Council backs mobile home park purchase

BY SUE MORGAN
Staff Writer

EATONTOWN - None of the residents now living at a local mobile home park will be uprooted if an area nonprofit organization buys the land it occupies.

In asking for the borough government to support its pending contract purchase of the 133-unit facility known as Pine Tree Mobile Village, the Monmouth Housing Alliance has pledged that current residents will not have to leave their homes against their will, according to Eatontown Mayor Gerald J. Tarantolo.

In fact, if the deal between the nonprofit alliance and its current private ownership goes through, the alliance intends to maintain the property as a mobile home park with affordable, rent-stabilized units housing the present occupants, Tarantolo said at the Borough Council's June 21 meeting.

"We've been assured by the Monmouth Housing Alliance that no one will be displaced," Tarantolo told a handful of Pine Tree residents who asked questions about the pending contract sale during the meeting's public portion.

Just minutes before, the council had unanimously approved a resolution endorsing the alliance's planned purchase of the property located south of the Monmouth Mall at 232 Route 35 south.

The council resolution effectively fulfills the governing body's promise made on June 7 to Donna Rose, the alliance's CEO, to back the organization's planned acquisition.

The one-page resolution was drawn up by the council's special counsel rather than Borough Attorney Gene Anthony, who recused himself because he is representing the alliance in the transaction.

Through the resolution approved last week, the council endorses the alliance's forthcoming application for funding from the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA).

Those DCA funds, if received, would then be applied toward the purchase of the property, Rose has said.

The alliance is also expected to tap into other federal, state, county and local funding sources besides the state DCA.

The property, which is now for sale, is owned by the estate of the late Joe Scialfa of Ocean Township, Tarantolo said. Scialfa died earlier this year.

The deceased owner was the father of singer/guitarist Patti Scialfa, wife of rock star Bruce Springsteen, who resides locally in Rumson and Colts Neck.

Rose would not disclose the purchase price for the mobile park.

If the contract purchase, which Rose has said is still in its preliminary stages, goes through, the Eatontown-based alliance would then seek to have the 133 mobile homes certified as affordable housing by the state Council on Affordable Housing (COAH).

If that certification comes through, the borough could then incur the 133 units as additional credits toward its state-mandated affordable housing obligation, Rose has said.

The Pine Tree mobile homes would be added to the existing affordable housing inventory and would help bring Eatontown into compliance with the upcoming third round of its COAH obligation, Tarantolo has said.

"The discussion we've had [with the alliance] is that they are looking to create affordable housing units out of Pine Tree," Tarantolo told the mobile park residents in attendance.

Eligibility for affordable, COAH-certified housing is based "on income, not assets," such as vehicles or savings accounts, the mayor explained.

"If you meet certain income criteria, then you're eligible for affordable housing," Tarantolo said.

Many Pine Tree residents would meet the state's COAH requirements, Rose has said.

If the alliance buys the property, the land and the units would be deed-restricted for use only as a mobile home park, according to Rose. Deed restricting will, in turn, make the mobile units rent-stabilized.

While negotiating the sale, the alliance is looking at individual leases for each unit, the amount of rent each resident pays for the trailer pad, and the park's facilities itself.

The alliance sought out the property when it came on the market in order to protect Pine Tree's occupants from being displaced if the site were sold to a developer or anyone who did not want the land to continue as a mobile home park, Rose has said.

Outside of Eatontown, the alliance is working to preserve other mobile parks in the county as affordable housing, Rose said in a recent interview.

Recently, owners of mobile homes at Paradise Park off Route 36 in Highlands partnered with the alliance as part of an ongoing effort to purchase the 4-acre tract those units sit on.

The mobile home owners there are trying to purchase that land, now owned by a private owner, to ensure that they can remain in place, Rose said.