>The New Jersey Senate has adopted a bill that may abolish Council on Affordable Housing (COAH)
COAH could soon be history
Friday, October 15, 2010
BY MICHAEL SEDON
The Ridgewood News
STAFF WRITER
https://www.northjersey.com/news/105009174_COAH_could_soon_be_history.html
The New Jersey Senate has adopted a bill that may abolish Council on Affordable Housing (COAH) rules that mandate how many affordable housing units a municipality is responsible for, based on a complex and sometimes questionable calculation.
The bill, adopted June 3 and titled S-1, threatens to abolish COAH. But the outcome of the discussion will not be known until the Assembly takes up the legislation, according to Village Planner Blais Brancheau.
“One hopes that the result for Ridgewood, as well as most municipalities, is a simpler system and a more reasonable obligation,” Brancheau said in an e-mail. “But the more realistic answer is: Who knows?”
COAH’s complexity has spawned numerous court battles over the years, resulting in three rounds of decisions that have changed the affordable housing obligation for municipalities throughout the state each time. COAH opponents have argued that these decisions have done little to actually address affordable housing needs for New Jersey’s residents.
On Oct. 8, the New Jersey Appellate Division struck down many of the revised “third round rules” that COAH adopted in 2008, including the current “growth share” calculation that the state used to mandate municipalities a certain number of affordable housing units, according to the League of Municipalities (LOM) website, njslom.org.
https://www.northjersey.com/news/105009174_COAH_could_soon_be_history.html
