Court Opinion

ID: 9699795
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:52:16.448036+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:58.050033
License: Public Domain

LARSEN, Justice
dissenting.
I dissent to the majority’s conclusion that the appellants have no enforceable rights against the township and developer. The Carlinos apparently were prepared to oppose the application for rezoning and, if necessary, challenge by appeal any approval of a new zoning classification. However, the appellants were misled to inaction by conduct of the township and the developer’s predecessor when the property was rezoned. The potential flames of opposition were doused quickly and efficiently by the soothing nectar of promises, stipulations and representations publicly and officially made by township officials and the then owner of the premises. There is nothing before us to suggest that the Carlinos were other than completely assured that the threats to the public health and safety, which they perceived, were effectively minimized by the establishment of a 300 feet buffer zone and the committment that no access road to Stenton Avenue would be built. The appellants’ good faith beliefs in this regard were derived directly from the pacifying actions of the township and the former property owner. The Carlinos, who were cajoled into giving up valuable and legally protected rights, should not be left without a remedy when they discover that they were deceived.
Under these circumstances, it may be said that the rezoning application with accompanying plan and representations were detrimentaly misleading as to the Carlinos. In such instances, our courts have said that negligent or wrongful official conduct which misleads an aggrieved party to his detriment can be equated to fraud. See: Appeal of Girolamo, 49 Pa.Commw. 159, 410 A.2d 940 (1980); See also: Visual-Education Devices, Inc. v. Springettsbury Township, 54 Pa.Commw. 529, 422 A.2d 235 (1980). Although the facts *507and specific issues in Girolamo and Springettsbury are dissimilar to those in the present case, the judicial disapproval of deceit and misleading conduct as a viable principle is applicable to the Carlinos’ situation.
Accordingly, I would hold that the appellants’ right to be heard, a right which they were wrongfully induced to forego in 1973, should be recognized under the facts in this case and would, therefore, reverse.
McDERMOTT, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.