By Mark Rosman
Staff Writer
FREEHOLD TOWNSHIP – A unanimous Planning Board has declined to grant a use variance to an applicant which sought permission to construct an automobile dealership on Route 9 in Freehold Township.
During the board’s March 16 meeting, attorney Mark Aikins, representing JAT Associates, presented testimony from engineer and planner Jeffrey Carr, who said JAT Associates wanted to build an Infiniti dealership on property at 3413-3415 Route 9 north in a CMX-3 zone.
The property is bordered by the Chadwick Square shopping center to the south, a tire store to the north, homes on Juniper Drive to the east, and across Route 9, by farmland on the west, according to a report read by board Chairman Richard Gatto.
An automobile dealership is not a permitted use in the CMX-3 zone. In order to receive the variance, the representatives of JTA Associates had to convince board members to permit the placement of a business in a location where a business of that type is not allowed by the township’s master plan.
Carr discussed zoning along the Route 9 corridor in Freehold Township and the location of automobile dealerships on the state highway. He sought to make the case that the construction of an automobile dealership in the CMX-3 zone would not impair the intent of the zone, in which medical and professional offices are permitted uses.
Carr said the dealership would preserve neighborhoods and the environment and facilitate the development of the Route 9 corridor.
The board’s planner, Paul Phillips, said the property where JTA Associates wanted to build the Infiniti dealership is not contiguous to a CMX-3A zone, where automobile dealerships are permitted.
Phillips said that during a re-examination of the township’s master plan several years ago, municipal officials studied the Route 9 corridor and decided not to rezone the property targeted by JTA Associates from CMX-3 to CMX-3A.
During public comment, several people said the board should not grant the use variance. Mike Schiff, who owns an adjoining property, said he was concerned about the amount of water runoff an automobile dealership would produce and the impact it could have on his property.
Other members of the public asked the board to grant JTA Associates the variance. They said an automobile dealership would bring jobs to Freehold Township and add to the community’s commercial tax base.
After public comment was closed, Gatto said he did not believe the applicant met the burden of proof that is necessary for a use variance to be granted. He said the applicant did not demonstrate that the business would not be inconsistent with the master plan, nor was he satisfied that the proposed use was inherently beneficial to the township.
Board member Kevin Asadi said he, too, had not heard any special reasons that would convince him to grant the use variance.
The board members unanimously passed a motion to direct the board’s attorney to prepare a resolution rejecting the applicant’s request for the use variance. The resolution will be memorialized at a future meeting of the board.
