P&Z’s Resubdivision Rejection

Challenged In Court

By Andrew Gorosko

A local couple has filed a court appeal challenging the Planning and Zoning Commission’s (P&Z) recent rejection of their application to resubdivide one residential building lot into two building lots.

The land in question lies in the Meadow Acres residential subdivision on Jo-Mar Drive in Sandy Hook, adjacent to the westbound lanes of Interstate 84.

Developers Kathryn S. and Robert Mathison of Riverside Road filed the appeal against the P&Z in Danbury Superior Court on June 25. The Mathisons are represented by attorney Robert Hall.

Through the lawsuit, the Mathisons seek to have a judge order the P&Z to approve the proposed  two-lot resubdivision, which the P&Z rejected on June 3. The land, known as Lot 6, is at 11 Jo-Mar Drive.

The Mathisons own 3.5 acres on Jo-Mar Drive situated in an R-1 Residential zone. The dead-end Jo-Mar Drive extends off the south side of Riverside Road. Jo-Mar Drive is a “loop road” that intersects with Riverside Road in only one place.

In the legal papers, the Mathisons maintain that Meadow Acres initially was approved as a 45-lot residential subdivision by the P&Z in 1963, and that Jo-Mar Drive was approved as a town road in 1968.

On March 4, the Mathisons applied to the P&Z to resubdivide Lot 6 in Meadow Acres into two building lots, each of which would conform with the subdivision regulations and the zoning regulations, according to the court papers. The plaintiffs hold that the only reason specified by the P&Z for its June 3 resubdivision rejection was that creating two building lots from one building lot would violate the provisions of the land use rules, which limit the number of lots on a dead-end street to 15 lots.

The Mathisons maintain that the 15-lot limit does not apply to their property because the original P&Z subdivision approval for Meadow Acres allowed Jo-Mar Drive to serve as the sole vehicle access for 35 of the 45 overall lots in Meadow Acres.

In rejecting the two-lot resubdivision application, the P&Z acted illegally, arbitrarily, and in abuse of the discretion vested in it, according to the Mathison lawsuit.

On June 3, P&Z members voted 4-to-0 to reject the Mathison resubdivision application. In their decision, P&Z members determined that the 15-lot limit on dead-end streets applies to the Meadow Acres subdivision, opting against increasing the number of building lots on the street.

The P&Z  has a July 20 court return date in the appeal filed by the Mathisons.