HANOVER — The Zoning Board has shot down a deal seeking to ease limitations on operating hours and capacity for Christ Redeemer Church, a proposed house of worship that has drawn pushback from neighbors over potential noise and traffic problems.

The board voted unanimously Thursday to reject a settlement between town attorneys and representatives, who sued in June asserting functions for the $5 million church planned for Greensboro Road were being unfairly limited by town regulations.

At the end of a 1½-hour meeting, board members argued that conditions placed on Christ Redeemer in April were fair and should be defended in court.

“I do think the order we finally reached in this was carefully reasoned and specifically tied to evidence in the record,” Zoning Board member Jeremy Eggleton told a standing-room-only crowd at Hanover’s town hall.

Board member Richard Green agreed, saying an April decision to grant the proposed 21,250-square-foot church building a special exception to build — but only with the conditions in place — was the result of careful deliberation.

“It’s reasoned, it’s mathematical, it’s fact-based and not arbitrary,” he said.

The Zoning Board’s decision sends the lawsuit filed by Christ Redeemer in June back to Superior Court.

Christ Redeemer Church has sought to build a house of worship in Hanover for 16 years. In 2016, the church proposed building a new structure for its more than 400 congregants at 28 and 32 Greensboro Road, but those plans haven’t yet come to fruition.

In court filings, Christ Redeemer argues that a limit of 300 occupants and operating hours of 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays and 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. on weekends were among several unreasonable limitations placed on the church building.

It also said the town’s zoning ordinance discriminates against religious institutions by requiring churches to obtain a special exception in areas of town that don’t require other buildings serving large numbers of people to apply for approval.

Manchester-based attorney Michael Tierney, who represents the church, said he intends to prove both of those claims before a judge.

“A new church has not been approved by the town in my lifetime,” he said following the meeting.

The last new church in the Institutional Zoning District was Aquinas House, the Catholic student center at Dartmouth College, built in 1960.

Meanwhile, neighbors who attended the meeting welcomed the Zoning Board’s decision, saying it partially protects Greensboro Road from the noise and traffic the proposed church would bring.

“I think there were a lot of good reasons to turn down the settlement, and I think the board found them,” Jeff Acker, who lives across the street from the church site, said after the hearing.

Acker and his wife, Lara, oppose the church proposal and have filed lawsuits challenging both the Zoning Board’s April decision to allow construction and an earlier waiver for wetlands rules. While he opposes the size and scale of the Christ Redeemer Church plan, Acker supports the conditions laid out in the board’s special exception to mitigate the impact of the project. He said the April decision was “thought out” and included evidence that the church would disturb the community’s residential atmosphere.

“To just completely throw (the April decision) out the window as proposed is ludicrous and offensive, quite honestly,” he said.

The proposed agreement, which was unveiled in September, sought to strike several conditions from the special exception.

The town promised to scrap its 300-person occupancy limit and not prescribe hours of operation. It also would have done away with a parking limit of 113 vehicles, although the church agreed to abide by that number.

In return, Christ Redeemer would waive its request for damages and attorneys’ fees.

Tierney, the church’s attorney, argued before the Zoning Board on Thursday that the board had attaching conditions to the proposed building arbitrarily. The evidence for restricting the church’s activities was not “narrow, objective and definite” as law requires, he said.

Meanwhile, the Ackers’ attorney, Nate Stearns, warned against accepting the agreement, saying it “leaves the neighborhood with no protections in place.”

Both Rob Houseman, Hanover’s planning and zoning director, and town Attorney Laura Spector-Morgan participated in the settlement talks but declined to speak publicly about the deal despite pleas from the audience.

“I think that we are entitled to know why somebody representing the town thinks this is better than that the board has already decided,” Acker said to applause.

Zoning Board member Bernie Waugh, a municipal attorney who previously represented Lebanon, responded that “we’ve had decisions with our attorneys and those are private discussions,” which are protected by attorney-client privilege.

The town’s attorneys likely believe Hanover will lose the lawsuit, or its insurance company is pressing for a settlement, Acker said after the hearing.

But even if that is the case, he said, the townspeople should be informed.

“They must have thought that this was a good proposal for the town or else they wouldn’t have agreed to bring it forward,” Acker said. “And the fact that none of them would stand up and explain to the public why they thought it was a good proposal cuts to the core of how a democracy is supposed to work.”

Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727- 3223.

Clarification

While Hanover resident Jeff Acker is opposed to  the size and scale of the Christ Redeemer Church building proposed for Greensboro Road across from his home, he says he is not against a church being built at that site. An earlier version of this story misstated his position on that point.