Hamilton Council adopts 504-unit affordable housing obligation after consultant reduces state land-capacity estimate

Hamilton Township Council on Monday adopted a binding resolution setting the township’s round 4 affordable housing obligation at 504 units after a consultant and township planners urged removing parcels that the state’s mapping had counted as vacant or developable.

The change reduces Hamilton’s land-capacity factor — one of three inputs the state uses to allocate regional need — and produces the lower municipal obligation. The resolution (No. 25-080) authorizes township staff to submit the binding resolution and related filings required by the new state program within the statutory deadlines.

Consultant Caroline Reiter of T&M Associates told the council her team reviewed the Department of Community Affairs (DCA) parcel mapping and aerial data from the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection and recommended removing parcels that are not actually vacant or developable — including houses of worship, Recreation and Open Space Inventory parcels, narrow lots with streams or other physical constraints, cemeteries and drainage basins.…