Township Council - Special Meeting

like to call the town of Parakaway special meeting December 30th 2025 to order. 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. Moment of silence to remember the service and sacrifices of the armed service members who protect our nation and the first responders who protect our neighborhoods.

Clerk, please take the role. Councilman Freellander here. Councilman Sacket here. Councilman Quinn here. Councilman Brooks here. Councilwoman Noun here. Councilman Salberg here. Councilman Vtovich. Council Vice President Brooks here. Council President Marson

here. Notice of this meeting was sent to the daily record in the official newspaper for the township of Rockaway in compliance with public law 1975 chapter 231, the open public meetings act. Additionally, notice was posted on the township website, the official bulletin boards of Rockaway, and filed in the office of the township clerk. Uh at this point I'd like to invite Mr. Novak. Good evening everybody. Just a quick intro on who you are and absolutely what you do.

Good evening everybody. My name is David Novak. That's N O. I am a professional planner with Burgess Associates the planning consultant. Uh I think we've been with Rockway Wave since 1995 or so. I've been working with you guys since 2011. Um, tonight I'm here to talk to you about the draft settlement agreement regarding affordable housing. Feel like every time you guys see me, it usually has to do something with affordable housing. So, I apologize for that. If you recall about a year and a half ago, the state adopted new affordable housing legislation for the fourth round of affordable housing. That covers the years 2025 to 2035. And essentially, towns need to come up with strategies to address their fair share of affordable housing. This has been a multi-step process. I believe I was back in front of you guys in April or May of this year discussing what we thought our perspective need or fourth round obligation was which was 301 affordable units. Um that was accepted by the court. Uh following that process we had prepared a housing element and fair share plan that was adopted by the planning board. It was endorsed by the council on time. And following that, for Rockway and for every municipality, there was a uh two-month period where anybody could object to that housing element and fair share plan. It could be a developer, it could be a nonprofit agency, so on and so forth. Some towns had up to 19 objectors. Rockaway had one objector. Uh that objector was fair share housing center. You were not special necessarily in that regard. Fair share objected to about 400 municipalities across the state. Uh what was a little bit of special about the objection is that they wanted the court to strip away Rockways immunity. So as a little bit of a background, part of the reason that we do this is because the state has adopted this legislation which requires municipalities to figure out where very low low and moderate inhouse households are going to be placed. The reason municipalities do it as well

is because if they don't have a protected plan and a certified plan, you lose what's called immunity, which means that the municipality is subject to what's called a builder's remedy lawsuit, wherein a developer can come in, find a piece of land that they like, and say, "Hey, Rockaway, you don't have a a protected plan. You're not protected by the court. I found this nice piece of property. I'm going to sue you to develop multif family here with a set aside for affordable housing." So what the protection does with this housing plan process is that it gives you zoning certainty. So you are immune from builder's remedy for whatever reason. We never really got into it. Fair share wanted to strip away the township's immunity. But I can say through the uh negotiation process set up through the program. Uh the program is the dispute resolution program that was adopted by the legislation which involves a special judge who's retired, a special adjudicator who's a professional planner and they try to mediate and bring the two sides together so that way we can avoid court. Um, through that process, we were able to come up with a settlement agreement with Fairshair Housing Center. Essentially, and I won't go through the entire settlement agreement, but what that settlement does is that it requires us to reszone one piece of property. Um, and when I say reszone, I mean replace the underlying zoning district. And that was block 22102, lot 5102. If you are familiar with where the barn is along Green Pond Road, it's right behind that. Yeah, it was a property that was approved for a hotel many years ago back in 2005. It was never built. Um, that actually remains the same. That was in our housing plan from this time. Uh, you will see on that little handout I gave you a blank piece of property right next to that. We had originally proposed reszoning that property. Um, after consultation with our special adjudicator and the Highlands Council, we found that that property really more than likely cannot be developed for multif family purposes. So, our original housing plan had that property being

resoned as well. That's been removed. So, the property see in blue will be a new zoning district that will remain the same as our adopted housing plan. We're making three additional changes in terms of what we call overlay zoning. So, an overlay zone is essentially a zone on top of a zone. So imagine a lot of us in Rockaway Township live in the R13 district that allows for single family dwellings. It establishes your front yard, sideyard, rear yard, setback, all of that. What an overlay zone is is a zone placed on top of that zone which gives developers an additional development option. The reason a lot of developers like this or property owners like this and the way it's accepted by the court is that it maintains that underlying zoning right. So you'll see next to the property in blue, block 22102, lot 2, there's a red overlay zone on there. That site is presently developed with an industrial building. It's located in the Iindustrial zone. With this overlay zone, that building will be allowed to remain as is. It can operate as is. A new tenant can move in. It does not become a non-permitted use. What it does is that it creates a new development option. And that overlay zone would allow for 53 total units there, including 11 affordable units. One other new component is, if you flip over your little map page, uh block 11001, lot 12.01. This is located right next to the uh Rockaway Mall, wedged between that and the Walmart site. This will be another overlay zone which again preserves that underlying office zoning would allow that office zone to continue but would allow for another multif family residential option. And then finally in our third round plan which we adopted back in 2020 I believe it was we adopted an overlay zone at top of the mall that would allow for residential. That's

remaining the same. That overlay district allows for a density of 2.2 units per acre. We're going to increase that to 2.9 units per acre, which would allow for an additional development opportunity there. Really, we're getting additional 29 affordable units. So, through the settlement agreement process, we need to reszone one new property, develop two new overlay zones, and then tweak the density requirement of an existing overlay zone. If we do that as well as follow the rest of the settlement agreement, uh we'll have an additional protection, the next step after this would be signing a resolution and the settlement agreement. Uh we have a court session tomorrow already scheduled for 1:00. Happy New Year's Eve to me. And uh if that goes well, the next step would be then preparing a revised housing element and fair share plan as well as new ordinances. And that would need to get adopted in mid-March of next year. So, it's a uh complicated process. It has not been the most fun process. Um, but that's essentially where we're at now.

All right. So, at this point, we'll start down at this end and work our way down and ask whatever questions we have. So, by doing this, we get to keep our immunity. That's correct. That's the main thing we need. All right. Thank you. I guess maybe just a little further explanation on 643 units within the mall property.

Yeah. So, uh that's is that's essentially what we would call floating density. So, the entirety of that tract looking at the boundary of those red lines would be uh about 222 acres altogether which is why that density is so low 2.2 to 2.9. Um the way we crafted that redevelopment or that I'm sorry that overlay zone originally and we would maintain that is that really those units could be placed anywhere. Um when we first contemplated that design back with the third round we were assuming that a lot of the underlying I'm sorry the the surrounding parking lots especially the ones that are somewhat underutilized now those would be the prime spots to be redeveloped. Um technically go those units could go anywhere. We would just need to see what it would be like any other application. Cycling would have to come through. Um

showing where those buildings would be located, how parking would be handled. Yeah. Um requiring still some sort of non-residential ground floor area so that way we maintain a ratable there. But it really gives the option. Um it would allow for either those outuildings to be placed there, underutilized parking areas if they were to contemplate maybe changing some of the anchor stores or adding units above them all. It allows for that flexibility. Um, so we don't really dictate where those units go. We just outline that big box and say it can go here somewhere. Have we ever been um approached by any developers for a plan like this?

No. Um, and one of the other things I should have brought up too is that um we were not approached by any developer during this process. Um, that includes the mall site or anywhere else in Rockway Township. Once this is approved in March, does [clears throat] this end? [snorts] No, never. Um, never. Uh, no. Uh, after that, there will be uh certain monitoring requirements. Uh, there's going to be a midway report to see whether or not anything's been built or if anything's still viable. But the number is not going to change. The number will not change. That's what I'm asking. Yeah, the number will not change until 2035 when we do this again. Hopefully, I'll have won the lottery by that point. But

Got it. All right. Thank you. All right. So, since they wanted to take away our immunity for something that we did four years ago. Yes. Right. Okay. So, is there anything built into this agreement for tomorrow that stops them from doing that in future? No. No. Uh that's an opportunity that they always retain. It would likely not be brought up again until 2035. Okay. Um and the whole discussion of immunity and their threat to strip that was not even brought up. So quite frankly, I don't even know if they really did a lot of research before they did that. Um, but no, there's it's tough to build that into a settlement agreement. I don't think they would ever agree to it anyway, but they can't bring it up again until 2035.

That's correct. Uh, from my understanding, yeah, that's my correct. That's correct. All right. Thank you.

You said nobody has approached the town as far as

not in not in a formal way. No. Um, so you know, for several towns during this process, we've had up to four or five developers. I think in one of our towns, we had maybe 15 developers file objections because they wanted to get into the plan. Uh, we had no developers file any type of formal objection to our plan. Uh, again, for any site, contemplated or otherwise. So, the only objector that we had was Fairshare Housing Center. That's not to say that we might not ever get approached by a developer who wants to look at a multif family project and you know that would be handled under a normal course. They can request a resoning from the council, request a free meeting, something like that. But in terms of the affordable housing process, there were nor no formal objections to our plan except from Fair Share Housing Center.

Okay. Now, so since nobody has come to us, [clears throat] could we go because if you see through the state all these malls are building [clears throat] you know complexes. Yeah. And since we're close to you know right on 80 and the the location is fantastic. Could you could we go to the mall and ask them? You can always organize a meeting with the representatives. Absolutely. Um yeah that that's something that you can do. It's not required by the settlement agreement, but if that's something that the township wants to do to have a sit down meeting with the developers in the mall to see if there's any interest in developing multif family there, that's absolutely an option that the township can do.

Well, it certainly behooves us to do something like that since they constantly coming to us for tax relief. So, I live uh I live in uh Fairmont right next to uh uh Garden State Mall. Same same thing. You know, they want to make money with their mall. Okay. This is a another way of doing it. And that's one of the reasons why we picked this site too, just because already had the existing infrastructure and was next to Exactly. Yeah. Okay. I'm good. Thank you. Good.

Yeah. Uh we had on the planning board given them the ability to go ahead and put on the second floor to put housing in and all that, but they've never done it. They've never asked us to do it. So, they would have to come back to us anyway. Right. We're We're kind of getting off on a Yeah. So, this is just Yeah, that was FYI. Got it. Uh Okay. Thank you. Okay. Uh the only thing I would request is as soon as possible to sign the settlement agreement in the resolution because uh we do have a date in court tomorrow. So, that needs to be physically signed tonight. Okay. It's already got it. Thank you very much.

Okay. Uh at this point, we'll have open to the public. Um is there anybody in the audience that wishes to speak? Please, Mr. Lord. sheet. I do not require a sheet from you today. No, you don't give a sheet.

Good evening everybody. Um, just to add to what was just discussed, uh, Michael, 19 drive, first time this year. I forgot that. Um, I think we should be as a council and administration proactive in trying to get a developer to pursue the mall to develop that area, not wait for the mall, which doesn't necessarily have an incentive to do that before we get a developer doing it in a location that's less or more intrusive to the community like the barn and Green Pond Road to put housing there. Green Pond Road's a disaster now. So, it' be much better to put it in a mall which is underutilized. So, if we can get a developer to pursue them instead of waiting for Simon to uh be proactive, which they're not very proactive most of the time, would probably be better for us. Um, also, does the town consider the water and sewage effects of this development? Because right now we're still getting notices about one treatment water well being offline and plus you put in 400 units that's a lot of extra sewage treatment stuff like that you know is the in infrastructure available for that I know our hands are tied on what the state requires because they don't care they just want what they want but something to you know plan ahead for I'd like to thank the road department every snowstorm I wake up and the road is blacktop which you don't See, in a lot of towns, I went through Randolph, roads are all snow covered. It's amazing what they do. However, if we can have when the police are driving around after a snowstorm, when people snowb blow straight into the street, I mean, you can get a little bit of snow in there when you're making a turn, but I've driven past several houses where they just blow it into the street and you got 60 feet of snow in the street because they choose to blow it straight into the

street. To me, that's a finable offense. um the um lease agreement, the 99 lease agreement if something could be explained to what that's about. I know the fire thing, but previous meetings spoke about we can't even staff it, but what's the plan for that? And just give a little oversight because there wasn't much uh in what I've read. And um this happy new year to everybody and White Metal Lake still has New Year's Eve tickets available if anybody's interested. Thank you. The good-looking gentleman in the back. You wish to speak?

Thank you. [clears throat] Uh okay. Uh we're going to do these resolutions separately. Uh resolution R25229, a resolution authorizing the exe execution of a mediation agreement with the fair share housing center regarding the fourth round housing element and fair share. Can I have a motion? I'll make a motion. Second. [clears throat] Cler, please take the role. Councilman Freellander, yes. Councilman Sackett, yes. Councilman Quinn, yes. Councilman Brooks, yes. Councilwoman Noon, yes. Councilman Sberg, yes. Council Vice President Brooks,

yes. Council President Morrison, yes. Say yes. His motion passes. Uh before we discuss the next resolution, can we just have a quick primer on that?

Thank you, Council President. Happy New Year, everybody. Um what you see here is a culmination of a very long wait. Um distilling this as quickly as possible. The original developers agreement for Pond View contained requirement that the developer build a firehouse for the town's use. That was carried through to the amended developers agreement and ultimately to the court action that and all of this is many years ago. Um probably about 3 years ago, we started negotiating uh with Bond View, Bond View's attorneys uh to get this over with because by that time and especially today, we need to even though the firehouse may not immediately be staffable by a fire company, we need it for a bunch of fire department and emergency services related space. Okay? and that's what it's going to be initially used for. So, what we're asking the council tonight is to approve uh the lease between the township and the fire and and Bond view. The lease is exactly in accordance with the requirements of the developers agreement which was that they build the firehouse for us. Um we are paying uh it's a 99-year lease for $1 a year. Uh we're taking over a portion of the property which is basically circumscribed by buffers on each side of the firehouse. The front access area, the rear access area, that's going to be it. Uh we intend to utilize it immediately. Uh the lease is a normal uh even though it's lengthy, essentially it's a normal

triple net lease. Um, we've also been advised that the premises are not accessible by our tax assessor. So, essentially we won't be involved in any situation of tax payback, but we were with the Norwoo agreement. Uh, and uh, that's basically it. It's a good lease and we're asking the council to approve it.

All right. Resolution R25230, a resolution authorizing the mayor to sign a 99-year lease with the owners of the Pond View development applicable to the fire emergency services station that has been [clears throat] constructed on the Pond View property. Can I have a motion? [snorts] So move. Clerk, please take the role. Councilman Freellander, yes. Councilman Sackett, yes. Councilman Quinn, yes. Councilman Brooks, yes. Councilwoman Noun, yes. Councilman Sberg, yes. Council Vice President Brooks, yes. Council President Morrison, yes. Say yes. Motion passes.

Motion to adjurnn by consensus. I meeting adjourned.