Politics & Government

Handsome Dispute Turns Ugly

A developer has filed a lawsuit claiming the town, the Planning & Zoning Commission and its chairman and an alternate member conspired to stop his industrial project.

A developer contends town zoning officials were so angered by an affordable housing plan he wanted to bring forward, that they conspired to block an extension on a special permit for a separate industrial project — which had already been approved.

Handsome Inc. and its attorney, Dominick J. Thomas Jr., filed a lawsuit against the Town of Monroe, the Planning & Zoning Commission, P&Z Chairman Richard Zini, Land Use Dir. Scott Schatzlein and Karen Martin, who is an alternate on the commission.

The legal action was brought to Superior Court in Bridgeport on July 20 and it has a return date of Aug. 9.

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The president of Handsome Inc. is Todd Cascella of Easton and his wife, Mona, is secretary.

"The lawsuit speaks for itself," Thomas said Friday. "We also filed an FOI relating to the illegal executive session. There was no basis for an executive session. It was just to put onerous conditions on our client."

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When reached at his law office Thursday, Town Attorney John P. Fracassini said the town had no comment on the pending litigation.

The plaintiffs are claiming "money damages in an amount greater than $15,000" with interest, attorneys' fees and costs, punitive damages and "such other and further relief as in law or equity may appertain."

According to the lawsuit, Handsome Inc. applied for a special permit needed to build on a 9.9 acre property at 125 Garder Road, which is in a D-1 industrial use zone in 2003. The P&Z approved the permit and a site plan for an industrial building there on March 20,2003.

The approval was effective for five years, until May 15,2008.

About one month before it was set to expire, the plaintiffs requested an extension, because they said they could not build due to "economic and related factors."

Several months before it sought the renewal of the special permit, Handsome Inc. had filed a separate application with the P&Z to build 32 units of affordable housing on another Monroe property the developer owned.

The suit claims the commission immediately indicated its disfavor with plans for an affordable housing complex and hired special legal counsel "to advise it on how best to conduct the hearings and arrange the evidence so as to assure that the defendant Commission's rejection of the affordable housing application would survive a court challenge."

At its April 24,2008 meeting, Handsome claims the P&Z voted 5-0 not to allow an extension for the permit for 125 Garder Road without asking any questions of the applicant and his engineer, who were present.

"One member of the defendant Commission openly stated that he already formed his opinion that the site was nothing but a mining operation and that construction of the industrial building on the site was secondary to the operation going on there," the suit alleges.

It goes on to say, "Another member, the defendant Commissioner Richard Zini (now the chairman of the defendant Commission), pressed the planner to find zoning violations but the planner responded that concerns raised were investigated and determined that no violation had occurred. Dissatisfied, ... Zini went on to, in his own words, 'beat up' the application criticizing the applicant's work and that of the town planner and the zoning enforcement officer."

The commission also wanted the plaintiff's application to start from scratch, according to the lawsuit. If Handsome submitted a new application, the P&Z could deny it because Garder Road is now a scenic road, according to the suit.

At the time, Monroe's town planner was Dan Tuba and the ZEO was Jack Brandt, both men have retired over the past year.

A Scenic Road

After the special permit and site application for 125 Garder Road was approved in 2003, the suit says Karen Martin, an alternate on the P&Z, purchased a home close to the property and became "the lead proponent of a petition to have Garder Road declared a scenic road so that it would not be further developed and so as to impede completion of the plaintiff Handsome's industrial project."

Handsome appealed the P&Z's denial of its special permit renewal to the Superior Court, and on Sept. 10,2010, Judge Howard Owens' decision was to overturn the town's denial, according to the lawsuit.

On Oct. 1,2010, Handsome's attorney, Matthew Ranelli applied to the commission for a full five-year renewal. But the suit claims that for six months the P&Z refused to even schedule the matter for discussion at any of its regular meetings.

Tax Lien Foreclosure

The town commenced "non-judicial tax lien foreclosure" proceedings against Handsome's property for unpaid property taxes "caused by the illegal and arbitrary refusal to renew the special permit. A tax auction of the property was scheduled for April 7,2011," the suit alleges.

Only when the foreclosure proceedings were aborted upon payment of the taxes by the plaintiffs' mortgage lender did the P&Z commission begin to consider compliance with the court ruling, the suit states.

On Friday, April 29,2011, the lawsuit says Land Use Dir. Scott Schatzlein, First Selectman Steve Vavrek and "another individual" appeared at 125 Garder Road "unannounced" and "falsely accused the plaintiffs Todd Cascella and Handsome of working on the site in violation of a cease and desist order that had [been] issued in March of 2008 when no such order was in effect."

"The First Selectman stated that the alternate commission member, defendant Karen Martin, was 'having a fit' claiming Handsome was working without a permit and that the defendant Commission chairman, Richard Zini, was 'going ballistic'."

The plaintiff also claims Schatzlein falsely accused Handsome of blasting without a permit.

"The defendant Scott Schatzlein then threatened that he could require a cash bond of over $100,000.00 if he so desired and expressed doubt that the plaintiffs could post that kind of bond," the suit alleges.

'Illegal' Executive Session

On May 5,2011, "Garder Road - Compliance with extension of approval" was listed on the P&Z meeting agenda under "For information purposes only," according to the suit.

Todd Cascella decided to attend the meeting with his zoning attorney and the commission immediately voted to go into executive session, the plaintiff says.

"In reality, the illegal executive session was held for the illegal purpose of developing a plan, in conjunction with the land use director (Scott Schatzlein) and unseated alternate member (the defendant Karen Martin) and the defendant Chairman Richard Zini, and with the full knowledge of the first selectman, as to the methods and means that they could use to prevent the plaintiff from proceeding further with its industrial project while paying lip service to the court judgement against the defendant Commission," the suit alleges.

After executive session, the commission moved the issue from item 22 on the agenda "Legal issues" to item 15 "Other business."

The commission voted 5-0 to make the approval for a renewed special permit retroactive from the end of March 8,2008 to the end of March, 2013, allegedly to not leave enough time for Handsome to complete the project, thus ending it.

"In its rush the defendant Commission neglected to also require the plaintiffs submit plans for the improvement of Garder Road," the suit claims.

As a result, sometime between May 5,2011, and May 13,2011, the commission, "without notice to the plaintiffs or the public, or an opportunity to be heard, secretly decided to impose a further condition on the renewal of the special permit," the suit claims.

The suit charges the condition to submit Garder Road improvement plans to the commission within 30 days was for the sole purpose of providing some factual basis to demand a $100,000 or higher performance bond, "guaranteeing the termination of" the project.

The plaintiffs said they found out about the new condition through a letter from Schatzlein dated May 13, 2011, "even though said condition was never part of the open meeting discussion or vote, but was only discussed and planned in the illegal executive session."

Handsome further contends that it had never before been required to put up a performance bond for this project.

In addition to claiming the P&Z did not give Handsome Inc.'s application fair consideration and that the defendants "evidenced a predetermination to deny the plaintiffs' applications and a prejudice against the plaintiffs," the lawsuit claims the town deprived them of their rights under the fifth and fourteenth amendments to the U.S. Constitution.


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