> Second. >> Madame Clerk, roll call vote, please. >> Mr. Ravitz, >> yes. >> Mr. Janata, >> yes. >> Mr. Gazelle, >> yes. >> Yes. >> Mayor Grigia, >> yes. I, Donna J. Wrigley mayor declare
ordinance number 04-26 approved and adopted and direct the township clerk to publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as otherwise required by law. Madame clerk, please read the title of ordinance '05-26
into the record. 05-26 amending chapter 95 zoning of the code of the township of Morris by adding the TH8H2 zone and adopting associated regulations 221A/227
Sussex A block 601 lot 16 and lot 18. >> Miss Laney, will you give a brief overview of ordinance number 05-26? >> Sure, Mayor. Uh this is 227 Sussex Avenue, uh block 601, lot 16 and a
portion of lot 18. Um this is a 21.5 acre portion of the six 66 acre rabbitical college campus. Um you've got single family neighborhoods to the east and to the south. To the west is
Streeter Pool. Um Patriots Path to the north. Its existing zone is OSGU for lot 18 and RA15 for lot 16. Uh as noted, it's proposed zone TH-8-h
uh which would permit up to 175 town homes um on that 21 12 acre portion with 35 affordable housing units which is a 20% set aside. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number
05-26? So move >> second. >> All in favor? >> I I Is there anyone here from the public who would like to approach the podium? >> And and if you don't, you're you're welcome to get up, but if you want to sit, I won't go on until I keep asking.
So if you'd rather stay seated until you approach the podium, Okay, if we quiet, please. So, the first >> resident can speak. >> Good evening. My name is Andrea Herman. I >> Can you go closer to the mic? >> Sure.
>> I'm Andrea Herman. I live at 18 Ramblingwoods Drive. So, I'm that little culde-sac there. I uh >> can't hear me. I'm sorry. I live on 18 Rambling Woods Drive. That's that little U that's adjacent to where it's being built. Um, I think this is the only
unit, uh, affordable housing that will be built. Um, and there'll be 174 houses built right there next to what would be our little single family homes. Right now, that's the top, very top of the hill, if you will. So, everything else goes downhill. Um, including Patriots
Path, Streeter Pool, and then all of my neighbors are homes are homes that already get water. Um, and I know they did an environmental um, adjustment of plan, but I can't see how it's not going to flood. I walk Patriots path every
day, weather permitting, and if it rains a little bit, it floods. So, I'm not sure how building 174 units is going to prevent that. And I know as a community, we all love having our walking paths and such. Um, and we also worry about
traffic. I mean, that little U there um is adjacent to Lake Valley and Lake Valley does get a considerable amount of traffic and there's a lot of speeding. I have two children. There's a lot of kids on our little street. They all play outside and it's going to be to have
that much more traffic in the neighborhood is not going to be great for for anybody, especially all the people that walk everywhere. So, I think that really needs to be taken into consideration as we're thinking this through. Um, I had a couple other notes.
Sorry. Uh, and those were all notes. Thank you. >> Thank you, >> Jack Permont. I'm her neighbor at 14 Ramblingwoods Drive and I joined some of her concerns, but I have other concerns as well.
When the environmental study was done, were they aware that there's a huge amount of radon in this area? When I built when I bought my house, I as second owner I bought in 1978. They didn't do radon inspections back then. I did the radar inspection. My
pico carries per liter in the basement were over 300. Fortunately, I don't get water because I'm almost at the top of the hill. the house below us get water and radon and I had to fill my close close my some
pump holes close friend trains and I'm concerned about the water that will run off even further because of construction up here. I know you're not
I know the hotel owns that property. exist property being built by them because I know when they built on tika way for their married students and h married students and faculty part of that was allowed for lowincome affordable housing
why can't you build closer to taway instead of behind us or why can't I assume they're never going to finish road 24 beyond where it's now as a super highway why don't you take the right away behind Lake Road and build there that's flat area, not a
heavily wooded slope that's going to affect our houses with flooding and they're going to have radon. I know radon comes straight up. I'm not worried about increase rad on my house. I'm also very concerned that the house next door to us at 12 Rambling
Woods Drive has a small beginning of a street next to them. When the housing on our street, the 60 houses were built, they thought possibly continuing up into the street or property, the 60 acres before it was bought by the Bitical College.
Thank you. And when that was done, no cont was ever done. So ours is a U-shaped street with the only property the traffic going 16 houses that live there.
I want to know if you're going to give access into that property if it is built through our street or if that will continue to be shut off. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hi, I'm Amy Weiss and I live on uh 190
Drive which is on the other side of Sussex right here. And I'm very very familiar with this property. I'm not here to debate whether there should be affordable housing or not affordable housing. This property was zoned as wetlands. We
were not given the right of notification when it was reszoned. Maybe it was in some newspaper or something, but we certainly didn't get certified letters like we did now. It was zoned as wetlands for a good reason. That tickway area is full of water. They've had to replace floors floors in those
apartments and full of mold. the rest of the property is a hill going up down to like a river below. When they if they remove those trees and build housing, the water drainage issues that will affect those houses directly below and I
believe our houses on the other side of Sussex will be also dramatically like affected. And I know this meeting is just about affordable housing, but I do think you should consider the impact in the environment and the people who live
there. My other question is with the traffic, like other people have brought up, the increased traffic, 175 units, that's a lot of extra cars. Um, are you planning on expanding Sussex? I live right on Sussex. I have that question of eminent domain. Is the
township going to take my property to expand the road to make make for these, you know, traffic? So, that that's a big question. Um, yeah, water. The trees are going to go
and the hill is not going to be able to support the water that comes. We already get a ton of water. >> Thank you. >> And I'm on the other side. YEP. My name is Alan English. I'm live at 12 Ramblingwood Drive, which is the
property Jack just referred to. Uh I share the comments you've already heard about density effect on water tables and schools and I appreciate the comments you already made on that regarding the other ordinance.
some of that. I appreciate the tight position the township is in. My specific questions for this particular ordinance though are on this di or map, we still see a green
buffer between the reszone property and the neighborhood to the right. Is that going to remain and is that going to stay undeveloped? And the second question specific to what Jack referred to is, will the access to this bigger
property be off of Sussex or do you anticipate extending that road into to allow access from that grade? And the comment I would make is that would seriously change the nature of the neighborhood
over here, which is a very quiet, uh, low traffic, kids playing in the street kind of neighborhood. Um, and so, you know, well, those are my two questions. Does the buffer stay? Is
there any access off of Rambling Woods? >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Hello, I'm I'm Tolga Tani at you guessed it 11 rambling wood here that is a horseshoe shaped uh street. First, I'd like to thank really frankly the efforts
of the township's uh attorney, planning person, really everybody on the board here for the tremendous effort that you've shared with us that went into um how much you considered the impact of these projects. Um
um I became aware of the reszoning plan by way of certified mail from the township because I'm on adjacent property. Uh thank you. I accept that I'm late to the party and I don't expect to influence,
you know, state imposed decisions here. Um, these are 16 houses. I I'm just going to elaborate a little bit on my neighbors. I know everybody's name. We've lived there kind of fairly closely in a tight closed community and and
there are presently nine children on this block that are under the age of 12. So it's a it is effectively a playground and this little nub here that extends into this property is a concern for all of us for the really safety and
enjoyment of those children. Uh the tax map seems to show lot 18 to extend to all of these woodlands. And by the way this appears to be kind of the project with the most loss of woodlands. Um oh my sump pump runs every day of the year.
This is not seasonal. This is not storm water. So we appear to be sitting on water that eventually goes into the Whippony River. I like my neighbors, I'm very concerned that the loss of permeable ground and woods here will
cause significant water issues other than the sump pump. I have wet ground uh at at portions of the year. So these are some thoughts. Yes, Sussex Avenue is kind of the single artery that feels feeds the the town and all of the
schools except on the other side of course uh Freeling Heisen. So these are these are some of the thoughts uh I have. We are losing essentially open space in doing so. And uh I'd like
to find out uh what the town will propose at the planning stage to to in terms of concessions from the developers or um or concessions from the town in in their negotiations to um make this plan
successful. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I'm Charles Mayo at three Ramy Woods Drive. Uh, and I agree with my neighbors. I also am concerned about uh, quality of life. We love our community and it's a very nice community where
everyone loves each other and the kids out there have a great time and our street is a playground for our kids and I don't think we should that amount of units and that amount of traffic. I don't know if any of you have ever gone down Sussex Avenue >> every day >> and and you know how Sussex Avenue can
be add 175 units with lots of more lots of vehicles and people it could be a problem and I I can foresee it becoming a problem and I agree with them about the water issues because we've had water issues in the past but I don't want to increase it you know by by this
construction and the one main concern I have if you do all that and that water comes down what happens to our property values Thank you. Hi, I'm Dory Paul. I live at 25 Lake Valley Road, like right there. I've been
here 35 years. And the one thing that I always loved about Morris Township, was the care that the community and the government, you took to make sure that we didn't become overdeveloped.
And this one thing right here, this development right in front of a very small amount of homes is really going to change the fabric of our community. I don't It seems to me
like this is a done deal that we're all here expressing upsetness, but I don't know that anything's going to happen other than we've expressed our frustration. But the question is why does it have to be here? Why are we
taking such a large unit? I don't understand it. It will affect all of us. Sussex Avenue is a nightmare of traffic morning and afternoon. I live on Lake Valley. I just don't understand how you guys
could approve this. That's all I have to say. Thank you. >> How you doing? I'm uh Scott Gibney. I live at 17 Nwood Drive. My property backs up to Sussex Turnpike. Um I agree
with everything the other speakers were saying here tonight. the uh you know land here is at the peak of the mountain there or the hill that is Sussex Turnpike and removing all of the trees there that hold the roots and the water
system together will be detrimental to the water system for all of the property owners in the area. Um, I think it's also worth noting that of all of the ordinances here tonight, this is the only one that requires the demolition of
the wetlands and new construction. There is currently a very small road that maybe leads to the entrance of this property that is not exactly easily accessible and cars coming out of that
will get an accident when people come to the peak of that hill or around the turn going up towards town. I know that all of this needs to be considered when they put their build uh property thing together, but
I really just uh I'm concerned for the children in the neighborhood. I have two children under seven and uh you know with all the traffic that's already there on Sussex Turnpike. uh all the construction vehicles that are going to be in and out of the neighborhood and
building up the uh you know traffic on that turnpike and on Lake Valley Road and on Lake View. All of those areas are going to be built up with uh construction vehicles. I imagine the Lake View uh school field where we
all play baseball in the spring, use that for parking for the construction vehicles. I just see a a mass confusion happening and not to mention the noise, right? There's nothing to diffuse that and you're going to be taking down some
trees on Sussex that actually take up the uh you know natural hedge. So all very concerning with the noise there. >> Thank you very much. Good evening, John Petraco to Cadina
Road. Um, and my first concern when I came here was going to be the traffic, which has been really well expressed. But when I before I came here, I was listening uh via Zoom and one of the things that the council
seemed to be proud of is that affordable housing was sporadic throughout the township and not together. Well, right down here we have Rose Arbor, which is affordable housing. So, we're putting two affordable housing units in, I would
say, in one area. And I'm concerned, but my my main concern is traffic. Um, when the town homes were built on Cadina Road across from Foster Fields, it was my understanding that the developer was going to put a traffic light in at
Cadina Road and Mendum Road. that never occurred. I could be I could be wrong about that, but you know, and again, a Cadina Road onto Mendum Road in the morning or Cadina Road coming back in the afternoon is
quite backed up. So, I would like that to be addressed. Um and again just the quality of life that we have that it is a very busy street um very heavily traveled by um emergency squads,
ambulances, fire engines, stuff like that. So with that in mind, I I would hope that this would be voted down um as we already have affordable housing in the neighborhood. Thank you. >> Thank you.
HOW ARE YOU? UH, George Celerico, Blackberry Lane. We'll get to my neighborhood later, but I just had a quick point here. Uh, I believe your lawyer said that this was mostly adaptive reuse. You're just reusing existing buildings.
Well, you're losing open space here because part of this is open space, isn't that right? and >> you know so therefore this adaptive reuse doesn't work here and I wonder if you have any plans to zone to to to address our our loss of
open spaces which is a big problem in the township and if there you're going to reszone other areas uh to make them open spaces. Thank you. >> Thank you. Sir, hi. Go ahead. >> George DeMarco went back. Um, oh,
>> I live walk this is streeter pool. I live about walking distance from that. So, uh, as George Telerico mentioned, I think this is a huge mistake to to consider putting that number of units in that property. This is 21 1/2 acre of
trees and I've been in the township for 26 years and I have happily paid an open space um uh >> tax >> charge or fee with my taxes for 26 years to preserve places like this.
>> And I am certainly sensitive to the need for affordable housing. But to take 21 acres of trees and get rid of it for this project, I think is ridiculous. use some of that uh open space funding
to acquire most of this land. Let the uh the township float a bond and build the 35 units we need here and then provide them to the people that need that might take maybe
4 acres and you can preserve 17 acres of land. I haven't seen the township's books, but how much money is in that fund? I bet it could acquire most of this and still provide the 35 unit. >> Thank you. >> The other thing I want to know, as one of my neighbors said over here, this
lady, is anything that's said here going to make any difference tonight? >> Sir, we're going to take everybody. We're listening to all your questions and concerns. And I know this is hard for people to understand. Absolutely. Everybody on the tantrum committee who
sits on this Dis and if you were here yourself please understand we are listening to you we're taking notes these discussions take place in all the different areas transportation environment all these so I we do hear
you so we're going to move on we're going to give everybody to their chance but we do hear what the res >> time left in my three minutes I wasn't keeping track was keeping track >> the other thing this is a related question So there are probably >> you have one more minute left. >> All right. There are probably income stipulations for someone to qualify for
this affordable housing. So it's built, someone moves in presumably they do well, their their business, their career goes well. >> How long do they how long are they allowed to keep that house? And what check or balances is provided to make
sure that if they do well and you know they have a nice cushy household income that they vacate it for someone else who needs it. Thank you, sir. >> Steve Larrett and I live at Deborah Drive and I was just wondering, will you
make available to us impact studies on the following areas? The strain on utilities, school capacity, emergency response times, traffic congestion, parking shortages, pedestrian and child safety,
incompatibility with the existing fabric, reduced noise and privacy, diminished property values, loss of green space, and most importantly, non-compliance with the master plan of
the township. Because one of the basic tenants of master plans is that growth in housing density should be based on slow growth not instantaneous spikes in the number of units which is what this
is introducing. >> Thank you sir. um Lee Goldberg. >> Okay, so let please everybody I know especially if you've been up to speak, we have a lot of people waiting to speak. So again, appreciate the
enthusiasm everybody has, but please give the people who are waiting the chance to get to the podium and let us hear their concerns as well. >> Uh Lee Goldberg, 10ourhead Road. Um I was a little late in getting here, so I guess you're taking questions then addressing them all at the end. Um, it's just a point of clarification as I was
reading through the ordinances online on the planning board sort of agenda page where they're all referenced. Is it correct to assume like some of them like 4-26 had Kushner's names next to it? 526 has the rabbitical college. Are those the actual developers? Two of them had the Toll Brother names. So, but on
tonight's agenda, there's no sort of developer name affiliated with each of the ordinances. So are those names that are on the planning board agenda and tied on the planning board page the actual developers of these properties? >> We're going to direct we'll answer the
questions. Each ordinance we're answering all the questions. >> Okay. So for this particular is the rabbitical college would they be the developer of the project or that's just trying to get clarity on it. Thank you. >> Go ahead. Hi Pam Russell, 31 Lura Lane. I do have questions on 100 Southgate um
later, but on this one I just don't understand how you take open space government use zone and then reszone it for highdensity housing. It is like people bought next to open space zone and I don't understand that process of how that can happen. I also want to
comment just on the process tonight in general. if you just approved 60 Columbia Road and then you said save all the comments on the process till the end like when how do we comment on the process? So I think um first I think the public notice I would disagree um with
the attorney. I've retired from the private practice of law, so I haven't done municipal land use in a while. But when we had to do notices, they had to be very precise. And I think if it said Wednesday, March 9th, that is confusing for people and people could think it was WEDNESDAY
and not it's very ambigu ambiguous. And when I had to when I practiced municipal land use law, we would have to renotice for that meeting. Um, and then, you know, I would just say that if we have comments on on the process in
general and you save it to the end and you've already approved all the ordinances, how do we raise those? And and those type of process questions are like what the previous speaker said, are there concept developer concept plans that you have on files that we haven't been are those public? Can we see them?
Um, you know, we can't save those questions for the end if you're voting on each ordinance as we go. >> Thank you. >> Go ahead. >> Gloria Karsten, Nin Spring Hill. Uh
happily I am not directly infected affected by some of the situations these sad situations I'm hearing about and the concerns that everyone has. I just have a general question that goes across all of these proposals. It seems as if we're building five times the number of units
that are necessary given that only approximately 20% of these developments will be affordable housing. Now, I'm sure everybody agrees with the need for affordable housing, but why build 374
units in a tiny area rather than 75, thereby having a much more significant impact on the quality of life in that area. I I'm I'm not understanding that. >> Okay. Thank you.
Uh John Mustin 24 Laura Lane. Um just two uh questions or or clarifications. One is we're reszoning the land. Um correct. Uh is that just a one-time deal for this developer or is that going to be reszoned for forever just in case the
developer's plans fall through? will that always be now that zoning and then uh you know understanding that a developer then could come on years and years later and just come and develop it into that same space. Uh and then the second question is uh before this law
got passed I assume there was previous payments to the township for affordable housing. What where is that money? How much money is it? And what are you doing with that money? and why isn't that going towards buying or or working with developers to kind of reduce that land
utilizing that money? So that's it. >> Thank you, >> Terry Hadzena. Um I have two questions with the open space uh government use the OG um uh the OSGU designation. Is that dedicated open
space? Does anyone know? Um my understanding is is that if the town or any town has taken state funds to buy open space in any part of their town, they're asked to list other areas that are open space and they become dedicated
open space and then to develop that I believe you have to go through quite a few loopholes on the state level to be able to develop that dedicated open space. Um my second question is that since people are saying that there are wetlands there, uh does the township
actually know if there exists um actual identification and um classification of wetlands on that property? And if so, how again do you get around state regulations? I know federal it's been weakening under our administration
federally, but statewise, how do you get around the wetlands state regulations for building there? Are you going to remediate somewhere else on some other property? Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hi, I'm Juvia. I live at 49 Alexandria Road and I'm not adjacent to this at
all, but um if the Rabbitical College is the uh entity that is developing this, I'm presuming they're doing that to provide housing for the people who are either working or worshiping at the biblical college. It it can't be
inclusionary. So >> yeah, but yeah, but they can still but they can >> sir. Okay, just ask your question. Ask question. >> No, I just because I was just worried that the people who worship there do not drive during any of their holidays and I
would just be concerned if there are literally hundreds of people trying to cross Kadina Road on Saturday mornings and Friday nights with kids. And that would be my only concern is that would be a nightmare on Cadina Road if you just had pedestrians
so that there's a lot of people walking. >> Yep. We'll address that issue. And >> hi, I'm Peter Gallerstein. Um I live at 38 Laura Lane, so I'm I'm not next to this project, but I have a question. it. I I think it's really nice that we as a
community, no one objects to affordable housing. That's not not one, you know, no one has said, well, I don't want this type of neighbor or that type of neighbor. And I think most of the concern has been about quality of life
and safety. I I just have a question and I hope you can answer it and and I hope our comments have some effect on how you vote. If you needed a I'm just going to pick out a number. If somehow the 20% was a was a 100 affordable housing
units, couldn't you just build or have someone build? And I realize you'd have to get a builder, but if you found someone who said, "Fine, I'll come into Morris Township and I'll build 140
affordable units." Could you do that without building 500 units? I mean, >> we'll answer Peter >> 500. >> We'll answer that question.
>> Well, I'm I'm just saying, but I mean, I'm just we'll address that question for many years. So, please 5* 1 is five, right? >> Um, we'll address that. >> I I hope you can address that question now. And I hope that the effect of all of these people, we have 150 between
here and outside doing this that this that it's not a done deal that you will will take the feelings of a lot of people and and not just pass seven ordinances tonight. >> My name is Mark Levy. I live at 63
Alexandria Road and I just wanted to echo the concerns of other people about the land use. Um this is the top of a hill. Um you're talking about putting 175 units on this parcel and from what I'm
reading there the structures are going to be three to four stories on top of a hill right here. I'm just saying that's totally out of character with this neighborhood. There's no other than the Tickway I think development which I think is only two stories. These are all
single family homes. It's not it doesn't belong there. Not to mention the fact that it's uh the environmental impact on the river. It is wetlands and I can't see how you'll possibly pass an environmental review. And if you do, I'd
like to know how you did it. Thank you, SIR. Seeing no one else in person, I'd like to have Sarah Schulen ask your question. >> Sarah, >> hi. >> Hi.
>> Good evening. How are you? >> I uh I just want to My question actually isn't specific to this property. it was more relied even though I do live uh in this area. But um my question was also to sort of echoing
other questions uh just hoping you guys can provide a little more clarity on for example things like when you say that um you know a a developer will only do 22% um affordable housing and and you know
if we could get more we'd get more. So, if you could just clarify a little more on what that process looks like, um, you know, when you're sort of vetting these developers with their proposals and what it, you know, how is it that no one is willing to take, uh, more than that? And
if they're, if a developer isn't willing to take more than that, why not, you know, sort of do a s a share a, you know, a development share where the town takes x amount of the responsibility of, you know, with the developer. That's I'm
just curious I how it works um if you can provide more clarity. And then the second thing is also asking for more clarity on uh for example with the Colombia office building development. Why not use eminent domain uh on that
kind of you know like an office building structure um and actually just build the majority of um you know the fair housing obligation the you know the sorry to
build the majority of the lowincome housing needed um by the township in order to satisfy your almost the entire obligation for fair housing. why not you know um use use eminent domain in that
way. So the the just basically point of clarity questions if you have time thank you so much >> Brian O'Shea Mr. Rohe, are you there? >> I'm here. Sorry, I was on mute. >> That's okay.
>> Okay. So, uh, first I'd like to thank you for this round four presentation. It's been very informative and it's great that um you're considering all the input of the residents before making these very monumental decisions. And at the outset, I'd like to say I'm not here to oppose affordable housing. I
understand the town's legal obligations and those obligations have to be met. But meeting a state mandate is not the same thing as good planning. And my question is simple and it goes to the heart of responsible planning. Has the township evaluated the full cumulative
impact of all these developments together? Over the last several years, we've approved several major residential developments. Patch Road, Colgate, Menon, Honeywood Reds, the Abbey, each at a significant density. Now round four proposes additional highdensity
developments across multiple carters. On top of that have we analyzed the combined effect not project by project but cumulatively combined traffic combined school enrollment combined fiscal impact combined strain on
infrastructure at full buildout. Before moving forward residents deserve clear answers to four questions. burst as aggregate traffic were mowled across Columbia Road, Sussex Avenue, Madison Avenue, Southgate Parkway, James
Street, and Hanover together at peak hours, and if so, where can that analysis be reviewed? Second, what student generation rates are being used for these units? More importantly, how do these assumptions compare to the actual enrollment outcomes from prior
developments in this township? Third, what is the true net fiscal impact per unit once municipal service costs and service costs are fully accounted for? And fourth, how have pilot agreements affected the distribution of tax revenue between
municipal government and our schools? These are not abstract concerns. Traffic congestion determines how quickly an ambulance can reach your door. School overcrowding drives property taxes upward and crowded classrooms reduce educational outcomes for our
children. Infrastructure deficits become long-term capital costs that residents carry for decades. These questions are not about politics. They are about whether the township is making decisions based on a complete factual record. Residents have the right
to expect that projects are done right, not simply approved and moved along. This means protecting parkland. It means avoiding access roads to parks where alternative exists. It means designing for real emergency apparatus under real world conditions, not theoretical access
that works only on paper. If cumulative analysis has been completed, publish it. If it is not completed before additional approvals move forward. Transparency is not an obstacle to progress. It's what makes progress responsible. We'll continue to engage conservatively and
make our voices heard as round four proceeds. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> David P. Do you have a question? >> Hi, good evening. Thank you for your time. Uh my name is David Padilla. I live near Lake Valley Road. Uh, as someone who was raised in low-income
housing and proudly owns a home in Morristown now, I commend your efforts for providing affordable housing. Um, however, I agree with what many of my neighbors have been sharing regarding the wetlands and the proximity to being on the top of a hill. Um so questions
are uh has a storm water management study been completed to evaluate how this will affect drainage and runoff and surrounding properties? Um some nearby neighbors already experienced significant groundwater issues. And uh
also regarding the environmental impact um given the hundreds of trees affected by this project, have there been any considerations for the wooded areas and the wildlife habitat that currently reside there, the deer, the birds, the
foxes, etc. And uh finally, if these studies have been conducted, uh will the township provide them to residents and allow us time to review before any final zoning decisions are made? Thank you. >> Thank you.
And PR, you have your hand raised. >> I'm sorry. That may have been done by mistake. >> Oh, okay. No problem. No worries. Oh, we'll take one last question from the podium. >> Thank you. My name is Len Abless. I live
in the Foster Fields development. Thank God I live high, but I know what everybody talks about with the water issues. I guess my concern is listening to all our concerns and putting it forth before the panel is that this was worked
on for over a year. These sites were picked, it was presented, it was passed on what they was done. And now I'm looking at it and it says there is seven days for us to meet our
state obligation. which means that if you vote down any one of these sites, we are not within confirmation of what we need to do in the time frame that was presented to us. So, it seems to me that
every one of these are going to be approved and then we're going to have to deal with the impacts that the all the residents are bringing forth regarding, for example, the percentage of increase in population
and I see all these new luxury town homes going all around the township into Morristown and I still see homes for sale, rentals 53 built these two giant warehouses which are still open and no
one is taking them. So I just don't feel that there's going to be that you are pressured to have to vote every single one of these sites forward otherwise the township is
problematic. Thank you. >> THANK YOU. OKAY, THANK you for the comments on the 227 Sussex Avenue. We'll now have the professionals Oh, >> oh, I'm sorry. Is there a motion to close public comment? >> So, move second.
>> All in favor? >> I >> I >> Okay, I don't Who wants to start? I know uh Joe, you'll have some questions to answer as well. They're going to answer. >> Okay. >> Okay. I I actually am going to punt to
Joe B to discuss the storm water and the wetlands >> and the wetlands. Joe B, our engineer. >> And one moment. I'm just seeing whether or not it's feasible for me to uh present from my screen, but I don't
think so. He's just checking his computer for something to see if >> he can Can everybody hear me? >> So, uh, two of the the larger concerns that were that were just discussed are the the presence of wetlands on on the
property as well as um the regulated areas associated with that and um which also includes flood hazard areas. So the the Whipony River is uh a freshwater non-traout producing freshwater two
classification. It's not a category one of the state of New Jersey. So it doesn't have the highest level of riparian buffer on it, which would be a 300T buffer. Uh the buffers on the Whippony River itself for
riparian are assumed to be 150 foot which is the second classification tier down. Um and that riparian area uh would then be delineated in an application to D by the developer at the time of the
development. Uh the Whippony River, as many of you know from walking the Patriots path, which is on the far side of the river, uh does bend towards this subject property and it somewhat echoes the blip that we see the depression in
the zone shape uh towards the property. And so if we look at the bottom side of Tikvo Way and across that zone boundary that's being established in this ordinance and out to Lake View Road,
that's effectively a straight line of where the regulated areas of freshwater wetlands which are currently assumed by D uh and not not fully delineated and verified exist on on that this near side
of the Whipony River, the the wetlands per D's guidance are relatively shallow to the extent off of the Whippony River and then they then reflect with regulated buffers off of them as many as
say 150 ft which is coincidental to the riparian area. uh the area that's being zoned is outside that regulatory buffer that's anticipated for these areas from the de you know from the perspective developers analysis as well as our
internal township analysis. So we would anticipate regulatory buffers affecting only the the top of the portion of the development the nearest to the river. Um when it relates to
deforestation, removal of trees for the replacement with impervious surfaces, uh our state has been going through a series of storm water management rule amendments and flood plane flood hazard area amendments over the last couple of years under the Murphy administration.
Uh most recently that culminated at the end of his term uh with the signing of the last NJ pact regulations which further reinforces the requirements for mitigation. Currently, uh the removal of the trees and
forestation does have a mitigated requirement for tree replacement uh either onsite or then in kind replacement towards uh opportunity by by payment for the municipality to reforest
in other areas and supplement other areas within the water. >> Please. >> Okay, everybody, let him finish. I'm going to give I'm going to give you the facts. What as it relates to the increase in storm water runoff, this would be a
major development. That major development would be analyzed for a 2-year, a 10-year, and a 100red-year storms. And in compliance, the peak flow reductions from a 100red-year storm are significantly
decreased uh by by a series of percentages of of respectively 50 75 and 80% of those peak flow of volumes. Uh that that analysis also includes an
impact to groundwater and an evaluation of the amount of permeable surfaces that are replaced such that the mitigation must exceed the recharge back into the ground of the
existing condition. So the depletion of that area will then be balanced by the design to ensure that the groundwater is not negatively impacted either in excess or in detriment of the groundwater table.
>> Okay. >> Mr. before before others address anything else as a lawyer and not an engineer my understanding and please correct me if I'm wrong uh Mr. which is that at the site plan
stage, any developer would have to address storm water management and would have to please correct me if I'm wrong because I may be wrong. I'm a lawyer, not an engineer. The uh uh they would have to reduce the magnitude and the
rate of the flow of the water coming off the development towards other properties. Would that be correct? How do they do that? >> Storm the state storm water regulations. >> That is correct. >> Okay. to be reviewed specifically
uh by me as the township engineer and the board engineer uh to the state standards and then also while applying for flood hazard area permits related to the riparian as well as the um freshwater wetland permits or sorry flood hazard for flood
hazard area impacts riparian impacts and wetlands they would also be reviewed by the state agency itself at D land use and they're engineers for storm water impacts not only to the Ripony River but to all surrounding uh properties.
>> Thank you. >> Thank you. I may be able to help on some other things but I just wanted to help on that one. >> Thank Mr. Warner. Thank you, >> Miss Laney. >> Mr. Mr. Phillips. >> I took in no particular order, but I
think uh I I'd like to address some of the issues that were uh raised. of one I think there was a discussion about three and fourtory buildings here. The height limit in this zone is three stories and
the market rate product is limited to what I'll refer to as a conventional townhouse meaning there is no multifamily housing uh other than conventional town houses that are permitted for the market
rate units. In other areas, we allow stacked town houses, which is units vertically stacked amongst uh one another. And we did that uh acknowledging that this is a site that is surrounded by single family development. And we wanted to have even
though it's a different product and a product associated with inclusionary development, we wanted to have a product which we thought was the most compatible with single family homes. We did it at a density uh here which is compatible with other inclusionary zones that the
township has reszoned historically in areas that uh basically include uh single family housing and certainly I will acknowledge that there's a will be a change in the character of this site and this area. Any development basically
of vacant land will have some impacts and we will acknowledge that and many of those impacts including things such as storm water, flooding, traffic and so on will be properly addressed at the time of uh site plan approval. There was a question about the uh uh whether the
OSGU zone was dedicated open space here. It is not. It's not either uh dedicated or green acres property. It's just zoned for uh open space which allowed us to move forward with the zoning to take that portion of the site that is now
zoned OSGU and to uh basically put in place a uh inclusionary housing uh zone. Um there was a question about whether the zoning is temporary or not. And I guess the short answer is it's it's in place until it's changed. Uh and
obviously if the township committee were to adopt this ordinance this evening, this new zoning would be in place and obviously it would be in place in part to assist the township in satisfying the fourth round obligation. anything can happen. Uh but the zoning quite frankly
and I don't mean to be flipped but it it's in place until there's some new other zoning that >> I could just add I given our agreement with fair housing center it would require fair housing centers consent and the court's consent to change the zoning at any time in the future if these projects weren't built
>> zoning runs with the land but but I would concur with both Mr. Caner uh and Mr. Phillips it may not it that would require that for purposes of our comp compliance with our affordable housing obligations. >> There was a question about a concept
plan and for most of these sites uh basically we had the opportunity to review uh either concept plans or iterations of concept plans with the uh prospective land owners and developers. The concept
plan here was quite rough. As you all know, there's no detailed engineering on this site at this point. And this site, as you know, has some uh challenging topography. And ultimately, there won't be a detailed site plan until detailed engineering is done. Obviously, again,
if the township committee decides to move forward with this uh ordinance, there was a discussion about whether the rabbitical college would be the developer. Uh and while uh there are some uh experienced developers amongst
the Rabbitical College sort of executive team, uh it's our understanding that the Rabbitical College would uh probably not be the developer, but would contract with a a developer to build the lands, but that remains to be seen. And basically this zoning just puts in place
the ability for any developer to build in accordance with the regulations that are part and parcel of the uh zoning. Uh there's no >> I can just add on that one. I apologize for interrupting uh but Mr. Phillips, but and we are not allowed as by law to
zone only for certain owners or occupants or developers. Uh so that is that why uh what Mr. Phillips says has to be the case. I'm sorry. Go ahead. >> It's okay. There is uh no pilot agreement. There was a a question about there's no it's not a redevelopment
site, capital law redevelopment. So there's no pilot agreement associated with uh any development on this property. There was a opinion stated about this is not compliant with the master plan. I think as Miss Laney and
others mentioned just a week ago, there was a consistency review by the planning board and they determined that the zoning was consistent with the master plan plan in that the housing element fair share plan is part of the comprehensive master plan. There was a
question about access from roads other than Sussex Avenue and based on the uh concepts that we've seen the access would be uh limited to Sussex Avenue and there's no contemplation at this time from any other access from any of the
other local residential streets that were cited by members of the uh members of the public. I think you addressed someone said this property zone for wetlands. It's not zoned for wetlands and certainly there's no demo of wetlands as Mr. Vuch stated. There are
state uh regulated wetlands which uh any developer would have to abide by uh and they are protected based on that state legislation and regulations. There was a mention of radon. I don't know about I mean this is the first time we've heard about uh radon on this property. I I
certainly am not in a position to address it. It might come up again at a at a site plan uh meeting. It certainly would be an appropriate question uh at the site plan stage. Um I think the only other thing which Steve you may want to
address was the why not green buffer areas or green buffers. Uh and I think that may have to do with portions of the existing OSGU zone that are not part of this uh resoning
meaning lands outside of the >> outside. Yeah. >> Thank both. So so to address that and some related this is uh some related questions. It was a question concerning open space and
and and how deep into uh uh uh that area this particular development might go. Uh as part of this proposal and this zoning uh or at least associated with this zoning uh there is the provision for
approximately 25 acres of open space area uh to be maintained uh by way of a dedication to the township of a conservation easement and preservation of that 25 approximately 25 acres as open space. Uh so
that would also have trails that are the responsible responsibility of the developer. Uh there are also uh buffers including 50- foot wide buffers and portions of that property uh to dovetail off of
what what Mr. Phillips was just discussing the uh that it says portion I think yes po portion of lot 18. Lot 18 is a much larger lot.
Um I can do it to music too, but but uh uh um I've been told I'm sometimes lyrical like that. Uh but the the uh but it's a portion of lot 18. Uh so the balance that you see up there, I don't do screen shares and and point
with lasers, but uh all that green up on top and around is is going to stay. That's preserved. That's part and parcel of the roughly 25 acres to be preserved. that also provides for in part additional buffers uh between the
proposed development zone I'll call it uh and the uh and the residential properties in and around it. So hopefully that helps and that's only some of the agreements already made by the
prospective developer as to uh uh providing for open space buffers and the like. Um trying to make sure we answer or as best we can everything. Access to Sussex was already discussed.
Uh when I mentioned adaptive reuse uh the gentleman I think it was Mr. Telerico, if I recall correctly, uh if you'll recall, I said all but one of the sites involves uh a site with uh that has or recently had structures existing
on it. Obviously, this was the one site that doesn't. This is the one site uh in the entire township uh that would be new construction, so to speak, not an adaptive reuse. Um Trying to see if there's anything that
wasn't already covered by someone else. Um, I don't know the exact balance of our affordable housing trust fund, but I don't believe it would be anywhere near uh what we could utilize to to buy um
any one or even a significant portion of any one of these sites. And as I explained earlier, uh maybe not everyone was here for that. Um lowincome housing, uh excuse me, 100% affordable housing, which we were able to effectuate on a
site not related to our fourth round plan that's in a on a different road. Um uh requires you to have the land. Uh requires you uh generally to provide payments in lie of taxes. uh it requires
you to generally have low-income housing tax credits or other mechanisms of funding and if not it generally requires you to and even if you do as a backup requires you to bond for tens of millions if not more uh that taxpayers
like us residents of the township are required to pay. Um so uh where it's feasible uh uh it's obtained and where it's not it's not I guess is the simplest way to put it.
I don't uh and we uh uh in zoning you cannot as I said before restrict occupancy or ownership. Uh the zoning goes with the land runs with the land. So someone asked I think about uh whether the rabbitical college would it would just be worshippers andor people
that work there. No, we uh that's there's no limitation with respect to market rate housing and certainly there's no limitation with respect to who is entitled to be a potential recipient or an occupant of the affordable housing
and I think that's it. >> Uh quickly though I just want to make sure because I know you talked a little bit about Paul about the topography there and how it is. So the question about the trees and you know anytime there's a development in the removal of trees >> rem
>> so could I don't know if I heard the response they're asking about how many trees are going to come down here and we >> we understand it's going to be a widespread area of the track that would be deforested to to accommodate that. So
there will be extensive surveys that identify the caliber of all the trees and then uh identify the required replacement schedule. >> Replacement that's what I wanted to address this >> to the extent practical it would be done as part of the development plans that come to our planning board. >> Y >> and where there is a balance that can't
be provided it would be addressed through uh payment in loo to the township tree fund so that it could be replenished throughout the watershed and other areas. >> Exactly. So that that would help with that situation of the water. >> And and again, there will be public hearings on uh if and when it got there
a site plan application where that and many of the other concerns that were rightfully expressed by residents would be addressed at that site plan stage. Again, this is the the zoning stage, not the uh site plan development stage.
>> When might that be addressed? When could we find >> if if and when they get to a point where they have fully engineered plans and in wish to proceed uh they would have to prepare an application, provide quite a bit of uh documentation. All all board
uh excuse me, all board professionals, municipal professionals would be involved in the process. uh and if and when it gets to the point of being deemed complete and and the hearings scheduled, those are noticed and there will be public hearings on all these
detailed development issues at that time. Can't predict when um >> but there'll be a notice that the certified >> there'll be the applications will be pending. They'll be on the website long before even the notices go out. uh and then they'll be the applicants themselves would be required to make the
notices uh with certified mail publication uh and the like and then uh uh interested members of the public anyone one and all can come to our planning board uh and be a a part and parcel of the open public meetings and public
hearing process. >> Thank you >> Mr. Jan Committeeman Janata or Deputy Mayor Janata. >> Yeah. Uh full first full disclos disclosure I'm the current chair of the Whipony River Waters waterershed action committee. Um also the lean is on the
same is a volunteer group. So I'm not um even paid for it. So I was noticing again that the Whippy River is there also that there's two tributaries on either side that flood flows in there. And as uh some of the residents have
mentioned, it's a known flood flood zone. Um is this area here uh uh said to be a flood zone or is it just uh north the park north of that? >> The the park the part of the open space
that's north of of the zoned area, the zoned boundary uh is does not overlap with the flood plane. >> Okay. Yeah, the the 100-year flood plan for Morris County was just revised by D and FEMA together in joint mapping
products. That mapping product looking at that most current in the last few months and being issued uh is outside of that area. And can you explain to people what a riparian buffer is because you mentioned a few times not sure if anybody
>> the so riparian buffer is um you mentioned just that the offset buffer from the top of bank of the river to establish a natural vegetative corridor >> for uh natural water quality improvements. So the the general concept
being that runoff going through vegetated stabilized areas, wooded areas, wetlands and other uh common vegetation nearest the waterway provides the best water quality cleaning to remove sediments and other debris so that the water is
cleanest as it enters the river and then it improves the water quality of the river itself. Is is there currently a riparian buffer there or >> there's a riparian buffer on almost every well on all regulated waters of the state of New Jersey. Um this is not
a category one which is 300 foot. >> The next level is 150 foot and then there is a 50 foot or zero buffer that would be applied. The 150 foot is identified to be most appropriate for
this site. um assumed pending DP verification based on the species and habitat in that area of the wetlands and that elevates it from a potential lowest level of a 50ft buff >> and is this site currently considered
open space or now would they have they have to reszone it? So it the OSGU zone permits open spaces, okay, as well as educational use and other public facilities. >> And a portion of the zone, the proposed
zone is residentially zoned as well. >> Right. So, and as it relates to dedicated open space, the nearest open space, dedicated open space tracks would be our pool facility municipally. And
then county open space being the Patriots Path, which is on the north side of the of the Whippity River. That that long narrow track you see there in the tax map outline, that is preserved open space on county rolls. >> Okay. All right. Thanks.
>> Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions from Committeeman Rabbitz? >> Thank you, Mayor. Uh, just a couple of things. There were a couple of points that I want to see if I can um restate in in English, so to speak. Um,
one of them is, and and this has come up now a couple of times, why can't we just build um all our affordable units in one spot? Uh, and that and this was this was addressed uh number one to acquire the land is it would be prohibitively
expensive for the township. We don't have that kind of money. We are not in the business of development. Um there were so many stipulations that would need to be in place to do that that it's not something that the township committee, this governing body is
considering. We do want to make sure that we as I had mentioned earlier distribute low and moderate income housing throughout the um the township to the extent we can control it and that is one of the main ideals of what we're
trying to do here is to stay in control of this process and not be subject to builder's remedy. So building it 100% affordable in other than a small um uh parcel on old turnpike road isn't really
feasible. Uh I've heard a lot about you know the environmental impact here and how it changes the character of the town and as Mr. Phillips had had stated it does and that's unfortunate um especially to those who drive by the area and like to see the pristine you
know wooded areas and um we all on the township committee and I'll speak for all of us we are environmentalists we do care uh and we also a few of us serve on the planning board so in in one of the questions that came up was when is this
going to happen what studies are done and this again I will restate this going to happen at the planning board level when um something moves from beyond a concept of a plan to something that passes through our review committees and
becomes uh an application that needs to be heard in front of the planning board. One of the things that our our engineer had mentioned is that um New Jersey storm water regulations have drastically
been changed and updated uh recently which we have been on the township committee trying to comply with and we are in compliance with that. Some of that is you know the loss of trees um storm water runoff. Again this is held at the planning board level and as to
Mr. Dvuch's point when we substitute permeable land for imper impermeable land uh with a a development such as this the um the upgrade to the land so to speak upgrade
to the land accounts for the storm water runoff. So in other words there will be less water runoff after the units are built than just nature taking its course. So in actuality it will be an improvement to
the land. Uh even though we are losing some of we if we pass this we are going to be losing some of the uh character of that part of the town which I guess I think we all kind of lament that. Uh we much rather see you know um redevelopment of of office space but
this land is owned by the rabbitical college. This is you know theirs to do what we they they can with it. the plan, the concept of a plan look good. Um, and I think that it's going to end up being beneficial to the town in the long run. Uh, even with the destruction of some of
the trees which will be replanted and if they can't be replanted in the new um site, they will be replanted in other parts of the town so we don't lose our canopy. And with that, mayor, I I think all those are all my comments. Oh, there was one more. I'm sorry. There was a
question of when we might see plans. Uh, as was mentioned early on, this is a 10-year round four. We could be seeing plans uh next month. We could be seeing them next year or in five years. We don't know. When they've completed the
process and it comes before the planning board, that's when um all of this will come up again. And again, we encourage because there was a lot of great input from the residents to come to that planning board meeting sometime in the future and voice these same opinions
because the planning board is going to be very receptive to what you what you're saying. >> Yeah. Thank you, Committee Rabbits. And by the way, there are several planning board members in the audience tonight, which I think shows the level of commitment and they too are always up on
top of every thing that comes before the planning board and ask incredible questions and everything you're bringing up that everybody's raising these issues. When at when you're at the planning board meeting, they are everybody the professionals and everybody on the planning board. I think
they're tougher than the residents. They are >> some of them are. Yeah. >> Yeah. So, um, appreciate the input. Uh, Committeeman Grael, you have anything? >> Uh, no, mayor. Thank you for asking. >> Okay. Just making sure you're still with
us there. >> Yep. >> Okay. Um, at this point then, may I have a motion to adopt ordinance number '05-26? >> So, moved. >> You're out of order, sir. I'm sorry. Why
don't you respond to his question? >> Public comments over. >> The public comments over. You have time. Everybody want >> you can come up during the next >> May I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 05-26. >> So move. >> First, >> second.
>> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Griselle? >> Yes. >> Mr. Rabbitz? >> Yes. >> Mr. Janata? >> No. Mayor Griglia. Yes.
>> The ordinance is adopted. 31. >> I, Donna J. Geriglia, mayor, declare ordinance number 05-26 approved and adopted and direct the township clerk to publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as otherwise required by law. Madame clerk,
please read the title of ordinance 06-26 in to the record. >> Am I reading it? >> 0626. >> So, just let's get everybody out. Just 30 seconds. >> Sorry,
>> we're sir. We're in the middle of the meeting. Would you step back, please? >> You don't approach the day as we're still in the middle of a meeting. If you're if you want to leave the meeting, you're welcome to do so, but we're in the middle of the meeting. The clerk is
going to read the next ordinance. Thank you. >> Okay, sir. do it. >> Ordinance 06-26, amending chapter 95, zoning of the code of the township of Morris by adding the
TH15 ah zone and adopting associated regulations 300 Madison Avenue, block 8601, lot 4. >> Okay. Miss Laney, will you give us an overview of ordinance 06-26?
>> Yes. This ordinance uh relates to 300 Madison Avenue, block 8601, lot 4. It's approximately 8.1 acres. This is the JC PNL building. It's bordered by three streets, Madison, Punchbowl, and Old
Turnpike Road. To the east are the railroad tracks that are Yeah. Sort of to the southeast are the railroad tracks and the Morris County Golf Club. To the west and south are office buildings. It is across Madison Avenue from Crumman Foster. Um to the south are other town
home developments including the Brownstones and Liberty Green. The existing zone is the O-15. Proposed zone is TH-15- AH. Uh the zoning would permit 118 town
homes and stack town homes. uh 24 affordable housing units uh which is a 20% set aside. We would also are be able to or we have also in our um uh mediation and settlement agreement with Fairshare Housing Center taken 12 bonus
credits because a it's a redevelopment of an office building and two it is within a half mile of transit as it's close to convent station. >> Thank you. I realize too there are still people that are having some side conversations,
but if you could please let us proceed so that everybody can hear the people that are here that still want to listen. It's hard to hear. So in both rooms, if we could keep the the noise level down, may I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number 06-26.
>> So move. >> So move. >> Second. >> Second. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I. Please approach the podium if you have comments. Hi, I am Chrissy Krunquist. I live at 20 I'm sorry, 7 Windingway uh
which is off Kitchell Road. Um I am currently living between development in Geralda of 200 units by Floren Park. Uh Madison uh Madison is doing 200 units in Geralda.
They're doing 400 units of low-income housing and apartments on Madison Avenue in front of Drew's property because they saved the forest on one side of town and are now putting 400 units on Madison Avenue. Um I'm also dealing with traffic
from Park Avenue, Floren Park that is also putting in units at St. Elizabeth over 200 units. Um the traffic on Old Turnpike Road on Madison Avenue um is horrendous. Um I can't get out of
Kitchell to make a left to go into town anytime between 3:30 and 6:30. It's a death trap. Also proceeding down to Woodland off of my street. I there must be at least an accident every two three
days. Making a left out of there is horrendous. Um because also at the end of my street, Harding is putting in 75 units of low-income housing. Um so I think the area itself, although perfect
for a transit community, I do agree with that, but the volume is just too much for the area. There are too many traffic incidences. Um, also to get to schools, our school, middle school, public school
is Flor is um, Freeling Heisen. So I live on the exact opposite side of the horseshoe of Mars Township. So to get across town to pick up a child in that school district takes over an hour each way during traffic times. You have
to leave so far in advance and sit and wait for your kid to get out of school. Um, so thank you. Thank you. My name is Ashley Smith. I live in Liberty Greens, which is right there off Punch Bowl Road. Yeah, right over there.
Um, I'm not opposed to affordable housing, but I share the concerns of my neighbors. I grew up in a bluecollar household. I always dreamed of living in a town like this, a town I never knew existed until I went to college here. I was enamored by the greenery, the downtown, the architectural interest of
the unique and quaint neighborhoods. I loved it so much that I made my life here. 15 years later, I moved my family here, and I am not here by the grace of anything but hardworking good parents. I am still paying for that education, but I'm here to prove that if you work really hard, you can live in a town like
this. But how long will Morris Township be a town like this? How long will it be an aspirational place to live if it becomes degraded by forced urbanization? We keep hearing the term fair share, but I think most of the people are here in this room to tell you that none of this
sounds very fair. And while we can all debate law and legislation, we can also call this as we see it, which is the prioritization of developer interests over community interests. And what is at stake here is changing the very thing
that makes Morris Township what it is. Its suburban charm and downtown appeal will be traded for forced urbanization with a quick injection of volume that will put stress on all local infrastructure, roads, schools, utility. It will tra it will change traffic
patterns, reduce open space and lack cohesion not only in aesthetic but in overall congruence with the community, our community. A community that is not only will it be subjected to the tangible stressors that you've heard, but intangibly changed through the
dilution of stability, safety, and the investment in its long-term residents. the dilution of the essence of community. Safety is a primary concern for most of us here, especially the parents. The safety of our roads, the walkability of our neighborhoods, the safety of our children, and the safety
of our quality of life. There are plans already being executed for two other communities on Park Avenue, technically in Floren Park, with an additional plan on Punch Bowlull Road behind Liberty Greens itself. This is less than half a mile from 300 Madison Avenue.
What I would like to be explained to me is why there is so much concentration of units to be built in such a small radius. And do you all speak with the municipal m sorry municipality of Floren Park as part of the planning process
given our shared border and community. My neighbors have raised several concerns here. Overall, seemingly many have not been materially addressed. Um, we lack cumulative risk assessment and we're now closing in on a deadline. Um,
forcing the hand of the community in earnest and in the spirit of real-time feedback, I would suggest that the board reassess their meeting procedures and project planning moving forward. >> Miss Smith, you're at your three minutes. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> Hi, my name is Jessica Greater. Um, I
also live in Liberty Greens. Um, and I am here a agreeing 100% with my neighbor here. But, um, also, you know, I'm a teacher. I live local. I'm a teacher local. And my concern, not only to this volume, is what is this going to do to
our schools? How is this going to impact our students, our schools, our teachers, and the community as a whole? Because the schools are really what help to drive people to come here? People move here for our schools. people, you know, if we want to have a community, you need to have people raising that community. And if you're going to overcrowd our
schools, and like the woman two people ahead of me said, there's already such congestion getting to and from schools, it's it's only going to make it worse when there's that much congestion also in the school. I know how hard it is to teach a room that is overcrowded. And if that's a situation that we're going to
have, as a teacher who taught in Marstown High School with an overcrowded room 5 years ago, I can only say this is going to make it worse. and that's a dis disadvantage to both our students and our community. I'm not going to reiterate everything else and just thank
you. >> Hello, my name is Terrence Smith. I'm on Six Independence Way, also in Liberty Greens. My first question is uh can the specifications that are listed in the
ordinance be changed at some point in the future by some kind of amendment. And I'm particularly interested in the specification for the 30foot setback
minimum for Punch Bowl Road. Um, having gone out to that uh area this afternoon, I discovered that the 30foot setback would basically remove all the trees that are on Punch Bowl
Road uh to the east side of the existing JCPNL building. The JCPNL building is something like 100 150 foot back from Punch Bowl Road. So my question is
assuming that this is going to be developed at some point, can that setback be expanded to move the edge of the building uh much further uh away from Punch Bowl? Uh my second question
is because Liberty Greens is set up the way it is, everybody there uh is a co-owner of the common property of the development, which means that the areas
immediately adjacent to the uh traction line and the trains all belong to 170 residents of Liberty Greens. And I don't think we all received notice of this even though it was stated earlier that
notices were supposed to go out to everybody within 200 ft of the zone. >> No one got >> um and my third question is uh thank you
very much. >> Thank you. Yeah, all over. >> My name is Jolie Elmore. We live at four Shepard Place, uh about two streets over from where this is going to happen. My my main concern has to do with the traffic. Um Shephard Place is already a
major cut through area for um the massive traffic on Madison Avenue, which is only getting worse. Um as many of you know who travel down that road during rush hour, Kremlin Forester has to have a police crossing guard there so that those cars can even get out. um during
rush hour which continues to back everything up. So my massive issue is with traffic and with our road Shephard Place who have young children including three of my own now becoming even more of a cutth through because Madison Avenue is so jammed up and if something
is going to be happening also an old turnpike uh it's just going to increase the traffic load and I'm very concerned about it. I also have um just a just a just a bad feeling and others have expressed this that what we're saying isn't really being heard because it seems that this that these decisions
have already been made. Um and I just want to express my concern over that. Thanks. >> Thank you. >> Hi Megan Burke. I'm at 8 Shepard Place. Uh in I'm also a member of the township economic development advisory committee.
Proudly a member of it. I've been on the that board since 2023. And I joined at the time when we had were just in the middle of the board was in the middle of preparing the Madison Avenue corridor study. And I can tell you that it was a labor of love for the committee. Um and
it uh we interviewed uh so many local residents in the area as well as all the local businesses with the aim of getting a handle on you know what does the future of the Madison Avenue corridor look like. um and the volunteer hours of of the residents that went into
commissioning that study just like all of you are doing your time but but it was a lot and it was very carefully considered and I can tell you that 300 Madison Avenue is exactly the opposite of what was recommended in that plan. Um
but but one thing but but our comments here tonight I understand uh the remitt is is to be limited to the zoning that's being presented. Um, but the reason I raised that plan is because one of the the key takeaways was that we need to preserve the setbacks on Madison Avenue.
Madison Avenue is a historic street and the way that it was constructed was everything was built far back from Madison Avenue. U just that's the historic that's the way that it was developed and in order to preserve the character of our community, it was so key to the residents and even the business owners that that be maintained.
And so when I saw the zoning for this plan and and read that it was 30 feet setback on Madison and also uh another resident from Liberty Green mentioned it was also I guess 30 ft on Punch Bowl as well. That's at odds with the 50 ft for
the four turnpike development. You're have a 50ft setback on Sussex, 75 ft on Columbia Road, 50T on James Street. Um, and then I believe there was also for the Southgate property, the setback um for Laura Lane was 50. And so I'd like
the committee to address what the thought pattern was, what the thinking was behind, um, giving Toll Brothers a 30foot setback for the 300 Madison Avenue uh, development um, and why residents are putting their committee members are putting in their time to
commission studies. that was adopted unanimously by the township committee when it was presented by our eminent chairman Lean Gallagher um and then was summarily ignored in the negotiations for this uh this site. Thank you. Thank you.
>> Um Lee Goldberg, 10Hourhead Road. Um, I guess I have a question for our planners or township committee or business administrator that can answer this sort of dubtailing of the previous woman's comments on the Madison Avenue corridor. Um, and the area that's being impacted here. I believe from the round three we sort of have two hold over sort of
redevelopment plans. I think one is on the agenda for later tonight on 95 Mount Campbell. I think there was another one that was actually on the St. Elizabeth's property. So, if there's any update to what that plan is or what's going on with that as it sort of impacts our overall need to address um affordable
housing, if there's any update on on what's else is planned for the or what was considered in the past on the um St. Elizabeth's property, that would be great. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Uh John Mustin, 24 Laura Lane. Uh just to kind of follow up um just because it
wasn't addressed and I I also agree that I don't think this process works because a lot of comments or questions made aren't really addressed all the time and I understand there's a ton of questions before but just uh regarding with the previous payments to the township about
from developers uh for affordable housing um was there any uh action or or or uh plan or or to go to developers to buy down buy addition affordable housing. So, we could reduce some of the buildings that were going,
meaning this one has 118 homes and there's 24 affordable housing. Taking some of that fund money and giving paying, we're partnering up with the developer to get 48 units out of it because the bottom line is the developer is not there to build houses. They're
there to make money. So, and if we're taking money from developers previously that I, like I said, I'm not really sure where that money is going, but I do know there's been years of payments towards affordable housing. The question comes, what is that money being used for? And
why aren't we trying to buy additional uh affordable housing so we don't have to do 10 or 12 developments? That's all. >> Thank you. >> My name is Paul D. Antonio at 10 Crescent Drive. Uh question I have is we've talked about spread in the
development throughout the town. It's interesting though that two of the highest density developments based on units per acre is the Columbia Turnpike and the Madison Avenue. The 2425 per acre for Colombia and almost 17 and a
half for Madison. So, it just seems an inordinate amount to be located just in this side of town. Uh, besides all the development everyone else has commented on, we know Floren Park loves building
uh their development in everybody else's backyard. So, you can't avoid what happens there. Uh, the other question I have, and this came up with the restoration hardware, the intersection of Punch Bowl and Madison Avenue and
Canfield is that's a horrible light. There is a light there now. It was worse obviously before the light went in. Will that be adjusted? Especially if we're talking about a new development being put there. So, it's going to make what
is a a bad situation even worse. The third thing that I'd like to ask is as the plan board looks at these developments and they have issues with certain setbacks, environmental, uh, water, flood, how married are we to
these numbers? In other words, if you're saying you're going to get 32 units of affordable housing here, 20 over here, and the overall number is X, if the planning board looks at what the the builder's
plan is and saying, "No, we can't do this because of some other issues, are is the town, what is plan B if we can't be able to build the numbers that are being proposed now and what is Yeah. What happens at that point?
>> Thank you. >> Hi, Pam Russell. Um, I just want to point out um for everyone's benefit on this one that the setback on Madison Avenue is 20 ft. So, if you picture what an anhouse building will look like on
Madison Avenue, that is hardly any setback at all. They just built an apartment building in Madison down near Staples. So everyone should go look at what Sure. >> Um they built an apartment building in Madison close to the Staples Shopping Center all the way on the road with no
setback and that's what an apartment building will look like on Madison Avenue. It's a tw They've given a 20 foot setback which is very little. So this will forever change the nature the character of historic Common Station. It's right in the middle of Common Station, an area with, you know, wall
where we have glass um gas lantern street lights were smaller than regular street lights. It it's a historic charact you know character. This project will forever change it. I also want to say that I watched both planning board meetings that went through this process.
It was the same process where this many large developments were approved in one meeting. there was no detailed discussion and questions from the planning board publicly at least on each project delving into these issues. And then the other thing I would say is when
you say don't worry about it. It'll all be taken care of in the site plan process, we all know that that's down to details on the trees and and type, but when you're already giving the density, that's that's it. It's over. You're saying you're giving the developer they
can build this that that it will be zoning as of right. So once we're in the site plan, we're down to the real details. And if you haven't analyzed traffic and density and and everything for each project, it's you you are
changing the nature of the township in one fell swoop in one meeting doing this many projects. In the past, these type of projects would have take each one would have taken months. And the other thing, if you're that afraid of builder lawsuits, the builder's already drafted
the ordinances for you. It can't get any worse than this. So it is you set we are taxpayers we pay the salaries of the experts and the experts sat with the builders and drafted the ordinances. So that's how so everyone can understand
how the process. Thank you. Gloria Karsten 9 Spring Hill Lane. I was doing some calculations. If you figure that there are 1,500 new units added to the existing number, the existing housing in Mars Township,
approximately 2.4 4 people, which may be conservative per unit, you come with up with approximately 2,000, I'm sorry, 4,000 new residents in Morris Township, which is approximately a 20% population
increase. My question is how can Morris Township accommodate and h how how is it planned for Morris Township to accommodate a 20% population increase clearly as one speaker mentioned there
would be would be a significant impact on schools certainly on the roads and other infrastructure as well as the overall quality of life having huge massive housing complex on every another corner. So, I guess my opinion is that
if we can't address how we would accommodate a 20% population increase, we shouldn't be doing anything until we can address that very fact. Thank you. Axelers, I live on Barbar Road, so just
past these town houses. Um, no objection to affordable housing. That's all fine. But I'm very much objecting to the process and how you are conducting this meeting and this process leading up to this meeting and uh how we are arriving at these decisions. I think this is very
inappropriate how this is handled. Um, and while you're of course inviting the public to speak here and we're able to be here, um, clearly it's not been adhered to or listened to anywhere to the degree that it probably deserves.
So, for a zoning to change, um, and I'm not going to repeat everything else that has already been said. I'm I'm I think that's been addressed enough. Um, but how do you reverse it? Uh, ever, of course, you're not going to. Uh the specific question that I have is
commuter traffic. So whoever is going to presumably reside here at the property in discussion is likely going to go to convent station for commuting at least a certain portion thereof. So what specifically has been studied as far as parking uh at convent station. You may
say people are going to walk probably not. >> Thank you. >> Uh Mr. Gazelle, your hand is up. >> It's not Gel. David P. >> David P. >> David P. >> Oh, I'm sorry. Oh, that's old. I'm
sorry. Okay, go ahead. >> Hi. Uh, Amy Bernstein, Merl, 3 Glenn Road. I have the distinct honor of living across the street from 299 Madison, the 24-hour lab 7 days a week that opened last year. Um, we've already
discussed the traffic. Uh there is a policeman there at about 3:00 on Madison Avenue near 300 Madison every day. The backup goes all the way down. It can go as far as to halfway down to uh the town
of Madison. Um we've already discussed that. The two questions I have I have actually three quick ones though. The first one is is it the policy? I know that I got a certified letter, but I thought we're also supposed to get something in the regular mail, which is
what I got with 299 Madison. So, that is something I would like to know since there are all these new um things being built. Uh the second thing is regarding the numbers. I understand uh some one of the gentlemen up there had mentioned of
course you can't put all the affordable housing uh in one place but again I just want to kind of push this point home. Why do there have to be so many other units being built? Okay. And then the
last thing is um this whole beautifification thing. I was in on all those meetings. I thought they were great. uh the corridor and how this was going to be a different vibe than Morristown and everything else. It is, as the other young lady said, um
completely in the wrong direction and it is something special about this area that we all love and we're proud of and it is just being scraped away. And lastly, um you know, they added the Starbucks, the Duncan, and the um and
the uh the child the the little uh child care center there. And that was all on the other. So when I wake up in the morning, I have there's like there's a lot going on and it's not nature. Um so I'm just disappointed. Thank you.
>> Thank you. I'm Robera D. Simone. I've been a resident of Convent Station Beachwood Drive for 44 years. I've been here many times. Um I'm just curious as to who is going to vet the developers. What kind
of building plans are we going to be able to see? I live obviously close to JCPN and L off Beachwood on Beachwood Drive. By the way, trying to get out of Beachwood Drive in the morning while everybody's driving 75 miles an hour up
Old Glenn Road. Sometimes my husband has to stand in the road and stop the traffic for me to get out. But anyway, um is there going to be any kind of vetting? Um what are the proposals for the building that's going up on uh the the JCPN now? Is it going to be the
existing building or is that going to be raised and new building put up? Once these buildings are up, whose responsibility is it to make see that they're maintained properly? I moved to Convince Station because at the time it
was very charming. Um, it had a great reputation. I love the look of it. It is now a strip mall between JCPNL and Friendley's. I mean, all of the places. I did not receive a letter when the Dunkin Donuts proposal was up
and um I was within the proper area to have received a letter. That was a surprise. And then also it was a surprise that that huge TD Bank sign was going to be turned into the Dunkin Donuts sign which I thought was going to
destroy the look of the of the avenue which it did. Um, if you've ever been in Chadam, they took their Dunkin Donuts and it was a charming little store. This thing looks like something out of a hunky tonk. Anyway, let's not make it any worse than it is on Comet on Madison
Avenue. It's impossible. The traffic is just absolutely impossible. I don't know. Is there something else that can be done with that property? Very good. Also, I'm going to squeeze in here the Abbey. For the last six years, I've been asking. It's a It's a
disgrace. I don't know what this township board is doing with it or what the developer is doing with it is nothing. It's a disgrace. It's crumbling. That beautiful mansion is crumbling. They're giant piles of soil in the parking lot. It's an eyesore and
property values probably have been diminished because of it. Thank you for your time. >> Thank you. Hi Oxanayati 5 old um so first of all I'm questioning your roles and why you are sitting even here
each time we are doing something and we as residents of this place um here and voting for something right you are saying everything is going to be okay I'm going back to 299 which is basically across from my property you were saying
that everything is going to be taken taken care of and everything is going to be totally fine. Um, right after we handed that in, right? So, everything goes wrong. What the minute we call township, they're saying you have to call call senator department or
somewhere else, right? So, basically what you are doing, you're just basically putting the check mark on each of your line. Whatever you have to do, but do you care about us? We actually put you in those chairs. So you truly have to do something at least consider
something what you are doing for us not for somebody else. Somebody mentioned already Abby now you're adding this housing right and you're adding so many units. Did anybody talk about even how is it going to be? We are already about
crime rates. We are already above the crime rates average America right now the last few years all the crimes that we had in the neighborhood. Um now even in the morning when I have to exit and go to work I'm praying that the police officer stands next to my property
because I cannot exit. This is all Glenn to go to medicine is a problem. To go to woodland is a problem to go to turtle is a problem. How am I supposed to kind of like how are we supposed to function like this? And you are doing like you are not listening a single word what we
are saying. You're basically saying very nice and fancy words right we are going to do this. This is going to look like this and like that and like that. Nothing is like that in reality. Nothing truly nothing would be done before. Nothing works the way you projected. And
now you are saying this is what is going to happen. It's not going to happen like that. 100% it's not going to happen like that. Who's going to be responsible for that crime rate? Yeah. Thank you. >> You have one more minute. >> You have one minute. Thank you. >> David P, your hand is up. Is that It's
been up a while. Okay. Okay. Is that it? >> Close. Motion close. >> Close. Yeah. >> Uh, can I have a motion to close the public hearing on ordinance number? So >> second 526.
>> All in favor? >> I >> I do. Do you >> Okay, Mr. Phillips. >> First thing I want to say is I can assure >> I can assure everyone in the public that the builders did not draft the
ordinances that the township committee is considering this evening. Um, and then I'm trying to go in the order that the comments were made, mayor. Um, there was a comment about there are several comments about traffic in the
area and the ability for the site to handle the traffic. There was a comment there's too much volume already. Uh, needless to say, as we've said before, there will be, you know, the detailed traffic studies at the time of the site plan approval. But I will say that one
of the >> Okay, everybody let him finish. >> One of the things about this site is there are three potential points of access. There's frontage on three roads and there is the potential to sort of
diffuse traffic into and out of the site at the very least because of that uh because of that fact. Second, there was a comment about the density and that it was too dense at this site. Um, first of all, this is clearly a redevelopment site. Um, and we also as the township's
professionals thought it was a very good housing site in part due to its proximity to uh, convent station. But I will tell the public that we had a number of proposals for this site, including proposals at higher densities
with a strictly multifamily product that we thought was not appropriate and out of character with the surrounding area, including the exit surrounding town houses and single family homes, which is why this zoning limits the product type
to a townhouse uh product. There was a comment about a concentration of units in this uh area. Uh we can only obviously address what we can address in Mars Township. Uh and I will say that uh
for all our rounds of housing, the first through the fourth round, uh the township's housing plan has been able to disperse units geographically throughout the township. They're not concentrated. And there are a number of other municipalities that have concentrated
the units and I think as a member of the public mentioned some of the surrounding communities put it on the border of adjacent towns including in Mars Township and unfortunately Mars Township has no control over what Floren Park or Madison can do unfortunately.
>> So there was a comment about the 30foot setback from Punch Bowl Road. Actually there was a question could it be uh could it be increased uh that if you if you basically there was a concept that we work with this
prospective developer uh on this property and based on that concept and the zoning that's being considered this evening uh and again the zoning which strictly limited to town houses uh and to achieve the total yield and affordable units the the short answer
the 30-foot is no. If you want to do a townhouse, you can't increase the setback. The only potential way to do that would be to go to another product to get the yield out of the site that we need out of the site. There was a concern
there was a concern expressed in relation to that setback about trees being removed. Uh the issue of whether or not trees are going to be removed from that setback will be the subject of site plan approval. Uh and certainly there is always the potential if uh
there are existing trees outside the building envelope to potentially maintain those trees. That again is an issue that would be deferred if this ordinance is passed to site plan approval. A similar comment was made about uh the setback with regard to the
Madison Avenue corridor study and if the setback's being uh inconsistent uh and that the setback's deficient. It's really the same issue. The reality is is if you're familiar with the site, it's not a very deep site from Madison
Avenue back to Old Turnpike. There's only so much room to accommodate uh development. And again, the only way to even potentially get a larger setback potentially would be to go to a different prototype, meaning
multifamily, meaning probably a four to fivetory building with structured parking. the only way to achieve the the density that we're achieving with limiting it to town houses and the township's professionals felt that that was inappropriate and out of context
with the uh immediate uh neighborhood. There was a comment about a question about the St. Elizabeth property on Punch Bowl Road. Uh and the answer to that is the zoning that uh was adopted back in our third round remains uh in
place and uh that zoning uh still uh would allow for that site to be developed uh to satisfy in part the township's third round uh obligation. So that remains in place today with no
changes proposed uh this evening. Mhm. >> Um I think those were my com I defer to Liz and Steve and and Joe as well, but those were comments that I had. >> I'll just add there was a question about
what happens if we can't the we don't build these numbers and really by law we're required to create a realistic opportunity for the development of affordable housing which we are doing with these zoning ordinances. If the sites aren't built, but they over the
next 10 years, but they remain a realistic development site, that is sufficient for fair share housing center. Um, and and and ultimately what we need are the affordable units, not so much the market rate units, but our
constitutional obligation is to provide the realistic opportunity and and that's what we're doing tonight. >> Thank you, Mr. Warner. >> One other Mr. Phillips and then Mr. >> I have one other comment. There was a comment made about um the increase in
the population from all this development. >> Uh and again I will just reiterate as all the professionals were is we have a constitutional mandate to meet this obligation. Uh and the other thing is is that I just will say that the increase
in the population will be nowhere near the 20% that was I think represented by the member of the of the public just based upon our knowledge of the number of units and the existing number of households in the township. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Warner.
>> I'll I'll try to hit most of the ones that were not already addressed by our planners. I think someone asked who vets the developer. I'm not exactly sure what they meant by vet the developer, but uh there was also reference to who maintains the properties etc. Uh if and
when these realistic opportunities and uh if these zoning ordinances are adopted uh when a developer comes with a developed land development application, there'll be a site plan process. It'll be heard by the planning board. Part and parcel of those processes uh generally
include things like developers agreements uh which would set forth between the township and whoever would be developing the project uh what the responsibilities of those developers are. Uh so we are not allowed to regulate who owns who operates, who
occupies, who develops. Um, but we certainly have tremendous amount of control over uh uh uh uh what their responsibilities and obligations are if and when uh they're given an approval by the planning board. The the um there was
a concern about a policy of someone got a certified letter, not a regular mail letter. Uh the the um the law requires certified mailings uh to a certain portion of the public. Our township generally has a policy where possible uh
to actually expand beyond that uh and to send regular mail even to a further uh group of if I recall correctly between 200 and 400 ft around the perimeter of the site as opposed to just within the 200 ft. here uh we went the step of
sending certified mail to everybody within 200 ft not only of these sites you're seeing on the screens but 200 within 200 ft of the perimeter as I recall of the larger existing zone
within which these sites are located. Hence somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand or more certified mailings. I'm glad you got the certified mailing the uh and and uh and certainly uh uh uh
every members of the public avail themselves of the opportunity to be here, which is a good thing as well. Um the the additional questions that might be pertinent to the attorney plan. Uh I think somebody mentioned that they saw
there was a planning board meeting and they didn't feel as if there was enough of of public input. Uh if you're referring to the last planning board meeting of of a week ago, that was the master plan consistency reviews for these ordinances which led to this these
public hearings this evening. It's part of the same process. the um uh Miss Laney mentioned that there would be we we're obligated to provide a realistic opportunity for the development of affordable housing and
that obligation continues. Uh the uh as part of this process, the state uh will be doing or I should uh uh a bidpoint review uh at five years in to see where we are in the process. So the obligation
continues throughout the fourth round uh and if uh determinations will be made at that point as to the progress being made with our realistic sites uh and uh if things need to change at that point it's
conceivable that they would uh but no one knows until we get there. Um I'm going to stay away from the planning and the engineering. Um again there was reference uh to uh where
does the affordable housing trust fund money go? Uh that is uh uh first of all part and parcel of this whole process has been and continuing will be uh that we uh have limitations as to what we can
spend those funds on uh as we uh collect them and we have to track and we're audited on an annual basis by the state as to what's coming in and what it's being utilized for. Um I believe and others can speak mo much more specifically than I. Um but certainly
you heard about those 134 extensions of affordability controls that resulted in uh together with the bonus credits more than half our obligation uh being satisfied without a single unit ever being constructed. uh as required by
law. The uh in order to uh obtain those additional extensions of the existing affordable housing uh restrictions on all of those units uh out of our affordable housing trust fund. uh the requisite
minimum requisite payment was made uh to each and every one of those property owners, their owner occupied units in order to uh obtain uh those extensions. Uh you might say money well spent. Um if
you did, you'd be very right. the the the um uh they also go towards 100% affordable housing projects such as the one we do have. Uh that is effectively part of our third round uh obligation.
Uh and uh so monies are going there as far as amounts and other I'll I'll defer to others who might know more about uh where other funds are going but we are utilizing them. We are collecting them >> and we are utilizing them. Mr. Quinn,
>> thank you. Uh, just a couple of other things to add. You know, we are regulated how we can use the funds. We are using the funds for any of our 100% affordable projects that are being built either by government entities or that are being built by nonprofit
organizations. We have one coming up later on for the hearing today. The support of housing um for disabled folks over at four old turnpike road. Yes, we will making a contribution to help with that project to to make that happen. We
also have a rehabilitation program for our residents that meet the income criteria and they can apply for that um for making uh repairs or other upgrades to their homes. Many of them affordable housing homes um that are now, you know,
that 20 to 30 year mark that need improvements and and unfortunately the folks don't have the money. So, if they qualify, um, we then can give them assistance. There's deed restrictions on that. So, they just can't take the repairs and sell the unit. They have to hold on to the unit for 10 years. And if
they don't hold on for 10 years, then they have to pay us back for that. Um, but even in the third round, any affordable housing project that, as I said, was by a government entity or a non uh profit, we made contributions to those projects as we are doing here in the fourth round. So, we will continue
to do that. Um, we have about $2 million in that uh affordable housing trust fund to fund these types of projects. Um, but by the time we get done with this fourth round, um, unless there's significant more money coming in, there won't be much left. And as we talked about,
there's just not enough money there to build our own projects uh, with only that that type of money. >> And if I may add, mayor, thank you, >> Mr. Quint. that rehabilitation, those rehabilitation monies that are
being spent from our affordable housing trust fund are not only noble, uh they're an obligation of ours as a township as part of this process. We focused on what we call the prospective need, the 375
unit number that became less than half that uh as a result of our efforts after we cut that number in half almost to begin with. Uh but also there's something called the uh present need uh
which involves obligations relative to rehabilitating existing affordable housing projects. So some of if not much of what Mr. Quinn was talking about uh is not only noble but also an obligation
of ours as well. So that hopefully gives people an idea of what is being done with those funds. It's being utilized to address our obligation and in large part to minimize
the development impact of our obligation on we residents. >> Thank you. I just want to address one of the other thing. Uh Mr. Vuch do you have anything? >> Uh just briefly the
topic of the questions related here for engineering were related to traffic. Mhm. >> Um again at the site plan level is where we see the in-depth traffic studies. Um those studies are going to be similar to the process that many of you in this
area may have seen with uh the K foster property and rehabilitation and and redevelopment opportunities of the abbey and other other sites. Um that process includes as this new site plan comes
forward looking at the existing what I would call the baseline traffic evaluation to include the sites that already have approvals not just those that are built but those that have approvals to be built. So sites like restoration hardware that have an
approval that traffic impact is assumed in the baseline and then part of the analysis of the proposed development as well as other development potential yield of the zone and the surrounding area for full buildout of the area. It's not just in a vacuum of the one
development at this moment given the existing conditions. So th that analysis is uh meant to be inherently comprehensive to the full build of of the plan and the development potential of the area and we will see that in the
furtherance of the site plan applications. >> Thank you. I just wanted to address to the comment um made about that in the township and um having anything to do with these sites being developed about crime. The crime in Mars Township has
not gone up. Uh, so I just want to be clear to residents, we have one of the best police forces in the county. We've have a couple of them with us here tonight. I just want to be clear that crime in Mars Township is not on the rise. So I think that's important that everybody knows. Any other comments from
the committee? >> I I do. >> All right, Jeff, go ahead. >> Uh, thank you. Uh so I wanted to uh comment on the testimony from Megan Burke uh who is a member of our EDAC. Um
and I was on EDAC. I'm not this year but I participated on EDAC with her uh for several years. First, thank you Megan for volunteering your time and uh all the effort you put into the Madison Avenue corridor. Um, I agree with much of what Megan said that this project as
proposed does not reflect uh what was in that Madison Avenue corridor study. Uh, what the feedback was that we got from our residents and of all the aid projects that are being put forward, uh, this is the one that's most problematic
for me uh, because of those reasons. So, um, Megan, I just want to make sure that you know that I I heard you. Um I feel similarly um and I I too am disappointed in in that respect. Um and to the to the
resident I think on Old Glenn Road who uh said that you know we the residents put us in these seats. Very true. You voted us in um and we have to balance a lot of different responsibilities um and different obligations. Uh this
one is particularly difficult because it's mandated by the state of New Jersey and we are trying to do the best that we can uh to do right by all of our residents uh not just in one particular part of town but all the residents across the town. Um and this was a very
particularly difficult uh task for us to get through. Um I do think we did a great job by spreading out the uh the obligation so to speak across the municipality has been said a number of times tonight. Um, but I I do I do hear the residents that are, you know, most
impacted by these projects and that was in our thought process as we went through the entire uh plan. Um, and that's the reason why we tried to spread it out as much as possible. But we just everybody knows that we we are limited in the number of sites that we had
available to us. It's not that the entire municipality is open for development. Uh so we are limited to certain sites that that fit the need and the requirement and has an owner who's willing to work with us to put the the affordable housing there and this was
one of those sites. Um thank you mayor. That concludes my comments. >> Thank you Committee Grail. Deputy Mayor Janata. >> Yeah. I just want to address that some some of uh the residents said that we don't listen but I think we actually do
listen to you and we try to balance everything out everybody here and um the planners and the attorneys are and the engineers they've balanced everything as as best as we can and we have been working as hard as we can on this and as
uh committeeman Greselle said this is uh this is the uh type the what the end results of months and years of discussions and we do listen to the residents and try to put put that those
factors in there. So it's it um I would not say that we do not listen but we do listen and we and we take your comments um at heart. Thanks. >> Thank you committeeman rabbits.
Thank you, mayor. I just also want to echo what Mr. Greyel had said because he said it really, really well. Um, this, you know, we were hoping for something a little different on Madison Avenue. We all had the EDAC uh report in mind when
we were looking at um potential, you know, sites for for this and and it it just didn't lend itself well because of the shape of of the uh of the parcel to to what EDAC had has
has had uh had put forward. And I and I get the disappointment in that because we here on the DES are disappointed too. We couldn't make that work. Um, in terms of the process, you know, as as the deputy mayor had said, we are listening,
you know, and these are great comments and I and we appreciate your concern. We appreciate the feedback and those of us who are on the planning board, whether we're in the audience or up here on the DES, we're going to be taking these to
uh heart very much and we expect to hear these same comments again during site plan review. But the process um as as I think as well before I even get to that Mr. Grael had said you know we we're not representing one particular
part of the town and I get and I get that people are here and they're in their little part of the town and how this kind of affects them whether it's traffic or infrastructure or losing trees or in the environment. I we get
that. We re we really do. It's it's it's something that we have to do. You know, the state is mandating this. We are under a uh a time obligation with this. We have been upfront uh in terms of process. We have been upfront with the
public every step of the way. And I and I and I understand that some of you are only here for the first time. But over the course of the last year or more than a year that we have been undergoing these these um these discussions uh we
have been trying to meet uh courtmandated deadlines and that's why things are happening faster now than they would be if this was a standalone any one of these was a standalone project. we have the entire uh township
to consider and not just, you know, Madison Avenue or Southgate or Colombia. We're we're looking at the bigger picture. And I think that that's something that if there's one thing you take away from all this is that we up here do care and we are looking at the
bigger picture and we are looking at what we're going to leave for the next generation of folks who are going to be the residents of this town. Mayor, >> thank you, Committeeman Rabbits. I do just want to address the comment made too about restoration hardware. Um,
believe me, we are as frustrated and upset as the residents are. This is a project that actually I wasn't even on the township committee when it was approved. It's over 5 years. I thought, "Wow, this is going to be great. It's going to be beautiful." They've come back before the planning board. They
reduced it in size a little bit. It's been very frustrating. We are on them every other month. We keep being told, you know, they're updating things. they've had some changes whether it was in their architect or their engineering people or whatever. Um you know for a
while it appeared restoration hardware wasn't doing that well but now they seem to be back. So we are doing everything we can. We feel the same way. We don't want to lose that building and it continues to deteriorate day after day. So just understand again that's something we feel the same way you do
about that particular situation. Are there any other comments on the deis? If not, may I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 0626? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Ravitz, >> yes. >> Mr. Janata,
>> yes. >> Mr. Griselle, >> no. >> NO. >> Mayor Griglia. >> Yes. >> I, Donna J. Wrigley, mayor, declare ordinance number 06-26 approved and adopted and direct the
township clerk to publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as otherwise required by law. It is now 9:12. We're going to take a 5m minute recess and we'll be back at 9:17. We are on 0726.
>> I'm good. Thank you. I have my Coke with me, too. >> I'm good, thank you. I should be drinking my water with my soda. How about every >> You're doing good, Joe. >> Okay, we're back in session.
>> Madame Clerk, please read the title of ordinance 07-26 into the record. 07-26 amending chapter 95 zoning of the code of the township of Morris by adding the TH58H
zone and adopting associated regulations 100 Southgate Parkway block 7101 lot 2. >> Miss Laney, will you give us a brief overview of ordinance 07-26? So this is for 100 Southgate Parkway
block 7101 lot 2. It is a approximately 19 point uh or2 acre site. It has an existing office building and um associated parking. It's located to the south of Southgate
Parkway and uh 287 adjacent to you know in the close proximity to 287. James Place town homes are to the southwest. Um then there are single family homes along Laura Lane to the east uh and open
space to the south. Um the existing zone is the O15. Proposed zone is TH-5- AH. The zoning would permit 104 town houses. Um 21 of those would be
affordable units, which is a 20% set aside. and we are in our uh housing plan able to take 10 bonus credits um for the redevelopment of an office building. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number
07-26? >> So moved. Second. >> All in favor? >> I >> I. >> Are there any members from the public who would like to approach the podium? >> Hello. Good evening. My name is Alice Kim. Uh I live in the Rolling Hills at
Blackberry neighborhood that's going to be directly impacted by this ordinance. There are four points that I'd like to really succinctly articulate tonight. Um even though it may fall on deaf ears as indicated in other ordinances, I still would like to document my disapproval. I think the first point will be around traffic and safety considerations.
Recognizing that we won't go into detail about that tonight, I still want to raise this as a very viable concern. Southgate Parkway has already undergone significant infrastructure changes starting about two years ago. As all of you are hopefully aware, when our fourlane parkway was uh truncated to two
lanes with one bike path. So in addition to the vehicular traffic, uh there's also an active cyclist flow that must be considered as well in addition to the residences that will be entering and exiting that block. Uh, one other thing to note here with the corporate park that you just mentioned before, there
will be two single lane exit and entrances coming out of that corporate park in addition to the existing flows of traffic that I articulated before. So my question is for this first topic, what will be the traffic mitigation strategies here? If you all have thought about any of that, my second question
will be around the building or the development itself. So you had shared for 227 Sussex A lot that the height limit will be three stories. I'd like to ask what the height limit for these 104 town homes will be in this corporate park and will the developer also plan to
use the existing paved footprint or will they also plan to uh demolish the existing woodland area even further? My third point is the overall impact on the rolling hills neighborhood. So, additionally, we will also experience significant construction on the opposite
side of the Rolling Hills neighborhood. If everyone is not already aware, the planning committee as of last year, August 2025, has already unanimously approved a plan to change 12 lots into 11 residential areas along with a retention basin to mitigate any kind of
water table challenges that may occur from this extensive overflow. Uh so should this ordinance now be approved, this means that the rolling hills neighborhood will be subject to two significant construction sites on both sides of the neighborhood which will remain active over the course of several
years. So as you can imagine this is going to have significant impact on our overall quality of life, construction damage, traffic, wildlife as well as trees overall which is a major concern that was also raised to deaf ears that it appears at last year's meeting. My overall feedback is my fourth point
here. I am a newer homeowner and I am honestly disgusted and appalled by the way this process has been conducted thus far. I had come into this three and a half hours ago with high hopes of trying to have a productive dialogue but rather I am walking away extremely disappointed
and honestly embarrassed by the way our local community and our government are trying to work this out. So um again I don't think that there is any hope or you know path moving forward that we can really compromise on but I just wanted to document my extreme disapproval and
hopefully later on when you address these questions please refrain from any overdrawn out legal ease and instead please speak and answer quickly and succinctly. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Peter Gallerstein, 38 Laura Lane. Um, I
have one very simple question which really was almost already asked. I'm interested in what the footprint will be of this. Will it still be the footprint of the parking lot or will it extend further up lower lower lane? Um my other
concern is uh I hope you will address the uh entrance and entrance to the to this uh uh project. Um I hope it does not include an exit and entrance onto Laura Lane. There are multiple homes there. There are multiple children
playing in the street there. That is a that is a bike route for a bike route. uh for the uh for the kids. The other thing is u Mr. Rabbits I you I think you referred to something I said about uh just building all the just building the
um affordable housing homes and you you implied that I or what I got from you is that you kind of quoted me as saying, "Oh, we should all put it in one place." That was not my intention at all. What I was trying to say is that we would
welcome um uh all housing, but maybe instead of going 4:1 or 20%, 4:1, is there a builder who would be willing to go 3:1? Uh are you allowed to do that? If you found a builder who was willing to do, you know, three
market housing for each affordable housing, did is that allowed by law? And did you ever look at that possibility? Um, you know, I mean, I I think as you've heard, no one here has has said a
word about that we don't want affordable housing. I mean, we all moved to this area to be in a diverse situation. We we sent our kids to the public schools. So, you know, if I didn't want this, I would have moved to Mountain Lakes or I some place real, you know, white bread, you
know, kind of homogeneous place like that. And the other thing is is that you've used the word obligation an awful lot. You're experts. Um I take offense at that. I mean we we we should do we're we're asking for things not because we
have an obligation. We ask for things because we enjoy this neighborhood. We enjoy the people in it and we want to continue to doing so. And I'm a little disappointed that all the comments here tonight don't seem to have any effect whatsoever. I mean and I respect all the people on
the board. I know them from other organizations and and and hopefully but I'm I only need 30 seconds. Uh I'm really disappointed that you've sat here and you've kind of nodded your heads and
and yet then just go ahead and pass it and it's what's what's the purpose of this? What what's the purpose of this meeting? I think it seems that the decision was made, you know, three and a half hours
ago and I I just I just I'm disappointed by the fact of the lack of >> you've been polite but not responsive. >> Thank you. >> Uh Pam Russell, I live down the street from 100 South Gate. I think 104 units
is very dense for this property. Um, when I look at it, I just can't imagine where you're putting 104 units. Um, as far as I can tell, the the map that was used to calculate the developable area did not include that there is a very
wide national gas pipeline on the property. It does not include that there's the Great Brook Waterway on the property. So, I don't know how that has been factored into the density. Um, as another neighbor said, we have a development going on at the top of the hill and then we have this at the bottom
of the hill. So, will will we face construction going out both ways of the neighborhood? Has any water and sewer analysis been done? Will this reduce our water pressure? Um, has any traffic analysis been done? Um,
I also there's been some mention that you have a lot of extra credits that you're from this process that you can roll forward for the future. If you have all these extra credits, why aren't you using them to reduce density on some of these projects? Overall, I think this project, if done nicely, it could be an
improvement to an obsolete office building at the end of our, you know, um but no one has taken the time to focus on the details. Um you know, if they're why are is it three stories? If these are town houses, if this is going to be nice like James Street, why aren't they
two stories? I'm also trying to confirm if the are these according to this chart. It says sales. It says everything sales except for Columbia Road which is listed as rentals. But then the planner testified at the planning meeting that you can't zone rental or sales which I've never heard of. We always zone
multif family single family um town homes. So when I read this I assume that town homes means market rate ownership town homes. So that's another point of clarification. You know, I don't think it's as terrible for us if this is nice
town homes like James Street, but no one it is. It has not been clarified. And there's just a lot of questions that the traffic, as a prior neighbor said. The other day, I couldn't even pull over for a cop car on Southgate Parkway, it's so narrow now, that the cop car that had to
go whizzing by me, there's hardly any shoulder there. Now you have bikes going down. It's, you know, four lanes to two lanes. And now you're adding in 104 units. And then when you say you've been very transparent too overall this chart which was also used at the planning board meeting doesn't have the totals
anywhere. You only list the affordable units. So a lot of people in the public don't understand that totals are 794 new units. Almost 800 units you're adding. So times that by the amount of people in each unit and what that does
to school and services and water and store it. It is you have not been overly transparent with 800 units and I also the process is offensive taxpaying residents who care about our town and have lived here I have lived here since
1993 >> three minutes we get cut off for three minutes was the developer in all the TCC meetings and and back talks and the proposals that got accepted did they get three minutes how were they cut off why do we only get three
Thank you, Terry Hina. Um, I want to go back uh to the 571 units um that were cut back um through negotiations from 307. and they brought it up to 375
and that was the agreed amount I guess with fair share housing and the builders association. Um, you said 203 of those units were already units that were built in the township of which many people signed off for $10,000 to extend them 30 years. But
if I someone can tell me if my math is correct, my thinking is correct. If you took the 375 units and you minus 203, you get 172 units. And unless they've changed the law, which they could have, um I believe that for rentals, the
township would get uh two um two um >> credits. >> Credits. Thank you very much, Mr. Quinn. Two credits uh for every rental. So, if you divided 172 by two, u making the units rentals, it would appear as if the
town would only need 86 rental units to to fulfill um what they had seemed to have agreed upon through court proceedings at this point in time. I may be wrong, but I'm just wondering about that. I also wonder about Harding
Township. I was here um from 1994 on when Harding Township built their affordable housing on the corner of Kitchell and Woodland. Uh they hooked into our sewer systems. Um how did Harding acquire that property? Um was it
already open space that was in their portfolio? And how did they actually get those units built? And how many units did they build at the time? and how are they building the new units that they're building uh in the foreseeable future? I'd like to have an answer to that from the committee because I'm wondering why
we couldn't have done something similar like similar to like what Harding did. Uh if not now, uh why didn't we do it beforehand? Uh I have another question. Uh I'm assuming this is the first time that the public has really gotten to
discuss with the committee. Thank you very much. um the committee uh about what is going on in our neighborhoods. And so I'm asking um whatever happened to Kathy Wilson's thought of having is it a sherade or
charade where you get the neighborhoods together and you ask them ahead of time before you've generated these ordinances what they think and where they think and what the problems are if you put it in their neighborhood. That's that's another question I have for the committee. And the last one is I believe
in May of 2021, you had a land use ordinance that you passed which said that you would give public notice 21 days uh to the people before the first of um sorry I got to get to my notes here but
um 21 days notice you would give to the public prior to the first meeting. Why didn't that happen here? I'm sure you must have known about the March 15th date long time ago. Thank you. Hi, it's uh George Telerico, Blackberry Lane. I just have a couple quick
questions. Uh I guess Mr. Warner said use the term adaptive reuse. I think that was his his term that many of these they're going to reuse it. And I take it you don't mean they're going to reuse this building, right? This building is going to get demolished. That's my one
question. And the other planner, you mentioned that 300 Madison Avenue, you had multiple proposals that you considered. Uh likewise, were there multiple proposals for 100 Southgate? Thank you. >> Thank you.
>> Hi, good evening. My name is Marissa Hedge and I live at 30 Laura Lane. There's much about the way this whole process works that's very confusing to me. This is not a world that I normally exist in, but I want to reiterate a lot of the comments and feelings that were
expressed by my fellow citizens of Morris Township. It seems very suboptimal this process truly. Um, I don't even know what question to ask you other than maybe keep it simple. Like one of the biggest concerns about this
development for me is that I don't want to see all of those houses, you know, flow into Laura Lane. So, how can you assure me, Morris Township Committee, that when you build this development, all of those cars aren't going to be flowing back towards our neighborhood
where our children play and do those things? So, I'm going to keep it simple. What's the process for assuring me that that's not going to happen? And I'll make one other comment. When you approved the development in Blackberry for those 12 homes, I asked what was the
assurance that I wasn't going to be flooded as a result? And really, there is none. And my only recourse, I think we discussed, was I would sue afterwards. There was a home in my neighborhood that built a built-in swimming pool. As a result of that,
later our front lawn became a lake. We had to put in additional drainage, which was quite an expensive, you know, proposition for us. So, you can understand the concerns of all of these citizens. This is going to degrade our quality of life. It's going to add a lot of concerns. It's going to change the
the feel of our neighborhood. So, I would I'm going to keep my question really simple. How can you assure me that the flow of traffic will not come back into Laura Lane? Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Good evening. Arthur Hedge 30 Laura
Lane. Again, like my wife, I don't live in the the construction business. I don't know what's going on here. I've lived on Laura Lane. No one has ever told us about this. We never got any mail notice that they're building this huge
development on our property. I I live within 500 yards of that. No one's notified us. No one in our neighborhood has been consulted on this or what should be done. No feedback was given. You're just going to go up here to approve this tonight without any
feedback from the people that it's going to be affected by it. What are you a public servant or are you in the hands of the developers? Why are you doing this without consulting anyone who lives in the neighborhood? I asked that question. And it didn't happen with the
other one either. That was approved and all designed before any got any feedback from the neighborhood. Why is that? Why do we not matter? Why do you not talk to us? I'd like to know the answer to those questions. Please consider the people
who actually live here and not the developers that you talk to. Talk to us. Thank you very much. You should be ashamed of yourselves. >> John Mustin 24 Laura Lane next door. Um,
I'm probably one of the closer homes. I'm right here to that. And uh, I agree. I did not get any notifications from planning board or anything on this. I did get a letter in the mail. I did not get any certified mail. I'm assuming that that's all documented with the T
town, right? So, and that's something we could request. >> Okay. Which we will be doing. And I'm also assuming the trust fund >> spending is all public information that we could do with the Oprah request. Okay, thank you. Um, the question I don't have the ordinance in front of me,
but why is this ordinance different than James Place? That's a question I'd like to have answered before, you know, tonight. Um, because, uh, you know, James Place, I I think we all agree, is a pretty successful and nice, uh, um, unit. and
uh and uh that is a concern that it seems like there's more units going in and there's it I don't understand why it would be a different ordinance on on that end. Um and that's all I'm going to say. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> I'm sorry. Can I say one more thing? I don't think I used my three minutes. And
just one other thing. I I appreciate the sentiment that you guys are listening, but I do agree. Uh this is how it's coming from the public. We're getting five minutes or even three minutes to tell you what we're saying and then you're voting. You came here with a vote. I understand. I've sat in that
seat multiple times before. We should have been brought in way beforehand just for even the general public. I understand that that's hard to do when you're opening it up, but listening four minutes before you guys vote on something that you guys already determined and we all know you've already determined it, but that you at
least should have given us a little more chance to do that. Thank you. >> Um Lee Goldberg, 10 Arrowhead Road. Um I think Miss Hena uh Zingga brought up an issue before. Um, I think she referred to them as perhaps a land use ordinance. Um, I think it's actually a resolution
that was passed a number of years ago. I think it lives right on our township website and page which talks about um how we can perhaps in the future. Maybe not tonight. Maybe we should have, could have, would have. Um, but those that resolutions were put into place to
prevent this type of atmosphere and this type of thing from happening tonight. Um, from my perspective, I've been in town for 30 years and have been attending meetings for 30 years. Um, I also sit on the zoning board and as I sit here and listen to this, I'm sort of saying, well, there's nothing new under the sun here, right? This they're in a
tough position because this is mandated by the state. Their hands are sort of tied. But again, from the public's perspective, you feel like you're late to the game. You're not getting in information. They're not talking to you. And it is it's it's it's it's not ideal, right? So there were opportunities to bring folks
into the process earlier. We actually addressed this in 2021 and would like to think, you know, again, we're going through round four now, but in the future, I know it doesn't help for tonight, but to to sort of have a process where people do feel that they're heard earlier and sooner um
would I think alleviate a lot of the confusion that people are feeling tonight. So I know Mrs. Z brought it up earlier. So, if we could address maybe again I know there were some rules with 21 days advance notice um and also some sort of public session before we got to a night like tonight and why wasn't
perhaps that implemented or if time didn't permit it or was chosen not to to be um addressed or implemented that would be I think helpful to know. Thank you very much. Thank you. >> Julie Hobalt 210 Mount Kimble I have. Um just wondering does the township have
any small parcels of land like 3, four, 5 acres that we could build 100% um affordable housing like Harding has done um with the farm. I mean they're cute. Um we don't have to make one quite as big as I think that's like 8 acres or 8
and 1/2 acres if we had small parcels. Um, if I could talk up a lot a lot of our requirement. >> Thank you. >> Hi. Uh, Joselyn Grisetti, 25 Blackberry Lane. Um, to me and apparently to most
everyone here, it appears that, um, this project is well beyond the zoning phase. So, um I like echo what everybody else has been asking and saying um regarding the overdevelopment, but um my question to you is since we're so far really
along in this phase, have you given what's the town's thought process on the schools? Like what are we going to do about the schools? What are we going to do about our our police force and our EMS? like how have you thought about
that yet considering you know this is so far along and um it's unfortunately a mood point and I do am very disappointed in the fact that we had you know the the certified letter was incorrect and we
have not been you know it's not as transparent as you may think and I think going forward with the township that's something that really should be improved because the word really isn't getting out whether I don't I don't know what to do
differently but I'm thinking about it. So I'm just really concerned about the schools and I'm actually very concerned about um you know on 25 Blackberry. I love it there. Um it's definitely you know busy but I love seeing I love
seeing runners. I love seeing cyclists and I love seeing the walkers from the town. I love I mean from our neighborhood and from Atlantic Health. They're walking around. It's just good to see the energy and the activity and that people are enjoying our roads and
I'm just afraid with that extra traffic that we're going to we're going to lose that. So that's all. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> There's not anybody else here in the room. I see no hands raised on Zoom.
So we'll turn this over. We'll start to answer. Oh, we have to close it. >> Oh god, why do we always forget it? See, I don't want to close public comment. >> Talk about um is there a motion to close public comment on ordinance number 0707-26?
>> So move second. >> All in favor? >> I >> Mr. Phillips. >> Sure. Uh again, I'm going to try and go in the order uh of the comments based on my notes. The um initial comment was
with regard to traffic and there was a question about whether there would be traffic mitigation strategies visa v the site and again I don't want to meet a dead horse but the tra the detailed traffic studies and the issue of traffic access to and from the site uh will
ultimately uh occur if this ordinance is passed at the time a a site plan application is filed with the uh planning board. And I only note which everybody knows already in that regard that this site has two potential means of uh of access. I think there was a
question about the about the allowable height in the zone. I just want to make it clear that the allowable height is a three-story maximum like many other zones where uh conventional town houses are the uh predominant market rate
product which is the case uh here. Uh there was a question about how much area of the site will be disturbed to accommodate development and will the building be uh demolished. I think it's safe to say that the building will be demolished if a developer pursues this
zoning. Again, if it's adopted and again it is clearly in answer to the gentleman's question, it's not an adaptive reuse in the sense that the building is going to be maintained. That building would be demolished and replaced with uh town houses. Along those same lines, there was a query
about uh where on the site would the you know would the development occur given the fact that it's already developed and disturbed site. What I can tell the public is the limits of disturbance will of disturbance will be based on uh several of the key underlying zoning
parameters including the uh there's limits on total amount of building coverage, total improved lot coverage. There are setback requirements and obviously there also will be limits uh in terms of if there are any
environmental uh uh environmentally sensitive areas on the property and there are on this property. So all those factors combined will basically determine where the new development will will occur. Uh again there was a comment
about uh an opinion that the the development for the site was too dense. I would only again respond that again we restricted the development here to conventional town houses at a at a density uh that is consistent with the
existing township zone scheme and other areas where uh town houses and inclusionary development basically is adjacent or across the street uh from single family uh housing. Um there was a query about utilization of rental bonus
credits. Boy, we would have loved to have been able to use rental bonus comments, but >> uh in answer to the question, they did change the law and there is no opportunity in the fourth round, no longer an opportunity to claim a rental bonus credit, which we were able to take
during the third round. So, the township could not avail itself of those bonus credits in this uh round. Uh there was some comments about Harding's plan which I I am not familiar with. So I'm really not in a position to address what they
did or didn't uh do. Um why I guess were um about the issue of planning sharetses. I mean realistically even if we wanted to to do planning sharetses again as others
have mentioned given the what I thought were unbelievably tight time frames in the legislation uh I think it would have been physically impossible even if we wanted to to try and do planning charettes for the site given all these month-to-month deadlines. I mean realistically
uh honestly candidly it just would have been impossible to do again. >> Yeah. And I'm only going to interrupt you Mr. Phillips because I want the people in this room to understand and I don't know how many of them were but you we did have the planners and Steve we got out of this ahead of every other
municipality two years ago. We had a big public meeting. We you gave you talked all about what the fourth round was, what the deadlines were going to be way ahead of anybody else. We had it up on the website. We continued to try to do those types of things by every time we
could get in front of it. So all I'm saying is I understand the frustration and some people here saying, you know, that we didn't we did everything we could. The timelines were so tight to even get together this group to try to do some kind of a public meeting was
practically impossible. And I'm only going to say this, we do appreciate and people come out when they're upset about something. But my point is, if you come to the township committee meetings, which usually there's a press person and two other people
sitting here, if you follow municipal messenger, just check the website every once in a while. Just read the local press on your computer. This stuff's been on the front page for weeks now about everything we're doing. So, it is
I understand it and we we get it. But and the other thing I'm just going to say this interjecting here and when you ask what do what should you do about it get more involved come to the meetings they're all open come to all our other meetings run for office you know the
more you know the more you know that's all I'm saying so we did try to do that and I'll get to the other piece later when you're finished about >> the 21 days notice we did do >> we did do so anyway continue Mr. Phillips.
>> I'm speaking and I'm entitled to look. I have that. >> Excuse me. Sir, you're out of order in the audience, sir. >> You're out of order in the audience. >> Mr. Phillips, continue. >> Yeah. The only look I don't want to beat this to death and I understand the frustration from the public about the
timing but the and I think the the the question or comment was not was with regard to the particular sites you know why wasn't that why weren't they gone to sharette and the reality is is that the time frame that we had from the point of
which we settled on the number to the point of which we had to have a housing plan in place with all the sites was ridiculous. What was it like a month and a half or two months? That's not long. >> It was a month and a half to two months. It was just it would have been a physical impossibility to do it and to
and basically to comply with the deadline. But again, I don't want to beat that to death. I think we've all kind of captured that frustration. Mayor, uh there was a question were there multiple proposals for this 100 Southgate site. There really weren't
multiple proposals here. And the reason is that the township professionals believed that only a townhouse, a conventional townhouse product was appropriate for this site at the prescribed density. Again, given the
surrounding land use context and any other product, whether it be multif family or a stack townhouse product, uh basically we felt was inappropriate. And this is the product that we pursued and this is the product that is basically um memorialized in the ordinance that
you're considering uh this evening. And the last thing I have because I'm going to punt to you Steve on schools. Uh but uh the last thing I have is why is this ordinance different I think than James Place and and really the the short answer is all of these ordinances are
different. They're all different to some extent. uh even though the product type may be the same, even the though the density may be very similar and the reason is is that the zoning for these sites and any other prior round site the inclusionary sites was basically tailor
made to take into account the characteristics of the site largely the size and shape. So it's no, you know, one sizefits-all and that's the reason why they're all sometimes different, sometimes only nuanced in terms of the differences. Um and that I don't know if
you had anything else that I may have missed. >> Uh just one note. Um an audience member asked about the um something I'd said at the planning board meeting that the ordinances couldn't include whether something was required to be rental or
required to be ownership. That is that is true. They can't be in the ordinances. They are in our plan though. And for the most part the town homes are ownership and multif family is rental. Mr. Warner.
>> Thank you, Mayor. The the uh >> I think it was Mr. Goldberg and others referenced the fact that we have a resolution that I believe uh provides and I'm paraphrasing for us to strive to provide I believe it might be 21 days
notice as opposed to the requisite 10 days notice under the law >> 21 days instead of 10. >> 21 instead of 10. And I believe we also try to where we can go 200 feet if you will beyond >> the legal requisite for notice the
perimeter of the sites generally 200 ft around the perimeter we try to go 400 ft that's the certified and regular mailing the uh in this particular circumstance for the reasons that have been beaten to death already uh and and uh your state
legislature uh is is where you should go uh the uh because they dictate unfortunately to us um and uh as a municipality uh they preempt us and we must abide by that those state statutes.
Um but because of that uh notwithstanding all the efforts made by everyone involved, we could not apparent uh do 21 days notice. I believe we got somewhere uh we we we got the things out the day after as best we could the
township after the uh introduction of the ordinances on the 18th on the 19th >> which I believe uh is somewhere in the neighborhood of 18 days >> from here I didn't go to school for math if I did >> uh uh well in any event the the uh I'll
save the jokes the the the um the uh I believe was somewhere in the neighborhood of as best we could 18 days instead of the 10 days requisite. Um I'm familiar with a lot of municipalities and how they operate. I have not come
across municipality in the state of New Jersey uh that uh provides roughly twice if not more the notice required by law uh in time frame and uh perhaps twice as much uh as is required by law in
geographic proximity. Um so frankly uh I applaud our township's efforts to do that. Um but uh in this case because of the state statute and the deadlines in the state statute it became an impossibility uh we were only able to do
almost twice as much as opposed to the twice as much that the township strives for. Um the uh >> schools schools. Yeah. Schools. >> Yeah. I'm going to save that one. Uh there
there I will get to that though. The the f uh I believe there was a concern about the density uh here uh for this particular project if my math's correct and I've already admitted it's not the best. So maybe Paul or Liz can help. But
I believe generally for the entire site the density here is five units to the acre gross. And even on a net basis, if you include the environmental constraints, I believe it's still in the neighborhood of 10 units per acre or
thereabouts. Uh so while different people have different views of what high density is, uh uh townhouse zoning in this municipality uh in certain areas as of as of right are in the neighborhood
of 8 and 10 acres to uh excuse me, eight or 10 units to the acre. Uh so uh that's for comparison purposes. We got the bonus credits. Um there was
reference to uh uh the 11 unit not 12 unit uh 11 unit and one lot that was a storm water basin uh uh project that was approved recently at at the planning board level. I believe we're beyond the 45day appeal period but regardless uh I
that was for the most part as I recall an as of right development uh for that particular applicant. I believe it was single family dwellings. >> Uh and uh uh there may have been some relatively modest uh bulk deviations
associated with it. The planning board had a public hearing and uh made that determination, but it was an as of right development for the most part as I recall. the um and I think people talked about uh the extent to which
for zoning purposes and land development application purposes we are procluded from considering impacts on tax ratables on property values on school issues as much as you
and I may think that sounds counterintuitive uh It is the law generally that governs us when we're considering zoning and when we're considering land development applications before our respective land use boards, the planning board and the
zoning board. Um, and I don't write any of those laws. I think that's it. schools. >> He just >> he just addressed the school issue >> precluded. The the state does not allow us to consider uh uh
>> the effects on >> the impacts on schools and uh uh municipal services and even property values for purposes of zoning particularly uh to the extent we have to meet our affordable housing obligation. There's that word obligation. Somebody
took issue with the word obligation. uh it is in the statute. It's in the Mount Laurel decisions that govern us and no one uses that term and I certainly don't use the term for any reason other than the accuracy of the
term. The term is our it's referred to as our constitutional obligation to create a realistic opportunity for low and moderate income housing and and our number is our prospective need obligation. uh it doesn't mean anything other than
it's a term that is defined and so we use it for accuracy uh facts matter. >> Thank you Mr. Warner, Mr. Vu. So, briefly to touch on the environmental constraints of the property, uh, similar to what we
discussed in the earlier hearings, uh, in this case, this is the Great Brook running mostly north to south along Southgate Parkway on the west side of the property. Um, it is similarly uh,
classified as a freshwater non-traout water. Uh the riparian on that is assumed to be again a 150 foot buffer. There are wetlands on both the north and south side of the access the existing access to Southgate. Um that did affect
the James Straits the James Place application at the time it was developed and similarly create constraints on this development uh as well as the flood hazard area. the existing footprint of the parking area um is on particularly
on that western side is uh roughly where the prior flood hazard area line had been established in the FEMA mapping. um that is clo more closely represented in the current mapping that was just released to be uh the critical floodway
areas. And then there is an additional um zone uh eastward into the developed footprint of some of the uh outer parking areas that is the rest of the 100red-year flood plane. Uh so in
development application the site will be constrained particularly on that side to the existing footprint and existing areas that have been developed for redevelopment and areas that are existing natural and vegetated would be
highly constrained by D and their permitting process not to allow so to speak horse trading between the two. So what you see as that western edge of the development will be a very familiar edge to the proposed development when it goes through the site plan process.
>> Thank you. Any comments from the deis? >> Comments mayor. >> Okay. >> This this shut up bud. Um >> I know you said no.
This this particular project is the one that's closest to my residence. And I just want to remind everybody that all of us up here are residents except for except for our attorney. We're all residents. So, we all have the interests of Mars Township in mind because we also
pay pay the taxes. This particular uh plan on on Southgate or the reasonzoning on Southgate is is near and dear to me. One of the things that I heard um from one of the residents was um how we've uh narrowed
uh and narrowed the lanes. We've added bike lanes in each direction. We've also added a sidewalk and and for those residents uh who who may not be aware, this is something that this governing body and the all the governing bodies
that I have been on since I've been on the township committee has strived to do is through our transportation advisory committee is to put sidewalks between points of interest. So what we did on Southgate and I don't know if you know
this, we won an award for that road. >> We did. >> All right. So on and the redesign of that road. So what we what we've done is we've calmed traffic by narrowing the road to from four two lanes in each direction to one with a bike path. We
connected the James Street sidewalk from James Street to basically the end of Southgate and you can cross the street to um to the stables and to Ginty into Ginty Pool. So we are doing this to get people at well certainly residents to
get people out of their cars onto their bikes onto their feet so they can we actually will reduce the amount of traffic which is something that all of us up here have heard from residents the cars go too fast there's too much
traffic this is one of the ways that we have done this in in the township u as for the as for the plan you know I like to walk there I I'm a power walker. I walk in that area. So, I have um I love walking in in that that particular lot.
Um it's gonna it's not going to be have I'm not going to have access to it anymore, but I'll you know, I'll I'll I'll recover from that. But this is I just wanted to talk about, you know, um that particular process. In addition, one of the things that I really want to
stress here, and I know we've got three more amendments to three more uh ordinance to go through is that because of the time constraints that that that that um Liz and and Paul and and um Steve were talking about, we've been
talking about all this time, we were under such tremendous, you know, time constraints to get something out and we couldn't, you know, engage the public in the manner that we would have liked to had any of these been standalone products. If we don't
pass this, the township loses control of all of these sites. So, a builder can come in and say, I don't care what plan you saw before. This is what I'm building and
you you can't say boo about it. So this is really important to us here up on the deas that we retain control of these of these sites to the best that we can and so they they comply to our ordinances rather than having a court force
highdensity housing that may not look anything like what we're seeing here. So we are doing the best we can up here and I want you to know that because it's the God's honest truth. Mayor, >> thank you. Committeeman Rabbitz. No comments. >> Mayor,
>> Mr. Gazelle. >> Uh, thank you. Uh, I just wanted to reflect a little further on your introjection uh earlier uh in this in this session. Uh, and understand the frustration in the room. Uh, and let the residents know that the frustration, as Mr. Rabbitz just said, extends to the
township committee, too. Um, I know that we are your first point of contact uh, as local representatives. Uh but just reminding everybody this was a mandate from the state of New Jersey that we had to follow through on in an extremely short period of time. Earlier tonight I
said this was likely in my 13 years the most difficult process that I've had to uh endure as a committee man to make sure that we were doing the right thing by our residents. Um and the residents are residents of the entirety of Morris Township. Uh not just the individual
areas, but we have to do right by everybody. And uh the frustration is that we had such a short timeline and that we are not allowed to take into account school you know the the school children that might be coming in and all
the other issues that that Mr. Warner um told us about and so we are frustrated too with the process um and you're you have every right to be frustrated with us but I just want to let the public know that they should also be uh frustrated with some of their state
representatives uh forcing this on us on such a short timeline. So, uh, feel free to feel free to, uh, be upset with us, but but know that this was this was a mandate that we had to that we had to meet in a very short period of time. And
just if you're frustrated, please extend those frustrations to your state representatives as well. Thank you, Mayor. >> Thank you, Committeeman Grazel. And uh I just want to add to that as well that you're absolutely correct and I can't tell you how many times mayors from surrounding municipalities got together
regardless of what party they were from all frustrated with the state. None of the municipalities in the state of New Jersey were asked for their input when the state made these decisions. None of them. So that was extremely frustrating. And like I said, if you had been at some
of the meetings, many of the committee people in the data spoke out two up to two years ago about that frustration and this just being given to us and said you have to comply. You are obligated to do this. It didn't matter. No matter what
all we all tried to fight back and we were just told it's what we had to do. If there are no other comments, may I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 07-26? So move. >> Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Griselle?
>> Yes. >> Mr. Janata? >> Yes. >> Mr. Ravitz? >> Yes. >> Mayor Griglia? >> Yes. I, Donna Jacia, mayor, declare ordinance number 07-26, approved and adopted, and direct the township clerk to publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as
otherwise required by law. Madame clerk, please read the title of ordinance 08-26 into the record. 08-26 amending chapter 95 zoning of the code of the township of Morris by adding the TH68H2
zone and adopting associated regulations 291 James Street block 6705 lot 5. >> Miss Laney, can we please have a brief overview? >> Thank you, Mayor. Um, this is 291 James
Street, block 6705, lot five. This is a three acre site on the west side of James Street. It is surrounded by single family homes, but further to the north is the church and then the James Street Commons development. The existing zoning is the
RA35. The proposed zone is TH-6-h. Um the uh we have here on this uh slide that it's 13 town homes, but actually the ordinance uh allows up to 15 town homes and three of those would be
affordable units, which would be a 20% set aside. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number 08-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I I >> Are there any members from the public
who would like to speak? >> I'd like to speak. I'm Donna Camarada. I live at 52 Raven Drive in Mars Township. I have been here for 34 years and I'm very upset with this town because I've
been a volunteer for three years with the town as a senior and I've run into just frustration everything I try to bring to the town and now I get a letter
and they don't even know the right day of the I mean it's embarrassing. I've been pay living here for 34 years in Dorset Hollow. They never told us anything. My neighbors don't know anything. And they want to put all the We can't even
get out of our complex in the morning. At night, we can't get back in. 287 is a parking lot. And they want to add all these units right by 287. So, I just am so disgusted with this
town and the people on the board, what they've done to us and how they're sneaking all this stuff through. And if you go for help, you just get ignored. You don't get returned phone calls. So, that's all I had to say. Thank you.
>> Thank you, >> Peter Colby. I'm hungry. It's tired. I lost my passion. So I lived at 292 James with my family directly across from 291. If you look at the area within a quarter mile
strip of where we live, you have Dorset, you have James Street Commons, and you also have James Place. Additionally, you want to add on another 100 units on Southgate. >> Yeah. >> So if you look at the size of this property, it's a 3 acre lot.
Do you really need to consume that for condos and affordable housing? To me, that is that is just going way beyond the boundaries of what we're trying to do here. I don't know if we're leveraging three credits and allowing us
the contractor or developer to grab some extra units, but to me, uh, it's not appropriate for that property in that area. Secondly, I believe also on 291 James, there are wetlands. I don't know if an environmental impact
study was done on those. On my property, it's wet all the time. Sump up 24/7. The backside of my property is butts up basically to the Great Swamp. You can't develop on that. But I know they backfilled on Dorset. They probably
backfilled on James Place as well. So, I'm assuming it going to affect the wetlands on that property as well. How is it going to affect my property? I'll be selfish on this. What's going to happen to my property? I don't want to look out my front window. I'm not even sure what the market value is of these
condos going in. You have, I believe, James Street Commons. I believe that's affordable housing already. Those are $500,000 units. You have James Place, those are million-dollar units. You have doors. They're probably $800 to $900,000 units.
What will we be getting if it if the decision has already been made? What will be going across the street from me? When we bought this house anyway, part of our portfolio for retirement was to basically uh upgrade the property and sell it at some point in my life.
Will I have to basically review how I'm going to retire and pull the money I had planned for retirement out of this property now that they're going to be building across the street? So, >> thank you for listening. >> Thank you.
>> All right. John Pine, uh 293 James Street. um next door to this property. Uh I want to echo what my neighbor just said. Um there are two sides of this property that are wetlands. Uh we've done our best to kind of care for that since we moved there 15 years ago. One
of the questions I have is that uh you know what's the proper buffer here because in the research I've done it's somewhere between 100 and 150 ft. In the survey that I got a year ago, it said 50 and what I received two weeks ago it says 25 ft from the property line. that
property line is wetlands. Um those wetlands um what else do I got here? This I mean this is a migratory pathway for both wildlife and birds that they come through all the time. They transverse
across all these properties. Uh that's going to get disturbed and interrupted. I've been calling the town for several years about this property. I've been assured that this could never happen because of the wetlands. And so I'd like to know what has changed, what, you know, why has the town changed their
position all of a sudden? And um the other thing that does not make sense to me, you know, as you look at this, you know, this is a single family unit home surrounded by single family unit homes, and you want to put a multi-unit
family dwelling in the middle of all of it. It just does not make sense to me. And I would ask, are there any other situations like this in the township? Cuz I'd be hardressed to I'd be hardressed to figure that out. Thank you.
>> Thank you. >> I'm Bill Robinson, nine Spring Hill Lane. I have two questions and one observation. Um, my first question is the a lot of the concerns that people have raised are about the increased density, the schools and so on. Has anyone looked at what
this is going to do to the master plan if the master plan still exists? Like what's what's Morristown going to look like in five or 10 years? You know, is it going to look like Union or something like that? Or is it going to maintain the the character that we all want, which is like a more balanced
density? So that's question number one. Question number two, somebody raised a point about what Harding did to address this this train that's approaching us that's coming from uh the New Jersey uh state uh mandates. Um and we've we've
come up with this way of addressing that. But are there other possible solutions? You know, what are what are the other towns doing? So that we I that's a question there. And then my third point is an observation. We've said that we're we this is very balanced. We've spread the
weight the the obligation to use the word around the town. But it seems that all but one of these plans is in the eastern part of the township. The only one the only one that isn't that that I as I understand it is the one on Sussex.
So I'm wondering why that is. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> My name is Bob Dodge. I live at 107 Harter Road. I'm affected by 291. I've lived there for 22 years. This property was purchased by a landscape company
called Pasani. They uh came in, started taking down trees unauthorized. They got uh chastised by the town for that. They caused wetlands that I didn't really have on my property. All of a sudden, I have a wet backyard. And and there is so
much wetlands there. I I went by the other day walking my dog and it was like a swamp there just the other day and there was no rain and it was like a swamp. I can't believe that Pani has he was trying to apply for this type of uh
a townhouse construction. Denied. Denied. Denied. No way it's going to happen all of a sudden because you have to mandate obligation. You rubber stamp a project that should absolutely not happen. And the amount of notice that we
got here for one week to come, 10 days, what? 21 days. You argue 18 days, 19 days. We got letters. This is ridiculous. If you guys started this process 3 years ago, we should have been involved in this 3 years ago. Not tonight. Are you going to all I heard
one nay all night. This was just a rubber stamp. We're wasting our time here. We're frustrated. You hear our frustration. But what does that mean? You guys have made up your mind. You're going to do it because you have to do it. And I understand that part of it, but this is ridiculous. This was not
well planned. And it is it is a disgrace to Mars Township. I hope we get more input when it comes to site plans that we're going to be involved early, not at the last minute when it's already decided. Oh, yeah. That's fine. That's good. Here we go. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Uh Lee Goldberg, 10 Arrowhead Road. Um I guess my first question would be either for um the planning board attorney or any of the township committee members that sit on the planning board um who were at the courtesy review last week um on this particular tract. can just
elaborate, you know, how that master plan courtesy review could view this particular lot and the proposed development on it as consistent with the master plan. So, I'd be interested to learn what the rationale is there. Um, it definitely presents as sort of 10 lbs in a 5 lb bag with all the residential
stuff going on around it. Um, I'm a little taken aback at the um the justosition of what's proposed there versus the residential neighborhood that it's in. um and would also be curious to know um and if it's not our business and you can't reveal
that that's understandable as well, but I'm not familiar with um any other time or maybe I'm misconstrued on this where a residential property like this was then sort of adapted in to
a um affordable housing reszoning or plan. Um, so I'm not sure if the township approached the land owner or if the land owner pro approached the township or there might be other people in the township who maybe live on multiple acres who may like to consider their spot as a good spot. So, I'm not
really sure how this came came to fruition. So, anything that can be elaborated on that would certainly be helpful to know. >> Thank you. >> Julie Hobalt 210 Mount Kimbo. Um, back to my previous question, uh, that I didn't hear an answer. Does the
municipality have small acreage of land that we could build our own affordable units? Seeing that this is only 3 acres, does the town not have three acres that we could relinquish to a builder and have him build 13 homes at perhaps in a
better location than in this neighborhood? Hi, I'm Tanya Pine from 293 James Street. Um, I just want to reiterate what my husband said. Um, I was there with him every time he would call the
township. We knew that Mr. Basani was trying to regrade our wetlands next to our home. We caught him and his workers cutting down trees in our wetlands.
He said he was trying to move the water. Um, we were very aware of what he was trying to do, trying to be a good neighbor to him and give him the benefit of the doubt. It's very upsetting. Every time my husband would call and ask, "Is this
something that's going to happen?" And he was told multiple times, "You lied to him." Whoever he spoke to, they said this would never happen in between these residential homes. So, we would like to know why all of a sudden
in between our homes, you're going to build town homes. And I would like to know why he was lied to because this was just eight months ago that he spoke to someone from the township and we were told this would never happen on that property. This
would not be reszoned. So, we'd like to know how this was reszoned and with the wetlands there, how close this will be to our property and just like all the other residents, what this is going to do to our property when it
does flood. Because similar to all of you, our sump pump runs all the time. So, we've heard other people say that, oh, things have changed and then they have flooding
and then that's going to come down on us to take care of that ourselves. The cost will go to us as homeowners. Thank you. Okay. Um, my question is because this is
currently zoned as single. >> This is currently zoned as single family residential. >> State your name again. >> Oh, Pam Russell. >> Um, this to me is the same as Sussex. I don't understand how you can take either
an open space government use zone or a single family residential zone and be reszoning that for highdensity housing. The other ones were and before it was stated that all but one is an adaptive reuse. That's not correct. This is
single family residential zone. So if you can be forced to put affordable housing in a single family residential zone in future rounds, like where does it end? If you're forced to be able to put it on open space and single family, I just
don't understand how it ever ends. I mean, these are not the office buildings make sense because they're, you know, it's it's they're having vacancy issues as you stated at the beginning. You take a class C obsolete office building and you and you put some
nice town houses. That makes sense in terms of zoning and planning. But taking a single family res residential zone 35 and and putting affordable housing has makes no sense from a planning perspective. I don't
think it is consistent with our master plan and I think it's a terrible precedent for the rest of our town. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hi Jocelyn Crosetti 25 Blackberry Lane. I just um wanted to reiterate that I don't think my question was answered
about the schools. I know schools are not taken into consideration along with the central services when the affordable housing mandate comes down. So my question was have you and it may be just a simple yes or no. I'm just curious have you thought about what we are going
to do with our schools because it's undoubtedly going to be a problem. I mean, my daughter graduated Mortown High School in uh 2021, and I know then they had to eat lunch on the floor. There's like no room for these kids to eat
lunch. They're eating on the floor, and who knows where else? But I mean, that's something that's uh definitely concerning. So, schools, essential services, has has there been thought yet about how we're going to handle all of
that? So, that was really my question. Um, and then my other question is when do we know about the um, like the site planning? Because I sat through the multiple rounds of the catch road debacle and I know the residents, they
were extremely unhappy, uh, rightfully so, and they were requesting the entrance and exit for this, um, affordable housing to be moved from Catch Road to Hanover. And again, it was a situation where it was too little too
late. Like the decision was already made and planned and they were voicing, you know, very legitimate concerns. I mean, that that's a it's it's a dangerous entrance and exit where, you know, there's a a soccer field and a
playground and a blind hill. So, my question is, I want to come because I know there's that back entrance onto Southgate. Um, so I'm going back to Southgate here. So I want to come to uh my or the the meeting where um I can
hear what the plan is for that entrance and exit to the 100 South Gate. So I will look for that. I do look for that. I consider myself pretty involved and sometimes it's not very easy to to find the information. And lastly, regarding
Southgate Parkway, and I'm only going to bring it up now because I don't think I'm going to be here for the end when it's open to all questions, but um I think it's nice, but I'm a cyclist and I'm a runner and I think I guess my question to you is uh
or my plea perhaps is that it could it really needs to be maintained better because there's debris in the bike lanes and if you're a cyclist, And because it is tight because of the cobblestones, if you have to move out of
the way for um any any type of debris, you could easily like go into a car. There's really not a lot of room to move. So, that's just one of my my points. And also the sidewalks cuz there's certain parts of the sidewalks that with the snow, they aren't
maintained. And I know people are walking in the street there at Southgate. So, it's >> You're right. You're three minutes. >> Okay. Thank you. >> So, it is pretty narrow. So, >> yeah, >> the maintenance would be wonderful. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Uh, Terry Hudzena again. I'm just wondering as a side, um, could you turn
up the heat a little bit? I don't know if it's just me. No, I'm >> I think a few of us are a little chilly. >> It's plenty hot up here. >> But if someone could turn it up, that would be appreciated. I think >> on my hands. Um, the one thing that I
wasn't going to talk about, but I've heard it from the some of these people in the areas that they're in. I was reminded of when the Morris estate came into existence. It's it spans both the left and right side of Woodland Avenue. And there were people like Stanton Peele
and Mary Arnold and uh even as some of you will know Lynn Seabbert uh that said the more estate should not be built on the side where Lanica is because there's wetlands and there are wetlands there. As a matter of fact, there's a sewer line that goes to the wetlands that sometimes spews out sewer
sewage. But in any and I see you're fixing it, thank you very much after 30 some odd years. But the point is the more state homeowners association had to when they were going to the planning board, a lot of those people that I just mentioned said that there's a high water
table and they were right. And so what happened after those town houses were built over on the Davenport side, a lot of association had to spend a lot of money to dig up around those foundations and support them and re whatever they do
to those foundations and they do have subumps that run continuously even over in the affordable housing side. So, I'm wondering if when some of these properties do have wetlands, did the township ever take into consideration that there might be a high water table and actually if people have basements,
they will be flooded. >> Thank you. See, >> close. >> Is there a motion to close the public comment? >> It was virtual. >> There's nobody no. >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor? I
>> I just raised their hand. >> Um, who wants to start? >> Start. >> I'll start. >> Okay. Mr. Phillips. >> Thank you, Mayor. Um, there was a number of comments including
the resident who lives across the street. Uh, I think Mr. Goldberg and there was another resident asked about sort of what's the wisdom of including this property in the uh plan. Um the genesis is that the developer had
approached the township regarding this site. Uh and ultimately it was deemed to be an appropriate location for a small it's only 15 total units townhouse uh project at a relatively low density
that would indeed contribute towards the township's fourth round plan. and we were looking for units in any which way we can and the appropriateness was largely in recognition of the mixeduse nature of James Street in the area and
the fact that there was precedent for multif family townhouse projects already existing along this particular street and now obviously the residents may may not agree with that but that is the rationale that went into including this site in the in the plan there was a
question about wetlands and the impacts of wetlands. Um, and certainly this is an issue that the developer is going to have to address if there are indeed wetlands. I'm not aware or we're not aware the professionals of any formal
delineation that was shared with us. Uh, although we heard that this site was close to areas which may be wetlands. the devel if a developer pursues an application, if this ordinance is adopted, they're going to need a formal letter of interpretation from the state
and they'll be bound by the state regulations. And if they basically uh there areas of the site that can't be accommodated because of that, it will be a it will be reflected and they may not be able to get the yield that they otherwise that we otherwise allow. It's
just permissive in the plan and ultimately that will be addressed again if this ordinance is passed at the sign time of sight plan approval and detailed engineering and studies and LOIs and and storm water management and all that is is addressed. Again, this is only the
stage of the uh putting the zoning in place which again is just permissive. Uh and the last planning issue that I have was the issue of master plan consistency was brought up again with this site. One just one other point that I didn't
mention before is that the township uh next year actually is due to do a new master plan. So, it's a very kind of pertinent and timely question and but uh you know it'll come as no surprise to the public that the the township has
been sort of um dealing with the housing plan over the course of the next two years and and if if we can you know ultimately uh you know put that past us then they can move forward with a master plan which will be addressed. But I will say again that in terms of master plan
consistency because this site is uh in the uh recently adopted amended housing element uh and fair share plan which is part of the master plan. Again a week ago it was deemed consistent with the master plan that's in place today. And
those are essentially the planning issues that I that I had. Mayor I don't know if I missed anything. Okay. >> Thank you Mr. Vu. anything about the wetlands or you not be >> Yeah, I can speak to them. Um, so
echoing what Mr. Phillips just said, uh, there will be an in-depth regulatory process that I'll have to adhere to in an application process. Uh currently D's guidance documentation shows anticipates
wetlands um predominantly to the the west of the subject property in the rear yards of the homes on Old Harter Road. Uh there is a isolated water body in that area. um that likely based on visual observation it it's
likely a habitat to some extent and then has surrounding wetlands that go generally north to south which would be along the rear property line and and down down towards the corner the southeast corner. uh it during that
process any existing delineations on any of these surrounding properties are at are the resources of DP along with the obligation of the applicant to identify any on-site and off-site wetlands that
may have permitting impacts. So, uh, the transition areas, which are what we term the buffers to a wetland, are either 150 ft or 50 ft based on exceptional or ordinary resource value. Um, so those
would be the the the buffers to those those wetland flags when they're delineated. Uh the development pattern on this site over the last 10 years in aerial review is relatively stable to the areas that were previously disturbed. The exception what I'd say is
the southerntherly lot line to uh I believe the resident here at 293 the adjoining lot to those wooded areas. It looks like there was some front yard activity that occurred, front and sideyard activity that occurred on the subject lot and that has then reveated in that area. uh if any of that was in a
transition area historically that's part of the look back by D when they go through the permit process. So some of those quote unquote past sins that might have existed would be considerations by D in their full review of the application and permitting of the site.
>> Uh with respect to groundwater uh the presence of wetlands also with it comes the presence of high groundwater table. So when we see wet wetlands in the area, it's anticipated that you're going to have a ground high ground water table. Um when you don't
have wetlands, you can still have high groundwater table based on geology and other uh storm water runoff and soil conditions. The sites that we're talking about in these ordinances, including this site, all of them are anticipated to be major developments in storm water management,
which means that there are required obligations of investigation for the soil, what underlying soils are on the site, where the groundwater table is established at the seasonal high and the and the active groundwater table. And
then the design of any of the um storm water solutions has to accommodate for that. When there is shallow groundwater, it restricts the ability to design a compliant site and then further restricts the development density. So inherently those constraints of the
stormwater management play with the other environmental constraints to kind of self-regulate the the appropriate density to the site further reducing the density potential from the the zoning rights of the site.
>> Thank you. >> The question about that was asked about any small available lots of land. I don't think the township has any >> other acreage. >> When we went through the exercise when we got to 375
>> or the 575, we went through every single parcel was there >> and you know there was you know very very little that you know >> wasn't accounted for. >> Right. Right. has to be a certain >> acreage in order to even be considered
for possib possibly for affordable housing. >> I forgot the exact number but >> couple acres is >> Mr. Phillips spent hours I mean decades. >> I mean we could have put them right out on the front lawn here according to the
state. We could have put 20 town homes. >> They thought that was available land in front of town homes. >> Yeah. Oh and Okay. Um and the school issue that was raised again. Um just one of the things I want everybody to
understand too because like we said the state this is not an issue like the state says whatever happens so if how many so raises the number of kids going to the schools you you have to accommodate. It's kind of like um years where they're more often in the past
than now, there was a big there were a lot of kids like coming up and all of a sudden schools needed a lot more room and then 15 years later, 20 years later, the numbers went way down. There are surrounding municipalities that closed schools, closed grammar schools because
they didn't need them. Well, guess what? With this happening to those towns, can you imagine? they don't they might have to open up schools that they had to close because if they had to accommodate more kids but I do meet with Dr. Mucci um the superintendent of schools and we
talk about this stuff. They have a big referendum coming up. So I keep asking what that number is. They don't know yet. I don't know. That's I mean there's a lot of stuff they need to do. They need to improve a lot of schools. But we will address that issue. Um it's like the best answer I can give you right now
on how we accommodate that. But we all make it work. It's what we have to do. Mayor also um with the school districts, you know, we provide them information every year on what developments are going in. So they they're doing five-year projections for their student
population and what the needs are going to be. So that is always been an ongoing process with the township and Marstown and the school district so that they can properly plan and doing their projections of future use for the schools and how many students going to be there. And as you said now looking at
that they have a large referendum coming up to do some expansions um that more information will be coming out on that but it'll be I believe in September. >> Yep. >> Any other comments from the day? >> Just real quick. >> Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
>> I'll I'll only be a moment but no go ahead. Go ahead. I'm going to yield to the professional. There was there was a question with respect to it was a resident on Blackberry Lane again with respect to when will at the site plan stage when will we be notified and uh to reiterate
uh the municipal land use law requires 10 days notice on public hearings for land development applications but the township strives to pursuant to a resolution voluntarily increase the period of time on those notices but also applications and please correct me if
I'm wrong. I believe once they are deemed complete, uh application materials start to make their way to the website well in advance of uh uh hearings, even well in advance of 10 days or 21 days uh uh prior to any
hearing before any site plan uh excuse me, any site plan hearing before the planning board. So the short answer is if and when it happens there'll be several weeks if not longer uh that uh people will be aware of an application
that has been brought before the planning board of this township and um I think there was one oh I just there was a reference to uh most of the sites being on the eastern portion of
the township. Uh obviously the Sussex Avenue site is not uh there are other sites in the third round uh including the uh aforementioned 100% 50 unit project that is not on the east side of
the municipality and I believe that other others are correct when they say that there the projects have been uh generally dispersed throughout the township. That's correct. >> Sorry for
>> Thank you. That was That was quick. >> Thank you, Mr. >> I just I just have a qu a a comment and a quick question because it seems to me in hearing what the residents are saying, you know, about this being wetlands and a high water table and the
fact that this is a a very small piece of property. Uh, and I'm hearing that of of any of the projects that we're talking about tonight, this is if any of them are going to fall through for whatever reason, it's going to be this
one because there may not be as as Mr. Warner had said, it may not be viable if once, you know, D starts taking a a real hard look at at this and whether the the builder can have the density that that
that they're expecting. So, I I guess the the question that I have is if for some reason if we pass this tonight and if for some reason the the um an application comes before the the
township to build 15 units and it falls through. What does this mean for our for our uh fourth round obligation? First of all, the obligation uh the prospective need obligation, the number
does not change. Um is it conceivable that for example this project were to end up having hypothetically 10 units and not 15 and maybe uh uh I don't you know right now it's a three-unit obligation for
affordables. So even then they may have a three-unit obligation. But regardless if for anything causes us to lose one or two or I believe it's uh three units uh anticipated
uh affordable units, we would have to make up those three units otherwise. I'm not going to say elsewhere. I'll say otherwise uh because it may be a different location. It may be a mechanism that potentially does not require
construction. That's to be determined. But the obligation, >> sorry, that's the word obligation. Uh continues. >> And I think that's important for the public to understand because we don't know what's going to be behind any of
this. So, who knows? >> And we we may not know. I mean, again, this the zoning is permissive, right? The township's not building it. is permissive and a developer will either come forward with a plan or not come forward with a plan and there as Mr. Warner said there's a midpoint review
after 5 years. If there's no application, we're simply going to say that based on the information that we have available to us, this zoning remains viable because we don't have any information on wetlands or anything else that says you can it accommodate less units because the concepts that we were
working with that uh which were presented to by the developer did not show any wetlands impacts on this site and it's going to be what it's going to be and it may not have to totally resolve itself potentially until after 2035 if we if there's no additional
information or a site plan application that's filed between now and then. So, it remains to be seen. >> Thank you for the clarification. >> Any other comments? >> Yes, mayor. >> Uh if I could if I could ask one of the planners uh to opine on two things and
then I will follow up with another question. Uh, one is the definition of OSGU because I'm not sure that the public fully understands what the OSGU zone actually means. It's not truly open
space. Um, and second to also uh talk about the fact that uh the the parklands and the open spaces that Morris Township does own. You know, this this relates to the question about does Morris Township own any parcels that could be built on.
Morris Township is 27% maybe we're up to 28% preserved open space. Uh which we're very proud of. Um but to have the planner uh opine on the fact that we cannot use that for affordable housing and on the fact that it actually helped
us reduce our obligation by having so much open space. Thank you. So, you're correct um that we did back when we were basically challenging the the number that was provided to us with the 571 units, we did a complete
inventory of all the properties in the township, including those that are municipally owned. And as you know, Jeff, many of those sites that the township owns are dedicated for recreational use and much of it through green acres. And that allowed us to eliminate those particular sites. And as
I mentioned, most of the uh land owned by the township was accounted for. And we were able to basically convince fair share housing and the court that those uh properties should not be included in the vacant land analysis which was the
genesis with for the 571 units. Uh, with regard to the OSG GU zoning, Jeff, and I just want to make it clear that this site is not an OSGU zone site. It's an R835 zone site, but OSGU stands for open space governmental use, and it allows
for a variety of public uses, including, you know, parklands, recreational lands. Uh, I believe schools are conditional use within the district. I think golf courses and country clubs are permitted use. So it's basically uh reserved for
what it says open space and governmental use and it covers as you mentioned a large segment of the geographic area of the township. >> Great. Thanks. And my yeah my question is uh per the discussion of the wetlands
that might be surrounding the property and uh Mr. Phyllis made a comment about the yield uh and our engineer Mr. BC uh commented about uh reduced uh you know building uh envelope possibility.
um if the when you know when we go to the site plan review or when the prop when the site goes to site plan review and there is a wetlands issue and the envelope for building does get reduced. Um I see in the ordinance in section
3 paragraph D item number one it says the maximum development yield will be 15 units a minimum of three units shall be set aside for low and moderate income households. Uh so if the yield on the
property gets reduced to instead of 15, 12, 11, whatever the number might be, uh is the three units of moderate low and moderate income housing uh still an obligation for the site no matter what
the building envelope turns out to be. The the short answer is yes. And we drafted the ordinance purposefully to require those units notwithstanding that there may be some constraints that might reduce the total yield otherwise.
>> Good. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Seeing no other comments, may I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 08-26? >> So move. >> Second. Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote?
>> Mr. Gazelle, >> yes. >> Mr. Ravage, >> yes. >> Mr. Janata, >> yes. >> Mayor Grigia, >> yes. >> I, Donna J. Geriglia, mayor, declare ordinance number 08-26 approved and adopted and direct the township clerk to publish proper notice
thereof on the township website or as otherwise required by law. Madame Clerk, please read ordinance number 08- 09 >> 09-26 into the record. >> 09-26, amending chapter 95, zoning of the code
of the township of Morris by adding the S SNH zone and adopting associated regulations for Old Turnpike block 8602 lot 10. >> Miss Laney, can I have a brief overview,
please? >> Sure. So full four old turnpike block 8602 lot 10 is just over half an acre. It's the former home I think of the tea t- room. Uh it was owned by the township or may actually is this
>> okay? Uh it backs up to Dunkin Donuts. Um single family homes face uh face Langden uh lane. Uh the railroad tracks separate it from development to the north including the Red Bulls facility north and east single family homes and
the country um club golf course. Um these types of facilities a group home are designed to look like single family detached homes. Uh they are permitted as of right statewide in all residential
zones um per the state law. Um, however, this is in the B11 zone and as such, we needed to write zoning to permit this type of facility. It would be a five- bedroomedroom group home. Uh, we would get five affordable housing credits for
the five bedrooms and because it's a special needs um we actually get five bonus credits. So, the um home would yield 10 affordable credits. Um currently I the operator contemplated operator would be community hope that
would be uh serving um adults with disabilities. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to open the public hearing on ordinance number 09-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor? I I
>> Mr. Goldberg Uh, Lee Goldberg, 10Hourhead Road. Um, I'm If someone can answer this during the answer portion of this, I don't know if there's going to be a lot of um, public commentary on this particular lot, but it's my understanding, and I may be incorrect, that the is whether
the township is still the owner of this tract of land or it's already been sold to another organization or another entity. Um, I believe we paid 700,000 for it back in 2021. So if it has been sold, wondering if we took a profit on
it or we sold it at a are we donating it or whatever it may be. So if any elaboration can be made on that and then also to uh Mr. Grael's point and then some elaboration from Mr. Phillips on open space government use. Um maybe I misheard earlier but I believe and I if
you could correct me if I'm wrong on this Mr. Phillips. But part of the Sussex A um issue on tonight's uh agenda, I thought someone had said that part of that was open space government use. Um and then also we did touch on St. Elizabeth's this evening, which I
believe is also open space government use. Um if not, if you could clarify with that learning institution, it would not apply. Um but to the point also raised by the um uh some members of the township committee and also the planners
um as we look across town um we have 4 acres as uh just sitting right there on the old Honeywell site that we've been told is going to be a recreational field at some point in the time and that's been sitting there laying for I don't know 6 years maybe more 5 years so I
haven't heard any hiding or hair of any development coming there. I know it is if it's designated for recreational. Are there any powers within um the processes and procedures we have here in the township to reszone that to consider that? Um I could also say the same for Bleki Field. I know it's a field. I
think I've seen some field hockey practice on it maybe I don't know 10 times over my course of 30 years here in passing by. So that also seems to be a very underutilized tract of land and wondering if when you did this vacant land analysis um if there was anything
that would allow you to have considered that or to have changed anything here with how we have things zoned or any prior agreements made um to make those lands eligible that are um along that corridor where this old term pike is located and also feeding into the
Madison Avenue quarter study that was re referenced earlier. Um, and then if there is any update on that four acres that's sitting there on the Honeywell site, whether there'll be shovels and ground to plan put forward, anything, I think that would be certainly uh good to know as we look at um open acreage
across the township. Thank you. >> Thank you. Seeing no other members of the public and no hands raised, is there a motion to close public comment? >> So moved. Second. >> All those in favor? Hi. >> Hi. >> Hi,
>> Mr. Phillips. >> Thank you, Mayor. So, um, in answer to some of Mr. Goldberg's comments, the, um, he's indeed correct. The bulk of the
rabbitical site on Sussex Avenue is zoned and was zoned OSGU. Part of that is was reszoned by earlier action this evening for inclusionary housing. The point I was making in answer to Mr. Grace's question was that
the I just wanted to make it clear that the site that we were considering as part of the public hearing which was James Place was an R835 zone not not an OSGU zone. I just that was the only point I was uh making. But you are correct that a portion of the rabbitical
college uh was previously OSGU and part of that campus will remain OSGU as was articulated by Miss Laney earlier. Uh you talked about St. Elizabeth. The only clarification is is that the bulk of
their lands remain OSGU, but the land uh portion of those lands running on Punch Bowl Road were reszoned as part of our third round housing plan to permit an inclusionary development with an affordable housing set aside. That's the
only caveat. They are no longer zoned to OSGU because they uh helped assist us in our third round housing plan. Um I really uh Mr. Goldberg don't have anything to add about the municipally owned properties that you uh cited. All
I can say is that when we did the detailed analysis way back when when we were trying to get our 571 number down uh it was my recol recollection and Mr. Quinn can comment that most of the municipal lands were either deed
restricted or they were actively used for some municipal purpose. Uh you know whether it be the municipal building or some other utility owned by the municipality they were accounted for and and that's all I can recollect. So I
can't speak to the specific sites and the other two who owns now and financial considerations. I'll defer to Mr. Quinn on that with regard to the to old turnpike road site. >> The old turnpike road site was to sold
to community hope for $700,000 and that transition took place >> finally. So they are now the owner of the property. So the $700,000 we spent, we have received back that $700,000. >> I'm sorry. We received back >> $700,000.
But the contract was was was underway a long time ago and it was a funding issue from the state that why it's sold. >> Right. >> Correct. And the other pl are recreation facilities and >> township committee is not going to move forward on recreation facilities. We
have done things on Prescott Road. We have permits there that this past fall for flag football and other things that we've we've permitted. So, it's, you know, has potential plans for down the road, but like everything else, it's, you know, needs funding and everything else. And there's a couple other
playgrounds in front of it that will probably take place before that's fully developed as a recreation field. But there is some recreation taking place now. >> Seeing nobody else who would like to speak, is there a motion to close public comment? >> So move.
>> So move. All those in favor? >> I >> I >> may I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 09-26. >> So move. >> Mayor Mayor, are we going to have a comments period? >> I uh do you have a question or comment
>> from the day? >> I I I just I have a couple remarks. Yes, if I could. >> Uh thank you. So uh >> Blki Field was brought up. Um I had you know it was one of the things that I had mentioned uh when these discussions happened 2 years ago but it's a
preserved field uh preserved open space and if I am correct maybe one of the planners can correct me if I'm wrong but if we wanted to turn that into a developable lot we would have to find uh four times as much open space to replace it. That's a 4:1 ratio. When you try to
unredeem preserved open space to make it uh usable again for another use. you have it's a 4:1 ratio of what you have to replace it with. Um, and the comment that uh the field by Honeywell uh is layingow uh that's not correct because it's taken a couple years for the field
to settle, for the grass to grow um and such. And to use that parcel for affordable housing uh would add to the affordable housing that's already on the Honeywell site. they already have uh a portion of that site that's already
affordable housing. Um along with old term Pike Road uh being the uh affordable housing or or the the use that we're using it for. Um that would be a huge amount of affordable housing in one really one location uh in Morris Township. So I don't think that's
reasonable approach either. And uh lastly, my only last comment is I and I said this from the day before. I am so proud of Morris Township for putting in housing that is for the special needs community. Uh we've done it before. We
did it at the Colgate site uh with six units up there. Uh we've done it at the catch road site and now we're doing it on Oldm Pike Road. There is a tremendous need for special needs housing in the state of New Jersey and Morris Township is one of the few communities that I
know of that actively pursues uh making that part of our housing formula. So very proud that we're including this particular project uh in in in our solution to the affordable housing crisis. Thank you, Mayor. >> Thank you, Committeeman Grael. Any other
comments from the deis? May I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 09-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Janata? >> Yes. >> Mr. Ravitz? >> Yes. >> Mr. Gazelle? >> Yes.
>> Mayor Griglia? >> Yes. I, Donna J. Grigia mayor declare ordinance number 09-26 approved and adopted and direct the township clerk to publish publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as otherwise
required by law. Madame clerk please read the title of ordinance 10-26 into the record. 10-26, an ordinance of the Township of Morris, Morris County, New Jersey, adopting the amended Mount Kimell Avenue redevelopment plan
regarding the property ident identified on the township's tax map as block 5506, lot 25, 95 Mount Kimell A, and block 5605,
lots 567, and 8, 102, 106, and 108, Mount Kimell A pursuant to the local redevelopment and housing law NJSA4A 12A-1. >> Miss Laney, can we have a brief overview
of ordinance 10-26? >> Okay, so this is 95 Mount Kimell amended redevelopment plan. Um, as noted, block 5506 lot 25 and block 5605 lots 5 through 8. It's 9.2 acres. Uh this was a
third round site and a redevelopment plan was done almost 10 years ago um to permit uh a mix of development of multif family and town homes that would yield 23 affordable housing units. Development
did not happen on that site. Uh and we were uh one of the objections that we got um at over the summer was from a perspective purchaser, new perspective purchaser of the site. Uh and one of their challenge aspects of their
challenge was that the uh redevelopment plan in place did not work. And that seemed to be the case as nothing had happened on the site. And just to note, this is the former Atlantic Health uh rehab building. Um so what this is is
amended uh redevelopment plan. It will permit um 139 sort of multifamily and town homes and 23 affordable housing units. And again this is consistent with our third round plan um and is um
you know was was uh a resolution of a challenge that we received over the summer. >> Thank you very much. May I have a motion to open the public comment on ordinance number 10-26? >> So move second. >> All in favor? I >> I.
>> Mr. Goldberg. >> Uh Lee Goldberg, 10 hour head road. Um questions for I guess um the planners or the township committee or anyone who could answer these questions. Um I know in looking at the So my first question
is uh in looking at the plans I in tying them back it's hard for me to tell what was actually amended between this plan and the last plan. So if someone could actually go over what those amendments were and what was actually amended. I think that would be helpful for the purposes of the public. Um whether it's
at a high level or granular level I think it would be appreciated. Um, in terms of the actual redevelopment plan, it's broken up into, you know, Mount Kemell apartments and Mount Kemell townhouse sections. I did notice, um, for the apartments, there's actually a
zero foot setback, um, which I've never really actually seen before given that it straddles the township and the town right there. Um, so if you could speak to that zero foot setback and then I think there's even language in there that may allow it to straddle and even go into Marstown. Um, I was actually
here about 10 years ago, I think, when Mayor Doerty came to a meeting here. And there was supposed to be some sort of coordination between the town and township to get this done. So, I'd be interested to learn if we did cooperate with Marstown or what Marstown's role in this and if they're comfortable with
having a zero foot setback or anything straddling onto their into their um town. Um, and then the difference between the bulk standards for the apartments and for the town houses. I noticed 60% impervious coverage for the the town houses is allowed and 40% for
the apartments. Uh 20% building coverage for the apartments and 40% building coverage for the um town homes. If you could just elaborate as to the rationale behind that. Um I did also see that I believe there um were going to be stacked housing units um which I thought
we were trying to get away from uh as a township. I may be misconstrued on that. So, if you could just talk to the nature of the um stacked units and why that was sort of um viewed as um appropriate. Um and then also in section 6A it says the
township committee will serve as the redevelopment entity. If you could just elaborate on that. I mean like it was mentioned earlier, I don't think that the township is in a position of being the developer on that. Um so maybe they turn it over immediately to a developer.
Um, so any comment on what that uh what that uh redevelopment entity constitutes? Um, there were also some other actions that were sort of um vague or they're at least touted as needing to be addressed in terms of infrastructure, environmental remediation, vacating any
public utility easements or other easements in the rightway and then also streetscapes and sidewalks along that um the the Mount Campbell. Um, again, I think when the area in need of redevelopment issue was um sort of issued, it was um declared that the
stuff in the township was an area needed redevelopment, but the stuff in Marstown was sort of not in need of redment. It could be it was rehabil rehabilitatable. It could be rehabilitated. Um, and then yeah, really, um, I've never seen 0%
setback or even, uh, another sort of, uh, application or plan where it does straddle into Morristown. Um, and, uh, interested in what cooperation and the extent to that we're partnering with Morristown or what their involvement, if any, is um, with this plan. Uh, thank
you very much. >> Thank you. See, >> I'm not leaving. >> That's okay. Take your time. Take your time. >> Uh Julie Hobalt to 10 Mount Kimell a um obviously I live right down the road. I was just wondering has there been any
conversation with Atlantic Health and possibly building um affordable housing for their workers like the lowincome workers and obtaining um affordable um housing units that way.
putting up, you know, another really nice building pretty much in the same footprint. >> Thank you. >> So, >> seeing no other persons here in public and no hands raised, is there a motion to close public comment? >> So moved.
>> Second. >> All in favor? >> I I >> Mr. Phillips, >> I don't know if I could keep up with the speed of Mr. Goldberg's comments. >> I have them all here. >> I think I got most of them. >> I have them all. I think >> um the essentially the the key change
here uh was an increase in the total number of units. Um and just to provide some framework for that is as Miss Laney mentioned there was a challenge uh because our uh existing plan which
was in place for just short of 10 years produced no units. No developer felt that it provided any kind of uh feasible method by which to meet that plan. Uh and ultimately when we went to a
mediation uh fair share housing agreed and indeed we came up with a compromise where we increased the total number of units from 115 to 139. I will say that 139 number is less than what the developer was looking for. Uh but that
is the the essential change. There may have been Mr. Goldberg a tweak to the coverage just based on a concept. they may may have needed a little bit of cushion is my recollection on the the coverage issue. Uh with regard to um the
zero foot setback, that's not a change from the existing redevelopment plan that was in place. There was always some contemplation because the Atlantic Health holdings including the building span both municipalities. So what this
plan does right now is it keeps that zero foot setback and that zero foot setback would allow for a comparable development to continue into the town of Marstown if Marstown so chooses uh to
pursue that. Um and I will say that the entity controls lands in both municipalities. So that would uh make sense to do that. But again, there's no change from the existing uh plan. Uh the
issue is stacked town houses. Stacked town houses were or are allowed under the current redevelopment plan that we're amending. Uh and that would be on the what I refer to as the lower side or south side of the site. So there's no
change in that product. It is allowed now. Uh there there are some references to language in the plan about the redevelopment entity reference. That's no change from the existing plan. Uh it's just that the township committee
would act as the redevelopment entity representing the township on the redevelopment of the site since it since it is subject to a redevelopment plan. It doesn't mean that the township is is doing any act of redevelopment. It's just acting as the entity. And I think
the plan, as I recall, provides for a redevelopment agreement uh between the developer and the township committee and the township and the reference to redevelopment entity. It's just that the township committee would fulfill that role uh in terms of of being the
representative in the agreement with the developer. There was other language that is cited uh in the uh plan uh about um easements and utilities. I think Mr. Goldberg that that we didn't change at all. That's that was in the existing
plan. We didn't change that. Again, the major uh change uh was an increase in the number of uh total units. And about the question about Atlantic Health and uh >> yeah, I'm not aware and didn't
participate in any separate conversations with Atlantic Health representatives about uh doing any kind of development outside what's in this redevelopment plan. I don't know if anyone else did, but certainly. >> But I thought even with the affordable housing, you couldn't designate it to be
Atlantic Health. >> No. No. >> Right. I was going to mention that that uh in order for any of the units that are in our plan to count uh towards our obligation, >> they have to be what's called affirmatively marketed, which means they
have to be marketed in our region, which is four counties of Warren, Union, Morris, and Essex um in a variety of ways that's in the plan that we um an ordinance that was adopted earlier tonight. But um if at if Atlantic Health had pursued that and had pursued housing
for some of their employees, we would not have gotten any affordable housing credit for it >> for it. >> Okay. Thank you. >> That's as far as the Yeah. Work workforce housing even separate and apart from Atlantic Health uh would not
be uh would not necessarily wouldn't constitute affordable housing for purposes of us meeting our >> need. the the obligation. Um and uh
it was it was somewhat interesting because some challengers appointed to the site as not having been developed in an effort to try to uh get densities much higher than they otherwise ultimately got or to get in our plan to
develop sites that are not going to be developed. Um but one of the challengers was a challenger saying this is a viable site. It does provide a realistic opportunity for the creation of
affordable housing. It just needs to be modified and as Mr. Phillips said um their efforts to modify it fell far short of what they sought. Uh um
ultimately it was only a 14 I'm sorry 20 24 unit there goes that math again 24 unit uh maximum increase in the uh number of units uh uh in our township and the project or I should say the
the zoning uh provides for a project that either stands alone in our township or uh as Mr. Phillips said uh would be a would cross the municipal boundary line
uh into Marstown and be comparable on that side as well. Uh and that ultimate determination will be made probably in part by what happens to Marstown and their efforts uh to meet their obligation and and ultimately what they
are ordered to do. But uh either way the project uh the zoning provides for realistic opportunity for the development of affordable housing and the court has already ruled as such. Nothing further. Thank you. >> Thank you. Any comments or questions
from the deis? Mr. >> Yes, I have. Yes, I have one. Thank you. Uh just to uh add to the question about whether Atlantic Health could have workers in that affordable housing and the comments from the planners uh about
that. Uh we've talked earlier tonight about the many failures of this affordable housing mandate from the state of New Jersey that we can't look at the number of school children. We can't look at traffic. Uh there's a lot of things we can't look at. And one of the failures in my mind is that there's
what I call local preference. Uh I think that all of these affordable housing uh requirements in each of the municipalities should have a local set aside for our uh first responders, our police, our young policemen who are joining the
force, our firefighters, our teachers, uh who all support the community. Uh it's my opinion and I've shared that with state legislators that we should be setting aside some of these affordable housing for people who live and work in our community and support our communities so they don't have to travel the long distances they that they do to
get to their jobs. Uh which reduce traffic on the road, reduce pollution uh to have all of these essential workers travel less distances. Um but in my opinion, it's a it's another failure uh by the state in this affordable housing mandate. Thank you.
>> Thank you. May I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 10-26? >> So moved. Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Ravitz, >> yes. >> Mr. Gazelle, >> yes. >> Mr. Janata, >> yes. >> Mayor Gerlia,
>> yes. I, Donna J. Gerriia, mayor, declare ordinance number 10-26, approved and adopted, and direct the township clerk to publish proper notice thereof on the township website or as otherwise required by law. Madame Clerk, please
read the title of the last ordinance 11-26 into the record. >> 11-26 amending chapter 95 zoning and chapter 57 land development of the code of the township of Morris.
>> Miss Laney. >> Okay. These are ordinances um that are deal with affordable housing regulations and development the development fee ordinance that are um statewide. They are ordinances that exist in our code
currently, but um one of the statewide regulations, the uniform housing affordability controls were amended in December. And as a condition of our settlement agreement with Fairshare Housing Center and also as part of the
court order, we had to amend our existing affordable housing ordinance and our existing development fee ordinance to be consistent with the new state law as well as the amended fair housing act. So these are um what you have before you is actually a model
ordinance that was um approved by or was prepared I think by an organization called the affordable housing professionals of New Jersey. It was signed off on by Fair Share Housing Center for all intents and purposes. It's a model ordinance. Um and we just
have adapted this model ordinance for Morris Township. >> Thank you. May I have a motion to open public comment for ordinance number 11-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor?
>> I. >> Are there any members of the public that would like to speak to this? Seeing none and seeing no hands raised, is there a motion to close public comment? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Is there another public comment?
>> Yes. >> Yeah. Yes, there is. All in favor? I >> I >> Any further discussion? May I have a motion to adopt ordinance number 11-26? >> So moved. >> Second.
>> Madame Clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Mr. Griselle, >> yes. >> Mr. Janata, >> yes. >> Mr. Ravitz, >> yes. >> Mayor Griglia, >> yes. I, Donna J. Grigia mayor declare or ordinance number 11-26 approved and adopted and direct the
township clerk to pub publish proper notice thereof on the township website or is otherwise required by law. At this time we have concluded consideration of the affordable housing resolutions and ordinances. We now will
consider resolution 67-26, appointing an individual to temporarily fill the vacant committee seat of committeeman Mark Dorphy. This time, I'd like to nominate Samantha Rothman to fill the vacant position of
Township Committee member. Is there a second? >> I second it. >> Are there further nominations? >> Yes, mayor. Can you list the three names that were were floated so the public knows who we're voting on?
>> Samantha Rothman, Jeremy >> Godwin, I'm sorry, Jeremy, you're right here and I Jeremy Godwin and Stephanie Lion. >> Mayor, may I just jump in real quick cuz committee man floated. Um we had a vacancy in our township committee and
it's controlled by statute on how that vacancy is filled. Since it was a democratic um committeeman who left the democratic committee um submitted three names to the township committee. The township committee can only select one of those three names. So these
nominations are not just being nominated from the floor. Um these are names that came from the democratic committee to fill a democratic seat on the committee. Uh if this um if the township committee cannot uh does not pick one of the three names, it then goes back to the Democratic committee for a selection to
the township committee. >> Thank you. >> And just for clarification, Mr. Caner, uh this is state statute. We're not making this up, right? >> No, this is this is a state statute committee. Um this is how the vacancy law operates in New Jersey. And again,
it's it's temporary. Uh upon the general election in November, um whoever wins that election will be sworn in following the election. >> Not following the election. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Not January. Following the election. >> Oh. Following the election,
the election results. >> Yeah. >> So, it's getting late. >> This is only >> this is only to fill the vacancy until the general election in November, which upon that election being certif certified, the new committee men will be sworn in. >> Okay. >> Very good. Uh, with that said, I would like to nominate Jeremy Godwin.
>> Is there a second? Hearing none, we'll move forward with Samantha Rothman. Madame Clerk, please read resolution 67-26 into the record and then we will take a roll call vote. >> The title.
>> Okay. A resolution appointing Stephanie Rothman. Samantha >> Samantha >> Samantha Roth Samantha Roth Rothman to temporally fill the vacant committee seat of committee member Mark Dorphy effective immediately upon adoption.
>> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? >> Yes, you need a motion. >> May I have a motion to approve resolution 67-26? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Madame clerk, may I have a roll call vote? Uh, Mr. Janata,
>> yes. >> Mr. Ravitz, >> yes. >> Mr. Gazelle, >> yes. >> Mayor Grigglia, >> yes. >> Resolution 67-26 is approved. We appreciate everybody who came out and um, congratulations to
Samantha Rockman. Public commentary. There are currently 18 members of the public joining us on Zoom. We will now open the meeting to the public comment portion for general commentary. We'll take comments from in-person attendees first and then switch over to Zoom. Please state if
you're a resident or non-resident for speaking. These comments are limited to three minutes per speaker. If you have questions you would like answered, your remaining time to speak will be yielded back to you for this purpose. Is there a motion to open public comment? >> So moved.
>> Second. >> All in favor? Hi. Hi. >> Hi. >> Okay. >> Uh Pam Russell, I have a couple comment uh follow-up questions on 100 Southgate. Um was the National Gas Pipeline
included in the calculation of developable area? I didn't get an answer and it doesn't seem like it was. The second uh question is, is there a concept plan that the township has received from Toll Brothers um that the that I can see? Is there a concept plan
for the property that I can see that the town has? And then my third question which really relates to 291 James Street. The planner had said that the concept plans of the developer did not show wetlands. But if
that turns out to be wrong going forward then you know it would be a lower um amount of units. Don't you have to check that if the wetlands are correct on the concept plan? Um and that's all. And then in general,
my comment is I cannot believe the amount of reasonzoning that was done in one night in one meeting. I think is completely insane. >> Can we can answer these questions? >> Let's wait to the end of public comment and do the same thing. >> Do the same thing. Okay. All right. Thank you.
>> Have a lot of members of public. >> Okay. Is there anyone else here in who would like to come to the podium? uh Lee Goldberg, 10 Arrowhead Road. Uh first of all, I'd like to thank uh former committeeman Jory, who's not here with us tonight, but for his years of
service on the township committee and to the community. Um and also with his service to the local fire department as well. So, he's certainly given back a lot to the community and wish him well on new endeavors. Um to Mr. Phillips. I'd like to thank him for his years of
service to the township committee. Um I've learned a lot from him over the years. Um I appreciate seeing him here this evening. I realize um you know sometimes you just never know. Maybe I'll see him here in the future. Maybe not. But if not uh Mr. Phillips and Paul, thank you so much for all your
years of service to the township again. Um there's been a lot of experiential learning uh that I've experienced through listening to you um elaborate on things over the years. So, thank you for all your service to the township community uh again to the community. Um and then to the full township committee,
thank you for your service. Um I know it's a difficult spot to be in tonight. Um it's a little understood topic. Um there's a lot of different things going on at a lot of different levels um at the state level, the legislature, what you're required to do. Again, it's always um a frustrating for the
residents to have to sort of learn about all this and try to get up to speed on it. It can be uh a lot of information to digest. I know um I think you come up to this with all good intentions. Um so thank you for your service in bringing this to us and you know all we can potentially ask for is to improve the
process going forward. Um overcommunication um on these things you know tends to prevent some of the things that happened here earlier this evening. Um so thank you for the opportunity um to ask the questions and to get some elaboration on them and uh thank you all for your time
and attention on this uh important issue that needs the time and attention. Um and thank you to all the professionals as well for answering the questions throughout the evening. Thank you. >> Thank you Mr. Goldberg. We really appreciate it. Um we know you come to the podium a lot but appreciate that you
come up the at the end off for your comments. Thank you, >> Jocelyn Gresetti, 25 Blackberry Lane. I was just wondering if you could just clarify because I was hearing about the third round and I'm what were our totals for that and you know what has been
developed or what hasn't been developed. Um, if you could just clarify that and then just so I can get a concept in my head adding that to the fourth round totals. So, how much are we talking if you can just tell me those numbers?
>> Yep. >> Between the two. And then I I'm also like a little confused too because um I kind of thought that the affordable housing it was mentioned I think a long time ago. Oh, it's for our teachers. It's for our our firefighters, young
firefighters, young police. And then I heard Mr. Gazelle say that it's not for that and we wish it could have been. So then who is this housing for? >> Okay, thank you. >> Seeing nobody else and no hands raised,
we'll go to an >> what? >> Oh, is there a motion to close public? >> So moved. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I >> Okay. Um, do Mr. Warner, are you ready? Are you pulling your mic because you're
ready to speak? >> Oh, yeah. Did I I gave it away, didn't I? >> Yes. >> The the the um >> uh one question that uh primacy recency recency is the last question asked. The last question that
was asked was uh uh a a reconciling the fact and people have talked about affordable housing being for our teachers, our firefighters, our police at least in part. Uh and then uh uh Mr. uh C councilman Gazelle's comments. I
think the distinction, just to be clear, is that with affordable housing, there's very low, low, and moderate income housing. And I think a lot of people would equate at least moderate income housing, which is 80% of the average income in the
state of New Jersey roughly or in this region, uh as being workforce housing is sometimes used. uh and maybe that is the type of housing that would equate to some extent with our teachers,
our firefighters, our police. Um but we cannot localize and that's the difference. You cannot localize and say we give a preference to our township's police and
our township's firefighters and our township's uh teachers. uh we have to leave it open uh even beyond the geographic boundaries of our township to anyone who would
qualify based on their income to be either very low low or moderate income for purposes of an essentially a lottery system to get that housing. So hopefully I think it was Blackberry Lane. I'm sorry I didn't get your name. But uh so
that's the difference when we say our teachers it's meant generally and beyond the boundaries of our township. Hope that answers that one. the the the um third round totals I might leave to our
planners, but uh but most of the third round uh uh the vast majority uh has been constructed and is occupied already. Uh we're basically talking about 95 Mount Kemell Avenue, uh the one that was just
done. Talked about the redevelopment plan being increased by 24 units. That project obviously has not come to fruition at least yet. It didn't come to fruition in the third round. And beyond that
um oh the sisters of charity uh uh project that was referenced earlier uh would be roughly well not roughly it would be 33 affordable units. Um but we get bonus credit 33 bonus credits. So we get credit for 66 while only 33 would be
constructed uh uh when that project comes to fruition. I think those are the only two third round projects that haven't come to fruition yet. >> Yeah, the I think all and Tim correct me if I'm wrong, but I think all the third round sites have either been developed
or approved other than the uh Sisters of Charity or St. Elizabeth, but that zoning remains in place. That's on Punch Bowl Road. >> Correct. >> And the 95 Mount Kemell Avenue redevelopment plan that was just amended by the township uh committee. There was
one other site that was part of the third round plan that we eliminated. It ultimately proved not to be viable and it was eliminated and that was memorialized in our housing element that we
>> uh prepared in uh 2025 and just recently amended. >> Correct. >> Um uh probably within the last week, right? >> Okay. >> The other are you are you done? The other I uh Mr. Goldberg, thank you for your kind words. They're much
appreciated. And then the other two comments that I had were uh with regard first to um the 100 southgate uh about a concept plan. There were several iterations of a very rough
concept plan that was shared with the township's professionals and provided some framework for the uh zoning that was adopted uh this evening. Uh, and then there was a comment about a utility. >> I'm sorry. Is that available to the
public? >> That's not for me to decide. >> Uh, I would suggest submitting open requests to the clerk and we'll review it. >> Okay. >> Thank you. >> And then there was a uh comment about a
utility easement. I'm not sure exactly what that was. Is it we we're certainly cognizant that there are lands uh utility owned lands along a portion of Laura Lane
>> more specifically >> towards the portion that fronts towards Laurel Lane basically running parallel to Laurel Lane. >> Yeah. There's a major national gas pipeline. >> Right. >> Correct. Um and the restrictions of that easement
are understood by the developer and will be will be adhered to. >> Yep. And the second comment, the last comment that I had was on the 291 James about the wetlands and again as I stated previously that uh you know the issue of
the wetlands is going to have to be addressed at some point when detailed engineering and studies are done but there were no wetlands as I recall that was shared with us at the time the a concept plan uh was reviewed by the township professionals.
>> Okay. Thank you. >> You're welcome. I just want the totals for the two rounds. >> Oh, the two rounds. Do you have the third round totals? >> The third obligation. >> The third round obligation
uh was 400 units. >> Okay. Thank you. >> What was the fourth round again? I'm sorry. >> The fourth round obligation was 375 units. >> My math is in >> Steve, I'll help you. 775.
>> 775. >> Yeah. But but but again remember as we stated multiple times before of that 375 I think it's 172 >> hopefully bonus credits and
>> yeah one only 172 are potential units to be constructed >> most of that 375 are the extensions >> of the affordability controls extending the existing period of existing
affordable housing units uh and bonus credits >> maximized by our planners. >> The other thing to note I'll just say is the compliance period between there could because the third round um obligations were litigated several times
the our obligation this 7 whatever 75 unit obligation extends for a period of 36 years. So it's from 1999 to 2035. So, it's it's it may seem like a lot, but that's actually a fair amount of time.
>> The third round was a 26 year ended up being a 26-year round. This started out it was supposed to be a six-year round. >> That's why you don't predict too much. >> Thank you. Are you coming to the podium or No. Okay.
>> What? >> Oh, we close public comment. I'm sorry. I asked I thought it was open. I apologize. Can I just um if you've closed it that's fine. It was just a comment about the gas line. Um >> just real quick.
>> Okay. Real quick at the Morris State. My understanding is that it's probably the same gas line that they're talking about on uh >> Yes. Thank you. And uh from my understanding, the Morate building 44, they have a sidewalk in the back of that
building. And I believe when the Wolves built the uh Morate and the the affordable housing, actually their sidewalk is within the easement of that that that line. It's very close to the building. So, please make sure that the developer, whoever develops that property, uh pays attention to the
easement there with the gas line. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Um one last thing I just want to say, Mr. Goldberg. Fortunately for us, I want everybody to realize that Mr. Jory is remaining a firefighter. So although we missed him and lost him off the township committee,
um he will remain doing that and want everybody to know that at the March 18th meeting, we will recognize and celebrate Mr. Jory. Um with that being said, I think >> mayor, I'd like to make a motion to adjourn.
So second >> the time is now 11:42. All those in favor >> I >> I >> I The next meeting of the township committee will be held Wednesday, March 18th at 7 p.m. for the regular meeting
5:30 p.m. for closed in the municipal building at 50 Woodland Avenue. Thank you all for attending. We really do appreciate it. Have a great night. >> You did a good job. you.