Opinion ID: 2402880
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: the issue of constitutionality.

Text: Section 1 of the act, N.J.S.A. 40:55-21.1 defines a blighted area to mean an area wherein there exists any of the conditions hereinafter enumerated: (a) The generality of buildings used as dwellings or the dwelling accommodations therein are substandard, unsafe, insanitary, dilapidated, or obsolescent, or possess any of such characteristics, or are so lacking in light, air, or space, as to be conducive to unwholesome living; (b) The discontinuance of the use of buildings previously used for manufacturing or industrial purposes, the abandonment of such buildings or the same being allowed to fall into so great a state of disrepair as to be untenantable; (c) Unimproved vacant land, which has remained so for a period of ten years prior to the determination hereinafter referred to, and which land by reason of its location, or remoteness from developed sections or portions of such municipality, or lack of means of access to such other parts thereof, or topography, or nature of the soil, is not likely to be developed through the instrumentality of private capital; (d) Areas (including slum areas), with buildings or improvements which by reason of dilapidation, obsolescence, overcrowding, faulty arrangement or design, lack of ventilation, light and sanitary facilities, excessive land coverage, deleterious land use or obsolete layout, or any combination of these or other factors, are detrimental to the safety, health, morals, or welfare of the community; (e) A growing or total lack of proper utilization of areas caused by the condition of the title, diverse ownership of the real property therein and other conditions, resulting in a stagnant and unproductive condition of land potentially useful and valuable for contributing to and serving the public health, safety and welfare. The legislation provides that if, after certain proceedings have been taken, a portion of a municipality is found to be blighted within that definition, the governing body may, but shall not be required to, acquire the real property within the area by purchase, or by eminent domain proceedings, and may proceed with the clearance, replanning, development or redevelopment of the area as a public purpose and for public use, or the said governing body may, by resolution, agree that a private corporation may undertake such clearance, replanning, development or redevelopment in accordance with statutory authority and subject to the provisions of paragraph 1, Section III, Article VIII, of the Constitution.  N.J.S.A. 40:55-21.10. Community redevelopment is a modern facet of municipal government. Soundly planned redevelopment can make the difference between continued stagnation and decline and a resurgence of healthy growth. It provides the means of removing the decadent effect of slums and blight on neighboring property values, of opening up new areas for residence and industry. In recent years, recognition has grown that governing bodies must either plan for the development or redevelopment of urban areas or permit them to become more congested, deteriorated, obsolescent, unhealthy, stagnant, inefficient and costly. As a result, at least 38 states now have remedial legislation similar to that of New Jersey. Jacobs & Levine, Redevelopment: Making Misused and Disused Land Available and Usable, 8 Hastings L.J. 241 (1957). Even if there were no express constitutional sanction for redevelopment of the type described in our statute, ample authority to do so might be found in the well of police power. Manifestly, the purposes to be served are intimately related to the public health, welfare and safety and so are consonant with both Federal and State Constitutions. Berman v. Parker, 348 U.S. 26, 75 S.Ct. 98, 99 L.Ed. 27 (1954); Sorbino v. City of New Brunswick, 43 N.J. Super. 554 ( Law Div. 1957); Redfern v. Board of Com'rs of Jersey City, 137 N.J.L. 356 ( E. & A. 1948); Ryan v. Housing Authority of City of Newark, 125 N.J.L. 336 ( Sup. Ct. 1940); Romano v. Housing Authority of City of Newark, 123 N.J.L. 428 ( Sup. Ct. 1939), affirmed 124 N.J.L. 452 ( E. & A. 1940); Annotation, 44 A.L.R. 2 d 1414, 1420 (1955). As the former Supreme Court said in Mansfield & Swett, Inc., v. Town of West Orange, 120 N.J.L. 145, 150 ( Sup. Ct. 1938): The state possesses the inherent authority  it antedates the Constitution  to resort, in the building and expansion of its community life, to such measures as may be necessary to secure the essential common material and moral needs. The public welfare is of prime importance; and the correlative restrictions upon individual rights  either of person or of property  are incidents of the social order, considered a negligible loss compared with the resultant advantages to the community as a whole. Planning confined to the common need is inherent in the authority to create the municipality itself. It is as old as government itself; it is of the very essence of civilized society. A comprehensive scheme of physical development is requisite to community efficiency and progress.    The police power of the state may be delegated to the state's municipal subdivisions created for the administration of local self-government, to be exerted whenever necessary for the general good and welfare. It reaches to all the great public needs;   . For an early forward looking expression in a related field, see Tide-water Company v. Coster, 18 N.J. Eq. 518 ( E. & A. 1866). In the Berman case, supra, the United States Supreme Court dealt with the constitutionality of the 1945 Redevelopment Act of the District of Columbia  an act quite similar in scope to that now before us. Its validity was sustained with a broad expression of the vista of the police power: Public safety, public health, morality, peace and quiet, law and order  these are some of the more conspicuous examples of the traditional application of the police power to municipal affairs. Yet they merely illustrate the scope of the power and do not delimit it.    Miserable and disreputable housing conditions may do more than spread disease and crime and immorality. They may also suffocate the spirit by reducing the people who live there to the status of cattle. They may indeed make living an almost insufferable burden. They may also be an ugly sore, a blight on the community which robs it of charm, which makes it a place from which men turn. The misery of housing may despoil a community as an open sewer may ruin a river. We do not sit to determine whether a particular housing project is or is not desirable. The concept of the public welfare is broad and inclusive.    The values it represents are spiritual as well as physical, aesthetic as well as monetary. It is within the power of the legislature to determine that the community should be beautiful as well as healthy, spacious as well as clean, well-balanced as well as carefully patrolled. In the present case, the Congress and its authorized agencies have made determinations that take into account a wide variety of values. It is not for us to reappraise them.   . 348 U.S. at pages 32, 33, 75 S.Ct. at page 102; compare Redevelopment Agency of City and County of San Francisco v. Hayes, 122 Cal. App. 2 d 777, 800-802, 266 P. 2 d 105 ( Dist. Ct. App. 1954), certiorari denied 348 U.S. 897, 75 S.Ct. 214, 99 L.Ed. 705 (1954). Moreover, if there were any doubt at the state level of the compatibility of the statute in question with our organic law, it would be dispelled by the 1947 Constitution, which contains specific approval and authorization of redevelopment projects. Art. VIII, Sec. III, par. 1 declares: 1. The clearance, replanning, development or redevelopment of blighted areas shall be a public purpose aod public use, for which private property may be taken or acquired. Municipal, public or private corporations may be authorized by law to undertake such clearance, replanning, development or redevelopment,   . Thus we come to the more specific charges of unconstitutionality.