He finally compromised with neighbors over his Narragansett shellfish farm. Then, more sued.

NARRAGANSETT – Residents of Mollusk Drive weren't thrilled about a proposal to grow mollusks near their waterfront homes.

After going through mediation, they reached a compromise with oyster farmer Andrew Van Hemelrijck and dropped their objections.

But that wasn't the end of the saga. Enter a second set of waterfront property owners overlooking Point Judith Pond who are now mounting another legal challenge to Van Hemelrijck's plans, saying that they didn't get a fair chance to weigh in.

"Primarily, the objection is based on the lack of due process and notice to my clients," said attorney Mark Fay.

Van Hemelrijck, a South Kingstown resident, intends to grow oysters and quahogs on a half-acre farm located just over 400 feet west of Great Island, as well as at a 0.05-acre winter site nearby. In an email, he said that the court challenge was coming from "extremely wealthy summer residents" who each own multiple properties on Little Comfort Island, directly south of the farm.

The lawsuit was filed Dec. 22 in Superior Court. The plaintiffs include Carol Nulman, who is acting as a trustee of the Carol Nulman Trust, the Carol B. Nulman Family Trust, the Joel S. Nulman Family Trust and the Saul Nulman Trust, which all own property on Edith Road and Florence Road.

Also listed as a plaintiff is the Rose Nulman Trust, the private entity that owns Rose Nulman Park in Point Judith, and where Nulman also serves as a trustee. The park closed to the public in 2021 and is not near the proposed oyster farm.

The other plaintiffs are Bradley J. Waugh and Northrip Realty, LLC. Waugh owns 17 Edith Road and is the sole member of Northrip Realty, which owns 13 Edith Road, according to the lawsuit.

Original objectors reached compromise through federal mediation program

Van Hemelrijck grew up on Great Island, where his parents and grandfather are year-round residents, he told the state Coastal Resources Management Council in October. Both the sites where he now plans to grow oysters and clams could be seen from his childhood bedroom.

He said he developed a love for aquaculture after his parents got a dockside permit to grow a small number of oysters at their home "I didn’t really go looking for it," he said. "It kind of found me."

Van Hemelrijck grew up hearing stories about the days when Point Judith Pond was home to wild oysters and a huge population of scallops, he said, and the idea of helping to restore the waters appealed to him.

His family has lived on Great Island for four generations, he said in an email: "We take the environmental health of this area very seriously, and the fact that oysters and oyster farms have been proven to be incredibly beneficial to the environment, in terms of water filtration and habitat creation for other species, has been a driving force behind this project."

In May 2020, Van Hemelrijck applied for an aquaculture lease from the CRMC. By then, he'd already been growing oysters at the primary site since 2017 under a temporary "commercial viability" permit which couldn't be renewed any longer.

"I've grown oysters successfully in this location on a smaller scale for three years without any complaints or issues," he noted in an email to The Providence Journal.

Van Hemelrijck's proposal for a full lease received all the necessary approvals from the Department of Environmental Management, the Rhode Island Marine Fisheries Council, the Narragansett Harbor Commission, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and others.

More: They've waited four years for approval of their oyster farm. The CRMC will keep them waiting.

But in June 2020, 17 Great Island residents, most living on Mollusk Drive, submitted letters of objection.

Attorneys Maureen A. Hobson and Roger Coutu Jr., who are Mollusk Drive homeowners, said the group was concerned that the farm would be a "hazard to navigation" and would affect recreational activities like boating – an assessment that CRMC staff disagreed with.

As the CRMC's records show, Van Hemelrijck quickly reached out to the Mollusk Drive homeowners to discuss their objections and try to figure out a resolution.

Though the property owners were open to the idea, it wasn't until last September that both sides sat down with mediators from the federally funded Rhode Island Agricultural Mediation Program, and hashed out an agreement.

At the CRMC's October meeting, Hobson said that they'd reached a compromise that included stipulations such as height limits for oyster cages. The CRMC approved Van Hemelrijck's application that night, with those conditions attached.

Attorney says objectors didn't have time for 'meaningful' mediation process

What might have seemed like a success story for mediation programs soon proved to be more complicated.

While Van Hemelrijck had been able to work out a compromise with the neighbors who live directly to the east of the farm, the neighbors directly to the south also had concerns. And they only learned about the application through a third party about three years after it was filed, according to Fay, their attorney.

Van Hemelrijck, in an email, pointed out that the application "was put out to public notice over three years ago and has been publicly available on the CRMC website ever since." He said Waugh and Nulman had "refused to participate in the mediation process."

That's not true, Fay said: His clients were willing to take part in mediation, but needed more time for experts to review the application so that they could have a "meaningful" discussion. Van Hemelrijck wasn't willing to delay the process further, he said.

Fay first brought up the lack of notice at the CRMC's September meeting, prompting the council to continue the application until October. He reiterated those concerns at the October meeting, but the council opted not to delay a vote any further.

The lawsuit seeks to have a court overturn the CRMC's approval of Van Hemelrijck's application, meaning that he would likely have to go through the whole process again, this time with input from the Little Comfort Island objectors.

The CRMC is listed as a defendant along with Van Hemelrijck. Spokeswoman Laura Dwyer declined to comment on Thursday, citing the pending litigation.

Following criticism from waterfront property owners who took issue with the lack of notice about proposed oyster farms, the CRMC changed its policies in 2022 and now notifies anyone located within 1,000 feet about a proposed aquaculture lease. If Van Hemelrijck's application were filed today, the Little Comfort Island homeowners would have been notified, Dwyer confirmed.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Point Judith neighbors sue to block proposed shellfish farm