About Abutter Lists
When you submit an application to the Zoning Board, you must include an abutter list, both as a typed or handwritten list of all the abutters (including their names, addresses, and the lot numbers of the lots they own), and on two sets of adhesive mailing labels, no larger than 1½ × 3¼ inches, for all the abutters (without lot numbers).
Public Notices
Before it can consider your application, the Zoning Board has to make sure that anyone who might be interested has a chance to know about the meeting. We do this by
- putting notices up in two places in the town (usually the Town Hall and the Post Office),
- putting a notice in a newspaper (usually the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript), and
- sending letters to all your abutters.
Definition of Abutters
Your abutters are defined by state law and the Zoning Ordinance. They include
- you;
- the owner or owners of the lot or lots involved in the application;
- the owner of every lot which touches any lot involved in the application (even at a corner), or which is directly or diagonally across a road, stream, river, or railroad right of way from any lot involved in the application; and
- the holders of any conservation, preservation, or agricultural preservation restrictions on any of the lots involved in the application.
Abutter Lists
You are required to submit a list of abutters to the Zoning Board along with your application, and the Zoning Board will then send a notice to each abutter on the list. The two critical things that you must realize about this process are:
- No Zoning Board decision is valid if the public notices haven’t been properly posted and the abutters haven’t been properly notified. Any abutter who wasn’t properly informed of a hearing can appeal any decision made at that hearing, and probably have it overturned. Unlike other appeals of Zoning Board decisions, an appeal based on improper notification does not have to be made within thirty days of the decision.
- The correctness of the abutter list you submit is your responsibility. The Town will be happy to help you find the information you need to prepare your abutter list, but it’s your problem if the list is incorrect. The Town does not have any responsibility or liability, even if you rely on Town-provided information that later turns out to be incorrect.