C-Town approved for downtown Matawan

BY TOM CAIAZZA
Staff Writer

CHRIS KELLY staff A C-Town grocery store will soon occupy the former Harris Hardware and Foodtown location on 126 Main St. MATAWAN - The downtown will soon have an "anchor" store.

The Unified Planning and Zoning Board of Adjustment met in special session on June 19 to approve the site plan and parking variances for a C-Town supermarket to occupy the vacant 126 Main St. storefront that previously housed Foodtown and Harris Hardware.

In a 7-2 vote, the board approved a variance for fewer parking spaces than are required for the 11,000-plus-square-foot building dubbed Main Street Market. The application was tabled last month because a discrepancy existed as to whether or not mixed-use variances granted more than a year ago were still valid, even though the business that originally intended to move into the site never did.

Councilman William Malley, a proponent of the C-Town, said he thought having the store there will bring more shoppers to the downtown and help the rest of the shops already there.

"I think the Planning Board made the right decision," Malley said. "Matawan needs a medium-size supermarket in the downtown."

Malley said concerns expressed by some that C-Town caters to lower-income areas are unfounded.

"They do their homework and check demographics," Malley said.

He said that C-Town is a business that caters to the people in the location where they are doing business. He said that they have stores in lower-income areas as well as middle- to upper-income areas, and cater their business accordingly.

The White Plains, N.Y.-based supermarket chain has 200 locations in five states including New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Republican Borough Council candidate Tom Fitzsimmons was one of the two board members who voted against the application, and said he did so because the parking capability proposed by the applicant was significantly less than what is allowed by Matawan's zoning laws.

Fitzsimmons said that the zoning requirement for the site is 74 parking spaces. The applicant only proposed 32 spaces, two of which Fitzsimmons said were of a questionable size to even be considered spaces.

Fitzsimmons said that he was the only board member who asked about the parking issue, which he said was telling of the true purpose of the meeting.

"Basically the meeting was a two-hour cheerleading section for 'having something in the downtown,'" Fitzsimmons said.

Fitzsimmons said the meeting was politically motivated, citing his Democratic opponent Joseph Mullaney's role in bringing C-Town to Matawan.

Mullaney, a business owner in the borough, said that from the beginning of the process, he knew that C-Town was "the right mix for Matawan."

"It will prove to be the best thing that has happened to downtown Matawan in I don't know how many years," Mullaney said. "It's phenomenal; it will certainly start the revitalization of downtown Matawan."

Mullaney is giving the people of Matawan his guarantee.

"The people of Matawan will be pleased," Mullaney said. "Not should be - will be."