Housing Authority v. Parks

Citations

• 211 Conn. App. 528

Syllabus

The plaintiff housing authority sought, by way of summary process, to regain possession of certain premises leased to the defendant tenant. The plaintiff sent the defendant a pretermination notice for nonpayment of rent, to which the defendant did not respond. The plaintiff then served the defendant with a notice to quit possession and, thereafter, served the defendant with a summons and complaint seeking immediate posses- sion of the premises. The defendant filed a motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction on the ground that the pretermination notice was defective. The trial court granted the defendant's motion to dismiss and rendered a judgment of dismissal. Nineteen days after the court rendered the judgment of dismissal, the plaintiff filed a motion to reargue, which the court denied. Thereafter, the plaintiff appealed to this court, and the defendant filed a motion to dismiss the appeal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction on the basis that the appeal was untimely, which this court granted. Held that this court lacked subject matter jurisdiction to entertain the plaintiff's appeal, the plaintiff having failed to comply with the five day appeal period set forth in the applicable statute (§ 47a-35): the plaintiff could not prevail on its claim that the five day appeal period set forth in § 47a-35 applies only to a tenant and not to a landlord, as the clear and unambiguous language of the statute includes appeals by any party, and the legislative policy in favor of the swift resolution of summary process actions, as reflected in the plain language of the statute, applies whether the appeal is brought by the landlord or the tenant; moreover, because the plaintiff's motion to rear- gue was filed outside of the statutory five day appeal period, its denial did not give rise to a new appeal period from the underlying judgment, as allowing an appeal from the judgment of dismissal pursuant to the denial of the motion to reargue would circumvent the jur