Residents sue to block revival of controversial apartment plan for Willows Event Center

A proposed controversial luxury development that was sidelined in 2022 by neighborhood opposition is back up for consideration at the Indianapolis City Council and now has spawned a legal fight.

A lawsuit filed Friday asks a judge to review and overturn the Metropolitan Development Commission's decision to approve the rezoning petition to construct apartments and townhomes in the 6700 block of Westfield Boulevard, the current site of The Willows Event Center. The lawsuit was filed by the Oxbow Estates Homeowners Association, Spirit Lake Co-owners Association and residents Thomas H. Durkin and Steve Yeager, who oppose a plan led by J.C. Hart Company of Carmel to redevelop the property adjacent to Spirit Lake.

More: Why Broad Ripple residents oppose Willows Event Center redevelopment

The developers want to rezone 21.4 acres for a $61 million apartment and townhome development called The Elements.

The MDC approved the project in December following a public meeting where supporters and remonstrators packed the council chambers and spilled into the outside hall. That decision sent the project to the Indianapolis City-County Council for final approval earlier this month, but the vote was delayed when the petition was called down for another public hearing by newly seated, first-term councilwoman Brienne Delaney.

The move prompted Hart, in an interview, to accuse Delaney of attempting to kill the project to honor a campaign promise.

The MDC and the developers — J.C. Hart Company Inc., Chase Development of Indianapolis, and Evergreen LLC — are listed as defendants in the lawsuit. The civil filing came ahead of the new public hearing set to take place during the council's regular meeting at 7 p.m. on Feb. 5.

John Kautzman, an attorney and spokesman for the plaintiffs, said in recent days the neighbors tried to meet with the developers but those efforts were unsuccessful. With the clocking ticking on the 30-day deadline to legally challenge the MDC's vote, the neighborhood associations and residents filed the lawsuit.

"We thought if we're not going to meet and not going to have the council meeting before that deadline runs, we had no choice but to go ahead and file suit to preserve any potential legal claims down the road," said Kautzman, who also lives near the proposed development.

Meanwhile, Hart, chairman of J.C. Hart Company, called the neighbors' lawsuit unfortunate and meritless. He questioned their sincerity in resolving concerns through the current process.

"Remonstrators have chosen to file a lawsuit against, among others, the City’s Metropolitan Development Commission, rather than to respect the city’s land use approval process, especially after the remonstrators asked the district councillor to take the matter to the full city-county council for a rehearing," he said in a statement.

Can you count the lake again?

Revived plans to raze The Willows Event Center — a former lodge and venue for weddings, corporate events and other get-togethers tucked in the "oxbow" of the White River just north of Broad Ripple Avenue — came more than a year after developers withdrew their original petition to rezone the site because of coordinated pushback from nearby residents.

The modified petition rekindled that fight.

Initial redevelopment plans called for rezoning the property to build 243 apartments and 18 townhomes. Developers are now proposing 192 apartment units across four smaller buildings and 16 townhomes. They also have reduced the height of the buildings, among other concessions. Hart said the development team redesigned the project to address neighbor's concerns about density, environmental issues, connectivity and pedestrian access, and so the development would comply with the city's comprehensive plan.

Neighbors living near the events center say the modifications don't go far enough. They insist the revised plans still don't comply with the city's Comprehensive Plan and fails to address their environmental concerns or pedestrian, traffic and connectivity issues they've raised.

A major point of contention remains the inclusion of Spirit Lake in calculating the project's total density. The roughly 13-acre lake accounts for more than half of the 21.44-acre project area, meaning only 8 acres is actually available for development. Neighbors say the lake should not be a factor because it was already used for density when Spirit Lake condos were built more than 20 years ago.

Using the lake again, would amount to a "double dip" scheme that would establish a bad precedent by permitting any developer seeking to erect buildings around the lake to have more units than the Comprehensive Plan and Pattern Book would allow.

"The double dip scheme by the owners to gain density using the same property for multiple projects is just one more reason this project does not pass muster,” Kautzman said.

The developers disagree.

"In every zoning case that they heard in front of the Metropolitan Development Commission, the staff always included the lake in the total density calculation which leaves our density, because of the total acreage of the lake and the land, around under 9 units per acre," Hart said, adding the lake is part of the development because it's a common amenity that benefits everyone.

A promise made

Despite the newly-launched court proceedings, the Feb. 5 public hearing before the city council is still expected to take place.

In an interview, Hart expressed frustration with Delaney's call for another hearing on the project. He said the developers met with the councilwoman twice to explain the project, the revisions and its compliance with the comprehensive plan.

"Her first act as a new city council member is bringing up a vote on killing a $61 billion project in her district," Hart said. He's convinced that Delaney's made the move to fulfill a campaign promise she made to the Willows' neighbors.

Delaney sees it differently. She said she doesn't oppose the project but is listening to her constituents, who don't oppose redeveloping the events center property but object to the project in its current form.

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Delaney said she met with the residents for nearly a year prior to the Jan. 8 council meeting, hearing their concerns and thoughts about the project. About 10 days before the election, she and her opponent were invited to speak with roughly 80 to 100 residents about the redevelopment project.

"At that meeting, I said that I would support the residents and that I would, if it came to it, that I would call it down so that is a fact," she said.

The rezoning petition was packaged with other items up for final approval at the council meeting. If Delaney had not called it down for another hearing, The Elements project would likely have been approved by the full council.

Delaney estimates that about two-thirds of the neighbors opposing the development are in her council district and that the others are in councilman John Barth's district.

"It wasn't a decision that I came to lightly," she said. "But ultimately, I felt that when you have this many neighborhood groups that are surrounding the development all speaking in unison, it's it's not a hard decision to support the neighbors."

Delaney said she will continue working to get both sides to compromise.

Contact IndyStar investigative reporter Alexandria Burris at aburris@gannett.com. Follow her on X, formerly Twitter, at @allyburris.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Neighbors sue to reverse MDC's approval of Willows redevelopment plan