Worcester County Christian Communications, Inc. v. Board of Appeals of Spencer.

• Decision Date: 16 April 1986
• Citation: 22 Mass.App.Ct. 83,491 N.E.2d 634
• Parties: WORCESTER COUNTY CHRISTIAN COMMUNICATIONS, INC. v. BOARD OF APPEALS OF SPENCER.
• Court: Appeals Court of Massachusetts

Page 634

491 N.E.2d 634

22 Mass.App.Ct. 83

WORCESTER COUNTY CHRISTIAN COMMUNICATIONS, INC. v. BOARD OF APPEALS OF SPENCER.

Appeals Court of Massachusetts Worcester.

Argued Jan. 10, 1986.

Decided April 16, 1986.

Lawrence F. Army, Worcester, for defendant.

Robert R. Waldo, Holden, for plaintiff.

Before GRANT, PERRETTA and WARNER, JJ.

PERRETTA, Justice.

After waiting a little over three months for the Spencer building inspector to act on its application for a permit to build a radio tower and ground broadcasting system, the plaintiff filed an appeal with the defendant board, asking the board to issue the permit. Construing the plaintiff's request as one for an order directing the inspector to act on the application, the board refused to issue any such directive. The reason given by the board was that the plaintiff could obtain a permit only if it were exempt from zoning on the ground that it intended to use the radio station for religious or educational purposes. See G.L. c. 40A, § 3. ¹ However, because the plaintiff's articles of organization (filed under G.L. c. 180) did not authorize it to advance religious purposes and because a "radio station is not educational in the sense that it should be exempt" from zoning regulation, it was unnecessary to order the inspector to act. On the plaintiff's appeal under G.L. c. 40A, § 17, the judge concluded that the plaintiff was entitled to the exemption. He annulled the board's decision and remanded the matter, ordering the board to direct the inspector to act on the plaintiff's application. We conclude that whether the plaintiff is exempt under § 3 is still an open question which must be decided, in the first instance, by the inspector. We amend the judgment to reflect our conclusion, and as amended, we affirm.

1. Alleged jurisdictional defect. In arguing for a reversal of the judgment, the board challenges the court's jurisdiction under G.L. c. 40A, § 17, by attacking its own jurisdiction to hear and decide the plaintiff's appeal under G.L. c. 40A, § 8, and § VII(B)(1) of the Spencer zoning by-law. We need not set out the board's argument in any detail. It is sufficient to state that it is based upon the fact that the inspector, by his failure to act, failed to file a decision with the town clerk, a condition precedent, alleges the board, to any appeal.

Two recent cases dealing with jurisdictional issues arising out of an inspector's failure to act on enforcement requests are sufficiently analogous to control and dispose of the board's contention. In Vokes v. Avery W. Lovell, Inc., 18 Mass.App.Ct. 471, 479 n. 11, 468 N.E.2d 271 (1984), the court specifically left for "another occasion analysis of the concern that a slothful building inspector could prevent complaining parties from exercising their rights by doing nothing upon receipt of an enforcement request and whether, if the inspector refuses to act, the parties seeking enforcement may have an alternative to the time and expense which might accompany resort to a complaint in the nature of mandamus." ² In Hogan v. Hayes, 19 Mass.App.Ct. 399, 402-403, 474 N.E.2d 1158 (1985), the court concluded that under Vokes, an inspector's failure to make a written response to an enforcement request, either "voluntarily or by compulsion," did create a defect which could be raised in ensuing proceedings. However, the court went on to hold: "The defect, although it may be spoken of as 'jurisdictional,' appears not to be of such significance that a court must take notice of it even if the opposing party fails to press it, cf. Mass.R.Civ.P. 12(h)(3), 365 Mass. 757 (1974) (subject matter defect); rather, like a defect of 'personal' jurisdiction, it may be overlooked if not timely objected to, cf. Mass.R.Civ.P. 12(h)(i), 365 Mass. 757 (1974)" (emphasis supplied). Here the board raised the defect, but not until after the plaintiff had appealed under G.L. c. 40A, § 17.

Reading Vokes and Hogan together, we conclude that the board's assertion of want of jurisdiction for it to have entertained the plaintiff's appeal was not timely asserted in the circumstances of this case. The plaintiff sought a permit from the board on the specific ground that the inspector had failed to act. Knowing full well that only the inspector could issue (or deny the issuance of) the permit and that the inspector had failed to act, the board could have declined to act and thereby forced the plaintiff then to seek whatever alternative remedies it might have. See Vokes v. Avery W. Lovell, Inc., 18 Mass.App.Ct. at 479 n. 11, 468 N.E.2d 271. However, the board deliberately construed the plaintiff's request as one simply seeking an order to the inspector to act. Rather than issuing the order, the board chose to do more. It reached the merits of the application, decided that the permit could not be granted as matter of law, and advised the plaintiff of its right of appeal under G.L. c. 40A, § 17. Now the board asks that the plaintiff be put to further expense and delay and be required to press its request anew in order to cure a jurisdictional flaw of no major significance. Had the board, on the basis of the jurisdictional ground presently asserted, refrained from hearing the matter and deciding it on the merits, we might well have been put to the task of deciding the question left open in Vokes v. Avery W. Lovell, Inc., 18 Mass.App.Ct. at 479 n. 11, 468 N.E.2d 271. We conclude, however, that the judge correctly rejected the board's argument, as its actions constituted a waiver of the claimed jurisdictional defect. See Hogan v. Hayes, 19 Mass.App.Ct. at 402-403, 474 N.E.2d 1158.

2. The plaintiff's intended use. In annulling the board's decision, the judge concluded that the plaintiff is a nonprofit educational corporation and that the purpose of the radio station is "both religious and educational in nature." The board does not dispute that the plaintiff is a nonprofit corporation, and there is record support for that fact.

What the board contends first is that the plaintiff has no right to further any religious purposes, as its articles of organization provide that the radio station is to be operated "exclusively for charitable, scientific, and educational purposes." The board claims that the plaintiff cannot advance any religious purposes without first amending its articles of organization. The argument lacks persuasive force. Cf. Congregational Church of Chicopee Falls v. Attorney Gen., 376 Mass. 545, 549, 381 N.E.2d 1305 (1978) ("[T]o hold that 'charitable' is not thus distinct from 'religious' and encompasses or engrosses 'religious,' appeals to common sense and conforms to ordinary speech. The point is strengthened by our remarks in Matter of Troy, 364 Mass. 15, 57-58 [306 N.E.2d 203 (1973) ] [an educational purpose, for example, has been considered charitable]").

Although the plaintiff is not an educational institution in the traditional sense of that phrase, that is, a school, we do not agree with the board's second contention that the plaintiff cannot, therefore, qualify for the G.L. c. 40A, § 3, zoning regulation exemption. By the plain language of that part of the statute relied upon by the plaintiff, see note 1, supra, all that is required is that the plaintiff be a nonprofit corporation intending to use its land or structures for religious or educational purposes. It may be that the formal trappings of religious and educational institutions assist in the determination that the intended use is for the appropriate limited purposes, but as we read § 3, the exemption is not restricted to religious sects and educational institutions.

To determine whether the plaintiff's intended use is for religious or educational purposes and, hence, within the protective ambit of § 3, focus must be placed on the use of the structure rather than on the structure itself. See Attorney Gen. v. Dover, 327 Mass. 601, 603-604, 100 N.E.2d 1 (1951); Whitinsville Retirement Soc., Inc. v. Northbridge, 394 Mass. 757, 760, 477 N.E.2d 407 (1985); Commission of Code Inspection of Worcester v. Worcester Dynamy, Inc., 11 Mass.App.Ct. 97, 100, 413 N.E.2d 1151 (1980). ³ We think this especially pertinent in view of constant advances in the communications industry and their relationship to the furtherance of educational goals. Hence, the judge was correct in rejecting the board's premise that a radio station can never be educational within the meaning of § 3.

Evidence of the plaintiff's intended use of its proposed radio station is provided in its licensing application filed with the Federal Communications Commission (commission). ^{4 4} Attached to that application is a document labelled "Statement of Educational Purpose" which reads in full: "The station proposed will serve an educational purpose by presenting high quality programs designed to be educational, cultural, and informative in nature. The station will carry information pertaining to local events including local news, public affairs, and other programs of topical local interest. To the extent that the proposed station presents programs of a religious nature, those programs will be designed to enhance and improve the lives of our listeners. All religious denominations in the service area will be given an opportunity to present programming on the proposed facility."

From the plaintiff's "Proposed Program Schedule," also filed with its application before the commission, we learn that of the daily eighteen hours of airtime,...