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From: DC for Reasonable Development [dc4reality@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, May 20, 2013 4:27 PM
To: press@dc4reality.com
Cc: admo4rd@gmail.com
Subject: PRESS ALERT: Court Decision in Major Brookland Development
Col. Brooks Neighbors Win in Court
DC Court of Appeals Sends PUD Case Back to Zoning Commission
The neighbors of the former Colonel Brooks' Tavern at 9th & Monroe Streets, NE, won a victory in the DC Court of Appeals on Friday. The District's highest court ruled that the Zoning Commission needed to further justify how its approval of a six-story, mixed-use Planned Unit Development (PUD) for the Brookland site conforms to the District's Comprehensive Plan.
The decision supports neighbors, known as the 200-Footers because they live within 200 feet of the proposed development and who have opposed the project from the start. "While the Court did not reverse ZC's decision outright and judge that the application be denied," says Carolyn Steptoe, Vice Chairperson of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 5B, "...the Court however did make clear that the ZC must make adequate findings of fact on several material issues which they failed to address or explain."
The Zoning Commission now has to explain: a) how this 200-unit development conforms to what Comprehensive Plan designates as "low density residential," b) how the destruction and replacement of existing freestanding homes conforms to the Comprehensive Plan's explicit preference for maintaining existing residential structures and neighborhoods, and c) how this project can be approved for an area designated in the Comprehensive Plan as a Neighborhood Conservation Area meaning that changes be "modest in scale."
"In this case the Court refused to allow the Zoning Commission to violate and ignore the District's Comprehensive Plan, which establishes mandatory protections for every neighborhood and community in the city," said Oliver Hall, the attorney for the appeal of the West End PUD now pending before the Court. "The Court should do the same in the West End and Hine School cases now before the Court and reverse the Zoning Commission's order greenlighting these PUDs."
The Court "remanded" the case back to the Zoning Commission. Director Harriet Tregoning's Office of Planning, on which the Commission largely depends for interpreting the Comprehensive Plan, must now explain its approval of the PUD.
"The 200 footers have done a great service for all their neighbors near Metro property," said John Feely on Brookland listserv. "Their stand will send a message to other developers and the Office of Planning that a cavalier attitude to the rights of homeowners and the comprehensive plan process will not go unnoticed. It may well embolden other neighbors to begin to mobilize and prepare for the onslaught coming their way. "
copy of the ruling >> http://www.dcappeals.gov/internet/documents/12-AA-973.pdf
### end ###
DC Court of Appeals Sends PUD Case Back to Zoning Commission
The neighbors of the former Colonel Brooks' Tavern at 9th & Monroe Streets, NE, won a victory in the DC Court of Appeals on Friday. The District's highest court ruled that the Zoning Commission needed to further justify how its approval of a six-story, mixed-use Planned Unit Development (PUD) for the Brookland site conforms to the District's Comprehensive Plan.
The decision supports neighbors, known as the 200-Footers because they live within 200 feet of the proposed development and who have opposed the project from the start. "While the Court did not reverse ZC's decision outright and judge that the application be denied," says Carolyn Steptoe, Vice Chairperson of Advisory Neighborhood Commission 5B, "...the Court however did make clear that the ZC must make adequate findings of fact on several material issues which they failed to address or explain."
The Zoning Commission now has to explain: a) how this 200-unit development conforms to what Comprehensive Plan designates as "low density residential," b) how the destruction and replacement of existing freestanding homes conforms to the Comprehensive Plan's explicit preference for maintaining existing residential structures and neighborhoods, and c) how this project can be approved for an area designated in the Comprehensive Plan as a Neighborhood Conservation Area meaning that changes be "modest in scale."
"In this case the Court refused to allow the Zoning Commission to violate and ignore the District's Comprehensive Plan, which establishes mandatory protections for every neighborhood and community in the city," said Oliver Hall, the attorney for the appeal of the West End PUD now pending before the Court. "The Court should do the same in the West End and Hine School cases now before the Court and reverse the Zoning Commission's order greenlighting these PUDs."
The Court "remanded" the case back to the Zoning Commission. Director Harriet Tregoning's Office of Planning, on which the Commission largely depends for interpreting the Comprehensive Plan, must now explain its approval of the PUD.
"The 200 footers have done a great service for all their neighbors near Metro property," said John Feely on Brookland listserv. "Their stand will send a message to other developers and the Office of Planning that a cavalier attitude to the rights of homeowners and the comprehensive plan process will not go unnoticed. It may well embolden other neighbors to begin to mobilize and prepare for the onslaught coming their way. "
copy of the ruling >> http://www.dcappeals.gov/internet/documents/12-AA-973.pdf
### end ###
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