Today, Mercer County Superior Court Judge Robert T. Lougy rejected a second request for a motion to stay that would have paused implementation of New Jersey’s landmark new affordable housing law.
The denial comes on the heels of Judge Lougy’s earlier rejection of a previous motion to stay request on different grounds, the rejection of two different emergent applications in New Jersey Appellate Court, and the rejection of an appeal to the New Jersey Supreme Court — in all, five separate court decisions rejecting this attempt to put New Jersey’s affordable housing law on hold.
The lawsuit was brought by two dozen municipalities, including many of the wealthiest and most historically exclusionary municipalities in the state. Using taxpayer dollars, they filed a case in September in an attempt to undermine New Jersey’s affordable housing policy framework, which requires each municipality to allow for its fair share of affordable housing.
The Court found the towns improperly brought this additional lawsuit without going through the proper procedure required by court rules. Judge Lougy wrote that “Plaintiffs have failed at every turn to get injunctive relief on the claims properly pleaded and seek relief here on claims not properly before the Court. Although Plaintiffs seek to again brush their deficiencies aside as mere ‘procedural frustrations,’ that is not the way litigation works.”
The Court also rejected all of the substantive arguments brought by the municipalities in their latest filing. Finally, due to the procedural issues raised by the plaintiffs’ filings, the Court postponed a hearing originally scheduled for January 31 on whether to dismiss the lawsuit in its entirety, setting a new date of May 9, while noting that date might change again in the future.
“It’s outrageous that a small group of wealthy towns is continuing to expend tremendous amounts of taxpayer dollars attempting to block the affordable homes New Jerseyans desperately need,” said Adam Gordon, Executive Director of the Fair Share Housing Center. “Fortunately, the mayors of these towns are a small minority — representing fewer than 5% of all New Jersey municipalities. Far more municipalities, many of whom supported the new law’s passage, are moving forward with creating homes under the new law.”
In New Jersey, the constitutional obligation for each municipality to allow its fair share of affordable homes, known as the Mount Laurel Doctrine, is recalculated every 10 years in cycles known as Rounds. Each municipality’s obligations are calculated by looking at factors in various regions of the state — such as job growth, existing affordability, and the growth of low- and moderate-income households — which determines an individualized requirement for affordable housing.
Ahead of the Fourth Round of Obligations starting in 2025, Governor Murphy signed landmark legislation (S50/A4) in March 2024 that streamlines the affordable housing development process and codifies the methodology used to determine each municipality’s obligations over the next decade. The legislation’s primary sponsors were Senate President Nicholas Scutari, Senate Majority Leader Teresa Ruiz, State Senator Troy Singleton, Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin, and State Assemblymembers Yvonne Lopez, Benjie Wimberly, and Verlina Reynolds-Jackson.
In October, the NJ Dept. of Community Affairs (DCA) released calculations on the number of affordable homes each municipality is required to allow over the next decade. Municipalities have until Jan. 31, 2025 to adopt DCA’s guidance or provide their own calculation consistent with New Jersey law, and until June 30, 2025 to adopt specific plans for how to address that number.
Over 200 towns have already filed to participate in the state’s Fourth Round process ahead of the January 31 deadline, with many more expected to do so in the next week.
