New Jersey city uses presence of a stray cat and some litter as rationale to condemn an Apartment complex and Auto repair shop

When Affordable Solutions to the Housing Shortage Are Illegal (Part 8)

One overlooked way that municipalities intentionally make housing unaffordable and in short supply is through so-called urban renewal otherwise known as “revitalization” or “redevelopment” schemes. Unlike the numerous zoning ordinances that make it illegal to build new affordable market rate housing these destroy existing affordable housing and dispossess residents who often have lived there for multiple generations and can scantily afford newer homes even without the government sandbagging them in the condemnation proceedings. This once again became an issue after a small New Jersey city voted to designate four homes and a business as “blighted” based on their distaste for the older structures and its proximity to their existing redevelopment project.

The city of Perth Amboy is using the presence of minimal litter and a feral cat to designate a quadruplex that houses four families and an adjacent auto repair shop as “blighted”, the first step towards condemnation and eventually demolition, under their Local Redevelopment and Housing Law. Like most Neo-urban renewal schemes the city used a “study” to characterize the area around the properties as "substandard, unsafe, unsanitary, dilapidated, or obsolete" (there is a vacant lot adjacent to the quadruplex and a 7-11 across the street) and used other ambiguous and sweeping generalizations such as calling the area “"detrimental to the safety, health, morals, or welfare of the community." The study did not identify any structural deficiencies, dilapidation, or unsafe conditions on the quadruplex or auto repair shop themselves but relied on an aesthetic critique of the buildings and larger area. The properties the city council voted to designate as blighted in April of this year just so happen to sit near a 44-acre redevelopment project.