Title: Leos Motors Inc. v. Town of Manchester

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

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.


                           Nos. 91-586 and 91-587


 Leo's Motors, Inc., et al.                   Supreme Court


                                              On Appeal from
      v.                                      Bennington Superior Court



 Town of Manchester                           April Term, 1992


 James E. Hand, et al.

      v.

 Town of Manchester


 Silvio T. Valente, J.


 Richard H. Coutant of Salmon and Nostrand, Bellows Falls, for plaintiffs-
   appellees Leo's Motors and Charbonneau

 Marilyn F. Hand of Whalen and Nawrath, Manchester Center, for plaintiffs-
   appellees Hand

 Robert E. Woolmington of Witten, Saltonstall & Woolmington, P.C.,
   Bennington, for defendant-appellant


 PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Gibson, Dooley, Morse and Johnson, JJ.



      MORSE, J.   These consolidated appeals arise out of closely related
 facts and raise the identical legal issue under 24 V.S.A. { 4470.  The Town
 of Manchester appeals two rulings of the Bennington Superior Court that the
 Manchester Zoning Board of Appeals wrongfully denied sign ordinance vari-
 ances to applicants.  We are asked to decide whether a written board
 decision, notice of which was inadvertently delayed beyond the statute's
 mandated 45-day period, requires automatic variance approval.  We decline to
 reach that result, and reverse.
      In 1986, the Town of Manchester adopted a sign ordinance that required
 nonconforming signs to be brought into compliance with specified standards
 within five years.  Section IV(2) provided that "[f]ree-standing signs which
 are non-conforming . . . may continue to be displayed until February 11,
 1991, at which time they shall be replaced or altered to conform with the
 present ordinance."
      Three days before the compliance deadline, applicant Leo Charbonneau
 applied for a variance to display a service station sign that was non-
 conforming on the basis of size and height.  On the same day, John and
 James Hand applied for a variance for a similar nonconforming sign.
 Hearings were held before the Board on March 25 and April 1, 1991.  In each
 case the Board denied the application in signed written decisions dated
 April 29, 1991.  Three days later, on May 2, 1991, the Manchester zoning
 administrator left her job without mailing the decisions to the applicants.
 On May 17, 1991, forty-seven days after completion of the hearing before the
 Board, another town official noticed that the decisions had not been sent
 and immediately mailed them to Charbonneau and the Hands.
      Each applicant appealed to the superior court pursuant to 24 V.S.A. {
 4471, arguing that the variances were deemed awarded by default under 24
 V.S.A. { 4470(a), as they had not been received within the mandated 45-day
 period.  24 V.S.A. { 4470(a) states in relevant part:
           (a)  The board shall render its decision, which shall
         include findings of fact, within forty-five days after
         completing the hearing, and shall within that  period
         send to the appellant, by certified mail, a copy of the
         decision. . . .  If the board does not render its
         decision within the period prescribed by this chapter,
         the board shall be deemed to have rendered a decision in
         favor of the appellant and granted the relief requested
         by him on the last day of such period.

 The court granted summary judgment to each applicant, and the Town appealed
 to this Court.
      In Glabach v. Sardelli, 132 Vt. 490, 495,