A contentious conflict between a Connecticut couple and a homeowner’s association in a historic section of rural Cornwall, where some multi-acre properties are valued over $1 million, has grown to become an extensive and expensive court case, showing that it’s not always easy to build houses in Connecticut, even if you have the money.

Rudolph and Lisa Marie Welk filed a lawsuit against the Coltsfoot Valley Association (CVA) in 2022 after they say the CVA put up numerous roadblocks and then denied their building plans. The Melks purchased the undeveloped 18-acre property along Valley Road that is subdivided for housing for $90,000 through foreclosure after the previous owner reportedly cut and ran after also bumping heads with the CVA. 

The Melks said in an interview that their real estate broker, former attorney, and insurance company all indicated that the CVA was fairly “benign,” and they shouldn’t have any trouble building their new house in the designated “building envelope,” but that has not turned out to be the case.

The Melk’s say they submitted plans to the CVA by a local architect to construct their planned 4,000 square foot wood and stone house, obtained wetlands permission, tagged and documented all the trees on the property and got a forestry management plan, but the CVA indicated they wanted to ensure the house wouldn’t be visible from the street, and argued that a wood and stone house is not “keeping with the rural nature of the area”, and thus not allowed by the CVA, according emails and documents.

The CVA’s bylaws say nothing about a house not being visible from the road and the other houses in the area are visible from the road. However, the bylaws include a caveat that says the CVA can deny a building for any reason they like.

According to court documents, including a report by the CVA’s Design Review Committee, “The Association may disapprove any plans or specifications which in its sole discretion it deems unsuitable or undesirable.” 

Furthermore, the committee found, “The design would not be in keeping with the rural nature of the area” because it “stood out as being different from any other house in the CVA, as well as different from all surrounding structures, which otherwise generally fall into the local vernacular tradition of a rural New England house (i.e. farmhouses, colonials, cottages, etc.).”

The committee ultimately recommended unanimously that the CVA deny approval due to “size, siting, and landscaping and in the exercise of its discretion.” The Melks received their denial on Christmas.

The Melks claim that the CVA’s sole discretion to approve or disapprove violates state statute and is “unenforceable,” in their initial court complaint.

“The truth of the matter is they just don’t want a house going up there at all,” Lisa Marie said in an interview. “We’re not the first party that they’ve tried to bully away. They thought that they would just be able to get rid of us like they did the first party.”

The Melks say that to-date they’ve sunk more than $600,000 into trying to work through all the designs, approvals, processes, conflicts and finally the court case. The Melks say they’ve offered to sell the 18-acre property back to the Association for the “real value” of the land but have been repeatedly offered only much lower values. According to a court document, the Association offered $150,000 for the land. 

For comparison, a 19.9-acre lot of vacant land owned by CVA secretary Jonathan Old was appraised at $227,500 in 2021, according to property records. Although the Melks have the property on the market, the ongoing issues with the Association have scared off potential buyers.

“It’s really been a defamation campaign,” Rudolph Melk said. “They’ve had a campaign of lies and innuendo from the moment we purchased the land, which has just been crazy.”

“They don’t want anybody going into the valley, they don’t want another home,” Lisa Marie said. “That’s fine, but they left it on the market. They could have bought it when it was in foreclosure. They chose not to because they thought they could keep everybody out which is why we’re in the predicament that we’re in with the lawsuit.”

According to a deposition of CVA President Rob Lacy, an attorney who also sits on the board of the Cornwall Conservation Trust, there is no rule saying that a house cannot be visible from the road but said that the CVA conducted a balloon test to see if the house would be visible from the road based on the plans submitted.

“The test confirmed that it was going to be as prominent and visible as I thought it was going to be,” Lacy said, adding that the house would be “really looming over the valley,” even though he admitted there were only “flickers” of balloon visibility.

“I thought this application, I felt this proposed construction was an outrage, so I’m not going to say I had an open mind,” Lacy said during the deposition. “It’s a much bigger house than we’re used to in a style that is utterly inconsistent with the style of the architecture, and it is perched up on a slope so that it’s as visible as it could possibly be. It’s an example of some very selfish behavior that people indulge in when they build houses where they enjoy a wonderful view and ruin the view for everybody else around. So, it’s a disaster for the scenic values of the Coltsfoot Valley.”

Interestingly, William Calhoun, Lacy’s predecessor who served as CVA president for 21 years and was president when the Melks received their denial, could not identify the rule anywhere in the Association’s requirements and bylaws in deposition, but believed there was another document that attested to the rule. Calhoun said he relied on Lacy’s interpretation of the rules in requiring that of the Melks. 

Calhoun also admitted to not knowing how big the Melks house would be, telling other members it would 10,000 square feet, and said the architecture didn’t fit the Valley because the home looked “English,” referring to the proposed house as “Buckingham Palace,” in emails, according to the deposition.

Both Lacy and Calhoun declined Inside Investigator’s request for comment noting that the lawsuit is pending, however, in court documents CVA has denied the allegations and argued that the CVA is “entitled to the protection of the business judgement rule because they acted at all times with good faith and in compliance with the Association’s Operative Declarations, Restrictions, and Bylaws.”

“Accordingly, Plaintiff is entitled to no relief in this action and the Court should observe the policy of judicial non-interference with business decisions made in circumstances free from serious conflicts of interest,” the CVA’s court filing says.

The Melks offered to compromise with the CVA in August of 2023 for $1.2 million. The Melks submitted a mediation statement in November of 2023 claiming damages of $2.1 million based on building material cost increases, storage and rental fees, attorney costs and the increase in capital costs, but as of now there has been no agreement reached and the case appears headed for trial.

The Melks say the court process has drained them financially whereas the CVA has an insurance company that is handling the legal case, calling it a “David and Goliath” fight. The couple has started a Go Fund Me page to raise money to keep their case going.

“We implore the community to see through the CVA’s manipulation and hold them accountable. Your support will aid us in seeking justice and preventing others from enduring such abuses,” they wrote.

“We bought a piece of land that was subdivided to build homes,” Lisa Marie said. “And all they wanted to do was disparage us and give us the runaround and were laughing behind our backs throughout the whole process.”

Republish This Story

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.