IS THE MAHWAH COUNCIL MAKING DEALS TO BRING POTENTIALLY THOUSANDS OF HIGH DENSITY HOUSING UNITS TO M
Make no mistake about about it. Development is coming in a big way to Mahwah and it will be in the form of high density housing along with retail development. Our Town Council will be making “deals” with developers to bring this all to us. This coming Thursday, February 23, the Mahwah Town Council is holding an “information session” on the Township’s Affordable Housing obligation. This is being done under the guise of “transparency” so that residents can better understand the complicated affordable housing obligations that Mahwah is facing. Information is important so I encourage all residents to attend and listen carefully to what the Council has to tell us. HOWEVER, as history has shown us with the Crossroads backroom dealing, this Council is far from transparent. LISTEN to what they tell you, but then WATCH what they actually do. Remember, this is a Council who told us in October that a Wellhead Protection Act to protect our wellheads from the hazards of development would be presented in December, only to now tell us that it will be presented in April. The development deals are not stopping while the Wellhead Protection Act is being worked on. The Council is laying the groundwork for the time that will come when they tell us that they have made “deals” with developers, including the developers for the Crossroads site and the Liberty Travel site (among others), to allow these developers to develop hundreds, if not thousands, of high density housing units in Mahwah which will include a certain portion of affordable housing units. The Council will tell you that making “deals” with these developers on affordable housing obligations will be better than allowing the courts to decide. This may be true. HOWEVER, history leaves us to question the motivations behind these "deals." Let us not forget that it was backroom dealings by the Council that brought us the Crossroads re-zoning to allow retail development at that site. The Township then sought to rescind that zoning due to public backlash. The result was costly litigation in which the judge found that the Mahwah Town Council acted in an “arbitrary and capricious manner” and the retail zoning was upheld. What does this Council have in store for us now? More arbitrary and capricious behavior? Council President Hermansen took to social media in recent weeks to attack the concerned citizens behind the “Stop the Mahwah Mall” group. He claimed that they are to blame for the current affordable housing obligations the town is facing because if the Crossroads had been developed, then the land would not now be available for residential housing. For Council President Hermansen to make such a tenuous argument and attempt to demonize a group of concerned residents is perhaps symbolic of what we have to look forward to in the coming months with this Council. Council President Hermansen claims that it was the litigation brought about by the Stop the Mahwah Mall Group surrounding the Crossroads that resulted in the site not being developed. The same litigation that ultimately found the Council to have acted in an “arbitrary and capricious'' manner. Perhaps Council President Hermansen thinks the public is so ignorant that we would fail to see that it was the economy that led to the Crossroads not being built, not any delay from litigation. In fact, the developer continued its application process while litigation was ongoing. The litigation did not seem to bother the developer. The reason the Crossroads was not developed was simple. There was not a desire for brick-and-mortar retail in that area (coupled with the challenges that the inferior highways leading to the site presented). Thus, I would argue that Council President Hermansen’s pitiful attempt to blame concerned residents for the town’s current affordable housing obligation is nothing but symbolic of what is to come from this Council. Shift blame on major issues. Don’t take responsibility for having caused the problem. Perhaps as the Council talks about wanting to have “transparency” around the affordable housing obligations in Mahwah, the Council President can explain why he received the maximum campaign contributions allowable under law from the political action committee that represents the building and construction unions who stand to benefit from the deals this Council is about to make in allowing high density housing and retail to be developed in Mahwah. Here is a link to the campaign finance filings which show that thousands upon thousands of dollars exchanged hands between the Council President and the building and construction unions. What did the unions expect in exchange for these campaign contributions, and why was the Council President the only politician in Mahwah to receive such monies? LINK: http://media.wix.com/ugd/73cc44_624e5e9cd04b43eeb025eb24c025ff25.pdf The Council President also took to social media in recent weeks to allege that if any residents use social media to raise concerns about the Council or its actions, such residents are “cyber bullies”. Oh the irony in such a statement! When the Council President himself and other members of the Council have been accused by fellow members of their own body of engaging in tactics of bullying and intimidation against one another, it is insulting to residents that any form of criticism of the Council by the public at large would be called “bullying” by the very purveyors of such tactics. Residents elect our Councilpersons and we have a right to express our opinions without the threat of being called a “bully” for speaking out. We have a Council with a supermajority all aligned behind the Council President, including two hand-picked members who were not even elected by Mahwah residents to their positions. A Council President who has the labor and construction unions in his wallet. Hmmm...... Development is coming to Mahwah and in a MAJOR way. While talking about “transparency” in the process is wonderful, let’s not forget that it is pictures like the one depicted below that are not made transparent to the public. The closed sessions. The backroom discussions. Let’s not forget how Crossroads originally came about. Is the below picture more symbolic of what was done then? Is it symbolic of what is yet to come? Residents should LISTEN to what the Council has to say. However, residents are smart. We will not be swayed by buzz-terms like “transparency” that politicians love to throw around as nothing but smoke screens to hide their true intentions. KEEP THOSE EYES OPEN MAHWAH! Development is coming and in a VERY big way Whose interests will the Council be looking out for? Hopefully is is not the interests of those who have their hands in the Council's wallet.
