Smithfield’s Town Council voted 4-2 on March 4 to deny developer Vincent Carollo’s request for a change to the town’s zoning ordinance that would have allowed him to move forward with his plans for just over an acre of land at Washington, James and Clay streets that he purchased from Joseph Luter IV last year.

Carollo, who bought eight lots in September that had been created from Luter’s 2021 purchase and subdivision of the formerly town-owned land, had applied for a text amendment to the downtown neighborhood residential zoning district, requesting verbiage that would allow him to apply a special use permit waiving the 5-unit-per-acre maximum density.

Had the text change been approved, Carollo would still have been required to return with that application and to make his case to the Planning Commission and Town Council for the proposed “James Parc at Smithfield,” which calls for four detached houses and three duplex buildings, each with two units for a total of 10 homes under condominium-style ownership. Luter had previously proposed four detached houses and one less duplex for a total of eight homes at the same site.

Carollo said his goal in requesting the text change was to “get to the starting line” to submit permit applications.

Councilman Darren Cutler described Carollo, who also owns Anna’s Ristorante on South Church Street and other properties throughout Smithfield and Isle of Wight County, as “a fine, upstanding citizen of the town.”

“However, I think it’s time for the Town Council, starting with this project, to stand up to developers and say, ‘adhere to our zoning requirements,’ not ask us to rewrite them for them,” said Cutler, who campaigned for his seat last year alongside Mayor Mike Smith, Vice Mayor Bill Harris and Councilwoman Mary Ellen Bebermeyer on a shared platform of reining in growth.

Bebermeyer, Harris and Councilman Jeff Brooks each supported Cutler’s motion to deny Carollo’s request after a substitute motion by Councilman Steve Bowman for approval failed 4-2. Bowman’s motion drew only his own and Councilwoman Valerie Butler’s votes. Bowman and Butler cast the two dissenting votes on Cutler’s motion with Smith abstaining from both votes.

Bowman said denying the text change would effectively bar Carollo from being able to make his case for James Parc by precluding him from even applying for a special use permit.

“To circumvent the capability of somebody to be heard as far as a project is concerned, to me is a violation of due process,” Bowman said.

“Every developer that comes before us, if it’s a quality or it’s a reasonable project, we deserve to listen to it,” Butler added.

“This is a difficult one for me. Having a development on that square done by a very well respected and very well liked developer and member of the community, it’s something that I can look forward to and totally embrace; but if I remove the personality and the drawings in front of me, and I consider only the legislative move that we are considering, I have difficulty endorsing that,” Harris said. 

Harris then called the move a “bad precedent.”

“I don’t believe that we should amend zoning regulations that are in place relying on the idea that somewhere down the line we can say no to everybody else who makes the same application,” Harris said.

The vote overturned a 6-1 Planning Commission vote in January to favorably recommend Carollo’s requested text change. Cutler, who serves as the council’s liaison to the Planning Commission, cast the lone dissenting vote.

A prior council approved a similar ordinance change last year at the request of developer Brian Mullins of Suffolk-based Quality Homes, who’d requested to add language to the town’s attached residential zoning district definition to allow him to seek special use permits for elements of the “Cottages at Battery,” a 130-home development slated for 14 acres behind the Royal Farms convenience store at Battery Park Road and South Church Street. Mullins’ later request for six special use permits related to that site stalled in the Planning Commission last fall.