Stealing the Farm
Happy Tuesday, and welcome to another edition of Rent Free. This week’s stories include:
- A vetoed housing supply bill in Connecticut.
- A gutting of San Diego’s productive “bonus ADU” program.
- The legacy of the Supreme Court’s Kelo eminent domain decision two decades on.
But first, our lead item on yet another case of eminent domain abuse in New Jersey.
Town Claims State Affordable Housing Law Forces It to Seize Family Farm for Affordable Housing
Andy Henry’s family has managed to hold onto its farm property in Cranbury, New Jersey, for five generations, including through a civil war, the Great Depression, and more recently, generous offers from developers to turn the property into yet another warehouse development dotting the area.
But now Henry might be forced to sell the home where he and his brother were raised to the township of Cranbury, which says it needs the site for affordable housing development.
This week, the Cranbury township council is supposed to vote on an affordable housing plan that would designate Henry’s farm, which he co-owns with his brother, as the site for affordable housing.
That vote will enable the township to begin eminent domain proceedings against the farm.
Town officials (who did not respond to Reason‘s request for comment) have stressed that seizing the farm was not their first choice, but rather a decision forced on them by New Jersey’s fair share housing law.
Henry and his attorney counter that the town has many other potential sites it could use for affordable housing and many other tools besides eminent domain to comply with state-set affordable housing goals.
“They saw this little patch of green out there and said, ‘oh, we’ll just snatch that up.’ It’s very disappointing to me,” he tells Reason.
Through a series of New Jersey Supreme Court decisions and state legislation stretching back decades, Garden State municipalities are required to periodically produce plans and update their land use laws to meet state-set affordable housing goals.
The state is currently in the fourth round of this affordable housing planning, in which Cranbury was given a target of building 265 affordable housing units.
Tim Duggan, Henry’s attorney, says that there are many different ways that Cranbury could meet this affordable housing goal that are more respectful of private property rights. It could change its zoning to allow for denser development. It could attempt to voluntarily purchase other sites in the town. It could pass an “inclusionary zoning” law requiring some percentage of new housing to be sold or rented at below-market rates. (This latter option would also impose a burden on private property owners.)
Instead, he says, the township is “trying to take the easy way out by grabbing a farm and building it all at one time.”
Cranbury is a small community in central New Jersey, located roughly equidistant between New York and Philadelphia, with I-95 running through it. That’s made it an attractive area for logistics businesses, which have been converting the properties surrounding Henry’s farm into warehouses over the past few decades.
Henry says that he’s received multiple multi-million-dollar offers from warehouse developers to sell his farm. He says none of those eight-digit offers outweigh the sentimental value he places on holding onto the farm property, on which a tenant currently raises cattle and hay.
New Jersey’s fair share housing rules are intended not only to produce affordable housing, but also to produce it in areas where future residents will have easy access to jobs, schools, and amenities.
Housing advocates argue that Cranbury’s plan to take Henry’s farm in the middle of a warehouse district runs counter to the purpose of the law.
The farm is “a two-mile walk to the bus. So people that are out there are not going to have an ability to get access to transportation. They’re not going have an inability to get to the community,” says Aaron Gordon of the Fair Share Housing Coalition, a New Jersey nonprofit that advocates against housing discrimination.
Henry says he first learned
Article from Reason.com
The Reason Magazine website is a go-to destination for libertarians seeking cogent analysis, investigative reporting, and thought-provoking commentary. Championing the principles of individual freedom, limited government, and free markets, the site offers a diverse range of articles, videos, and podcasts that challenge conventional wisdom and advocate for libertarian solutions. Whether you’re interested in politics, culture, or technology, Reason provides a unique lens that prioritizes liberty and rational discourse. It’s an essential resource for those who value critical thinking and nuanced debate in the pursuit of a freer society.
