An appellate court found a zoning board was arbitrary when it refused to hear an area variance application for the same property which had been denied an area variance nearly twenty years earlier. On April 25, 2006 the Appellate Division Second Department, in Matter of Moore v. Town of Islip…
The Village of Mamaroneck has indicated that it will be appealing the recent decision of the United States District Court, which found that the Village had violated the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) when it denied an application to expand the Westchester Day School (see our March…
On March 14, 2006 the Appellate Division Second Department rejected the issuance of a Negative Declaration under SEQRA in the case Matter of Avy v. Town of Amenia. In upholding the findings of the State Supreme Court, the Appellate Division found that by approving an amendment to the local zoning…
In applying RLUIPA to the decision by the Village of Mamaroneck Zoning Board of Appeals that denied a special permit to the Westchester Day School, the District Court responded to criticism contained in an earlier decision by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals which remanded the District Court’s finding of…
The long awaited decision in the case of the Westchester Day School v.The Village of Mamaroneck Zoning Board of Appeals has been issued by Judge Connor of the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of New York. In a 160 page decision Judge Connor found that the Zoning Board…
In a December, 2005 decision the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the judgment of Omnipoint Communications against the City of White Plains. Omnipoint had been denied a permit to construct a 150 foot wireless communications tower on a local golf course. The Court noted that if supported by substantial…
The Village of Suffern New York has been sued under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) by an Orthodox Jewish group that maintains a home for Orthodox Jews visiting relatives and friends at nearby Good Samaritan Hospital. The group, which was denied a use variance, has received…
The Appellate Division of the New York State Supreme Court decided a trilogy of cases on December 27, 2005 relating to a series of determinations by the City of New Rochelle Zoning Board of Appeals to permit construction of an addition to a local religious institution. The cases, Halperin v.…
The Court of Appeals remanded a case involving New York City’s adult business zoning regulations for further hearings on whether so called 60/40 businesses should be regulated as adult businesses due to adverse secondary impacts on nearby properties and neighborhoods. The action by For the People Theatres of New York,…
On December 5, 2005 the Second Circuit Court of Appeals remanded the case of Brody v. Village of Port Chester back to the District Court on the issue of whether Brody had actual notice of the proceedings and procedures under New York Eminent Domain Procedure Law (“EDPL”) before his property…