Court dismisses suit by Save Sandy Hook
Friends of Clearwater must take case to federal claims court
BY LIZ SHEEHAN
Correspondent

Members of the grassroots environmental group Save Sandy Hook were scheduled to meet this week to decide what action to take after U.S. District Court Judge Mary Little Cooper dismissed the group's suit aimed at blocking commercial development on Sandy Hook.

The December 2004 suit was part of Save Sandy Hook's campaign to overturn a 60-year lease granted by the National Park Service to James Wassel, a Rumson developer, to commercially develop 36 or more buildings at historic Fort Hancock in Sandy Hook. Monmouth County Friends of Clearwater petitioned the court successfully for the right to join the suit.

The 34-page decision rendered last week provided for an appeal by the nonprofit group to be filed within 60 days.

"We have to have a meeting," Judith Stanley Coleman, who heads Save Sandy Hook, which she founded to stop the commercialization of the national parklands, said Monday.

She said that the case had been costly and the opponent had "all federal money behind it."

"You're fighting a big boss," she added.

Richard Wells, superintendent of the Sandy Hook Unit of Gateway National Recreation Area, said Monday, "We're very pleased with the decision."

It places the park service "one step closer to preserving" the Fort Hancock buildings "for the benefit of the American people," he said.

But he said he was not completely clear as to what the judge's decision would mean, because the attorneys had not had time to evaluate the opinion.

In June, Save Sandy Hook's attorney, Paul Josephson, who also represents Monmouth County Friends of Clearwater in the suit, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Irene Dowdy appeared before Cooper to present oral arguments in the case.

Cooper asked both lawyers to direct their arguments to whether the district court should take jurisdiction in the case.

At the hearing, Dowdy said that Clearwater's case belonged in the Court of Federal Claims because the environmental group was a "disappointed bidder."

Clearwater, an environmental group, had attempted to lease its longtime headquarters at Fort Hancock, but was turned down and the building was included in the Wassel lease.

Cooper's decision said that the Clearwater case belonged in the federal claims court.

It also said that Save Sandy Hook had not sufficiently proved that the group had standing to bring the suit to court, but left it open for further proof of standing to be supplied in an appeal.

Josephson said Tuesday, "We are reviewing the opinion with our client. No decision has been made yet.

"We are pleased that the court found it had jurisdiction in this case," he said.

He said the court wants proof of a "specific" way his clients had suffered from the violation of each law cited in the complaint.

The fact that the judge's opinion was "without prejudice" means that there is an opportunity "to come back and file an amended complaint," according to Josephson.

He said standing refers to "whether or not plaintiff has sufficient interest or injury to bring a claim" to the court.

The park service signed the lease with Wassel in 2004, after selecting him as the developer for Fort Hancock in 2000. He has received several extensions of the time in which he must prove that he has the financial ability to carry out the project, the most recent at the end of June.

Save Sandy Hook, the N.J. Chapter of the Sierra Club, the N.J. Public Interest Group and the N.J. Environmental Federation, some local and state officials and Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-N.J.) oppose the Wassel proposal, saying it will harm the unique environment at Sandy Hook and worsen already severe traffic problems in the area

Other local and state officials, the Monmouth County Planning Board and the National Trust for Historic Preservation approve of the project, saying the government lacks funds to rehabilitate the historic buildings so it must be done by a private developer.

Wassel's plan calls for reuse of the historic Fort Hancock buildings as restaurants, overnight accommodations, offices, conference centers, and environmental and educational facilities.