The developer behind a plan to build 124 apartments at the former Paterson YWCA site has dropped the proposal following months of fierce pushback from neighbors who packed City Hall to fight it. The scrapped plan marks a win for 4th Ward residents who had warned the project would overwhelm an already strained stretch of Carroll Street.
According to the Bergen Record, the developer scrapped the plan to build the apartments at the old YWCA property amid strong community opposition. The Carroll Street property has sat underutilized for about a decade, according to News 12 New Jersey, and the most recent plan called for multiple apartment buildings totaling 124 new units.
A Meeting That Never Happened
Tensions boiled over on Aug. 19, when more than 100 residents jammed City Hall to oppose the proposal, forcing officials to cancel that night's Planning Board meeting, per northjersey.com. City Hall security staff called for police backup to handle the angry crowd of protesters that evening, according to the Bergen Record. Planning Board chairperson Janice Northrup said the cancellation was necessary because people in the audience were shouting so loudly that it was impossible to conduct the meeting, the outlet reported.
Residents who showed up that night said their objections went beyond the specific site. Concerns centered on overdevelopment, limited parking, traffic and the city's aging infrastructure, the same report notes. Some in attendance floated an entirely different use for the property, suggesting it could instead host programs teaching skills such as sewing, braiding and basic home repairs.
Mayor Pushed for a Smaller Project
Mayor Andre Sayegh had already urged the developer to scale back the plan before it collapsed entirely, per the same account. The Planning Board's next meeting had been scheduled for Oct. 26 after the August session fell apart, though the application's path through that process remains part of the broader record of a proposal that ultimately never made it to a vote.
Paterson officials have pointed to progress elsewhere in the city's housing stock, touting a reduction in vacant and abandoned properties of 92% since 2018, from more than 2,000 down to fewer than 200, according to News 12 New Jersey. That backdrop has shaped how City Hall frames redevelopment fights like the one over the old YWCA, even as this particular site remains without a settled future.
Part of a Wider Pattern in North Jersey
The Paterson standoff is not an isolated case. In West Orange, a planning board deadlocked 4-4 on a developer's bid to build 496 apartments on a wooded hillside, effectively blocking that project, as reported by NJ.com. In nearby Wayne, a zoning board's unanimous rejection of a 285-unit project, which included 57 units set aside for low-income residents, led the developer to sue and seek a builder's remedy for 610 units, according to Cleary Giacobbe Alfieri Jacobs Lagana LLC. Not every contested proposal ends in defeat, though: Newark's Planning Board approved a 150-unit project in University Heights that had been rejected twice before, per TAPinto.
For now, the former YWCA building sits as it has for roughly a decade, its next chapter undecided after the developer's retreat from the 124-unit plan that drew so many residents to City Hall in the first place.
