The law was broken but then there is the reality of what’s happening to Lakewood and surrounding localities.
This isn’t Alabama and the local yokels didn’t decide to “keep them Jews out”.
What’s going on down there with the Hassidic community is literally out of control and other Jews living there oppose it just as much.
Not to say this was legal. It wasn’t.
Jackson Township is ran by idiots
The idiots decided to create a law where dorms were prohibited in all zones in Jackson Township
They could have made this law better, but they went the stupid way
They allowed others to bypass the law without even needing a variance, a variance is where you ask the township zoning board to consider allowing you to do something to your property that is otherwise against the zoning laws. Or an activity.
Jackson Township has a history of enforcing the code against Jewish individuals but ignoring violations by non Jewish individuals
This includes, an email from a town council member to code enforcement regarding Jewish residents meeting at each others homes on Friday nights to pray. He wanted them arrested/cited for zoning violations since their private homes were not legal for religious services. However people of other religions were never called out for their at home prayers.
Jackson Township even went after a polish grandmother because she was given a commercial sewing machine from her previous employer, set it up in her garage and was mending/making articles of clothing for the girl scouts and local mothers. Some of the people she helped were Jewish and local busy bodies happened to see Jewish people going to her house, they blew her into code enforcement. Her home was located next to a busy large gas station and across from a 20+ store shopping center on a 4 lane road with a traffic light. She certainly wasn’t disrupting the “peaceful and tranquility” of the neighborhood. Code Enforcement required she get a variance, since her property was zoned residential, she went to the variance board and was denied. She eventually moved back to Poland.
The Mayor made a comment that if the proposed synagogue was a christian church, it would have had zero opposition from him and the board.