A legal challenge against a cell tower on Chappaquiddick fell short last week after the neighbors’ complaint was dismissed by the state Appeals Court.
Chappaquiddick property owners Dana and Robert Strayton have for years been fighting a 115-foot cell tower on a nearby property, claiming the tower had an adverse impact on their views, safety and property values.
Pursued by the town, the tower was built on Robert Fynbo’s Sampson avenue property as a way to bring better cell service to the island. The tower was approved by the Martha’s Vineyard Commission in 2017 and the Edgartown planning board the following year.
In the latest ruling in the long-running court battle, a panel of Appeals Court judges dismissed the Straytons’ contention that the state Land Court made the wrong decision on a previous appeal.
The lawsuit goes back to 2018, when the Straytons sued the planning board over the board’s decision to issue Mr. Fynbo a special permit to build the tower, which replaced a past cell tower on his property.
At the time, the Straytons also filed a complaint with Dukes County Superior Court over the Martha’s Vineyard Commission’s approval.
The superior court ruled in favor of the commission and that ruling was upheld by the Appeals Court. After the Appeals Court decision on the commission case, the state Land Court ruled that the Straytons also did not have standing to contest the planning board’s ruling, and that all the issues had already been taken up in the other court case.
The Straytons argued that the Land Court should have heard the planning board appeal separately, because there were two different statutes involved in the case.
In the technical, eight-page ruling last week, the Appeals Court found that despite the two different sets of regulations, the cases oversaw the same grievances: visual impacts of the tower, an increase in traffic, safety concerns and the diminution of property values. Because of this, it was fine for the Land Court to dismiss the case because the issues had already been opined on and upheld by the other courts, the Appeals Court panel wrote.
The Straytons’ attorney, Paul Revere, did not return requests for comment Monday.
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