Albert v. Zoning Hearing Board

OPINION

Justice NIGRO.

This appeal raises the issue of whether the Commonwealth Court erred in granting a license for the operation of a halfway house for recovering alcoholics and drug-addicts in a residential zoning district based on its conclusion that the facility qualified as a “single-family detached dwelling” under the local zoning ordinance. For the following reasons, we conclude that it did err and therefore reverse.

On January 13, 2000, Dawn Albert filed a zoning application to operate a halfway house, known as The Waverly Retreat (the “Retreat”), on a 30-acre tract of land that she…