Howell Planners To Review 319-Unit Housing Plan On Thursday

HOWELL, NJ - The Howell Township Planning Board is set to review preliminary and final site plans for a new residential development on Fort Plains and Sunnyside Road at a meeting Thursday night.

The multi-building development complex under review is slated to include 319 residential units, with 72 market-rate single-family units, 155 market-rate townhouses and 92 condominium units for low-to-moderate income households. The development is poised to satisfy a good amount of affordable housing units that Howell must provide by 2025.

The units come as part of an ongoing settlement with the Fair Share Housing Center, which sued several New Jersey municipalities in the 2010s for lack of affordable housing. In 2018, a judge determined that Howell must build 895 "credits" worth of affordable housing by 2025, according to the Asbury Park Press.

Dubbed “Views at Monmouth Manor,” the plan has drawn a bit of controversy among residents since the planning board was originally scheduled to review in September 2020 (the current application was originally scheduled to be heard on Jan. 7, 2021 before it was pushed to Feb. 4).

Some critics of the development plan argue that increased construction in the township is squashing Howell's historic roots in agriculture. Others, including the township environmental commission and state environmental protection officials, are concerned about wildlife species - such as bobcats and birds - that call the undeveloped wetlands home.

“A lynx (bobcat) was sited on the property which is a protected endangered species,” Joan Osborne of the Howell Environmental Commission wrote in November. “We are concerned with the loss of habit[at].”

Howell Township Mayor Theresa Berger, a Democrat, and former Deputy Mayor Evelyn Malsbury-O’Donnell, a Republican, have both voiced concerns about overdevelopment in the region during their campaign for reelection in 2020.

Residents have brought up concerns ranging from population increases to development.

“I lived on Sunnyside, 5 yrs ago. So happy we left when we did. The development going on in Howell is out of control,” one user wrote on social media.

“What are the plans to accommodate schools? I’m sure a lot of the people that will live in this new community will have school-aged children,” another user asked.

The applicants, FP Howell, LLC and the estate of William Whalen by Gina Bettencourt, John Berkoben and Ruth Bennett, They are also proposing monument-style site identification signs, refuse enclosures, landscape and lighting improvements and parking on premises, according to the latest meeting agenda.

In September, the applicants also proposed two boulevard-style roadways along the Fort Plains Road site, according to a meeting agenda. It’s not immediately clear if that addition will still be proposed on Thursday.

The meeting will be livestreamed on Youtube via this link.

You can join the meeting at 7 p.m. using the following information:

Join by phone:
US: +1 929 205 6099 (New York)

Join by web:
https://zoom.us/u/a4Lp9qzPg
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