On Monday, July 22, the Delran Council held a special meeting to discuss affordable housing. The meeting began with Council President Gary Catrambone taking the audience through a brief history of affordable housing in Delran.
According to Catrambone, affordable housing is a constitutional obligation targeted to low- to moderate-income households. It is not Section 8. Low-income households are defined as those households earning less than or equal to 50 percent of a regional median income, and moderate-income households are defined as households that earn more than 50 percent, but less than 80 percent.
Catrambone stated that the first round of obligations toward affordable housing was satisfied in Delran in 1986, the second would be satisfied in 2003, and would give Delran a surplus of 14 units. From 1999 to 2015, three attempts to find the third round of obligation by the state failed. In 2015, COAH was divested and affordable housing was taken over by the court system.
Due to the courts taking over the housing issue, towns had to file a declaratory judgment action in superior court to approve their revised housing plans. Delran filed on July 6, 2015. During the process of establishing a number of affordable housing needed in the town, Delran had three interveners join the case; Fair Share Housing Center, Chester Avenue LLC and Atlantic Delta LLC.
The FSHC is a nonprofit organization that intervenes in lawsuits around the state to force towns to build additional affordable housing. In this particular case, the FSHC wanted Delran to build 827 low to moderate homes and 3,308 market value homes. This demand would create a total of 4,135 new homes in Delran.
The Chester Avenue development, located at Holy Cross along Chester Avenue, wanted to build 400 new homes. The Atlantic Delta development located next to The Home Depot on Route 130 wanted to build 240 units with only 36 affordable units. Also, the former Stellwag Property, now known as Delran Land, LLC, initially agreed upon 82 age-restricted homes for residents 55 and over.
According to Catrambone, after negotiation with these four different projects, the number of new homes fell dramatically. The council negotiated with the Fair Share Housing Center to bring the number from 827 affordable houses to 186 and 3,308 market value homes to 495. Instead of nearly doubling the town’s population, this will only increase the population by 11 percent.
Next, the Chester Avenue development was negotiated from 400 to 265 homes. This includes 212 fair market value homes and 53 affordable homes. For the Atlantic Delta development, the overall number of 240 units stayed the same, but the number of affordable houses increased to 48.
While the Delran Council, in its own words, “avoided disaster” with the number of potential new homes, many residents still voiced their opinions on traffic, taxes, the impact on the schools and the impact to their personal properties. At the time, the council did not have every answer to the questions of the residents, but Catrambone appreciated all of the concerns that the council may have overlooked.
“I want to thank everyone that came out,” said Catrambone. “ I have a list of things that the council and I will go over, and as problems arise, we will have to figure it out to fix them, but I thank everyone for being respectful and providing some great questions. They were very well thought out.”
