Agenda - Planning Commission - 08/04/1998

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Z.B. July 25, 1998 -- Page 5 The court affirmed the board's decision, and Klein appealed again. DECISION: Affirmed. The evidence supported the board's decision. Essentially, Klein was asking the court to rule that the zoning board had to allow a business to operate in a residential zone whenever the owner showed the business would be as discreet as the permitted uses. This would subject all residential zoning to mandatory exceptions based on intensity of use and would make home-occupation regulations superfluous. : Klein had the option of either moving into the condo -- which he said he planned to do eventually or selling the property. Even if the zoning restric- tion did make Klein's condo unmarketable, which he never proved, the fact that the property could be put to a more beneficial use didn't create an unnec- essary hardship because there were less profitable alternatives available. Fi- nally, Klein's claim of hardship was self-created, albeit in ignorance rather than defiance of the law. see also: Consolidated Management b~c. v. Cleveland, 452 N.E. 2d 1287 (1983). Zoning Violation -- Township orders skydiving business to shut down Citation: Smith v. Zoning Hearing Board of Conewago Township, Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, No. 2002 C.D. 1997 (1998) Smith leased land at the Gebharts' airport in Conewago Township, Pa., and began running a skydiving business. As business expanded, he put a mobile home on the property to use as an office. .. A few months later, the township zoning officer ordered Smith and the Gebharts (owners) to stop operating the skydiving business because it wasn't a permitted use in the agricultural district. The cease and desist order also cited them for putting a mobile home on the property without a permit and for engaging in a use skydiving m that wasn't permitted in the district. The owners appealed to the zoning board, claiming federal law preempted the township from regulating any activities, including skydiving, at the airport. The owners argued skydiving was an accessory use to an airport. They also claimed skydiving was a legal nonconforming use at the airport because the Gebharts began running a skydiving business when the airport opened in 1969. (They had shut the business down two or three years later.) The board affirmed the order, finding the owners violated the zoning ordinance by failing to get a permit for the mobile home. It also determined federal law didn't preempt the township's ability to regulate skydiving and that skydiving wasn't an accessory use to the airport. The owners appealed to court. They relied on a case in which a federal court in New York struck down an ordinance because it conflicted with federal law in the area of parachute jumping. The ordinance had restricted when, where, and how jumps could occur, and prohibited jumps at night and over spectators. It'-I