Group says Dalton's future in jeopardy

By RALPH BARTHOLDT

Staff Writer

The expansive spaces that have given Dalton Gardens neighborhoods a unique rural feel, and allowed for residents to be on septic systems, are being jeopardized by a council decision to allow backyard developments.

That’s the contention of a group of Dalton Gardens residents who say the city has purposefully hidden from public view a deal it made with one family to allow development of a four-lot, backyard subdivision, which is prohibited by city code.

The group, which posts its concerns on a Save Dalton Gardens Facebook page, fears the city is setting a dangerous precedent that will affect the future of their community.

Dalton Gardens Mayor Steve Roberge, however, says the small urban development on the 7000 block of 16th Street that the city has agreed upon was the result of a court settlement.

The city was sued by a longstanding Dalton Gardens family who wanted to develop lots on their property, which was subdivided in 1975, before the current zoning ordinance was in place.

The city ordinance allows only development of lots with public road frontage.

The lots, owned by the Streeter family, located in the back of the family home — a large undeveloped meadow at 7024 16th St. — were subdivided months before the ordinance took effect more than 40 years ago, Roberge said. And the city, after two years of contending with a lawsuit from the Streeters and spending $30,000 on litigation, recently opted to mediate a solution.

“Our attorney said it was well within our purview to do this,” Roberge said Monday. “We had to make a tough decision.”

The decision to allow the subdivision doesn’t sit well with neighbors who think it will open the door to more landowners wanting to slice their 5-acre properties into saleable lots.

The issue began in the autumn of 1975 when Jack and Marie Streeter, seeking to offset an upcoming city plan requiring 110 feet of road frontage on lots slated for development, made arrangements for a small subdivision, complete with an easement from 16th Street.

One of the problems with the plan, according to Jeff Crandall, a founder of Save Dalton Gardens, is its lack of a plat. Despite creating a subdivision, the Streeters did not have it recorded until 1978, years after the ordinance took effect.

“This means the lots were never legally divided,” Crandall said.

In addition, Crandall and other Save Dalton Gardens advocates say the current City Council opted to accept part of the Streeters’ recent proposal to move forward with the subdivision 43 years later without any public hearings, or variance approvals open to public scrutiny.

Crandall accuses the city of giving the Streeters a nonconforming use permit to develop the lots, although the lots do not fit the description of the ordinance outlining nonconforming use permits.

“The city does not have the authority to grant nonconforming use certificates for lots lacking public street frontage, but only for lots that are too narrow, too shallow, or smaller than 1 acre,” said Crandall, an attorney.

Dalton Gardens neighbor and Save Dalton Gardens organizer Peggy Leonard said the city in the past has required applications for a variance and hearings for remedial items such as a setback for a fence, but the council scuttled hearings for the Steeters’ subdivision before approving it.

“This seems a bigger issue than a 5-foot fence, so why not have the same rules?” Leonard said.

The city a year ago — prior to allowing for the subdivision — told the Streeters their subdivision plans were illegal.

According to paperwork in the lawsuit, the council denied the Streeters’ plans in a June 23, 2017, letter because the proposed properties did not front a public street, were not part of a plat, did not qualify for grandfather rights, and there was no request for a variance.

Roberge said the city reneged on its earlier decision, and issued the nonconforming use permit in an effort to settle the lawsuit.

The Streeters have been paying taxes on the separate lots, instead of one 5-acre parcel, for 42 years, Roberge said. The latest agreement scales back the Streeters’ plan to allow development of four lots instead of five lots.

“We didn’t just give in,” Roberge said. “We tried to look at all of the factors to make this decision.”

Neighbor Jim Kimball, who, as a regional manager for the Department of Environmental Quality, was instrumental in the early 1970s to push for Dalton Gardens to remain on septic systems, said if more similar developments are allowed it could jeopardize the city’s special status, ushering in sewer system requirements by the state.

“I want to make sure this agreement doesn’t jeopardize the city,” Kimball said.

Roberge said that will not happen.

“I look at this decision based on this property,” Roberge said. “We’re not setting a precedent. This doesn’t mean that all ordinances are off.”

Crandall said his group is considering further litigation.

City residents are questioning the decision, and council members have not been responsive, he said.

“It’s not going to be hard to get people fired up about this,” Crandall said. “Because they already are.”