Riverhead appeals court ruling that Oak Hills roads were made ‘public highways’ by 2015 Town Board resolutions

Riverhead’s fight with a Baiting Hollow community over road maintenance and repairs continues.

The Town Board last month authorized outside counsel to appeal a trial court judgment in favor of the Oak Hills Association earlier this year in costly litigation dating back to 2016.

Prior to the current appeal, the town spent over half a million dollars on legal fees and costs paid to three outside law firms representing the Town Board, members of the board, the highway superintendent and the highway department, according to documents obtained by RiverheadLOCAL through a Freedom of Information Law request.

Town officials say the cost of complying with the trial court’s ruling would far exceed the legal costs of the appeal.

The Suffolk County Supreme Court ruled on Jan. 6 that roads in the Oak Hills community were made public highways by Town Board resolutions adopted in 2015 and therefore the town highway superintendent is required to provide services due all public highways, as required by State Highway Law.

The dispute over responsibility for taking care of the roads in the north shore community started in October 2014, when then-Highway Superintendent George Woodson sent a letter to the community’s homeowners association informing the community that the highway department would not maintain or remove snow from from its roadways, which Woodson said were private roads, except in an emergency.

The Oak Hills Association contacted the Town Board and in December 2014, the board held a public hearing to determine whether the Oak Hills roads were “public highways by use” under section 189 of the State Highway Law. The board heard testimony from residents about prior snow removal and maintenance by the town of the roads in the community.

In 2015, the board passed resolutions declaring that the roads in the community were “Town of Riverhead 189 Highways” requiring the town highway department to keep the roads open for safe use, including snow and ice removal, but stating the highway department was not required to pave, widen, install drainage or otherwise improve the roads.

The Oak Hills Association sued the town and the highway superintendent in 2016, complaining about the limited scope of services that would be provided to the roads in the community.

After the association sued, the Town Board in 2017 adopted another resolution that declared the Oak Hills roads to be “public highways under Highway Law § 189 based on the evidence elicited at the December 2014 hearing,” trial court judge David Reilly wrote in his Jan. 9 decision.

Woodson then sued the town, the Town Board and the Oak Hills Association, “alleging that the 2017 Resolution was arbitrary and capricious” and seeking “a judgment declaring that he was ‘not obligated to treat the pathways of OHA as ‘public highways’ under section 189.” Both Woodson and the Oak Hills Association appealed the trial court’s May 2019 decision, which granted each side some relief. The Appellate Division last year held that the Town Board’s 2017 resolution declaring the Oak Hills roads public highways was “arbitrary and capricious” and lacked a rational basis.

Justice Reilly in his January decision in the Oak Hills case ruled that last year’s Appellate Division ruling in the Woodson lawsuit over the 2017 resolution does not require the court in the Oak Hills case to annul the 2015 resolutions, as the town and the highway superintendent argued. “Doing so would give defendants an unfair advantage, allowing them to nullify the 2015 Resolutions on a ground provided in CPLR 7803 well past the statute of limitations for doing so,” Reilly wrote. The judge in his decision had already dispensed with the town’s own claim that its own 2015 resolutions were arbitrary and capricious because that claim must be made under Article 78 of the Civil Practice Law and Rules and the four-month statute of limitations — a hard deadline for filing that challenge — had long since passed.

The parties have stipulated that the time to file appeal papers in court is extended to Oct. 12.

Oak Hills Association attorney David Antwerk said in an interview he is confident the trial court’s judgment will be affirmed on appeal. “It was very well-reasoned,” he said.

Town Attorney Erik Howard expressed confidence in the town’s prospects to get the trial court decision overturned.

Devitt Spellman Barrett of Smithtown will continue to represent the Town of Riverhead and the Town Board in the action. Prior to the appeal, the town paid the firm $170,577 since its hiring in January 2019, according to town records provided in response to a Freedom of Information Law request. Another lawyer, Garrett Swenson, represented the town in this matter prior to that and was paid fees totaling $13,106. Swenson withdrew after his election as Suffolk County district court judge.

Bee Ready Fishbein Hatter & Donovan of Mineola will continue to represent the highway superintendent. Bee Ready was paid $352,337 for its representation of the highway superintendent in both the Oak Hills Association lawsuit and the suit brought by former superintendent Woodson.