Snow blankets the River Park project site in West Lebanon, N.H., on Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2025. The New Hampshire Superior Court granted a preliminary injunction to reinstate the site’s building permit and extend the planning board’s site plan approval deadline to October 27. (Photo by Alex Driehaus, Valley New)
The long-delayed River Park mixed-use development that was conceived as a home for biomedical and tech offices is seeking a two-year extension on its site plan, arguing that a court decision last year in the developer’s favor amounts to a “material change” in the plans and paves the way to extend the timeline for the project.
Granting the site plan extension would “constitute a significant gesture of good faith in rebuilding the trust” between the developer, David Clem, and the city, Clem told city officials earlier this month.
Clem and his son, Chet Clem, have been tussling with Lebanon officials over the fate of the project for several years, and the relationship has been marked by setbacks, acrimony and court battles.
On Monday, the Lebanon Planning Board is scheduled to take up the merits of the developer’s request to extend by two years the time allowed to undertake site work for phases two through five of the project.
The move is the latest effort to restart the River Park project that seeks to build an office park on a largely undeveloped swath of land bordering the river along Route 10 just north of the West Lebanon business corridor on North Main Street.
For the past couple years the project has been at a standstill amid a permitting and legal battle with the city.
Shortly before Thanksgiving last November, following three days of hearings, a New Hampshire Superior Court judge issued a preliminary injunction to extend the site plan for River Park’s first phase — a 61,000-square-foot life sciences building. The court in the same decision also reinstated an expired building permit.
“Site plan” work encompasses the building of infrastructure such as water, sewer and excavation required in advance of construction of the building on the site, for which a separate building permit is required. Generally, both site plan approval and building permits are issued with time limits for when the work is to be undertaken.
The legal victory was a significant one for the Clems, who parked a portable sign on trailer wheels at the site that announced “Thank you NH Superior Court” in capital letters as bulldozers returned to the site to do excavation work.
A building permit for phase one was initially issued in December 2019 and the Clems had planned to begin building the following spring, but the COVID-19 pandemic threw off the timeline. Building permits are valid for 180 days. As the pandemic wore on, the Clems sought and were granted two 180-day extensions through Jan. 13, 2023.
But in November 2022, excavation for the building’s foundations uncovered a unmapped stormwater pipe which set off a conflict over the ensuing months between the developers and the city officials over missed deadlines and demands for additional documentation in order for the permit to remain in compliance, according to court records.
In February 2024, the city’s planning department notified the Clems that the building permit for phase one had expired and was now invalid because no “work” had been done at the site in the past 180 days, the city contended.
The Clems objected to the invalidation, arguing that “work” under the permit covered out-of-the-public eye “preparatory work,” including obligating themselves to $870,000 in contracts with project partners.
The Clems appealed the building permit invalidation to the city’s Building Code Board of Appeals, which found that “work” included unseen “preparatory” work and overturned the planning department’s invalidation.
That was followed by the city appealing the reversal to the State Building Code Review Board, which reversed the reversal, according to court records.
Finally, the Clems sued the city and sought a preliminary injunction in court to reinstate the phase one site plan extension and reinstate the accompanying building permit.
A Superior Court judge, in a densely written 28-page opinion released on Nov. 25, 2024, sided with the Clems, finding their arguments “persuasive” and that they had demonstrated the project faced an “immediate threat of irreparable harm.”
The judge extended the site plan approval by 11 months and two days, and reinstated the building permit for 180 days.
With the extended timeline for phase one now in effect, the Clems are seeking to push back the site plan timelines on the following four phases of River Park by two years to accommodate the sequential building phase of the project.
On Feb. 10, the Planning Board, after voting 4 to 1 with one abstention, agreed to take up the request for consideration on the merits at the next Planning Board meeting on Monday at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall.
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