Courts favor city,
neighbors in zoning case

By Lauren Fritsky
Times Staff Writer

For two years, West Torresdale residents worried that a green lot on Legion Street near Avalon would become a townhouse complex.
The vision disturbed them because the area was already being squeezed by development and busied with speeding traffic. A 17-unit building on a lot the Zoning Code said should only fit two homes was not what they needed next.
On Aug. 23, Commonwealth Court agreed. In an 8-1 decision, they reversed a mandamus opinion granted by the courts that would have allowed developer John Arcidiacono, known as John Arch, to carry out the project.
The case was unique because it skipped by the Zoning Board of Adjustment, a common first stop for developers and residents looking to build or alter property, and went straight to the courts after Arch filed a lawsuit against the city.
City Councilman Brian O’Neill (R-10th dist.) believes Arch took the drastic step because the politician interfered on behalf of the West Torresdale Civic Association to stop the Department of Licenses and Inspection from granting the developer a permit to build on the split-zoned land.
"They said there was some political interference," said O’Neill, a lawyer who sits on the city Zoning Code Commission. "But if there hadn’t been, they would have gotten permits to build seventeen townhomes. There’s a process that they have to go through."
In the court’s decision, Commonwealth Court Judge Renée Cohn Jubelirer said the panel agrees with Common Pleas Court that "the exertion of political pressure here to influence the issuance of the permit was wrong." It notes, however, that two of the three requirements for mandamus relief — which means Arch would have been allowed to build as a matter of right — were not met.
At first, it appeared that Arch would get to build in the end.
In 2006, a Common Pleas Court judge ruled in favor of the developer. A three-judge panel later heard an appeal from the city in Commonwealth Court and then referred the case to the nine-judge panel that heard the case on June 13.
Arch already built four houses on the lot adjacent to the one he wants to erect the townhomes on. Three of them are owner-occupied, while the other is leased.
O’Neill said that Arch could file an appeal in the case, but that it’s up to the state Supreme Court to grant it.
The developer’s lawyer, George Bochetto, told the Times an appeal is "certainly under consideration." The attorney was surprised that the court didn’t uphold the previous decision that ruled in his client’s favor.
"We had every reason to believe it would be upheld," he said.
Judd Newton, president of the West Torresdale Civic Association, is happy with the decision, but refuses to get ahead of himself.
He said the neighbors on Canterbury Road whose backyards face the lot Arch wanted to develop are interested in buying the land to protect it from future development attempts.
"I had to inform them that this is just one step," Newton said. "(Arch) still has the opportunity to appeal."
Had the case been decided in the developer’s favor, O’Neill thinks it could have set a dangerous precedent for future community zoning matters.
"It would throw a lot of zoning cases out of the zoning board and into courtrooms," O’Neill said. "It was a nice try but it didn’t work."
Newton lauded the neighbors and the councilman for not backing down to Arch’s attempts.
"We feel like we’ve accomplished something," he said. "It’s the neighbors that kept it going. They know that when you have a good politician who works with you, it protects the neighborhood." ••
Reporter Lauren Fritsky can be reached at 215-354-3038 or lfritsky@phillynews.com