It will be known as The Great Hopewell Give-away.
With the Affordable Housing settlement having been approved in court, approximately 3,000 new homes are coming to Hopewell Township. Approximately 95 percent are slated for the southern tier with over 2,000 new homes coming to both sides of Scotch Road.
It took Hopewell Township 200 years to become home to approximately 6,000 residences. In the next 8 years, the number of township residences will increase by 50 percent, to 9,000 residences.
Massive development requires massive services paid for by massive tax increases, but don’t blame the coming 653 affordable housing units. Blame the failed negotiating ability of our township committee.
Scotch Road landowner C. F. Hopewell, LLC, sometimes called Sansone Pacific, sometimes called Fortress Investment Group, was said to have made a tidy profit when they bought the Merrill Lynch properties from Bank of America and sold off pieces to current owners. Now, they can make another tidy profit when their currently-zoned office space on both the east side and west side of Scotch Road is rezoned for commercial and residential uses.
80 percent of those residences will be market-rate with only 20 percent designated for affordable housing.
The public has asked repeatedly that, by satisfying C. F. Hopewell/Sansone Pacific/Fortress Investment Group’s insatiable corporate greed, there should be linkage to a substantial benefit for the township. 80 percent for them and 20 percent for us does not fit the bill.
That’s why the affordable housing settlement will and should be known as The Great Hopewell Give-away. Hello 3,000 new residences, good-bye Hopewell Township as we know it.
—Harvey Lester, Titusville
