Environmental Judge Vacates
Ruling on Sunset Hill Apts.
By M. D. Drysdale

In a strongly worded opinion issued last week, Environmental Judge Meredith Wright rejected last fall's decision of the Randolph Development Review Board (DRB) in turning down a nine-unit apartment building on Sunset Hill Road.

The apartment building has been proposed by realtor Kevin Blakeman of Sharon and has been determinedly opposed by residents of that road. The proposed development is a permitted use under current zoning but needs site plan approval from the DRB.

Blakeman's proposal has become one of the most controversial cases in Randolph zoning, and the Oct. 31, 2006 DRB decision came in a 4-3 split vote, in which the dissenting three members filed their own dissenting opinion, saying that Blakeman should have been granted a permit.

Last week the Vermont Environmental Court came down solidly on Blakeman's side, vacating the Oct. 31 DRB ruling and employing unusually blunt language critical of the majority opinion in that ruling.

Judge Wright did not, however, specifically order the DRB to grant a permit. She ruled that "the decision of the DRB is not supported by substantial evidence in the record as a whole, and the conclusions are not supported by DRB's findings."

Then she remanded the case back to the board "for further proceedings consistent with this decision, which may include its determination of appropriate conditions and safeguards..."

Strenuous Differences

What happens next is an open question. The two sides had an immediate and strenuous difference of opinion as to what Judge Wright had actually decided.

"In my view, the board has to issue a permit," said Blakeman's lawyer, Brice Simon of Stowe. "There is no latitude to reopen the hearing and make different findings. The permit is granted, with whatever conditions are appropriate."

Not so, responded DRB chair Joel Tillberg with vigor.

"Judge Wright did not say that Kevin Blakeman gets a permit. She could have directed us to grant a permit, but did not do that," he said.

"What I read from that opinion is that the written decision did not contain enough evidence," he said, declaring that the DRB now could reopen the case, and take new evidence that could be used to back up its conclusion according to Judge Wright's standard.

He showed no inclination to reconsider the board's denial of the permit. "I think we made the right decision," Tillberg said.

Atty. Peter Nolan, who handled the case for the town, said he wanted to "ponder" the ruling. His first inclination is to believe the board could re-open the hearing "to decide whether it had enough evidence to make the findings she wants," he said.

Atty. Simon responded that it was not simply a matter of the DRB not explaining its evidence clearly enough.

Judge Wright "looked at the entire record," he said. "She actually listened to the tapes of the hearing- everything that was said at those hearings was available to her. She determined that the findings were not supported by the record as a whole."

Taking new evidence on the case would "smack of a personal vendetta" against Blakeman, his attorney said. "If they do anything other than issue a permit with appropriate conditions, they would be subject to an appeal."

The DRB has its next meeting Aug. 21. The Blakeman decision is not on the agenda, said Zoning Administrator Mardee Sanchez, but it could be taken up. Any deliberations would have to be on the record, she said, not in deliberative session.