Tag: fair share housing center

  • What’s in the Settlement?

    Not into technical stuff ? Skip this and scroll down to the next post!

    But if you want details, here you go:

  • No excuses

    UPDATE: Critical Council meeting Monday, March 9, 2026, 7:30 pm, Borough Hall, 54 Fairmount Avenue, upper level. You need not speak.

    You’re traveling? Homebound? Chained to the bed frame? No problem!

    You can see the meeting LIVE on Zoom at https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82762628332

    Before the Mayor & Council plunge ahead with plans to pave over our green, vacant, taxpayer-owned parcel at 58 North Passaic Avenue, right next to Memorial Park behind the Library, they need to GIVE US A FORUM to discuss the pros and cons and alternatives. There is no excuse to do otherwise.

    Tell them so! Or at least show them you care about your hometown.

    Two easy ways to do that:

    1. Email the Mayor & Council:

    mayorcouncil@chathamborough.org

    bhargrove@chathamborough.org 

    cdempsey@chathamborough.org

    jmathiasen@chathamborough.org

    jstrickland@chathamborough.org

    khay@chathamborough.org

    kkoronkiewicz@chathamborough.org

    mgilmore@chathamborough.org

    mayor@chathamborough.org

    2. Attend or Zoom the next Council meeting: Monday, Feb 23, 2026 at 7:30 pm, either:

    In person at Borough Hall, 54 Fairmount Avenue, by elevator to the upper level, or

    Online, from the comfort of your home, by Zoom webinar, details to follow here: https://www.chathamborough.org/resident/calendar/mayor-council-meeting-6-30-executive-7-30-public-meeting-2-1771893000

  • Deadlines

    There are many different ways to meet state mandated affordable housing obligations, but unless the Mayor & Council get a jump on the deadlines, their options will be severely limited.

    That’s why the Mayor has scheduled a public workshop for June 27: to let the public have its say before unveiling her plans.

    Are the Mayor & Council taking the steps necessary to get a good result for the Borough?

    Ask them!

    1. Are you are investigating lower-density, environmentally superior options, like converting existing market rate apartments to affordable ones?
    2. If not, why not? What are you waiting for?
    3. Are you unaware that waiting means forfeiting options?
    4. Are you unaware that if you procrastinate too long, we’ll be forced to accept more huge projects like the Ivy – or even bigger.
    5. If you’re resigned to accepting more big projects, what are you doing to make sure we get a better deal this time?

    Here are the deadlines facing the Mayor & Council (additions and corrections welcome):

    03/31/24 – Deadline for the developer BNE to file the Periodic Report on Total Project Costs, due within 90 days of Substantial Completion under the terms of the December 2023 financial (PILOT) agreement for the Ivy at River Road

    05/01/24 – Deadline for the Borough to bill the developer of the Ivy apartment project on River Road for the second quarterly payment of the annual property tax substitute known as a Payment In Lieu of Taxes (PILOT), which was unpaid as of 06/10/2024

    06/18/24 – Deadline for the Borough to report non-residential fees collected for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund

    06/30/24 – Deadline for the Borough to submit to the Morris County Superior Court and Fair Share Housing Center a quarterly report on the progress of the 15-unit, 100% affordable project to be built on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza

    08/01/24 – Deadline for the Borough to bill the developer of the Ivy apartment project on River Road for the third quarterly payment of the annual property tax substitute known as a Payment In Lieu of Taxes (PILOT), which has gone unpaid as of 06/10/2024

    09/16/24 – Deadline for the Borough to report residential fees collected for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund

    09/30/24 – Deadline for the Borough to submit to the Superior Court and Fair Share Housing Center a quarterly report on the progress of the 15-unit, 100% affordable project to be built on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza

    10/20/24 – Deadline for the state to announce the Borough’s affordable housing quota for Fourth Round 2025-2035

    11/01/24 – Deadline for the Borough to bill the developer of the Ivy apartment project on River Road for the quarterly payment of the annual property tax substitute known as a Payment In Lieu of Taxes (PILOT), which had gone unpaid as of 06/10/2024

    12/31/24 – Deadline for the Borough to submit to the Superior Court and Fair Share Housing Center a quarterly report on the progress of the 15-unit, 100% affordable project to be built on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza

    01/31/25 – Deadline for the Borough to adopt a resolution accepting an affordable housing quota for Fourth Round 2025-2035

    02/28/25 – Deadline for “interested parties” to challenge the Borough’s Fourth Round 2025-2035 affordable housing quota in a new dispute resolution program

    03/31/25 – Deadline for the IVY developer BNE to submit the Auditor’s Report to the Borough and DCA

    03/31/25 – Deadline for the Borough to begin construction of the 15-unit, 100% affordable apartment project on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza.

    03/31/25 – Deadline for the Borough to submit to the Superior Court and Fair Share Housing Center a quarterly report on the progress of the 15-unit, 100% affordable project to be built on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza

    06/30/25 – Deadline for the Borough to file its Housing Element & Fair Share Plan, including a new showing that it’s consistent with state policy on development and redevelopment

    08/31/25 – Deadline for challenges to the Borough’s Housing Element

    12/31/25 – Deadline for the Borough to settle challenges to its Housing Element or explain why it won’t make the changes requested

    03/15/26 – Deadline for the Borough to adopt any and all the ordinances, rezoning, and redevelopment areas required by the Housing Element

    03/31/26 – Deadline for the Borough to get a Certificate of Occupancy on the 15-unit, 100% affordable project on Bowers Lane in Post Office Plaza

    09/26/26 – Expiration of the Borough Third Round immunity from builders’ remedy lawsuits and exclusionary zoning challenges

    Sources:

    https://www.newsbreak.com/share/3489430077474-new-round-of-affordable-housing-regulation-requirements-to-kick-off?_f=app_share&s=i1&pd=0EKN9Y6I&lang=en_US&send_time=1718234102&trans_data=%7B%22platform%22%3A0%2C%22cv%22%3A%2224.23.1.1%22%2C%22languages%22%3A%22en%22%7D&sep=new_web_share_0531-v2

    NJ League of Municipalities: https://www.njlm.org/civicalerts.aspx?aid=2924

  • Strange Bedfellows

    Is there anything all of NJ can agree on? Yes!

    From Newark and Hackensack to Cherry Hill and Cape May, we all cherish our freedom.

    That’s why residents of all stripes are asking Governor Murphy to veto a bill that would undermine our freedom by gutting our right to public records.

    Please join us. Contact Governor Murphy. Call (609) 292 6000. Text (732) 605 5455. Or go to www.nj.gov/governor/ to send an email.

    Urge the Governor to veto bill S-2930/A-4045, which would gut the Open Records law.

    Btw, this is NOT a partisan issue. The opposition spans the political spectrum, from:

    NJ Working Families Party, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, and Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop); to

    the founder of the Fair Share Housing Center, the NJ Public Defender’s Office, League of Women Voters, and the NJ Press Association); to

    NJ State Assemblyman Brian Bergen (R-Dist. 26, Denville area); “a conservative bomb-thrower” per The New Jersey Globe.)

    What has drawn together all these strange bedfellows?

    “…I fear that if documents are harder to get [via the OPRA process], we will get less transparency and that will lead to more corruption, fraud, waste, and abuse. If your [Assembly / Senate] goal was to save money, be careful. A less transparent government is very likely a more expensive one, I fear….”

    Kevin Walsh, founder of Fair Share Housing Project and now Acting State Comptroller of the State of New Jersey [State watchdog] during NJ State Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Hearing on Mon 3/11/2024

    “…this bill [S-2930] is dangerous…giving you [lawmakers] the benefit of the doubt, some of you are just terribly misinformed or intentionally misled…”; ” …and frankly this bill really does look like a list of all the cases that they [defendant municipalities] lost …”

    C.J. Griffin, Esq. during NJ State Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Hearing on Mon 3/11/2024.

    “…The Synopsis of the Bill [S-2930] innocuously provides that the Bill “makes various changes to process for access to government records; appropriates $8 million.” In reality, the Bill eviscerates New Jersey’s Open Public Records Act, N.J.S.A. 47:1A-1 et seq. (“OPRA”) – a statute that was carefully and painstakingly crafted over a period of fourteen years…

    New Jersey Press Association statement dated 3/7/2024