Last month, in Cuffaro v Zoning Board of Appeals of the Village of Bellport (Index # 620453/2021), the Suffolk Supreme Court reinforced the existing and binding case law that a municipality’s issuance of a building permit to a similarly situated lot effectively sanctions the subdivision of that property by deed without the requisite subdivision approval. In a strongly worded decision
Continue Reading “Grandfathering” By Issuance of Building Permits
Last month, the State’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, upheld the Appellate Division’s decision annulling the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) issuance of permits to Sand Land Corporation (“Sandland”) for renewal and expansion of sand mining operations at a 50-acre site in Southampton, New York and remanded the matter back to the DEC. The site, owned
Continue Reading NYSDEC Mining Law Appears Further Undermined by the Court of AppealsRecently, the Suffolk County Supreme Court affirmed the Southampton Village Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) denial of a special permit to subdivide the subject property into two residential lots in the Village’s Office District. In 99 Sanford Place LLC, v Zoning Board of Appeals of the Incorporated Village of Southampton, (Sup. Ct. Suffolk County. Sept. 20, 2022) Justice Linda
Continue Reading Is Prior Precedent Dead in the Village of Southampton? Depends on Who You Ask.Typically, zoning variances “run with the land”, and absent a specific time limitation, they continue until properly revoked. See, St. Onge v. Donovan, 71 NY2d 507, [1988]. As a result, variances cannot be made to apply only to the current owner. But under the Fair Housing Act (FHA), reasonable accommodations can be made that are essentially personal variances
Continue Reading Zoning – Reasonable Accommodations Under the Fair Housing Act
Zoning codes are constantly evolving in response to perceived or real threats of overdevelopment. Generally, a municipality may in the reasonable exercise of its police power, amend its zoning code to be more restrictive in the bulk area requirements required for development of a parcel. Known as a “merger provision” when a landowner purchases an adjacent substandard parcel of land,
Continue Reading Single and Separate Exemptions For Substandard Lots
Last week, in The Seaview at Amagansett, Ltd. v. Town of East Hampton Justice Paul J. Baisely, Jr. found the Town of East Hampton and several of its officials in civil and criminal contempt of the Appellate Division, Second Department’s 2021 decision that restricted access to a 4,000-foot long area of oceanfront property commonly known as “Truck Beach” in Napeague,
Continue Reading Town Of East Hampton Runs Aground At Truck Beach
The “Special Use Permit” is a zoning term and process used by a municipality to encourage, but still regulate, land use in a zoning district by making it subject to a special review and criteria detailed in the zoning ordinance. See, Town Law Section 274-b, Village Law Section 7-725-b and City Law Section 27-b.
The “Special Use Permit” also
Continue Reading What’s So Special About Special Use Permits?
In a unanimous decision, the Court of Appeals upheld the Second Department’s decision in Hunters For Deer v Town of Smithtown that the Town may not regulate discharge setbacks for bow and arrow in a manner inconsistent with State law. In that decision, the Second Department held that long bows could not be defined as firearms and that the
Continue Reading Court of Appeals Affirms Appellate Division Decision Invalidating Town’s Discharge Ordinance
On January 4, 2022, the New York Court of Appeals heard oral argument in the case of Hunters For Deer, Inc. v Town of Smithtown, where conflicting provisions of a Town of Smithtown firearm ordinance and the Environmental Conservation Law (ECL) both vie for authority.
This appeal presents questions of preemption and statutory interpretation: whether the State Legislature, in
Continue Reading Slings and Arrows At The Court Of Appeals
Generally, many property owners assume that where a lot is held in single and separate ownership they are entitled to an area variance “as of right.” That is not entirely true. An exception to the single and separate doctrine is the doctrine of merger. Undersized lots that share a common boundary and are owned by the same person or entity
Continue Reading Single and Separate and the Doctrine of Merger