EATONTOWN - Jennifer Bernell stood patiently at a microphone on Wednesday night, waiting for an opportunity to speak, while borough officials and residents bickered about issues ranging from transparency in government to how to properly knock on doors.

When the dust finally settled and she was given the green light to speak, Bernell - the director of development for the Kushner Companies - calmly and politely dropped a $500 million bombshell that stunned the standing room only crowd at the borough council meeting.

"I just spoke with the Kushner family and we had felt over the past nine months that we were making great headway in terms of working with the municipality in improving (Monmouth Mall) and devoting incredible resources. Given the response tonight, we realize that these changes are not welcome and we are planning to leave the mall as is. So thank you very much," she said, referring to opposition to the company's plans to spend $500 million to turn the popular shopping mall into a sprawling mix of retail and residential spaces.

A standing room only crowd packed the Memorial Middle School in Eatontown on April 27, 2016 to hear the Borough Council vote on an ordinance that would have allowed for the Kushner Companies planned $500 million makeover of Monmouth Mall. (Rob Spahr | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com)

Bernell and the rest of the Kushner representatives then promptly walked out of the building, as many of the opponents to the project applauded while some members of the governing body slumped in their chairs or put their hands in their heads.

Mayor Dennis Connelly attributed Kushner's decision to abandon the project to misinformation spread by certain groups of residents who opposed to the project, thus costing the borough a valuable opportunity.

The mayor and council members worked to avoid such a situation by posting information about the project on the borough's website, sending out a newsletter, replying in writing to questions from the public, discussing the project at public meetings and even walking around town knocking doors to explain the actual details of the project in person.

"It's a sad day," Connelly said. "This property is not part of 'small town' Eatontown, it's the biggest business, our largest ratable. It was a project that should have been moved forward. This was a bad message for our town to send."

Kushner Companies, which bought out its partner in the Monmouth Mall for $38 million in 2015, announced in February that it planned create a mixture of open-air and enclosed retail shopping, dining and an outdoor space for entertainment - such as concert series - as well as one- and two-bedroom apartment rental units, an outdoor plaza, green spaces and a streetscape on the mall's existing property.

"We want to build a community. The introduction of residential and pedestrian friendly activity really fosters that sense of community. We also want to incorporate 'live, shop and play' elements and make sure they're highly integrated with indoor and outdoor activities" Robert B. Berry Jr., vice president of the Washington, D.C.-based architectural firm CallisonRTKL, said of the project in February. "All of that together will reinvent the visitor experience, not making it just a repolished mall, but a repurposed mall - a repurposed town center that becomes a 24/7 activated space."

Prior to the public comment on an ordinance that, if approved, would have rezoned the mall property to allow for the redevelopment to incorporate its residential component, Connelly said he was going to recommend that the Borough Council actually vote down the ordinance so the developer and borough officials could come up with a plan that was little less intense.

However, he made it clear that it was important for Eatontown to have the project move forward. Doing so would help boost the borough's declining ratables, he said, as well as give the mall a opportunity to thrive during an era of changing consumer practices and to help the borough satisfy its affordable housing obligations.

"Every day we read about large stores closing and companies going bankrupt. ... Malls as we know them are dying. The biggest draw at our mall is the movie theater over any retail store. We need our mall to survive, this town relies on it," Connelly said. "The plan before us will do this. The Town Center mixed use will create jobs, will not burden our schools. This plan will make a positive tax ratable for many years. Our roads can handle it and it doesn't cut down one tree, it actually adds green space."

But Connelly said the plan as proposed under the ordinance still needed to be tweaked to address the concerns of nearby residents.

"I can honestly say to the residents tonight: I hear you. I want our professionals to get the project to be scaled down. Not change it totally, but let's increase the buffers to our single-family homes, decrease the height of the mixed-used buildings, eliminate or scale down the hotel, eliminate the roof-top golf, improve the language to put controls on the games of amusement," he said. "After doing this, I hope that more of you will accept this plan."

A short time later, after several residents bashed the project and the governing body, the Kushner representatives were walking out the door.

Connelly said he plans to call the Kushners to personally apologize for what happened during the public meeting and ask them to reconsider.

He said Eatontown has had a bad reputation in the past of being a difficult place to develop, which he said the borough has been trying to work itself out of in recent years.

"We have projects in litigation all over this town, commercial properties that need to be cleaned up and our property taxes keep going up. So I was proud of the council to have to guts to put this forward and work with (the developer) as a unit from day one," he said. "Again, this was a bad message to be sent... for all of Eatontown."

Rob Spahr may be reached at rspahr@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @TheRobSpahr. Find NJ.com on Facebook.