Case Title: In re Miserocchi

Citation: 170 Vt. 320, 749 A.2d 607

Docket Number: 

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 2000-01-28T00:00:00Z

Document:
In re Miserocchi (99-166); 170 Vt. 320; 749 A.2d 607

[Filed 28-Jan-2000]

       NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under
  V.R.A.P. 40 as well as  formal revision before publication in the Vermont
  Reports.  Readers are requested to notify the  Reporter of Decisions,
  Vermont Supreme Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of
  any errors in order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes
  to press.

                                 No. 99-166

In re Appeal of Jeff and 	                     Supreme Court
Ann Miserocchi
                                                     On Appeal from
                                                     Environmental Court

                                                     January Term, 2000

Merideth Wright, J.

Paul Gillies of Tarrant, Marks & Gillies, Montpelier, for Appellant.

John D. Hansen, Rutland, for Appellee.

PRESENT:  Amestoy, C.J., Dooley, Morse, Johnson and Skoglund, JJ.

       SKOGLUND, J.  Applicants appeal from decisions of the environmental
  court that (1)  denied on summary judgment their request for a variance,
  and (2) denied after trial approval for  a change in use from agricultural
  to residential.  We conclude that applicants do not need either 
  change-of-use approval or a variance to change the use of their
  nonconforming structure from  one permitted use to another permitted use. 
  Thus, we reverse the decisions of the environmental  court to the extent
  that it held otherwise.

       The environmental court made the following findings.  In 1988,
  applicants acquired an  eighteen-acre parcel in the Town of Clarendon with
  a barn that was formerly used to store  agricultural equipment.  The parcel
  is in a residential district of the town, in which both  agricultural uses
  and one-family dwellings are permitted uses.  The barn is forty feet wide
  and  one hundred feet long, with the longer dimension running along the
  road.  The barn is set back  ten-to-twenty feet from the edge of the
  pavement.  The town zoning regulations require, in a  residential district,
  a minimum forty-foot setback from the edge of the road.  Thus, the barn is 
  nonconforming with the setback requirement.

       Applicants claimed that the 1988 zoning administrator told them that
  they did not need 

 

  a permit to alter the interior of the building for a residence, but that
  exterior renovations would  require a permit.  Applicants installed a water
  supply and sewage disposal system and installed a  mobile home at the back
  of and partially inside the barn.  In 1995, a subsequent zoning 
  administrator told them that the residential use was a violation of the
  zoning regulations, and  appellants applied for change-of-use approval. 
  The zoning board of adjustment addressed the  request as if it were a
  request for conditional-use approval.  As the environmental court 
  recognized, there is no zoning regulation that requires conditional-use
  approval to allow a change  in use from one permitted use to another
  permitted use in a noncomplying structure.  Nonetheless, the zoning board
  of adjustment granted a conditional-use permit to allow applicants  to
  renovate part of the barn to use as a dwelling, by adding not more than two
  bedrooms and a  bathroom, provided they did not change the shape of the
  building.  The zoning board of  adjustment also limited the use of the barn
  as a dwelling to ten years.  Applicants did not appeal.

       Subsequently, in 1996, applicants applied for (1) a change-of-use
  permit to remove the  ten-year limitation on their residential use of the
  structure, and (2) for a variance to add skylights  to the front and an
  addition to the rear of the building.  The zoning board of adjustment
  denied  both the change-of-use permit and the variance.  On appeal, the
  environmental court ruled on  summary judgment that applicants did not meet
  the criteria for a variance, but also ruled that  "[i]n general, no
  variance should be necessary for a residence or an addition or accessory 
  structure beyond the 40-foot setback."  Because the applicants had not
  provided the court with  sufficient information as to the specific project
  proposed, the court ruled that the issue was not  suitable for summary
  judgment.

       Following a trial on the request for a change-of-use permit, the court
  reiterated that  applicants need no permit for any of their plans for
  residential use behind the forty-foot setback  because this is a permitted
  use in the residential zone.  Although recognizing that the zoning  board
  of adjustment erred in considering the change-of-use request as a request
  for conditional-use approval, the court also applied the conditional-use
  factors in 24 V.S.A. § 4407(2).  The 

 

  court denied the application for permanent residential use of the part of
  the barn within the forty-foot setback because it would increase the
  intensity of the use of the noncomplying part of the  structure.  The court
  found that, under 24 V.S.A. § 4407(2)(D) (adverse effect on bylaws), 
  increased use would adversely affect § 280 (nonconforming uses) and § 430
  (requiring the forty-foot setback) of the Clarendon zoning regulations. 
  Applicants appeal.

       We will uphold the environmental court's construction of a zoning
  regulation unless the  construction is clearly erroneous, arbitrary or
  capricious.  See In re Weeks, 167 Vt. 551, 554,