With Election Day one week away, the fight over development along County Line Road is taking center stage in the Jackson mayoral race, with Mayor Jennifer Kuhn and her Republican running mates vowing to continue battling two proposed affordable housing developments whose developers have taken the township to court.
According to the Kuhn campaign, the two projects would bring a combined 738 housing units to the County Line Road corridor along the Lakewood border:
- The larger proposal, on property adjacent to the Lakewood Golf & Country Club – about 40% of which lies within Jackson – would bring approximately 450 units in the area of Brewers Bridge Road, Clearstream Road and County Line Road.
- The second project would bring approximately 288 units across from the Four Seasons at South Knolls community, near Hampshire Hills.
The campaign also released the overall site plan for the proposed Lakewood Country Club development:
Kuhn said no to both projects, and the developers are now suing the township, according to the campaign, which credits the mayor with fighting and preventing nearly 1,000 units on County Line Road. Council candidates Brian McCarron and John Pejoski, running with Kuhn on the Republican ticket, say they are committed to supporting that fight if elected Tuesday, November 3.
The campaign is framing the election as a referendum on the projects, claiming that a vote for Kuhn will stop the developments, while the rival “Fight for Jackson” ticket is looking to put all of the affordable housing on County Line Road. “A thousand units on County Line Road. You have a choice this November,” the campaign said. “Vote to protect County Line Road by voting for Kuhn, McCarron and Pejoski.”
The proposals are the latest flashpoint in Jackson’s years-long battle over high-density development and state affordable housing mandates. The Township Council voted in December 2024 to close an over-development loophole in the Highway Commercial Mixed-Use zone – a move a developer threatened to sue over, and which a Superior Court judge later upheld. Kuhn, who identified the zoning gap while serving as council president, was voted in as mayor last October.
The council has also unanimously opposed state legislation that would allow high-density housing on religious and nonprofit-owned properties, and Jackson was among the municipalities that took the state to court over its affordable housing mandates.
Jackson’s mayoral and council races are among those on the November 3 ballot – see TLS’s full ballot guide here.
The following video was released by the Kuhn campaign:
Yes! Keep Jackson beautiful. Don’t let overdevelopment happen in Jackson, as it did in Lakewood! Now we know what overdevelopment looks like. Lakewood was once beautiful also. Yes, there can be some growth. But not to this degree and it has to planned also.
Elliot Shem Tov has no plan. All hot air. He will destroy Jackson
Why is this different from Brookwood that was built there about 50 years ago? Jackson is four times the land area of Lakewood, yet currently has less than half the population!
But granted, developments should be made smartly – with very good walking capabilities; sidewalks, crosswalks – in both housing areas and stores etc. They are done this way, more or less, in Lakewood, with a drop room for improvements in some, maybe just due to lack of experience originally. Some needed traffic lights to be added to their “entrances” which was and continues to be done as necessary.
One thing I like about Westgate development in Lakewood, for example (about half a square mile) is that even though it is quite dense, there are many trees and bushes – including flowering ones – throughout.
Maybe an exit and entrance ramp onto County Line – instead of a light – would help.