UPDATE: Judge sides with Asbury, meaning homeless shelter to close
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 10/25/07
BY NANCY SHIELDS
COASTAL MONMOUTH BUREAU
FREEHOLD State Superior Court Judge Lawrence Lawson today upheld
Asbury Park's administrative directive last week for the Jersey Shore
Rescue Mission to close after city zoners voted unanimously to deny
the variances the 40-bed homeless
shelter needed to stay open.
City Manager Terence Reidy said the city will work with the mission's
resident director, Garry Williams, to have it closed Friday. The
mission, an expansion of the Market Street Mission in Morristown, had
been waiting for the judge's opinion and had been refusing new
referrals from social agencies. Six men were there Wednesday night.
The Zoning Board of Adjustment made its decision a week ago Tuesday,
at which time Brendan Judge, the mission's attorney, said they would
appeal the zoners' ruling. An appeal cannot be made until after the
zoning board memorializes and
then publishes its decision at a meeting in November.
When the city manager ordered the facility to close in seven days,
the mission sought relief from Lawson, seeking to continue operating
the shelter and other activities at its site on Memorial Drive. But
the judge upheld the city manager's
action.
"The victory for Asbury Park is that an appeal could go on for years
and all that time the city would be affected by the impact of the
mission during that time,'' Reidy said. "We'll see what the mission
does on appeal.''
City zoners had held hearings on the mission's application three
times since 2005 after first denying it, then approving it following
an appeal, and finally denying it again after a group of residents,
Stand Up For Asbury, filed a new appeal last year to close the
operation.
Zoning board members last week cited many reasons for their denial,
but the overwhelming reasons were that it could bring several hundred
homeless men from outside of the city who would be given up to 10
nights of shelter but would be
placed on city streets during the day without sufficient programs in
place to help them.
The zoners said Asbury Park is helping its own small homeless
population but cannot be the regional center for the poor and
homeless.
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