PROVIDENCE — A Rhode Island Superior Court judge has ruled that state coastal regulators unlawfully decided a 2023 decision to expand an aquaculture farm in South Kingstown.

Judge Joseph Montalbano sided against the Coastal Resources Management Council and Matunuck Oyster Bar owner Perry Raso last month, vacating the agency’s approval of a 2-acre expansion of an oyster farm in Potter Pond in South Kingstown.

At the heart of Montalbano’s March 25 ruling is the fact CRMC’s politically appointed, then 10-member executive board chose to approve a modified version of Raso’s original application, one that changed the ultimate footprint of the scallop farm.

The decision stems from the fact CRMC didn’t provide notice or opportunity for additional public comment on the modified application. In his decision, Montalbano wrote that the CRMC board, unlawfully, approved a “substantially” modified aquaculture application that would have required the public to be “put on such notice of said changes.”

“The Approved Farm includes substance changes not contemplated by either the Subcommittee or the Council and not properly noticed by the public or plaintiffs,” wrote Montalbano in his decision. “Thus, the Council’s failure to send the Approved Farm back for public notice was in error.”

Raso, who already owns 10 acres of aquaculture just south of Meadow Point, originally submitted an application to CRMC to expand his Potter Pond aquaculture farm by three acres in 2017. The expansion would bring the total area occupied by aquaculture in the pond to 3%, well below the 5% limit imposed on waterbodies by the state. It took six years, and one ad-hoc subcommittee from CRMC, before the board voted to approve an expansion.

The application was contentious. Residents and nearby property owners expressed safety concerns over the aquaculture cages and gear, the possible limiting of spring and summer water activities, and whether the farm’s expansion would push people toward the center of Potter Pond, causing use conflicts. CRMC received 149 letters in opposition, 79 of which, staff noted, were from out-of-state residents.

In a possible bid to alleviate some of the concerns of residents, CRMC asked agency staff to draw up an expansion that had less of a footprint on the pond. The expansion ultimately voted on and approved by CRMC in June 2023 was 2 acres in size and was located 50 feet more landward than the original application.

But the board’s decision was far from unanimous, with two members, Catherine Robinson Hall, a coastal policy professor and attorney who has since left the council, and Ronald Gagnon, the Department of Environmental Management designee, voting against the modified proposal.

At the time, Hall said she thought approving the 2-acre proposal was more than what the executive board was allowed to do.

“I believe it’s fairly established that the agency who was in charge of reviewing an application, the burden of proof to prove that the application meets the laws is on the applicant, not on the staff,” Hall said at the time. “Having the staff make a recommendation of something that they drew is a conflict.”

Montalbano’s ruling kicks the matter back to the CRMC board, which will be required to redo the approval process for the aquaculture expansion, with a mandate to hold a public hearing before the ad-hoc subcommittee to deliberate on the expansion.

A spokesperson for CRMC said the agency was reviewing the ruling and had no comment. Raso did not immediately respond to a request for comment from ecoRI News.

Montalbano’s decision isn’t the first time a Superior Court judge has overturned a CRMC decision. In 2022, the state Supreme Court overturned a backroom deal between the agency and Champlin’s Marina & Resort to expand its Block Island marina after a protracted 20-year legal battle, ruling the agency had no authority to engage in private mediation to settle the matter.

Last year, Judge Jeffrey A. Lanphear vacated another decision by CRMC, this one approving an expansion of Jamestown Boat Yard’s marina and dredging project. The council, wrote Lanphear, erred by refusing to put together a subcommittee as the agency traditionally does for contested cases, and violated its own internal policies and regulations by approving the expansion.

Court decisions like Montalbano’s are prime fodder for critics and reform advocates who have been pushing lawmakers to abolish the executive board entirely. Topher Hamblett, executive director of Save The Bay, has had a keen eye on the council’s activities for years, and said in a statement Wednesday that CRMC “continues to violate the laws and make procedural blunders.”

“Here we are, in 2026, and the Court has instructed the Council to redo hearings on an aquaculture application submitted over eight years ago, but this time, to follow its own rules,” Hamblett said. “Judicial reversals of Council decisions with orders to ‘do it again, but the right way’ erode the public’s trust, hamper orderly review of coastal permits and negatively impact Rhode Island’s business climate.”

Hamblett, with other environmental organizations and good government groups, have been pushing the General Assembly hard in recent sessions to scrutinize the CRMC board. Lawmakers took a pass on getting rid of it last year, choosing instead to lower its total number of members to 7 and giving Gov. Dan McKee until March 1 of this year to appoint six new members (DEM still holds one slot for its representative).

McKee missed the deadline, and hasn’t made an appointment since he appointed a Barrington foot doctor to serve on the council last year.

This year’s reform legislation looks much different. Save The Bay and others have chosen to back legislation that would fold CRMC into DEM, making it a distinct division within the larger department. It’s not dissimilar to how other states in New England handle their coastal zone management programs.

One of the reasons for preferring merger legislation this year? Save The Bay told ecoRI News last month they were hoping it would be more palatable to lawmakers by costing less. In 2024, the state House Fiscal Office had estimated abolishing the council would cost the state $2 million annually, a death knell in a legislative environment where new taxes or spending are sometimes considered dirty words.

While backers of the legislation contested the estimate, legislative leaders used it as an excuse to hold the bills indefinitely.

But as critics have been quick to point out repeatedly in recent years, nothing has fixed the recurring problems at the heart of CRMC.

“Even if the most highly qualified people were appointed,” Hamblett said, “they would be operating in a structure that consistently ignores its own rules, drags out permit applications for years, is unaccountable and ill-equipped to deal with the threats and challenges facing Rhode Island’s coastal communities.”