1,000+ people have applied for 3 affordable rentals in Haddonfield, as the borough tries to expand housing options

Mayor Colleen Bianco Bezich was walking in a Haddonfield neighborhood where a well-maintained house signifies her affluent community’s willingness — after years of opposition, contention, and reluctance — to embrace affordable housing as a public good.

“Historically, Haddonfield hasn’t done a good job with affordable housing,” the mayor said, pausing at a two-bedroom Fowler Avenue home that the borough bought for about $350,000 to reserve for income-eligible tenants.

“You can’t point the finger at any one commissioner or administration, but we’ve had enough ‘not in my backyard,’’’ said Bianco Bezich, who has been mayor since 2021. “To my mind, scattered affordable housing sites are a new and exciting way for Haddonfield to have more housing options and opportunities for everyone. The vision is each neighborhood being home to a family that couldn’t necessary afford market-rate housing.”

Overseen by a nonprofit the borough set up and managed by a division of Triad Associates, a private firm it hired last year, the scattered site program will include eight properties in neighborhoods across Haddonfield. A first round of applications closed Jan. 31 after attracting 1,169 prospective tenants for rental units on Fowler Avenue, Lake Street, and in Haddonfield Commons, and Triad is continuing to accept applications for a waiting list, township officials said.

The mayor and the two other members of the borough Board of Commissioners expect that the scattered-site approach will help the tree-lined Camden County suburb known for its strong schools and lively downtown to at last begin to meet its court-ordered affordable housing requirements.

“We understand we have an obligation to do what’s right,” Commissioner Kevin Roche said.

But for a community of less than three square miles and more than 12,000 residents, with little available land and residential real estate prices rising beyond the reach of many, “there’s no single formula for success with affordable housing,” he said.

“Scattered sites are one of a variety of actions we have to take.”

Said Commissioner Frank Troy: “The three of us [commissioners] are fully committed to meeting our ‘Fair Share’ obligations and thinking creatively about how we can do so. We are looking across the borough as properties become available to see if anything would be a good fit. And scattered sites help remove any stigma associated with affordable housing.”

A complicated history

In 2019, Haddonfield signed a legally binding agreement with the Fair Share Housing Center to meet the borough’s affordable housing obligations under the Mount Laurel doctrine. Named after four successive New Jersey Supreme Court decisions beginning in 1975 that outlawed local zoning regulations that discriminate against disadvantaged buyers and renters, the doctrine set up a mechanism for municipalities to provide affordable housing under lower court supervision.

Based on considerations such as population growth and availability of land for residential development, the 2019 agreement directs Haddonfield to provide for 83 affordable units by 2025. These are to include the 20 townhouses of Snowden Commons, a development set to rise on a vacant, 1.5-acre site behind borough hall on East Kings Highway.

Conceived as a 28-unit complex, Snowden was downsized to 20 townhouses after some neighbors raised questions about the impact of the density on parking and traffic. Bianco Bezich and other borough officials devised the scattered site strategy as a way to make up for the eight units lost at Snowden. According to Fair Share, about 40 communities statewide, including Cherry Hill, are using similar approaches.

Construction of the $5.4 million Snowden complex also has been delayed since last year due to an ongoing review by New Jersey’s Historic Preservation Office, which got involved because parts of the site are within the borough’s historic district.

Opponents had hoped the preservation concerns would permanently scuttle Snowden Commons. But officials said that the borough had received conditional approval from the preservation office and that the developer, Community Investment Strategies, of Lawrenceville, Mercer County, is ready to proceed pending final approval. Construction is expected to begin later this year.

“It will not look like what people think of when they think of ‘affordable housing,’” Bianco Bezich said. “Every townhouse will have its own address and private entrance.”

The 2019 agreement also calls for 10 more affordable units to be built on the former Bancroft school site on Kings Highway at Hopkins Lane as part of a townhouse community proposed by developer J. Brian O’Neill, who is also the founder of Recovery Centers of America. O’Neill’s proposal to build one of his addiction treatment facilities on a portion of the property outraged many local residents in 2015.

» READ MORE: A new plan underway for Haddonfield's Bancroft property

Founded in 1883 by special education pioneer Margaret Bancroft, the school had outgrown its park-like Haddonfield campus by the turn of the 21st century. The borough Board of Education proposed buying the property for $12.3 million, but a 2013 ballot question to authorize the purchase failed. In 2014, Bancroft announced that it would build a new campus in Mount Laurel and moved there in 2017.

» READ MORE: As Bancroft leaves Haddonfield, the borough and the school look ahead

Following the furor over the proposed rehab facility, the borough itself bought the Bancroft site for $12.9 million in 2016. O’Neill retained an option to buy back 8.2 of those 19.2 acres, and in 2019 he and the borough entered into an agreement in which his development firm was to build 80 market-rate townhouses as well as the 10 affordable townhouses there.

But last December, O’Neill sued the borough in federal court, claiming that Haddonfield’s primary intention all along was not to develop townhouses but to thwart development of a residential treatment facility for people living in alcohol and drug addiction — which the suit alleged is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The developer also is seeking the court’s permission to build either a treatment facility or a townhouse development with as few as 90 or as many as 400 units on the site.

Haddonfield has asked the court to dismiss the suit. In a separate and public statement, the borough contended that O’Neill’s surprise move came despite “multiple attempts by [Haddonfield] to engage in a collaborative process [and] negotiate in good faith over the last three years.”

The statement goes on to say that the borough “remains committed to complying with its constitutional obligation to provide affordable housing while the litigation progresses.”

Speaking for Fair Share, Esmé Devenney, a New Jersey Housing Justice Corps fellow, said: “Our feeling is Haddonfield needs to build the 10 units it has agreed to build [and] it would be a violation of our settlement agreement if the 10 units are not built there.”

Fair Share also is “happy that Haddonfield was able to find a new way to meet its Mount Laurel obligation” using the scattered-site approach, she said.

The mayor, who grew up in Pennsauken and lives with her husband and their young son in a section of Haddonfield that abuts Haddon Township, said affordable housing is a key element of her administration. The houses are being purchased with money from the state’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund, not by borough funds.

“When I first took office, it became apparent to me that the Snowden development, which was in the works for a decade, was in limbo, and I felt a real impetus to make it happen,” said Bianco Bezich, a lawyer with a background in land use.

“It’s not just about meeting court obligations or settlement terms,” she said. “We need more affordable housing in Haddonfield. I will move proactively and aggressively to make it happen.”