Monroe Township (Gloucester County), NJ: Historic-Cultural Monuments (2026)

Section 175-110 gives the Planning Board the powers and duties in N.J.A.C. 7:50-6.153(a), including recommending to the governing body which historic resources should be designated. A resource counts as significant under Subsection E(2) when it keeps integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling and association and meets one of four tests: association with significant events, association with significant persons or institutions, architecture (the work of a master, high artistic values, or distinctive characteristics of a type, period or method of construction), or a site likely to yield information about Pinelands history or archaeology.

A certificate is required for two things. The first is construction, encroachment upon, alteration, remodeling, removal, disturbance or demolition of a designated resource, or any action that makes the site inaccessible. The second is development not otherwise exempt under § 175-57C where a significant resource has been identified. Applications carry the information listed in N.J.A.C. 7:50-6.156(b), and both boards apply the standards in N.J.A.C. 7:50-6.156(c).

Every application for major development must include a cultural resource survey, following Appendix B of the Pinelands Commission's Cultural Resource Management Plan dated April 1991. The local approval agency can waive the survey when evidence of cultural activity is insufficient, lacks the potential for importance, or lacks any potential for significance. A certificate issued because of a survey is effective for two years; if neither the Pinelands Commission nor the Township Committee designates the resource in that time, the section's standards stop applying until the Commission designates it. Resources that are not significant but show graphic evidence of cultural activity are documented with a narrative description, photographs, a scaled site plan and a New Jersey state inventory form.

Locally, § 46-4 names the Ireland Hofer House, the Hall Street "Little School" and the Reading Room for protection, and the Historical Society recommends in writing to the Planning Board whether a site meets the criteria. Section 175-23 tells the Planning Board to discourage development that detracts from, encroaches upon, damages or destroys historic and archaeological resources.