Warrington fire site March, 2016 site.
Paul Goldfinger, Editor @Blogfinger
We recently learned that the lawsuit brought by the Warrington Hotel lawyer, aimed at forcing the Township to give back the pre-fire permissions for a boutique hotel, had been dismissed.
The judge evidently ruled that the Township was correct in insisting on only a single family house at that location.
Since then, no work has been done at the Warrington Hotel site–now just a foundation. (see below)
Here is a report of what is happening now after the fire, spreading voraciously along Seaview Avenue, destroyed several homes.
One of the cottages that vanished at the western edge of the fire, adjacent to the historic yellow house at Founder’s Park, will not be rebuilt because the lot has been purchased by the yellow house owner who wants the location as a buffer.
Continuing to move eastward along Seaview Avenue, there is construction underway at one lot.
One of the cottages that was consumed in the conflagration, fronting on Seaview Avenue, is now being built from scratch, with framing now to two stories. The previous Warrington Hotel had a 3 foot easement there out to Seaview Ave., but that easement is now gone and unavailable.
That leaves the most eastward cottage on Seaview Ave. that was destroyed. Evidently, the owner of the Warrington wants to buy that property which would give him an easement from the Warrington location out to Seaview. Evidently the owner refused to sell, but we’re not sure where that story is now.
As for the hotel site itself, even though the zoning allows a single family home, land use law says that nothing can be built there without access to Seaview Ave., because you can’t build on a land-locked lot. Lake Avenue is not a street.
These circumstances suggests that the owner of the Warrington property may not even be allowed to go single family, in which case the lot may now be useless.
And, by the way, we still don’t know if the feds finished the arson investigation or if the Warrington owner has appealed the court case.
ROBERT GOULET
“On a Clear Day.”
Joe,
An easement to accommodate a 21 unit development must be 40 feet wide.
The property that the easement is claimed to be on is only 23 feet wide and zoned to accommodate a single family house.
Maybe the easement is to permit a helicopter to land.
More questions that must be answered by the township:
Does a lease holder of the OGCMA with a non-conforming lot have the right to grant an easement that makes his lot even more non-conforming?
Does the Township have the right to zone for uses greater than single family when the OGCMA lease does not include any wording within the lease for any use except for a single family use?
Since the OGCMA does not have zoning power, then the OGCMA lease can only permit a single family use since all OGCMA lots are nonconforming for each leasehold.
The Township must by law zone all areas within OG for single family uses. Therefore, its zoning for OG that permits any and all other uses except for single family uses is in violation of law and in contempt of a court order.
Therefore the Planning Board, the Board of Adjustment and the Township have knowingly been using zoning that clearly is in violation of law to grant uses and density in OG to harm and endanger the residents of OG.
Kevin Chambers
Not all easements appear on tax maps….
The Court was correct in its ruling. There is a very serious issue here that is not being addressed. Each lot in OG is held by a private contract between two parties, the OGCMA and the lease holder.
Has the Board of Adjustment been given the right to enter into this private contract and change the use of the contract?
Has the OGCMA given the Board of Adjustment the right to enter into any of its contracts and change the use of any of the OGCMA contracts?
Until those questions are answered by the township, there should be no further variances granted for uses other than a single family use in OG or for any lot in OG.
Kevin Chambers
Paul,
You were correct, there never was an easement from the Warrington to Seaview Ave, it would have been on the tax map.
Another example of our incompetent Board of Adjustment, relying on their ‘experts’, instead of simply checking the tax map themselves.
The Warrington ‘lot’ is landlocked. Let’s see how the Land Use Administrator wiggles out of this one.