Smithfield board denies appeal over proposed battery storage site at 155 Mountandale Road

The Town of Smithfield Board of Review, sitting as the Board of Appeals, voted to deny an appeal from GDMESS LLC seeking a special-use permit to build a battery energy storage facility at 155 Mountandale Road. The board concluded the applicant had not acquired vested rights before a town ordinance that prohibited battery energy storage took effect on Feb. 9, 2024.

Attorney John Mancini, representing the applicant, told the board the company submitted a master-plan application on Nov. 22, 2023, and received a certificate of completeness in December 2023. Mancini argued that certificate vested the project and "is my ticket" to move through the land-development process, and that later ordinance changes should not bar the applicant from continuing the master-plan, zoning-board and preliminary-plan sequence he described.

Kelly Morris Salvatore, counsel for the zoning official Christopher Gentile, countered that the applicant failed to file the required zoning application with the zoning official before the ordinance took effect. Morris Salvatore told the board the town adopted an ordinance amendment (added a definition for battery energy storage and prohibited the use in all zoning districts) that became effective Feb. 9, 2024, and that the applicant did not file the zoning application until April 10, 2024. She cited a Rhode Island case she said is on point and Smithfield ordinance sections (including the town's vested-rights provisions) to argue that protection attaches only when an application has been submitted to the official designated to accept that application.

During public comment, resident David Ursula, who lives a few hundred feet from the property, said a certificate of completeness only triggers scheduling before the planning board and "does not do anything with respect to vesting rights." Attorney Joseph Wasilewski, speaking for another nearby resident, argued the applicant's subsequent filing of the special-use application after the ordinance was adopted undercuts a claim it could not have filed sooner.

After deliberation, an unidentified board member moved to deny the appeal, citing the evidence that the applicant "never acquired any vested rights with respect to its application for a special use permit prior to the effective date" and the Town of Smithfield zoning ordinance amendment prohibiting energy storage and substation facilities in all zones on 02/09/2024. The motion was seconded and carried on a unanimous voice vote. The board directed the town solicitor to draft a written decision incorporating documentary evidence presented and to forward the decision to the zoning board for approval at its November 2024 meeting.

The board's decision leaves in place the zoning official's determination rejecting the special-use application and prevents the applicant from proceeding under the pre-amendment regulatory regime. The board adjourned following the vote.