JACKSON TOWNSHIP, NJ – Jackson Township Councilman Marty Flemming, hot on the campaign trail Thursday night, spoke to residents about New Jersey’s Council on Affordable Housing. For decades, elected officials in Jackson have railed against the state mandate to build large-scale, high-density affordable housing in the mostly rural community.
Link << Listen to Jackson Township Councilman Marty Flemming speak in support of mandating affordable housing in Jackson.
For many years, the township was forced to build apartments and townhouses under the state mandate.
On Thursday, Flemming championed the affordable housing mandate.
“What affordable housing is, they are monetarily restricted. [You need] $40,000 to $50,000 just to even get into a COAH house.” Flemming said. “It’s a state-mandated program, and it’s not as bad as you think.”
Affordable housing in Jackson is the driving force behind the legal rights that enable builders to clear-cut hundreds of acres of forest to build high-density housing projects that often go against the township’s zoning laws.
One of the main issues of concern to Jackson residents in this year’s election is the rapid pace of high-density residential and warehouse overdevelopment in Jackson Township.
In the past few years alone, several thousand new affordable housing and high-density housing units have been approved by Flemming, who also serves on the Jackson Township planning board.
Two weeks ago, Flemming hosted a fundraiser at the Pine Barrens Golf Course, owned by Lakewood Developer Mordechai Eichorn, who is the builder behind Jackson Trails and two private school campuses for Orthodox Jewish school children on Leesville Road.
The meeting raised speculation after Flemming abstained from voting on Eichorn’s application due to a ‘conflict of interest’. Earlier in the year, Flemming privately met with township attorney Sean Gertner and Eichorn to instead build a high-density residential complex on the Leesville site that is currently in review by the planning board. That deal fell through when the township zoning board rejected Flemmings’s plan to build 48 homes where only ten could legally be built without a variance.
Last week, at the township council meeting, Flemming was questioned about his stance on high-density affordable housing.
When asked how he intended to stop overdevelopment in Jackson, Flemming replied, “I never said I would do that.”