Rowan, Glassboro breaking ground on expansion

An ambitious $300 million plan to turn a sleepy Gloucester County borough into a "quintessential college town" enters a new phase this week.

With high-rises taking shape amid the debris of demolished houses, officials will hold a ground-breaking ceremony today to start construction of a boulevard connecting Rowan University and Glassboro.

Borough and university officials say the project will cement town-gown relations in this mostly rural area and be a boon for students and faculty, as well as local residents.

But not everyone is celebrating.

Last week, audiotapes surfaced in which a borough official tries to persuade a resident to sell his home to the developer, SORA Holdings L.L.C.

In the audiotapes, Economic and Community Development director Randi Woerner curses repeatedly while telling a resident the town would use eminent domain and "take every single thing that you own" if he failed to finalize a sale.

Adam Szyfman, owner of a T-shirt printing company, several rental buildings, and a home in Glassboro, released the audiotapes to the media and posted them online at http://fixglassboro.com. He said he taped Woerner on Feb. 8, 2008, during two telephone conversations, a week after he failed to show up at settlement.

Woerner had called to ask him to sign legal papers agreeing to a new settlement date, Szyfman said. He wouldn't sign because he said he needed more money to relocate and he had hired a lawyer to help him.

Woerner told him it was a mistake to hire a lawyer and then told him that if the town seized the property for redevelopment, it would not negotiate a price, according to the tape.

The town lawyer will then say, " 'Here, this is what your house is really worth, here is what we're giving you, see you,' " Woerner says in the tape, adding that it would be far less than the original deal. She also warns the developers will likely "sue you for the money they lost" and for libel.

As Szyfman released the audiotapes, he also announced plans to run for council, saying he wants to attack the lack of transparency in the town.

News releases issued by SORA Holdings earlier this month say eminent domain, the process by which government seizes property to remove blight and to promote the common good, was not used when it acquired about 90 properties. Szyfman says that is when he decided to come forward with the tapes, because he said eminent domain was used as a threat.

Joseph Brigandi, the borough administrator, said Woerner, a borough employee who is paid a salary of about $55,000, had "no authority to negotiate contracts for the borough" and did not handle any other properties in the redevelopment area. He said Woerner and Szyfman were friends, and she was speaking to him unofficially.

Woerner said she could not comment and referred all questions to Brigandi, saying he was the "only one who can give a statement."

Brigandi said that the other property owners, mainly in the area of Main Street, were satisfied with the settlements and that Szyfman was "the only one complaining." Brigandi said Szyfman got $190,000 for his house and $35,000 to relocate.

Szyfman says other business owners are upset, but feel intimidated.

Greg Filipek, who with Tom Fore owns SORA, says they are moving ahead with plans to build off-campus housing for more than 800 students, a Barnes & Noble bookstore with a Starbucks, a Holiday Inn, and as many as 125 retail shops and a few hundred apartments. SORA is a master redeveloper, with offices in Sewell and Towson, Md.

Townhouses for about 500 students, which will be leased by Rowan, are scheduled to be finished by the fall semester.

"We took 26 acres and leveled it and will be rebuilding it," Filipek said. "We're basically rebuilding a downtown and using the strengths in the area, which are the college and the students."

Filipek, who has been on the project six years, said that the acquisitions were all negotiated amicably, but that "eminent domain was never taken off the table." SORA handled the negotiations for the borough, which approved the prices and bought the parcels. Later, as the development proceeds, SORA will buy the parcels from the borough.

So far, SORA has bought about 20 percent of roughly $20 million in acquisitions, Filipek said. SORA has also agreed to pay for the demolition costs, which the town handled, and the interest on the town's loans, all administrative fees, and lost taxes on the properties, Brigandi said.

"It's a public-private partnership," said Brigandi, who is also a county freeholder.

Brigandi said state and federal highway funds were paying for the one-third-mile Rowan Boulevard; Rowan is contributing to marketing; and the town is applying for federal stimulus money to pay for a storm-basin project and for a proposed town library in the downtown.

Until the release of the tapes, the project had gone relatively smoothly. Brigandi said he would not discuss whether Woerner was disciplined because it was a personnel issue. But he said that "hypothetically," the statements found in the tape "wouldn't be tolerated."

Szyfman said he "was friendly" with Woerner, but he did not consider her "a close friend." He said he knew her because he had offered to take photographs for economic-development holiday events for free.

"When I missed the settlement, she came to my store and demanded I go over there, to the closing," Szyfman said. "Later she called me. She was abusive. She wasn't my friend."

In the audiotapes, Woerner tells Szyfman to sign a legal paper agreeing to the original price, but tells him that the developer would actually offer more and that he should trust her.

Szyfman declined to sign and eventually went to settlement last September. He got $25,000 extra for relocation costs.