A New Jersey judge rejected a request from 26 towns for an injunction to halt the state’s affordable housing development process while their lawsuit challenging the state requirements is decided.
The towns sued in October to void a state law the created guidelines for calculating how much affordable housing each town must generate over the next decade. The towns claimed the law forces them to build housing without accounting for how much development they are able to support.
According to a report from The Gothamist, Mercer County Superior Court Judge Robert Lougy ruled that the wider public interest in new affordable housing “overwhelmingly” was greater than the towns’ insistence they are being overburdened by the affordable housing they are asked to construct.
“The Court finds it incongruous with all principles of equity to leave the State’s low- and moderate-income households in worse shape than before the Legislature’s comprehensive reshaping of the field,” Lougy wrote in his decision, adding that the 26 towns “have no entitlement to deprive other municipalities” of their right to go through the affordable housing process.
The towns responded to the ruling by announcing they will file an appeal.
“Our coalition remains steadfast in challenging a law that imposes unfair affordable housing obligations upon New Jersey’s suburban municipalities – while exempting the urban ones – for each 10-year decade into perpetuity,” said Mayor Mike Ghassali of Montvale, New Jersey, one of the towns that filed the lawsuit.
Judge Lougy scheduled a Jan. 31 hearing on a motion filed by the state to dismiss the towns’ lawsuit.
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