Hebb v. Lamport

• Decision Date: 29 March 1976
• Citation: 4 Mass.App.Ct. 202,344 N.E.2d 899
• Parties: Janet T. HEBB v. Allan LAMPORT et al., trustees.
• Court: Appeals Court of Massachusetts

Page 899

344 N.E.2d 899

4 Mass.App.Ct. 202

Janet T. HEBB

v. Allan LAMPORT et al., trustees.

Appeals Court of Massachusetts, Norfolk.

Argued Jan. 13, 1976.

Decided March 29, 1976.

Stephen Carr Anderson, Boston (Julian J. D'Agostine, West Acton, and William B. Tyler, Boston, with him), for Allan Lamport and another, trustees.

Robert I. Kalis, Foxboro (Leon J. Lombardi, Foxboro, with him), for plaintiff.

John J. McCarthy, Wakefield (Stanley V. Ragalevsky, South Boston, with him), for John W. Keith Builders, Inc., intervenor.

Gael Mahony, and John A. Gilmore, Boston, for Kaufman and Broad Homes, Inc., amicus curiae, submitted a brief.

Before HALE, C.J., and GOODMAN and GRANT, JJ.

GRANT, Justice.

This is a bill in equity (originally filed in a Probate Court but subsequently removed to the Superior Court) brought in 1974 by a resident and registered voter of the town of Stoughton (who is also a landowner therein) to challenge, and to secure a previously requested reversal of, a long standing construction by the town's building inspector of so much of § VI ('DIMENSIONAL AND DENSITY REGULATIONS'), B ('Table of Dimensional and Density Regulations'), of the zoning by-law of the town (as adopted in 1970 and in effect until 1974) as set out the minimum lot area requirement applicable to land lying in the so-called 'Residential-Multifamily' (R-M) zoning districts when used for multifamily dwelling purposes. ¹ The defendants originally named were the building inspector, the town and the planning board of the town. By assent, John W. Keith Builders, Inc. (Keith), a builder and the holder of building permits issued by the building inspector in accordance with his construction of the by-law, and the trustees of Meadowbrook Trust (Meadowbrook), as the owners of land lying in an R-M district and desirous of obtaining building permits, were permitted to intervene as parties defendant.

The case was submitted to a judge of the Superior Court on a brief statement of agreed facts and on copies of the zoning by-laws adopted by the town in 1964 ² and 1970 (the latter as amended in certain respects in 1971) and a copy of an amendment of the aforementioned § VI, B, which was adopted by the town in 1974, shortly after the filing of the plaintiff's bill. The judge excluded testimony proffered by the defendants as to the intention of the draftsmen of the 1970 version of § VI, B, and as to the planning board's subsequent interpretation thereof.

It appears from the agreed facts that the controversy centers on the proper construction of that portion of the by-law's table of dimensional and density regulations which was originally adopted in 1970 and is graphically reproduced in the margin (formula). ³ The plaintiff contends that the formula required a minimum lot area 'for multi-family units in . . . (an) R-M district . . . (of) 6,000 square feet per unit plus 1,000 square feet for each bedroom.' The building inspector's construction had been that the formula required only an initial dedication of 6,000 square feet of land plus 1,000 square feet for each bedroom to be located on the particular lot. During the period from the adoption of the 1970 by-law until the filing of the plaintiff's bill the building inspector had issued building permits for approximately 1,400 multifamily dwelling units in accordance with his construction of the minimum lot area requirements of § VI, B, as then in effect. As of the time of trial (June of 1975) approximately 1,000 of those units (more than 500 of them condominiums) had been constructed and 300 more were under construction. The 1974 amendment of § VI, B, struck out the words '6,000 1,000 per bedroom per unit' appearing in the table of dimensional and density regulations (n. 3, supra) and replaced them with the words '6,000 sq. ft. per dwelling unit plus 1,000 sq. ft. per bedroom per dwelling unit.' ⁴

The judge filed a memorandum of decision in which he ruled in favor of the plaintiff's construction of the formula and ordered the entry of a judgment consistent therewith. Keith and Meadowbrook moved for a new trial and related relief. Kaufman and Broad Homes, Inc. (Kaufman), a developer of a partially completed condominium complex in an R-M district for which 101 various building permits had been issued by the building inspector during 1973 and 1974, moved for (and was granted) leave to be heard as amicus curiae on the form of the judgment. Following a further hearing which is not reported, the judge found that Keith, Meadowbrook and Kaufman had 'acquired substantial rights, incurred substantial obligations, and made substantial investments, all in good faith reliance on the interpretation by the (b)uilding (i)nspector, and . . . (would) suffer substantial loss and harm if the (c)ourt's declaration . . . (should be) applied to them. ⁵ The judgment thereafter entered contained a declaration consistent with the plaintiff's construction of the formula but provided, in effect, that that construction should not be applied to building permits issued to or applied for by Keith, Meadowbrook and Kaufman prior to the date of the filing of the plaintiff's bill (April 9, 1974) but should apply to all permits first applied for after that date. ⁶ The building inspector and Meadowbrook appealed. ⁷

Much of Meadowbrook's argument is devoted to mathematical demonstrations of alleged inconsistencies of the plaintiff's construction with the dimensional and density requirements applicable to uses in other types of zoning districts (see Green v. Board of Appeal of Norwood, 358 Mass. 253, 257--259, 263 N.E.2d 423 (1970)) and to supposedly undesirable results which, it is said, would have flowed from the plaintiff's construction of the formula. It also argues that there was error in excluding the proffered testimony as to the intention of the draftsmen of the 1970 by-law, but we reject the argument because there was nothing to show that any such intention was ever communicated to anyone. See Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., Inc. v. Reading, 354 Mass. 181, 187, 236 N.E.2d 188 (1968); Parmenter v. Board of Appeals of Grafton, 360 Mass. 852, 274 N.E.2d 351 (1971).

The plaintiff argues that her construction of the formula would have yielded minimum lot sizes consistent with those required by the table of dimensional and density regulations for dwelling units located in other types of residentially zoned districts. The plaintiff also seeks to emphasize the action taken by the town meeting in 1974, which she says confirms her construction of the formula. The difficulty with that contention is that in the absence of any indication of what may have motivated the town meeting (such as a report of the planning board under G.L. c. 40A, § 6, as in effect prior to St.1975, c. 808, § 3), we have no means of knowing whether the intention was to overrule the building inspector's construction or was to adopt an entirely new policy with respect to density requirements applicable to multifamily dwellings lying in R-M districts. ⁸

There does not appear to be any real dispute between the plaintiff and Meadowbrook as to the ordinary principles of construction which should be employed to determine the intended meaning of the formula in question. 'None of the words of a . . . (by-law) is to be regarded so superfluous, but each is to be given its ordinary meaning without overemphasizing its effect upon the other terms appearing in the . . . (by-law), so that the enactment considered as a whole shall constitute a consistent and harmonious . . . (legislative) provision capable of effectuating the presumed intention of the . . . (town meeting).' Bolster v. Commissioner of Corps. & Taxn., 319 Mass. 81, 84--85, 64 N.E.2d 645, 647 (1946). Accord, e.g., Commonwealth v. Woods Hole, Martha's Vineyard & Nantucket S. S. Authy., 352 Mass. 617, 618, 227 N.E.2d 357 (1967). Compare Selectmen of Hatfield v. Garvey, 362 Mass. 821, 826, 291 N.E.2d 593, 596 (1973) ('Generally, a zoning by-law must be read in its complete context and be given a sensible meaning within that context.').

We think the building inspector's construction violated those principles by ignoring certain words appearing on the face of the formula and by taking the entire formula out of context. His construction attributed no functional or other significance to the concluding words 'per unit' and paid no heed to the additional and almost immediately ensuing verbal requirement of § VI, G, 3 of the by-law that '(t)he minimum lot area required per each individual dwelling unit . . . shall be multiplied by the number of such units to obtain the minimum lot area required for the total tract of land' (emphasis supplied). ⁹ That section focuses on the ultimate question which must be answered by a developer of multifamily housing, by the planning board, and by the building inspector, namely, the total number of individual dwelling units which can be constructed on any given area of land lying in an R-M district. It does so by first concentrating on '(t)he minimum lot area required per each individual dwelling unit.' The quoted words, when taken in the context of multifamily dwellings, obviously refer to the formula '6,000 1,000 per bedroom per unit' which appeared in the immediately preceding table of dimensional and density regulations in the column entitled 'Minimum Lot Area (sq. ft.)' (see n. 3).

The plaintiff's construction of the formula meshes with the verbal requirement of § VI, G, 3, by yielding a minimum lot area measured in terms of the area required for each individual dwelling unit, a quantity capable of ready and direct translation into the total number of dwelling units which could properly have been constructed on any given area of land. The building inspector's construction did not mesh with § VI, G, 3, because it yielded a minimum lot area which (apart from the initial dedication of 6,000 square feet) was measured in terms of total numbers of bedrooms, completely...