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Smart Growth
Pinelands Comprehensive Management Plan (CMP)
About forty percent of Camden County is within the New Jersey Pinelands
Area. The 1.1 million acre-Pinelands region, a United Nations recognized
ecological resource, is the largest body of open space on the Mid-Atlantic
seaboard between Richmond and Boston and sits atop aquifers containing
17 trillion gallons of some of the purest water in the nation. All
this, right in our own backyard.
In 1979, the State and Federal government established the country's
first National Reserve to preserve, protect and enhance the natural
and cultural resources of this special place. The Pinelands Comprehensive
Management Plan (CMP) contains development and conservation policies
for the reserve, protecting it in a manner that maintains its unique
ecology while permitting compatible development. Growth management
policies for land outside the Pinelands Area are in the State
Development & Redevelopment Plan.
The CMP prescribes a series of maximum development intensities and
minimum environmental performance standards for a number of management
areas in the reserve. These management areas, which range from preservation
areas where almost no development is permitted to regional growth
areas where development is encouraged through public water and sewer
service areas and transfer of development rights programs, or PDCs.
The CMP also establishes a Pinelands Commission, which ensures that
future development plans and all public and private development
and conservation activities are in conformance with the CMP.
Under the Pinelands Protection Act, the Pinelands Commission has
the power to review proposed development and to disapprove projects
and applications that fail to meet CMP. Municipalities with land
use plans and ordinances in conformance with the Plan may approve
local development applications; however, the Commission retains
a moderate degree of oversight. Camden County's Board of Chosen
Freeholders and all five Pinelands municipalities (Berlin Borough,
Berlin Township, Chesilhurst, Waterford and Winslow) have endorsed
the Pinelands Comprehensive Management Plan. There plans and ordinances
have been and remain certified by the Pinelands Commission.
To learn more about the Pinelands Comprehensive Management Plan
and the New Jersey Pinelands Commission, go to:
http://www.nj.gov/pinelands/index.shtml
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