Project foes give up court fight
Citizens’ group against Peachtree Village now aim to defeat development’s supporters on town council in fall elections
A citizens’ group in Peachland is moving its battle against town council from the courts to the ballot box.
Friends of Beach Avenue has announced it is abandoning a legal challenge against council’s decision to approve a five-storey building on Beach Avenue.
The group, which collected donations to fund the legal action, received advice from a lawyer that its court case likely would not succeed.
Instead, FOBA will focus its attentions this October on defeating the four council members who approved the five-storey building, known as Peachtree Village.
“With an election on the way, suffice it to say that we are not going away,” FOBA spokesman Lloyd Sotas wrote in an email.
“We are pretty sure we represent and are also part of the vast majority of Peachlanders (who) do not want to see five storeys right on Beach Avenue,” Sotas wrote.
The group’s now-abandoned legal challenge was based in part on the idea that council had ignored its own official community plan in approving Peachtree Village.
A previous edition of the plan stipulated that heights would be limited to three storeys on the property where Peachtree Village was proposed. But earlier this year, council amended the OCP so that three storeys would be a guideline, not a hard and fast restriction.
“It was at this point that FOBA, after consultation with our lawyer, decided to reconsider the likelihood of a successful (court challenge),” Sotas wrote.
Asked how much money was collected by FOBA and whether those funds would be returned to people who’d donated, Sotas wrote: “There was nothing ever in the way of a monetary judgment to be gained by this. The Supreme Court petition was paid for by Peachlanders who donated their money to a cause each person individually believed in.”