IN THE COMMONWEALTH COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA

The Links at Gettysburg Land :

Company, Inc., :

Appellant :

:

v. : No. 1006 C.D. 2019

: SUBMITTED: May 11, 2020

Board of Supervisors of Mount Joy :

Township :

BEFORE: HONORABLE RENÉE COHN JUBELIRER, Judge

HONORABLE CHRISTINE FIZZANO CANNON, Judge

HONORABLE BONNIE BRIGANCE LEADBETTER, Senior Judge

OPINION NOT REPORTED

MEMORANDUM OPINION BY

SENIOR JUDGE LEADBETTER FILED: June 25, 2020

The Links at Gettysburg Land Company, Inc. appeals from an order of 

the Court of Common Pleas of Adams County affirming the decision of the Board 

of Supervisors of Mount Joy Township that the conditional use approvals for two 

projects had expired due to the developer’s failure to meet traffic study conditions. 

For the reasons that follow, we reverse and remand this matter to the trial court with 

directions to remand to the Board for reinstatement of the conditional use approvals.1

In decisions dated April 27, 2015, the Board approved conditional use 

applications for expansion of the planned golf community and erection of a hotel 

and conference center. Both decisions contained essentially the same condition 

 

1 This case was considered seriately with related cases The Links at Gettysburg Land 

Company, Inc. v. Board of Supervisors of Mount Joy Township (Pa. Cmwlth., No. 1007 C.D. 2019, 

filed June 25, 2020) and The Links at Gettysburg Land Company, Inc. v. Board of Supervisors of 

Mount Joy Township (Pa. Cmwlth., No. 1008 C.D. 2019, filed June 25, 2020).
2

requiring that the developer submit plans to prevent expiration of the conditional use 

approvals. Condition No. 1 for the hotel and conference center provided:

The approval of the conditional use for the hotel and 

conference center uses shall expire two years from the date 

of this Decision, subject to written petition setting forth 

sufficient reason for the Board’s grant of an extension of 

the expiration. The conditional use shall not expire if a 

land development plan has been submitted.

(April 27, 2015, Hotel Decision at 11; Reproduced Record “R.R.” at 44a.) Condition 

No. 2 for the expansion of the planned golf community mirrored Condition No. 1 

but for requiring submission of a subdivision plan. (April 27, 2015, Expansion 

Decision at 14; R.R. at 31a.) Prior to April 27, 2017, the Links submitted the 

respective plans thereby satisfying the two-year deadline.

Additionally, both approval decisions carried a condition requiring the 

Links to update the traffic study within three years of the respective decisions. 

Condition No. 9 for the hotel and conference center and No. 10 for the expansion 

provided: “Every three years from the date of this Decision, the applicant shall 

update the traffic counts and movements data of the Traffic Study made part of the 

Modified Application and within one year of the completion of the development 

shall submit an updated Traffic Study to the Township.” (Hotel Decision at 12; R.R. 

at 45a and Expansion Decision at 15; R.R. at 32a.) Accordingly, the Links’ traffic 

engineer submitted a January 2018 letter opining that “since the development 

expansion associated with the conditional use approvals for Links at Gettysburg has 

not been built, and no other significant developments or traffic improvements have 

occurred, the traffic counts, assumptions, analyses, and recommended 

improvements included in the traffic study remain valid and unchanged.” (January 

15, 2018, Updated Traffic Impact Study at 1; R.R. at 115a.)
3

In a May 22, 2018, decision, the Board determined that the Links failed 

to satisfy Conditions Nos. 9 and 10 for failure to submit updated traffic counts and 

movement data by April 27, 2018. Accordingly, the Board concluded that both 

conditional use approvals had expired for failure to satisfy those conditions. 

Nonetheless, the Board also acted on the April 2018 revised preliminary subdivision 

plan for the expansion and the April 2018 revised preliminary land development plan 

for the hotel and conference center. The Board denied both plans, stating that it was 

incorporating the May 3, 2018, review comments from the Township’s engineer and 

zoning officer.

The Links filed three separate appeals with the trial court: (1) appeal 

from the Board’s decision that conditional use approvals had expired due to failure 

to meet traffic study conditions; (2) appeal from Board’s denial of preliminary land 

development plan for the hotel and conference center; and (3) appeal from denial of 

preliminary subdivision plan for expansion of the planned golf community. Without 

taking additional evidence, the trial court affirmed the Board in all three cases. The 

Links’ appeals to this Court followed, respectively, Nos. 1006, 1007, and 1008 C.D. 

2019. We consider the appeals seriately but separately.

In the present appeal, the Links argues that the Board erred in 

determining that (1) the conditional use approvals expired for an alleged failure to 

meet the traffic study conditions; (2) the traffic study conditions were enforceable 

as a matter of law when construed to authorize automatic termination of the 

conditional use approvals; and (3) the conditional use approvals expired 

notwithstanding the Township’s failure to pursue the enforcement process 

authorized by law for the failure to meet the conditions of conditional use approvals.
4

By way of analysis, resolution of this matter is not dependent upon 

whether the Board erred in determining that the developer failed to satisfy the traffic 

study conditions. Instead, the proper focus is whether the Board erred in using its 

determination that the developer failed to meet those conditions as support for a 

decision that the conditional use approvals automatically expired. Notably, there is 

no expiration language in the traffic study conditions for failure to submit what the 

Board deems to be a compliant update. This is in contrast to the automatic expiration 

language in the approval expiration conditions, Conditions Nos. 1 and 2, requiring 

that the developer submit plans within two years of the April 2015 decisions.2

Moreover, it is well established that conditional use approval does not 

automatically expire for failure to satisfy a condition. Kulak v. Zoning Hearing Bd. 

of Bristol Twp., 563 A.2d 978, 980 (Pa. Cmwlth. 1989). As we held in Kulak with 

respect to special exceptions:3 “To hold that a special exception automatically lapses 

upon violation of a condition would create confusion and uncertainty for property 

owners and municipalities.” Id. More specifically, we observed:

There is no rule that the failure of a property owner to 

comply with a condition attached to a special exception 

automatically nullifies the zoning hearing board’s grant of 

the special exception. The municipality must take some 

affirmative measure to enforce the condition, or to revoke 

the special exception, when compliance is not forthcoming 

or is impossible.

 

2 The expiration language in Conditions Nos. 1 and 2 mirrors Section 110.70.C.6(h) of the 

Township’s Ordinance.

3 A conditional use is nothing more than a special exception which falls within the jurisdiction 

of the municipal governing body rather than a zoning hearing board such that the law regarding 

both is virtually identical. In re Thompson, 896 A.2d 659, 670 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2006).
5

Id. Consequently, where the township in Kulak took no action to revoke the special 

exception or to seek enforcement of the condition, we held that the owners’ failure 

to comply with the condition did not automatically nullify the special exception. Id. 

at 981.

With respect to enforcement in the present case, Section 110.1201.C of 

the Township’s Ordinance provides that the enforcement of ordinance provisions 

lies with the zoning officer.4 This is consistent with Pennsylvania law providing that 

zoning officers and not zoning hearing boards or governing bodies are responsible 

for the administration of ordinances. See Section 614 of the Pennsylvania 

Municipalities Planning Code (MPC)5(zoning officers administer zoning ordinances 

and may be authorized to institute civil enforcement proceedings as a means of 

enforcement) and Borough of Jenkintown v. Bd. of Comm’rs of Abington Twp., 858 

A.2d 136, 140 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2004) (holding that zoning officers act as gatekeepers, 

administering zoning ordinances, in part, to shelter boards from the duty to render 

preliminary decisions as to zoning compliance).

However, the zoning officer in the instant case took no enforcement 

action with regard to the Links’ alleged failure to satisfy the traffic study conditions. 

Instead, the Board prematurely used the Links’ allegedly non-compliant traffic study 

submission as a springboard for determining that the conditional use approvals had 

expired.6

 

4 Violation of a condition of a conditional use approval is, essentially, a violation of an 

ordinance. See Kulak, 563 A.2d at 980 (holding that violation of a condition attached to a special 

exception is the equivalent of a violation of a zoning ordinance).

5 Act of July 31, 1968, P.L. 805, as amended, 53 P.S. § 10614.

6 As noted, whether the developer met the traffic study conditions is not before us. However, 

given the fact that the developer’s traffic engineer concisely set forth why he believed that the prior 

study remained valid, we perceive no overt failure to satisfy those conditions. At most, the letter 
6

Accordingly, we reverse and remand this matter to the trial court with 

directions to remand to the Board for reinstatement of the conditional use approvals 

for expansion of the golf community and erection of the hotel and conference center.

_____________________________________

BONNIE BRIGANCE LEADBETTER,

Senior Judge

 

dismissing the need for updated traffic counts and movement data constitutes some inchoate 

compliance that may or may not become the subject of a future enforcement action. In any event, 

the Township had a duty to exercise good faith and afford the developer a reasonable opportunity 

to respond where there was a misunderstanding or difference of opinion. See Monger v. Upper 

Leacock Twp., 132 A.3d 585, 590 (Pa. Cmwlth. 2016) (recognizing duty of good faith in reviewing 

and processing land use applications).
IN THE COMMONWEALTH COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA

The Links at Gettysburg Land :

Company, Inc., :

Appellant :

:

v. : No. 1006 C.D. 2019

:

Board of Supervisors of Mount Joy :

Township :

O R D E R

AND NOW, this 25

th day of June, 2020, the order of the Court of 

Common Pleas of Adams County is hereby REVERSED. We remand this matter to 

the trial court with directions to remand to the Board of Supervisors of Mount Joy 

Township for reinstatement of the conditional use approvals for expansion of the 

planned golf community and erection of the hotel and conference center.

Jurisdiction relinquished.

_____________________________________

BONNIE BRIGANCE LEADBETTER,

Senior Judge