It's been more than 50 years since the state Supreme Court decreed that using municipal zoning to keep out low-income people was unconstitutional.
That began what is now known as Mount Laurel housing or the Mount Laurel mandate. Out of this also came something called the "builder's remedy," which allows construction of market-rate homes as long as a percentage of them meet affordable income standards.

Nothing about the last half-century has been neat and clean. Many towns oppose such housing for myriad reasons. It hurts the town's character. It overcrowds the school system. It eliminates much cherished open space.

Mikie Sherrill is now trying to deal with the problem.

She set the bar high, talking in her campaign about building thousands of affordable homes in a state where average homes sell for half a million dollars.

And on Wednesday, she trumpeted two steps that she said will increase the building of affordable homes throughout the state.

The governor said applications for a second cohort of municipalities participating in the New Jersey Housing Opportunities for Municipal Equity and Success (NJ HOMES) initiative will close on July 1. Thirty municipalities will be selected to receive technical assistance and planning support to advance strategies that increase housing production.

Sherrill also announced that the New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency (NJHMFA) successfully raised nearly $35 million through its Affordable Housing Tax Credit auction, generating critical new resources to finance affordable and workforce housing developments throughout the state.

If that sounds too much like bureaucratic gobbledygook, the administration's goal is to help towns solve their own housing needs, as opposed to a heavy mandate from Trenton.

That means decisions on what to build - townhouse, garden apartments, single family homes - will rest with local leaders.

The first cohort of towns taking part in the NJHOMES program involved 10 municipalities representing a geographic and sociological cross section of the state.

They were, moving roughly from north to south, Palisades Park, Montclair, East Orange, Mendham,  Far Hills, East Amwell, Evesham, Stafford Township, Fairfield (Cumberland County) and Salem City.

More towns have been invited to sign up.

As explained by officials, localities will take the lead but state resources will lend a hand.

“We simply cannot afford 10-year studies while housing becomes more and more unaffordable,” Sherrill said.

As fate would have it, the governor's event came the same day that President Trump was supposed to sign a federal housing bill that passed with bipartisan support.

But the president never did that, giving Sherrill an opportunity to fault Trump for never doing anything to help average people.

National politics aside, if the Sherrill Administration can make real progress on building more affordable homes after 50 years, it will be quite the achievement.