Lakewood Township's Planning Board tonight voted to formally endorse the proposed banquet hall ordinance, with several conditions.
As introduced by the Township Committee, the ordinance would have permitted catering facilities and banquet halls as accessory uses in school buildings in all zones where schools are permitted, provided the following parking requirements are met:
Where the section of the school utilized for catering and banquet functions is 800 square feet to 1,999 square feet, 0.75 parking spaces shall be required for every 100 square feet of area utilized for catering and banquet uses, and if the section of the school utilized for catering and banquet functions is 2,000 square feet of greater, then 1.0 parking spaces shall be required for every 100 square feet.
The New Jersey Municipal Land Use Law requires the Township Committee to forward all proposed land use ordinances to the Planning Board and to grant them 35 days to review the Ordinance before the Committee can adopt the Ordinance on final reading.
The relevant portion of the law (NJSA 40:55D-62(a) states:
The governing body may adopt or amend a zoning ordinance relating to the nature and extent of the uses of land and of buildings and structures thereon. Such ordinance shall be adopted after the planning board has adopted the land use plan element and the housing plan element of a master plan, and all of the provisions of such zoning ordinance or any amendment or revision thereto shall either be substantially consistent with the land use plan element and the housing plan element of the master plan or designed to effectuate such plan elements; provided that the governing body may adopt a zoning ordinance or amendment or revision thereto which in whole or part is inconsistent with or not designed to effectuate the land use plan element and the housing plan element, but only by affirmative vote of a majority of the full authorized membership of the governing body, with the reasons of the governing body for so acting set forth in a resolution and recorded in its minutes when adopting such a zoning ordinance...
The zoning ordinance shall be drawn with reasonable consideration to the character of each district and its peculiar suitability for particular uses and to encourage the most appropriate use of land...
In essence, the Planning Board's task is to review the land use plan element and the housing plan element of the Township's most recent Master Plan and to report back to the Committee whether or not the Ordinance as introduced is consistent with the Master Plan.
As previously reported here on FAA News, Attorney Rob Shea and Engineer Gordon Gemma representing an industrial park business owner presented a comprehensive expert review which made the argument that the proposed ordinance is not consistent with the Master Plan.
However, the Planning Board did not bother to dwell very much whether or not the proposed ordinance is or is not consistent with the Master Plan.
Instead, the Board voted to recommend adoption of the Ordinance but with the following changes:
• Banquet halls will not be permitted in residential zones
• The Board wants all parking to be on-site only with no need for cars to park on-street. As such the Board concluded that 1 parking space per 45 sq feet of "the section of the school utilized for catering and banquet functions" will be sufficient. This floor space count will include the gross floor area of the section of the school utilized for catering and banquet functions, including the kitchen and all secondary simcha rooms (such as chuppah's etc).
• The Board discussed whether or not this requirement should include the existing school parking or if it will be in addition to the existing school parking.
The Board concluded that the "higher parking count" will rule, meaning that as long as the school is not used at night, and they do not park their buses in the parking lot overnight, they can count the existing school parking for the banquet hall parking requirement.
If the school parking lot is used at night then they would need to provide additional, separate parking for the banquet hall.
The Board also discussed requiring every banquet hall to hire traffic guards to maintain order that the parking does not spill onto the roads, however, this condition was not included in the final vote.
The Board also discussed grandfathering in legalization for banquet halls in schools which are already built. However, Board Chairman Moshe Neiman noted "it's not our privy to grandfather in already built banquet halls".
Board members discussed that back in April 2021, when the Township Committee proposed to amend the Cedabridge Corporate Campus zone to permit banquet halls to be included in hotels at 8 parking spaces per 1,000 sq feet, the Planning Board was much stricter and recommended to amend the proposal to permit banquet halls but only at 1 parking space per 1 person of the banquet hall capacity, and only if/when Pine Street is dualized. The Committee acquiesced to requiring 1 parking space per 1 person of the banquet hall capacity, but eliminated the requirement to wait until if/when Pine Street is dualized.
Board members opined that perhaps they should enact the same stringent parking requirement here now. Board Attorney John Jackson immediately pulled them back, saying "such a parking requirement is 'unusual'".
[Fun fact: At the time that the Township Committee adopted the strict 1 parking space per 1 person of the banquet hall capacity for banquet halls in hotels in the Cedarbridge zone, Mayor Ray Coles stated that he "would like to" enact this strict parking requirement for banquet halls all over town. It is therefore puzzling as to why the Township Committee now introduced this ordinance at much less parking.]
The Planning Board's recommendations will now head to the Township Committee who are scheduled to hold a public hearing and final vote on the proposed ordinance at their upcoming meeting next Thursday, 5:30pm.
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5 comments:
According to their Zoning Board application, Lake Terrace contains 21,058 sq feet of "banquet hall area" including the secondary rooms:
Main ballroom 11,849
Chuppah 4,080
Kitchen/ storage 3,200
Chosson suite 600
Kalla suite 1,100
Yichud room 229
This does not include:
coat room 950
Main lobby area 3,917
At 1:45 parking, that would require 468 parking spaces
Board Attorney John Jackson was extremely out of line.
It's not his job to tell the Board that a 1:1 parking requirement is "unusual".
His job is strictly legal, not planning.
It's amazing that the Board did not dwell very much on whether or not the proposed ordinance is consistent with the Master Plan.
That is their entire Statutorily required job, not to give random recommendations to the Committee.
Was it a unanimous vote? Was there no one advocating for the average Yankel?
It was 4-1.
There was no one working too hard for the "average Yankel".
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