Spot Zoning

A group of landowners that includes township Supervisor Lester Balderston has launched a zoning-law challenge that could result in construction of up to 1,500 housing units on farms its members own. The landowners, who together have about 300 acres, have formed the Dolington Land Group to try to win the zoning change. They filed an application last week to appear before the Zoning Hearing Board. The action was made public at the Board of Supervisors meeting Wednesday night.

Local officials acknowledged yesterday that they made a colossal error when, just weeks before concluding broad changes in the master plan, they scrapped a law requiring that residents be notified of the rezoning. "You learn from your mistakes," said Council President John Rogale. "If I had it to do over again, I would have held a public hearing on each of the separate issues and zoning changes. " Instead, Rogale was nearly smothered last week by more than 150 phone calls from residents who feared that the township was about to rezone their land and dramatically raise their taxes.

The Zoning Hearing Board has thrown out the contention of four residents that the township commissioners engaged in spot zoning when they designated as institutional 15 1/2 acres at Limekiln Pike and Dillon Road, the possible future site of an assisted-living facility. But Wednesday, the zoning board postponed until Dec. 18 a ruling on the merit of residents' arguments that the commissioners made procedural errors when they approved the zoning change. The board requested the transcripts of last year's hearings on the matter.

Call it Multiplex: The Sequel. Zoning board members tonight are going to review a plan for a 20-screen theater proposed by American Multi-Cinema Inc. of Kansas City, Mo. The property lies about one mile south of another AMC multiplex, the Marlton 8 Theatre next to the Greentree Shopping Center on Route 73. The new 3,710-seat multiplex would be located behind the Marlton Crossing Shopping Center, on a 22.5-acre parcel zoned for commercial use...

The Township Council has introduced a zoning change that would allow a day- care center and a personal-care facility along Route 352. If approved, the R-2 residential district would allow campuslike, low- intensity uses to serve as a transition between commercial uses, such as the Granite Run Mall, and residential properties. The amendment was drafted to allow day-care centers and personal care facilities as a conditional use in the R-2 district. The amendment outlines a number of lot requirements, including a minimum lot size of 3 1/2 acres and a minimum of 200 feet of frontage on Routes 352 or 452. During the meeting Monday night, Ira Dury, equitable owner of property at 25 N. Middletown Rd., outlined his proposal for a day-care center that would accommodate 120 children.

The shopping center war is not over. After 19 months of stormy municipal meetings on plans to build a shopping complex on a Lower Salford farm, the struggle may be moving to a Norristown courtroom. Members of a residents' group plan to appeal a decision by the Lower Salford Board of Supervisors to rezone residentially-zoned farmland for the center. The Harleysville Committee for Responsible Government is expected to file the appeal in Common Pleas Court this week, according to Alan Starman, the group's president.

The township's 13-page proposal to revise the zoning ordinance met with strong opposition from residents, Planning Commission members and one supervisor on Wednesday night, as the Board of Supervisors struggled to approve a comprehensive plan to manage burgeoning land development in the region. They came within breaths of voting. Supervisors Chairman George Collie said he was ready, and so did Supervisor Janet French. But in the final minutes of the 4 1/2-hour board meeting, the supervisors delayed the vote until June 22. Supervisor Raymond Stepnoski requested more time to review the sign-ordinance revisions and said he wanted a fresh copy of the ordinance with all the amendments.

For Springfield Hospital officials, it's a matter of survival. For the Springfield Area League of Women Voters, it's a matter of good government. These two respected Springfield institutions find themselves in opposite camps in a zoning dispute over the proposed expansion of the hospital. Come next month, the township Board of Commissioners will have to choose sides. Hospital officials are asking the township to amend the zoning code to fit the hospital's expansion needs. The hospital, which is losing $1 million a year, sees its salvation in the construction of a $25 million "wellness center" that would create a niche for it in the competitive local health-care market.

The third time is often the charm, but not for the Gloria Dei Hilltop Corp., which wants a zoning change to build an apartment complex for senior citizens on a 36-acre tract it owns on Valley Hill Trail. For the third time in a year, the township Planning Commission denied Gloria Dei's request for the zoning change at its Monday meeting. The commission voted unanimously against allowing the land to be rezoned from residential to high density, effectively ruling against the proposed 150-unit apartment complex for those 55 and older.

Two recent actions - one in the courts, the other in the legislature - may bode well for opponents of a rezoning plan in the Blenheim section. This month, a Camden County Superior Court judge denied the township's request to dismiss a case filed by three residents. The homeowners are challenging state regulations on notifying property owners about rezoning in their area. The state requires that municipalities post legal notices of rezoning proposals in local newspapers. The plaintiffs say such notices don't reach enough of the people who could be affected.