In the summer of 2012, the Oakland town council debated at the 11th hour how to protect the borough’s affordable housing money from Governor Chris Christie who had vowed, “We’re going to collect that money…”
Today, Christie is one step closer in enforcing the state’s right to seize affordable housing monies that sat idle in municipal coffers for the four years prior to July 2012.
This was an initiative begun by former Governor Jon Corzine in an effort to force municipalities into producing concrete plans on how the money was to be spent. If, after four years, a municipality failed to commit the funds to an affordable housing project – the money would be seized by the state.
The state’s seizure of the money has been a heated subject of debate – and will continue to be – but Christie recently fulfilled a court decision that demanded that the COAH board must approve the seizure of what some estimate to be about 150 million dollars in funds throughout the state.
NJ’s state budget is expected to have a significant shortfall, and the affordable housing funds being seized are expected to help fill that gap.
Oakland’s council, in an emergency meeting due to the July 2012 deadline, voted to try and protect Oakland’s affordable housing funds with the creation of The Oakland Housing Corporation. The council passed a resolution to create a nonprofit 501(c)3 comprised of 3 council members Betsy Stagg, Tim Jensen, and Karen Marcalus; two former council members John Szabo, and Frank DiPentima – plus two additional Oakland residents.
At a recent council meeting in the spring of 2013, it was announced that the current mayor, Linda Schwager, had taken a position on the board; and, there were also additional openings. Schwager, along with council member Sandra Coira, had voted against the creation of the housing authority in Oakland.
Schwager and Coira had argued in favor of committing the funds to an established entity with a track record in affordable housing projects. The majority of NJ towns seeking to commit their affordable housing funds chose the route of partnering with established charitable or nonprofit organizations focused on affordable housing, which leaves Oakland in a very unique and vulnerable position.
To date, there has been no transfer of the estimated $800,000 from Oakland to the Oakland Housing Corporation. These monies were to be used by Oakland in an effort to meet the local affordable housing obligation; the mandated obligations will continue to exist, but any local money would need to come from other sources.
Chris Christie has already passed one legal obstacle, but it is expected that housing advocacy groups and local municipalities will also be seeking relief from the courts before writing Trenton a check.
Links:
http://theoaklandjournal.com/oaklandnj/oakland-money-at-risk/
http://theoaklandjournal.com/features/the-oakland-housing-corporation/
This is devastating. My party has thrown the $800,000 down the drain by not accepting Bergen County’s offer to take over the affordable housing obligations. Now, we will have to see our property taxes increase again to cover the gross negligence of the majority of Oakland’s council members.
We lose if Christie grabs the money and we lose if we appeal the seizure, using taxpayers’ dollars to pay the high-priced lawyers.
Is anyone really surprised by this? The Governor made it clear that he was coming for this money – money the borough sat on for years and is STILL sitting on – and did nothing until the last hour when they formed this phoney-boloney organization despite having a county organization with a proven track record already in place. Instead of putting that $800k to good use building affordable housing in Oakland to a) fulfill the borough’s COAH requirements; and b) allow our seniors the chance to remain in town, the money will be spent either fighting a losing battle with Trenton or helping to close the state budget gap.
So the winners will be the lawyers. The losers will once again be the Oakland taxpayers. A recurring theme.
Politics at it’s worse. Biale and the Bergen county housing authority had a plan ready to go. The council Republicans said no because they didn’t want a Democrat to look good. Oakland lost, Oakland will lose the funds, and the sitting council Republicans are responsible.