82 Crestway: Soon to be "paradise"?
A business owner who racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines has reached a court settlement with the town of Hamden — and has an opportunity to restore an industrial property covered in illegally dumped waste back into the home of Paradise Landscaping.
If the business owner, Ruslan Boyarsky, abides by the terms of the settlement, he will see 90 percent of those fines disappear.
Paradise, which operates under a limited liability corporation called 8292 Crestway, has been barred from operating out of its Hamden facility as it seeks to come into compliance with the town’s zoning regulations.
The saga began when Boyarsky improperly received a building permit. He spent a year working out of his industrial-focused property at 82 — 92 Crestway despite a cease-and-desist order from Zoning Enforcement Official Holly Masi. Then he dumped debris up to 90 feet onto two neighboring properties. So the town took him to court back in 2020. At that point in time, he reportedly owed at least $250,000 in fines.
Read more about the history of Paradise Landscaping in Hamden and New Haven here.
According to the court settlement reached by the developer and the town, Boyarsky is expected to pay only one tenth of that original total fine (which doesn’t count additional transgressions which may have taken place through the pandemic).
The settlement, on file in state Superior Court, stipulated on Jan. 13 that Boyarsky is responsible for a $50,000 fine to the Town of Hamden. But if all goes according to plan and Boyarsky complies with the town’s terms, he’ll have to pay only half of that reduced amount.
The settlement states that Boyarsky is responsible for paying a $25,000 up-front fine to the town. Once the town receives that money, Boyarsky is required to obtain a performance bond — of an amount that is yet to be determined — and a temporary zoning letter in order to perform on-site remediation, which involves extracting the debris and fill that the company dumped on its own property and neighbors’ land.
Through the settlement process, Boyarsky also retained a licensed environmental professional (LEP) who has put together a remediation plan and facilitated an environmental assessment of the impacted land adjacent to Paradise’s facility.
According to Acting Development Director and Town Planner Erik Johnson, the town will hire and pay for an independent LEP to monitor the remediation process. That ensures that should the case go back to court, a third party would be able to act as witness in lieu of town employees, such as zoning officer Masi, who first sued Boyarsky.
Once “Part A” is complete — which, according to the settlement agreement should happen within a span of 90 days — the town will release the bond requirement. Boyarsky must then come to the Planning and Zoning Commission with a revised site plan and receive a zoning permit to move forward with the work it originally applied to do back in 2017.
“It’s like putting Humpty Dumpty back together again,” said Johnson, who said that the site has changed so dramatically from the illegal actions taken by Paradise that the company’s initial site plan is no longer possible to pursue.
If Paradise commits to following those steps, the second half of their fine — $25,000 — will be waived. They’ll be back in business, free to operate out of their Hamden space.
If not, Paradise’s actions will be subject to further fining from the court. Theoretically, Johnson said at a recent Planning and Zoning meeting, Boyarsky could ultimately be imprisoned.
It’s unclear how much Paradise may have actually owed the town. After Masi hit the company with a cease and desist order in Sept. 2019, she issued a citation that carried with it fines of $150 per violation per day. At that point in time, Masi had pointed out five violations — one year of that behavior would have added up to $270,000 by September 2020.
“Accrual time got all screwed up just because of Covid alone,” Johnson told the Independent. “What we ended up agreeing to is that the fine is $50,000, which is slightly less than $150 per day for 365 days.”
“The town is just concerned about getting the issues resolved,” Johnson said. A court order places more pressure on the company and takes some weight off the shoulders of town employees.
“I’m glad that we were able to get some resolution,” he added. “I am hopeful that the principals of Paradise Landscaping will comply with the court order… and we can put this series of unfortunate events behind us.”
“The town of Hamden is not in the business of putting businesses out of business. We just hope businesses can respect their neighbors and comply with Planning and Zoning standards,” he concluded.
Boyarsky echoed Johnson.
“We want nothing more than to get this behind us, satisfy the requirements and get our permit in place,” he told the Independent.
“We’re happy to finally reach an agreement and hope we can work together from here on out — we don’t want any bad blood.”
