'No end in sight': Centerplan's lawsuit against city, designers of Dunkin' Park faces new hurdle
Contributed
Dunkin' Park in downtown Hartford.
It’s alive.
A high-profile lawsuit brought by the original developer of Dunkin’ Park against the city, and multiple subcontractors, has been winding through the state’s court system since 2016.
The $56 million ballpark, home to the Hartford Yard Goats Double-AA baseball team, opened in 2017.
While the stadium has succeeded in bringing crowds of more than 6,000 fans to downtown Hartford, a dispute over cost overruns and delays with its construction – and the city’s decision to fire the original developer, Middletown-based Centerplan Cos. – remains mired in controversy.
A major piece of the lawsuit was resolved in October, when the City Council approved a $9.9 million settlement with Centerplan and an insurance company. The city also withdrew its counterclaim.
The agreement enabled the city and other defendants to be withdrawn from the case. Also, it allowed Stamford-based developer RMS Cos. to begin constructing a 228-unit apartment building and parking garage on a lot across from Dunkin’ Park, one of the properties involved in the dispute.
But it did not settle claims between Centerplan and project architect Kansas City-based Pendulum Studios II.
In April, Pendulum filed a third-party complaint against the city and several subcontractors, reeling them back into the case. The third-party complaint says the city and two subcontractors are liable for damages caused by their own negligence, and that Pendulum had no way of anticipating the problems that occurred.
Another subcontractor, BVH Integrated Services, has filed an apportionment claim against the city and five other defendants.
Meanwhile, Centerplan has filed a cross complaint.
The 18 parties now involved in the case have filed numerous motions to dismiss and strike, but the case appears to be headed for another trial – a process that could take years.
The case already went to trial in 2019 and a jury ruled in favor of the city, finding that Centerplan and another company, DoNo Hartford, “controlled Pendulum at all relevant times and were, therefore, responsible to the city for any of Pendulum’s design errors, defects and deficiencies.”
Centerplan appealed, and the state Supreme Court reversed the jury’s decision.
Recently, the city filed a motion to strike/dismiss the new claims, to which Pendulum has objected. There are currently 13 pending motions, and a hearing is set for Oct. 1.
On Sept. 16, Centerplan filed a motion for an order referring the case to mediation.
An attorney for Centerplan, Louis Pepe of McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpenter, argued in the court filing that the case has already consumed “more than its fair share of judicial resources,” but “the end is nowhere in sight.”
He noted that the legal fees involved for 18 parties in protracted discovery proceedings will be “prodigious,” making the case increasingly hard to settle.
“Counsel for all the parties owe their respective clients and this court an obligation to explore, in good faith, all alternatives — including mediation — to the continuation of this debilitating litigation,” Pepe wrote.
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