Opinion ID: 1901249
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Prohibitions on multi-family housing and mobile homes:

Text: (2) Cranbury and South Plainfield prohibit any new multi-family housing. Monroe permits multi-family units only in its retirement community. Carteret, East Brunswick, Edison, Jamesburg, Middlesex, Milltown, North Brunswick, Old Bridge, Piscataway, Plainsboro, Sayreville, South Amboy, South Brunswick, South River, and Woodbridge place restrictions on multi-family housing. b. Restrictions on development that are not necessary for health and safety or required by good planning practices: e.g., low densities per acre, excessive lot sizes, excessive frontages, and excessive square footage for buildings themselves. Plaintiffs claim all the municipalities now before the Court have numerous instances of such excessive standards. c. Bedroom restrictions: (1) North Brunswick and Plainsboro placed limitations on the number of two bedroom units allowed and prohibit larger units.

d. Overzoning for industry and too much large-lot zoning: (1) Cranbury, East Brunswick, Edison, Monroe, North Brunswick, Old Bridge, Plainsboro, Sayreville, South Amboy, South Brunswick and Spotswood are overzoned for industry up to as much as 700 percent over projected demand. e. The discretionary authority vested in municipal authorities to discourage housing developments: (1) Edison's cluster options are subject to the discretion of municipal officials. (2) East Brunswick's Planning Board has the discretionary authority to assess improvement fees against builders. On May 4, 1976, two years after the complaint was filed and after a trial that lasted two full months, Judge Furman handed down a two part decision. 142 N.J. Super. 11 (Ch.Div. 1976). First, he divided the defendant municipalities into three categories: a. All claims against the Township of Dunellen were unconditionally dismissed because the court found Dunellen to be a developed community outside the scope of Mount Laurel. Plaintiffs did not appeal this dismissal. b. Claims against 11 communities (Carteret, Helmetta, Highland Park, Jamesburg, Metuchen, Middlesex, Milltown, South Amboy, South River, Spotswood and Woodbridge) were dismissed, conditioned upon the adoption of certain zoning amendments by these municipalities. The court noted that these municipalities were substantially built up, though not quite developed for Mount Laurel purposes. The plaintiffs agreed at trial to these conditional dismissals. c. The zoning practices of the remaining 11 municipalities (Cranbury, East Brunswick, Old Bridge (formerly Madison), Monroe, North Brunswick, Plainsboro, South Brunswick, Sayreville, Edison, Piscataway and South Plainfield) were found to be in violation of Mount Laurel. In order to remedy these violations the court ordered each of the municipalities to provide a realistic opportunity for the construction of the fair share of the lower income housing allocation determined by the court. The trial court determined numerical fair share allocations for the 11 municipalities found to be in violation of Mount Laurel. 142 N.J. Super. at 35-38. It accepted plaintiffs' suggestion that Middlesex County was the appropriate housing region for remedial purposes. It concluded that each of the municipalities should accommodate low and moderate income people in proportions equal to that of the County as a whole  15 percent low income and 19 percent moderate income. After finding the prospective low and moderate income housing need of the County through 1985 to be 18,697 units, the trial court allocated 4,030 of these units to remedy imbalances in the provision of low and moderate income housing among the 11 municipalities themselves as follows: Cranbury 18 Piscataway -0- East Brunswick 1,316 Plainsboro -0- Edison 1,292 Sayreville 328 Monroe 23 South Brunswick 156 North Brunswick 180 South Plainfield 416 Old Bridge 301 The remaining 14,667 units of the County's lower income housing need were allocated equally among the 11 municipalities, i.e., 1,333 units per municipality. All units allocated to each municipality were to be apportioned as 45 percent low income housing and 55 percent moderate income housing. 142 N.J. Super. at 37. The trial court emphasized that these 11 municipalities were required to do more than just refrain from zoning out their fair share allocation of lower income housing. Affirmative steps to encourage the construction of lower income housing, such as utilizing mandatory set-asides and density bonuses and pursuing federal and state housing subsidies, were required. All but 4 of these 11 municipalities (Old Bridge, North Brunswick, Edison and Sayreville), appealed. On appeal, the municipalities claimed that the trial court erred by using Middlesex County as a region for fair share purposes. They maintained that this Court specifically rejected the use of counties as regions in both Mount Laurel I and Madison. This claim was pressed most vigorously by the townships on the outskirts of the County, particularly Plainsboro and South Plainfield, who argued that their fair share allocations could not be properly arrived at without a consideration of the housing needs and obligations of municipalities in adjacent counties. The following individual defenses were raised by the seven municipalities on appeal: a. South Plainfield claimed it was developed and therefore not bound by Mount Laurel.