Court Rules With Salem In Kobyluck Appeal

On April 17th, a New London court ruled against Kobyluck Brother LLC’s appeal to overturn a decision by the Salem Planning and Zoning Commission, effectively ending the Waterford business’s quarry in the town.

Kobyluck owner Matt Kobyluck said he will reapply to continue to quarry stone at the Rattlesnake location. But for now, his company has no permit in Salem to quarry stone at 279 Rattlesnake Ledge Road.

Kobyluck Brothers LLC, a Waterford-based businesses that has a pending application to the Town of Waterford , has been running a quarry on Rattlesnake Ledge in Salem since 2002. In 2010, the Town of Salem voted to renew a special permit for the Kobyluck application, but with stiff stipulations Kobyluck argued was excessive.

Kobyluck took the town to court to appeal the stipulations of the permit. On April 17th, the court reject Kobyluck’s appeal, with Judge Joseph Purtill saying the stipulations by the commission were reasonable.

Background in Salem

Kobyluck began operating his quarry in Salem in 2002, and neighbors began to complain about Kobyluck’s quarry in 2005. The company and the town have had a series of disagreements that wound up in court ever since.

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At one point, Kobyluck agreed to pay the town $125,000 in a settlement. As part of the settlement, both sides agreed that neither did any wrongdoing.

“I was never found guilty of doing anything wrong,” Matt Kobyluck said Tuesday. “We reached a settlement where nobody took fault… It became a business decision at that point.”

Waterford Application

Kobyluck Brothers LLC has an application pending in both the Planning and Zoning Commission and the Conservation Commission to install a stone processing facility at 28 Industrial Drive. The Conservation Commission closed the public hearing on the application last week, and the Planning and Zoning Commission should close its public hearing on the application next week.

When interviewed Tuesday, Matt Kobyluck said what happened in Salem has no bearing on what will happen in Waterford. He said the sites in Salem and Waterford are different and there is no relationship between the two.

 “I don’t understand what my zoning appeal has anything to do with my application in Waterford,” Kobyluck said. “There is no similarity with anything about either project.”

In Salem, Kobyluck ran a quarry, where he blasted and processed stone. In Waterford, he is planning to build a stone processing facility where stone will be brought off-site to be processed.

But for the first five years of the application Kobyluck will be blasting and processing stone on-site as part of the construction of the project. Kobyluck compared it to the work that went on at Waterford Commons, where stone was blasted and processed on site for years.

Kobyluck said the problems in Salem were all revolved around the intensity of his workload, and there would be no issues in Waterford. As part of his Waterford application, Kobyluck said he agreed to frequent monitoring by Waterford land use officials.

“With the amount of preconstruction monitoring that has been done, the amount and inspection and monitoring I have agreed to during construction and the amount of monitoring I’ll do after construction, it will more than ensure and make sure that there will be no issues,” he said. “If that doesn’t give people a level comfort, then I don’t know what will.”