1993-01-26
~
QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING
SECOND REGULAR MEETING
JANUARY 26TH. 1993
INDEX
Site Plan No. 3-93 Dr. Joseph Guerra 1.
Site Plan No. 4-93 United Cerebral Palsey Association 2.
Site Plan No. 5-93 Harrisena Community Church 9.
SEQRA REVIEW ONLY Thomas Dittus 23.
Subdivision No. 1-1993 Edward & Mary Cardinale 26.
SKETCH PLAN
Subdivision No. 4-1993 Guido Passarelli 36.
SKETCH PLAN
Pl-93 RECOMMENDATION ONLY Ronald Newell/Garfield Raymond 40.
P2-93 RECOMMENDATION ONLY Curtis Lumber Co., Inc. 62.
THESE ARE NOT OFFICIALLY ADOPTED MINUTES AND ARE SUBJECT TO BOARD
AND STAFF REVISIONS. REVISIONS WILL APPEAR ON THE FOLLOWING MONTHS
MINUTES (IF ANY) AND WILL STATE SUCH APPROVAL OF SAID MINUTES.
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QUEEBSBURY P~BXBG BOARD MEE~IBG
SE~D R8GULM IIU'l'IIIG
JAIIUARY 26~H. 1"3
7... P.M.
MEMBERS PRE88B~
TIMOTHY BREWER. ACTING CHAIRMAN
CORINNE TARANA, SECRETARY
ROGER RUEL
KATHY ROWE
CRAIG MACEWAN
MEMBERS ABSEBT
CAROL PULVER
EDWARD LAPOINT
EXECUTIVE DIREC~OR-JIM MARTIN
PLANNER-SCOTT HARLICKER
TOW~ EHGINEER-RIST-FROST, TOM YARMOWICH
STENOGRAPHER-MARIA GAGLIARDI
MR. BREWER-We've got a couple of things we've got to do internally.
Ha. everybody read the minutes?
MR. MACEWAN-Which ones?
MR. BREWER-The 15th and the 22nd.
MR. RUEL-Which ones?
MR. BREWER-December 15th and the 22nd.
~R. RUEL-Yes. I've read those.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Any corrections? Comments?
CORRECTIOH OF MIBUTBS
December 15th, 1992: NONE
December 22nd, 1992: NONE
MOTIOB TO APPROVE THB MIBUTES OF DECBMBER 15TH. 1992 A.D DECEMBER
22WD. 1992. Introduced by Corinne Ifarana who aoved for its
adoption. seconded by Roger Ruel:
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES. NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver. Hr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-Okay. We'll go to the first itea on the agenda. and we
have Correspondence from the first applicant. Corinne. would you
please read.
HEW·· BUSIHBSS:
SITE PLAH NO. 3-93 TYPE I WR-1A. C.E.A. DR. JOSEPH GUERRA
OWNBR: J. GUERRA. A. CAHPIBLLO LOCATION. SEBLYE ROAD. CLEVBRDALE
TO COHSTRUCT A SECOHD STORY ON AH EXISTIHG SIHGLE STORY HOME.
("ARRB. COUBn P~BIBG) (A.P.A) ~u: HAP BO. 16-1-32 LOT SIZB:
28.... 8Q. r~. SBCYIOB 179-79r
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MRS. TARANA-Dated January 26, 1993, Town of Queensbury, Re: Guerra
Site Plan Review App. "Please withdraw this site plan review
application and schedule it for the February agenda. Joe Roulier"
MR. BREWER-Okay. Do we have to table that?
MR. MARTIN-No. He's asking for a withdrawal.
MR. BREWER-Completely withdraw, and we don't have to make a motion
or anythin9 then?
MR. MARTIN-No.
MR. BREWER-Okay. We'll get ri9ht into the business, I guess.
SITE PLAR RO. 4-93 TYPE: UNLISTED ZORE: SFR-1A URITED CBRBBRAL
PALSBY ASSOCIATION OWNBR: SAMB AS ABOVB LOCATIOR. SOUTH SIDE OF
AVIATION ROAD WEST OF MOUNTAIN VIEW LANE FOR CORSTRUCTION OF A
2.212 SQ. FT. BUILDING AND ASSOCIATED PARKIRG TO SBRVE AS THE
ADMIRISTRATIVB OFFICE FOR THE PROSPBCT SCHOOL. TAX MAP NO. 82-3-2
LOT SIZE. 1.44 ACRBS SBCTIOR. 179-28 D (3)(A)[l]
JOHN GORALSKI. REPRESENTING APPLICANT. PRESENT
MRS. TARANA-Before we get into it, this organization comes under
the Warren/Washington County Community Services Board, and I'm on
that Board, so I'm going to recuse myself from both the discussion
and the vote.
HR. BREWER-Okay.
STAFF INPUT
Notes from Staff, Site Plan No. 4-93, United Cerebral Palsey
Association, Meeting Date: January 26, 1993 "Pr01ect DescriPtion:
The applicant is proposing to construct a 2.212 square foot
building and a 15 space parking area. The building will be used as
administrative office space for the adjacent Prospect School. The
project is located on the south side of Aviation Road directly west
of the Prospect School and zoned SFR-1A. The property is an
unlisted action under SEQRA and a short EAF was completed for this
project. Pr01ect Analvsis: The project was compared to the
following standards found in Section 179-38 E. of the Zoning Code:
1. The location, arrangement, size, design, and general site
compatibility of the buildings, lighting and signs; The proposed
building will be the only structure on the site; therefore, site
compatibility is not an issue. There are no signs proposed as part
of this project. There does not appear to be any on site lighting
proposed. Consideration should be given to installin9 li9hts for
the parking area. These lights should be directed towards the
building and away from the adjacent property. 2. The adequacy and
arrangement of vehicular traffic access and circulation, including
intersections, road widths, pavement surfaces, dividers and traffic
controls; Access to the site will be from Aviation Road. The
access is to be 24 feet wide. Access to the site should not be a
problem. 3. The location, arrangeaent, appearance and sufficiency
of off-street parking and 10adin9; The parking area will consist
of 15 parking spaces including one handicapped space. This meets
the zoning code requirements for a 2,212 sq. ft. office. Staff
would like to see the parking lot reconfigured so that the spaces
are facing the office and not the adjacent residentially zoned
property. This would lessen the impact on the adjacent property
and also allow for easier accessibility to the buildin9. Since
this office is to service the United Cerebral Palsey Association
and the adjacent Prospect School, it would seem prudent to provide
for more handicapped spaces. 4. The adequacy and arrangement of
pedestrian traffic access and circulation, walkway structures,
control of intersections with vehicular traffic and overall
pedestrian convenience; Pedestrian access to the building could be
improved by re-configuring the parking lot so that the spaces are
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facing the bUilding and providing a sidewalk or walkway along the
eastern edge of the parking area. This would enable pedestrians to
enter the office without having to cross the parking area. 5. The
adequacy of stormwater drainage facilities; The stormwater drainage
system is to be an infiltration trench system around the southern
and eastern edge of the parking lot and also for the office
building. This method was reviewed and approved by Rist-Frost (see
letter dated 1/5/93). The comments were addressed by the applicant
in a revised site plan dated 1/6/93. 6. The adequacy of water
supply and sewage disposal facilities; The site is serviced by town
water. Sewage disposal will be through an on site septic system.
The system was reviewed by Rist-Frost and was deemed to be
satisfactory. 7. The adequacy, type and arrangement of trees,
shrubs and other sui table plantings, landscaping and screening
constituting a visual and/or noise buffer between the applicant's
and adjoining lands, including the maximum retention of existing
vegetation and maintenance including replacement of dead plants;
The applicant is preserving to the maximum extent possible the
eXisting vegetation. The proposal includes plantings around the
front of the building but none on the rest of the site.
Consideration should be given to providing a landscaped
buffer/screen between the parking lot and the adjoining property to
the west. In order to enhance the aesthetics of the site and the
neighborhood in general, street trees should be provided along
Aviation Road. They should be set far back enough so that it is
not impacted by future expansion of the roadway. 8. The adequacy
of fire lanes and other emergency zones and the provision of fire
hydrants ¡ The access is wide enough to allow for access of
emergency vehicles. The closest fire hydrant is on the north side
of Aviation Road, east of the site. 9. The adequacy and impact of
structures, roadways and landscaping in areas with susceptibility
to ponding, flooding and/or erosion. There does not appear to be
any areas of the site that are susceptible to ponding, flooding, or
erosion. SummarY/Recommendation: The Planning Staff has several
recommendations regarding this site plan. Lighting should be
provided for the parking area. This lighting should be directed
away from the adjoining properties and towards the building. The
parking lot should be reconfigured so that the parking spaces are
facing the office and not the adjacent property. Additional
handicapped spaces should also be provided. A sidewalk should be
provided along the eastern side of the parking area to ease
accessibili ty to the building. A landscaped, screen should be
provided between the parking lot and the adjoining property as well
as street trees along Aviation Road."
MR. HARLICKER-There's also a letter from Rist-Frost Associates, and
Tom will address that.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
ENGINEER REPORT
Notes from Tom Yarmowich, Rist-Frost, Town Engineer, January 5,
1993 "We have reviewed the project and have the following
engineering comments: 1. Corrected Green Area calculations
indicated that the building will occupy 3.5% of the site and the
paved parking areas with sidewalks will occupy 11.7% of the site.
The proposed Green Area is therefore 85%, and is in conformance
with zoning. 2. The details for infiltration trench construction
indicate topsoil covering. The trenches should be constructed with
freely draining stone material up to finished grade. This will
reduce impact erosion beneath roof lines and will permit the
trenches to properly intercept sheet runoff from parking areas."
MR. BREWER-And do we have someone here for the applicant?\
MR. GORALSKI-Good evening. My name is John Goralski from Richard
Jones Associates. Also with me tonight are Larry Galush, the
Director. and Malcolm O'Hara, the attorney for the Cerebral Palsey
Associates. As was stated, this building is proposed to be an
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administration building for the Prospect School. There will be
about five employees working in the building. I can address the
comments.
MR. BREWER-Yes, if you'd like to go right down through them.
MR. GORALSKI-Okay. There are no signs proposed at this time. If
a sign does become a necessity for one reason or another, it would
most likely be a small, wall mounted sign that will be much smaller
than anything that's allowed, as far as the Sign Ordinance is
concerned. Consideration should be given to installing lights in
~~:i8:lfí~ r8JxingW~'Svepo\os~iJ1~~ gw~ J3:P£1cfflg tps k85fngthiS 61
similar to those that are built by the BOCES classes and shipped to
a site and put together there.
MR. BREWER-This is going to be a wood building?
MR. GORALSKI-Yes. It's going to be a wood framed building. I have
a sample of the type of elevations.
MR. BREWER-So it's not going to be constructed there, then?
MR. GORALSKI-We don't know that yet. That hasn't been worked out,
but it's going to be your basic ranch style house.
MRS. ROWE-Is that why they talk about Phase I and Phase II in the
diagram, because it'll be constructed in two different?
MR. GORALSKI-Right. Well, the Phase I will be built this spring,
and that's what's they need right now for administrative offices.
Phase II mayor may not be built in the future, depending on their
needs, but at this point, Phase I will be built this spring.
MRS. ROWE-Okay.
MR. GORALSKI-Getting back to the comments. Because we would like
to keep this as residential as possible, and the fact that there
won't be any evening programs going on in this building, we really
don't feel that lights in the parking area are necessary. There
will be lights at all the entrances, residential style light
fixtures. There is also a street light right at the driveway
entrance. You can see the utility pole on the property corner.
There's a garage street light there. So we don't think there's any
need for lighting.
MR. BREWER-I guess the only thought that would come to mind is
possibly in the winter, maybe a light on the side of the building.
MR. GORALSKI-There will be, there's an entrance on the side of the
building. There will be typical wall mounted residential fixture
on that side of the building.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Anybody else?
MR. GORALSKI-I'll go on. The Staff would like to see the parking
lot reconfigured so that the faces are facing the office and not
adjacent to the residentially zoned property. We have no problem
with doing that. To be honest with you, it's a property adjacent
to a 30 foot strip that probably will never have a house on it, but
we have no problem with flipping it over and have all the parking
point in towards the building, and as far as providing an
addi tional handicapped space, once again, the operator didn't
really think it was necessary, but we have no problem with
providing an additional handicapped space.
MR. BREWER-Okay. How many was in mind, when the Staff wrote these
comments?
MR. HARLICKER-I didn't really have a number in mind.
It just
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seemed that since the structure was going to be associated with the
school, I wasn't sure what sort of clientele was going to be using
the building.
MR. GORALSKI-There will be an occasion for clients to come to this
building now and again. So, like I say, we don't have a problem
there with one. The requirement is one for every 25. We had one
for 15. If you want to see another one, that's fine.
MR. BREWER-Okay. That would be fine.
MR. GORALSKI-Okay. As far as the stormwater and the sewage
disposal system, we revised the trench detail to reflect Tom's
comments, and the sewage disposal system seems to be, you know,
it's designed for the requirements. Landscaping and buffering, as
far as that's concerned, once again, if the idea is to protect that
adjacent property, we can plant some arborvitae or some sort of
shrub that's gOing to grow into a screen to protect that property.
MR. BREWER-Is this something that's gone before the Beautification,
or will go?
MR. GORALSKI-No. They never called us to go.
MR. BREWER-Maybe you could get together with them, possibly?
MR. GORALSKI-Sure.
MR. BREWER-And maybe come up with some kind of a plan.
MR. GORALSKI-As far as street trees are concerned, we have proposed
some extensive foundation plantings for the building. Most of the
materials and labor for this building is going to be kind of a
donation type of thing, and they have a pretty close budget. If
we're going to be providing a screen on the western side of the
property, I don't know that our budget is gOing to allow for street
trees. We're going to provide as much foundation planting and that
type of thing as we can, shown on the plan for that. To be honest
with you, street trees are an expensive item that, if we don't have
to do, we'd prefer not to.
MR. BREWER-I don't really have a problem with not putting street
trees in, personally. I don't know how anybody else feels, maybe
some shrubs out towards the road, or something to that effect.
MR. GORALSKI-We could maybe move some shrubs. Instead of putting
the shrubs behind the handicapped ramp, we could put them in front
of the handicapped ramp.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MR. MACEWAN-What was the question regarding the sidewalks? You had
a comment on that.
MR. HARLICKER-Again, yes, to provide some sort of walkway on the
eastern edge of the parking lot, where the cars pull in. It's just
a suggestion.
MR. MACEWAN-Now that they're going to flip the parking lot over to
the other side, they'll mirror that over, is that necessary, now
that they're going to mirror image that?
MR. HARLICKER-It would allow, I don't know what sort of traffic.
MR. GORALSKI-There are only going to be five people working in this
building, and if one or two people come by during the day, that's
going to be a lot of people.
MR. HARLICKER-Yes.
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MR. MACEWAN-You're not anticipating a lot of traffic in and out of
the place?
MR. GORALSKI-No, not at all.
MRS. ROWE-How about traffic between the two buildings? That was
one of my concerns, as far as.
MR. GORALSKI-There probably will be some need for.
MRS. ROWE-Are students going to be traveling back and forth?
MR. GORALSKI-No.
MRS. ROWE-So, it'll just be adults?
MR. GORALSKI-It'll just be employees going back and forth.
MRS. ROWE-Okay.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Is there any other questions from anybody on the
Board?
MRS. ROWE-This doesn't really concern your site, but maybe you can
answer this question for me. What is that big yellow chlorine sign
building that's out in the front there?
MR. GORALSKI-That's, the City of Glens Falls Water Department owns
that building, and they store chlorine for their chlorination for
City water.
MR. RUEL-That's ugly.
MRS. ROWE-It's terrible. There's no complex between that and it's
vicinity near the school or anything, right?
MR. GORALSKI-No. That building's very secure.
MRS. ROWE-Okay.
MR. MACEWAN-On your application, you say that you're going to have
a building of 2212 feet. Is that both Phase I and Phase II?
MR. GORALSKI-That's Phase I and Phase II.
MR. MACEWAN-Combined?
MR. GORALSKI-Combined.
MR. MACEWAN-What is the size of the Phase I building itself?
MR. GORALSKI-It's 24 by 44.
MRS. ROWE-24 by 44.
MR. RUEL-1056.
MR. MACEWAN-Question for the Staff. How do we handle this, because
he's looking at two phases, here, of the application.
MR. BREWER-Would it be two building permits? One building permit?
MR. MARTIN-It's a question of how long the phasing takes, how long
they project it over what amount of time.
MR. MACEWAN-He's basically saying they may not even go ahead with
it.
MR. GORALSKI-Yes. At this point, we can't say. It may never
happen, but the building is being designed and the site's been laid
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out and what not to accommodate the second phase.
MR. MACEWAN-Should the application reflect that it's only one
building, at that square footage?
MR. MARTIN-I think, at this point, it's for both phases, but I
think a resolution for approval should be for the first phase.
MR. BREWER-And then he would have to come back to us for the second
phase?
MR. MARTIN-Providing that it didn't occur in a given amount of
time, he would, I believe.
MALCOLM O'HARA
MR. O'HARA-I think it would be better, if we had an approval for
both phases, if we didn't complete the second phase within a period
of time in which the Board prescribes, we would come back, in the
event that we decide we want to go forward with the whole thing.
Malcolm 0' Hara, attorney for the United Cerebral Palsey
Association. If we could, we'd like approval for the whole project
tonight. If the Board, if the Board would like us to come back, if
we don't complete the whole project within a certain time frame,
we'd be happy to do that, rather than, if we should decide, three
months from now, or even when we get into construction, lets just
do it all at once, we don't want to have to come back.
MR. BREWER-Right. What kind of a time frame would be appropriate
for you?
MR. O'HARA-Three years.
MR. BREWER-Three years? I was thinking like a year.
MR. GORALSKI-Well, I mean, the site plan review is good for a year.
I mean, we have a year to get a building permit.
MR. BREWER-If we gave you a year from expiration of the building
permit, that would give you two years.
MR. MARTIN-Well, a building permit can be extended by the applicant
for, like I think, a $25 fee.
MR. GORALSKI-Right. I mean, basically, if we wanted to, we could
get the site plan review, we could take a year to get our building
permit, and then we'd have another year to renew it.
MR. BREWER-But then you wouldn't start the building for a year,
though, realistically?
MR. GORALSKI-Right.
MR. MACEWAN-But if he needed to come back to us and ask for an
extension, he could certainly do that.
MR. BREWER-That's not a problem.
MR. MACEWAN-Give him a year, and then if you have to come back and
get an extension from us, have him come back and get one.
MR. MARTIN-He gets a year automatically, under the regulations.
MR. BREWER-So, if we gave him a year from the date of expiration of
the building permit, that would be two years. Then if you had to
come back, I think it would be just an in and out type of thing.
MR. MARTIN-My recommendation would be to grant the approval for the
entire thing, both phases, and it kicks in a years time clock right
away, and if he's not finished by then, then the responsibility's
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on him to come in and get that extended by the Board.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Anything else?
MR. HARLICKER-If this is going to
suggesting, how is that going to effect
to put all the parking in that you're
going to put in enough?
be phased, like you're
the parking? Are you going
required, or are you just
MR. GORALSKI-I guess what we would do in this case, based on the
discussion, we would build the eight parking spaces for the first
phase, and then when we build the second phase we will add the
other seven spots.
MR. MARTIN-I'd make note of that in your resolution.
MR. BREWER-Okay. So we've got a lot of things we've got to work
into that.
MRS. ROWE-And initially the one or the two handicapped spaces out
of the eight?
MR. GORALSKI-We'll put both.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Does anybody have anything else on the Board
before we have the public hearing? Anything else from you, John?
MR. GORALSKI-I don't believe so.
MR. MACEWAN-Are you guys satisfied with the responses to things?
MR. YARMOWICH-Yes.
MR. BREWER-Okay. With that, I'll open the public hearing.
anyone from the public wish to speak on this issue?
Does
PUBLIC HBARING OPB.BD
NO COMMBNT
PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED
MR. BREWER-Okay. With that, we'll close the pUblic hearing.
MR. MARTIN-You have a Short Form SEQRA on this.
MR. HARLICKER-Do you want to take us through that, Scott?
RESOLUTION WHBN DETERMINATION OF NO SIGNIrICANCE IS HADE
RESOLUTION RO. 4-93, Introduced by Timothy Brewer who moved for its
adoption, seconded by Craig MacEwan:
WHEREAS, there
application for:
review., and
is presently before the Planning Board an
UNITBD CBRBBRAL PALSEY ASSOCIATION. site plan
WHEREAS, this Planning Board has determined that the proposed
project and Planning Board action is subject to review under the
State Environmental Quality Review Act,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED:
1. No federal agency appears to be involved.
2. The following agencies are involved:
NONE
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3. The proposed project considered by this Board is unlisted in
the Department of Environmental Conservation Regulations
implementing the State Environmental Quality Review Act and
the regulations of the Town of Queensbury.
4. An Environmental Assessment Form has been completed by the
applicant.
5. Havinq considered and thoroughly analyzed the relevant areas
of environmental concern and havinq considered the criteria
for determining whether a project has a significant
environmental impact as the same is set forth in Section
617.11 of the Official Compilation of Codes, Rules and
Regulations for the State of New York, this Board finds that
the action about to be undertaken by this Board will have no
significant environmental effect and the Chairman of the
Planninq Board is hereby authorized to execute and sign and
file as may be necessary a statement of non-significance or a
negative declaration that may be required by law.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Tarana, Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-Okay. Now we can make a motion.
MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 4-93 URITED CEREBRAL PALSEY
ASSOCIATION, Introduced by Craig MacEwan who moved for its
adoption, seconded by Roger Ruel:
Contingent upon approval of Staff Input and Notes, inclusive of the
realignment of the parking confiquration, the lighting,
landscaping, the additional handicap parking, and storm runoff, and
that the applicant get together with the Beautification Committee
for suggestions for final site plan. It'll be phased, and the
first eight parking spaces will be put in, with two handicap
parking spaces, and possibly the shrubs out front.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mr. Ruel, Mr. MacEwan, Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Brewer
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Tarana, Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
SITE PLAN NO. 5-93 TYPE: UNLISTED RR-5A HARRISERA COMMUNITY
CHURCH OWNER: SAME AS ABOVE LOCATIOR: EAST SIDE RIDGE ROAD.
NORTH OF ROUTE 149 PROPOSD 36' X 60' ADDITION '1'0 REAR EDUCATION
BUILDING. (WARRER COUNTY PLANRIRG) (A.P.A.) TAX MAP NO. 21-2-12
LOT SIZE: +1.5 ACRES SECTION: 179-15 (D)(3)
MICHAEL MULLER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
STAFF INPUT
Notes from Staff, Site Plan No. 5-93, Harrisena Community Church,
Meeting Date: January 26, 1993 "proiect DescriPtion: The
applicant is proposing to construct an addition to an existing
education building. The addition will be approximately 2,550 sq.
ft. in size and will be located to the rear. The project also
involves the expansion of the existinq parking lot by 30 spaces for
a total of 90 spaces. The project site is located on the east side
of Ridqe Road just north of Clements Road and is zoned RR-5A.
Proiect Analvsis:" Staff has not had any chance to look at the
elevations of the model that he just presented us. so I'll leave
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that up to your discretion, as to whether the addition is
compatible with the eXisting building or not. "The project was
compared to the following standards found in Section 179-38 E of
the Zoning Code. 1. The location, arrangement, size, design and
general site compatibility of buildings, lighting and signs~
Elevations of the proposed addition were unavailable at the time
these notes were written. 2. The adequacy and arrangement of
vehicular traffic access and circulation, including intersections,
road widths, pavement surfaces, dividers and traffic controls~ The
arrangement of the parking lot will allow for circular flow.
Signage should be placed indicating the direction of vehicular
traffic. It appears that the Dlost ieffectivte flowtWOUld be enteriRa
through the nor~hern access and ex t ~rom he sounern access. T e
optional additional lot, which consists of 15 spaces directly north
of the existing church, is not part of this application. All
access ways have a width of 20 feet which should allow for adequate
two way flow through the lot. 3. The location, arrangement,
appearance and sufficiency of off-street parking and loading~ The
project is to have approximately 90 parking spaces which should be
sufficient for the site. Several of the spaces are adjacent to the
driveways and could prove to be dangerous. There is also a dead
end parking area just to the south of the large lot that could use
some arrangement. There is no room for cars to turn around. 4.
The adequacy and arrangement of pedestrian traffic access and
circulation, walkway structures, control of intersections with
vehicular traffic and overall pedestrian convenience~ There
appears to be quite a distance between the southern end of the
parking lot and the church and education building. Provisions such
as a sidewalk should be made to allow for pedestrian safety and
convenience." I had listed in here provisions for a sidewalk, but
after speaking with the applicant's agent, it appears that the area
I was considering for a sidewalk is lined with Maple trees. So,
I'll withdraw that comment. " 5. The adequacy of stormwater
drainage facili ties ~ The stormwater management plan has been
reviewed by Rist-Frost. They found that the stormwater drainage
facilities appear to be in general conformance with applicable Town
standards with 8 minor comments. They recommend that the Board
consider conditional approval. 6. The adequacy of water supply
and sewage disposal facilities~ The site is serviced by on site
water well and septic system. The septic system will be replaced
to meet or exceed Town standards. The water supply is from an
existing well and will remain unchanged. 7. The adequacy, type
and arrangement of trees, shrubs and other suitable plantings,
landscaping and screening constituting a visual and/or noise buffer
between the applicant's and adjoining lands, including the maximum
retention of existing vegetation and maintenance including
replacement of dead plants~ The proposal does not include much in
the way of landscaping. The general landscaping plan will include
evergreen shrubs on the south side of the expansion. No trees are
proposed and a grass lawn will be planted upon completion of the
project. The parking lot is located behind the existing cemetery
which serves as a buffer between the street and the parking lot.
The church also owns the property behind the expanded parking lot;
therefore, landscaping around the parking lot is not really needed
as a buffer. However, the parking lot is rather large and some
landscaping around the perimeter or some landscaped island would
improve the aesthetics of the site. 8. The adequacy of fire lanes
and other emergency zones and the provision of fire hydrants~ The
20 foot wide drives should improve emergency accessibility to the
si te. 9. The adequacy and impact of structures, roadways and
landscaping in areas with susceptibility to ponding, flooding
and/or erosion. The proposal should not be adversely affected by
areas that are susceptible to flooding, ponding, or erosion.
Recommendation: The Board should consider requiring some
additional landscaping around the parking area, walkways in order
to increase pedestrian safety and convenience, the elimination of
several parking spaces that are in conflict with the existing
driveways and the elimination and rearrangement of the dead end
parking area."
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ENGINEER REPORT
Notes from Tom Yarmowich, Rist-Frost, Town Engineer, January 22,
1993, "Rist-Frost has reviewed the project and has the following
engineering comments: 1. Stormwater management design is
apparently directed to performance standards of Lake George Park
Commission Requlations. The project has been reviewed with respect
to Queensbury stormwater management guidelines only. The proposed
system of parkinq lot catch basins connected to the drywells, as
detailed on the drawings, generally conforms to the applicable Town
of Queensbury stormwater management guidelines and provides
adequate stormwater management for proposed impervious surfaces.
2. The plot plan, dated 8/21/91, indicates 15 optional parking
spaces between the existing church and the existinq educational
center. This area has not been accounted in the stormwater design.
It is understood that the optional parking area is not a part of
the proposed improvements. Should the applicant intend to
construct the optional parking area, stormwater management will
need to be addressed. 3. The erosion control notes should refer
to the New York State Guidelines for Urban Erosion and Sediment
Control as a general standard for measures required during
construction. 4. The catch basin detail should indicate a minimum
sediment sump depth between the outlet pipe invert and the bottom
of the catch basin to retain sediment. 5. The drywell detail
should indicate a filter fabric envelope around stone and should
indicate the depth of gravel below the structure. 6. The height
of the curb proposed to direct runoff into proposed basins located
in area should be indicated on the detail. 7. The extent of the
curb should be shown on the parking area plan. 8. Slope direction
for proposed paving should be indicated on the parking area plan to
generalize grading intent and to direct runoff to proposed catch
basins. It is our opinion that the engineering comments are minor
and it is recommended that the Planning Board consider granting a
conditional site plan approval unless there are unresolved non-
engineering issues. The Planning Board could stipulate that the
applicant comply with these comments and resubmit revised plans
prior to Planning Board signature on the site plan."
MR. BREWER-Okay, and we also have Warren County Planning Board, "No
County Impact". One thing that I wanted to ask before we start
wi th this project is, the line where you're going to build the
building, shows it, I think it was nine foot. Was a variance ever
granted for that the setbacks? You did qet a variance for that?
Okay. So the variance was granted for that.
MR. MULLER-Yes.
MR. RUEL-Yes. It's right here.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Would the applicant like to address the comments?
MR. MULLER-My name is Michael Muller, and I'm President of the
Harrisena Community Church. To my left is Reverend Lamont
Robinson, who is a minister of the church. Basically, the plan is
to add on to the existing building. If you have visited the site,
it is not the church sanctuary that is out front. It is the small
building to the rear of the church sanctuary, and they do say a
picture is worth a thousand words, and basically this model is
worth a thousand words. The existing building is situated from
this point to approximately this point, and what we plan to do is
renovate that and integrate it with a maj or addition to the
existing building. There is no door, presently, on the existing
building, at this location, and this will be made part of the
renovations, and this will be the principle entryway into the
building, and it would have handicapped access ramp, which
basically comes off the parking lot. Where you're seated, as Board
members, you're in the parking lot, so to speak. This would
probably be an auxiliary access, probably used as an exit to the
building because of the way that it is laid out, how we would
utilize the interior space. Basically, there is also access in and
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out through a staircase that's situated on the easterly side of the
building. The best side of the bUilding is what you're looking at,
and that is that that would be the southerly exposure. We're
planning to have large windows, and certainly landscaping as
permitted, but certainly not blocking the large sun windows that
are gOing to go in there. The large room is what we call a Great
Room. It basically would be used as a facility for dining, because
the church, from time to time, has occasions where we do have
dinners. It would be utilized for meetings. It would be utilized
for services, if that be the option of the church. This building
will contain bathrooms, as it does now. However, we've outgrown
the facili tv! inhterms18f c~ildren that utilize the quilding for
cnurch scno6,. T e nUl ng-Is preseñtlY also used aur~ng ~ne wëeK
for meetings, like AA meetings, Boy Scout meetings and that would
continue, probably in the Great Room. Basically, the old building
will remain as a structure, but it will be fully integrated into
the new building, that is that the selection of the committee to
make the decisions as to what this building will look like
basically said that the new building will have vinyl siding, nice,
modern roof shingles, if you will, sort of a rough tone. No one
made any decision as to colors. I'm not looking forward to being
at the meeting where they make the decision about colors, but the
old building will basically have a new skin on it. So, it will be
fully integrated, and it will look like a modern building when it's
all said and done. The parking I'd like to address, just so that
you feel comfortable with that, and that is on the maps that you've
seen.
MR. BREWER-Maybe we could put a map up.
MR. MULLER-If we're all looking at the same piece of paper, this is
the existing Harrisena Community Church, what we call the
Sanctuary, and this is Ridge Road. What's drawn on here was
proposed probably a year or so ago, and it's just our effort to try
to show where the available spaces could go. It is not part of our
p,lan, and as the engineer had indicated to the Board, if it were,
then other drainage calculations would have to be made. It's not.
It's not even an option, and we have been assuring everybody ever
since this plan started that it was not part of the plan. It was
asked to be drawn there when we first got started, to show where we
could put parking if we were in a parking jam, and the same can be
said of the parking that was drawn here. That parking was here,
just to get your bearings on it, is that we've crossed over and
gone off of Harrisena Community Church property. We've crossed
over a cemetery, which is actually the property of the Town of
Queensbury, the cemetery, and then we come back onto Harrisena
Communi ty Church property. That is what would appear to be an
exiting driveway for the pastor's residence, which is off this map,
but it is indeed utilized. You sort of have circular flow of
traffic on a Sunday, main entrance in, primary exit out. There are
no parking spaces anticipated in here, and they would require fill,
and I just don't think it would be aesthetically pleasing. The
County Planners didn't want to see it out there anyway. So where
we hope to address our parking needs has to do with the existing
parking lot, which would be repainted, relined, if you will, and
then we have been, over the course of the last two or three years,
putting fill in here, because there's qUite a drop off at this
point, and we've put quite a bit of fill in there already, and
we've got a great deal of fill to go. So having extended this out
to make it level with the existing lot, and as you can see in the
plans the engineer has provided, we have rip-rap beyond the surface
area that we have paved. That would be where we would make our
major addition, as to parking. Down in here, that's where Scott
was saying there has to be some re-working of the parking. I've
tried to re-work that in my mind, several different ways, and it
never comes out right. The parking that is extended out there, it
actually now exists as gravel, that is that it was pushed in there.
It's been working for about a year. It hasn't worked really well.
Cars used to park right up to the edge of the pavement, and then by
extending it out, those who thought it was a great idea to extend
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it out, they did it at the expense of the parking spaces that used
to be there. So all the cars are doing is parking further east.
We didn't add six. We just moved them, but that happened.
Sometimes it happens with the Committee. Other basic concepts that
I'd like you to, basically, understand as part of our project, is
that, obviously, to make an addition to the building, we have to
hug that setback, and of course we did get the relief on that, and
basically there's no utilization of that space between our building
on the north side, and Mr. Wilcox's property line. He has his
garden, and we basically don't use that now. We've just got some
shrubs there. We would probably just continue a line of shrubs, if
that was something that was satisfactory, but we don't put traffic
back there. Maybe children or two run back there when they run in
circles around the building, but we don't use 1 t as a traffic
pattern, and we plan to hang nothing off the building. This
addition that's back through here is basically what we've shown you
on the model. Off in here is where our septic system would be, and
it's just an excellent place to put it, because this larger piece
of property here is basically a stormwater retention area. That's
the concept of how we're going to address those issues in there,
and what we did to try to arrange this plan to make it work is that
up until about three years ago the Church only owned up to that
line that I'm making with my finger. We added this additional
piece of property so that we could do all of what our plan
proposes, that is add to the existing and have a stormwater
retention area, and put a state of the art septic system in, other
wise we could not have fit it anywhere. So that's basically our
plan.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Do you want to go down through the notes and
address each one? Well, you pretty much have done that. Would you
like to do that, Mr. Muller, go down through, you've addressed the.
MR. MULLER-You have the notes and I don't, so.
MR. BREWER-I'm sorry. You didn't get a copy of them?
MR. MULLER-No, I didn't.
MR. MARTIN-They're available over here.
MR. MULLER-Okay. Well, start with Number One?
MR. BREWER-Yes. I think you've pretty much covered One.
MR. MULLER-Okay. I think I've covered location, arrangement, size,
design, and general site compatibility of the building. The
lighting is existing lighting, that is that we have a very large
street light that sits on a pole, here, and it definitely lights up
the entire parking lot, as well as well off into the field. We
didn't have any lights coming off our existing building, but that's
a consideration, if you wanted to see it. I mean, we just thought
we have an awful lot of light there. We have spotlights allover
that Church, and on that eXisting building that really do light up
the area very well. As for signage, we propose no new signage.
The elevations, I did provide Scott at the last moment with what
was the drawing of the elevation on the southerly exposure, which
is facing you, and on the west. The north side is developed. It's
actually what we call the back of the building. On Item Number
Two, Adequacy and arrangement of vehicular traffic access, I did
describe the circulation.
MR. BREWER-I think you've covered Two.
MR. MULLER-Okay. We didn't have any plans for traffic controls.
It would be your preference if we have an arrow. We'd be happy to
do that. We just want it to be tasteful, because we just don't
want to have some giant arrow in there.
MR. RUEL-Will these driveways be one way?
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MR. MULLER-They are not one way now, and I have to tell you that
how we utilize them is one way. That is that.
MR. RUEL-Are you going to make them one way, with an arrow or a
sign?
MR. MULLER-Yes, we could do that.
knows which way is the wrong way.
Anybody that goes to this Church
They know that. They do.
MR. RUEL-There's only one way, right?
M~åY ~uIfEcf[Je:ånt f~ vidf'r\Vsel tR~e~stelbi>2Ytog'i\~g p8Niibtfft.\yb!Hit
there'd be a divider in our parking area, because it's a very large
parking area. I don't think that's a good idea. I think that we
really don't have any space for it. Every bit of legitimate
parking space is precious to us. We groaned and moaned when we had
to take a portion of the parking space and utilize it to make a
stockade fence around the eXisting dumpster, and we ended up losing
about two parking spaces on account of that. Now our intention is
to keep cars off of the Ridge Road, and if you pass by this Church
on a Sunday morning, we have people that are in the habit of
parking on the Ridge Road by the cemetery. We want them off. I
promised the Zoning Board of Appeals, when we were before them
about a year ago, that I would keep an inventory of what is our
parking problem so that we could then figure out a legitimate need
for what is our parking needs. I have between six and ten cars on
a Sunday that are out here, and I have between six and ten spots
that are vacant over here, and what we can do is tell people to
please not park on the Ridge Road. Please use the parking spaces.
If we're going to improve on the, we're probably now gOing to have
an additional line of parking spaces in there. You'll have a
tendency to neglect, the one thing we don't want to do is put to
put a whole line of No Parking signs out there. I think that would
look kind of lousy right there in front of the Church by the
cemetery. We'll just keep telling them.
MR. RUEL-You should have signs in front of the cemetery saying Do
Not Enter.
MR. MULLER-Have we address, then.
MR. BREWER-I guess maybe Four.
MR. MULLER-Number Four, okay, Pedestrian Access and Circulation.
It is our custom, at this point, is that having, well, okay, this
is how we utilize it, and that is that people pull in through here
and they off load their passengers. That seems to be the practice,
heading off to the Church. We have our handicapped access parking
right in here, these two, and that continues to be ideal, in terms
of the new location of the building, that is that we could move
them even closer to what will eventually be our handicapped ramp.
This, again, still, for this line of traffic, is an ideal off
loading situation, off loading for the Church, and off loading for
the children to go into what we call the Christian Ed Building, or
off loading all of the passengers into, if we're having a dinner or
a service in here. Eventually though, somebody's going to have to
park that car down through here, and the suggestion that there be
a paved walkway, I don't favor it. I think that it can certainly
be easily utilized, in terms of the open, paved parking area, and
I'll tell you why. There's only two logical paths, if you ever
wanted to put a paved walkway in, because obviously you're trying
to get from the far end back to these bUildings. One would be
through here, and we don't want to do that because that's where
this beautiful line of Maple trees that actually have an excellent
buffer between the cemetery and the parking area. So you really
have a sight buffer from Ridge Road. This one over here is that
we're at the far end, that is that it would be a walkway kind of
like on a ledge. I wouldn't recommend that. That is that I think
that the inclination is having parked your car pointing toward the
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mountain, if you will, the open field, and it's really pitching
down, the inclination will be, just walk back down through the
parking lot. In terms of paved walkways between bUildings and all
of that, we still use that blacktop, but obviously this is a paved
walkway, and this will be a paved walkway, and this is proposed to
be another walkway which will be a ramp, so that it's possible to
utilize a ramp here, but I don't think anyone with a wheelchair or
having a walking handicap will ever use this, because that's a
staircase. They will use this. There will be an elevator in the
center of the building so that they can go to both of the floors,
and they probably will not use this, because they're gOing to be
confronted with an existing staircase. I don't see any need for a
sidewalk between that Church and that building.
MR. BREWER-How does everyone else feel? We can discuss the
sidewalk if we want to. If we don't, we don't.
MR. RUEL-You' re talking about the use of blacktop, versus the
installation of sidewalks, and you're considering ramps as
sidewalks.
MR. MULLER-Well, yes. This thing here, this is a ramp. That's not
blacktopped.
MR. RUEL-Yes.
MR. MULLER-It has a railing on it, too.
MRS. TARANA-How high is that ramp?
MR. MULLER-It climbs one inch every foot.
eventually get, is that what you're asking?
How high does it
MRS. TARANA-I'm just wondering, will it have a railing on it?
MR. MULLER-Yes, it will have a railing on it.
MRS. TARANA-The way it looks there, I thought, somebody could roll
right off.
MR. MULLER-Yes. The model maker didn't put a railing on it, but I
have a drawing that shows that it's right here. It's, I guess, a
tubular steel ramp. That's the way it was explained to me.
MR. BREWER-So I guess the sidewalk's not a major issue with anybody
here.
MR. RUEL-I don't have any problem with that.
MR. MULLER-Well, do you folks have any suggestions about the dead
end parking area?
MR. BREWER-There's nothing, really, you ~an do.
MR. MULLER-It reminds me of the toy where you have to spell the
words by moving the little pieces around. Eventually, you're going
to end up boxed in here. We really have worked hard on trying to
figure out parking. There's an extension of an additional piece of
property which we like to think goes with the Parsonage. That is
that the Parsonage is here, and it has five acres of the property
attached to it. It makes that consistent with the zone as a Single
Family house. We had, at one time, considered extending the
driveway and swinging around and putting additional parking on the
other side of the Pastor's home, but in truth, no one's going to
walk that far. Nobody. And everybody in this Church is getting
older and older. If we go to Number Five, the Adequacy of the
stormwater drainage facilities, I can only speak to it generically,
and say to you that we made every attempt to comply with the Lake
George Park Commission's Stormwater Management Plan requirements,
which don't exist anymore, for a while. That is that they were
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thrown out in a court proceeding, but we have every reason to
believe they'll be back. We want to comply with those. Mr.
Montgomery's here, the gentleman who did draw the plans, if there
was a specific question. We certainly can comply with what was
recommended by Rist-Frost, in terms of the additional minor
requirements. The Adequacy of Water Supply and Sewage Disposal
Facili ties, speaking first and more appropriately to the water
supply, it's well water. It's certainly potable. and we've had an
adequate output. In truth, we're increasing the size of the
building, but I don't think we're going to increase the use of the
si te. That is that this is an expansion of necessity. That is
everybody that's jammed in the little building will then have the
additional space to get into the larger buildIng, but we nave nad
dinners there until we just, literally, ran out of space, but it's
been adequate to run toilet facilities and adequate to run a
ki tchen facilities and Woodcock Brothers who service it always
tells his client, well, we haven't had any problems, and our fall
back position, should that ever be a problem, is that we have lots
of space to still drill for another well, if we had to do that. As
for our sewage disposal facilities, that's draw in the plans, and
was done by our engineer, and he says that that system's going to
work, and that's quite a system. That's 10 centuries better than
what we presently have now. We have the equivalent of a one holer,
plus, right now.
MR. BREWER-Will the bigger facility maybe lead to bigger dinners?
MR. MULLER-It could. It could. We now have our dinners here, and
what's the maximum amount of people we've gotten in a dinner here?
LAMONT ROBINSON
MR. ROBINSON-175 to 200.
MR. MULLER-Yes. and we were putting about 150 people in the small
building, and ran out of room.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MR. MULLER-The Adequacy of type of arrangement of trees, shrubs and
other suitable plantings and landscaping, well, does Queensbury
still have a functioning Beautification Committee?
MR. BREWER-Yes.
MR. MULLER-Okay. We'd be happy to comply with their request. I
think that we have large arborvitaes here, and the Committee had a
discussion about, when we improved the facade on this side of the
building, it's presently a split block type of concrete pseudo rock
type of thing that was probably real popular in the Sixties, but
doesn't pass anymore. It would not compliment our building. It's
going to come off, so we're probably going to cut out all of the
large shrubs there. They're no longer shrubs. I think they
qualify as street trees, and they're about as tall as the building,
and then we will plant arborvitaes and we'd be happy to comply with
the Beautification Committee. I don't see the real need of trying
to plant in here, and that is that there's a spectacular view which
we'd all like to take benefit of, and off in here. we just don't
want to block it, as well. There's nothing to hide, lets put it
that way. We're off in the back of this property, and we can see
no structures for as far as you can see. That is that you just see
the mountains.
MRS. ROWE-I agree with what you've said so far, but I have one
concern with the north side of the building. As I walked along the
north side, I noticed quite a few signs that said, keep off the
fence, or something similar to that nature. I guess you said that
that was the Wilcox's property.
MR. MULLER-That's Percy Wilcox's. Right.
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MRS. ROWE-Is there some way to put some kind of a hedge or
something that would offer them more protection back there?
MR. MULLER-Yes. We could put a hedge back there. That would
probably make Mr. Wilcox happy. He'd still put the signs on the
hedge.
MRS. ROWE-I'm sure he would. He seems to have this concern. So I
thought that that might eliminate some of his problems with the
building.
MR. MULLER-Yes, but in all honesty, we have a very good
relationship with him, and it's better than a truce, because he was
concerned about all of this, and I explained all of it to him, and
then at the last meeting, when we were at the ZBA, he told me that
I could be his spokesman, to say that he thought it was okay, and
I said, well, perhaps you want to come and speak for yourself.
Yes, he put the little signs there because Reverend Robinson has,
I'm gOing to blame it all on your Youth Group, and that is that the
older kids, and maybe my Boy Scout group, everybody wanted to put
their but on Mr. Wilcox's fence, okay, because teenagers can't
stand up.
MR. ROBINSON-Actually, the signs that you see there presently ~
place on the fence, not at his request. When we had the festival
there last September, and there were a lot of artisans from Larac
had groups there, we felt that this would save some difficulty.
MRS. ROWE-Well, the back portion of the fence seemed to be chicken
wire, something like that.
MR. ROBINSON-It is.
MRS. ROWE-Which if somebody tried to sit on or lean against, it
probably wouldn't hold up too well.
MR. ROBINSON-It wouldn't work.
problem.
No.
I don't think that's a
MR. MULLER-There was a long line of trees in here, and what it all
was was boxelder, and about a year and a half ago, we hired a group
of fellows to come in and basically cut it all out, chip it all up.
It's just really a lousy tree. Of course, we were gOing to go
further, interestingly enough also what was planted in there was
every possible flower that had ever been brought into the Church,
and after it was utilized people would dump it off the side of the
parking area, and if it was a flower that had a bulb or something,
it would come up the following year, okay, so they had all sorts of
beautiful flowers growing in there. We're going to basically have
rip-rap beyond our most easterly extension, and I thought about,
you know, it would be nice to maybe plant some evergreens down
along our property line or something like that, but basically we're
keeping this open as a field, and we've managed to utilize it a
Ii ttle bit, on one occasion it might turn out to be an annual
thing, where we have a family festival in the fall. We had oxen
rides through here. We might continue that. That would be kind of
nice, but if you ship us back to the Beautification Committee, we'd
be happy to comply with their planting request and recommendations.
MR. BREWER-Okay. So the recommendation of the Staff is the
elimination of several parking spaces that are in conflict with
existing driveways, and the elimination and rearrangement of the
dead end parking area. We can eliminate that parking that would
be.
MR. MULLER-We can eliminate this, absolutely, okay. We can
eliminate this. These things that I'm pointing to don't exist,
okay. Here you can eliminate. Did I hear a Staff problem on that?
MR. HARLICKER-It's hard to see it from here. Are you talking about
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the parking in between the drive to the house and the street, is
that what you're pointing at?
MR. MULLER-Yes.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay.
MR. MULLER-You can eliminate that. It doesn't exist and it's not
going to.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay.
MRS. TARANA-And the ones on the other side are staying, right on
that other side?
MR. MULLER-I want to talk about that in a minute, but I just wanted
to make sure that these two are clear. Okay?
MR. HARLICKER-AII right.
MR. MULLER-This third area does not exist either.
MR. BREWER-It does not exist.
MR. MULLER-It does not.
MR. HARLICKER-You're talking the area to the east of the drive?
MR. MULLER-That's right.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay.
MR. BREWER-Also, was this considered, Scott, the parking spaces
where the existing driveway coming in, the parking spaces there,
the six, right up by the sidewalk going to the new building?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. It's just that there was one that was right
next to the driveway coming in there. That was one of the ones I
was concerned about. Somebody could be pulling in and backing out.
MR. MULLER-This one?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. The one right next to the drive there.
MR. ROBINSON-That already exists. Are you thinking it would
decrease the utilization of the building?
MRS. TARANA-Yes. He's saying, when the traffic comes in.
MR. ROBINSON-It does presently exist, and really hasn't presented
any difficulty. if I'm thinking of the right one.
MR. MULLER-Yes. you are. You're thinking of the two spaces that
are now designated handicapped parking spaces.
MR. ROBINSON-Right. Right over in this area here.
MRS. TARANA-Those are both handicapped now?
MR. ROBINSON-Yes, they are.
MRS. TARANA-And they're not any problem with people coming in and
out of the driveway, or coming in to the driveway?
MR. ROBINSON-No. There has never been a problem there. There used
to be a large tree there, which is no longer there. That probably
would have cut the visual access.
MR. BREWER-Well, the handicaps are way down at the other end,
Corinne.
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MRS. TARANA-He's talking about, two, right?
MR. MULLER-Yes. You're looking at handicap parking that's on an
easterly extension and I'm informing you that the eXisting
handicapped parking is where I've just had a little arc drawn
there, that we were saying it hasn't posed a problem, and how
long's it been paved like that?
MR. ROBINSON-About 15 years, somewhere in there.
MR. MULLER-Okay. Well, I guess what I want to say is it's all well
and good to do it for aesthetics, but we can't run out of parking
spaces. It's at the expense of stacking them on Ridge, we don't
want to do that. If I could persuade you that I'd like to keep two
there, nothing there, nothing there, nothing there.
MR. BREWER-How about, I'd feel better if you possibly maybe moved
these two handicaps to the other side of the sidewalk, and left
them as regular parking spaces? In other words, you're just
trading two for two.
MR. MULLER-Yes. That's okay.
MR. BREWER-I'd rather have someone be able to walk out of their
car, rather than have someone in a wheelchair and have to.
MR. ROBINSON-That would even be closer to the ramp area.
MRS. TARANA-Yes, it would.
MR. BREWER-I just think it would be a safer thing.
MR. ROBINSON-Sure.
MR. MULLER-So, the handicap parking that you would like to see is
sort of mid.
MR. BREWER-Between the two ramps.
MR. RUEL-Between the two ramps.
MR. MULLER-Okay. Yes. Great. No problem.
MR. BREWER-I just think it would be more accessible and safer, if
for some reason somebody came in there and didn't know the parking
lot. Then you've got all four of them right in a row, and you're
not losing any space. Okay. Now we can go through Rist-Frost,
quickly. One I don't think we have to worry about. I think two
we've addressed.
MR. MULLER-Number Three I have no problem with, and we'll make
reference to that. I guess that point is that you'd like to see
that actually written on the plan, right?
MR. YARMOWICH-Yes.
Department.
It's just for the benefit of the BUilding
MR. MULLER-Okay. I'd be happy to do that, and on Number Four, that
detail has to be specified, I'll show that to the engineer. Number
Five is no problem.
MR. BREWER-Six is a minor detail.
MR. MULLER-Yes. It's not a problem, if I understand where that is.
That's at the easterly side of the parking lot?
MR. YARMOWICH-Right. It abuts the rip-rap slope.
MR. MULLER-Okay. Let me ask a question of the man who does the
plowing. Putting a curb on the easterly side of this parking lot?
19
"--"'
-..,,"-
Okay. No problem.
MR. YARMOWICH-Normally, the snow just goes off that edge, right?
MR. MULLER-Yes.
MR. YARMOWICH-It won't interfere with that.
MR. MULLER-Okay.
MR. BREWER-Okay, and Eight.
MR. MULLER-The slope direction, that's not a problem. We can
indicate it. We're not changing that slope. It does flow
easterly, towards the stormwater retention area.
MR. BREWER-Okay. I guess that's all the notes. We do have
something from Warren County. "No County Impact". All right. Is
there anything from anybody on the Board, before we open a public
hearing? Okay. With that, I'd like to open the public hearing.
Is there anyone that would wish to speak on this project?
PUBLIC HEARIBG OPENED
ISABELLE MUNOFF
MRS. MUNOFF-My name is Isabelle Munoff, and I am a member of
Harrisena Community Church, as well as a Board of Trustee Member.
I'd just like to say that I appreciate the time that you're
spending going over our plans with us. We have put many, many
years behind these. and much thought. A lot of people here have
put a lot of time into them, and the people sitting here at this
table, and I just want to just reassure you that we've done every
possible, made every possible effort to make this project good for
everyone involved, the community as well as ourselves, and I'd like
very much your support on our efforts. Thank you.
MR. BREWER-Is there anyone else? Okay.
hearing.
I'll close the public
PUBLIC HEARIBG CLOSED
MR. BREWER-We have a SEQRA.
that?
Would you like to take us through
MRS. TARANA-Just Part II, right?
MR. BREWER-Start with Letter A.
MRS. TARANA-How come it's filled in already? Is that supposed to
be filled in already?
MR. MARTIN-Sometimes that's done. It doesn't really matter. Your
answers are the answers that matter.
RESOLUTION WHEN DETERMINATION OF NO SIGNIFICANCE IS HADE
RESOLUTION BO. 5-93, Introduced by Corinne Tarana who moved for its
adoption, seconded by Craig MacEwan:
WHEREAS, there
application for:
is presently before the Planning
HARRISENA COMMUNITY CHURCH, and
Board
an
WHEREAS, this Planning Board has determined that the proposed
project and Planning Board action is subject to review under the
State Environmental Quality Review Act,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED:
20
1. No federal agency appears to be involved.
2. The following agencies are involved:
NONE
3. The proposed action considered by this Board is unlisted in
the Department of Environmental Conservation Regulations
implementing the State Environmental Quality Review Act and
the regulations of the Town of Queensbury.
4. An Environmental Assessment Form has been completed by the
applicant.
5. Having considered and thoroughly analyzed the relevant areas
of environmental concern and having considered the criteria
for determining whether a project has a significant
environmental impact as the same is set forth in Section
617.11 of the Official Compilation of Codes, Rules and
Regulations for the State of New York, this Board finds that
the action about to be undertaken by this Board will have no
significant environmental effect and the Chairman of the
Planning Board is hereby authorized to execute and sign and
file as may be necessary a statement of non-significance or a
negative declaration that may be required by law.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan, Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. Brewer
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-Okay. Now, would someone care to make a motion?
MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAH NO. 5-93 HARRISENA COHHUNITY CHURCH,
Introduced by Corinne Tarana who moved for its adoption, seconded
by Craig MacEwan:
For a proposed 36 ft. by 60 ft. addition to the rear of their
education building, with the following stipulations: One, that
they meet with the Beautification Committee for advisement on
landscaping, that they move the two westerly, presently handicapped
parking areas between the ramp so the four are contiguous, and that
they comply with the Rist-Frost comments and resubmit revised plans
prior to the Planning Board's signature on the site plan, and that
they will put arrows to show the flow of traffic.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
MR. BREWER-Did we agree, we're going to put a sign, One Way, on it?
It's probably not necessary.
MR. MULLER-If you'd like it, we'll do it.
MR. BREWER-I mean, we're talking members that go to your Church
every single week, that know the routine.
MR. MULLER-An arrow?
MR. ROBINSON-We just thought that that would be less.
MR. MACEWAN-Even at the entrance and exit. just paint right on it,
"Enter", and "Exit", right on the macadam.
MR. RUEL-It's not important.
MR. ROBINSON-Yes, rather than a sign.
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
21
'-----
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-I'd like to ask the next applicant if we can just sway
from the agenda for just about a few minutes. We've got a couple
of SEQRAs that we want to go through for the ZBA. It shouldn't
take more than a few minutes. I'd like to ask the Board just to
look at them real quick and see if we make a decision as to whether
we want to go over them or not.
MR. MARTIN-I jus~ want to supplY YOll a little b.ackaround as to what
happened here. These were orIgl'nðl.l.Y act.lons WhlCl'I were Cl.aSSiIIeèl
as Type II, they would not need a SEQRA Review. The Zoning Board
did not agree with my determination on that and sent them to the
Planning Board at the Zoning Board meeting last week. So that's
why there's been such quick turnaround on this on such short
notice. One of these is the Thomas Dittus application you've seen.
It was on your agenda previously. The Peter Sahlke and Joseph and
Mary Carolyn Shay you have not, and you've not had a chance to see
those in site visits either, but I wanted tO'at least, I thought it
would be a good idea to start the dialogue on these. You can
indicate to the applicants if there are any questions you have, so
that we don't have to come back a second or third time.
MR. BREWER-I guess what I would just ask is, the applicants are all
here?
MR. MARTIN-We have the Sahlkes here, and we have a representative
from the Dittus'.
MR. BREWER-All right. The Dittus I have, from my packet, I don't
know how it stayed in my packet, but I have it. We can look at
that. Do we have maps, possibly we can just look at quickly, to
get a feel of what the project might be? I mean, reading what they
want to do on the SEQRA doesn't really explain to us what.
MR. MARTIN-All three of them are very similar in nature. They're
all a situation where there's a dwelling present on the property
that's going to be torn down and replaced by a new dwelling of a
larger size, therefore requiring the variance.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Well, we'll do them one at a time. Maybe we can
go through Dittus first, because we all have seen that. Anybody
that wants their memory refreshed can take a look at it.
MRS. TARANA-Are we going to do an environmental impact, an EAF, on
a project we haven't seen?
MR. BREWER-That's what's being asked of us, if we want to do the
SEQRA before we do the project.
MRS. TARANA-How can you do a SEQRA before you see a project?
MR. BREWER-They're asking us. We don't have to do it. It was just
thought that if we could, it would accommodate the applicants.
Craig, how do you feel?
MR. MARTIN-Even if there are any questions, you can at least convey
those to the applicant between now and your next meeting, and then
he can, in the meantime, address those concerns and come back to
you the next time.
MRS. TARANA-Come back the next time for the?
MR. MARTIN-For the SEQRA Review only, yes, and then subsequent to
that, the variance would then be heard, and the matter would be
over with.
MR. BREWER-Would that fit in so that they would be on our agenda
22
-.-"
and the ZBA next month?
MR. MARTIN-Right.
agenda.
So they can be accommodated in the February
HR. BREWER-Personally, I don't have a problem with Dittus, because
I've seen it.
MRS. TARANA-I saw Dittus, too. That's not a problem with me, but
I do have a problem with really even thinking about a project that
we haven't seen. I think that's very difficult to do.
MR. MARTIN-Again. it's a very unusual situation and is not to be
repeated. We're having a meeting tomorrow night with the ZBA, and
a representative from DEC to get this classification business
resolved once and for all.
MRS. TARANA-What do you mean, it's not to be repeated?
MR. MARTIN-Well, once we get the classification straightened away,
right now the Staff is in conflict with the Zoning Board's opinion
on this, and we hope to get this resolved tomorrow night. That's
what resulted in this unusual course of events.
MR. BREWER-Okay. What I guess I have to know is how do you feel
about the other two?
HRS. ROWE-I don't think that I can make any kind of a judgement on
something I haven't seen yet.
MR. RUEL-I can't, either.
MRS. TARANA-No. I would abstain.
MR. MACEWAN-Ditto.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Then I guess the feeling of the Board is we'd
like to see the sites before we do the SEQRA.
HR. HARTIN-The other thing I would just ask is if you could
indicate any questions that might come to mind at all, given the
very least that you do know. I mean, if there's any questions that
you could present to the applicant at this time, and they could be
addressed between now and when it does come before you.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Well, why don't we slow down for a second, and
we'll go through Dittus, and then that'll be out of the way, and
then we can go one at a time and look them over, and give any
questions that we might have to the.
MR. MARTIN-And also the agents are here. They can give you a brief
presentation of the project.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Well, that would be fine. Then why don't we go
through Dittus right now. We can do that, and then we can take one
at a time, the other two. How do you feel about that?
MRS. TARANA-I have no problem with doing Dittus.
MR. BREWER-Corinne, do you want to read us through that?
RESOLUTIOH WHEN DETERMINATION OF NO SIGNIFICANCE IS MADE
RESOLUTION FOR SEORA REVIEW ONLY, Introduced by Corinne Tarana who
moved for its adoption, seconded by Timothy Brewer:
WHEREAS, there
application for:
is presently before
THOMAS DITTUS, and
the
Planning
Board
an
WHEREAS, this Planning Board has determined that the proposed
23
~
project and Planning Board action is subject to review under the
State Environmental Quality Review Act,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED:
1. No federal agency appears to be involved.
2. The following agencies are involved:
NONE
3. The proposed action considered by this Board is unlisted in
the Department of Environmental Conservation Regulations
implementing the State Environmental Quality Review Act and
the regulations of the Town of Queensbury.
4. An Environmental Assessment Form has been completed by the
applicant.
5. Having considered and thoroughly analyzed the relevant areas
of environmental concern and having considered the criteria
for determining whether a project has a significant
environmental impact as the same is set forth in Section
617.11 of the Official Compilation of Codes, Rules and
Regulations for the State of New York, this Board finds that
the action about to be undertaken by this Board will have no
significant environmental effect and the Chairman of the
Planning Board is hereby authorized to execute and sign and
file as may be necessary a statement of non-significance or a
negative declaration that may be required by law.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan, Hr. Brewer
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-Okay. Then we're all set. Now you want the applicants
of Shay and.
MR. MARTIN-I think the representative for Mr. Sahlke is present.
MR. BREWER-Mr. Sahlke.
JOHN RICHARDS
HR. RICHARDS-I'm John Richards for the Sahlkes.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Do you want to just give us a real brief.
MR. RICHARDS-My name is John Richards, an attorney in Glens Falls,
and I'm here representing Mr. Peter Sahlke. Mr. Sahlke's in the
front row, here, as is the property owner, his mother, Mrs. Olga
Sahlke, and I guess I'm asking the Board if they would, perhaps
give us a chance to be heard on the SEQRA matter, here. Through no
fault of anyone's, we've been kind of whipped sawed through all the
different Boards, here, on a very simple procedure, here. All we
plan to do is take down an existing 1200 square foot residence on
the property and put up a new one of almost the identical size,
except instead of facing, being perpendicular to Route 9L, it's
going to be parallel with it, in other words it will face it, as
most homes do. This will be an improvement, obviously. in
aesthetics. We're putting a new septic system in. It's going to
be farther back from Route 9L, although still not far enough to
meet the setbacks. I think we missed it by about five feet. We're
about five to ten feet from compliance with the shoreline setback,
and then there's a creek in the back. Now I've got a couple of
24
',-",
~
maps here, the SEQRA impacts, the EAF was completed. I understood
we could be heard tonight, if we completed it. We got it done, and
I think you'll find that there's really no impact, and it can be
done very promptly. Let me just give you a couple of copies of the
map, if I may, to show you what I'm talking about.
MR. BREWER-Okay. So if we agree to see this our first meeting next
month, then you could still get on the ZBA, and there wouldn't be
a problem with the approvals.
MR. MARTIN-Right.
MR. RICHARDS-I guess I'm asking, there's no way it could be heard
tonight, so that we wouldn't have to come back for another meeting
of the Planning Board next month?
MR. BREWER-You heard the Board. The Board doesn't feel
comfortable, without going out and seeing it, is what I gather from
the other four members that are present. I think I feel pretty
much the same way. I'd like to be able to see something before I
go through a SEQRA with it. It would be a matter of, probably, 15
minutes at our next meeting. Then you could go on to the ZBA, is
how I feel.
MR. MACEWAN-I would rather see the site before I make any comments
or decisions on it.
MR. RICHARDS-Are there any particular areas that you might have a
concern about right now?
MR. BREWER-Well, basically what it is I think that everybody feels
is that normally we get our packets a week and a half ahead of
time. We go look at the sites, discuss them while we're looking at
the sites, come up with any comments, and then when we come to the
meeting, we have comments for the applicant. That's pretty much
the way we've always done it, since I've been on the Board, and I
think that's what we want to keep doing.
MRS. TARANA-I think the problem some of us that are new members are
having is that, according to the Rules and Regulations, it says
that we are committed to see the project site.
MR. MACEWAN-Site plan visits before we do any business with any
applicant.
MRS. TARANA-Yes, and I'm sorry that this has happened, that these
people have been delayed like this, and yet I feel that I would
like to see the site. I don't feel comfortable voting on something
that I haven't seen or trying to do an EAF on it, and I know in the
past, there were a couple of times when I didn't see a site, when
I would abstain, I wouldn't vote, because I hadn't seen it, and I
know other members have done that in the past, as well.
MR. RICHARDS-If that's the way the Board feels, we'll be back.
MR. BREWER-Okay. I sympathize with your situation, but it's just
a matter of the way we've always done things, and I think we should
keep.
MR. MARTIN-I just wanted to facilitate an opportunity for them to
talk to you, in the event you did have a question that wouldn't
even be resolved in the site visit. I just wanted to make sure
that there were no.
MRS. TARANA-It's hard to know what to ask when you haven't seen it.
MR. BREWER-Well, I just looked quick, Jim, and it says on the SEQRA
that they filled out, possible APA wetlands on the east boundary.
MR. RICHARDS-The APA is not even sure.
25
---
MR. BREWER-Okay. That's fine, but I just look and I see things
like that, and I would rather be sure, before I made a personal
decision.
MR. MARTIN-We were also instructed by the ZBA to, in fact, put this
on the Planning Board meeting for tonight. So, we were trying to
honor that request also.
MRS. TARANA-Has it gone to Warren County?
MR. MARTIN-In terms of the variance, yes.
MRS. ROWE-Could you explain the septic system to me, because I've
never seen one with this mound type of thing before.
MR. RICHARDS-Well, I'm not an engineer, but basically that's set
up, when it did not have great drainage, as this area does now, to
allow for greater drainage, I believe, percolation. It's an
advanced system and obviously we'll have to obtain a permit from
for getting the septic system installed. This has been designed by
Scudder Associates.
MRS. ROWE-And there's some kind of a pump in here? Is that what
this lift station is?
MR. RICHARDS-I believe so.
MRS. ROWE-Okay, a force pump kind of a thing.
MR. BREWER-Well, I guess our decision is not to go through it
tonight, as much as I hate to say that to you.
MR. RICHARDS-And we'll be on the first meeting in February.
MR. MARTIN-Yes. I can assure you of that.
MR. RICHARDS-Will we be early on the agenda?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. BREWER-We can do these first, if Jim can put them on the agenda
that way.
MR. RICHARDS-Okay. Thank you.
MR. BREWER-Are we going to go through the same thing with Mr. Shay?
MR. MARTIN-I don't know that they have anybody here.
MR. BREWER-They don't have anybody here? So we can notify them?
MR. MARTIN-Right.
MR. BREWER-Okay. The next order of business.
3\0)
\~
SUBDIVISION NO. 1-1993 SKETCH PLAN TYPE: UNLISTED SFR-1A
EDWARD & MARY CARDINALE OWNER: JEFFREY KELLY LOCATION:
SOUTHWEST SIDE OF PEGGY ANN ROAD. +150 FT. RW FROM INTERSECTION OF
WINTERGREEN ROAD. PROPOSAL IS TO SUBDIVIDE INTO 3 LOTS. SELL LOTS
1 & 2 (1 ACRE LOTS). AND RETAIN LOT 3 (5.9 ACRES). TAX MAP NO.
119-6-34 LOT SIZE: 7.9 ACRES SECTION: SUBDIVISION REGULATIONS
ANDREW MCCORMACK, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
STAFF INPUT
Notes from Staff, Subdivision No. 1-1993, Edward & Mary Cardinale,
Meeting Date: January 26, 1993 "proiect Description: The
applicant is proposing to divide a 7.9 acre parcel into three lots.
Lots one and two will be 1.0 acres in area and the third lot will
26
'-"
----
be 5.9 acres. The project is located on Peggy Ann Road just west
of Wintergreen Road and is zoned SFR-1A. Each of the lots will
have frontage on Peggy Ann Road. Lot one will have 49 feet of
frontage, lot 2 will have 40 feet of frontage and lot 3 will have
75 feet of frontage. Access to the three lots will be via a common
drive with branches off of the main drive to service lots one and
two. The main access drive has been roughed in and it appears that
clearing has begun on lot 2. Proiect Analvsis: The applicant is
before the Board for sketch plan review and recommendation. The
project was compared to the sketch plan requirement found in
Section 183-7. The project does not involve the construction of
any streets. The lots will be serviced does not involve the
construction of any streets. The lots will be serviced by Town
water and on site septic systems. The applicant should have
percolation tests done in order to determine the suitability of the
lots for septic systems. The topography of the site is varied. On
the southeast corner, where lot 2 is located, the slopes range from
approximately 18 to 11 percent. There is a knoll located on the
center of the proposed lot and the 18% slope is to the southeast
and the 11% slope to the northwest. Lot 1 is relatively level as
is lot 3. The overall slope of the property is generally to the
northwest with a high point of 430 on the top of the knoll on lot
1 to a low of 395 feet on the western side of lot 3. Drainage and
erosion control should be addressed. Emergency accessibility
should also be addressed. The proposed location of the house on
lot 3 is quite a distance from the road. The applicant might want
to work with the fire department on the design of the drive."
MR. HARLICKER-I spoke with Kip earlier in the week, and they worked
with the Planning Board on a similar type application several years
ago, and they have a letter drafted up that I'll get a copy of,
that has various recommendations on the drive, what can be done to
improve the accessibility, and I'll provide the applicant with a
copy of that letter, and those are all the comments that we have.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Is someone here from the applicant?
MR. MCCORMACK-My name is Andrew McCormack, owner of the surveying
firm of Coulter & McCormack in Glens Falls, here representing
Edward & Mary Cardinale in their application for a three lot
subdivision. The Cardinales could not be here tonight. A little
background on this subdivision, back in April and May, an
application for a variance from the Zoning Ordinance to permit what
you see on the map here tonight, there was some discussion back at
the Zoning Board of Appeals meeting where there was some
disagreement between the Board, Staff, attorneys, as to the
interpretation of that Ordinance. Be that as it may, the plan
that's here tonight is the same one submitted then, however, and as
I outlined in my transmittal letters to Mr. Martin, and having gone
over this same plan with him, after the revision to the Ordinance,
Section IV, Paragraph C, do you have that, by any chance, in front
of you? I can read it to you. It's brief. It's have to do with
double the lot frontage on an arterial road.
MR. BREWER-What number is it?
MR. MCCORMACK-It's Section IV, Paragraph C.
MR. HARLICKER-I don't know. It might not be in your copy because
it's a new amendment to the Zoning Code.
MR. BREWER-It's a new amendment? I don't have a copy of it.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, essentially, I'll read that Paragraph C, As of
the effective date of this Chapter, all residential lots fronting
on a collector or arterial road identified herein, or any new
collector or arterial road, shall have two times the lot width
permitted in the zone. That's the same language as in the older,
original Ordinance. Then it goes on, Except that this requirement
shall not apply under circumstances where adjoining residential
27
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~
lots exist or are proposed to be established, and that the width of
each lot meets the required width of the zone, in this case 150
feet, ingress or egress is limited to and provided by a single
common driveway, which is documented on the plat and in a written
legal document which is record in the County Clerk's Office.
That's what this plan did in the first place, but it wasn't
permitted under the previous Ordinance. We demonstrated on the map
where the driveways would be. There's three driveways coming out
Peggy Ann Road, but we didn't propose to use those. I believe in
the earlier submittal, as an explanation, we, in keying the map
Driveways A, B, and C would come out on Peggy Ann Road, but our
proposal was tohnot iuse Driveway Band C, but have Lots 1 and 2
come out onto t e dr veway lor A.
MR. RUEL-I don't have A, B, and C. Do you?
MR. BREWER-No, it's not on there. That's was the old plan.
MRS. TARANA-Yes. Can you just show us, so we're sure of what A, B
and Cis?
MR. RUEL-Yes. We don't have it here.
MR. BREWER-I would presume that this is going to be A, B, and C, or
in that type of a way. This is a new map? That was a plan that
they.
MR. MCCORMACK-It's the same map. We labeled A, B, and C are the
three driveways.
MR. RUEL-Where? A, B, and C?
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes, and they were on the map because we had
a driveway, but that did not meet the Code at that time.
the letter states, and this map, that the driveways for Two
will join the one for A, in a single entrance out.
to show
So, as
and One
MR. BREWER-So it would be a common drive.
MR. MCCORMACK-And then as I say, I went over that with Mr. Martin,
making sure that we interpreted the change in the Ordinance
correctly, and he agreed we had.
MRS. TARANA-This was the original map?
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes.
MRS. TARANA-But I don't even see driveways on this map, coming out
on Peggy Ann Road.
MR. MCCORMACK-These driveways where they originally proposed and as
we just discussed, there were maps submitted to the Zoning Board of
Appeals, and to the Planning Board at the same time. We went to
the ZBA first, to get the variances, then to the Planning Board.
Well, we never got to the Planning Board. They tabled the matter
at the ZBA level.
MR. BREWER-This was months ago. I can remember, last year, going
up there and looking at it.
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes, last April, but since the Ordinance got changed,
then this scheme of things.
MR. BREWER-Comes back into place.
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. So we have this one and this one coming out to
28
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here, and this eXiting to Peggy Ann Road.
MR. BREWER-I don't know, we're getting lost with the old plan. I
don't even think it's relevant, not at this point, but what he's
proposing is to have a house here come into this driveway. This
driveway come into this driveway, and this one have one driveway.
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes.
MR. BREWER-So I don't see any relevance of what the plan used to
be. We're looking at this plan now. So, if we can go on with this
plan right here, we'd be fine.
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes. Well, without the knowledge, in full, of the
wording of the Ordinance, you say, well, this will work.
MR. BREWER-I understand.
MR. RUEL-This is better, because
responsibility for their own driveway.
each person
can have
MRS. TARANA-Have you talked to the transportation people about
this? Have you talked to the Highway Department about this?
MR. MCCORMACK-No, we haven't.
MR. HARLICKER-I was going to say, how is the realignment on Peggy
Ann, that's going on up there, going to effect your access to the
road?
MR. MCCORMACK-I haven't seen any plans for the realignment. I'm
told that by my client. who has been talking to Mr. Naylor, that
Peggy Ann is going to get moved from where you see it, 100 or more
feet away. So that that one driveway will extend further across
the present Peggy Ann Road.
MR. MACEWAN-Okay. What happens with that right-of-way that was the
old Peggy Ann Road?
MR. MCCORMACK-The Town intends to still retain that right-of-way.
MR. MACEWAN-So he has to cross Town property with his private
driveway to get to the new proposed Peggy Ann Road, which is more
than 100 feet away?
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, the Town would certainly have a very wide
right-of-way. and is the case here and in any other case, you
travel 12 to 13 feet over Town right-of-way before you get to the
main road. In this case, you'd be traveling maybe another 75 feet.
I think the reason for the relocation is to straighten the road and
to, those are going to be lower than the present one. So, the
intersection of Wintergreen Road would be the same, but there's a
hill that goes over.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Would you like to address the comments from
Staff, as far as the topography, and maybe the perc tests? Is that
something we could ask you to do?
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes. For sketch plan, we don't normally, don't have
to present soil test results.
MR. BREWER-Right.
MR. HARLICKER-No.
MR. MCCORMACK-We have done a test pit down, about the center of Lot
3, about 10 feet down, with medium grain sands.
MR. BREWER-Okay, just so that when we get to Preliminary you have
that stuff for us when you get here, so that it's not holding you
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up at Preliminary, we can have that stuff available to us.
MR. MCCORMACK-We anticipated on the Preliminary submittal to have
the test hole results, percolation test results, and the sewage
system design.
MR. MACEWAN-How does the applicant plan to address the maintenance
responsibilities of a shared driveway?
MR. MCCORMACK-As to the actual cost, if that's what you're leading
to.
MR. MACEWAN-Snow removal and so on and so forth, maintenance in the
future.
MR. MCCORMACK-There wi 11 be a deeded recorded easement, as the
revised Ordinance calls for. I have not discussed what my client
intends to do in terms of dealing with the two future owners of
Lots 1 and 2, as to what type of sharing of expenses.
MR. BREWER-I quess what we have to be concerned with, from my point
of view, is if these people buy these lots and they don't want to
pay to have that shoveled or plowed or whatever, then they're
stuck. If she says, okay, I'm not going to do it, you're stuck.
There has to be some kind of agreement from the person that's going
to maintain this, to those other two people.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, I do know that the Cardinales, whose house
would be in the rear, it's their driveway. So, they will plow it
and maintain it, of course, they need to have it maintained, but I
did suggest to them that they have something in the deed, sharing,
for the future.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Emergency access, will that be discussed with the
fire company, possibly? Could we ask you to do that before
Preliminary?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. They have some recommendations regarding
keeping trees from overhanging the road, and essentially what it
sounded like was a general maintenance of the road, what they'd
like to see, because it's tough to get back in there. One of the
scenarios that he pointed out to me is, on here, there's no turn
around shown on the site plan. I know this is just a preliminary,
and just a sketch. but the scenario he came up with is, what
happens if an ambulance has to drive all the way into that back
lot, and then back all the way back out again.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, presumably, he would turn around in somebody's
driveway, where they have their own turn around to start with.
MR. HARLICKER-I'm saying, from looking at this, and this is one of
the issues that Kip pointed out is, if he drives back to where the
proposed house is on Lot 3, at least on this, there's no turnaround
indicated. I know that can be provided for, when it comes to
preliminaries, but if none is shown on the site plan, the ambulance
will have to then back out all the way to one of these other
driveways in order to turn around and get out, to drive forward.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, since this is not a Town road, aqain, if the
applicant builds on Lot 3, where the house is shown, he will have
a driveway going up to his house, the garage, and he will have the
ability to turn around, so would an ambulance.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay. I'm just saying, that's not shown on the site
plan. So there~s no way of knowing.
MR. BREWER-Okay. So the only thing I have is I would suggest that
maybe we could get the perc tests and maybe even"discuss it with
Kip, if that's not a problem, the turnaround or whatever. Kathy,
do you have any questions?
30
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MRS. ROWE-We were just questioning the driveway, and we wanted to
know if it was going to be paved or dirt or gravel?
MR. MCCORMACK-I believe it will be a good gravel road, to start
with. Actually as you've observed that the Cardinales have
switched the location of their proposed house over to what would be
just below the Number Three in the circle. to the left of the
driveway as you come in there.
MR. BREWER-What are you saying to us? This map that we have right
here, the house isn't in the right place?
MR. MCCORMACK-That was where they thought they would put their
house. Now they're thinking they're going to put it over here.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MR. MCCORMACK-And there is presently a little turn off at this
point.
MR. BREWER-When you come back for preliminary you'll have that map
adjusted?
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MRS. ROWE-Is it their intention to retain that entire 5.9, or is
there, at some point, a cul-de-sac that's going to go in, and
you're gOing to develop the rest, or?
MR. MCCORMACK-It's there intention to retain this at this point.
They do know, or the previous Board was shown a plan to further
divide this into, this Lot 3, into a total of three lots, and
that's the reason for this 50 feet. That's the reason for that
being 50 feet. They simply, if they went for a major subdivision,
six lots, at this point in time, if they were to build down here,
they would likely have to build that Town road, and they said, we
can't afford to do that. So it wasn't a mystery or anything being
held back, that they do intend, once they get these lots sold, to
build that road to Town specs.
MR. RUEL-You know what I'd like to see, I'd like to see this road
paved, up to here, now, and if you do develop it later, at least
you've got the road in, but at least it'll help these people, much
better access for these driveways.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, I can suggest that to my client and see if he
would agree to do that.
MR. RUEL-I'm quite concerned about the condition of this driveway.
This man gets up at five o'clock in the morning to go to work in
the middle of winter and this thing is not plowed yet, you know,
he's got a problem. He can plow his own driveway, but who takes
care of this, and when, and what assurance does he have that this
driveway will be properly maintained?
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, I think those are some agreements that the
Cardinales will have to make with the buyers of Lots One and Two.
MR. RUEL-It's pretty touch, I think.
MR. MACEWAN-I would like to see something, an agreement set forth,
before we even would approve this.
MR. MCCORMACK-Well, what I would suggest to do, put together a
draft of that agreement that would go, at the next meeting.
MR. RUEL-It doesn't mean they'll live up to it.
31
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MRS. ROWE-I know.
MR. BREWER-Well, if they don't, then they have some course to.
MR. MACEWAN-Notice on your Staff Notes, here, you guys, for us,
usually put a recommendation on the bottom, of one form or another.
You didn't on this, and I'm curious as to why.
MR. HARLICKER-Well, these really aren't approvals. It's more of a
chance to get some input, and more of a give and take from the
applicant, unless there's some major problems with it that can't be
Qvercomi in Preliminary. A lot Qf this s..tuff you've been
d1scuss ng can be taken care of DY tñe t:'íme pre-¡ìmi"nary Revlew
comes around, on the drafting of the easements and things like
that, maybe erosion control, because Lot 2 has some fairly steep
slopes on it, where that driveway's going up, like about 10
percent.
MR. MACEWAN-Yes, but the site plan submitted to us isn't even
accurate.
MR. HARLICKER-I didn't know that until now.
MR. MARTIN-We're hearing that for the first time.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Anything else?
MR. MACEWAN-Can I offer a suggestion that we table this, until we
get a little bit more information on it?
MR. BREWER-This is just sketch. It's merely to just get an idea of
what the man wants to do, so he can move into the process. He gets
to Preliminary and we can hold him up at Preliminary as long as we
want, and I think for the benefit of both him and us, we can just
move him along, give him conditions that he has to meet before we
can here him at Preliminary.
MR. MARTIN-The two things I would point out for the Board is, if
you review your Subdivision Regulations, the standards for a Sketch
Plan application are much less stringent and much less involved.
It's meant to be a conceptual review, and results in a
recommendation to go on to Preliminary, not an approval of any
kind, and you still have two levels of approval after this, then
you have Preliminary and Final.
MR. MACEWAN-I guess the quirky thing, here, with me on this is the
shared driveway thing.
MR. MARTIN-Well, this is something the Board is seeing for the
first time, and quite frankly you're going to see a lot more of
with the amendment that was enacted by the Town Board in November.
They just enacted legislation that permits this as a, that relieves
the double the lot width requirement. This was an application that
quite frankly was on the shelf and couldn't be acted on until this
change came along. When the change came along, then this was
reactivated. So you're going to see more of these things, and it
would probably be a good idea that we work out an acceptable
solution, like you say, written agreements that go with the deed or
something to that effect, that would satisfy your concerns, and
this is something we can apply as a model solution, time and again,
because I think we're going to start to see these things more
frequently.
MRS. TARANA-I have a question about the erosion possibility.
Apparently, Lots One and Two are flat, but Lot Three is quite a bit
elevated from those two?
MR. MARTIN-No. It's the reverse.
MR. HARLICKER-No. Lot Two is the one that's got the knoll on it.
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MR. MCCORMACK-Lot Three is lower.
of Lot Two.
The high point is on the center
MRS. TARANA-Two is the high point?
MR. HARLICKER-Right.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. I see, this one is higher right here, yes. I
read this thing wrong, okay. So what are, have you given any
thought to erosion control, because that could drain right down
onto that road, runoff, whatever, from Lot Two.
MR. MCCORMACK-From the center of Lot Two down toward the road. The
slope there is, from Two down to the road, there's only about a 10
foot drop, about 150 feet. It's not that steep. I would
anticipate that since the main road, the driveway for Lot Three,
since it's a continual down slope, down to which is, and we've done
a profile of it, it's about four percent, which is more than
acceptable, that where that driveway turns into the house on Three,
be it the one you see there, or if you choose the other one, at the
end of that there could be a drainage structure that would take
that to the drain that is coming down from Peggy Ann Road, and the
drainage off of One and Two, because it all heads down to about
that circle you see on the map. At that point, the drain structure
could be constructed, or a detention, but these are matters that we
normally present at Preliminary level.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Anything else from anybody else? Would somebody
care to make a motion, with the stipulations in it, or without them
in it?
MR. RUEL-What stipulations?
MR. BREWER-Well, the things that came to my mind is a revised map,
perc tests, and talk to Kip Grant about the fire access.
MR. MACEWAN-And any deed easement restrictions, shared driveway.
MR. BREWER-Right, that he could bring back with him at Preliminary.
MR. MACEWAN-Does anybody else have any comments, questions?
MR. BREWER-No. That's all I've got.
MRS. TARANA-I don't have any comments.
MR. MACEWAN-All right, I'll go ahead and give it a whirl.
MOTION TO RECOHKBRD SUBDIVISIOR NO. 1-1993 SKETCH PLAH BOWARD &
MARY CARDINALE TO GO OR TO PRELIHIRARY, Introduced by Craig MacEwan
who moved for its adoption, seconded by Roger Ruel:
With the following stipulations, upon resubmission at Preliminary:
That the applicant revise the plat to show percolation tests and
relocation of proposed house, that he get in contact with the Fire
Marshal regarding emergency access into the site, and that he also
present'deeds or easements, proposals, for the other two lots, and
how that will be handled.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. Brewer
NOES: Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-Three to two, how does that work, no action?
33
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MR. MARTIN-No action.
MR. BREWER-We didn't approve it.
what's the procedure here?
There's no action taken.
So
MR. MARTIN-You need a majority vote, a minimum of four votes.
MR. BREWER-What's the procedure now?
MR. MARTIN-You can entertain another motion, or the applicant
simply would have to come back.
MRS. ROWE-Well. maybe in coming back he'd be able to address some
of our concerns.
MR. RUEL-He's got to come back anyway.
MR. BREWER-Well, I understand that, but my feeling is, it's just
conceptual approval, to go on to Preliminary, to give him a chance
to get the things that we are concerned about into order, and bring
them back to us at Preliminary. If we don't feel that the items
that he brings back to us are sufficient, we can table him, we can
deny him. That's an option that we have.
MR. RUEL-I agree.
MR. BREWER-That's my feeling. I think at the very earliest stage
of it, I don't think we should just turn the man away and say he
has to come back in another month.
MRS. TARANA-I' d just like to address that. We're voting on a
concept, and it's the concept which I don't approve of.
MR. MACEWAN-I agree with you.
MR. HARLICKER-Well, then does anybody have any suggestions as to
how the concept could be altered to address your concerns?
MRS. TARANA-Well, the problem I have with the concept is, you've
got these three lots with one shared driveway, and then, obviously,
the anticipation of more lots with the shared driveway. I just
don't think that's a good idea. I think whether you have deeded
restrictions or not, practically speaking, that can be a problem.
I think that we have seen it a problem with people with two lots on
one shared driveway, and it just seems a little much to me.
MR. MCCORMACK-May I address the Board?
MR. BREWER-Yes, you may.
MR. MCCORMACK-The whole idea of the change in the Ordinance was to
eliminate driveways out onto an arterial highway. That was the
reason for it, and this sketch plan addresses that to the letter.
We eliminate three driveways going out, and we have one, and that's
what the addition to the Ordinance is all about. Now, as to in the
future, once Lots One and Two are sold, and the Cardinales have
their home on Lot Three, that's it until such time as they come
back in for, either at that point, depending on the time span,
another three lot subdivision, or it may have to be considered a
major, but at that point, that road will have to be a Town road,
because there won't be any more than the Cardinales and the two
front lots using that common driveway. The Ordinance change was to
cause this type of design to come about. I understand your concern
that the two lot owners up front be protected in some way, with an
agreement as to who was going to do the maintenance. That will be
something that will be addressed in Preliminary. This map is a
sketch plan map. With your comments now, we come back addressing
those comments.
MRS. TARANA-I just wonder if there isn't some other configuration
34
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or something that could occur with this piece of property.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Does anyone on the Board care to make another
motion? I don't know, would you agree to come back? I would like
to see it move on, myself. That's my opinion. Kathy?
MRS. ROWE-I think it should move on because he's going to come back
anyway again and submit all this when we do the site plan. So, I
mean, he's going to be bringing us a better conception of this, and
I don't think he can make a decision on his own what the Cardinales
are going to decide anyway.
LEON STEVES
MR. STEVES-Mr. Chairman, it's none of my business, but I would like
to make a comment.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Could you state your name for the record?
MR. STEVES-My name is Leon Steves. I'm next on the agenda. You
all know that all lots have to front upon a Town road. Therefore,
there can't be any further subdivision without the approval of this
Board anyway.
MR. BREWER-Correct.
MR. STEVES-I think that's what Mr. McCormack was trying to say.
MRS. TARANA-It just doesn't make sense to me that that's a good
plan.
MRS. ROWE-We didn't say that it was or it wasn't, Corinne. We're
just saying that, at this point, it needs to move a little bit
forward so that we can see what it's going to look like, visualize
what it's going to look like when he comes back.
MRS. TARANA-Well, when he comes back, what's going to change with
the single road with three driveways going off it? What's going to
change? Is that open to question?
MR. MCCORMACK-That won't change.
MRS. TARANA-That's not going to change, and I have a basic problem
with that.
MR. RUEL-Well, I think changes can be made. I think a change can
be made to meet the Ordinance and also to eliminate the common
driveway. At least I think people should have an opportunity to
try to resolve it.
MRS. TARANA-I mean, I would like, if that could be reconfigured, do
you think?
MR. MCCORMACK-The new change in the Ordinance is calling for this
type of arrangement, rather than three driveways gOing out.
MR. RUEL-Yes, but they're not calling for a common driveway.
MR. MCCORMACK-Yes.
MR. RUEL-They are, a common driveway?
MR. BREWER-Yes, they are.
MRS. TARANA-We don't have it in our book.
MR. BREWER-No. We don't have it yet.
MR. MCCORMACK-"Except
requirement for double
that
the
this requirement", that is
lot width, "shall not apply
the
under
35
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circumstances where adjoining residential lots exist or are
proposed to be established and that the width of each lot meets the
required width of the zone, and Two, that ingress or egress is
limited to and provided by a single common driveway, which is to be
documented on the plat and in a written legal document which is
recordable in the Warren County Clerk's Office."
MR. MACEWAN-How aware are you of this change in the Ordinance?
Were you actively involved in it when they did it?
MR. MARTIN-No. That was something that was already in the works
when I took this position. It had already been submitted to the
Town Board.
MR. MACEWAN-Do you have any idea of what the Town Board had in
mind, how this was going to be handled?
MR. MARTIN-I think the motivation behind this change was that in
cases like this where you have relatively minor subdivisions, and
I term minor as being two or three lots, that the double the lot
width was excessive and this was viewed as a way of circumventing
that, in the cases of these relatively minor subdivisions that are
usually exchange of properties between relatives or something of
that nature. That was the motivation for it.
MR. HARLICKER-Another thing might be, it was an attempt to limit
the number of driveways that are coming out onto arterial roads.
By allowing two or three lots to use one driveway, they eliminate
the need for having three separate driveways coming out onto Peggy
Ann Road. So, from a safety standpoint, it's better.
MR. MARTIN-See, your copies haven't been updated yet because the
amendment has been submitted to the Department of State, and it has
to come from the Codification Service.
MR. BREWER-Well, I'd like to make another motion.
MOTION TO RECOHHBRD SUBDIVISIOR NO. 1-1993 SKETCH PLAR EDWARD &
MARY CARDIRALE TO GO OR TO PRELIMINARY, Introduced by Timothy
Brewer who moved for its adoption, seconded by Roger Ruel:
With the following stipulations: When he comes back for
Preliminary, to have a revised map, perc test information, to talk
to Mr. Grant, the F ire Marshall, about accessibility for fire
apparatus, and the conceptual deed restriction or agreement for
road maintenance for the common driveway.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES: Mr. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES: Mrs. Tarana
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. MACEWAN-Note, Staff, could we possibly get a copy of that new,
so we can have it to look at?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
SUBDIVISION RO. 4-1993 SKETCH PLAN TYPE I RC-15. WR-3A GUIDO
PASSARELLI ROUND POND C.E.A. OWNER: SAME AS ABOVE LOCATION:
NORTH SIDE ROURD POND RD. WEST SIDE BIRDSALL ROAD. PROPOSAL IS TO
SUBDIVIDE +20 ACRES INTO 22 LOTS. TAX HAP NO. 67-~-1 LOT SIZE:
SUBDIVISION REGULATIONS
LEON STEVES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
MRS. TARANA-I'm going to recuse myself from this, because I work
very actively on the Town's purchase of Round Pond. I even met
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with Mr. Passarelli, which he may not remember, but just to avoid
any appearance of impropriety, I have been advised to recuse
myself.
STAFF INPUT
Notes from Staff, Subdivision No. 4-1993, Guido Passarelli, Meeting
Date: January 26, 1993 "Pr01ect Description: The applicant is
proposing to subdivide a 20 acre parcel into 22 lots. The property
is located on Round Pond Road and Birdsall Road and is zoned RC-15
and WR-3A. The subdivision includes the construction of a cul-de-
sac to service 15 lots, one lot will have frontage on Birdsall
Road, six lots will have frontage on Round Pond Road, and there
will be an undeveloped lot at the intersection of Round Pond Road
and Birdsall Road." It currently looks like a three bay garage is
located on it. "The lots will range in size from 15,000 sq. ft. to
approximately 3.7 acres. The property is not serviced by Town
water or sewer. The project is adjacent to the Round Lake Critical
Environmental Area and, therefore, a Type I action for SEQRA.
Pr01ect Analysis: Since the property is not serviced by Town sewer
or water, all the lots will have to have individual septic systems
and wells. Tests will have to be done for the sUitability of on
site septic systems. Separation of wells and septic systems should
also be addressed. Topography and the size of the lots might
create separation problems. Erosion and drainage are also a
concern because of topography. The narrowness of some of the lots
could cause problems in the future; there appears to be very little
room for expansion on some of the lots." If some of these people
wanted to add on to their houses, they'd have to go in for
variances. "One also has to question the desirability of placing
single family homes next to the Great Escape, of having the traffic
associated with 16 houses using Birdsall Road as access and having
6 lots fronting Round Pond Road."
MR. HARLICKER-Site distance should also be addressed. It appears
that there could be some concern with site distance on the curves
on Round Pond Road, right where Birdsall Road and Round Pond
intersect.
MR. STEVES-That's an addendum, is that right?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. I went out and looked at it today.
MR. STEVES-All right. Thank you.
MR. BREWER-Okay. We also have a letter from VanDusen and Steves.
"Dear Board Members: At this time we are requesting a postponement
of the grading, drainage and landscaping plans. We are hoping to
discuss these matters at the Sketch Plan review meeting so that we
would be able to get a better understanding as to your concerns."
Okay. Mr. Steves, would you like to address the Board?
MR. STEVES-Yes. Thank you. One of the problems that we had with
this plan is the confusion, the location of the Environmental
Critical Area around Round Pond, that is the area that is
designated as 500 feet from the pond. It does cut across a corner
of the property off Birdsall Road, as shown on the plan. My
understanding of that was that, in going into an Environmental
Critical Area, you would take a report, such as Hiland Park's, in
the SEQRA Review. I have asked that question, and have been told
that it's just a full blown SEQRA, not the whole book. Therefore,
although we marked it on the plan, excluding that area below in the
triangle, that area itself is a part of the RC-15, the entire site
plan, therefore, is in the RC-15 zone, not any of it in the WR-3A
zone. What we're considering is the area west of Birdsall Road and
north of Round Pond Road, and that's all in the same zone, and
Birdsall Road is the separation between the two zones of WR-3 and
the RC-15, and Round Pond is.
MR. BREWER-But a piece of this property goes across, for the right-
of-way for Niagara Mohawk, is that what you're saying, or am I
37
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misunderstanding you?
MR. STEVES-I'm sorry. It's your larger plan. On the larger plan,
we've outlined it, the strip 500 feet from the lake, and
inadvertently wrote on it WR-3 and RC-15. The actual division line
of the zoning line has nothing to do with the environmental
critical area. The zone line is Birdsall Road south, the entire
length. Do you know what I'm saying?
MR. BREWER-Well, I see what you're saying, but.
MR. MARTIN-So, what you're saying is the zoning district boundary
as depicted ls 1ncor~ect.
MR. STEVES-That's correct. It's depicted as the 500 foot line,
when it isn't. It's actually Birdsall Road, all in the RC-15 zone.
MR. MARTIN-So that area depicted on the plat as "Other Lands of
Passarelli" is, in fact, RC-15 zoning?
MR. STEVES-That's correct.
there?
Do you know where the garage is out
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. STEVES-That's the area I'm talking about. That is part of the
RC-15 zone. Some of the comments that have been made, and that's
what the purpose of a Sketch Plan is for is to encourage these
comments, we concur with. We will do exactly what Scott has
suggested, enlarge the lots in the cul-de-sac. We want to make
each of them at least 100 feet on the building lot. Although the
Code permits 75 feet on the street line, we don't want to go that
small. We want to go larger. We would try to make each of the
lots at least 20,000 square feet, because we have the same
concerns. We will, though, because we have that extra area, we're
talking 20 acres here, we will be going to a Number 23 lot. So,
instead of 22, as depicted on the map, we'll have 23, a slight
difference in configuration because we'll be using that triangle in
the corner for two lots, eliminating a lot in the cul-de-sac. Do
you follow what I'm saying? Your road configuration will be just
as shown on your plan, but we'll eliminate lot lines, that is, have
less lots on the cul-de-sac.
MR. HARLICKER-And then more lots would access off of Birdsall Road.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay.
MR. BREWER-And you'll come back with map showing that?
MR. STEVES-Yes, and also we would ask you approve the suitability
for septic, water supply.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MRS. ROWE-I don't want to start trouble, but based on the previous
application or Sketch Plan, why are we permitting all of these lots
on Round Pond Road, instead of one road out with the shared
driveway type of a situation?
MR. STEVES-The topography itself does not lend itself to a road
access off Round Pond Road. If we were to provide a road in there,
internalized road, we wouldn't be able to use one side of that
road. You wouldn't have anything between Round Pond Road and any
other road. You've driven through there. There's a nice flat area
in there.
MRS. ROWE-Yes, there is.
38
MR. STEVES-And then it goes right up steep to that hill.
MR. MARTIN-The other very simple answer is. the lot width
requirement is 75 feet in RC-15. All these lots do meet the double
the lot width requirement at 150.
MRS. ROWE-Okay.
MR. BREWER-Anything else?
MRS. ROWE-I just want to clarify, here. So you are gOing to
eliminate one of the lots up in the cul-de-sac?
MR. STEVES-Definitely.
MRS. ROWE-And add an additional lot down on Round Pond Road?
MR. STEVES-Right. So, we will come back, at the Preliminary Stage,
with 23 lots, the same road configuration.
MRS. ROWE-Okay.
MR. BREWER-I would ask Mr. Martin if he could verify that, not that
I don't believe you or trust you. but I would just ask him to
verify the zoning line.
MR. MARTIN-Well, we can do that at Preliminary.
MR. BREWER-Yes.
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. STEVES-I checked that today.
MR. BREWER-I believe you. Your application says 22. You've said
23, and the map says 25 lots.
MR. STEVES-It will be 23.
MR. BREWER-Twenty three.
MR. STEVES-Well, we're trying to, you know, we have followed the
regulations, as far as permitted use in lot size. Obviously, it's
too crowded, and therefore we will enlarge them. As I told you, we
want to make them at least 100 feet on the building line, and
20,000 square feet per lot.
MR. BREWER-So you're saying the lots will be 20,000 square feet,
give or take?
MR. STEVES-Yes. I mean, we've got 20 acres in here, and we're
talking 23 lots.
MR. RUEL-So that's an average of about nine tenths of an acre per
lot.
MR. STEVES-Take out your road, I would say you're talking three
quarters of an acre.
MR. RUEL-Yes.
MRS. ROWE-Based on my previous experiences, I just want to ask. Is
there going to be some word of caution in the deed or with the
realtor that's going to be selling these lots to let these people
know that the Great Escape is back there and on their, you know,
boundary, and if he wants to put another roller coaster, they're
not going to be in here.
MR. STEVES-No, but since we are going with the subdivision, and
perhaps we will provide a buffer along there. Perhaps you will ask
39
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him to provide the buffer on his side.
MR. RUEL-Is there a buffer now?
MR. BREWER-It's all woods.
MR. STEVES-It's all woods.
MR. HARLICKER-There' s a 50 foot buffer required, between the
commercial uses and the residence.
MR. STEVES-We're in the same zone, RC-15.
MR. HARLICKER-I think it's uses.
MR. MARTIN-Yes, it would be uses.
MR. STEVES-Okay. You'll have a 50 foot buffer.
MR. RUEL-Each lot will still have it's own water supply?
MR. STEVES-As it stands right now, yes.
MR. RUEL-And its own septic?
MR. STEVES-Yes, sir. We'll meet the Department of Health Code
requirements, get their approval before.
MR. BREWER-How far is the water table there?
MR. STEVES-It would vary.
groundwater problems.
I don't think we would have any
MR. BREWER-No, I'm talking for wells.
MR. STEVES-Wells?
itself.
I wouldn't think much lower than the lake
MR. BREWER-Okay. Any other questions from anybody else? Would
someone care to make a recommendation?
MOTIOR TO RECOHHBRD FOR SUBDIVISIOR RO. 4-1993 SKBTCH PLAR GUIDO
PASSARELLI, Introduced by Timothy Brewer who moved for its
adoption, seconded by Roger Ruel.
With the following stipulations: With a revised map, indicate the
perc test.
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote.
AYES: Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mrs. Tarana, Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
Pl-93 RECOMMBNDATION ONLY RONALD NEWELL/GARFIELD RAYMOND
PROPERTY IRVOLVED: APPROXIMATELY 30 ACRBS BBTWEBN BAY ROAD AND
COUNTRY CLUB ROAD. CURRBNT ZONING: UR-1A PROPOSED ZONE: HC-1A
TAX MAP NO. 61-1-41.1, 44. 17 (WARREN COUNTY PLARRIRG)
RONALD NEWELL AND GARFIELD RAYMOND, PRESENT
MR. NEWELL-Let me just say, that was zoned UR-l Acre and the
request is for an MR-5.
MRS. TARANA-Okay, and no HC-1A?
MR. NEWELL-No, MR-5. That was amended.
40
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MRS. TARANA-Did you go to Warren County Planning Board as an HC-1A?
MR. NEWELL-No. We went as an MR- 5. The letter from the Town
indicating that the application was changed to MR-5.
MR. MACEWAN-Doesn't he have to go back to the County?
MR. NEWELL-We've already been there.
MR. BREWER-He's already been there.
MR. MARTIN-It went to the County as MR-5.
MRS. ROWE-But it doesn't say that here on this page. See, that's
why I had my questions this afternoon. This is the Warren County
Planning Board's determination, and it doesn't say that here.
MR. MARTIN - I know when it was with the Town Board, I made a
presentation to them suggesting this in a recommendation, and I
know that that's the way it was taken to the Warren County Planning
Board. What their motion was, I have no idea what their discussion
was, or why that says that, but it was presented as an MR-S.
MRS. TARANA-When was that changed?
MR. MARTIN-It would have been late November, early December.
MR. NEWELL-If I can indicate, at the time I attended the County
Planning Board, there was a letter read in that was part of the
record, that it was an MR-5.
MRS. ROWE-Well, all the questions were basically raised because
everything inside the document stipulates Highway Commercial One
Acre, including the front page.
MR. NEWELL-I have no idea what you're looking at.
MR. MACEWAN-Including the documents that I have in front of me.
The document I have in front of me, from the Warren County Planning
Board, is dated January 20th of this year.
MR. NEWELL-Right.
MRS. ROWE-Well, this has down here on the front page of this,
of Queensbury Staff Review of Petition for Zone Change.
Change from UR-1A to HC-1A, or Highway Commercial One Acre.
makes no mention at all.
Town
Zone
It
MR. NEWELL-Well, that would be the motion. The motion was to
recommend, based on that MR-5. The whole discussion was MR-5.
MR. MACEWAN-This thing here says that they approved it.
MRS. TARANA-HC-1A.
MR. MACEWAN-Yes, but MR-S on there, too.
MR. BREWER-HC-1 and MR-S is what it says, right?
MR. RUEL-Yes.
MR. MARTIN-See, we have a letter from the applicant in the file.
"I kindly consider this letter as an amendment to our petition for
zone change to reflect request for a UR-1A to MR-S. Ronald Newell"
Dated Decemb~r 30th, 1992.
MRS. TARANA-I don't understand why it went to Warren County, then,
as HC-1A on January 20th, 1993.
MR. MARTIN-Because the original petition was for an HC-1A zone.
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MRS. TARANA-Well, didn't that letter go to them?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. NEWELL-And I'm telling you it was acted on as an MR-S. It was
not acted on as an HC-1.
MRS. ROWE-See, my main reservation about this whole thing is even
all the documentation inside talks about a zone change analysis and
Highway Commercial. It never mentions MR-S through the entire
document.
MR. NEWELL-Again, I'm not sure what document you're referring to.
MRS. TARANA-Let me just take a look at the Summary and Conclusions.
It tells why. You take a look at for yourself. I don't believe
MR-S is mentioned any place, on any of those papers.
MRS. ROWE-Yes. It mentions it as a more acceptable zoning for the
property than Highway Commercial. As far as anything else, it's
all Highway Commercial in here.
MRS. TARANA-Yes.
MR. NEWELL-Well, perhaps you could consider the document before you
as being amended to MR-5, as opposed to HC-l, because that was our
intent. That is our intent, and that's our present application.
MR. BREWER-Well, we can stipulate that in our recommendation
anyway.
MR. MARTIN-Exactly.
MR. BREWER-Just, food for thought. I was at the Town Board meeting
when Jim made the presentation to the Town Board, and I do recall
him saying that the appropriate zone for this is MR-S, and I think
that was the intent of Jim's presentation, because they did ask for
Highway Commercial, and he said it was inappropriate. I'm talking
about the Queensbury Town Board. That's my recollection of the
conversation.
MR. MARTIN-When I prepared this report back on November 9th, that
was very, very early in the process, and the initial, the reason
for the report being prepared in the first place was there was a
concern on the part of the Town Board about taking this from a
Residential One Acre zone all the way to a Highway Commercial zone,
and they wanted to explore the option of another zone that may be
more appropriate, given the Master Plan and the physical
constraints on the site.
MRS. TARANA-Yes. I agree with that.
Warren County approved this for HC-1A.
My concern more is that
MR. NEWELL-They approved it MR-5.
MRS. TARANA-What they're telling us is they approved it for HC-1A,
and everything attached to this discusses that. That's not the
applicant's problem, but I don't think things should be coming to
us which are not correct.
MR. BREWER-I agree with you.
MRS. TARANA-It' s .!.Q. far off. This is not a little mistake. We
looked at this whole thing thinking of HC-1A, when we looked at the
property.
MR. NEWELL-If you're suggesting that you would prefer that we do an
HC-1 as an MR-S.
MRS. TARANA-Not at all, and I'm not saying that this is your
42
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problem, because apparently you did send a letter clarifying it.
Do you get my point?
MR. NEWELL-I get your point.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Well, we can go through the Staff Comments, if we
want to.
MR. MARTIN-Okay. I wrote this on November 9th. I think you've had
a chance to review it. Just for the sake of time, I'll read my
recommendation only into the record. You have the remainder, or
Summary and Conclusions. "The proposal for a change of zone for
this particular site from UR-1A to HC-1A requires careful
consideration."
MR. BREWER-Whereabouts are you Jim?
MR. MARTIN-Letter D. I don't have number of pages. Do you have
the Staff Review Report?
MR. BREWER-Yes. I've got it.
MR. MARTIN-Okay. Summary and Conclusions.
MR. BREWER-I found it.
MRS. ROWE-Are you going to amend that Highway Commercial, now, to
MR-5, then?
MR. MARTIN-Well, the formal petition was originally for HC-1A. The
amendment came formally and officially on December 30th, and at the
time that this was written, the petition was still from the
applicant, they weren't even aware of my recommendation, at that
point. I'll go on and read it into the record. "The proposal for
a change of zone for this particular site from UR-1A to HC-1A
requires careful consideration. The physical constraints of the
site, the availability of on site or municipal sewer facilities,
the environmental features of the site and capacity of existing
infrastructure to service the site are all topics highlighted by
staff in this review. Taking into account these factors as well as
the stated goal for development of this corridor as an office and
community center, some office development on the parcel appears to
be reasonable. However, the HC-1A zone allows for development
beyond the physical limitations of this site. Uses allowed in this
zone are also at odds with the stated goals of the master plan.
Therefore, a less intense zone change which would allow for office
development is preferred." And I will go on record as saying, my
recommendation as Staff now, as well as at that time, was to take
it to MR-5.
MR. BREWER-Okay. We can hèar from the applicant.
MR. NEWELL-By the way, we concur with Mr. Martin. I think his
recommendation was based on a rather extensive review of the
property, the development of the corridor and the applicable laws
that relate to this particular situation. The history of the
property itself is that prior to the 1988 or '89 zoning change, it
was a UR-5 designation. The zoning change brought it to UR-l. It
resulted in a notice being filed with the Town, objecting to the
re-zone. I think there were two use variances filed with the
Zoning Board of Appeals. I think you should also be aware of the
fact that there were two lawsuits that were commenced against the
Town, one of which resulted in a referral back to the Zoning Board
of Appeals, and one which is pending. I think the general
consensus is that this property is appropriately, and should be
appropriately designated as an MR-5. A lot of study and a lot of
effort and a lot of energy has gone into arriving at that
conclusion. I think when you look at the property and consider
where it's located and you consider what surrounds this property,
specifically a townhouse development, a dance studio, highway
43
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commercial across the street on Bay Road, particularly in view of
what has also gone on further on down the road, when you consider
the other offices which are located, the professional offices, that
this designation, the proposed re-zone designation is appropriate
under the circumstances.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Maybe we could hang a map up, so everybody could
see what exactly you're doing.
MR. NEWELL-That map you have there, that was submitted solely for
the purpose of showing the wetlands. All those lots, I think
there's 100 and some odd lots that have nothing to do with what
we're proposing. That was used by, I think, Jones, I'm trying to
think of the name of that.
GENTLEMAN IN AUDIENCE-His name was John Wheeler.
MR. BREWER-Maybe we could get some kind of a feel as to what you
are going to do there.
MR. NEWELL-All right. This is the actual configuration of the
property. The one with all the lots on it was used because that
marks the flagged wetlands. Forget about the lines and the lots,
because that really has nothing to do with anything.
MR. BREWER-Okay, because that was going to bring me to this.
That's multifamily dwellings.
MR. NEWELL-No, it has absolutely nothing to do with anything. Only
the person who went out and marked the wetlands used that
particular map. So that's the only reason that that map has been
submitted is to show a more accurate reflection of where the
wetlands are.
MRS. ROWE-On this, the older map, where do you come out on Sweet
Road, from this one?
MR. NEWELL-Well, let me take that map off, because that. Here's
Bay Road. You go over here, and what this map does not reflect is
this lot right here. That lot is right here, and that goes out
onto Country Club Road, all right, and Sweet Road is up here.
MRS. TARANA-Right next to the new construction? Is this road
coming out right next to the new construction, there's a cellar
hole dug?
MR. NEWELL-Cellar hole. That's correct. The cellar hole's right
here.
MR. MARTIN-Just as a note for the Board, too. We've contacted the
real estate agent that was listed for selling that lot and said
that we hope that there is no construction going on there, because
there's been no building permit issued to that site. We have since
seen no more activity at that site. I don't know what the purpose
of the hole was being dug, but we were making sure that it was not
for construction of a hole, because there was no building permit
issued.
MRS. TARANA-So, the hole is being left there?
MR. MARTIN-I don't know what the hole is for. I hope it's not for
a home, because we have no building permit.
MR. NEWELL-Well, I can assure and the Board that there will be no
construction at that particular location without a bUilding permit.
That goes without saying.
MR. MARTIN-Okay.
MRS. TARANA-Is that a piece of your property?
44
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MR. NEWELL-Yes.
MRS. TARANA-And you don't know who built that?
MR. NEWELL-Sure I do.
MRS. TARANA-Well, what did they make the hole for?
MR. NEWELL-Well, I think, they ultimately wanted to put a home up
there, and I think that was probably the purpose. Maybe, I don't
know what, I guess he was digging a hole to see if they could dig
a hole.
GARFIELD RAYMOND
MR. RAYMOND-They were digging a hole to see about what type of
foundation they'd have to put in there, whether or not they could
put a slab in there. Whether or not they'd have to put in a crawl
space in there.
MRS. TARANA-They dug a foundation without getting a bUilding
permit?
MR. RAYMOND-They dug a hole.
MR. NEWELL-There's no foundation.
MRS. TARANA-Well, it's obviously something that's supposed to be a
foundation.
MR. NEWELL-Well, ultimately you would hope that there would be.
MRS. TARANA-But why wouldn't you get a building permit? I guess I
don't understand?
MR. NEWELL-Because you weren't sure what you could put there.
MRS. TARANA-But you don't just dig a big hole and not get a
building permit to do that.
MR. RAYMOND-Well, I think that you can. I think that you're
allowed to dig a hole on your property if you want to dig a hole on
your property. I don't think you need a building permit to dig a
hole. If you're going to start construction on your property, I
think that you need it.
MR. MARTIN-That's, technically, true.
MRS. TARANA-You can excavate your land without a bUilding permit?
MR. MARTIN-Right, but as soon as there begins any pouring of
concrete or any attempt to set footings, then that would constitute
a violation.
MR. NEWELL-So, that is the law in the Town of Queensbury, and we
are in compliance with the law in the Town of Queensbury.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. I hear you.
MR. NEWELL-All right? You may not agree with it, you may not like
it, but that's the rules and we're in compliance with the rules.
We're not going to put any buildings, foot any forms, put in the
cement, put in the blocks, until there's a building permit, until
we have the necessary approvals, but the bottom line is, or what I
was trying to show you is that that lot runs along this line here.
This was purchased separate from this lot, all right. We purchased
this piece of property first, and then we acquired this piece of
property for access onto Country Club Road. When we bought this,
the State had not come in and flagged all of this, and it was our
intent, we were going to try and utilize the entire parcel of
45
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property. Since then, the State has come in and flagged a good
portion of it, and designated it wetlands, which, to a large
degree, restricts the use of this property and this property in
conjunction with this property, or this section.
MR. BREWER-So, is this going to be one piece of property or two
pieces of property?
MR. NEWELL-Well, right now it's two pieces of property. We have
two separate deeds.
MR. BREWER-It's going to be one piece, though?
MR. NEWELL-Well, it all depends on what we can do and what we can't
do with the property. Right now , it's a UR-1 designation, all
right. It's probably the only UR-l designation for this type of
site configuration in the Town of Queensbury, which is why we've
had all the problems we've had since the thing was re-zoned. That
was, UR-5, that was what is today an MR-5. It was once UR-5. All
of this was UR-5, and then the Town came in and re-zoned it UR-l,
and we're coming back here today saying it still should be MR-5, or
UR-5. It never should have gone to UR-l.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Now getting back to, tell us about what you were
going to put in there.
MR. NEWELL-Well, there's any number of things that we could do with
the MR-5, that you cannot do with UR-l. Specifically, cultural
professional uses which is on the Bay Road side, which we've tried
to do for some years now. At one time, we had two one acre lots
cut out and delineated on the Bay Road property, on the Bay Road
side of this lot, and we never could get the Zoning Board of
Appeals to agree to a use variance, because it was always their
decision, and stated in the record any number of times, that the
property was inappropriately zoned, and they said why should we
give you a use variance for a property that should be an MR-5. It
should be re-zoned. Why should we do it piecemeal? The whole
property should be MR-5. So here we're stuck with a UR-1
designation, the Zoning Board of Appeals taking the position that
it's improperly zoned and they're not going to give us a use
variance, and then it's kind of a Catch-22 situation. They're not
going to give a use variance because it's not properly zoned, which
is the reason why we're here.
MR. BREWER-That still doesn't answer my question, though.
MR. NEWELL-What am I going to do with it?
MR. BREWER-Do you have an idea, conceptually, what you might do
with this?
MR. NEWELL-Well. the front part we'd like to put professional
offices in there, at least have the capability of putting
professional offices there.
MRS. TARANA-The front being Bay Road?
MR. NEWELL-Yes, and maybe in the back utilizing the MR-5
designation to put in homes, using the balance of the property as
the basis for the cluster uses. I guess you could even consider
that, cluster the homes, using the balance of the property as the
available area to support that type of usage.
MR. MACEWAN-You have no definitive plans as to what you'd like to
do?
MR. NEWELL-We've been kind of hand strung from Day One on this
thing. When you say, what are you going to do with it, initially,
after we got stuck with the UR-1, we tried to market it, and as a
practical matter, we can't market this property for residential use
46
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on Bay Road. It can't be done. You can't sell it because no one
wants to come in and put a single family dwelling on an area which
is primarily professional, or more appropriately used for a
professional use.
MR. BREWER-So, I guess what my question would be, then, are we
recommending that we re-zone all of this that doesn't come out
here?
MR. NEWELL-No, that does. Are you talking about the Country Club?
MR. BREWER-Well, if it's two different pieces of property, how can
it come out? You were going to change that if we recommend that
you re-zone that?
MR. NEWELL-Yes. That's exactly right.
MRS. TARANA-And you want to put a road from Bay to Country Club?
MR. NEWELL-No, no. We can't do that, as a practical matter.
MRS. TARANA-Isn't there a road shown?
MR. RAYMOND-No.
MR. BREWER-That was the lots that they said that they're not going
to do.
MRS. TARANA-Well, then that has nothing to do with it?
MR. MACEWAN-Absolutely none. We should never have even seen that
map.
MRS. TARANA-I know the houses didn't, but I thought the road was
going through?
MR. NEWELL-No. Forget about anything on this map, other than the
wetland designations. That's all this map was submitted for. No
other reason. There are no lots. There's no roads. There isn't
anything on this property, other than the wetlands, which are
delineated by these marks. A prospective purchaser looked at this
property one time, and before he went any further with it, he had
Richard Jones, he had one of their engineers go on the property,
one of their surveyors, go on the property and mark the wetlands.
Now I had hoped that he had used that map, but unfortunately he
used this map, which was the wrong map, but be that as it may, if
you exclude these lines, exclude the road, you could look at this
with the idea in mind of where the wetlands are. That's all this
map is used for.
MRS. TARANA-So the only place you don't have wetlands is over here,
off Bay Road?
MR. NEWELL-Dry, dry, dry. This is the designated wetland.
MR. MARTIN-And given the situation this is in, they're going to be
required for a wetlands permit from DEC, and also from the Town,
should they attempt to do any development within the wetland, and
the separation distance is 100 feet from the edge of the flagged
wetland, if you're to stay out of the wetland.
MR. BREWER-Right. Might I ask this? If he wants to put any kind
of homes on the Country Club side of that, is that subject to site
plan review, if there's going to be a subdivision?
MR. MARTIN-Yes. All uses are subject to Site Plan Review. The
Board went and saw this site in the winter time?
MR. MACEWAN-Our Board?
47
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MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. MACEWAN-Just a couple of weeks ago.
MRS. TARANA-We just saw it.
MR. MARTIN-Yes. I saw this in November, and there was.
MR. MACEWAN-We went there, all of us, under the impression, because
there was four of us together, under the impression that this was
going to be a development for a housing development, with 107, or
8 lots, qoing fr01J' Bay Road and all theiwayhover lto kthe COtuntrv
Club Roaã. Tnat s wñy we're arT s1 tt ng ere 00 1ng a you
dumbfounded.
MR. MARTIN-There's a substantial amount of standing water that I
found on the lot in November. .
MRS. TARANA-I had a question about the pictures that you submitted.
MR. BREWER-Jim took them, I think.
MRS. TARANA-Jim took these pictures?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MRS. TARANA-Looking north from the site area along Country Club
Road. It can't be from the site. No way.
MR. MARTIN-Well, actually it was across the street from the site
area. I couldn't get up the corridor. I was trying to show the
corridor, the neighboring uses.
MR. NEWELL-This would be Sweet Road, here, and this would be the
land, over here.
MRS. TARANA-Right. The land is down Country Club a little bit, and
I think you'd have a really different perspective if you did take
a picture of the site, looking north, across the street where the
site is.
MR. MARTIN-Well, I was trying to show the corridor and the
neighboring uses up Country Club Road.
MRS. TARANA-Right, I realize that, but I do think the perspective
from the site, looking north, on Country Club is quite a bit
different than what this.
MR. MARTIN-Well, with the curvature of the road, I couldn't really
get the corridor. It curved off and you really couldn't get the
corridor, so I went across the street to get it.
MRS. TARANA-That's my point.
MR. MACEWAN-We seem to be getting off on the real wrong foot, here.
MR. NEWELL-I'll tell you, this is nothing new with this entire
project. It seems like we got off on the wrong foot in 1989, 1988,
and we have not gotten on the right foot since. So, this is
nothing new. We'd be tickled to death to get off on the right foot
just once on this parcel.
MR. BREWER-This isn't a public hearing, but I guess I'll ask the
Board, how does the Board feel about taking comments from the
public, brief comments from the public?
MR. MACEWAN-Well, in my personal opinion, I don't know what you can
comment on. We're not really sure and clear what their intentions
are to do with the piece of land.
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MR. BREWER-Maybe they may have questions, or.
DAN VALENTI
MR. VALENTI-I just have one thing to say, and then I'll leave you
alone. My name is Dan Valenti, I'm from Valenti Builders, and I
own quite a bit of property around this development, or around this
piece of property. The only thing we're concerned about is that if
you zone it and you change the zoning on this property, that the
piece that's on Country Club Road would then have the possibility
of professional office there. They'll have the legal right to do
that. We just want to protect that neighborhood, that that stays
the single family residential. It's a small lot, now that I see.
It would definitely not hurt the development if it was kept the way
it is, and it would protect our neighborhood, and that's the main
thing we're concerned about.
MR. MACEWAN-That's one of my concerns, and that was one of the
comments that was mentioned on our trip.
MR. VALENTI-Because what's happened previous to these gentlemen,
other than development along that road, the businesses keep trying
to come down the Country Club Road, closer and closer to Sweet
Road, and all we're concerned about is not to stop them from what
they're doing, but to just protect the neighborhood so it stays
residential.
MR. MARTIN-My only comment to that is, as Zoning Administrator, and
I'll go on the record as saying this, it would be my determination
that professional offices would not be allowed from the Country
Club Road side. The way I read the MR-5 zoning is that
professional offices are allowed only within 1,000 feet of Bay
Road, and if they were to come in with that type of plan, I would
say that it would need a variance.
MR. VALENTI-That must have been changed, then, Jim, because the
last time someone went through that, it was the green house across
the street.
MR. MARTIN-Well, that's mY interpretation.
MR. VALENTI-Well, the Town Board interpreted it the other way.
LIZ VALENTI
MRS. VALENTI-I'm Liz Valenti. All we're saying is really, we have
no objections to them putting offices on the Bay Road. I think
it's really very appropriate, because I agree, nObody wants to live
on the Bay Road. It's a highway, but our only concern is that
these are really two pieces here. Am I right?
MR. NEWELL-That's correct.
MRS. VALENTI-Okay. This is the second piece, and it's already two
pieces. We just would like to say, fine for this, but I'd like to
see this stay the way it is, and that's single family residential.
MR. MARTIN-I'll read into the record the language that I'm
referring to, out o~ the MR-5 District.
MRS. VALENTI-Jim, no offense, but we've been through it. You have
someone on this Board who knows, who lives in the area, and I'll
tell you, we've been through this, and I don't want to have to
argue with you.
MR. MARTIN-I'm just saying, as Acting Zoning Administrator, there'd
be Professional Office, note.
MRS. VALENTI-Yes. and you'll be gone, and who knows where you'll
be. You'll run for president.
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MRS. TARANA-Let me just, how do you feel about keeping that one
piece of property?
MR. RAYMOND-The only question I would ask is, would we have the
right to cross, have a roadway, an easement across that, to get
into the MR-5 area? I mean, if you're on Country Club, and we're
dealing with this. So, if we wanted to put a road in, to do
something in here, would we be able to cross this to go into that?
MR. BREWER-Well, I think what he's saying is, if he wants to put a
road in to come into Country Club to come in and build houses in
here, he has a right to do that. I don't see anything wrong with
that.
MRS. VALENTI-Why can't you access through the Bay Road? You've got
a wetland in there?
MR. RAYMOND-Well, no. All this is wetland, see.
MRS. VALENTI-Right.
MR. RAYMOND-See, this is not a wetland here. So, if we wanted to
cross this and get access into here to do something, I just want to
make sure that we're going to have a right to cross this piece to
service this land.
MRS. VALENTI-So, Garfield, in other words, what you're saying now,
which is what they were asking you is, what they were aSking you
is, you have full intent, or you have the intention of possibly
putting a road in from Country Club Road to access that MR-5?
MR. RAYMOND-I don't know, but I'm saying for practical purposes,
for development purposes, it would have to be. You're not going to
cross 1,000 feet of wetlands to gain access to maybe three or four
acres on the back side of Country Club Road. It's not going to do.
It's just cost prohibitive, and we ran into this problem before
when I had some land on Sweet Road. They were saying that, can you
cross an SFR piece of property to service an MR-5?
MR. VALENTI-See, that circumvents what he just said about the 1,000
feet. We could have professional offices with entrances on Country
Club Road, and that's what I'm trying to avoid.
MRS. VALENTI-That's what we're trying to avoid.
MR. BREWER-I can understand and sympathize with what you're saying,
but I can also sympathize with what he's saying is, if, what Jim is
saying is he can't build, this is the way I take it, he can't build
a professional office outside the 1,000 foot line of Bay Road.
MR. HARTIN-Right. I'm saying the office building has to be
physically located within 1,000 feet of Bay Road.
HR. BREWER-Within 1,000 feet of Bay Road.
MR. VALENTI-Within 1,000 feet.
MR. MARTIN-Right.
MR. BREWER-Within 1,000 feet.
MR. HARTIN-Not 1,000 feet off and beyond, within 1,000 feet of Bay
Road.
MRS. VALENTI-And what about Country Club?
MR. BREWER-There's a perimeter.
MR. MARTIN-I'll read the Section. Professional Offices, Notel In
the MR-5 along Bay Road, office buildings shall be located within
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1,000 feet of Bay Road, period.
MRS. VALENTI-What about Country Club? I don't care about Bay Road.
I think Bay Road is fine. I think it makes perfect sense.
MR. MARTIN-What I'm saying is that if a plan came in to me, as
Zoning Administrator, showing a professional office 500 feet off
the Country Club Road, no, it's not an allowed use.
MRS. TARANA-Well, then it seems to me we could zone one end and not
the other, change the zoning.
MR. NEWELL-What he's saying is, if you're going to put a
professional office, it has to be within 1,000 feet of Bay Road.
MR. VALENTI-I understand that.
MR. NEWELL-Then what's your concern?
MR. VALENTI-Because across the street from your property, three
years ago, they wanted to put an aerobic center, and the Town Board
approved it.
MRS. VALENTI-Under Health Related Facility.
MR. VALENTI-Under Health Related Facility, they approved it, I
caught it, and the only reason she never built it was because she
came in and tried to double the square footage at the last minute,
and she couldn't get the money, and then the moratorium came into
effect and she lost the whole deal. We went through this for many
years.
MRS. VALENTI-We're only trying to protect the neighborhood. That's
all we're trying to do.
MR. BREWER-What I was about to say, Mr. and Mrs. Valenti, is he
made a good point. Even if he doesn't or does anticipate building
houses.
MRS. VALENTI-I don't care about houses.
MR. VALENTI-I don't either.
MRS. VALENTI-It doesn't bother me at all.
MR. BREWER-He said it's cost prohibitive to make him come across
1,000 feet of wetland. If he wants to come in here with a road to
get to his land and put houses in there, I don't see anything wrong
with that.
MRS. VALENTI-That's not his land.
MRS. ROWE-That's not his land.
MR. BREWER-Well, his land's up here. If he allowed him to come
across his land to get in here to build houses, I don't see
anything wrong with that.
MR. VALENTI-We don't, either.
MRS. VALENTI-As long as it doesn't turn out to be an office
building.
MR. BREWER-He can't put an office building there.
MR. MARTIN-I'm saying, it's very simple. If you have MR-5 zoning
up and down Bay Road, on each side of the corridor, what this
zoning district is saying, you can see it with Mr. Passarelli's
proposed subdivision, he has all of his offices within 1,000 feet
of Bay Road. It would be 1,000 feet on each side of the road.
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Beyond that, it's not allowed.
MRS. VALENTI-What about a Health Related Facility?
MR. VALENTI-If you look at Type II's and MR-S, it's a Type II, a
Health Related Facility would fall into that category and
professional offices. This Town Board, not these people, but the
Town Board of Queensbury approved it and it's on the record that I
opposed it vehemently, and we got turned down, and the only reason
it didn't fly was because she couldn't get the money, but they
approved it under Type II.
MR. MARTIN-Well, that's a different situation, the Health Related
Facility.
MR. VALENTI-Well, that's what I'm trying to say, once the zoning's
in place, we have no say. The Town Board can say.
MRS. VALENTI-You're picturing homes. I'm picturing Health Related
Facilities.
MR. MARTIN-Now, when I was saying offices, I was saying, doctors,
dentists offices, something like that. Now, Health Related
Facility, you're right. That's a different matter. A Health
Related Facility is allowed anywhere within an MR-S zone.
MR. VALENTI-Right, and that's what we're, we're just trying to
protect that particular part of the Town, to keep it residential.
MR. MARTIN-Right. Now, it's within the Board, you've done this
before. You can recommend for approval. You can recommend for
approval with contingency, or you can deny, and something you may
consider is recommend with taking the Item Number Seven out of the
site plan review, under Type II, which refers to hospital and
physical therapy and that type of thing.
MR. NEWELL-We agree not to put a hospital on that.
MRS. TARANA-Well, couldn't we also recommend MR-5 for the first
piece of parcel, or the first parcel, and UR-1 at the other end,
right?
MRS. VALENTI-I don't want an aerobics.
MR. VALENTI-I don't want a racquet club, either.
MR. NEWELL-We won't put a racquet club, either.
MR. BREWER-We can't make those stipulations here. This Board
doesn't have the authority to re-zone this property or not re-zone
this property. We're making a recommendation to the Town Board.
That's all we're doing.
MRS. ROWE-Is there any way to subdivide this land into two pieces
and change?
MRS. TARANA-It is subdivided.
property.
You've already got two pieces of
MRS. ROWE-Because you can't use the wetland anyway to build
anything on, can you?
MR. NEWELL-It's two separate lots.
MR. RAYMOND-It's not subdivided.
MRS. ROWE-Can you build something on that wetlands?
MR. MARTIN-I'm not sure about that.
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MRS. ROWE-Be honest, now.
MR. MARTIN-I'm honestly not sure. He'd have to apply for a permit.
There are stipulations he'd have to meet, and if you can't.
MR. NEWELL-That's with the State of New York. That's with ENCON.
You'd be lucky if you could get two varieties of ducks in there on
a given day. I mean, they'd want to make sure the other ducks
weren't flying in the other duck's water. It's ridiculous what you
have to do with the State.
MRS. TARANA-Is there any reason why the two separate pieces of
property, the one on Bay Road, couldn't be re-zoned MR-5, and the
piece on the other end kept as UR-l? Why would you be opposed to
that?
MR. RAYMOND-I'm not necessarily opposed to it. I mean, maybe that
UR-1 may not be the answer, but maybe something like SFR, or
whatever, or something a little bit less than the one acre parcel.
MR. BREWER-Yes, but then it's another application for another re-
zoning.
MR. RAYMOND-But as long as we can have access across this to
service this piece back there. I mean, that's my main concern, and
my main concern is, as once before, as I said, I was on Sweet Road,
we had something, and there was a big turn out saying, one of the
technicali ties was going to be, well, we don t know if we can
really cross single family residence to service a multifamily area,
is what their arquments are.
MRS. TARANA-And what I'm saying is, you can get around that by
keeping it all multifamily, MR-5. Then you don't have the problem.
MR. NEWELL-I think I follow your concern about, I have no
objections, and I think maybe we can phrase it in such a way, to
say that we would not put anything else, or nothing would be placed
on it, other than a single family residence or something consistent
with an MR-5, which is a single family residence. In other words,
we won't be getting into professional offices. We won't be getting
into health care facilities. We won't be getting into anything
like that.
MR. MACEWAN-But MR-5 isn't sinqle family residence.
MR. RAYMOND-It is, really.
MR. NEWELL-How about this proposal? If you re-zone the whole thing
MR-5 with the understanding, as it relates to this parcel, the only
thing that could be constructed on it is residential use, period.
MR. BREWER-How big a piece of property is that piece of property
right there?
MR. NEWELL-It's about a two and a half acre lot.
MRS. TARANA-An MR-5 would allow how many lots for that size, do you
have any idea?
MR. MARTIN-That's 5.Ø00 acre zoninq, with a minimum lot size of
10,000 square feet. So, you'd have, Corinne, on two and a half
acres~ 10 lots, eligible for 20 units.
MR. MACEWAN-And by the time he cuts a road through there, that
would do what to it?
(Discussion took place between applicant and Valenti's. Was not
clear what was said.)
MR. MARTIN-Depending on the design, I don't know.
It's limited
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even further.
MR. MACEWAN-I want more
recommendation to anybody.
by the seat of your pants.
information, before I make any
I just think that this is really, fly
MR. NEWELL-If you don't want health care facility, fine, we have no
problem with that.
MRS. VALENTI-All I want is residential.
MR. NEWELL-Fine. All we wênt ~o do is what's in tþe 0fdinance~ and
if you want to restrict tuat uack part-~o say we re ust gOlng to
use it as residences, that's fine, but we've got to be able to use
the front part of Bay Road, within the first 1,000 as is set forth
in the Ordinance, Cultural Professional.
MR. BREWER-I think what this Board has to do, in my mind, is make
a recommendation whether it should be re-zoned MR-5, period, not
whether we can make you put houses there or we can let you put.
MR. NEWELL-I agree. I think that's the whole purpose of it, again.
MR. BREWER-I mean, if you're ever going to do anything there, it's
going to come back to us, and we can set conditions.
MR. NEWELL-That's right.
MR. BREWER-And I agree that there shouldn't be any businesses on
the Country Club Road, and I strongly believe that, and I would.
MR. MARTIN-The other thing I would suggest for the Board to do is
it's been common practice that the Board forward a copy of these
minutes on to the Town Board, regarding this matter.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Can we recommend with stipulations?
MRS. TARANA-And you would not accept keeping the Country Club Road
piece of property UR-1, not changing that?
MR. NEWELL-The problem with that is, and I kind of agree with Ray,
that there may very well come a time when we want to use the
Country Club lot for say a single family dwelling or two single
family dwellings, and then try to get into the back lot to utilize
the MR-5 designation, so that we could put a number of single
family dwellings, and then find ourselves in a situation where we
can't cross. If we can't cross the UR-l lot to get into the MR-5
lot.
MR. BREWER-Is that a fact?
MRS. TARANA-I'm saying, where is the property line?
MR. MARTIN-They can cross.
MR. BREWER-Well, why is he saying they can't cross?
MR. MARTIN-Depending on how it's subdivided and how it's
configured.
MR. NEWELL-Ray had that experience over on Sweet Road, but here's
the line right here.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. I'm saying, why can't from there to Country Club
be UR-1, or UR, whatever it is right now, UR-5.
MR. NEWELL-That means that you could put one residence on this,
what it is, 1.6 acres?
MR. RAYMOND-l.6 acres.
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MRS. TARANA-What's wrong with that?
MR. NEWELL-Well, if you don't own it, there's nothing wrong with it
at all.
MR. BREWER-So, you would want to put 15 units on that piece of
property? There's no justification for that.
MR. NEWELL-No, no. I'm not saying that at all.
MRS. ROWE-Well, all the surrounding properties have similar
acreage. I mean, the Valenti's have two and three acre lots across
the street. They're very good sized lots on that same section of
road.
MR. NEWELL-If you look up there, all your lots are approximately,
on the Country Club side where the property is located, most of
those lots through there are not one acre parcels. They're
probably anywhere from a quarter acre up to a half acre, is what
they are. The Valenti's across the street. They have a big
development. I think that their lots are two and three acres over
there.
MRS. VALENTI-The smallest lot is an acre and a half.
MR. NEWELL-This is a small little lot here, a small little lot
here.
MR. VALENTI-And all I'm saying is, even if you got the MR- 5
designation, what you're saying is, on an acre of land
MR. MARTIN-When you have a minimum lot size of
so you would be allowed four lots, and then
dwelling of one for every 5,000 square feet.
dwelling units on one acre.
10,000 square feet,
you have a minimum
So you'd have eight
MR. NEWELL-So, even if we wanted to do that, we'd have to come back
before this Board, I would assume, for site plan review.
MR. MARTIN-Yes. You'd be subject to site plan review.
MR. NEWELL-So, I can't conceive of being able to come in here and
say I want to put eight lots in here. I just, Number One, don't
think you would do it. I would be very surprised if you'd do it.
MRS. TARANA-So, how many would you think we would pass? I mean,
why not, then, keep it UR?
MR. RAYMOND-On this particular piece, I think that the max you're
gOing to get out of that is going to be two lots, at the max, and
that's if you even get two lots. I don't even know if you can,
because I don't know whether or not the land, the water table is
such it will allow you to support more than one lot on it. So, I
mean, that's something that's going to have to be proposed to you.
MR. BREWER-So, why are you having a problem with us making it stay
one house on that lot?
MR. RAYMOND-My only concern with that is I want to make sure.
you're saying it's not a problem. I want to make sure it's not a
problem. I want to be able to cross that to gain access to the
other half of the property.
MR. BREWER-Why are you saying it is a problem?
MR. RAYMOND-Because I had that problem on Sweet Road. On Upper
Sweet Road we put in a four lot subdivision, and at that time we
were crossing, the land was cut into two pieces, in the sense that
you had SFR on Country Club Road, on the back portion that came,
adjacent to the cemetery was multifamily, and we tried to put two
55
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eight unit buildings in the back and the whole town showed up for
that.
MR. MARTIN-The only limiting factor I can see is if they have
enough room to accommodate an access road, and still meet their one
acre requirement with whatever would be remaining after they cut
the access road through.
MRS. ROWE-Well, they have one and a half acres there.
MR. MARTIN-I don't know what would be taken up, area wise, to cut
a road through there to a town standard.
MRS. TARANA-So, basically, you want access to go from Country Club
to Bay Road?
MR. RAYMOND-No. We don't want that. We want access to go from the
Country Club Road to service.
MR. NEWELL-I think she's right. She said you want access from the
Country Club Road, not onto Bay Road. You're making reference to
the Bay Road lot, aren't you?
MR. MARTIN-What's that dimension? What's the width of that lot
from Country Club Road back? How deep in does it go?
MR. NEWELL-There's no way we could go from the Country Club Road
onto Bay Road on this lot.
MR. RAYMOND-This here, you want on Country Club?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. RAYMOND-You've got 300 feet there.
MR. NEWELL-You can't do it.
MR. RAYMOND-You have approximately 300, 294 feet here, which would,
so, we're dealing with, I think you're only going to get one lot
out of there.
MR. MARTIN-You'll probably use up a quarter of an acre, or there
abouts, to cut a road through, to put a right-of-way.
MRS. TARANA-Where is that wetland? Could you just please flip that
up so we could see the wetland map again.
MR. RAYMOND-In terms of the road configuration, you're still going
to have to address the wetlands behind it.
MRS. ROWE-What kind of service does a wetland require?
MR. RAYMOND-I'm not sure I understand your question?
MRS. ROWE-Well, you say you want to put a road back there to
service and maintain the wetland. What do you have to do to a
wetland?
MR. RAYMOND-Not maintain the wetlands, we want to avoid the
wetlands. These are all wetlands here. This is a non-wetland. So
what we want to do is have a road come in to, say you want to put
some kind of single family dwelling or duplex or something in here,
you have to gain access to it. So you're going to have to come out
Country Club Road. Otherwise, you're going to have to construct
something, from what you're saying, all the way from Bay Road back
here, and you're going 1,000 feet to service two or three acres of
land, it doesn't make any sense.
MRS. ROWE-So, from what you're saying, then, it might be your
intention to subdivide this further into another house lot, etc.?
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MR. RAYMOND-No, not necessarily. I mean, down the road, it could
continually be, or you may just have one single project. You may
not necessarily have to have lots in there. It may just be one big
project that could consist of a housing development, which is owned
and maybe rented. I don't know what it's going to be.
MR. NEWELL-You see, there's no way in the world that we can say.
this is what we're going to do with the property. You say. what,
tentatively, are you going to do with it? I don't know. I do know
in a UR-l we can't do anything at all, period. It's a dead issue.
Under an MR-5, we have the potential for putting Cultural
Professional on Bay Road, but there is absolutely no way,
physically, I guess physically you could do it if you had enough
money and you wanted to put enough effort into it, to go from Bay
Road and put a road over that wetlands. DEC wouldn't permit you to
do it in 100 years, because you've got the wetlands. You couldn't
get the approval to do it. So, that's the only way that we could
access the dry land on the front, adjacent to the Country Club Road
is to come over the Country Club Road lot. The center property,
for all intents and purposes, is inaccessible. We can't use it.
MRS. TARANA-Yes. I have no problem with the Bay Road, none. If
you want to go MR-5 there, I think that's absolutely appropriate.
MR. NEWELL-Fine.
MRS. TARANA-I have a problem with going MR-5 on the other end,
because you could put in a number of things in the MR-5.
MR. NEWELL-It's restricted to residential.
MR. MACEWAN-No.
synagogues.
You could put in schools, churches, hospitals,
MR. NEWELL-You can restrict it.
MR. RAYMOND-Restrict it to residential.
MRS. TARANA-If that were to be restricted, what happens if these
people no longer own the property?
MR. RAYMOND-If it's re-zoned, it's going to pass with that
restriction.
MR. BREWER-It's deed restricted.
MRS. TARANA-I just don't see the purpose of re-zoning the other
end.
MRS. ROWE-Was this lot on Country Club Road originally two
different lots?
MR. NEWELL-Yes.
MRS. ROWE-Because on my document, Parcel 16 & 17, it shows an SFR
indication with a one acre zoning in here. Where did that come
from?
MR. NEWELL-I don't know where.
MRS. ROWE-Right along this property line in the back, it shows a
designation that it used to be two lots and.
MR. RAYMOND-Well, no. This is SFR One Acre over in here, is the
designation, that was the previous, that's referring to that lot,
but I think that that came from the previous owners by way of two
deeds. I think that that was, at the time. two lots.
MRS. ROWE-Well, when did it lose this SFR designation, then, and
become UR-1?
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MR. NEWELL-I think UR-1 came into play in 1988 when they had the
zone change.
MRS. ROWE-The re-zoning at that time?
MR. NEWELL-But I have no problem with what you're saying, and I
think you can do it. If you want to make restrictions on that
small lot, restrict it to residential use, because that's all we
want to do with it.
MRS. TARANA-So, we could recommend single family residence zone?
MR. NEWELL-I'd rather you didn't do single residential, single
family. If you're saying, the only thing that that could be used
for is single family residential, all right, and what I'm saying
is, MR-5, and restrict it to residential. I have no problem with
that at all.
MRS. TARANA-But if you don't have a problem with that, why, instead
of having restrictions that could get lost, why don't we just re-
zone it single family residential?
MR. NEWELL-Well, they can't be lost. They'd be part of the Town
records.
MRS. TARANA-We've seen that happen before.
MR. NEWELL-Well, at that point. if you're going to just throw up
your hands and say the system is no good, we can't rely upon it,
then we're all lost. If you're concerned that we're going to put
a health club up or some other commercial facility, eliminate that
concern by putting a restriction that that lot is for residential
use only, and I'd have no problem with that at all, none.
MRS. ROWE-Well, I have a problem with that because Charlie Wood's
property where the Red Lobster wants to sit has deed restrictions
on it that say single family residential only, one single family
house, one and a quarter stories high, with possibly a three car
garage, and that is being considered for re-zoning.
MR. NEWELL-Wait a second. Because Mr. Wood wants to, or own
property and he wants the Town Board to consider it. That's his
right. He can come before any Board and ask for consideration.
MRS. ROWE-Well, that's what I'm saying to you, though.
restrictions don't necessarily mean anything.
Deed
MR. NEWELL-Well, he hasn't got that approval yet, either.
MR. RAYMOND-We're not on a deed restriction. We're talking about
a zoning restriction, and I think that's a lot different. What
you're doing is you're just indirectly doing what you want to do
directly, and that eliminates our concern that we would still have
access across that property to service the back land. That is my
only concern, because that was an issue, and I don't think a
bonafide issue. I don't think it was legitimate, but the Town used
that as a tool, in order for the proposal to be denied, and I have
a little concern over that.
MR. MACEWAN-Jim, question for you. If we determine that we felt
that piece of property on Country Club Road should remain HC-1A,
single family residential, I'm sorry, and they wanted to go to the
ZBA to get a zoning change on that, at some future date, can they
go through that process and get that change, if they got the
acceptable from them?
MR. MARTIN-Yes. Anybody can submit an application for a use
variance, at any time. You can't restrict that, and they're
entitled to that option.
58
MR. NEWELL-I think you're missing the point completely, here.
Anybody can make an application to any Board. That's why Boards
are here, and that's why you sit on Boards, and that's why we're
here, because we make an application. I mean, we're not violating
any law or offending any member of the public or for ~hat matter,
hopefully, not offending this Board, by being here. You have a
right to make an application, and no matter what you do, you can't
stop an application from being made. The question is, can the
application be successfully made, does it make sense, will it pass
muster with Mr. Martin, here. and if it doesn't, it won't. Now,
the concern here is whether or not we intend to put anything on
that small lot, which is other than residential, and the answer is
no. We do not, and we'll accept whatever restrictions you deem
appropriate to prevent that property from being used for anything
other than residential, and I don't know what else we can do at
that point.
MRS. TARANA-Let me just tell you my thinking about this, in regard
to the Urban Residential, and why I'd like to see it kept that way.
These Urban Residential zones it says were set up, because they
encompass environmentally more sensitive land areas. I think
that's an environmentally sensitive land area. That's why the UR-1
was created, but that piece of property that you would like to
develop, which is not wetland, is abutting the wetland. That makes
it a sensitive area, and it just doesn't make sense to me to change
that to the MR-5, which the purpose of is to, designated to provide
for an anticipated increasing demand for high density, mUltifamily
housing and professional office buildings in areas located near
commercial services subject to intense development pressure.
That's not happening at the Country Club end of your property.
That's just not happening. It's residential there.
MR. NEWELL-But, in terms of that, though, you haven't even looked
to them for aid on that, if someone owns a piece of property, the
zone should be changed in a certain manner, you've got to plow
across the line, other wise we're going to be splitting everything
up allover the place.
MRS. TARANA-You've got the split property. You've got two pieces
of property.
MR. NEWELL-Are you just making reference to this entire Bay Road
piece of property?
MRS. TARANA-I'm talking about the Country Club. I have no problem,
MR-5 on Bay Road, I have no problem with that at all.
MR. RAYMOND-But the Bay Road property goes. this is it. That's the
Bay Road property.
MRS. TARANA-You pointed out the boundary line to me before as being
over on the Country Club end.
MR. NEWELL-The property lines are as they appear on this map here.
MR. RAYMOND-The property lines are this. This is the Bay Road
property. This is the Country Club property, just this small
piece.
MRS. TARANA-That's the piece I'm talking about.
MR. RAYMOND-It's 1.64 acres.
MRS. TARANA-That's what I'm talking about. You already have two
pieces of property there.
MR. NEWELL-And I don't, you can keep that SFR. I don't really
care, as long as I have access to the back piece.
MR. MARTIN-Well, that's what I was trying to say earlier.
59
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MRS. ROWE-See, the thing is that bothers me is that he can have
access to that back piece and put in a health club or whatever
under this MR-S zoning. He's telling us it's dry there. He can
put anything he wants, once he has that access in back there. So,
he keeps the front part single family residential. Once that's MR-
5 in the back, he can put in anything. He can put in duplexes,
office spaces, hospitals, exactly.
MR. RAYMOND-I mean, there are duplexes in that area. I don't see
where that's a problem anyway.
MRS. ROWE-Even if you keep. the front single family residential~ it
doesn't stop him from driving through there ana developing ~hat
back section that he claims is dry.
MR. NEWELL-Why is that such a bad thing, to have residential use,
consistent with that MR-5 designation? Why do you find that
offensive? I mean, the whole Bay Road area is set up that way.
MRS. ROWE-This isn't Bay Road. This is Country Club, this is Sweet
Road, this is residential area.
MR. NEWELL-Over here you have the Town house development. You
could probably throw a rock from here over to here. Over there
you've got the Valenti developments. Now, all of a sudden this is
no good for MR-S usage? All of a sudden this is something separate
and apart, and it has to be marked with.
MRS. TARANA-That is part of your MR-5.
MR. NEWELL-This is, yes, but this lady here is saying that this is
not an appropriate use for MR-S either.
MRS. TARANA-No. I don't think she's saying that.
MR. NEWELL-I think she is.
MRS. ROWE-I'm just saying that MR-5 allows for a lot of things that
may not necessarily be what anybody wants back there.
MR. NEWELL-I don't know of any concern of anyone else. Up and down
Sweet Road you have, there's some multifamilies up on that, and I
know because that was part of the project that we put up there.
MRS. TARANA-On Sweet Road?
MR. NEWELL-Yes.
MR. BREWER-Well, I just think we're getting into a long argument,
here, and I don't think we should. I think if this Board feels we
should make a recommendation, we'll make it and go on with it.
MRS. TARANA-Okay.
MR. BREWER-Does anyone feel strongly about making a motion?
DR. WISWALL
DR. WISWALL-I just have one question. If this is a public hearing.
MR. BREWER-It's not a public hearing, but I said we would take
comments.
DR. WISWALL-Well, you took comments from Valenti, but you wouldn't
from me.
MR. BREWER-Yes, I will.
DR. WISWALL-Now, our property adjoins this property, and I could
tell you some things, and I could tell you some things that you
60
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ought to do with the property, but I'm not going to because it's
too late tonight, but I think that I should have been notified. I
get notified for everything that's within 500 feet of our property,
and our property adjoins this property, and I wasn't notified about
it.
MR. BREWER-No, because this is a recommendation, sir, from this
Board to the Town Board. When the Town Board has their public
hearing, you will be notified.
DR. WISWALL-Okay.
MR. BREWER-This is strictly a recommendation from this Board to
that Board.
DR. WISWALL-Thanks for listening.
MR. BREWER-You're welcome.
MR. NEWELL-I hope, at this point, if you can understand what we've
gone through on this, the frustration we've experienced in trying
to do something with this property. At this point, we really
haven't had a whole deal of success, nor have we gone to any
particular Board that's been terribly receptive, or for that matter
gone to any particular Board which has been consistent, because one
Board says the other Board ought to do something, and that same
Board says the other Board ought to do something, and we've been
going in circles since 1988.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Thank you. Would anybody care to make a
recommendation, whether to recommend approval or denial?
HOTIOB TO DBNY THE RECOHHBBDATIOB TO RB-ZOBE THB EBTIRB 30 ACRES
BBTWEBN BAY ROAD ABD COUBTRY CLUB ROAD. WHICH IS CURRBBTLY ZONBD
UR-l TO HR-5, Introduced by Corinne Tarana who moved for its
adoption, seconded by Kathleen Rowel
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following votel
AYES: Mr. MacEwan, Mrs. Rowe, Mrs. Tarana
NOES: Mr. Ruel, Mr. Brewer
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver. Mr. LaPoint
MR. BREWER-No action.
MR. NEWELL-Would you consider a motion to re-zone, considering two
lots, the Bay Road lot, and the Country Club Road lot. Would you
consider a motion to make a recommendation to approve a re-zone of
the Bay Road lot from the UR-l to an MR-5?
MRS. TARANA-Yes. I would.
MRS. ROWE-Would you consider subdividing those two Bay Road lots
away from the rest of it and leaving that designation UR-1?
MR. NEWELL-Not at this time, because then we're getting into a
whole other ball of wax.
MRS. TARANA-The reason I wanted to make that motion.
MR. NEWELL-I wish you would.
MRS. TARANA-Well, I have no parameters to describe that piece of
property.
MR. NEWELL-Just refer to it as the Bay Road lot.
MRS. TARANA-Well, I want to be sure that we know what the Bay Road
61
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lot is.
MR. NEWELL-The Bay Road, and we can agree, the Bay Road lot
consists of all of the property, exclusive of t~e Country Club lot,
because they're two separate lots, two deeded, separate lots. This
came from the LaRose Estate. This came from the Wheeler Estate.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. That was what I had tried to do.
MR. NEWELL-If you want to refer to it as the Wheeler Lot, which is
the Bay Road Lot, that's separate designated, and this is the
LaRose Lot.
MRS. TARANA-So, we took no action, am I right?
MR. BREWER-Right.
MRS. TARANA-So, you can entertain another motion?
MR. BREWER-You can entertain another motion.
MO.,IOB TO RECOHHBBD THE APPROVAL OF THE RE-ZOKIBG OF THE WHEELER
PROPBRTY. WHICH IS THE BAY ROAD PROPERTY. FROM UR-l TO MR-S,
Introduced by Corinne Tarana who moved for its adoption, seconded
by Roger Ruel:
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
MR. RUEL-You don't have to say anything about the other piece?
MRS. TARANA-I'm not saying anything about the other piece.
will remain whatever it's zoned.
That
MRS. ROWE-Could Corinne read that again?
MRS. TARANA-Yes. Well, let me just tell you what I'm trying to get
at.
MRS. ROWE-You just want to re-zone that Bay Road property to MR-5.
MRS. TARANA-Just from Bay Road to that property line on that other
piece of property to MR-5.
MR. RUEL-All the way to that dotted line.
MRS. TARANA-Meaning the rest of the property remains the same.
It's not part of the motion.
AYES: Mr. Ruel, Mrs. Tarana, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES: Mrs. Rowe
ABSENT: Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
P2-93 RECOHHEKDATIOB ONLY CURTIS LUMBER CO.. IBC. PROPERTY
INVOLVED: SIBGLE LOT OF APPROX. .13 ACRBS FROBTIBG FBLD AVB. ABD
FELD AVE.UB CURRENT ZONB: UR-l0 PROPOSBD ZONED: LI-1A (WARREN
COUBTY PLA.BIBG) TAX HAP NO. 117-9-14. 21
JIM DAVIES, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
MR. HARLICKER-I just want to point out something that may nip this
in the bud before we get started here. If you note Warren County
comments, please. Their comment is that, "The WCPB deemed this
application incomplete and removed it from the Agenda. The WCPB
would like clarification on issues related to the map. The map
shows that the second-hand shop and Daggett's Vending are on Holden
Avenue, when actually they are on Western Avenue. The Board would
like to clarify actually which parcel they are talking about.
Also, the Board would like to clarify the stipulations and
62
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--
conditions placed upon this parcel when it was reviewed back in
July of 1987. The Board would like to know if these have been
complied with." So, I don't know if you want to take any action on
this, since.
MR. DAVIES-I'd like to clarify one thing. Daggett's Vending is on
Holden Avenue right there. My name is Jim Davies.
MR. BREWER-Can we take action if they haven't been
County?
to Warren
MR. HARLICKER-Well, they've been to Warren County,
County wants them to return. They deemed the
incomplete and removed it from the agenda.
and Warren
application
MR. BREWER-I guess what I'm saying is, if we take any action
tonight, does it mean anything?
MR. MACEWAN-We could take action tonight, couldn't we, contingent
upon the County?
MR. MARTIN-Well, again, you and the County, in this particular
instance, are sort of acting in the same capacity. You're both
advisory and recommendation only. You could certainly recommend
contingent upon their review, but really both Boards, in this
particular case, are advisory to the Town Board, and if defeated at
either Board, requires a majority plus one at the Town level. So,
I think I would recommend that the applicant certainly go back to
the County. I think the Town Board, if they saw this, would say
that. This is really impacting their decision and not your
recommendation.
MR. DAVIES-When didn't we have notice from the County?
understand that. I never got notice.
I don't
MR. MARTIN-You should have gotten one of these from the County
Planning Board.
MR. DAVIES-I never got it. I could have explained it.
MR. MARTIN-Were you at the County Planning Board Meeting?
MR. DAVIES-No.
MR. MARTIN-Well, you should have been there.
MR. DAVIES-I wasn't informed that it was going to be heard. I had
no way of knowing. No way.
MRS. TARANA-You didn't know about the Warren County Planning Board?
MR. DAVIES-I didn't know when it was going to be heard. I was
never notified of it. I could have clarified some of these things.
MR. MARTIN-Because comments, usually, of this nature are obviously
things that, there was no representation there so the Board just
kicked it back.
MR. BREWER-If we hear the applicant, and we can make our own
decision whether we can recommend approval or denial, and then if
they deem that it should be denied, then it's their recommendation,
and ours stands as it is, right?
MR. MARTIN-Right. E
MR. DAVIES-Except yours, I don't know if that would still have to
be a majority plus one. Is that for recommendations?
MR. MARTIN-Right. If either Board denies, or recommends against
approval, then it's going to require a majority plus one from the
63
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Town Board.
MR. BREWER-But irregardless, he still has to go back to Warren
County?
MR. MARTIN-Right.
MR. DAVIES-So the only change that Warren County could effect,
after this Board makes a decision, is whether or not it's deemed to
be a majority.
MR. MARTIN-Right, but be ~hat as i~ m,aY_t YÞu' re stiJ.I qoinQ'dto have
to go back to~he Board, uecause tue TOwn Boara won t cons~ er tnls
until you do.
MR. DAVIES-All right.
MR. BREWER-Okay. I think that it's only fair that we should hear
him anyway, since he's been here a couple of times.
MRS. TARANA-Well, I don't recall having trouble, when we looked at
this place, knowing where it was, except we weren't quite sure
whether it was one or the other of those two small little
properties.
MR. HARLICKER-The one lot is already zoned Light Industrial. Lot
21 is already zoned Light Industrial.
MR. DAVIES-The deed shows three lots. One of them is already Light
Industrial.
MR. HARLICKER-Right.
MR. DAVIES-But two of the others, Lot 14 and Lot 21.
MR. HARLICKER-Lot 21 is Light Industrial.
MR. DAVIES-Well, it was UR-10 the time I looked at it, but if
that's the case, that's fine.
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. It just means one less.
MR. DAVIES-If that's the case, that's fine. That's not the way I
read the map.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Maybe we can go through Staff real quick.
STAFF INPUT
Notes from Staff , Petition 2-93, Curtis Lumber, Meeting Date I
January 26, 1993 "A. Pro1ect Description: The applicant is
seeking to re-zone an adjacent 5,537 square foot parcel from UR-10
to LI-1A in order to allow for the expansion of their lumber yard.
The single lot (tax map number 117-9-14) is currently residential
with a small house located on it. A site visit was made to the
property by the staff on 1/12/93. Access to the site was made from
Feld Avenue. The property was not well maintained and the house
appeared to be in disrepair. There were no outstanding physical
characteristics to the site. It is a level residential lot with
several large mature trees on it. B. Existinq Land Use
Characteristics The parcel is small and is typical of the
residential lots in the area. The main difference between this lot
and the others in the neighborhood is that this one has the
misfortune of being adjacent to a lumber yard. The urban
residential zone is a neighborhood which has a mix of land uses
(see attached tax map)." What I did is we drove around the site,
looked at the site from the van, and also went through the Tax
Assessor's rolls. "Scattered commercial uses, an auto repair, a
roofing company and a small warehouse, are mixed in with
residential and vacant lots. The light industrial zone to the
64
'-
south of the proposed re-zoning is also characterized by a mix of
land uses. Commercial uses are the predominant use with a few
residential and vacant lots mixed in. C. Zone Chanqe Analysis 1.
What need is met by the proposed change in zone or new zone? It
appears that the applicant is seeking a zone change to allow the
expansion of an existing industrial use, specifically a lumber
yard. It does not appear to meet any other needs other than those
of the applicant. The applicant states that there is a need to
assimilate adjacent lots into a zone having compatible uses and
similar character. The adjacent lots to the north and across the
street are existing single family uses, none of which are
compatible or of similar character with a lumber yard. To the rear
of the lot there is an existing house and garage that have been
converted to a storage building; this use would be compatible with
a lumber yard. Any expansion of the industrial zone to the north
would come into conflict with the existing residential uses. 2.
What proposed zones, if any, can meet the stated need? The Light
Industrial (LI-1A) zone is the only zone that allows lumber
yard/building supply use. 3. How is the proposed zone compatible
with adjacent zones? The property is bounded on the north, west
and east by an Urban Residential (UR-10) zone and on the south by
a Light Industrial (LI-1A) zone. The UR-10 zone allows for
primarily high density residential use. As stated in Question 1,
any expansion of the industrial zone would come into conflict with
the existing residential uses. The only use that it would not
conflict with is the adjacent storage building on Holden Avenue.
4. What physical characteristics of the site are suitable to the
proposed zone? The property is flat and would not represent a
problem for expansion of the lumber yard. The eXisting house could
be removed. There are several large mature trees on the property
that would have to be removed prior to any future development of
the site. 5. How will the proposed zoning affect public
facilities? The property is serviced by municipal water but it is
not served by a municipal sewer system. This would impact future
development of the property. Expansion of the lumber yard to the
north may increase truck traffic through the neighborhood. With
the increase in storage on that part of the site, delivery people
might find it more convenient to access the site from Feld Avenue.
6. Why is the current zoning classification not appropriate for
the property in question? The property may have lost most of its
residential appeal because of its proximity to the industrial uses.
However, if the industrial zone is extended to the north on Feld
Avenue, the next lot will then lose its appeal. This scenario
could conceivably continue north to Columbia Street. 7. What are
the environmental impacts of the proposed change? The
environmental impacts of the proposed change relate more to the
adjacent residential properties than they do the particular lot
that is to be re-zoned. The noise and odors that are associated
with industrial uses will have a negative impact on the existing
residences. The storage of lumber will also have a negative impact
on the aesthetics of the neighborhood. The lot currently serves as
a buffer between the lumber yard and the existing single family
residences. By re-zoning this lot the buffer is eliminated. 8.
How is the proposal compatible with the relevant portions of the
Comprehensive Land Use Master Plan? One of the goals of the land
use plan is to provide for screening and buffering of industrial
and commercial properties to preserve and enhance property values
of adjoining areas. It does not appear that the re-zoning of this
property to light industrial would be compatible with the
previously stated goal. The re-zoning of parcel 117-7-14 to LI-1A
would most likely reduce the residential value of the adjoining
residentially zoned properties. It also appears that the re-zoning
would not be compatible with several of the developmental policies
outlined in the land use plan. According to the land use plan,
developmental pOlicies of the Town include the locating of
industrial zones in areas that are accessible to major highway
arterials without disturbing residential neighborhoods and to
preserve neighborhood integrity by requiring adequate buffers
separating residential, commercial and industrial zones. The lot
that is proposed to be re-zoned is not accessible by any arterial
65
road. It is over 500 feet from Luzerne Road, the nearest major
arterial and is directly accessible only through a residential
neighborhood. The lot is surrounded on three sides by a
residential zone and the re-zoning would not do much to preserve
the neighborhood integrity. One of the developmental strategies
outlined in the land use plan is the establishment of buffer zones
between industrial, commercial, and residential zones. It does not
appear that this re-zoning would be compatible with this
developmental strategy. The re-zoning would not allow for any type
of buffer between the industrial zone and the adjacent residential
zone. 9. How are the wider interests of the community being
served by this proposal? The land use plan, goals, policies and
strategies were developed in consideration of the wider interests
of the community. If an action is in conflict with those stated
goals, policies and strategies, it is likely that the action is not
serving the wider interests of the community. The applicant states
that the productive use of property suitable for the intended use
and creating a more, favorable business climate are community
interests that will be served by this re-zoning. If there are in
fact viable community wide interests, they can be met without re-
zoning a residential lot to light industrial. There is property
adjacent to the applicant's that is vacant or else currently
misused or under-used that does not require re-zoning. D. Summary
and Conclusions The proposal for a zone change for this specific
piece of property from UR-10 to LI-1A requires careful
consideration. The change will allow for a much more intense use
of the lot, and this new use will be in direct conflict with many
of the existing neighboring residences. There does not appear to
be any physical constraints on the site. The fact that it is not
serviced by municipal sewer could be a limiting factor in future
industrial development. The major factor in this re-zoning appears
to be its impact on the neighboring residential properties. By re- .
zoning this piece of property to LI-1A, the adjacent properties are
then put in the same situation as the lot that is proposed to be
re-zoned. This could have a domino affect on the neighborhood.
Each adjacent property could fall victim to the same circumstances,
being located directly adjacent to an industrial zone, as the
initial property that was re-zoned. The Planning Board, along with
its recommendation, should consent to the Town Board being Lead
Agency for the purposes of SEQRA. Taking into account the above
factors as well as the stated goals, policies and strategies for
preserving butfer zones and neighborhood integrity and expansion of
industrial zones into areas with accessibility to major arterials,
as outlined in the land use plan, it does not appear that this re-
zoning is in accordance with the planning objectives of the town.
The applicant indicates that the main reason for requesting this
re-zoning is to allow for the expansion of the lumber yard. It
appears that this need could be met without expanding the LI-1A
zone. There is vacant and under-utilized industrial zone property
adjacent to the lumber yard that could accommodate the lumber yard
expansion without further impacting the residential zone to the
north (see attached tax map). Furthermore, expansion to the north
may be difficult. The Zoning Code, Section 179-72 requires a 50'
buffer between any industrial use and any abutting residential zone
at the lot line. It appears that the applicant could not expand
the lumber yard onto this re-zoned property without violating the
previously quoted section."
MR. BREWER-Thank you. Mr. Davies.
MR. DAVIES-Yes. I am Mr. Davies, an attorney in Glens Falls. This
is Mr. Griffen with me from Curtis Lumber Company. Curtis Lumber
Company is the applicant. We are seeking a recommendation with the
Town Board for re-zoning of what initially I thought were two lots
that were UR-10, and I'd like, maybe if you could double check on
that. Is that possible?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. I've got a photocopy of the zoning map here.
MR. DAVIES-I know that this area had been re-zoned not too long
66
~
ago.
MR. HARLICKER-That might be part of the confusion, too, at the
County Board.
MR. DAVIES-Okay. Well. I'll speak to the County Board. Actually,
Daggett's Vending is primarily on Western Avenue, but they also do
have property on Holden Avenue right in back there. The second-
hand store is where it is indicated to be. As I look at it, the
Staff Recommendations, Notes, mention that the lot in question is
bordered on three sides by residential. I don't see it that way.
It's light industrial on one side, and Feld Avenue is on the other
side, and it is residential where the second-hand store is, but the
truly residential character is really only on one side, to the
north. Curtis Lumber Company needs more space for its lumber yard,
simply, lumber storage. It intends to utilize what you see on the
map, there, those Lots 13 and Lot 21 for that purpose. It also
needs additional space, which would be the Lot 14 that we were
talking about tonight. It would be used solely for lumber storage,
no other industrial active use, and fenced, buffered, as you
require, and otherwise intended to be in keeping as much as
possible with the residential character of the rest neighborhood.
We wouldn't contemplate that there would be any additional traffic.
There's traffic there now. The problem is that perhaps it's
becoming even more congested, traffic wise, as far as getting in
and out, because the space isn't available to properly store all of
the lumber and the bUilding products, expanding the area of storage
will not, per say, increase the amount of business Curtis Lumber
does. So, it's consequently the traffic.
MR. BREWER-I guess what you just said to us is, properly buffered,
but our notes say that you can't possibly do that, because if
there's a 50 foot buffer required, you've only got 40 feet of
property.
MR. DAVIES-We're intending to construct a fence of whatever nature
might best serve as a buffer. I'm not talking about the typical
buffer zones.
MR. BREWER-Does anyone have any questions?
MRS. ROWE-Do you own these three lots, or are they just tentative
types of ideas, here?
MR. DAVIES-They own them.
MR. GRIFFEN
MR. GRIFFEN-We own them.
MR. DAVIES-There's a deed attached to the application.
MRS. ROWE-Okay. Twenty-one, thirteen, and fourteen, am I correct?
MR. DAVIES-That's correct.
MR. RUEL-Well, where are they on there?
MRS. ROWE-Twenty-one, thirteen, and the little tiny thing, here's
twenty-one, here's thirteen, and this is the one they want to
change the zoning on now.
MR. DAVIES-I really think that even in so far as the remainder of
the residential property to the north is concerned. the. proper use
by Curtis Lumber of the proposed lot 14, probably it would be
better than the way it exists right now. Curtis Lumber Company has
in its possession a permit for the structure that's on that
property now. It should be demolished, and it's an eyesore, and
it's probably a fire trap at this point. I think it would be an
improvement to that particular property.
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MR. BREWER-Can you address some of these notes that were given to
us by Staff? The specific one I would want to know about right now
is Question Number Six, "Why is the current zoning classification
not appropriate for the property in question?" And Scott has a
note, "The property may have lost most of its residential appeal
because of its proximity to the industrial uses. However, if the
industrial use is extended to the north on Feld Avenue, the next
lot will then lose its appeal. This scenario could conceivably
continue north to Columbia Street."
MR. DAVIES-Well, that's kind of what I was trying to say before,
that I don't think there would be this domino effect. This
particular lot will be improved by the demolition of the structure
that's on it. I think that it would improve the neighboring
residential lots to the north. It would be a more pleasant view
for those lots, that there'd be a fence, a fenced in industrial use
such as a lumber yard, than what exists there now.
MR. BREWER-And the second-hand store is currently in operation?
MR. DAVIES-It certainly is, and then there's a used car lot right
down the road from that.
MR. BREWER-Yes. It's on Luzerne and Western.
MR. DAVIES-I don't think one of them is licensed, but they have an
awful lot of cars out there for sale.
MR. GRIFFEN-I think we've done nothing but improve the area in that
particular. As you know, the previous time when we were before the
Board, I mean, we bought the other land that the lumber yard is on
now, and across on this side of the road where we presently have
the store and the new barn, if you have ever presently been on that
land previously owned by the owners, okay, we've done nothing but
tear down old buildings and put something up that's decent. In
fact, we have expanded so much we have now gone across the road
into the City of Glens Falls and rented three stores as of January
1st in the Shop N' Save mall, and we are putting a design center
into there to enhance our lumber yard here, and it's just out.
This is the first time it's been.
MRS. ROWE-What, like a kitchen center type of a thing?
MR. GRIFFEN-A kitchen design center, right, kitchen, bath, paint
and everything. We've rented three stores, where Debbie's Yogurt
was, and the other two adjacent stores. We are building in there
right now, presently. It will be open in two weeks.
MR. DAVIES-This is a growing business, and they grew more than they
had expected when they first located there. They need this room.
MRS. TARANA-Could I just ask, what does the "V" mean on these maps?
MR. HARLICKER-Vacant.
MRS. TARANA-Well, if it's vacant, they don't have any zoning?
MR. HARLICKER-Well, vacant, there's no structures on them.
MR. MARTIN-It's a reflection of the use. The zoning district is in
place. It's the actual use.
MRS. TARANA-That's what I'm wondering, where it has, like it has
single family residence right here, then it has "V". Does that
mean single family residence?
MR. HARLICKER-No. The V's mean they were vacant, according to the
Tax Assessor's rolls, and driving around the neighborhood. We
combine the two together, and this is what we came up with. Some
of these, the vacant ones, are owned by one acre, and they are part
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of, you know, a property owner may own four lots. The house will
be on one of the four lots, and the rest of the three will be
vacant, but they're used as yard space, in some of the situations.
MR. MARTIN-Yes. I think the situation you have, in this particular
section of Town, is you have a very old subdivision that was
essentially a paper subdivision creating 40 and 50 foot lots, and
this is true of the whole area of West Glens Falls, and people,
over time, have purchased several lots and combined them to have an
appearance of a quarter acre or a half acre, but a lot of these
lots were an eighth of an acre or less, when originally subdivided.
MR. HARLICKER-For instance, the one right adjacent to the proposed
re-zoning, the two single family residences to the north, that
corner lot's listed as vacant, when actually it's part of the yard
for that single family residence.
MRS. TARANA-So it is actually a single family residence? I mean,
if they wanted to sell that piece of property, it would be single
family residence?
MR. MARTIN-Right. We've seen several of these deeds in the office.
What happens is these people have deeds for all three lots, and if
they were to sell that home, they'd sell off both deeds. In some
cases, they've gone to the Assessor's Office and they've combined
the lots to receive one tax bill for two or three lots.
MRS. TARANA-Okay. So these two that are vacant here.
MR. HARLICKER-Which ones, to the south?
MRS. TARANA-Yes.
MR. DAVIES-We'll show you a bigger picture, here. Maybe this will
help.
MRS. TARANA-Yes, I have that. but I don't think that's.
MR. GRIFFEN-See, this is the lot we're talking, here, to re-zone.
When we purchased this, we purchased this, this, and this. These
are zoned, this is zoned the UR-10. These two lots here are zoned
light commercial, which we can use already at present. So we're
asking just to contingent this one on to it. See, we presently own
right here, and the fence is right here, okay, when we bought
these, now these are in use, that we could use. We're waiting to
get this one to tear the house down, to continue this. So this is
what we're aSking for here. This gives you little bit better, I
think, perspective of the way it looks, correct?
MRS. TARANA-Yes. It's just on this one I'm getting lost.
MR. HARLICKER-Okay.
what.
That's just pretty much an enlargement of
MR. GRIFFEN-That's what I'm saying. It just gives you a better.
MRS. TARANA-Well, I'm kind of wondering about this property down
here that you also own, right?
MR. GRIFFEN-Yes. This right here. This is our entrance right
here, and we own up, just like this, and allover through here this
way, that one big blank area that you see.
MR. RUEL-It says Curtis Lumber right on it.
MRS. TARANA-What I was wondering about were the "V's" here. That's
not light industrial?
MR. HARLICKER-Yes. It's light industrial. They're vacant lots in
light industrial.
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HRS. TARANA-That's what I'm trying to find out.
MR. RUEL-I'll show you what he has here.
he's asking for this to be re-zoned.
He has these two, and
HR. GRIFFEN-This one there's a house on right there, which is where
it borders, and then there's another. this is Daggett's Vending,
then there is a vacant lot, there's a couple of vacant lots down
here that already border us this way.
MRS. TARANA-Like I this one, you look at this. You own all these?
HR. GRIFFEN-That's right.
MRS. TARANA-These are vacant. Are they light industrial?
MR. GRIFFEN-I don't know if they are.
that are vacant.
There is two right there
MR. HARLICKER-Yes, they are. They are light industrial.
HRS. TARANA-So, you've got two light industrials with that little
single family residential in the middle of it.
MR. HARLICKER-Right in the middle. That's my, when I refer to
misuse of property and things like that, because that's a seasonal
structure, just to the south of there. You've got situations like
that.
MRS. TARANA-Right.
MR. GRIFFEN-And this house here does not have municipal sewer.
They still have an out house, one of the few left in Queensbury.
HRS. TARANA-Okay. That's what I'm getting at.
HR. HARLICKER-Staff just feels that a more proper use for this
piece of property is as a buffer zone between them and the
residential properties to the north. The Zoning Code requires a 50
foot buffer.
HR. BREWER-That was going to be my next question. Could they apply
for a variance to alleviate that buffer?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
HR. BREWER-They would have to, is that correct?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
screen. That's
requirement.
A buffer cannot be fulfilled by a fence or a
a screen. A buffer is an area dimensional
MR. BREWER-So that the applic~rit is aware of that. He would have
to apply for a variance.
HR. GRIFFEN-Can I ask you a question? We already got a variance
from the previous, for the buffer there. That was a previous
variance. So I can't see the relevance. You've got to come back
and get the buffer when we've already got the variance from the
first buffer zone that's here, and then we bought the land that's
there.
MR. DAVIES-Well, if we'd have to apply for a variance, then, of
course, we'd be put to that test. We'll take it a step at a time.
MR. MARTIN-I'd have to go back and see what the original resolution
was, from the ZBA.
MRS. ROWE-Would the buffer also have to extend along that Lot 21,
then, Jim?
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HR. MARTIN-I'm having trouble. Which one is Lot 21?
MR. BREWER-Yes, it would.
MR. RUEL-Why? You've got UR-10, then UR-10.
HR. BREWER-Because they're changing the zone, aren't they to that,
or is it just these, 13 and 14?
MR. RUEL-No, only this one.
MR. HARLICKER-Only the shaded in one, Tim.
MR. BREWER-Do you own 21?
HR. GRIFFEN-Yes, we do.
HR. BREWER-Why wouldn't you change that?
MR. GRIFFEN-We do. We just bought it.
HR. DAVIES-That may be my mistake. Apparently. I may have been
looking at an older map, perhaps. I know the zoning was changed
around there not too long ago. My map shows that 21 was also UR-
10, and the applicat,ion was for a change of both 21 and 14.
Apparently 21 is already light industrial.
HR. BREWER-That's where I'm confused.
MR. HARLICKER-Yes.
HR. DAVIES-I guess we're only here tonight concerning Lot 14.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MR. MARTIN-Yes. The buffer would run simply between the
residential and the industrial zone.
MR. RUEL-Forty-one feet.
HR. BREWER-Fifty feet.
HR. HARTIN-Fifty feet.
MR. RUEL-I've only got 41 here.
MR. BREWER-I understand that, but the buffer is supposed to be 50
feet.
MR. RUEL-Feet. I'm talking about the length.
MR. BREWER-No. The buffer would have to come from this line, 50
feet.
MR. RUEL-Really? Why?
MR. BREWER-Because that's what the Ordinance says.
HR. RUEL-This is UR-10.
MR. BREWER-They're trying to get it re-zoned to LI-1.
MR. RUEL-LI-1 against a UR-10, you need a buffer zone?
MR. BREWER-A 50 foot buffer, yes. Okay. Does anybody else have
anymore questions?
MR. RUEL-I don't have a question, but I have a statement about it.
I'm familiar with the area, and I think that, personally, light
commercial would improve the area.
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MR. HARLICKER-It's light industrial, not light commercial.
MR. RUEL-Yes, or light industrial, because most of the homes, I
don't know if you've been there, but they're single family non-
residential, and that area needs a lot of help. A lumber yard or
any other light industrial would be a big help in that, a step in
the right direction, because you see that, you come out of Glens
Falls and you enter Queensbury, you know, "Welcome to Zip Code
12804", you know. and what do you see? You've got to have a bigger
lumber yard. That's a bad neighborhood.
MRS. TARANA-Is this single family residential, is that one
occupied? Does somebody live in that little house? It's over on
the other side. I'm back to the two "V's".
MR. DAVIES-On the south side?
MRS. TARANA-Yes.
MR. DAVIES-I think that's vacant.
MR. GRIFFEN-Next to our driveway there is a house.
MRS. TARANA-And what about the houses right adjacent to the
proposed zoning, are they inhabited?
MR. GRIFFEN-They're way down.
MR. DAVIES-They are way down. I think that owner probably owns all
of those lots, but his residence is down the road a bit.
MRS. ROWE-I was concerned about just one thing, because I went all
around. I walked all everywhere today, but have you ever had
problems as far as the noise that comes from the site? Because
while I was there there was forklifts going, and then I was sitting
in a closed car, even, on Feld Avenue, and the noise from the
tractor trailers and the forklifts and everything else.
MR. GRIFFEN-Ma'am, I'll tell you, we've had no complaints,
virtually no complaints since we've been there. none. and I'm a
regional manager of five stores, so I would hear about it.
MRS. ROWE-I don't know if Ed's would be a place that would
complain, but I was curious about the other?
MR. GRIFFEN-He came to the last, when we re-zoned the property, he
came in favor of it.
MR. BREWER-Who's that?
MR.· GRIFFEN-Ed.
MR. DAVIES-Ed Hermance.
MR. GRIFFEN-He spoke in favor of it.
MR. BREWER-Okay.
MRS. TARANA-I have a question. Do you know what the Warren County
Planning Board is referring to when they say stipulations and
conditions placed on the parcel before, in '87?
MR. GRIFFEN-Yes. There was restrictions of the hours that we could
be open, okay, when we first put the small lumber yard on this side
of the street, on this side of Holden, okay. They restricted us to
the hours that we could not be open on Saturdays, and we could not
advertise the place and such, and that since has been changed.
MR. DAVIES-Then they re-zoned the whole area. Initially, Curtis
Lumber had a variance with these kinds of restrictions, and then
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that whole area was re-zoned to light industrial. So all of a
sudden the need for the variance no longer existed, and hence,
neither did the stipulations.
MR. BREWER-Okay. Would anybody care to make a recommendation?
HO"l'ION '10 RBCOHHBRD P2-93 CUR'rIS
PROPER'rY IRVOLVBD. A SIRGLB LO"l'
FRORTING FBLD AVBRUB ABD ~BLD AVBRUB.
PROPOSBD ZOBB O~ LI-1A, Introduced by
its adoption, seconded by Roger Ruell
LUHBBR CO.. IRC . ~OR 'l'HB
OF APPROJ:lHA'rBLY .13 ACRBS
CURRBR'l' 10BI.G. UR-10 TO
Craig MacEwan who moved for
Duly adopted this 26th day of January, 1993, by the following vote:
AYES I Mrs. Rowe, Mr. Ruel, Mr. MacEwan, Mr. Brewer
NOES I Mrs. Tarana
ABSENT I Mrs. Pulver, Mr. LaPoint
MR. MARTIN-Just a note for the Board, a week from Tuesday at 7
p. m., the 9th, we're going to have an informational workshop
session with the residents of Greenway North and that neighborhood.
I've already told Kathy, for the purpose of trying to develop a
plan or some solutions to the land use patterns and traffic
patterns and the zoning in that area. It's Tuesday, February 9th.
I'm going to tell the Zoning Board. You're not required to come.
I just say as people who are obviously interested in planning in
the Town. Your input it certainly welcomed and encouraqed.
MR. RUEL-What time?
MR. MARTIN-Seven p.m. in this room.
MRS. ROWE-I have one more question regarding the last applicant.
If Warren County decides against this whole thing, did we have to
have a super majority, or just a majority?
MR. BREWER-No. We're done.
MR. MARTIN-The Town Board has to have a super majority.
MRS. ROWE-Okay. The Town Board.
MRS. TARANA-What about the next month's meetings?
MR. MARTIN-Yes. You should also set your site visit date.
MR. MACEWAN-Our meetings are going to be on, well, we only have one
meeting, that's the 23rd, right?
MR. MARTIN-We're going to start putting together a committee like
was in place before, to deal with the master plan for the Town, if
anybody would like to consider serving on that. I just caution you
that you're lookinq at a long, lonq time, a lot of meetings, a lot
of late niqhts.
MR. RUEL-Put me down.
MR. MARTIN-I'll actually formally have like a sign up list or
something.
MR. RUEL-Okay.
MR. MACEWAN-I have a question. After thinking about and giving my
vote, how can I go about changing my vote? Seriously.
MRS. ROWE-On which application?
MR. MACEWAN-On the Newell one.
Does that create a real big
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problem?
MR. BREWER-Yes, it does.
MRS. TARANA-I'm wondering what the legality is of, this question he
raised, making a motion to approve, and then voting against it?
MR. BREWER-I mean, he made a motion to approve it. and then voted
against his own motion. You can vote any way you want.
MR. MARTIN-In terms of changing your vote, I think the Board would
have to reconsider the matter, you'd have to re-advertise it.
MR. RUEL-You'd have to start allover again, right?
MR. MARTIN-Yes.
MR. MACEWAN-Let sleeping dogs lie, then.
On motion meeting was adjourned.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
Timothy Brewer, Acting Chairman
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