Green Jersey

Trump’s tax payment

Donald Trump paid more than $260,000 yesterday as a show of good faith — the money covered EnCap-related back taxes — and to prevent the sale of tax liens on four North Arlington properties, according to the Star-Ledger and Bergen Record. He apparently paid with funds from his “personal account.”

The North Arlington land is subject of a court fight between the borough and Cherokee Investment Partners. (Cherokee, EnCap’s parent company, accused North Arlington of reneging on an agreement to allow construction of 1,600-plus homes there.)

To learn more about Cherokee, which has had wide-ranging success buying brownfields, then cleaning and flipping them, click here. The private equity firm successfully cleaned sites in New Jersey in Elizabeth and Bayonne, and has been pursuing projects in Asbury Park (dirty land becomes residential and shopping Mecca) and Pennsauken (dirty land becomes residential, shopping and golf Mecca). But in the wake of Inspector General Mary Jane Cooper’s damning report, the firm recently quit the Pennsauken project, according to the Courier-Post. It is said to be reevaluating all its redevelopment projects across the country.

While the Asbury Park project is mentioned on the firm’s website, its plan for the Meadowlands (not surprisingly!) isn’t.