New York City lawyers are asking for the Bruckner Boulevard rezoning lawsuit to be dismissed, arguing that there were “fatal errors” in the filing of the suit.
Bronx Coalition Against Up Zoning Inc., a group of local residents led by accountant and insurance agent John Cerini, filed an Article 78 lawsuit against the city on Feb. 13 calling for the rezoning to be nullified. The rezoning, which was approved by the City Council in October, plans to bring 348 apartments across four buildings in Throggs Neck that range from three to eight stories tall. Local opponents who have been vocal since the proposal’s inception see the project as a threat to their low density neighborhood.
The lawsuit was filed by Buffalo-based environmental lawyer Richard Lippes a mere four hours before the Feb. 13 deadline to challenge the rezoning. In the suit, Lippes argued that the city’s planning department did not properly conduct the environmental review for the project.
The city filed the motion to dismiss in Bronx County Supreme Court on Friday, arguing that the case should be thrown out because the petition was served too late and the project developer wasn’t named as a respondent.
Nathan Taylor, the senior counsel for the city’s environmental law division, said that the petitioners’ arguments in the lawsuit are no more than “quibbles with details of the environmental review that pass by the true engine driving the litigation,” which is that they “simply do not like” the project.
“They have been zealous advocates for their view throughout the land use review process, but ultimately, the City Planning Commission and their elected representatives were not persuaded,” Taylor argued. “Now they have turned to the courts but such policy disagreements are not a legal issue for a court.”
Lippes, the attorney for the project’s opponents, told the Bronx Times in an interview on Monday that he is going to ask for an adjournment to respond to the city’s…
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