Land use matters arise in a number of situations and parties in interest usually are property owners.  For example, a homeowner may want to build a deck on her home but cannot do so without obtaining a variance because the proposed deck will not comply with all of the municipal ordinance requirements.  For another example, a homeowner may be concerned that a shopping center proposed to be built near his home will cause him disturbances and loss of property value so he may want to object to the shopping center application.  Depending on the particular circumstances, these types of objections may, with proper representation, either result in a denial of the shopping center application or at least a set of conditions imposed on the developer that benefit the homeowner.  In the above types of circumstances and many others involving the use of land, people usually are better served by hiring an attorney.

A client’s land typically represents the larger part of their “nest egg” or life savings and expert representation of clients in their land use issues is of utmost importance.  Decisions on land use matters usually come down to a weighing or balancing of the “positive criteria” and the “negative criteria”, which, simply put, is a balancing of benefit/detriment factors.  The expertise of counsel is essential in targeting and highlighting those factors for the client’s benefit.

With his substantial experience representing planning and zoning boards, representing applicants before planning boards and boards of adjustment (zoning boards) and representing objectors to applications before those boards, Mr. Hiskey can guide clients through such processes with expertise and professionalism that will achieve positive results for his clients.