HOWELL – Members of the Howell Zoning Board of Adjustment said they are tired with a business operator’s alleged stalling on an application for more than a year following a zoning violation regarding wetlands on the firm’s property (Sakoutis Brothers Disposal) at 113 Route 34, Howell.
Sakoutis Realty is before the board seeking use variance approval and preliminary major site plan approval for the expansion of a nonconforming contractor’s storage and refuse yard.
During a meeting on Nov. 25, board members were informed in a letter from the applicant’s attorney that Sakoutis is still working with the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) regarding the wetlands and a wetlands buffer area. The attorney asked that the matter be rescheduled from Nov. 25 to a meeting in 2020.
The board’s chairman, Wendell Nanson, took issue with carrying the application to 2020 when the application was set to expire on Dec. 31.
The board’s attorney, Ronald Troppoli, said the applicant would have to provide notice to property owners within 200 feet of the parcel about a new hearing date. He said the board could assign the application a hearing date and “that is the proceed or die date. That would be my opinion because you cannot hold up the enforcement of the zoning laws forever.”
The original zoning violation was written on July 16, 2018.
Nanson said the applicant did not even have a site plan.
“This should be the last time it is carried, meaning that when it gets a final date, I might consider a dismissal at that point and time if it comes to that,” Troppoli said.
The board’s planner, Jennifer Beahm, said a violation should not take 18 months to mitigate the DEP issues.
“And these are not new issues. If you recall, this case was before us previously and then withdrawn. So this applicant is well aware of what is required and I honestly feel at this point it is just a stall tactic, because they are able to continue to operate the way they are and (the zoning) violations are stayed while the application is pending before us. So the longer they carry (the application), the better it is for them. They can continue to operate as if it is nothing, there are no issues,” Beahm said.
The firm’s application was filed in November 2018.
Beahm agreed with Troppoli in saying the board should send the applicant a letter which states that if it does not show up the next time the application would be dismissed.
The Sakoutis matter was back before the board on Dec. 9, when attorney Michael Vitiello represented the applicant. Vitiello said he was not the applicant’s attorney during the zoning violation or the attorney who submitted the site plan application, or when the review letters were issued. His said his firm was retained in March.
Vitiello said there is a significant wetlands issue that is being dealt with, as well as the site plan.
“None of it is being dealt with as fast as the board wants and I completely understand that,” he said.
Vitiello asked the board not to dismiss the application that evening. He said the applicant would need about one month to address the issues and to meet with the board’s professionals.
Beahm again questioned why it was taking 18 months to resolve the wetlands issue and Nanson said changing attorneys was another “stall tactic” by the applicant. He said this would be the final time the Sakoutis application was carried.
Board member James Moretti said he believed the applicant was dragging his feet because any engineer could see where the wetlands are and come up with a plan.
Board member Thomas O’Donnell said he was present in 2014 when Vitiello’s client got mad at the board and walked out. He said he has no idea what has occurred at the site since then, but said, “We are not going to put up with people walking out and not taking care of things like they should be doing.”
When the zoning board holds its reorganization meeting in January a new hearing date for the Sakoutis application may be assigned.
