A group of five East Side condo owners who filed a lawsuit against the city of Milwaukee, opposing plans for a 55-unit apartment development near Downer Avenue, today said they are dropping the lawsuit.
“We are withdrawing the lawsuit, for now,” the group said today on its website. “Realizing that the lawsuit we had filed Aug. 18 is complicating communication with the city, developers, and others, we are filing a motion with the court today to withdraw it.”
Last week, the City Plan Commission voted unanimously to support plans for the 55-unit apartment complex on land owned by St. Mark’s Episcopal Church at the corner of North Hackett Avenue and Belleview Place, near Downer Avenue.
The commission’s conditional recommendation requires the developer, DeMichele Company, LLC, to work with the city’s Department of Public Works and as well as the Department of City Development to conduct a study of how the development might impact traffic in the 2600 block of North Hackett Avenue, which is a northbound one-way street. Residents opposed to the project have sited impacts to traffic as one of the major concerns of the project. Other concerns have been related to the density of the project.
“At least we were able to get some of our points across,” the condo owner group said today on its website. “Is such a big jump in zoning really necessary? Why? What about the process? Should we accept that the city hasn’t planned this change but is reacting with a simple yes/no to a single plan from a single developer? How can this process provide the most benefit for all its citizens?
“We realize that we are lucky to live in a neighborhood that has enough disposable income and time to organize and file a lawsuit so we can have a voice and not be ignored,” the group said on its website. “This doesn’t make us NIMBYs. Nobody should have to sue the city to have good-faith input into how their neighborhood develops. We’d like this to establish a precedent for how all neighborhoods in the city should be treated.”
