Residents said they did not want additional development in the county and called for more teeth to enforce the Plan and preserve farmland and open space. Many said they feared development would make traffic worse. Many protested NJ DOT plans to widen Route 31 -- a two-lane north-south road -- through the mostly rural county. They said the widening and the development it would spur would be antithetical to the State Plan.

While fears about the loss of local land use control had dominated preliminary discussions when the Plan was first formed, most participants embraced it at Thursday's meeting, and called for better enforcement of its provisions.

Another prominent theme was the complaint that Council on Affordable Housing rules were often used as a "builders remedy" to permit construction of 4 to 5 times more housing than the Plan would allow. On the other hand, farmers blamed the State Plan for devaluing their land and said the resulting loss of equity made getting bank loans for new equipment difficult.