Opinion
Argued May 7, 1975
May 28, 1975.
Zoning — Amendment to zoning regulations — Legislative process — Judicial authority — Appeals — Challenge to validity of ordinance — Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code, Act 1968, July 31, P.L. 805.
1. The courts have no power to interfere with a strictly legislative process, and no appeal to the judicial system lies from action of a governing body denying an application to amend zoning regulations. [325]
2. The Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code, Act 1968, July 31, P.L. 805, provides a method whereby the validity of a zoning ordinance can be challenged on substantive grounds. [325-6]
Argued May 7, 1975, before President Judge BOWMAN and Judges CRUMLISH, JR., KRAMER, WILKINSON, JR., MENCER, ROGERS and BLATT.
Appeal, No. 1335 C.D. 1974, from the Order of the Court of Common Pleas of Westmoreland County in case of Cabin Hill, Inc. v. Greensburg Planning Commission, an agency of the City of Greensburg, and The City of Greensburg, a municipal corporation, No. 463 April Term, 1973.
Request for change in zoning classification to the Planning Commission of the City of Greensburg. Request denied by City Council. Property owner appealed to the Court of Common Pleas of Westmoreland County. Defendants directed to amend zoning regulations. MIHALICH, J., for the court en banc. Commission and City appealed to the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania. Held: Reversed.
Joseph B. Mitinger, City Solicitor, for appellants.
Irving L. Bloom, with him John F. Dent, and Dent Bloom, for appellees.
The appellee, Cabin Hill, Inc., requested the Planning Commission to recommend and the Council of the City of Greensburg, Westmoreland County, to effect the rezoning of six acres of the appellee's land from residential to commercial. The Planning Commission recommended that the proposed rezoning be denied and Council accepted this recommendation. Cabin Hill, Inc. appealed to the Court of Common Pleas of Westmoreland County. The lower court took extensive additional testimony, viewed the property and reversed the City Council's action. The City of Greensburg has appealed.
The law of the case is clear. Pennsylvania courts have no power to entertain appeals from the denial by governing bodies of applications having as their sole purpose that of accomplishing amendments to zoning regulations. "Where a landowner follows this course of action the matter is strictly a legislative process, and, . . . the courts have no power to interfere. . . ." In Re: Appeal of Frank Merlino from Plains Township Board of Commissioners to Amend Zoning Ordinance, 19 Pa. Commw. 143, 146, 339 A.2d 642, 644 (1975). This was the law prior to the enactment of the 1972 amendments to the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code, Clover Hill Farms, Inc. v. Lehigh Township Board of Supervisors, 5 Pa. Commw. 239, 289 A.2d 778 (1972), and we have repeatedly held that those amendments effected no change in the rule. See In Re: Appeal of Frank Merlino, supra; Warren v. Ferrick, 17 Pa. Commw. 421, 333 A.2d 237 (1975); Board of Commissioners of McCandless Township v. Beho Development Company, Inc., 16 Pa. Commw. 448, 332 A.2d 848 (1975); Board of Supervisors of Ferguson Township v. Strouse, 16 Pa. Commw. 143, 328 A.2d 177 (1974). The matter has been fully explored in the cases cited, which seem, unfortunately, not yet to have become generally known to the bar.
Act of July 31, 1968, P.L. 805, as amended, 53 P. S. § 10101 et seq.
If Cabin Hill, Inc. had sought to challenge the zoning ordinance on substantive grounds and if it had initiated such a challenge before the Council in the manner prescribed by Section 1004, 53 P. S. § 11004, of the Pennsylvania Municipalities Planning Code, the lower court would have had jurisdiction to hear an appeal from Council's action. See Ellick v. Board of Supervisors of Worcester Township, 17 Pa. Commw. 404, 333 A.2d 239 (1975); Robin Corporation v. Board of Supervisors of Lower Paxton Township, 17 Pa. Commw. 386, 332 A.2d 841 (1975).
Order reversed.