Legal notice claims lack of action by Muncy Township equates to approval of proposed data center

When Joe Orso III cited possible litigation concerning the proposal for a data center in Muncy Township as the reason he was returning for the third time as solicitor, a little over two weeks later, a legal notice filed this week supports that possibility.

Danko Holdings II, LP / Fishlips, LLC, a local development company owned by Dan Klingerman, had filed a conditional use application April 28 in order to develop a data center on a property in the township along Yetter Road. Under the state's Municipalities Planning Code (MPC) within 60 days of receiving the application, the township had to conduct and complete the required hearing on the application or ask for an extension. The township did neither of these things.

Because of that the developers have received "deemed approval" of the application according to the legal notice.

"The basis for the deemed approval of the Application is the failure of the governing body to commence, conduct, and complete the required hearing on the Application as provided in MPC Section 908(1.2), 53 P.S.10908(1.2), within sixty (60) days of the Township's receipt of the Application, the Applicant not having agreed in writing or on the record to any extension of time," the notice stated.

When DANKO filed the application, the board of supervisors initially denied that there had been an application for a data center and a moratorium on data centers in the township was passed.

When it was finally revealed by the Sun-Gazette when Supervisor Heath Ohnmeiss shared an April 22 application by the developer, that there had been an application, there were still claims by some township officials that the proper procedures had not been followed in order for it to be considered accepted by the township.

Last month, the township's planning commission began working on a curative amendment for the zoning ordinance in order to address the data center issue, but even as recently as the beginning of this month, the commission's head, Larry Spatz had stated that he had not heard anything from the developer and had not actually seen the plans for the proposed data center.

"I haven't heard anything...we haven't seen the plans yet...the best I could say is, I've seen more from the Williamsport Gazette. I look at that and I say, gee, this is what's going on, but that's where I'm getting my information from right now," he said.

"We have not seen the plan and I think there's a legal reason for that," Spatz added.

At this week's Planning Commission meeting, Orso had again told the public that DANKO would be claiming deemed approval of their conditional use application and that action would probably result in litigation. He also claimed inconsistencies in DANKO's application.

Deemed approval was enacted to prevent developments from being intentionally delayed by local governments. There are strict timelines imposed by the MPC governing the approval of applications.

Part of the procedure is the applicant, DANKO Holding II LP/Fishlips LLC has to provide " public notice as permitted by Section 913.2(b)(2) because the Township failed to give public notice of the deemed decision within ten (10) days as required by said Section."

Both Samuel Wiser, Jr., of Salzmann Hughes, P.C., solicitor for DANKO and Orso were contacted for this story but had not responded as of the publication deadline.