Despite concerns from two of its own members and a handful of residents, West Windsor Council mustered the three votes needed to approve two ordinances enacting a settlement agreement with InterCap Holdings to build a mixed-use development at the Princeton Junction train station.
The council voted 3-2 to adopt the ordinances on March 7, with Linda Geevers and Diane Ciccone voting “no,” and George Borek, Charles Morgan, and Council President Kamal Khanna voting in favor. The vote followed a public hearing during which residents expressed their opinions on the plan.
The ordinances are part of a legal settlement between West Windsor and InterCap, led by Steve Goldin, a township resident. Under the settlement Intercap would drop its legal challenge of the township’s designation of the 350-acre area around the Princeton Junction train station as an area in need of redevelopment. This includes InterCap’s 25-acre property on Washington Road near the Princeton Junction train station. The ordinances were introduced on January 18.
The settlement, reached last November, calls for 800 housing units, retail, and infrastructure and amenity improvements on InterCap’s property. The most notable feature is a 50,000-square-foot “promenade” that would provide a public area for residents and a “shared space” between cars, pedestrians, and bicyclists.
The first ordinance outlines standards as they apply to the InterCap property and identifies the areas of the redevelopment plan that will not be applied to the InterCap tract. The second ordinance guarantees that the terms of the settlement and redeveloper’s agreement will remain in place, even if the township’s redevelopment plan is struck down by subsequent litigation, should it occur.
In approving the ordinances, council rejected a number of recommendations made by the planning board for revisions to the plan. Because the ordinances were to be approved as agreed upon by the town and Intercap, acceptance of those revisions would have effectively killed the settlement.
The ordinances will now go to state Superior Court Judge Linda Feinberg, who will hold a “fairness hearing” and then consider approval of the settlement. A hearing is scheduled for Tuesday, April 5.
If Feinberg grants approval, Intercap would submit a site plan application to the township planning board. If the board approves the application, Intercap has agreed to dismiss its lawsuit against the township.
Prior to the public hearing, Township Attorney Michael Herbert presented a resolution he drafted to accompany the ordinances to outline his response to the revisions recommended by the Planning Board. The areas where the Planning Board found discrepancies were “incorrect,” he said. “There were no inconsistencies.”
The planning board met on February 23 and March 2 to hear testimony from the outside professionals they hired to review the ordinances, and then make non-binding recommendations to council. The board used outside professionals to avoid a conflict of interest and provide an unbiased review.
Foremost among the board’s recommendations was that the township should demand that InterCap perform a fiscal impact study before the council voted on the ordinances.
The board also said the township should add more retail to the area, limit the number of bedrooms in housing units to two, eliminate cross streets through the promenade, and require InterCap to fulfill any affordable housing requirements on site — based on present and future state regulations, whatever they may be.
Among the biggest concerns for the Planning Board and Geevers and Ciccone was the requirement of only 5 percent of affordable housing included in the settlement and the ordinances. Herbert addressed this concern, among others, in his resolution. He told the council that if Feinberg found that the 5 percent affordable housing was insufficient, the “deal’s off,” or the developer would have to come up with higher numbers.
Most of the council members agreed with Herbert, including Morgan, who is at many times at odds with him on a number of issues. “I think he’s done a masterful job with that resolution,” he said, before voting. “I think it’s well done and addresses the issues.”
He said that although he originally voted against the township’s own redevelopment plan, West Windsor had no choice but to settle. If it continued litigating and won the lawsuit in court, it would have a redevelopment plan but no willing developer to build it. On the other hand, the township could lose in litigation.
The ordinance enacts a proposal “that is probably as good as it gets,” he said.
Borek said that “it hasn’t been an easy or smooth process,” but the “potential for a lawsuit here if we didn’t do anything is tremendous.”
Geevers and Ciccone were critical of the plan, however. Geevers said the second ordinance that would enact the terms of the agreement even if the redevelopment plan was struck down was “a gift to InterCap.”
She maintained she felt a fiscal impact report should have been submitted before the adoption of the ordinances and feared West Windsor taxpayers would be burdened with extra affordable housing requirements if the 5 percent set aside was deemed insufficient.
In addition, she revealed that InterCap had threatened the council prior to the meeting, saying “if we don’t approve these ordinances tonight, the settlement is off, and we’re back in court.”
Ciccone also referred to the threats. “I wanted to have some tweaking [to the ordinances],” she said. “I was told to take it or leave it.”
“I do not like being bullied by the plaintiff and his lawyer,” she added.
She said she was particularly concerned with a lack of specifics on the number of bedrooms for each housing units and shared Geevers’ concerns with the affordable housing requirements.
“I actually agree with their analyses,” Ciccone said of the Planning Board recommendations. “I wish it would have happened sooner.”
Ciccone said she felt the council could hold off on voting on the ordinances and still fall within the settlement agreement.
She and Geevers tried to get the council adopt the Planning Board recommendations, but the vote failed, 3-2 (despite having to be taken twice because Morgan, who attended the meeting through teleconference, mistakenly voted in favor because he thought he was voting on the ordinances).
The ultimate votes for both ordinances and the resolution were each 3-2, with Geevers and Ciccone voting against the measures.
A few residents who attended the Planning Board hearings reiterated their concerns about the ordinances, urging the council to accept the changes suggested by the board. Resident John Church said “this kind of independent analysis was very badly needed” and that the matter “should have been vetted by the Planning Board earlier.”
Resident Mike Baxter also urged the council to have a fiscal impact study conducted before adoption.
