## Facts

- In 1946, all lot owners in the Culbertson Subdivision in Vernon Township, Crawford County, executed and recorded a restrictive covenant barring the sale or keeping for sale of alcoholic beverages on any subdivision lot.
- Vernon Township Volunteer Fire Department, Inc. purchased about 3.25 acres within the subdivision to build a social hall intended to generate revenue, including by selling alcohol.
- After construction began, the fire department learned of the recorded covenant; the covenant was discoverable through a title search.
- The subdivision contained 77 parcels; owners of 68 parcels signed releases of the covenant, three did not sign but did not seek enforcement, and owners of six parcels refused to release and sought to enforce the restriction.
- The fire department argued the covenant was obsolete due to changed conditions, citing alcohol-serving establishments within roughly two miles of the subdivision.

## Issues

1. Whether changed neighborhood conditions rendered the 1946 restrictive covenant prohibiting alcohol sales within the subdivision obsolete and unenforceable.
2. Whether the covenant continued to provide a substantial benefit to the objecting landowners despite releases by most other parcel owners and surrounding development.
3. Whether equitable defenses (estoppel, laches, waiver) could bar enforcement if the covenant remained valid.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania reversed the Superior Court and reinstated the trial court’s judgment enforcing the restrictive covenant.
- The Court held that the evidence supported the trial court’s finding that conditions had not changed in a way that nullified the covenant’s benefits to the objecting landowners.
- The Court concluded the Superior Court improperly displaced supported trial-level factual findings in an equity matter.
- The Court remanded for the Superior Court to consider the fire department’s unaddressed defenses of estoppel, laches, and waiver.

## Legal Principles

- A restrictive covenant is not rendered unenforceable by changed conditions unless the change substantially destroys or impairs the covenant’s intended benefit.
- In assessing “changed conditions,” the relevant focus is the restricted tract and whether the restriction still serves its protective function there; development or contrary uses outside the tract may be insufficient.
- In equity cases involving restrictive covenants, appellate review is constrained: supported trial court findings of fact may not be reweighed or replaced by an appellate court.
- A recorded covenant running with the land binds later purchasers with at least constructive notice.
- Releases by many benefited owners do not, by themselves, eliminate remaining owners’ ability to enforce a still-beneficial covenant, absent extinguishment or a valid equitable bar.

## Conclusion

The court reinstated enforcement of the subdivision’s recorded no-alcohol covenant, holding that nearby alcohol-related businesses did not establish changed conditions within the subdivision sufficient to defeat the covenant and that the appellate court erred by reweighing fact findings; the case was remanded to address potential equitable defenses to enforcement.


Vernon Twp. Volunteer Fire Dep’t, Inc. v. Connor, 579 Pa. 364, 855 A.2d 873 (Pa. 2004)