NEIGHBORHOOD OPPOSITION against a proposed seven-story apartment complex in Willow Glen has entered a new phase, after one resident launched a lawsuit intended to force the city into conducting a more thorough review of the development’s potential impact on the area’s sewer system.

Jeffrey Yuille, who lives directly adjacent to the proposed development site at 940 Willow St., filed a lawsuit on April 17. The legal challenge takes aim at the city’s finding that the existing sewer infrastructure is adequate to service the 126 apartments slated for construction at the site. The complaint contends the city’s analysis of sewer capacity was flawed, calling into question a certification that allowed the project to bypass additional environmental review. The lawsuit asks the Santa Clara County Superior Court to essentially halt the project until the site is cleared by an independent inspector.

The lawsuit comes after the San Jose Planning Commission rejected an appeal from a nearby resident, who urged the commissioners to overturn the development permit on grounds the project does not meet city design standards.

Yuille attended the March 11 appeal hearing. During public comment, he laid out a litany of concerns about the city’s hydraulic analysis,  and demanded a more rigorous review to prove “with math not assumptions” the extra load from the new apartment building would not trigger a sewage backup in his home.

“That means assume rain, a Super Bowl Sunday and everyone’s flushing the toilet after the first quarter when the 49ers are up 14 to zero,” Yuille said.

Yuille declined to comment beyond a brief written statement confirming the lawsuit had been filed when San José Spotlight reached out.

A representative for the developer behind the project, San Francisco-based Redco Development, did not respond to a request for comment.

The San Jose City Manager’s Office and City Attorney’s Office did not respond to a request for comment.

The proposed project would redevelop a 1-acre lot at the southeast corner of Willow Street and Kotenberg Avenue, which now houses a liquor store, into a new residential complex with roughly 1,600 square feet of retail space on the ground floor.

The development has faced organized neighborhood opposition since Redco first proposed it in 2023. In addition to concerns about the potential strain on the neighborhood’s public infrastructure, including its sewer capacity and electrical grid, residents have also said the seven-story building is out of character with the surrounding area, which is largely made up of single-family homes. They also warn the influx of more than 100 new residents would lead to clogged, unsafe streets.

While the project does not meet the city’s zoning rules for the site, city officials have said they have no choice but to approve it, given it has streamlined status under California’s “builder’s remedy” law. That’s because the developer submitted the project application during a period of 2023 when San Jose was out of compliance with state housing law, having missed the Jan. 31, 2023 deadline to submit a long-term housing development plan.

Redco Development has also made use of another housing streamlining law — Assembly Bill 130, passed last year — to claim exemption from the environmental review process typically required by the California Environmental Quality Act.

But Yuille’s lawsuit argues the city has failed to demonstrate that the new apartment complex would be adequately served by existing utilities, thus invalidating a key finding that undergirds the exemption.

The complaint alleges several technical problems with the city’s hydraulic analysis, which the plaintiff obtained through a Public Records Act request. For example, the plaintiff claims to have identified inconsistencies across various city documents, such as measurements of pipe diameters, that call into question the city’s modeling of sewer functions. The document also contends the city’s findings were based on overly rosy assumptions about the condition of the aging pipes now serving the area.

Other nearby residents have also voiced concerns about the neighborhood’s sewer capacity. They report frequent sewer backups, followed by inspections that reveal broken pipes.

During the March 11 hearing, officials with San Jose’s Department of Public Works defended the city’s sewer analysis.

“The results show that both the 10-inch sewer main along Willow Street and the 6-inch sewer main along Kotenberg Avenue do have adequate capacity to accommodate the project,” Michelle Kimble, an official with the department, said.

Faced with angry criticism from multiple residents at the hearing, Redco co-founder Chris Freise also spoke up for the benefits a residential project of this size could bring to the neighborhood.

“At the end of the day, Willow Glen needs housing,” he said. “That’s where folks want to live.”

News of the recently filed lawsuit has won cheers from some other nearby residents.

Maren Sederquist, who serves as board president for the Willow Glen Neighborhood Association and has spoken out against the project before, said she hopes the legal challenge will push the city to address residents’ concerns.

“From the beginning, there have been questions about whether the existing sewer infrastructure can handle a project of this scale,” Sederquist told San José Spotlight. “The city should have done a more thorough job evaluating those impacts upfront.”

Contact Keith Menconi at keith@sanjosespotlight.com or @KeithMenconi on X.

This story originally appeared in San José Spotlight.