Opinion ID: 2258152
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Validity of Zoning Amendment

Text: Plaintiffs contend that the Waterville zoning change to accommodate the Shaw's development is invalid because it fails to meet the requirements of the controlling statute, 30 M.R.S.A. § 4962(1)(A) (1978), that a city's zoning ordinance be pursuant to and consistent with a comprehensive plan adopted by its legislative body. Specifically, plaintiffs urge that the zoning amendment here at issue is invalid because it is not consistent with the Waterville comprehensive plan's stated goal of protecting residential neighborhoods. By the ultimate thrust of plaintiffs' argument, they would have us construe the Waterville comprehensive plan to prohibit the city council from changing any boundary between a residential and a commercial zone. We reject that argument, as did the Superior Court, for it is based upon too narrow and inflexible a reading of the comprehensive plan. The comprehensive plan that section 4962(1)(A) requires every municipality to have as a prerequisite to zoning is by definition a compilation of policy statements, goals, [and] standards with respect to issues relevant to land use regulation. 30 M.R.S.A. § 4961(1)(A) (Supp.1986); see Baker v. Town of Woolwich, 517 A.2d 64, 68 (Me.1987). The Waterville comprehensive plan sets forth a number of goals relevant to the rezoning requested by Shaw's, of which the protection of residential neighborhoods is but one. Particularly pertinent is the plan's emphasis on the need to expand economic opportunity in Waterville and to provide adequate space for commercial development. Even more specifically, the plan sets as a zoning goal for the City the commercial development along three arteries including Kennedy Memorial Drive, [6] by stating the following: Commercial growth should continue to follow its present pattern of development with relation to three major traffic arteries of the City. Firstly, College Avenue has been, for years, the traditional node for newer commercial development. The present state of development and large volumes of traffic on that street preclude other types of use. Main Street, south of Route 95, and Kennedy Memorial Drive also have very large traffic volumes. While these streets do not have a long history of commercial development, their present state of rapidly progressing development has established them as major areas of commercial land use outside of the downtown area. By allowing for commercial development to occur in a coherent pattern in these areas of the City, other areas may be completely exempted from the pressures of this type of land use. . . . Waterville Comprehensive Plan, Land Use at 6 (emphasis added). From the transcript of the hearings conducted by the city council, it is clear that the council recognized and acted upon its responsibility to amend the zoning ordinance only in a way consistent with the comprehensive plan and the multiple goals stated therein. Faced with the multiple goals of protecting residential neighborhoods and promoting economic opportunity and commercial development along Kennedy Memorial Drive, the city council was not required to refrain from permitting any intrusion whatever upon an area previously zoned residential. Rather it had the job of accommodating these multiple goals in a way to advance the overall best interests of the City and its people as defined by the comprehensive plan read as a whole. The test for the court's review of the city council's rezoning action is whether  from the evidence before it the city council could have determined that the rezoning was in basic harmony with the [comprehensive] plan.... Haines v. City of Phoenix, 151 Ariz. 286, 727 P.2d 339, 344 (App. 1986) (emphasis added); see also Green v. County Council of Sussex County, 508 A.2d 882, 890-91 (Del.Ch.1986). In making that review of the record before the city council, the court will not substitute [its] judgment for that of the duly elected legislative body, the city council. Haines v. City of Phoenix, 727 P.2d at 343. The parties challenging the council's action have the burden of showing inconsistency between the rezoning and the comprehensive plan. Id. On the basis of the evidence before it, the city council was justified in concluding that the zoning change was in basic harmony with the comprehensive plan because the change struck a reasonable balance among the City's various zoning goals. On the one hand, the goal of promoting commercial development along Kennedy Memorial Drive (with the creation of additional job opportunities and the attraction of consumer dollars to Waterville) could not be fully achieved by the proposed shopping center within the 800-foot strip previously zoned commercial. The development of one-stop shopping means that a retail shopping area to be competitive must be large enough to offer customers a substantial variety of stores; and significant traffic flow advantages accrue to a deeper shopping center layout as compared to strip development. Also, recently imposed environmental regulations require the construction of a storm water retention basin, which in turn requires an additional area for a commercial establishment. On the other hand, the area that the city council rezoned commercial had been zoned residential for 58 years and still at the time of the rezoning no house had been built within it. The residents challenging the Waterville rezoning fail to persuade us that the city council's conclusion was not adequately supported by the evidence before it.