Rich Constable

Richard E. Constable III is an American lawyer who was the 16th Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs, serving from 2012 to 2015. A former Assistant US Attorney, he was also the Deputy Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development. Rich Constable currently serves as MSG Entertainment’s chief strategist overseeing legislative, community, and social impact initiatives.

Early life and education Constable was raised in East Orange, New Jersey, and graduated from Seton Hall Preparatory School. He attended the University of Michigan, where he was awarded a Harry S. Truman Scholarship,

Commissioner of NJ Department of Community Affairs On November 21, 2011, Governor Chris Christie announced that he chose Constable to join his cabinet as Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA), and replace incumbent Commissioner Lori Grifa. Christie stated that Constable was "someone who has worked with me for years and whom I have turned to many times for his leadership skills, integrity and friendship." When Constable stepped down in March 2015, he was succeeded by Charles Richman.

Council on Affordable Housing As DCA Commissioner, Constable was the chair of the NJ Council on Affordable Housing (COAH). COAH met April 30, 2014, and voted 5–1 to adopt proposed new guidelines that govern municipal and contractor obligations to provide affordable housing in the state as mandated by the New Jersey Supreme Court in a January 2014 ruling. The proposed rules called for roughly 110,000 affordable housing units to be added across the state between 2014 and 2024.

Hurricane Sandy On Monday, October 29, 2012, Hurricane Sandy caused unprecedented damage to New Jersey's housing, business, infrastructure, health, social service and environmental sectors. "It would have been fiscally irresponsible for the state to take the higher bidder," said Constable. The $68 million contract was originally meant to run from 2013 to 2016, but in December 2013 was revised to end in January 2014. Initially, the RREM program had problems, leading to complaints from some applicants and Democratic lawmakers. Constable cited HGI's "performance problems" and noted several months of "corrective action" by DCA. and $15 million was subject to an arbitration dispute. The DCA subsequently retained ICF International to perform work previously assigned to HGI. At a New Jersey Assembly Budget Committee hearings, in April 2014, Constable said "the good news is that we're at a place now where the concerns that were widely publicized don't exist anymore."