Click on image to the right to see the TapInto article convering the Phillipsburg Land Use Board meeting. TapInto does not put their articles behind a paywall and does significant coverage of local Phillipsburg news.
TapInto Phillipsburg reports on the Land Use Board meeitng. The Land Use Board voted to have the town engineer, Tim O'Brien, prepare a Consistency Report for the August 22, 2024 Land Use Board meeting. On August 22, 2024, the Land Use Board will make a determination as to whether changing the Peron Howard Street property to Industrial, and opening the way for a warehouse to be built on that property, is consisten with the town's Master Plan. The will also make a determination as to whether the town should modify the Riverfront Redevelopment Plan to allow Industrial in District 5 (aka the Peron Howard Street Property).
Many people spoke about the harm a warehouse will cause to the nearby residential communities and how the rezoning from Riverside Residential to Industrial does not fit the Master Plan. The folks against the warehouse asked the Land Use Board members to vote that the rezoning change does not fit the Master Plan.
You can read more about why we do not believe the rezoning of the Peron Howard Street property goes against the Master Plan in our web article "Rezoning Peron Howard Street Property To Industrial Violates Town Master Plan".
Click on the image to the right to see the article in Lehigh Valley Live:
A shoutout for Robin Coe-Donaldson and the Phillipsburg Downtown Associatin for taking a stand against the warehouse in downtown Phillipsburg, miles away from a major highway, and next to the Delaware River.
A few things to note:
- If a donation is made to the New Jersey Highlands Coalition, you can write "PEW" in the memo field of the check. If PEW is written in the memo field of the check, the money will be allocated to the Phillipsburg Environmental Watch group. All monies in the PEW account are dedicated towards paying legal expenses used towards the fight to stop a warehouse from being built on the Peron Howard Street property.
- As of the time of this post, we have no idea of which site plan Peron Construction intends to build. The Town Council was specifically asked which Concept Plan they were using when they passed the Ordinance 2024-14 for the first reading, and Council could not provide any specifics as to which Concept Plan they were using as the foudation for Ordinance 2024-14. Council could not say how many trucks were going to be using the warehouse. Council was just voting to rezone the property from Rivrside Residential to Industrial. Regardless of what the warehouse ordinance says, once it is passed any size warehouse that receives land use board site plan approval can be built, and there is no requirement for rail that can be enforsed through the ordinance.
Click on the image to the right to see the WFMZ artical regarding the 328,000 square foot warehouse.
Peron Consruction does an initial presentation of a 328,000 square foot warehouse to the Philllipsburg Town Council.
Peron Construction, 100% owned by developer Michael Perrucci, received approval for their fourth warehouse site plan for the Peron Howard Street Property. This iteration of site plan approval is for a 328,000 square foot warehouse. This site plan has approval for 200 trucks per day and rail was mentioned.
Note, the article indicates that this is the third site plan approved, but there was an ordinance for a 510,000 square foot warehouse passed in May 2021. The May 2021 ordinance is currently subject to litigation. Hence, the 328,000 square foot site plan is the fourth site plan for the Peron Howard Street property.
A note to keep in mind. If the Peron Howard Street Property zoning is changed from Riverside Residential to Industrial, Peron Construction is not constrained to build the 328,000 square foot warehouse that it obtained approval for in the January 25, 2024 Land Use Board Meeting. We believe a primary reason for the approval of this site plan is to try to sway folks to support changing the Peron Howard Street property from Riverside Residential to Industrial, and for the town to avoid losing the lawsuit Docket Number WRN-L-000248-21.
We believe the rail is a fiction that is being presented to try to convince some residents and businesses to support the wrehouse. Even though there is rail by the property, there are several issues, in our opinion, that would make the rail prohibitive.
- The curret rail is not able to handle freight
- The cost to bring the current rail up to condition to handle freight would be prohibitive
- Michael Perrucci has promised a rail connection to the property since his original purchase of the property to build residences on the property in the mis 2000s (around 2005, need to look up actual date of his meeting with Council). No rail has ever come about.
- As mentioned, this is the fourth site plan approved for Peron Construction. Various site plans have been done because the State would not let Peron Construction build the warehouse on open space land encumbered by the State of New Jersey, modifications in the site plan were made to try to win votes by promising a rail connection, and a site plan was made because a previous site plan would not have worked.
Click on the image to the right to see the TapInto Phillipsburg article regarding the approval of the 328,000 square foot warehouse site plan at the January 25, 2024 Phillipsburg Land Use Board meeting. A shoutout to TapInto Phillipsburg for their coverage of Phillipsburg events and also for not having a paywall blocking residents from seeing information about their town.
Peron Construction, 100% owned by developer Michael Perrucci, received approval for their fourth warehouse site plan for the Peron Howard Street Property. This iteration of site plan approval is for a 328,000 square foot warehouse. This site plan has approval for 200 trucks per day and rail was mentioned.
A note to keep in mind. If the Peron Howard Street Property zoning is changed from Riverside Residential to Industrial, Peron Construction is not constrained to build the 328,000 square foot warehouse that it obtained approval for in the January 25, 2024 Land Use Board Meeting. We believe a primary reason for the approval of this site plan is to try to sway folks to support changing the Peron Howard Street property from Riverside Residential to Industrial.
March 4, 2021 - Councilman Frank McVey makes 'vicious and sexist' attack on an environmentalist in his comments regarding the rezoning
Click on the image to the right to see the article in Lehigh Valley Live regarding this issue:
Counciman Frank McVey, in what appeared to be an attempt to intimidate enviromentalist Theresa Bender-Chapman, made comments of a “vicious and sexual nature” and “misogynistic and unacceptable offense.”
This was a continuation of aggressive and unusual behaviour that seemed to be occuring, which started with the January 2021 meeting where Councilmen Robert Fulper and Frank McVey appeared to be acting as proxies for Peron Corporation.