Southern Burlington County N.A.A.C.P. v. Township of Mount Laurel

456 A.2d 390, 92 N.J. 158, 1983 N.J. LEXIS 2344
CourtSupreme Court of New Jersey
DecidedJanuary 20, 1983
StatusPublished
Cited by263 cases

This text of 456 A.2d 390 (Southern Burlington County N.A.A.C.P. v. Township of Mount Laurel) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of New Jersey primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Southern Burlington County N.A.A.C.P. v. Township of Mount Laurel, 456 A.2d 390, 92 N.J. 158, 1983 N.J. LEXIS 2344 (N.J. 1983).

Opinion

The opinion of the Court was delivered by

WILENTZ, C.J.

This is the return, eight years later, of Southern Burlington County N.A.A.C.P. v. Township of Mount Laurel, 67 N.J. 151 (1975) (Mount Laurel I). We set forth in that case, for the first time, the doctrine requiring that municipalities’ land use regulations provide a realistic opportunity for low and moderate income housing. The doctrine has become famous. The Mount Laurel case itself threatens to become infamous. After all this time, ten years after the trial court’s initial order invalidating its zoning ordinance, Mount Laurel remains afflicted with a blatantly exclusionary ordinance. Papered over with studies, rationalized by hired experts, the ordinance at its core is true to nothing but Mount Laurel’s determination to exclude the poor. *199 Mount Laurel is not alone; we believe that there is widespread non-compliance with the constitutional mandate of our original opinion in this case.

To the best of our ability, we shall not allow it to continue. This Court is more firmly committed to the original Mount Laurel doctrine than ever, and we are determined, within appropriate judicial bounds, to make it work. The obligation is to provide a realistic opportunity for housing, not litigation. We have learned from experience, however, that unless a strong judicial hand is used, Mount Laurel will not result in housing, but in paper, process, witnesses, trials and appeals. We intend by this decision to strengthen it, clarify it, and make it easier for public officials, including judges, to apply it.

This case is accompanied by five others, heard together and decided in this opinion. 1 All involve questions arising from the *200 Mount Laurel doctrine. They demonstrate the need to put some steel into that doctrine. The deficiencies in its application range from uncertainty and inconsistency at the trial level to inflexible review criteria at the appellate level. The waste of judicial energy involved at every level is substantial and is matched only by the often needless expenditure of talent on the part of lawyers and experts. The length and complexity of trials is often outrageous, and the expense of litigation is so high that a real question develops whether the municipality can afford to defend or the plaintiffs can afford to sue.

There is another side to the story. We believe, both through the representations of counsel and from our own research and experience, that the doctrine has done some good, indeed, perhaps substantial good. We have tried to make the doctrine clearer for we believe that most municipal officials will in good faith strive to fulfill their constitutional duty. There are a number of municipalities around the State that have responded to our decisions by amending their zoning ordinances to provide realistic opportunities for the construction of low and moderate *201 income housing. 2 Further, many other municipalities have at least recognized their obligation to provide such opportunities in their ordinances and master plans. Finally, state and county government agencies have responded by preparing regional housing plans that help both the courts and municipalities themselves carry out the Mount Lam-el mandate. Still, we are far from where we had hoped to be and nowhere near where we should be with regard to the administration of the doctrine in our courts.

These six cases not only afford the opportunity for, but demonstrate the necessity of reexamining the Mount Laurel doctrine. We do so here. The doctrine is right but its administration has been ineffective.

A brief statement of the cases may be helpful at this point. Mount Laurel II results from the remand by this Court of the original Mount Laurel case. The municipality rezoned, purportedly pursuant to our instructions, a plenary trial was held, and the trial court found that the rezoning constituted a bona fide attempt by Mount Laurel to provide a realistic opportunity for the construction of its fair share of the regional lower income housing need. Reading our cases at that time (1978) as requiring no more, the trial court dismissed the complaint of the N.A.A.C.P. and other plaintiffs but granted relief in the form of a builder’s remedy, to a developer-intervenor who had attacked the total prohibition against mobile homes. Plaintiffs’ appeal of the trial court’s ruling sustaining the ordinance in all other respects was directly certified by this Court, as ultimately was defendant’s appeal from the grant of a builder’s remedy allowing construction of mobile homes. We reverse and remand to determine Mount Laurel’s fair share of the regional need and for further proceedings to revise its ordinance; we affirm the grant of the builder’s remedy.

*202 In Caputo v. Township of Chester, two resident landowners of that Morris County township had long sought rezoning of their property to allow residential construction with densities greater than those previously permitted. After much negotiation the municipality rezoned but not to plaintiffs’ satisfaction. Plaintiffs therefore commenced an action challenging the validity of the ordinance, an action that ultimately was based upon our decision in Mount Laurel. The trial court held that the ordinance was invalid but refused to grant a builder’s remedy to the would-be-developer, who appealed. Chester apparently acceded to the court’s ruling, no appeal having been taken. We granted direct certification of the developer's appeal. The only issues before us in that matter are the propriety of the denial of a builder’s remedy and of the invalidation of a five acre minimum lot requirement in a single family zone. We affirm that denial, reverse the ruling as to the minimum lot requirement, and reverse and remand the cause for further proceedings limited to the issue of the satisfaction of Chester’s present indigenous need for lower income housing.

In Glenview Development Co. v. Franklin, again a developer sought both to invalidate the zoning ordinance and to obtain a builder’s remedy. The trial court held that this rural Hunterdon County township was not subject to the Mount Laurel obligation because it was deemed not to be a “developing” community, from which ruling the developer appealed. We certified the matter directly. We affirm the trial court’s ruling but reverse and remand the cause for further proceedings limited to the issue of the satisfaction of Franklin’s present indigenous need for lower income housing.

In Round Valley, Inc. v. Clinton, the usual two-pronged attack by the developer (declaration of invalidity and builder’s remedy) was successful at the trial level, where the court entered a judgment invalidating the ordinance and appointing a master to assure its appropriate revision and to assist in effectuating a builder’s remedy.

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Bluebook (online)
456 A.2d 390, 92 N.J. 158, 1983 N.J. LEXIS 2344, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/southern-burlington-county-naacp-v-township-of-mount-laurel-nj-1983.