Drug Rehab Facility Rejection Prompts Suit Against Wayne Zoning Board

WAYNE, NJ — The Wayne Zoning Board is being sued after it voted to reject a proposal to convert a medical office building into a drug rehabilitation facility in town.

In March 2025, WPB Investors, LLC, filed an application with the Wayne Zoning Board to convert a property it owns into an inpatient drug rehabilitation facility.

The property, located at 220 Hamburg Turnpike in Wayne, is a medical office building adjacent to St. Joseph’s Wayne Medical Center. According to the suit, the building has been unused for four years.

As hearings on the application commenced in fall 2025, WPB Investors supplied the Board with testimony from experts, including civil engineers, planners, and operators, which provided evidence as to how the site would operate efficiently, the suit says.

Part of WPB’s application was a conditional use variance, which would allow the zone to be used for inpatient care rather than just the outpatient care it is already approved for.

Legal representatives from St. Joseph’s Wayne Medical Center objected to the proposal but offered no testimony “in support of the objection/against the (application),” the suit reads.

The suit added that there was no comment from the public with concerns with regard to the proposed rehab facility.

The board unanimously voted to reject the proposal, eventually memorializing the decision through a resolution passed in January 2026.

The suit indicates that the Board’s reason for denying the application was due to parking constraints.

However, WPB said it offered testimony from experts explaining that patients under the care of the rehab could not drive themselves, the only cars that would be in the parking lot at a given time would be the rehab employees (six at a time), and cars from visitors during occasional visitation days.

WPB added that visitations would be staggered to avoid overcrowding the parking lot at a given time.

WPB calls the Board’s rejection “arbitrary, capricious, unreasonable, improper,” and “contrary to the unrefuted expert testimony.” Additionally, the suit says the decision was “in flagrant disregard of the weight of the evidence compromising the record, and an unlawful and abusive exercise of the Board’s discretion.”

WPB demands that the Board reverse its decision, approve the application, and provide attorney’s fees and costs of suit.

Wayne Zoning Board representatives told Patch, "The Zoning Board is currently reviewing the complaint and will be filing a response to it at the appropriate time.”