Published: July 12, 2013
By Anthony Campisi

The New Jersey Supreme Court may have saved the state's affordable housing agency from Governor Christie's efforts to dismantle it, but it doesn't appear likely that it will begin working soon to reduce its backlog of hundreds of applications for housing developments.

Instead, Christie is continuing his push to weaken the state's strict housing rules with a controversial attempt to seize up to $165 million dedicated for local affordable housing projects to balance the state budget.

And the high court has yet to rule on a challenge to a new series of housing regulations that would set out towns' new obligations to build affordable housing — adding more uncertainty to the debate.

In that climate, New Milford Borough Administrator Christine Demiris said Thursday that it was unclear how the high court's ruling Wednesday — which preserved the Council on Affordable Housing — would affect conditions on the ground.

Affordable housing has emerged as an issue in a large-scale development planned for the former United Water property on River Road. Uncertainty over the state's housing rules has complicated discussions over the number of affordable units that must be constructed.

Hackensack is one town where housing projects have been held up over the dispute over the future of the housing agency.

The city's plan to use money from a local affordable housing trust fund to rehabilitate housing units has been awaiting approval from the council for more than two years. The council has only met once since 2011, when Christie announced plans to abolish it and transfer its powers to a political appointee.

A Superior Court judge has scheduled a hearing on Aug. 29 on a lawsuit that affordable-housing advocates have filed seeking to force the agency to resume holding monthly meetings.

"Perhaps now that the court has ruled, the logjam will begin to clear," said Hackensack City Manager Stephen Lo Iacono.

Towns and affordable-housing advocates say the council's failure to act on hundreds of similar requests has stymied development across the state.

"The court decision has no immediate impact regarding municipalities, and obviously what is the most imminent issue, which is the efforts to seize the municipal affordable-housing trust funds," said East Windsor Mayor Janice A. Mironov, the president of the New Jersey League of Municipalities.

'Failed experiment'

Christie has long been an opponent of the state's strict affordable housing rules, which the state Supreme Court set out in a series of rulings known as the Mount Laurel doctrine, saying they take powers from local elected officials.

He called the court's ruling on Wednesday the latest move in "a failed social experiment."

The governor has argued that a state law signed by his predecessor, Jon Corzine, gives him the right to take the local affordable housing dollars to balance the state's budget — though a series of court rulings has given additional protections to the money.

Towns and housing developers have until Aug. 2 to tell the council why it shouldn't take the funds — though they can then pursue other legal maneuvers to protect the money.

Affordable housing advocates began pushing the agency to resume normal operations even before the court's decision.

The Fair Share Housing Center filed suit against the state in Superior Court in Mercer County last week, asking Assignment Judge Mary C. Jacobson to order the agency to hold monthly meetings.

Housing advocates also are calling on the governor to fill the six vacant seats on the council's 12-member board.

"It's got to be an independent, diverse body made up of all the stakeholders," said Nina Arce, spokeswoman for the Housing and Community Development Network of New Jersey. The council's board is supposed to represent a variety of interests — from homebuilders to the disabled community — and have a partisan balance, she said.

Legislative Democrats, for their part, have said they want to pass legislation to rework the state's affordable housing rules and eliminate the council, which has been viewed as bureaucratic and slow to act. Christie conditionally vetoed one such attempt in 2011.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Community Affairs, which oversees housing issues for the Christie administration, did not respond Thursday to a request for comment on the future of the council.