Residents of Villas on the Park in Berkeley Heights showed up at Tuesday's township council meeting rattled by a question nobody could answer: what happens to their homes now that the complex's affordable housing contract has ended. One tenant said she learned the contract had expired by reading a news article, and residents want to know whether it can be renewed and what they can do to help.
Tenants Describe Leaks, Mold and Silence From the State
Tawanda Morales spoke on behalf of several residents who attended the meeting, describing deplorable living conditions including leaks, mold and rotten wood that she said have gone unrepaired while residents wait for a state inspection that was supposed to examine their living conditions. According to TAPinto Berkeley Heights, the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs missed that scheduled inspection and has not set a new date, though the agency said it would notify residents once one is scheduled.
Morales said residents were getting no answers despite thanking township officials for their efforts, and she described the state as an agency that does not rush to get things done. She told the council that residents feared they might not have somewhere to live in the coming months if the property shifted to market-rate housing, adding that many would not be able to afford market-rate rents if that happened. Morales said she had already emailed Gov. Mikie Sherrill, the DCA, the mayor and others seeking intervention.
Township Says Its Hands Are Tied Without More Information
Mayor Angie Devanney called the matter complicated and reassured residents that township officials were with them, while noting that county government cannot intervene because the issue falls under state jurisdiction, according to township officials. Devanney said she plans to involve state Senate President Nick Scutari and other state officials to push for more attention to the stalled inspection.
The township has retained a special affordable housing planner and a special affordable housing attorney, but Devanney said those two need to confer before the council can obtain more information. She said the council was expected to hold an executive session on the issue Tuesday, with a special session also expected before the council's next regular meeting on December 1. Township officials reported that the construction official had visited the complex at least once or twice.
A resident identified as Jessica told the council she learned the contract had ended through a news article, and she pressed officials on whether the contract could be renewed and how residents could help push the process forward. Township Administrator Liza Viana said the state inspection needed to occur as soon as possible, and she said she plans to forward residents' correspondence with the DCA to the township's contact in the governor's office to request intervention. Berkeley Heights had asked the state agency to schedule the inspection for Tuesday, according to the report.
A Similar Fight Over Expiring Affordability Is Playing Out in Jersey City
Berkeley Heights isn't the only New Jersey community wrestling with an affordability deadline. In Jersey City, tenants in Newport's towers have been pushing the state and city to help them stay in 271 moderate-income apartments as their leases approach expiration at year's end, according to Hudson County View. Those tenants raised the issue at an October 6 meeting of the Jersey City Rent Protection Special Investigation Committee after the units' 30-year tax abatement had expired and the regulated affordability program had recently ended.
The Newport Tenant Association has pointed to NJHMFA rules and records it says show affordability protections there actually last until 2028 and 2029, a claim the outlet characterizes as the tenant association's position. Property owner LeFrak has said the Jersey City Council rejected two separate efforts to extend affordability protections, in 2019 and again in 2025, and that it will continue offering eligible residents below-market rent adjustments of 3.5% for the year after their current leases expire. The Newport situation involves a different property and a different set of facts than Villas on the Park, but it illustrates how expiring affordability terms have become a flashpoint across the state.
New Jersey's Department of Community Affairs maintains a searchable database of hotel, motel and multiple-dwelling inspection records that is supposed to include ownership information, unit counts, inspection outcomes, violation data and inspection fees, according to the agency's Housing Inspection Database. Separately, the DCA's Division of Codes and Standards has published guidance stating that multiple-dwelling units are subject to periodic inspection, while buildings with just one or two units fall outside the jurisdiction of the state's Bureau of Housing Inspection. Neither resource confirms what, if anything, state inspectors have found at Villas on the Park, leaving residents to wait for answers the township says it still doesn't have.
