

By JEFF KAPLOWITZ

GUEST COLUMNIST

As a lifelong resident of Jersey City and a commercial real estate broker for 27 years, I would like to offer a different perspective on Mr. Malone's Jan. 27 editorial in The Jersey Journal.

From 1994 to 2002, I was a commissioner on the city Planning Board. During that time we voted on many redevelopment plans and development applications and revisited the master plan and zoning ordinances. The city planning staff, in my opinion, is by far the best and most dedicated in New Jersey. Most redevelopment plans and applications are vetted through many meetings with developers and stakeholders with the goal of following the master plan not just for today, but into the future. It is true that there has never been 100 percent agreement, but the process is open.

Journal Square started its growth as a transportation center in 1912 and grew to be Jersey City's business, entertainment and governmental center in the 1920s and maintained its position of power and glory into the 1960s. Since then it has declined, and today the surrounding area consists of commuter parking lots and 99-cent, discount liquor, fast food and phone stores. Every mayor over the past 40 years has tried to rejuvenate the Square, without success.

Over the last decade, I have participated in many planning and public community meetings where the goal was to redevelop the area. The process has been long, but what has finally emerged, in my opinion, is not only good for Journal Square but for Jersey City.

BUILDERS FOLLOW MASS TRANSIT

The market trend today and for the foreseeable future is that people want to live in cities again. One of the reasons for this is that all amenities are within walking distance. But how do you create that in an area that is old and mostly built out from the 19th and 20th centuries? Most urban planners will say that you build where your highest density of residential and commercial development is within a quarter-mile of a mass transit hub because people can maximize public transit, and as you go further out you have progressively lower density development, which creates the appropriate scale for residents and pedestrians.

In Jersey City we have one of the best mass transit systems with PATH, bus, ferry and light rail, and that is where the city has planned its most aggressive development, along those hubs. In Journal Square, the core of the highest density is around the PATH terminal, with all the surrounding areas limited to development between two to 10 stories.

TAX ABATEMENT POLICIES

As a member of Mayor Fulop's real estate transition committee, we looked at and made recommendations for tax abatement policies. The new policies are directed to areas that need incentives to grow, such as Journal Square, Bergen/Lafayette and Greenville, and were drastically reduced Downtown where the market is now sustainable without incentives.

As a commercial real estate broker, it has been difficult over the years to convince investors and developers to look at Journal Square because it just did not make economic sense.

The question is why should government give tax incentives? The answer is that incentives to developers will give them a profitable project on which they will spend more of their own money to build, creating temporary jobs for construction workers who will spend their money with local businesses, which in turn creates local jobs. In the long run, people who live and work in these new buildings will spend their money in the surrounding neighborhood. This creates opportunities for small businesses to open and thereby creates new permanent jobs. This is called the economic multiplier effect, where for every dollar invested a multiple amount is generated in the local economy.

FUNDING HOUSING

In the past our local government has required money for affordable housing, but instead of creating the housing Downtown where the incentives were given, they were put into the Bergen/Lafayette and Greenville sections of Jersey City. It created unbalanced neighborhoods with no amenities, no jobs, low performing schools and no opportunities. This policy has led to a sense of hopelessness and a high level of drug and gang crime activity. It will take the attention and resources of the Fulop administration, with the help of the stakeholders from these neighborhoods, to make a positive change.

The Fulop administration has taken the first step by changing the tax abatement policy to create a more balanced approach to affordable housing. If you get a tax incentive, you must pay for or create affordable housing in the ward where you will develop.

The function of local government is to deliver services to its residents, to create safe, successful and sustainable neighborhoods. Government must pay for these services, and the only way to raise the money is through real estate development, which will attract new businesses and new residents. There is no reason why longtime residents should feel that they will be displaced if a balance can be achieved. I believe that Mayor Fulop's approach to development is the right choice for Jersey City.