NY Appellate Court Upholds Dismissal of Based on Lack of Standing

This post was authored by Hillel Weiss, Jacob D. Fuchsberg Touro Law Center

A private religious educational institution in Clarkstown, entered into a contract to purchase a new property for the expansion of their educational offerings and to act as a house of worship. The school sought permits from the Building Department to conduct repairs on the newly purchased property. The building inspector determined that no permits would be forthcoming as a special variance was necessary. Pursuant to the Zoning Local Law of the Town of Clarkstown chapter 290, there were two issues of noncompliance with the new property: 1) A school of general instruction required a minimum frontage that the new property lacked; and 2) access to a state or county major or secondary road is required for nonresidential uses in residential districts with discontinued use for one year.

The school appealed this decision and alternatively requested a variance. Subsequently, the school failed to close on the property and the owner revoked consent for any land use applications related to the property, after which the ZBA declined to consider the matter further.

In response, the school made a Freedom of Information Law request for all details pertaining to the Town’s consideration of the property and all related materials. When the Town failed to respond within the required 10 days, the school brought a hybrid claim against the permitting decision and the failure to furnish the Freedom of Information Law request.

The temporal aspects of this case, namely the school’s decision to not close on the property, meant that the school lacked standing as there was no injury-in-fact. Even the claim that the frustration of the bargain itself was an injury, was unsubstantiated. The court reasoned that because zoning laws are intended to protect health, safety and welfare, the protection of the parties’ economic interests fall outside of the zone of interests protected by zoning interests.

The Court upheld the FOIL claim, and the determination of the reimbursement of reasonable attorneys’ fees and litigation costs was remitted to the Supreme Court.

Ateres Bais Yaakov Academy of Rockland v Town of Clarkstown, 2023 WL 4340224 (NYAD 2 Dept. 7/5/2023)