Bernards Township Planning Board pauses Fellowship Village parking review, seeks one more theater-event/sample dates

At its Oct. 21, 2025 meeting, the Bernards Township Planning Board continued review of Fellowship Village Inc.s annual parking report and asked the applicant to provide specific underlying weekday-count dates and either a second theater-event count or evidence of an equivalent event by Dec. 1, 2025 so the board can confirm compliance with a 2016 parking-management condition.

The item was presented by Jennifer Phillips Smith, counsel for Fellowship Village, who said the applicant submitted reports dated May 3, 2024 and June 25, 2025 that include counts going back to 2021. "At the end of the day, the two reports that we've submitted have shown that at any given time, more than 40% of the spaces on the site are vacant," Smith said, summarizing FellowshipVillage's position that the campus has ample parking.

The board heard technical testimony from Mark Aguilar, executive director of Fellowship Village, and Gary Dean, a licensed traffic engineer with Dolan and Dean who performed independent spot checks. Aguilar described staff-conducted hand counts performed about three to four times per week at roughly 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., logged in Excel and averaged by month. Dean said his firm performed independent daytime and evening counts (including a May 17, 2025 Saturday evening performance) and concluded the campus campuswide inventory left "200 spaces available all the time minimum" during a full-theater event.

Dean also summarized measured vacancy rates: "During the weekday we had a vacancy rate of about 40 to 47%. For our full-capacity theater event on Saturday, May 17th, we had 57.8% vacancy," he testified.

Board staff and the board's engineering reviewer (UTRS, per a Sept. 10, 2025 memo) accepted that overall campus supply appears adequate but said the submitted materials did not fully meet the parking-management program incorporated into the 2016 approval. Specifically, the program requires on-site counts from a minimum of four weekdays during late morning and early afternoon and counts for at least two theater events to ascertain peak demand from outside groups; the UTRS memo said the report provided only one theater-event measurement and did not explicitly show the dates of the required weekday observations. The memo also flagged a discrepancy between a reported inventory of 559 spaces and the approved plans listing 614 spaces and recommended future reports include a complete as-built inventory and explanations for any layout changes.

Board members asked Fellowship Village to supply the underlying daily-count logs identifying which days were used for the four-weekday sample and to provide either a second theater-event count or attendance data sufficient to estimate peak parking for a second event. Counsel for the applicant said the underlying logs exist and agreed to provide them; applicants also agreed to supply an additional theater-event count if they do not already have one that meets the resolution's specification.

The board voted to continue the matter to allow review of the supplemental records. The board directed staff to docket the additional materials so engineers and members can examine the underlying data at the board's next review; the board noted the applicant was to submit the clarified report and any additional event counts by Dec. 1, 2025 for review in the January 2026 cycle. The board's next regular meeting was scheduled for Dec. 2, 2025.

What this means: Fellowship Village's multi-year counting effort and an independent consultant both found substantial unused parking across the campus, but the planning board is asking for documentary proof that the counts comply precisely with the 2016 parking-management program (four weekday samples and two theater-event samples) before it will close the matter.