Middletown Sued By Developer Over Circus Liquors/Rt. 35 Property (2024)

Real Estate

A new lawsuit was filed Aug. 17 over a long-battled-over Middletown piece of land:

Posted Wed, Aug 23, 2023 at 4:55 pm ET|Updated Thu, Aug 24, 2023 at 2:13 pm ET

The developer is AAMHMT Property, LLC, based in Wall Township. They are in contract to purchase the 51-acre plot of land where Circus liquor store (the "evil clown" sign) is located on Rt. 35 between Kings Highway and Kanes Lane.

The address is 761-653 Rt. 35. Other than the liquor store, the 51-acre lot is predominantly woods. The longtime owners of that property are the Azzolina family/Mountain Hill.

That property is part of Middletown's Circus Liquors Redevelopment Plan. For several years now, Middletown said it would allow commercial shops and housing to be built there. In fact, this is the same property where Village 35/The Shoppes at Middletown was proposed to be built a few years ago, which would have had a Wegman's, a movie theater, a 24-Hour Fitness and shops with pedestrian walkways.

However, in the summer of 2020 (the middle of the pandemic) the developer pulled out and entirely killed The Shoppes at Middletown after they said they were not able to secure financing. Read that story: Wegmans Pulls Out, Village 35 No Longer Coming To Middletown (Sept. 2020)

Toll Brothers owns an adjoining parcel of land and is currently building townhouses there. It will be called Middletown Walk.

Now this August, the landowner says Middletown is not providing for enough affordable housing units at 761-653 Rt. 35.

According to AAMHMT Property, there is no affordable housing set-aside requirement for the land they own. The developer wants Middletown to rezone the property for what it calls "high-density inclusionary development," which means affordable housing.

This all goes back to this decision Middletown made in 2019 to withdraw from affordable housing mandates from the state. That year, Superior Court Judge Jamie Perri (who has since retired) granted Middletown's unusual request to withdraw from New Jersey's affordable housing obligations.

At the time, Middletown administrator Anthony Mercantante said: "We've built hundreds and hundreds of affordable housing units. In fact, other towns in New Jersey should catch up to Middletown. Yet Fair Share wants us to build over a thousand more units. We have virtually no land left. If you took all the affordable housing they want the state to build, there wouldn't even be enough people to live in it all. It's ridiculous."

Mercantante pointed to affordable housing in new developments such as Regency Park, Wedgewood and Cottage Gate on Hwy. 36, plus the Village at Chapel Hill on Hwy. 35 and Harmony Glen off Harmony Road and senior affordable housing at Bayshore Village in Port Monmouth and Conifer Village on Hwy. 36.

"Whatever we do never seems to be enough," said Mayor Tony Perry at the time.

By withdrawing from the affordable housing mandate, Middletown left itself open to what's known as "exclusionary zoning" or "builder's remedy" lawsuits from developers.

"There is a risk we'll get sued. But we'll take those on a case-by-case basis," Mercantante told Patch in 2019. "But if we didn't withdraw, we'd have to go ahead and rezone multiple properties around town for affordable housing."

Many developers use New Jersey's affordable housing requirements as a chance to force towns to increase building density.

In fact, AAMHMT Property even quoted those very comments Mercantante and Perry made to Patch in their lawsuit:

"A July 31, 2019 article on Patch.com quotes Middletown Township Administrator Anthony P. Mercantante as saying, 'We basically think the process is unfair.' As such, we have no reason to believe that (Middletown) intends to work with us to address the Township’s affordable housing shortfall," said the developer. "The Township, Township Committee and the Planning Board have failed to create sufficient realistic opportunities for the construction of safe, decent housing affordable to low-and moderate-income households and their fair share of the region’s need for such housing."

"And thereby are in violation of the New Jersey Constitution."

Middletown Withdraws From NJ's Affordable Housing Mandate (July 2019)