If you didn't have a keen eye, you would have missed the public notice in yesterday's Asbury Park Press that announces the upcoming Middletown Planning Board's public hearing for the Four Ponds (a.k.a Avaya) housing project in Lincroft.
This is the development that everyone on the Township Committee approved of in 2009 and was suppose to not happen.
Gerry Scharfenberger, Tony Fiore, Pam Brightbill and Steve Massell (who wasn't on the Township Committee in 2009, but as a member of the Planning Board approved of and presented the plans to the Township Committee) have repeatedly vowed that they are against the project but have done nothing to try and prevent it.
I'm sure that they will be blaming Democrats in Trenton for not heeding Governor Christie's wish to reform the affordable housing law, COAH, even though the governor vetoed a reform of it earlier this year:
TOWNSHIP OF MIDDLETOWN
PLANNING BOARD
NOTICE OF HEARING
Case #2010-202
To: All Property Owners Within 200 Feet
PLEASE TAKE NOTICE THAT Four Ponds Center Associates has applied to the Planning Board of the Township of Middletown for preliminary and final site plan approval, with no variances, so as to permit the applicant to develop and construct 342 residential dwelling units, and one community clubhouse, with associated roadways, parking, walkways, stormwater management, utilities, lighting and landscaping improvements. The proposed dwelling units shall consist of 270 townhouses and 72 flats, with 68 of the flats being restricted as affordable housing. This project is part of the Township Housing Element and Fair Share Plan for affordable housing.
The existing commercial building located on the subject property shall be demolished. The property is zoned RMF-2 (Residential Multi-Family Overlay Zone), The application conforms to the standards of the RMF-2 Zone; however, the Applicant will seek any and all variances and/or waivers necessary to accommodate the application as filed or as revised by the Planning Board on premises located at 307 Middletown-Lincroft Road, also known as Block 1063, Lot 10 on the Tax Map.
A copy of the application has been filed in the Office of the Planning Board and may be inspected during regular business hours.
A public hearing will be held on Wednesday evening, the 4th day of May, 2011 at 6:30 p.m. in Town Hall, 1 Kings Highway, Middletown, New Jersey at which time you may appear either in person or by agent or attorney and present any objections which you may have to granting this application.
ANSELL GRIMM & AARON
Attorneys for Applicant
By:/s/ RICK BRODSKY, ESQ,
Dated: April 18, 2011
Attorneys for Applicant
By:/s/ RICK BRODSKY, ESQ,
Dated: April 18, 2011
13 comments:
So Tony 'Can-You-Spare-Me-A-Dime' Mayor Fiore actually voted to pass a plan that approved the Avaya site for COAH development, then voted in favor of a resolution while on the Middletown Township Committee taking a stand against COAH. Sounds like a flip-flop to me.
During candidates night sponsored by LVGA, Steve 'Rarely-Has-A-Point-of-View' Massell said that if he was on the T.C when the COAH resolution came up for a vote that he would have voted against it; yet while on the Planning Board, he voted for the resolution approving the Avaya site for COAH development. So, now there are two Flip-floppers when it comes to the Avaya site being converted to a COAH building site.
Who can can you trust? So much for the integrity of elected Republican officials and Republican candidates for elected office.
I wonder if the Middletown community would have been dealt a three-of-a-kind Flip-flopper hand if Settembrino had been on the board at the same time as Fiore and Massell?
Is Republican candidate for Township Committee Stephanie Murray on the Planning Board? Do we have four-of-a-kind when it comes to COAH?
I was at the LVGA annual meeting which was attended by Mercantante and the new planner Greenspan. They were quizzed as to this topic and their sentiment was the Twp. had to identify locations for COAH but with the economy the way it is we should not expect this development to happen. Oh well look's as if it will.
The concern most people had was not that it would contain a large amount of affordable housing, but that the affordable housing would be rental units. The plan is for 3 story buildings that would contain these apartments.
Locals I spoke with would rather the affordable units be owned so the "pride of ownership" factor would come into play. Having a large amount of rentals could pose several quality of life issues. This at a time when we have laid off teachers and are anticipating the lay offs of Police Officers.
It boggles my mind that no one is asking the question of what happened to the jobs that used be done at this facility. Yes, let us scrap over who voted for what when the township had to identify COAH housing sites or how many units will be built. No one is asking "Why are we converting a facility that used to employ thousands of people in well paying jobs into another tax consuming housing development?" Those evil corporations would pay RE taxes but at least they wouldn't load up the schools, and maybe they would keep a restaurant or deli open with lunch business.
If Middletown is OK with just being a bedroom community for NYC finacial and banking industry, then fine, but when they go into the tank, woe unto us. Maybe all the smart electrical engineers went to work for Fort Monmouth. Oh wait, they shut that down also.
Once again "NOT IN MY BACK YARD!!" This is what the people in Lincroft always say.
to 10:14 pm post
What happened to the jobs? Do you just move to thIs country?
NAFTA & the government divesting ATT. The brilliant politicians who think they are so smart ruined tremendous companies. American jobs sent to other countries, our skilled workers are out of work.
Watch when they build the new housing units. Maybe an immigration officer should be posted there to check if the workers are legal.
anon 6:54 Your comment is so typical of the ignorance in this town. Anytime intelligent people make a sound argument when it comes to preventing an unwise development where they live, people like you say NIMBY.
With your approach, I guess you think we should all roll over and play dead and not try and protect our community?
Get the facts before you start to criticize. Maybe you'll learn something and count your blessings that we have the right to defend what would ultimately ruin a community.
Your complaints should be directed to those who made the poor decisions in the first place. That would be our Township Administrator and Planning board.
Remember the Planning Board in this town with Judith Stanley-Coleman as director always tried to use planning to keep out what they saw as the "riff-raff" in their minds .
"Move if you can't afford to live here" was her mantra.
Bravo to the person with the pin point argument against Mr. or Mrs. NIMBY. It couldn't have been said any better. I would gladly buy you a drink at the Lincrfot Inn, but who will be able to navigate all of the fun traffic possibly created by this mess. Unreal.
anon 9:45 The issue here is not with the 68 COAH units. The issue is with increasing the residential homes by 16%. That would likely be adding over 1000 more people to the community. The roads are already overloaded due to Brookdale.
The infrastructure in Lincroft which also includes schools, emergency responders etc.simply can not support the added population.
There is also the development at Bamm Hollow which is currently in litigation. That would add even more.
I am new to this issue so please do not flame me for asking this question. Why do 342 units have to be built for COAH purposes if 68 are designated as affordable housing. Why not build 100 units on the property and meet the 20% requirement with 20 units?
Anon 12:41
The simple answer to your question is because Middletown needs to build many more units of affordable housing than just 20 units.
If I remember correctly, I could be wrong, Middletown needs to build ~ 1200 units to fully comply with it's COAH obligation.
And the reason why only 68 units are being built is because since these units will be rentals, the Township receives double the credit for them. So, 68 real units become 136 for credit purposes.
The owner of the property who is ultimately Benedict Torcivia
of Torcon wants to maximize his profit and the township just sees an increase tax revenue. The development would more than double tax revenue for Middletown at that site but at cost of anyone that travels through or lives in lincroft. Funny how the rezoning permitted a project of this size and denisty perfectly with no consideration of the surrounding property zonings. People bought their homes based off living near a commercial office research zoned property not next to high denisty multifamily housing. In this economy let's face it will be built cheaply and sell for even less. Check the sale listings there are plenty of available housing in Middletown and they are affordable.
lets see 342 homes at 2 per home is 684 people - proably another 684 cars if they each have 1 child that is another 342 kids in Lincrfoft school that only has 529 kids in it right now -they dont even have a lunchroom after 50 years. Are new schools being built? What will the 684 cars do to the enviroment when they are waiting for the traffic lights? Are roads being widened? Those law makers that approved this should be held criminally liable if it goes thru.
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