McLean, VA-based Sunrise Senior Living has filed a $30 million lawsuit against the town council of Vienna, VA, alleging that the body discriminated against older adults and people with disabilities in rejecting a rezoning application and conditional use permit for an 82-unit, 108-bed assisted living and memory care community proposed for a downtown redevelopment area.
The move violates the Virginia Fair Housing Law, Sunrise Development claimed in its 40-page complaint, a copy of which was obtained by McKnight’s Senior Living. The lawsuit was filed July 17, one month after the 4-3 council vote against the project.
“The Town Council decided that elderly and disabled persons were not the type of people the Town Council wanted downtown — on the front porch of Vienna,” the lawsuit stated. “According to the Council, such a prime downtown location should be reserved for a younger, healthier, and able-bodied population.”
Sunrise is seeking reconsideration of its application as well as at least $30 million in damages, plus legal fees. The company did not respond to a request for comment.
The town’s attorney told the Tysons Reporter website that the town disputes the allegation that the council violated the Virginia Fair Housing Law but would not comment further on the pending litigation.
Assisted living communities are acceptable uses in the area, called the Maple Avenue Commercial (MAC) Zone, where Sunrise wanted to locate the facility, according to the lawsuit. In fact, Sunrise said, the MAC zone is the only area in town where assisted living communities are permitted, and the town has no other assisted living communities.
The company’s ultimately submitted plan — which had been revised over a 16-month planning and review process, according to Sunrise — was to build a four-story, 77,000-square-foot senior living building, with 2,264 square feet of retail and structured parking on the ground level as well as one level of underground parking, on three-fourths of an acre. The property, Sunrise said, has been vacant since 2016 and formerly housed medical offices and an urgent care center. It is zoned for mixed uses, including residential, commercial and office, and includes a parking lot.
Sunrise said it was treated differently than other applicants pursuing rezoning in the MAC zone and that all other applications — for townhouses, a car wash, hotel and bar/restaurant — were approved.
“Every other application for the MAC Zone included market-rate multifamily units and/or townhouses and/or retail locations that cater to younger demographics,” the lawsuit stated. “The only significant difference between the Proposed Community and the other rezoning applications is in the market Sunrise intended to serve, i.e., elderly and disabled individuals in need of assisted living.”
Town officials questioned whether assisted living residents would patronize local businesses and suggested that the senior living facility be built in a different location, Sunrise said.
“Upon information and belief, no other applicant for the MAC Zone was questioned regarding the age of their future residents or how pedestrian-friendly those residents would be — i.e., whether or how much they would be walking around the neighborhood and frequenting local establishments,” the lawsuit stated.
Some council members’ concerns about parking, Sunrise said, “were a mere pretext for discrimination against the elderly and/or individuals with disabilities.”
No other applicant was required to propose its own parking standard, but the town has no applicable parking standard for assisted living facilities and asked Sunrise to propose one, according to the lawsuit. The company spent “hundreds of thousands of dollars on parking studies, redesign, and other necessary tasks” as part of the approval process, the complaint stated.
