Title: George v. Timberlake Associates

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

George v. Timberlake Associates  (98-170); 169 Vt. 641; 739 A.2d 1207

[Opinion filed 2-Aug-1999]
[Motion for Reargument denied 2-Sep-1999]

                                 ENTRY ORDER

                       SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 98-170

                             JANUARY TERM, 1999

Margaret George and John Russell	}	APPEALED FROM:	
	                                }
	                                }
     v.	                                }	Washington Superior Court
	                                }	
Timberlake Associates	                }
                                        }	DOCKET NO. 645-11-97Wncv

       In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       Petitioners Margaret George and John Russell appeal from a judgment
  entered in the  environmental court dismissing as untimely their appeal of
  a decision of the Montpelier Planning  Commission.  At issue is site plan
  approval granted by the commission to Timberlake Associates in  connection
  with a convenience store at 108 State Street in Montpelier.  The
  environmental court  determined that petitioners, who are neighbors of the
  Timberlake project, failed to file their notice  of appeal from the
  commission's approval within the requisite thirty-day period.  We disagree
  and,  accordingly, reverse.

       The relevant facts are not in dispute.  Because they owned property in
  the "immediate  neighborhood" of the project under site plan review,
  petitioners were "interested person[s]" with  standing to challenge the
  planning commission's decision.  See 24 V.S.A. § 4464(b)(3) (defining 
  "interested person").  On May 19, 1997 the planning commission approved
  Timberlake's revised  design and site plan in connection with the 108 State
  Street property, but no document purporting to  be a written decision on
  the application was issued.  The minutes of the May 19 meeting were filed 
  with the city clerk on May 30, 1997.  Less than an hour before midnight on
  June 18, 1997, exactly  thirty days after the meeting at which the planning
  commission approved the site plan, petitioners  handed a notice of appeal
  to the dispatcher at Montpelier police headquarters.  This document 
  reached the planning board the following day -- thirty-one days after the
  planning board voted to  approve the site plan.

       V.R.C.P. 74(b) requires that a notice of appeal from a decision of a
  governmental agency be  filed "with the clerk of the administrative body .
  . . or other appropriate officer."  The  environmental court concluded that
  in these circumstances a police dispatcher is not an appropriate  officer
  within the meaning of the rule and, therefore, that Timberlake was entitled
  to dismissal of  the action because the notice had not been appropriately
  filed within thirty days of May 19, 1997.   We need not reach the problem
  of whether serving the police dispatcher was legally sufficient,  however,
  because we conclude that petitioners were still within the thirty-day
  appeal period when  the notice reached the planning commission on the
  following day.

       To make that determination, we must first address Timberlake's
  contention that petitioners  waived the issue by failing to raise it before
  the environmental court.  See Spencer v. Killington,  Ltd., 167 Vt. 137,
  140,