Zoning Board Rejects Request to Build Apartments at Boxwood Hall Site

The Haddonfield zoning board on Monday unanimously rejected a request for a use variance to build a 2.5-story, 33-unit apartment building on the historic Boxwood Hall site at 65 Haddon Ave.

The two-and-a-half hour meeting featured an hour of questions from the seven-member board and alternate members, 45 minutes of public comment and nearly another hour of members explaining why they opposed the request.

The property contains a home built in 1799 by John Estaugh Hopkins, a member of one of Haddonfield’s founding families. The builder planned to maintain the historic building, convert an existing cottage to a duplex and build the apartments on the remainder of the 1.4-acre site.

The zoning board had previously rejected the variance request last year, which would allow apartment usage on the property that had been used as a residence and most recently, a business office, over the last 200 years.

An attorney for the developer had the decision reversed in Superior Court in Camden in June because the complex includes seven low- to moderate-income, price-restricted units. The inclusion of the affordable housing created a different standard for the board to consider. The developer’s attorney had called the board’s denial “arbitrary, capricious and unreasonable.”

Haddonfield has an affordable housing plan approved by the state Council on Affordable Housing. The plan calls for 192 units, 155 of which have yet to be built.  The borough has current plans to build 89, which leaves a shortfall of 66 units. Therefore, the Superior Court ruled the zoning board would have to weigh the benefits of the project against the costs by employing a legal standard known as the Sica test to determine if the project is "inherently beneficial."

Even with the new criteria, the board shot down the use variance Monday night.

“Boxwood Hall is a monument to the history of Haddonfield,” said board member Robert Grady, echoing the sentiment of the board. “I remain convinced this applicant failed to meet the need for this variance.”

Richard Hluchan, the attorney for the developer, Estaugh Commons, and its principal partner Bill Burris, said he plans to appeal the ruling again to Superior Court.

“We satisfied the criteria and it should be approved,” he said.

Sentiments for historic preservation drew the sharpest comments from the audience of less than two dozen scattered around the 150-seat auditorium in Municipal Hall, while board members also cited traffic, congestion and the building’s proximity to the Haddonfield Friend’s School for the denial.

“It is a place for contemplation of our collective heritage,” said Pete Hart, of Pitman, who grew up in Haddonfield near Boxwood Hall and claims lineage to the borough’s founding families. “Lose your history and lose part of your identity.”