Planning Board — February 9, 2026

What happened

This was a 30-minute meeting. Chair Dave Campeas opened at 7:00 p.m. and the Board adjourned at 7:30, with a full roster present including both alternates.

The Board took one formal action, and it had nothing to do with Kenvue: a resolution in Case PB-03-23 (Harlingen Associates, LLC, Block 6001 Lot 33.01 on Route 206) extending preliminary and final major subdivision site plan approval to January 8, 2027, memorialized on a nine-aye roll call with no nays. The January 12, 2026 minutes were approved nine to nothing.

The substance of the night was an information session, not a public hearing. Township Administrator and Planning Director Lori Savron, with Assistant Planning Director Cheryl Chrusz, Township Planner Isabel Rodriguez and Township Attorney Wendy Rubinstein Quiroga, presented the draft 2026 amendment to the Fourth Round Housing Plan Element and Fair Share Plan ahead of the hearing. No vote was taken on the amendment.

The presentation confirmed that the E. Kahn site at 199 Grandview Road (formerly Kenvue, formerly Johnson & Johnson), 23 Orchard Road and Thrive Assisted Living were all being removed from the plan adopted in June 2025. In their place, the township would extend affordability controls — generally 30-year deed restrictions under the state’s Uniform Housing Affordability Controls — on existing units: 35 for-sale units at McKinley Commons, 19 at Montgomery Glen, 60 senior rentals at McKinley Court (58 creditable under the state cap on age-restricted units, 75 with bonuses), and, newly added, 96 rental units at Pike Run with 48 bonus credits, for 144. The Fourth Round obligation is 260 credits; when the amended plan was adopted on March 9, 2026, the township’s planner put the total at 275 — 210 preserved units plus 65 bonus credits, clearing the obligation by 15.

Staff laid out a schedule that did not survive the weather: draft posted February 13, Township Committee introduction of the implementing ordinance February 19, Planning Board hearing and adoption February 23, Township Committee endorsement and ordinance adoption March 5. The February 23 hearing was cancelled by a blizzard; adoption came on March 9, 2026 instead.

Why it matters

This is the meeting where the township showed its work on the swap that took the Kenvue site out of the housing plan — the change residents had spent the previous summer asking for. Two points from the presentation are worth holding onto. First, a Master Plan element is policy; it does not rezone anything, and zoning changes are a separate Township Committee process with its own hearing. Second, removing the site from the housing plan does not settle what gets built there. Staff described the property as available for reuse or redevelopment under current zoning through an ordinary site plan or subdivision application — or, if the owner wants something the zoning does not permit, through a use variance at the Zoning Board.

Staff also noted that in October 2025 the Township Committee had directed this same Planning Board to investigate whether 23 Orchard Road qualifies as a non-condemnation redevelopment area, with the study due back around March 2026. That is the same statutory mechanism the Committee would turn on the Kenvue site itself in September 2026.

Worth watching

• The information session begins (2:07) — Master Plan basics; policy, not zoning.
• What changes, and how credits work (10:04) — the 260-credit obligation and the 25% bonus cap.
• The credit math, site by site (15:03) — McKinley Court and Pike Run.
• The schedule (18:20) — the dates, including the hearing that was later cancelled.
• Public participation opens (21:05) — Jennifer Winell’s question.
• The GDP lawsuit explained (21:40) — why the Board declined to hear a General Development Plan.

Public comment

Three residents spoke.

Jennifer Winell asked what the contingency plan is if the pending E. Kahn litigation ends with the court permitting housing on the site. Township Attorney Wendy Rubinstein Quiroga’s answer was short: if circumstances change, the township amends the Housing Plan again.

Chip Crider asked for a plain explanation of the newest lawsuit. Counsel said the township had not been served, but understood the objection to be that the Planning Board would not let the owner present a General Development Plan. Montgomery has no ordinance authorizing GDP review and no standards to review one against, and such an ordinance is not mandatory — so, on counsel’s advice, the Board declined. The owner remains free to file a site plan application, or to bring an informal concept plan for general feedback. Developers often prefer a GDP, counsel added, because it requires less documentation and, where a town has the ordinance, can shield a project from later zoning changes for years. Crider called the dispute unnecessary confrontation, and possibly a miscommunication; the Board’s position was that it was a technical legal limit, not a choice.

Carolyn Hoeschele reported holes being dug all over the E. Kahn property — most around the lake, one or two north of Grandview Road. A board member suggested the northern ones might be septic testing; she said she did not know why. The Board noted that a landowner may dig on their own land, and referred her to the township engineering department.

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Sources: the meeting video on the township’s archive; Planning Board minutes, February 9, 2026; the township’s slide deck. Names and roll calls come from the approved minutes.