This bill is not about giving developers more time
to build on previously issued permits, it’s about helping developers skirt new,
more protective regulations that have been recently adopted including the Flood Hazard Rules,
Water Quality Management Planning Rules (WQMP), and new Category One
designations that protect drinking water, keep folks out of harm’s way from
floods, and focus growth in the right places. Further, New Jersey’s permit program already gives
developers a ten year window to build once a permit is issued.
These new regulations are critically needed to
protect New Jerseyans’ waterways and to prevent flooding statewide. By allowing development to go forward that does not comply with these
new regulations, you are allowing these problems to get worse.
72% of New Jersey’s waterways are already
impaired, violating water quality standards. No other state has as high a
percent of impaired waterways as New Jersey, the most densely populated
state in the nation. Numerous studies of development and water
quality declines show a direct correlation between development and water
degradation. Common sense policies such as Category One designations
(which give waterways a buffer within which no large scale development is
permitted) and the WQMP Rules (which limit development in areas rich in
high quality waterways), are needed to prevent further declines.
This bill would undo efforts to stem this trend by exempting some
development projects from these new protections, allowing water quality to
get even worse.
New Jerseyans along the Delaware and in northern Jersey
have suffered three major
floods in less than three years and forecasts for this year and future
years indicate that we can expect more extreme weather that contributes to
flooding. For this year, forecasts indicate that the Atlantic
hurricane season will be more active than the average 1950-2000 season
with 8 hurricanes (average is 5.9), 15 named storms (average is 9.6), and
4 intense (category 3-4-5) hurricanes (average is 2.3). By passing this
bill, and allowing development to go forward in flood plains that the Flood
Rules would have otherwise limited, you are putting more property and
lives in harm’s way as flooding increases from hurricanes and other
weather.
This bill ties one hand behind the state’s back
when it comes to protecting the environment and public health from new threats
or old problems becoming worse that might require stronger remedies (permits
and regulations) than we have today.
Currently, permits expire after a reasonable amount
of time (5-10 years typically to see a development through to completion)
for a reason. It permits towns to review zoning and the state to adjust
its rules and laws if needed in response to changing conditions "on
the ground" -e.g. water supplies get depleted and polluted, open
space is lost, air quality is threatened and improved scientific
understanding of these changes and their effect on the environment and
public health.
Any steps the state takes to strengthen environmental
standards during the period of time that the bill would extend permits
would be almost meaningless. That’s because any new standards
adopted would not apply to a of NJDEP held permits, while
only applying to newly sought permits, a small fraction. This
puts policymaking on the environment almost completely on hold through
2014, a truly disappointing position for leaders in a state like New Jersey to take. New Jersey is known for its leadership
on the environment, but this bill would seriously mar that reputation. majority
This bill purports to be a solution to our state’s
economic crisis, by allegedly helping to keep the housing market stable, but in
fact, it will do nothing to stabilize the housing market. The rationale behind the bill has
been fabricated by developers and builders who are taking advantage of an
economic downturn to skirt around environmental regulations.
The slowing of the housing market is mainly affecting
sub-prime lending right now, squeezing out flippers and speculators. We
are not seeing a crisis effect on developers and sellers of new homes,
built for buyers in the prime lending market.
Developers now crying the loudest have engaged in a
form of speculation, by overextending their business in the housing bubble
of early to mid 2000s. One of the state’s largest builders, Kara Homes, now bankrupt, is the poster
child for this.
Developers want A2867/S1919 because they became
dependent to the high profit margins enjoyed during the housing bubble when
homes were overvalued and overpriced. The developers now reporting the biggest losses
failed to plan for an end to this bubble, a softening of the market and a
return to more typical times.
The drop in home prices are bringing valuations - the
difference between what a home should cost and its actual price - back to
pre-bubble levels. As housing prices drop, New Jersey developers are
asking the state for a subsidy (no environmental compliance costs) to
remain as profitable as they were during the housing bubble of 2001 –
2006, rather than adjust their business to sell homes at a more accurately
valued price. According to the financial research firm Global Insight and
the banking company National City Corp, “Home prices declined in 262 of
the 330 metropolitan areas surveyed during Q1’08. The sharp dip in home
prices means that only 8 markets can now be considered overvalued, down from
14 markets last quarter. In mid-2006, at the height of the bubble, a full
53 metro areas were considered over-valued.” New Jersey’s market in the early to mid
2000s was widely over-valued and is still over-valued.
The real economic crisis is the increased cost
state residents will have to pay to treat polluted drinking water and deal with
the ramifications of flooding. If this bill passes, state residents already hit hard by
rising food costs, gas prices, and utility bills will also be asked to pay the
cost of the developer’s holiday from environmental regulation this bill would
deliver. While polluters take a six year plus “holiday” from new environmental
regulations, all New Jerseyans will be asked to pay billions more to ensure
they have clean drinking water and to recover from flooding.
