Sunset Hills hires more attorneys to keep fighting rezoning
SUNSET HILLS — City officials here have hired another Law firm, without capping expenses, as their fight to keep an area property owner from rezoning a strip of South Lindbergh Boulevard stretches into its sixth year.
A home on Court Drive in June 2011 sat empty after a December 2010 tornado hit this area of Sunset Hills along Lindbergh Boulevard. Since then, the city has debated whether to keep the area residential or allow commercial along this side of busy Lindbergh Boulevard near West Watson Road.
Christian Gooden
In a special meeting Friday afternoon, the Sunset Hills Board of Aldermen authorized hiring Clayton Law firm Armstrong Teasdale to represent it in its appeal of a judge’s order directing the city to pay $509,000 in attorney fees because of its “vexatious and spiteful hostility” to the property owner in the zoning dispute.
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The hiring of Armstrong Teasdale is the latest in a rezoning dispute between the city and a trust led by Dr. George Despotis. The Despotis trust has sought to rezone its five acres at the corner of West Watson Road and South Lindbergh Boulevard for years, submitting a plan for a credit union at the corner in February 2016.
A judge last year sided with the trust and ordered the city to rezone the land and pay the attorney fees as a penalty for its “spiteful hostility” to the trust and Despotis.
Now, the city is hiring one of the region’s top Law firms to represent it. Armstrong Teasdale attorney Jeffery McPherson’s engagement letter says he bills $400 per hour. The engagement provided no maximum contract amount.
“As we have discussed, the fees and costs relating to this litigation are not predictable,” McPherson wrote to the city’s longtime attorney, Robert E. Jones.
That concerned at least one Sunset Hills aldermen.
“That really has no budget limitations,” Alderman Fred Daues said Friday. “I really think our resolution should mandate a ceiling.”
The move Friday also used a new rule Sunset Hills approved earlier this month lowering the vote threshold to suspend the rules and pass ordinances with only one reading rather than two.
City Administrator Brittany Gillett told the Post-Dispatch that the rule change was not solely to accommodate the hiring of Armstrong Teasdale at the special Friday afternoon meeting.
Insurance has covered the cost of litigation thus far, and the city has paid only about $40,000 out of pocket, she has said. But Gillett said it’s “undetermined” whether the city’s insurance policy will cover the $509,000 in attorney fees ordered by the court.
Alderman Christine Lieber questioned why the city was moving so fast when recent variance requests Despotis submitted indicate there could be a compromise. She was the lone “no” vote against hiring Armstrong Teasdale.
“It looks like there could be reason for not spending any more city money if this can be worked out,” Lieber said. “Why would we move forward when we just got information that they’re looking to settle?”
But other aldermen urged the city to move ahead.
“We’ve ridden this roller coaster for many years, it’s time to get some experts on it,” said Alderman Ann McMunn, adding she “can’t imagine” the city would spend much money on the firm over the next several weeks.
“You can’t imagine,” Lieber retorted. “But no one can tell us how much it’s going to cost.”
An attorney for Despotis, John Hein of Brentwood-based Hein Schneider & Bond, said there have been settlement discussions on and off for years but that the city’s hiring of another Law firm indicates it plans to keep fighting.
“Based on the fact that they’re hiring Armstrong Teasdale it looks like they’re planning to proceed with the appeal in lieu of actually trying to find a way to come to a reasonable compromise,” Hein said Friday. “Which of course would be consistent with the behavior of the last decade, which is why they got the attorney’s fee order entered against them in the first place.”
St. Louis County Circuit Judge John Borbonus last year ordered the city to rezone the property and to pay the attorney fees, noting the city has approved commercial development surrounding the parcels and ignored its own staff’s recommendations in denying Despotis’ request. Despotis testified at trial that he heard Jones, the city’s Lawyer, say that the city “was not going to lose to this family again.”
Jones’ father, Robert C. Jones, was the city’s Lawyer — the Sunset Hills auditorium where aldermen meet is named after him — when the city lost a similar case in 1981 to Despotis’ mother, Olga Despotis, that forced it to rezone the property.
Hein said there is “militant opposition” to his client from some factions in Sunset Hills that has not let up since the ruling.
“The court entered a judgment to require the city to rezone,” Hein said. “And it’s continued to be rejected every time it comes before the board.”
The trust has filed variances in an effort to move the project forward, Hein said.
“Fundamentally, he has given the city every opportunity to move forward,” Hein said. “The ball is fully in the city’s court.”
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