In the latest audacious move by Benny Marotta, lawyers hired by his companies filed a court application last week seeking to nullify Council’s vote last August to designate all four Rand Estate properties under the Heritage Act.
In the court application, lawyers for the Marotta companies allege that the Town process was deficient and unfair and ask that the Council decision to designate be nullified.
If there was any doubt about what Benny Marotta’s professed “love” for NOTL and how he “wants to make it better” actually mean, his actions over the last few months tell us all we need to know:
- clear cutting a major part of Randwood prior to the new Council enacting a tree bylaw
- illegally destroying protected Dunington-Grubb landscape, and
- now seeking to void the last Council’s decision to accord heritage status to Randwood
We have some questions:
- Why did Mr. Marotta wait almost six months to launch a court challenge of Council’s decision to designate Randwood?
- Why did he first appeal the Council decision to the Conservation Review Board if it was his intention to challenge it in court instead all along?
- Is it a co-incidence that the court application was only launched after SORE was given party status by the Conservation Review Board?
- Why is Mr. Marotta now seeking to have a court nullify the Council designation decision when he and his spokesperson have spent the last two and a half years telling the Town at every turn that they agree the Rand Estate deserves heritage protection and that we would see a designation application “soon”?
SORE is considering its options, including seeking party status in the court application. We will keep you apprised of further developments. To review the court application, click below.
Notice-of-Application-issued