Objector WeCare Response dated May 4 2026 to Letter of Bryan D Plocker Esq

By this statement, the applicant makes two things clear: (i) that the applicant does not plan to submit anything further to the Board; and (ii) that the applicant expects the Board to dispose of this application without the consideration of the weighty concerns expressed by Board members in their request for responses to their seven questions. Objectors agree that the Board should dispose of this application expeditiously, but we believe that the disposition should be to deny it for incompleteness and a failure to meet legal requirements, as well as the extensive evidence of environmental and community harm, as our experts have discussed. Even though the Board bent over backward to give the applicant an extra opportunity to fill in the gaps in its application and respond to the Board’s specifically enumerated public health, safety and welfare concerns, the applicant failed to avail itself of that generous opportunity. Mr. Plocker’s letter takes nine pages essentially to reiterate the point his client has been making throughout the extended Planning Board hearings—that by adopting IH-1, the inclusionary housing ordinance relating to this development, the Township limited the Planning Board’s jurisdiction to one matter—whether the application comported with the ordinance. Not only is such an argument improper under the Municipal Land Use Law that imposes certain positive obligations on the Board that cannot be overridden by the governing body, but such an approach would effectively neuter the Board and prevent it from considering whether this application would violate the public health, safety and general welfare of its West Orange neighbors and of surrounding municipalities, a primary task of any planning board. This lengthy hearing process has been notable in many ways, but perhaps one more than others — literally hundreds of statements from members of the public, most of the area municipalities and their environmental commissions, the West Orange Environmental Commission, the Essex County Board of County Commissioners and Environmental Commission, and the Lenape Nation have been presented at the Board hearings, along with letters and formal resolutions to this Planning Board — and literally not a single person, group or governmental body supported the development application. All neighboring municipalities and their public officials have unanimously opposed

Planning Board — and literally not a single person, group or governmental body supported the development application. All neighboring municipalities and their public officials have unanimously opposed the application and offered many substantive reasons for why it should be denied. Such unanimity of opposition is almost unheard of — in any contested case someone supports the applicant, but, here, there is literally none, an absence that should speak volumes. We address the applicant’s response to the Board’s recent requests below: 2