Case Title: Dinsmore Dev. Co. v. Cherokee County

Citation: 260 Ga. 727, 398 S.E.2d 539

Docket Number: S90A0733

State: georgia

Court: Georgia Supreme Court

Date: 1990-12-03T00:00:00Z

Document:
260 Ga. 727 (1990) 398 S.E.2d 539 DINSMORE DEVELOPMENT COMPANY, INC. et al. v. CHEROKEE COUNTY, GEORGIA. S90A0733. Supreme Court of Georgia. Decided December 3, 1990. Reconsiderations Denied December 20, 1990. Reconsiderations Denied January 7, 1991. Peterson, Dillard, Young, Self & Asselin, Dick Wilson, Jr., Davis, Gregory & Christy, Hardy Gregory, Jr., for appellants. McVay & Stubbs, Kiping L. McVay, Elliott R. Baker, Eugene Benson Chambers, Jr., for appellee. Zickert & White, Kathryn M. Zickert, amicus curiae. BELL, Justice. The appellants seek to operate a private solid-waste landfill on agriculturally-zoned land in Cherokee County, Georgia. To obtain permission from the appellee Cherokee County (the county) to operate the landfill, appellants filed an application for a special-use permit with the county Board of Zoning Adjustment (BZA). The BZA denied the application after conducting two hearings, and appellants appealed the denial to superior court, which affirmed the BZA's decision. We then granted appellants' application for appeal. For the reasons given in this opinion, we reverse. 1. Appellants contend the county zoning ordinance lacked sufficient objective guidelines upon which the BZA could base its denial of a permit, because, appellants allege, the standards under which the BZA decided whether to grant special-use permits for landfills were vague and ambiguous. We find this contention has merit. The only provisions of the county zoning ordinance that arguably provide guidelines for the BZA in considering landfill permits are Article X, Section E, Paragraph 3, Subparagraph g (8), and the "Purpose" preamble of Article I. Article X, which pertains to the BZA, provides: By itself, this provision of the ordinance lacks any objective standards for the use of the BZA. Appellee concedes this, but argues that the ordinance's statement of purpose in Article I provides the necessary guidelines. That statement of purpose reads as follows: The question is whether the landfill provisions of Article X, taken in conjunction with the purpose statement of Article I, are "drawn with sufficient specificity to apprise an applicant of common intelligence of the standards which he should anticipate the governing body will consider." Levendis v. Cobb County, 242 Ga. 592, 594 (1) (250 SE2d 460) (1978); accord Suddeth v. Forsyth County, 258 Ga. 773, 775 (2) (373 SE2d 746) (1988). Applying this test, we hold that the purpose statement contains only a statement of general goals and purposes, and provides no criteria to govern the BZA's determination. Arras v. Herrin, 255 Ga. 11 (334 SE2d 677) (1985); Lithonia Asphalt v. Hall County Planning Comm., 258 Ga. 8 (364 SE2d 860) (1988).[1] Accordingly, we find that appellants are entitled to the approval of the BZA for the permit they sought. Crymes v. DeKalb County, 258 Ga. 30 (364 SE2d 852) (1988). Because it appears that other requirements for obtaining the permit have not yet been fulfilled by appellants, we remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. Id. at 31-32. 2. In light of our holding in the first division of this opinion, we do not reach the remaining contentions of the parties. Judgment reversed and remanded, with direction. All the Justices concur. [1] Compare Suddeth, supra, 258 Ga. (2) at 774-776, in which this Court considered an ordinance that required application of a balancing test to determine whether certain criteria outweighed other criteria, id. at 776. We found the balancing test sufficiently restricted the exercise of discretion, and distinguished the ordinance in Suddeth from the ordinances in Arras and Lithonia Asphalt.