Date: Fri 18-Jun-1999

Publication: Bee

Author: ANDYG

Quick Words:

Daniels-Estates-Parmalee

Full Text:

Developer Sues P&Z Over Subdivision Proposal

BY ANDREW GOROSKO

A Trumbull development firm is suing the Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z)

in a move to gain court approval for its proposed 13-lot residential

subdivision off Parmalee Hill Road which the P&Z rejected in May.

In a lawsuit filed June 10 in Danbury Superior Court, Daniels Hill

Development, LLC, sues the P&Z in an effort to have a judge overturn the P&Z's

May 20 rejection of the Daniels Hill Estates subdivision proposal.

Attorney S.W.G. Denlinger represents the developers. The town has a July 13

court answer date in the lawsuit.

In light of Parmalee Hill Road area residents' concerns that the presence of a

new subdivision would generate additional local traffic and worsen hazardous

traffic conditions on Parmalee Hill Road, P&Z members rejected the proposed

subdivision.

At a March public hearing, Parmalee Hill Road area residents warned P&Z

members that the proposed subdivision would pose added safety hazards on that

steep, narrow, winding street.

The development has been proposed for 40 acres on the west side of Parmalee

Hill Road, just north of the Housatonic Railroad train tracks.

Twelve of the proposed 13 lots would have road frontage on Daniels Hill Road,

a proposed 1,490-foot dead-end street which would extend into the rugged

development site from Parmalee Hill Road.

Lawsuit

In the lawsuit, the developers state that on May 20, after the public hearing

had been closed, the P&Z read into the record a letter from Mary Kelly, the

school system's transportation director, on her traffic safety concerns about

Parmalee Hill Road. The applicant was given no opportunity to rebut the

letter, the suit states.

"There was no credible evidence before the (P&Z) that (the applicant's)

subdivision proposal, if approved, would necessitate unreasonably large

expenditures by the town to grade and improve existing streets to serve

vehicular traffic to be generated by the proposed subdivision in a safe

manner," the suit adds.

The P&Z's denial of the subdivision application was based on the existing

physical conditions of a town road which is not on the applicant's property,

the suit states. The P&Z did not require that the applicant improve that town

road for subdivision approval, it adds.

The selectmen and the developer reached no "road work agreement" under which a

developer agrees to make certain improvements to town roads near a subdivision

site as part of a subdivision approval.

According to the lawsuit, in denying the application, the P&Z acted illegally,

arbitrarily and in abuse of the discretion vested in it by law because: the

P&Z accepted material into the record after the public hearing was closed; it

denied the subdivision for a reason not supported by the record; it failed to

approve the application although the application complies with the

regulations; and it denied the applicant a reasonable use of its property,

among various other reasons.

P&Z members May 6 had been poised to act on and ostensibly approve the

project, but P&Z member Michael Osborne stressed his concern that many area

residents at the March public hearing told P&Z members that traffic generated

by the development would worsen existing traffic hazards on Parmalee Hill

Road. P&Z members then reconsidered the application, and rejected it May 20.

Origin

In December 1997, the Daniels Hill Development, LLC, applied to the

Conservation Commission to do regulated construction work in wetland and

watercourse areas. The commission conducted public hearings on the application

in February and March 1998, and rejected the application in April 1998. The

developers sued the Conservation Commission in May 1998 in seeking court

approval for the project.

According to that past lawsuit, the commission's denial of the application was

based on considerations which weren't part of the public hearing record,

exceeded the commission's powers, and was speculative and vague.

The developer later submitted a revised wetlands application to the

Conservation Commission which gained commission approval in September 1998.