Monmouth land transfer process moving along - Army News | News from Afghanistan & Iraq - Army Times

Monmouth land transfer process moving along

The authority charged with redeveloping the former Fort Monmouth, N.J., property hopes to have all the necessary agreements allowing it to acquire the land in place by the end of March.

Once those agreements are ratified, the more than 1,100 acres in Oceanport, Eatontown and Tinton Falls can begin to be transferred to that agency, the Fort Monmouth Economic Redevelopment Authority.

There are two agreements that have to be signed by the Army and FMERA, a memorandum of agreement and an economic development conveyance. The memorandum must be signed before the EDC can be approved, according to authority officials.

FMERA approved the MOA at its Dec. 21 meeting. The agreement is being reviewed by the Army’s general counsel, FMERA executive director Bruce Steadman said.

“It’s a lengthy, iterative process,” he said. “In most communities, this process of developing an MOA and developing EDC documents takes a couple of years. We’ve been fortunate to have a great working relationship with the Army. At an air base I was at, it took six years to get this MOA done.”

Steadman said the Army is as anxious to turn over the property as FMERA is to receive it.

“They see this 1,110 acres as one of the jewels in their control and ownership, so they want to try to push this out into the marketplace as soon as possible,” Steadman said. “Eleven hundred acres in New Jersey is a lot more valuable than, say, 5,000 acres in Kansas.”

The memorandum outlines the main points of the EDC, outlines how and when the property would be turned over to FMERA and sets both parties’ responsibilities, according to a Dec. 21 presentation.

The EDC is the document FMERA will use to formally request transfer of title for the various properties.

The memorandum anticipates a two-phase property turnover, with eight Phase 1 parcels transferred by Feb. 1, 2013. Those parcels include the golf course, the Howard Commons residential area, the Oceanport Avenue marina, the former hospital property and several parcels of land in Tinton Falls and Eatontown. The remainder of the property would be transferred to FMERA at a future date, according to the presentation.

FMERA estimates that over a 20-year period, sales and leases of the fort property would bring in about $138 million. That money would be split, on average, evenly between the Army and the authority.

FMERA is bound by law to reinvest its share of the proceeds into the redevelopment project for seven years following the last transfer of property, Steadman said. There are 12 areas in which that investment must go, including road construction, transportation management facilities, utility construction and building rehabilitation, said Erin Gold, an authority spokeswoman.

Steadman said FMERA’s goal is to create enough income to help the three hosting towns offset additional expenses once the land is annexed.

The Army’s share of the proceeds must go to the U.S. Treasury.

None of the property can be transferred to FMERA until the Army produces a “Finding of Suitability for Transfer,” which is basically a document saying there are no environmental issues with the property. All proposed FOSTs will be reviewed by the state Department of Environmental Protection, Steadman said.

The DEP has already asked for additional information regarding two lime pits on the property of the former Myers Center and on the location of various underground storage tanks, Steadman said.

There are also “eight or nine” landfills that will need to be closed, Steadman said. That property will not be able to be redeveloped for decades, which means they will probably be used for green space, he said.

The 445,000-plus-square-foot Myers Center may be demolished, Steadman said, because the authority may not be able to find a purchaser for it.

“Sooner or later we’ll have to come to grips with tearing buildings down and starting from scratch,” he said. “The Myers Center is the No. 1 site on the property that could have some very high potential for redevelopment if it’s torn down sooner, rather than later.”

One building that may be saved from the wrecking ball is the former health clinic, which was constructed in the late 1950s as Paterson Army Hospital. Steadman said a potential purchaser is interested in renovating the building for a medical use.

The property’s redevelopment plan also calls for 20 percent of all housing built on the property to be affordable, Steadman said. The authority’s initial affordable housing plan was rejected by a state Appeals Court panel in 2010 but has since been modified and accepted.

The plan, by federal law, also has to take into account Monmouth County’s homeless population, said Rick Harrison, the authority’s director of facilities planning.

FMERA is planning to work with four main entities to provide assistance for the area’s homeless, Harrison said. Monmouth County’s emergency homeless shelter continues to operate on the fort property, and will do so, he said.

FMERA will provide financial assistance — with money generated through sales and leases — to one group for the construction of a safe house for victims of domestic violence off the fort property, Harrison said. Another group will use a counseling center next to the former chapel on the main post for a day center for homeless people enrolled in a program that gives them a place to stay overnights, Harrison said.

A 16-bedroom housing facility on the former fort property, as well as 20 single-family homes, will be administered by an affordable housing group, he said. These units will be classified as permanent supportive housing, which means the occupants are under no time restrictions, he said.

Harrison said FMERA is also talking to a Massachusetts-based group that provides housing for homeless veterans.

None of the homeless or affordable housing plans will go into effect until after the MOA and EDC agreements are finalized, Steadman said.