Incompatibility of proposed home

I am a newbie on the forum but have served on our HOA Board in various capacities since its inception 10 yrs. ago. I recently was recruited again and agreed to serve a year.
Our problem from the outset was that only members who had a personal agenda wanted to serve therefore they have dominated the board actions.
The current problem I am faced with is the ACC decision (backed by the preceding Board) to deny approval of an individuals house plan because the height of the house was not compatible with others on the street.
The facts are:
The very expensive view lot is restricted to a one story house with the only height limit being the city maximum of 35'.
The original lot surface was the highest of the 10 along that side of the street.
The lot owner owner initially proposed a larger house with a height of 27' and a 8/12 roof.
The lot owner had to blast rock to provide a level building pad on bed-rock
The lot owner has now reduced the size of the house and lowered the height to 23.5' with a 3/12 metal roof.
The house will be 3' higher than the house on the right which is set back 40 further(this makes it look lower) and is the smallest single story in the addition.
One dominant, board member who voted against the house lives behind at a 30' lower elevation and has no view.
Another dominant member,who voted against, owns a very low cost,vacant, non-view lot across the street

I am trying to convince several board members ,who have vetoed his last proposal " due to incompatability with other existing structures" to accept it.

Comments please

I fail to see how they can even vote to deny since the proposed height is well below the maximum.

Maybe they have a minimum height AND a maximum height restriction.

Thanks for the comments. I would like to add " has anyone had any experience in litigation of an issue like this"
Ben

Yes. There were two cases here where the board ended up granting/approving the proposal after suit was filed.

The boards' attorneys both recommended approval since there were no areas where the building was out of compliance with the restrictions and ARCs and the refusal appeared arbitrary.

These did not occur in my HOA, but in two different nearby HOAs. I heard about them at a workshop for neighborhood leaders. One of the board members was on a panel and was discussing the situations and how/why they ended up reversing the decision.

The board member on the panel was not one of the ones who voted against the proposed building.

But, the refusal in this case had to do with metal roof. Their CC&Rs did NOT disallow metal roofing material. Their ARC guidelines do for OUTBUILDINGS, but NOT for main building. Apparently the board tried to argue since the ARC guidelines for outbuildings disallowed metal roofing material, and the outbuildings MUST have the same shingles/material as the main building that the main buildings (the main house on the lot) cannot have a metal building, either.

Unfortunately, the people building on the lot were not requesting approval for an outbuilding and don't ever intend to build one. So whatever outbuilding roofing materials are disallowed makes no difference.

The board disagreed. The family brought suit. The board ended up reversing before going before the judge, after the two attorneys got together.

I don't know the full details on the other but if I recall it had to do with vinyl versus brick veneer. The governing docs did not say that vinyl was verboten. But the board tried to deny approval to a home that was planning on putting vinyl siding. That board ended up approving before the case went to trial, but I don't know why.

It would be different if the regulations you shared did not give the maximum. The regulations don't appear to address whether or not the roofline of adjacent homes MUST be within X inches of feet of each other.