Zoning Board Misinterpreted Term “Auditorium” to Require Fixed Seating and Thereby Wrongly Prohibited Use of Property as a Night Club or Dance Club

The Third Department determined the zoning board of appeals had misinterpreted the term “auditorium” in its ruling that a “Rave party,” night club or dance club violated the permitted use of the petitioner’s building.  In so ruling, the Third Department explained its role in reviewing a determination by a zoning board:

Courts will annul a determination of a board of zoning appeals only if it is irrational or unreasonable … . Although a reviewing court will generally grant deference to the interpretation of an ambiguous zoning ordinance by a board of zoning appeals, where, as here, “the issue presented is one of pure legal interpretation of the underlying zoning law or ordinance, deference is not required” … .Moreover, “[z]oning regulations, being in derogation of the common law, must be strictly construed against the municipality which has enacted and seeks to enforce them, and any ambiguity in the language used must be resolved in favor of the property owner”… .

* * * Resolving, as we must, any ambiguity in favor of petitioner, we conclude that the BZA’s determination that the proposed use was impermissible – based solely upon its limited interpretation of the definition of auditorium as requiring fixed seating, to the exclusion of other commonly accepted definitions – was irrational and unreasonable… . Albany Basketball & Sports Corporation … v City of Albany, 517313, 3rd Dept 4-3-14