August 25, 2025, Planning Board Special Meeting Transcript - WEHI

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 89 has a free hand. The developer is constrained by an enormous range of rules, regulations and public policy requirements, some of which are specific in the MLUL. Now, just because an ordinance may have lifted most or even all of the ordinary environmental requirements in the township for developers, does not mean the board does not have a duty to analyze the risk of environmental harm and whether it's necessary to avoid it. The MLUL specifically requires that analysis. And if a town council should remove it, my view, foolishly, all of those requirements in the MLUL stands to as the required source of guidance and the board still must conduct the environmental analysis. And so when we have a land preservation professional, who has spent her career determining whether land is suited and necessary for preservation because of its qualities, that relates directly to the policy mandate the board must adhere to under the MLUL. Which is to look at a site plan application for avoidance of ecological harm or major ecological harm. So when a land professional says this is land that has certain preservation value that normally would be sought in the profession for protection, that informs the board of the value of the land in terms of the need to avoid environmental and ecological harm and so it is directly within the purview