Can you force people to change a voluntary homeowners association into a mandatory one?

Your question raises two different legal issues: (1) Can your voluntary association be turned into a mandatory membership association which could require payment of a share fo the costs of maintaining the access road? (2) Can the owners paying their share of the dues require the non-paying owners to pay their fair share? (1) You cannot subject property to a covenant requiring a mandatory membership association without the consent of the owner of the property. Thus, you can only make those owners who are willing to do so subject their property to a mandatory membership association. (2) Although I do not practice in New Jersey, the common law rule in many states is that adjoining owners who share a right-of-way are all obligated to pay a pro rata share of the costs of maintaining the right-of-way. Thus, you might check with a New Jersey lawyer to see if the non-paying owners might be forced to pay their share. If so, they might be more amenable to establishing a mandatory membership association to make it easier to collect from all owners--as well as obtain the other benefits of such a community association.