Title: In re Appeal of Morrill House, LLC and Smith Variance

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

In re Appeal of Morrill House LLC and Smith Variance
(2010-376)
 
2011 VT 117
 
[Filed 30-Sep-2011]
 
ENTRY ORDER
 
2011 VT 117
 
SUPREME COURT
  DOCKET NO. 2010-376
 
MARCH TERM, 2011 
 
In re Appeal of Morrill House LLC
  and Smith Variance
}
}
APPEALED FROM:
 
}
Superior Court,
 
}
Environmental Division
 
}
 
 
}
DOCKET NO. 27-2-10
  Vtec
 
 
 
 
 
Trial Judge: Thomas S. Durkin
 
In
the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:
 
¶ 1.            
Applicants Howard Smith and Morrill House, LCC appeal from a decision of
the Superior Court's Environmental Division denying their request for a
variance to subdivide property located in the Town of Fair Haven,
Vermont.  They contend that their application should be deemed approved
because the town zoning board of adjustment failed to issue its decision
denying the application within the deadline prescribed by the relevant statute
and local zoning ordinance.  We affirm.
¶ 2.            
On October 15, 2009, applicants submitted a zoning permit application
seeking approval to subdivide the subject property.  The town zoning
administrator denied the application after concluding that the proposal failed
to comply with side- and rear-yard setbacks and minimum-lot-width
requirements.  Applicants then submitted their application to the zoning
board of adjustment, which held a hearing on November 9, 2009.  The board
entered into an executive session immediately following the hearing and voted
at that time to deny applicants' request.[1] 
One of the board members was charged with drafting a
written decision, and the zoning administrator was instructed to inform
applicants of the board's decision.  The zoning administrator averred that
on the day of the board hearing he told Howard Smith that he would telephone
him with notice of the board's decision and that he did so the next morning,
leaving a message on Smith's cell phone.  Smith denied receiving a
telephone message informing him of the decision.
¶ 3.            
The board member assigned to write a decision did not deliver one to the
board clerk until January 11, 2010.  The decision was then distributed to
the other board members, who reviewed and signed it on January 15, 2010, sixty-seven days after the board hearing had
adjourned.  Shortly thereafter, applicants received the decision and
appealed to the environmental court, arguing only that their variance
application should be deemed approved under the applicable state and local law
because of the board's failure to timely notify them of the decision.  In
response to the parties' cross-motions for summary judgment, the environmental
court granted summary judgment to the Town, ruling that, even assuming the
board failed to notify applicants of its decision until shortly after January
15, 2010, the deemed approval remedy was not warranted under the circumstances,
as a matter of law.  Applicants appeal to this Court, arguing that the
board's negligence in not notifying them of its decision before the deadline
set by state and local law entitled them to deemed approval of their
application under those laws, and that, in any event, issues of material fact
concerning the timing of the board's decision should have precluded summary judgment.
¶ 4.            
We begin with the relevant statute and town zoning ordinance. 
Section 4464(b)(1) of Title 24 provides that a municipal panel reviewing a land
development application "shall . . . issue a decision within 45 days after the
adjournment of the hearing, and failure of the panel to issue a decision within
this period shall be deemed approval and shall be effective on the 46th day." [2]  The following sentence of the same
provision provides that "[d]ecisions shall be issued in writing and shall
include a statement of the factual bases on which the . . . panel has made its
conclusions and a statement of the conclusions."  24 V.S.A. § 4464(b)(1).  The statute further requires that decisions "be
sent by certified mail within the period set forth in subdivision (1) . . . to
the applicant."  Id. § 4464(b)(3). 
The relevant provisions of the local zoning ordinance are the same as, or
similar to, these statutory provisions in all essential and relevant
parts.  See Town of Fair Haven Zoning Ordinance §§ 666, 667 (1998). [3]
¶ 5.            
Applicants argue that these laws provide a remedy of deemed approval
when the Town negligently fails to follow the procedures set forth
therein.  Specifically, applicants point out that neither the statute nor
the ordinance provides for notification by telephone, and, in any event, there
are disputed facts as to whether the board voted to deny their variance
application on November 9, 2009 and whether they were notified of that decision
the next day by telephone.  Applicants further point to the board's
failure to notify them in a timely manner of the factual bases for its decision. 
Applicants also briefly note that the environmental court failed to consider
certain substantive issues concerning their application for a variance.
¶ 6.            
Taking the last claim first, we conclude that applicants did not raise before the environmental court, and thus failed to
preserve, any substantive issues regarding the merits of the variance
decision.  The environmental court noted that the "sole issue" raised by
applicants in 

their appeal of the
board's decision was their claim that their application should be deemed
approved because of the board's procedural notice violations in issuing its
decision.  This is confirmed by applicants' statement of questions
submitted to the environmental court.  On appeal to this Court, applicants
have not cited the record to demonstrate otherwise.
¶ 7.            
Regarding applicants' claim of disputed facts precluding summary
judgment, the environmental court found no dispute that the board made a
decision to deny applicants' variance request on November 9, 2009. 
Applicants' lone, unsupported sentence in their brief on appeal stating that
this fact was in dispute cannot overcome the environmental court's unchallenged
finding that this fact, as confirmed in the three affidavits submitted by the
Town, was undisputed.  As for applicants' claim that it was disputed
whether they were ever orally notified of the decision before they received the
written decision shortly after January 15, 2010, the environmental court
acknowledged that this fact was in dispute, but determined that the Town was
entitled to summary judgment even assuming that the Town had not provided
applicants with oral notice of the decision.
¶ 8.            
Thus, this appeal boils down to whether applicants were entitled to
deemed approval  of their variance application where the board made a
decision on the application before  the forty-five-day deadline, but did
not notify applicants of the decision or provide them with a written decision
until after forty-five days.  As we pointed out in In re Ashline,
because of the prominence of the deemed approval remedy in various contexts in
Chapter 117 of Title 24, we have construed the relevant statutory language on
numerous occasions "and have consistently held that the purpose of the deemed approval
remedy provided is to remedy indecision and protracted deliberations on the
part of zoning boards and to eliminate deliberate or negligent inaction by
public officials.' "  2003 VT 30, ¶ 13, 175 Vt.
203, 824 A.2d 579 (quoting In re Fish, 150 Vt. 462, 464, 554 A.2d 256,
258 (1988)).  "We have cautioned against extending the deemed approval
remedy beyond this limited purpose, as improper application can operate to
grant permits wholly at odds with the zoning ordinance.' "  Id. (quoting In re Newton Enters., 167
Vt. 459, 465, 708 A.2d 914, 918 (1998)).  "Consequently, we have strictly
construed the deemed approval remedy to apply only when clearly consistent with
the statutory purpose."  Id.
¶ 9.            
In Hinsdale v. Vill. of Essex
Junction, we refused to apply the deemed approval remedy in § 4464's
predecessor statute containing similar language in circumstances where the
village board of adjustment, following a hearing, orally notified the applicant
of its vote denying the permit, but did not mail the written decision to the
applicant until after the statutory time period had expired.  153 Vt. 618, 625, 572 A.2d 925, 929 (1990).  We held
that "a zoning board decision can be considered rendered before notice is
mailed to the applicant if the board has made a decision and given the parties
actual notice of its action before the expiration of the forty-five day period,
regardless of when the decision is reduced to writing."  Id.; see In
re White, 155 Vt. 612, 616, 587 A.2d 928, 930 (1990) (stating that deemed
approval remedy "is intended to curtail indecision and protracted deliberations
in the zoning decisionmaking process" and that Legislature did not intend to
defeat zoning appeal scheme based merely on absence of written decision). 
In strictly construing a remedy with the potential to allow land development
that conflicts with local zoning laws, we held in Hinsdale that the
deemed approval remedy was mandated only when a municipal board failed to
render a decision within the statutory time period, not when it failed to give
written notice of its decision.  Hinsdale, 153 Vt. at 623, 572 A.2d  at 928.  Accordingly, we concluded "that the
notice time limit is directory."  Id.
¶ 10.         Applicants
seek to distinguish Hinsdale by the fact that the board in this case
failed to provide even oral notice of its decision.  We have already
rejected similar arguments in cases that followed Hinsdale.  In Leo's
Motors, Inc. v. Town of Manchester, 158 Vt. 561, 613 A.2d 196 (1992),
 the municipal board denied variance applications within the
forty-five-day period but inadvertently failed to mail the decisions to the
applicants until after that period had expired.  Concluding that "[t]he Hinsdale
rationale applies just as well to late notice to an applicant as it does to
oral notice," we declined to apply the deemed approval remedy to a situation
where a decision had been made, but notice of the decision had not been given
during the prescribed period because of the inattention of a town clerk.  Leo's Motors, 158 Vt. at 564, 613 A.2d  at 198. 
Noting that the case involved neither indecision nor protracted deliberation,
we stated that "the negligence or inadvertence of a municipal employee
unrelated to the timeliness of the decisional process ought not to defeat the
strong policies in favor of phasing out nonconforming uses."  Id. 
We held that a decision is rendered so as to avoid the deemed approval language
as long as it is "finally made before the expiration of the forty-five day
period, regardless of when, or if, the decision is reduced to writing."  Id.
at 565, 613 A.2d  at 199.  We reaffirmed this
holding in In re Griffin, 2006 VT 75, 180 Vt. 589, 904 A.2d 1217 (mem.),
which involved another statutory provision with similar deemed approval
language.  Once again we held, relying on Leo's Motors, that the
deemed approval remedy is inapplicable and inappropriate when, absent any
policy of delay, a municipal board's decisions are made within the prescribed
period but no notice of those decisions is sent to the applicants until after
the expiration of that period.    Griffin, 2006 VT 75, ¶¶
13-15.
¶ 11.         Although
the facts in Leo's Motors and Griffin differ in some respects
from the facts in the instant case, the holding in those cases controls the
outcome here.  As in those cases, the board here made a decision within
the prescribed period but failed to notify applicants within that period of the
decision and the bases for the decision.  Following our previous case law,
we will strictly construe the deemed approval remedy to apply only when the
decision was not made within the prescribed period, which was not the case
here.  Applicants' reliance on In re McEwing, Services LLC, 2004 VT
53, 177 Vt. 38, 857 A.2d 299 is unavailing.  In that case, the municipal
board issued "an untimely decision" beyond the prescribed period as the result
of protracted deliberations, thereby making the statutory deemed approval
remedy appropriate.  Id.  ¶ 21.
           
Affirmed.
 
BY THE COURT:
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Paul L. Reiber, Chief
  Justice
 
 
 
 
 
John A. Dooley, Associate
  Justice
 
 
 
 
 
Denise R. Johnson,
  Associate Justice
 
 
 
 
 
Marilyn S. Skoglund,
  Associate Justice
 
 
 
 
 
Brian L. Burgess, Associate
  Justice
 
 
 

[1]  Although the Town produced neither
minutes nor an audio recording of the executive session, it submitted
affidavits from three individuals who were present during the meeting confirming
that the board made the decision to deny applicants' variance request following
deliberations at the meeting.  The environmental court found this fact to
be undisputed.  Applicants do not raise, and thus we do not consider, the
potential relevance to this case of 1 V.S.A. § 313(a), which, among other
things, precludes taking "formal or binding action" in executive session in
most instances.
[2]  Under the previous version of the
statute, the municipal panel was required, within forty-five days of
adjournment of the hearing on the matter, to "render" rather than "issue" a
decision, as provided in the current version of the statute.  The word
"render" was changed to the word "issue" when this statute, among many others,
was rewritten and reordered several years ago in a comprehensive act aimed at
consolidating legislative appeals and revising land use development law. See 2003, No. 115 (Adj. Sess.), § 104.  There is no
indication, howeverand applicants do not arguethat the Legislature intended
the change in the wording from "render" to "issue" to have any substantive
effect in meaning that would alter our previous case law construing the
predecessor provision.  Indeed, in the sense they are used in the statute
and ordinance, the two words share a common meaning.  See Black's Law
Dictionary 850, 1322 (8th ed. 2004) (defining "issue" as "[t]o be put forth
officially" and defining "render" as "to deliver formally").
 
[3]  These ordinances were in place at the
time of the zoning board's decision in this case, but have since been
repealed.