WOODBURY, NJ - The city council has agreed to pay the city planner $2,420 to draft a developer fee ordinance, which would make the city compliant with new affordable housing regulations. The requirement is part of the third-round regulations set forth by the state Council on Affordable Housing (COAH). The ordinance would require developers of non-residential properties to pay the city 2.5 percent of the property's assessed value before receiving a certificate of occupation, according to city Administrator Thomas Bowe.
The city assessor will determine the property's assessment based on plans submitted to the construction office as well as a final assessment 10 days before the certificate of occupancy is issued, Bowe explained.
That money would go into a city fund, which would then be used to create the approximately 80 new affordable housing units the city is responsible for under the third-round COAH rules, Bowe said. If the city does not adopt such an ordinance, the non-residential development fees from new constructions would instead go to the state, Bowe said.
"If we wouldn't do this but still attempt to be COAH-compliant, we'd have to find the money somewhere," Bowe said. "We'd have to budget the money."
Bowe said he doesn't foresee the funds from such fees to completely satisfy the city's affordable housing responsibility, "but this will help."
"It will help with us doing what we have to do relative to creating new units," Bowe said. "We've been fortunate to have some new development come here in the recent past like, for example, Walgreens."
The city has long been COAH-compliant, so the new ordinance is in line with the city's desire to remain so, Bowe said. "We've always applied for and been recognized as COAH-compliant," Bowe said. "For a long period of time, we've been a town that was living the COAH dream, as it were," he added. "We've had moderate- to low-income units in this town for years."
Source: NJ.com