Court Won't Take Up Township's Fast-Track Appeal of Wolfson Disqualification Motion

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Douglas Wolfson. [/caption] The New Jersey Supreme Court has declined to weigh in on whether a retired judge's rulings on affordable housing obligations should be overturned because of his long-term personal and professional relationship with a developer. The court, in an order signed by Chief Justice Stuart Rabner on Dec. 5, denied a motion for leave to appeal in the case, meaning the court will not consider whether a bid to retroactively disqualify now-retired Middlesex County Superior Court Judge Douglas Wolfson from South Brunswick’s ongoing affordable housing litigation was improperly denied. South Brunswick has pointed to Wolfson's relationship with the developer, as well as what it calls the judge's pro-developer rulings, in efforts to challenge the amount of housing it must provide for low- and moderate-income residents, as required by the state Supreme Court’s series of Mount Laurel affordable-housing rulings. South Brunswick had asked the Supreme Court to bypass the usual appellate process. Jeffrey Surenian, the township's attorney, said the the court's decision to not hear the appeal was a "travesty," but added that the township is prepared to pursue its argument through the normal appellate process. The Cherry Hill-based Fair Share Housing Center, which advocates and litigates matters on behalf of those seeking affordable housing, has been disputing South Brunswick’s claims of an appearance of impropriety on Wolfson's part. The township’s allegations “were not sufficient to lead the judge to recuse,” said the center’s executive director, Kevin Walsh. “They were moving to recuse the judge after he retired.” Wolfson did not return a call seeking comment. South Brunswick sought to have Wolfson’s rulings from July and October 2016 overturned based on his relationship with developer Jack Morris—even though Morris is not seeking to build in South Brunswick, and Wolfson steered clear of Morris-involved cases. “Simply because Judge Wolfson has a relationship with Mr. Morris does not preclude him from being involved in this litigation,” Mercer County Superior Court Judge Douglas Hurd ruled earlier this year, noting that the township did not accuse Wolfson of an actual conflict of interest or challenge the validity of the substance of his rulings. Hurd transferred the matter back to Middlesex County, after which South Brunswick filed the motion for leave to appeal with the Supreme Court. While on the bench, Wolfson handled litigation involving the township, but not Morris’ company, Edgewood Properties, according to documents. And Wolfson recused from cases that came before him involving Edgewood. Nevertheless, Wolfson for years has had personal and professional ties to Edgewood, and South Brunswick claimed Wolfson’s decisions in other affordable housing cases could work in favor of Edgewood. South Brunswick, in its efforts to establish an apparent conflict, had previously seized on the fact that Wolfson took up representation of Edgewood immediately after his Dec. 30, 2016, retirement, and represented the developer before becoming a judge decades ago. The township later relied on financial disclosure documents that Wolfson's wife, U.S. District Judge Freda Wolfson of the District of New Jersey, made to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, which documented vacations Morris provided to the couple. Since retiring, Douglas Wolfson went to work for the Weingarten Law Firm in Parsippany. Morris’ wife, Sheryl Weingarten, heads Weingarten Law Firm. Wolfson has represented Edgewood Properties in litigation involving municipalities other than South Brunswick. Wolfson originally was a trial judge from 1991 until 2002, when he left the bench to become the director of the Division of Law. He rejoined the bench in 2013 and retired about a year ago. As a judge designated to hear affordable-housing cases in recent years, Wolfson authored a number of groundbreaking decisions on towns’ obligations under the Mount Laurel cases, which require local governments to maintain a level of affordable housing and prohibit them from enacting exclusionary zoning laws that would bar construction of such housing. At issue for South Brunswick, a sprawling bedroom community some 40 miles south of New York City, is how many units of affordable housing the township will ultimately be ordered to provide. South Brunswick could be required to provide 1,533 units of affordable housing in upcoming years. South Brunswick claims its obligation should instead be set at a maximum of 927 units.