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2009.02.17(Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING FIRST REGULAR MEETING FEBRUARY 17, 2009 INDEX Subdivision No. 17-2006 EXTENSION Subdivision No. 6-2008 LEAD AGENCY STATUS Special Use Permit No. 54-2007 EXTENSION Site Plan No. 48-2008 Site Plan No. 5-2009 Site Plan No. 64-2007 Site Plan No. 7-2007 MODIFICATION Site Plan No. 22-2007 MODIFICATION Site Plan No. 3-2009 Site Plan No. 4-2009 Theodore & Kathy Ann Rawson 1. Tax Map No.330.-1-20.1 Kelaco, Inc. 2. Tax Map No. 301.17-3-45 Michael & Cindy Trombley 3. Tax Map No. 265.-1-16 NPA II, LLC 3. Tax Map No. 296.18-1-47 Randy Severance 24. Tax Map No. 266.1-1-20 Brian McCall 31. Tax Map No. 302.8-1-39, 38 Jolley Associates 39. Tax Map No. 302.5-1-98 Jolley Associates 40. Tax Map No. 288.16-1-3 Adirondack Factory Outlet Center, Inc. 41. Tax Map No. 288.12-1-22, 23 Haun Welding Supply, Inc. 47. Tax Map No. 303.20-2-34 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. 0 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING FIRST REGULAR MEETING FEBRUARY 17, 2009 7:00 P.M. MEMBERS PRESENT CHRIS HUNSINGER, CHAIRMAN GRETCHEN STEFFAN, SECRETARY DONALD KREBS THOMAS SEGULJIC STEPHEN TRAVER PAUL SCHONEWOLF, ALTERNATE MEMBERS ABSENT THOMAS FORD MR. HUNSINGER-I'll call the meeting, the Town of Queensbury Planning Board, on Tuesday, February 17t" to order. For members of the audience, there is a handout of the agenda, and also a handout that talks about the protocol during the public hearings. There are several public hearings scheduled this evening on several of the items that we will discuss. The first item on the agenda is approval of minutes from December 16t" and December 18t", 2008. Would anyone like to make a motion? APPROVAL OF MINUTES December 16, 2008 December 18, 2008 MOTION TO APPROVE THE QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MINUTES OF DECEMBER 16T" & DECEMBER 18T", 2008, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Paul Schonewolf: Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford ADMINISTRATIVE ITEM EXTENSION OF FINAL APPROVAL FOR SUBDIVSION 17-2006 THEODORE & KATHY ANN RAWSON AS REQUESTED BY LETTER FROM HUTCHINS ENGINEERING MR. HUNSINGER-The next item on the agenda is a request for an extension for Subdivision No. 17-2006 for Theodore and Kathy Ann Rawson. MRS. STEFFAN-Did everybody get to read the November 13t" letter that accompanied the resolution? MR. KREBS-What, from Hutchins Engineering? MRS. STEFFAN-Yes. MR. KREBS-Yes, I got it. MR. HUNSINGER-Any discussion? Anybody have a problem with it? MR. KREBS-No. MRS. STEFFAN-No. MR. HUNSINGER-Would anybody like to make a motion? 1 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MOTION TO EXTEND FINAL APPROVAL FOR SUBDIVISION NO. 17-2006 THEODORE & KATHY ANN RAWSON [As set forth in the letter submitted by Hutchins Engineering dated 11/13/081, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: According to the resolution prepared by Staff. Final approval was granted on 6/24/08, the applicant then has a 180 day timeframe to file the mylar with the County Clerk which would have been 12/24/08. A 90 day extension was requested by Hutchins Engineering and on 12/16/08 the Planning Board granted a 60 day extension to 2/24/09. Further review is needed by the Town Board; therefore this application is tabled to 3/24/09. Duly adopted this 17th day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford SUBDIVISION 6-2008 KELACO, LLC: REQUEST FOR LEAD AGENCY STATUS MR. HUNSINGER-The next item on the agenda is a request for Lead Agency Status for Subdivision No. 6-2008 for Kelaco, LLC. Has this been to the Zoning Board yet? MR. OBORNE-I think this is an approved Special Use Permit that needs to be extended at the request of the applicant. I think they're having some difficulties with gaining proper calculations. I'm not exactly sure to be honest with you. I think they're having some difficulties with gaining proper calculations. I'm not exactly sure to be honest with you. That is a request by the applicant. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. OBORNE-And this is, I'm sorry, is this Kelaco? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. OBORNE-I'm sorry. That's also known as Collette subdivision. It's up on West Mountain Road. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. OBORNE-And I believe you're seeking Lead Agency status. Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. OBORNE-I apologize. MR. HUNSINGER-That's okay. MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me. We did Preliminary review, we did Sketch Plan review. MR. HUNSINGER-We did Sketch Plan, yes. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. I'll make a motion. MOTION TO SEEK LEAD AGENCY STATUS IN CONNECTION WITH SUBDIVISION NO. 6-2008 KELACO, LLC, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: WHEREAS, the Town Planning Board is in receipt of a Subdivision application for Kelaco: Applicant proposes subdivision of a 36.2 acre parcel into 21 residential lots ranging in size from 1 acre to 7.0 acres. Subdivision of land requires Planning Board review and approval. WHEREAS, the Planning Board of the Town of Queensbury has determined to begin an environmental review process under the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA), and 2 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) WHEREAS, the Planning Board of the Town of Queensbury has identified the project to be an Unlisted action for the purposes of SEQRA review pursuant to 6 NYCRR 617, and WHEREAS, the Planning Board is the agency most directly responsible for approving the actions because of its responsibility for approving the land uses for the property, and NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, The Planning Board of the Town of Queensbury hereby indicates its desire to be Lead Agency for SEQRA review of this action and authorizes and directs the Zoning Administrator to notify any other potentially involved agencies of such intent. That Part I of the SEQRA will be sent to the following agencies [as identified in EAF]: NYS DOH, TOQ Board of Health, TOQ Water Dept., TOQ Highway Dept., Warren Co. DPW, Adirondack Park Agency MOTION TO SEEK LEAD AGENCY STATUS IN CONNECTION WITH SUBDIVISION NO. 6-2008 KELACO, LLC, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: According to the resolution prepared by Staff. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford SPECIAL USE PERMIT 54-2007: MICHAEL & CINDY TROMBLEY REQUEST FOR EXTENSION OF FINAL APPROVAL MR. HUNSINGER-And then finally under the last item under Administrative Items is Special Use Permit No. 54-2007 for Michael and Cindy Trombley. They have requested an extension for final approval. One of the things, a question I did have of Staff is did they give any indication how much time they're looking for? MR. OBORNE-They're looking for 12 months. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Twelve months. Okay. Because the letter didn't have a date, so the logical question is for how long. MRS. STEFFAN-So do we have to note that it's a one year extension? MR. HUNSINGER-Is there any reason not to consider the request? MR. OBORNE-I don't believe so, no. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Any discussion? Anyone like to make a motion? MOTION TO EXTEND THE FINAL APPROVAL FOR SPECIAL USE PERMIT NO. 54- 2007 CINDY & MICHAEL TROMBLEY, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Seguljic: According to the resolution prepared by Staff. Final approval was granted on 2/19/08 [resolution attached], the applicant then has 1 year to either apply for a building permit or request an extension. An extension has been requested by Cindy & Michael Trombley. Therefore, final approval for this application is granted to the following date, 2/19/2010. This will be for a one year extension. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Krebs, Mr. Traver, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford SITE PLAN NO. 48-2008 SEAR TYPE UNLISTED NPA II, LLC AGENT(S) BARTLETT, PONTIFF, STEWART & RHODES OWNER(S) SAME ZONING HC-INT. LOCATION 820 STATE ROUTE 9 APPLICANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF A 3 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) 14,820 SQUARE FOOT WALGREENS PHARMACY AND A 4,642 SQUARE FOOT CHILI'S RESTAURANT WITH ASSOCIATED SITE WORK. NEW COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS REQUIRE PLANNING BOARD SITE PLAN REVIEW AND APPROVAL. PLANNING BOARD TO PROVIDE A RECOMMENDATION TO THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS. CROSS REFERENCE AV 77-08; SV 74, 75-08 WARREN CO. PLANNING 11/12/08 [APPROVED] LOT SIZE 22.87 +/- ACRES TAX MAP NO. 296.18-1-47 SECTION 179-4-020 STEFANIE BITTER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Keith, whenever you're ready to summarize Staff Notes, please. MR. OBORNE-Sure. The purpose of tonight's meeting is for a recommendation from the Planning Board to the Zoning Board of Appeals concerning permeability. They have requested a recommendation from the Planning Board concerning the new impervious surfaces proposed for this project. The applicant is proposing additional hard surfacing within the 50 foot Type C buffer along the east portion of the property adjacent to the Pine View Cemetery, and additional hard surfacing facing Quaker Road. The Planning Board may consider the potential impacts these proposals may have on the surrounding area. This is for Site Plan No. 47-2008, Northern Plaza Associates. The requested action for tonight, again, is a recommendation to the Zoning Board of Appeals concerning the proposed hard surfacing. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MS. BITTER-Good evening. MR. HUNSINGER-Good evening. MS. BITTER-Stephanie Bitter, attorney for the project. I'm here this evening with Bill Dutch, from Northway Plaza Associates II, sitting beside me. They have been under ownership for 20 years. They've been through some ups and downs, but are hoping to be on an upswing at this point. Jim Hagen's also here with us tonight, the architect for the project. Chris Boyea from Bohler Engineering and Nicole David Heiser from Clough Harbor Associates, both of which are engineers for the project. This project has been about 10 years in the making. Mr. Dutch and his partners took an old, stale site that needed a major facelift and modernized it. They made that their priority. The first phase of the project was Home Depot, essentially. I bring up the Home Depot project because although the Home Depot parcel as it exists today is independent, it definitely functions together with the Plaza, not only visibly, but also for purposes of storm, I'm sorry, for parking. When Home Depot came before the Board to talk about their permeability variance, they described the fact that, looking at the Plaza together, there was a 30% permeability. So they had an argument for their deviation. Here, this evening, we're also talking about a deviation of merely one percent. In this case, we're seeking a deviation so we can finish up this project that's been going on for about eight years, which will essentially revitalize the plaza. This plaza has had some unfortunate vacancies, and sits at the main intersection of the Town of Queensbury, and needs some serious revitalization. Right now as it exists it has an empty Monroe Muffler facility, an empty medical center facility, and an empty Travelers office. At this time, Mr. Dutch is seeking to demolish the old Monroe Muffler to construct two new businesses, reconfigure the Travelers space to a retail, and hopefully help the existing Per Se business located in the rear to expand. What does this mean in an economy of uncertain times? Jobs. Although jobs are important, we realize that permeability is, too. However, in addition to this revitalization project, Northway Plaza is also proposing to construct a stormwater management facility, which will take and treat all the runoff from Route 9, which is currently being untreated, and entering Halfway Brook to be treated on Department of State land. I'm going to get into more detail on that. Mr. Dutch inquired, from the State and the County, the idea of acquiring two triangular shaped lots. This would assist him with reconfiguring the main portion of this plaza which sits at the main intersection right there. In exchange, or as part of the exchange for these parcels, Northway Plaza will design and construct a stormwater management project. This has been deemed one of the most important projects for Warren County Soil and Water Conservation for the past five years. This is going to be very beneficial, although it does not specifically impact the Plaza. I'll let the engineers go into more detail if that's necessary for this review, but most of the Plaza's stormwater is treated on site. For the Home Depot is treated in the rear, and for Northway Plaza, the Plaza itself, it's treated with underground stormwater facility that this Board had actually implemented during one of the prior site plan reviews, but without the negotiation of these parcels, this stormwater management project might never have come to the surface, and obviously that would be a major impact to this 4 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) Town. Although it is expensive to the applicant, he would like to revitalize this site, as I'm sure the Town would itself. The Plaza is currently with these vacancies, on a major intersection, and it's unfortunately a real eyesore. Here we're trying to bring two new businesses into Town and expand an already existing business, which is huge in this economy. We're proposing two nicely landscaped, very attractive, architecturally designed buildings which would be a big change in that area from what's there now. We're aware that the immediately adjacent cemetery has some certain concerns, which we had anticipated. The office space is located in the rear, and those parking spaces that we're proposing are vital to this project. At this time, we're proposing a retaining wall with a fence, but we're willing to discuss the possibility of putting maybe planter, like a retaining wall with a planter island to incorporate certain landscaping in that retaining wall, if that's something that would be better suited for that area, but without those parking spaces, we really don't have a project. As a result, the removal of those trees are a must. Obviously, the Northway Plaza is a huge tax base for this community. Without having occupancies in these spaces, it devalues the Plaza itself. Travelers left a big impact on this Plaza. Without the ability to put more spaces in the rear, the Plaza's going to be in serious trouble. We're here tonight seeking your recommendation for permeability, which obviously the Zoning Board will review tomorrow night, and will be of the authority to review the balancing test. It's our opinion when you look at the balancing test for this variance, whether the benefit to the applicant outweighs the detriment to the community, we feel that it is weighed in our favor, for the three reasons, jobs, stormwater, revitalization. I'm now going to turn it over to Chris Boyea to go into more detail about the stormwater management project that we're proposing. CHRIS BOYEA MR. BOYEA-Again, my name is Chris Boyea with Bohler Engineering, and we've been asked to look at a stormwater management system, and again, this is not for the Plaza. This is for the existing drainage shed of Route 9, which is very large, and it exists today. The improvements that we're going to make are quite significant, and that's one of the reasons why we wanted to talk about them tonight. The existing drainage shed starts way up by Flower Drum Song and Wal-Mart. It's shown here on this map, which is a bigger aerial of what you see here. It encompasses over 12 acres of development area, comes all the way down from Flower Drum Song, down through McDonalds. There's a hardware store that's included. There's an A & W that's included. All that stormwater, 12 acres of it, comes down, is collected in this area, and then makes its way down to Halfway Brook. That drainage currently is collected in a 36 inch diameter pipe, is piped right to the Brook. Very little control, very little treatment of that stormwater that's there today. So what we're proposing to do is detain and put in a stormwater management system in this green space right here at the intersection. Our original proposal called for us to put a stormwater basin here, dig a hole, daylight the 36 inch pipe. That basin would provide some infiltration. It would also provide some control, so that we could release the stormwater at a slower rate down to Halfway Brook. That was the most cost effective way to do it, but after looking through Warren County and Town comments over the years, it was decided that maybe an open basin at the main intersection wasn't the best solution for this project. They had come back and asked whether we could do a more expensive system, which would be underground infiltration, so that there wouldn't be a big hole at the intersection. We went back and looked at that and have now, again, over several months back and forth with DOT and the Warren County Soil Conservation Office, come up with a system that appears to be amenable to everybody. It involves the installation of a CDS unit, which stands for Continuous Deflective Separation Unit. That's apre-treatment unit that we will purchase and install, and that's going to remove up to 80% of TSS, which is your Total Suspended Solids. So that's your dirt, your debris, those types of things that currently make it to Halfway Brook, right now, right through that 36 inch pipe. We're going to install that unit here, up here. After that removes the dirt and sedimentation from everything that comes from Wal-Mart upstream, it will then go into 16,000 cubic feet of storm tech chambers, which is a infiltration system. It gets buried underneath the soil. Those chambers are going to be installed in this green space area right here. From there it's going to go into a controlled outflow, and then it will eventually make its way down to Halfway Brook. The system that we propose to put in here is going to reduce volume by 50%. That's quite a lot. It's because the soils are really good here for infiltration, and it's going to reduce peak discharge for like that 100 or 500 year event by three percent. So that's pretty significant. It's pretty significant that we can do that in a small green space area of that big for a drainage area that comes all the way up into here. The County also requested some additional maintenance items that we put in so that it's an easier system to maintain, which is an (lost words), and we've gone ahead and made those revisions as well. In short, this is going to improve the downstream capabilities. Obviously when we take and we install a system here, from this point all the way down to Halfway Brook is obviously going to have more 5 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) capabilities. So if additional development was to happen, there's room for additional development. The quality of the stormwater as it goes down there is going to be much better, and overall it's a great project that, as Stefanie mentioned, Warren County is 100% behind, the DOT's behind, because this is existing drainage that we're making better. It has nothing to do with the project, although our project sponsor is funding the cost for some of this improvements as part of it. I'm happy to answer any other questions, but that's the stormwater improvements that we're proposing, in a nutshell for offsite. MRS. STEFFAN-Now that little piece of property, that is owned by the applicant or a combination of people? You said Warren County Soil and Water's involved. Warren County and the Department of Transportation. MR. BOYEA-It's actually owned, right now it's a combination. There's a small land swap that's going to happen there, but it's going to be New York State DOT land. So we're investing money on their property. JIM HAGEN MR. HAGEN-For the record, my name is Jim Hagen. I'm the architect, and we've been talking to the State and the County for about seven or eight years now. On this map up here, on the screen, the blue line is the current property line. There is a triangular piece of land right in here that we thought was owned by the State but is actually owned by Warren County. Then there's another triangular piece of land that goes out like this, that encompasses the drive that comes in off of Quaker Road, which you'd actually think that's part of Northway Plaza, but in reality that's owned by the State of New York, and then there's another section out here that is green space, lawn area that is owned by the State. So the intent is that Northway Plaza would acquire this triangle and this triangle. This would remain State land. In doing so, Northway would pay for the improvements, the stormwater facility, restoration and landscaping of that area, and then it was all said and done, this would really be just a landscaped lawn area that would remain at the corner, that would still be owned by the State. The facilities would be partially on the State land and partially on the land that is being acquired. A little complex, but it's a tight little area. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions from the Board? MR. SCHONEWOLF-Is there a road through there, or does it go behind the building and it comes out on the side? MR. HAGEN-There's a road that comes through from Quaker Road into here. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Yes, I know that. MR. HAGEN-And then there's a road that goes behind the center right now. MR. SCHONEWOLF-So you're going to maintain that? MR. HAGEN-Absolutely. That's the main loop road around the back of the building that provides access to the lower level. It's also used for deliveries and it's also used for fire safety purposes. MR. SCHONEWOLF-That's what I was thinking about. If you shut it off, you're going to have a problem. MR. HAGEN-No, you can't do that. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Okay. MR. TRAVER-With regards to the issue of the permeability, I noticed, looking at your designs, and Staff and Town Engineer comments, as this Site Plan moves forward, it appears that you may consider some alterations to your design, and I'm wondering if any of those potential alterations might change the permeability numbers at all. MR. HAGEN-I think what we'd like to do, if it's okay with the Board, is let us go through and explain a little bit more about the details of the site, what it is we're doing, and I think Nicole can show a little bit more of what we're talking about on the Site Plan, and I'd be certainly glad to address the technical issue of the numbers that we're talking about for the permeability, and then I think we'd be in a better position to explain your question. 6 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. TRAVER-Very good. NICOLE DAVID HEISER MS. HEISER-Good evening, everybody. My name's Nicole David Heiser. I represent CHA, which is the engineer for this project. I guess I'll just briefly describe the project. At the March 3rd Planning Board meeting is when we'll go into more detail for all your other questions and concerns. This project is proposing a, where the existing Monroe Muffler was here, and this area we're proposing a Chili's Restaurant and a Walgreens here. There's also going to be some renovations to the existing Travelers space to accommodate for new commercial and office space, but a few changes to circulation. This actually, there was, I saw a couple of comments. I just received the comment today. So I haven't had time to look over them, but as proposed, we are not proposing any changes to this entrance on Route 9 right now. It was staying as is. It's something we're going to look at, based on some of the comments, but I did want to note that some of the comments are based on how the circulation already exists right there. Down on Quaker Road, we are proposing a right in, right out with, knowing there's a lot of traffic issues with people not obeying what that's supposed to be right now, and we're proposing a small curved pork chop, as you will, in the center there. We have, for the stormwater for the site, we're proposing basically, the site is broken down into two stormwater areas, and they're both going to be underground storage units, and the stormwater within the site is going to be completely contained and go into the systems that we proposed. Like Chris had said, all the stormwater that's going down Route 9 would be coming into their system they design on Route 9. There is not going to be, you know, any intermingling. We have one proposed underground system here to collect all this stormwater, and then the way the grading is, we also put a second system back here to collect down the slope here, and that's the basics of it. Any questions? MR. HUNSINGER-Any questions? MR. HAGEN-If I could, let me get into the meat of the number of issues. I'd like to give you a handout. I believe this was (lost word) to Staff. These are diagrams that show the site areas as exists and as proposed, utilizing our calculations, and on the top sheet, on the eight and a half by eleven, is a summary of that. This site, as you're probably well aware, is a very complex site. There's a lot of stuff going on. Number One, it's an odd shaped property. It was developed over many, many years, and it's kind of evolved into what it is today. It also has a lot of topography across it, and one of the basic assumptions that we've made as part of our assumption is that we're still looking at this as an overall development, and by overall development, I'm saying that the area in blue is technically what is owned by Northway Plaza Associates, but in fact the Home Depot parcel and the land north of Home Depot is part of Northway Plaza, and when this was reviewed back in 2001/2002, this was reviewed by this Board and the Zoning Board as an overall coordinated entity, and an approval was granted for certain site work to be done. At that time, it was contemplated that something was going to happen with the Monroe building at the bottom. In fact, some work was started, but then it was put in abeyance and in fact the property owners posted a bond to make sure that the rest of the work would be completed. So in effect, although this is a new application on the record, it's really a continuation of that prior approval that dates back to 2001/2002. Having said that, we're looking at this as a total overall development of some roughly, approximately 30 acres, about 34 acres total area. In some of the numbers that were generated, if you look at what Northway Plaza owns, the numbers are significantly less because that doesn't include the Home Depot parcel. So for that reason, in the package I've given to you tonight, there's a tabulation chart that says Northway Plaza Associates which is basically the area in blue, plus the two triangular portions, and then there's also Northway and Home Depot, which we feel is what really should be looked at, because this was the total plan for the entire development. In doing these numbers, we prepared a detailed breakdown using the maps that we had available to us and if you look at this first chart, what you're going to see is a lot of little numbers, which, if you add them up, will come up to the numbers on my tabulation sheet, and this first chart shows the property as it exists today, and calculates the permeable area as it exists today. The second diagram takes the plan as proposed and goes through that same analysis and generates a separate set of numbers. The net effect of this is approximately a one percent increase in the impermeable area, and because of that, that's why we're requesting the variance from the Zoning Board. We had seen some Staff comments, and again, it's a very complex site, so it can get confusing. One of the questions was, in terms of building area, and reference was made to the office center as being 43,500 square foot. We, in fact, agree that is it 43,500 square foot in gross building area. However, in one of the documents that we've submitted here, we also had a parking 7 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) calculation, and for that we use Gross Leasable Area, which took out exterior wall thicknesses which is substantial, mechanical rooms and some common areas, which got it down so there was about a 3,000 square foot differential there. The 43,500 was used in our total hard surface area. I think, when you look at the two plans, there's virtually no change in 90% of the site. We're not going to be doing anything up in the Home Depot. We're not doing anything over by the area of the office center. We are proposing some traffic changes in the center of the site, but essentially the hard surface is staying the same here. Most of the changes are occurring at the southern end of the site, and also this eastern edge of the site adjacent to the cemetery. What we would like to do, in addition to accommodating the two new buildings, the pharmacy and the restaurant, is we need to be able to accommodate the existing office tenants that exist on the property, and when you drive by on Route 9, you see the building. It looks like a one story building. What you're not seeing is that there's a substantial square footage on a lower level that's accessible from the east side where there's currently a company called Per Se Technologies that occupies about 25,000 square foot of office space in the bottom of this building here. There's another 13,000 square foot that was previously occupied by Travelers which is in that basement space, which the owners would like to re-tenant. The problem is, and in the case of Per Se, is that they're looking to expand their facilities, and they're in negotiations with the owner right now to do so, but they need to make sure that there's adequate parking. Currently because of the configuration of the site, and the grade differential, their parking is primarily in this area. In order to accommodate them, we would like to get some more parking back in this area, and as a result, what we've done is we've shown expanding this line of parking that exists right now to the east approximately 40 feet to pick up that additional parking. Now what that does is it encroaches on the 50 foot buffer area adjacent to the cemetery, and I think that is where most of the change in the permeability is occurring. I think you're going to find there's minor differences down in this area down here, but most of it is in that area, and really what we're trying to do is accommodate the existing tenants in the center. In looking at this, and Nicole can get into more detail on this, we have an area that has got some topography to it. There's a slight upslope, and then there's a crest, and then it goes back down the hill this way. There's also it drops off down into the cemetery property. The plan, you've got some photos of that area. Okay. This is what I'm talking about, the slope down. That area is currently treed with a combination of deciduous and coniferous trees. The property line, let's see, this is probably the edge of the parking lot here. This is probably the edge of the parking lot here. These are the cemetery maintenance buildings. I'm going to say, for my ball, the property line probably falls somewhere right about through here. This pole here, I'd say the property line probably runs down through here, coming in from Quaker Road. This is a shot from that driveway coming off of Quaker Road. What I'm pointing out is that some of those trees will be taken down in order to accommodate the additional parking, but there still would be some trees in that area. Because of the grades that exist, there will be a strip of land on this plan that is about 10 foot wide from the property line to the edge of the parking, and in that area we're proposing to construct retaining walls and fencing to control the grade differentials that will exist. Now that is not a uniform grade. At some points, you could literally walk on grade across from what would be the cemetery property onto what would be the finished grade of the parking areas. Other areas, the parking areas would actually be lower than the cemetery property, but there are a number of areas, particularly up in here, and at this lower end, where the new parking areas would actually be higher than the cemetery property, and that's where we're proposing retaining walls, and again, Nicole can get into some details of that. What we're proposing to do on top of the retaining walls, or along the edge of the parking area, is to construct a six foot fence, so that, visually, you would not be able to see the vehicles that are parked adjacent to that edge of the property. Is it the trees that are there now? No, but we feel that it's a balance that will maintain some of the privacy issues, but at the same time provide the additional parking that the owners need to accommodate their tenants to maintain the viability of the property. Nicole, would you want to explain a little bit more about those retaining walls? MR. SCHONEWOLF-Can I ask one question? MR. HAGEN-Sure. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Of that original 50 foot buffer, how much of the buffer is going to be left after you finish the parking? MR. HAGEN-Approximately 10 foot. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Ten foot. 8 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MS. HEISER-I'm just going to go a little bit over the retaining wall. I brought some photos to kind of give you an idea of what we're thinking about. The height of the retaining wall is going to kind of vary and we're going to do kind of a tiered look, and to, I guess, minimize the look of straight wall, we have, these are ready rock walls that have been done before, and what we'd like to do is some kind of, so the audience can see too, some kind of tiered look with landscaping terraced in between the levels to kind of add a little more naturalized look to get back that, some of the vegetation that they're losing there. This just, this shows some ornamental grass, terraced. A couple of ideas, this one. Here's another Walgreens small terrace. Again, what we're thinking about is something more like this picture here. You can see the larger trees in there. So once you start adding some variation, some difference, it could actually look, it would be, you know, this could look really, really nice. MR. SCHOEWOLF-But you only have 10 feet to do that in. MS. HEISER-Yes, but again. MR. SCHONEWOLF-So depending on how much you're going up or down, you're not, that structure has to have a fairly sizeable base to it. MS. HEISER-Sure, sure, you know, and the same with street trees. I mean, you plant street trees in very small spaces. The vegetation would be, I'm a landscape architect, actually, by profession, so it would be, you know, very nicely picked out. We would look for something more native, naturalized. We want it to blend in to some of what was taken out. So these are kind of the ideas. We don't want to just put a straight wall, you know. We realize the adjacent cemetery is very concerned. So we really want to give them something that would look really nice, and these photos, if you'd like to keep them, will give you some ideas. Any questions? MR. HAGEN-One thing I didn't mention is that this overall site, if you look at the parking calculations, we are complying with the zoning requirements for parking. We do have, in some cases, some tenants who require more than the minimums, and we are accommodating that within this plan. We do not feel that we've got too much parking. In fact, if anything, we're probably at the minimum necessary to satisfy the tenant requirements. A lot of what has happened here was a result of what Travelers had imposed on this site over the years that they occupied this property, and at one point they occupied, what, about 80, 90,000 square foot of space, and so a lot of what's happened here with the configuration of the spaces, bridges that were constructed, elevators that were installed, were all done to accommodate the Travelers. Once they vacated, some of those facilities no longer become practical. While it looks like there may be a lot of parking out in the front area, there's really not a practical area, a practical way for an employee working in the lower level at the office space to come in here, park, and work through the building down to the basement area. They really need to be back in this area. This petition, particular section of the building, also has about 15,000 square foot of office space and was previously occupied with Travelers on the upper level behind the Peter Harris space, and those employees were parking in this area of the site. So I guess what I'm saying is, we've really looked at all the options to try to balance the needs of the zoning requirements and also the needs of the tenants to maintain a viable property, and we feel that our current request is just an extension of that ongoing process we've had over the years. MR. SEGULJIC-Why couldn't an employee walk through the building? MR. HAGEN-Because this will more likely be leased by a tenant, a retail tenant, facing towards Route 9, and you've got other existing tenants leased in this area of the building. MR. SEGULJIC-So you don't have any common area they could walk through? MR. HAGEN-That's correct. MR. DUTCH-We did with Travelers. There was a corridor for Traveler's own interoffice traffic, but that will go away if we are able to revitalize the center and get a single tenant, and that's what we're seeking for the Traveler's building. We would not be able to share a corridor any longer. The types of people we're talking to would take the entire facility. So we can't make these people walk around the entire center to access the office space in the back. It's a safety hazard, Number One, and, Number Two, the retail tenants which is hopefully the highest and best use for the front of the center, because there aren't any office tenants available right now in the market, the retail tenants want parking for their customers in front of the store. They don't want those spaces occupied by 9 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) employees who leave their cars there the entire day. I just wanted to elaborate just for a second. We invested several million dollars in Travelers expansions over the years. Bill Dutch, for the record. We invested the money at Traveler's behest. We were not able to earn back the return on that investment because Traveler's didn't stay long enough to pay back all the monies that we invested. So we now have finished office space that has no function whatsoever, even as warehouse space, unless we can re-let it as tenant, as office space. Per Se Technologies, we have entered into a negotiation for them to stay in the property, but they demand, you know, as part of the negotiation, that they have adequate parking. Without this additional parking strip, I don't know if we can keep Per Se ourselves or if they'll move somewhere else. I know there are competitive proposals out there for them, or if they'll even stay in the County. That I can't guarantee, but I can guarantee, if we can provide the parking, that they've committed to staying. It's very essential to this property, and again, the hardship was created because Travelers pulled out of spaces and, you know, left us with space that is assessed on your tax rolls, the improvements were assessed, but now the only use is office space, and we must continue to seek other office tenants. In the back, it's a park like setting and hopefully we can induce other people to occupy some of these spaces. MR. HAGEN-Sir, earlier you had a question if we could alter the plan. MR. TRAVER-It was just my observation in looking at your initial plans, and in preparation for a more complete Site Plan Review, that I just wondered if there were any of the, and I understand what you've submitted and I've read the comments. So, you know, you're not specifically addressing them tonight, but I'm just wondering, are you thinking in terms of what potential impact, and as you've explained, I can see that it would be minimal at best, but I initial wondered, would the calculations possible be affected by any changes that you might choose to make in response to these comments? MR. HAGEN-I think your assessment that, yes, there could be minor changes, but they would be minimal, but by the same token, I think that when you look at the numbers that we're talking about, we're really talking about only a one percent difference in increase in the impermeable area on the overall site. I think Staff and I have slight differences, but we both came to approximately the same conclusion. MR. SEGULJIC-Maybe you can clear something up for me, then. It looks like the original, what you had submitted originally, for permeability calculations, did not include the Home Depot. MR. HAGEN-That is correct. MR. SEGULJIC-Why was that? MR. HAGEN-The best answer I can give you is we had multiple players and there was probably lack of communication. MR. SEGULJIC-But that's a separate parcel? MR. HAGEN-It's technically a separate tax parcel, but this whole development, including Home Depot, was approved as a unified Site Plan. MR. SEGULJIC-So is that correct? MR. OBORNE-It was approved as a unified Site Plan, but those are two separate, distinct parcels. MR. HUNSINGER-When Home Depot came in, we made them upgrade the entire parking area, include stormwater management, improve the lighting to meet the new Code. MR. SEGULJIC-So it's fair to say we should look at the entire parcel? MR. OBORNE-That is what I disagree with. I think that is part of the problem that the applicant and Staff is having is my review is a technical review based on the Northway Associates property only. It doesn't include the Home Depot. Northway Plaza does not own Home Depot. That is just a fact. Now if you want to deal in reality or whatever other words you want to use, that's fine, but my review is based on the fact that Home Depot is not part of Northway Plaza. 10 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SEGULJIC-Right, because the drawing that was up there had the property line not included. MR. OBORNE-Correct. It was culled off. MR. HAGEN-If we could go back to that slide that shows the overall site, what you're going to see here is that white box is the Home Depot building, right up here. This parking field in front of Home Depot is actually what is used by Home Depot and was designed to accommodate Home Depot, but as you also see, that's part of the Northway Plaza Associates Three, or One parcel. It's not part of the Home Depot parcel. Home Depot was subdivided out of the overall parcel, not so much for planning or zoning purposes, but for financial purposes, to create a separate tax parcel. MR. SEGULJIC-So when I look at your calculations, which calculations match to where that blue line is? MR. HAGEN-The blue line calculation would be Northway Plaza Associates. MR. SEGULJIC-Just Northway Plaza Associates? MR. HAGEN-Right. The second set of calculations, Northway and Home Depot, is the entire site. MR. SEGULJIC-Repeat that for me again? I'm sorry. MR. HAGEN-The Northway and Home Depot calculations, the second set, is for this plus the parcel that is Home Depot's. MR. DUTCH-The complexities of the financial credit markets today, we all know what's going on with them, way back when, when we re-financed this property, we got a financing instrument which is referred to in our trade as a conduit loan, a securitized loan, very similar to what's being packaged and sold in these home loans. Because of the tax aspects, the ramifications of that type of loan we had, it did not contemplate any changes in the asset that was being financed at the time we did this, which was back in the mid 90's. As a result, then, Home Depot came in. It was an opportunity for us and the owners of the Plaza, to bring this center into the 21St Century, as opposed to what it was, and improve the asset, and improve the appearance for the community, both aesthetically and as a viable project going down the road. We had to acquire some additional land. The rules of the security instrument that we had, the mortgage we had, would not allow us to amalgamate additional land into the loan, or it would have destroyed the tax benefits of the loan for those investors who bought these securities. Out of our control. It was our lender's control, and the lender said, no, you cannot add this collateral. So therefore we had to subdivide this thing, and it was part and was contemplated as being part of this total center. You can see that there is no flow out from Home Depot into an adjoining street. It all comes through and we share the parking. It comes through the center. It has to be looked at as part of this whole Plaza. Ultimately, because it was subdivided out, and because of the tremendous expense that we, site work and everything else that we put into the property, we, in fact, had to borrow money from Home Depot to get this thing done, because our loan did not permit us to go into a secondary market and borrow money to make roughly four or five million dollars of improvements we did to the overall site. At that time, the only way we could pay Home Depot back was to actually sell them the parcel back and pay off their loan, and that's why that thing sits the way it does. It's a complex thing. If we get into discussions of derivatives and all those kinds of things that are out there today, none of us, least of all me, would understand them, but that is why that parcel sits and was subdivided to meet the technical aspects, which, you know, you're charged with doing. Yes, but the real world today is a different set of facts, unfortunately. I didn't mean to take your time up with a financial lecture, but germane to the arguments. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. One of the questions I had on the proposed Site Plan versus the current Site Plan is there's, it looks like three loading docks going in behind Retail Space A. MR. HAGEN-Correct. MR. HUNSINGER-That take up a lot of current parking, and tell me what the thinking is there? Do you already have a tenant identified that needs those loading docks? 11 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HAGEN-When these drawings were prepared, we did not have a tenant in mind, and in fact, if you look at the plan closer, what you'll see is that we're showing subdividing that 58 or 59,000 square foot up into multiple tenant spaces. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. HAGEN-Recognizing that, and recognizing that you not only have deliveries, but you're going to have trash going in and out, we felt it might be prudent to have more than one loading dock at the rear. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. HAGEN-As a result, we showed schematically on here three. Could it be two, yes, possibly. Since then we've had at least one discussion with one potential user who may take the whole thing, but at this point it's so preliminary, that I don't even want to go down that road. We really don't know who's going to be occupying this at this point. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. BOYEA-Plus there's an elevation change so the parking there isn't really. MR. HAGEN-Yes. This parking lot here is probably about 15 foot higher than the parking adjacent to it, and it's pretty impressive grade changing. MR. HUNSINGER-So you're saying that that parking wouldn't be available for that office tenant anyway? MR. HAGEN-It would not be. Could it be refined and could we pick up another eight to ten spaces in that area? Possibly. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. HAGEN-But you're not going to pick up 25 or 30. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. SEGULJIC-You're looking for 60 more spaces, about. MR. HAGEN-Approximately, yes. MR. SEGULJIC-You also have that area off to the northeast. MR. HAGEN-You're talking about up in here? MR. SEGULJIC-Down a little bit, right there where the building is, up above there. MR. HAGEN-That's the wetland area. MR. SEGULJIC-Not the Travelers building. The building to the north are Traveler's buildings. MR. HAGEN-This one. MR. SEGULJIC-Put your finger, just go due north. You went too far, over to the west, to the south. Right in that area there. MR. HAGEN-There is parking there right now. MR. SEGULJIC-But you could pick up some more spaces in there, I would think. MR. HAGEN-Not really, because that's an area. MR. SEGULJIC-You could pick up more. MR. HAGEN-No, because what you have here is a loading dock coming into the Post Office, and into the back of these retail buildings that front onto the, towards Route9. So we needed room back there for maneuvering space for trucks. 12 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SEGULJIC-Well, my overall problem is that your landscaping there is woefully short, and you're coming to us to take down more trees, and I think if you were to nip and tuck in different areas you might be able to find more spaces. MR. HAGEN-We spent a lot of time on this. I'm not going to disagree with you, but let me say this, we'd certainly be willing to go back and take another look at it, and certainly would be willing to work with the Board to try and minimize the amount of paved parking areas we have to create. MR. SEGULJIC-Because, you know, I'm all for keeping the tenant there. I don't want to see you losing any jobs, have them move anywhere, but I think you've got to try a little harder, not just taking down more trees. You're saying you're going to solve the stormwater problem. How was that created? Because of impervious surfaces, and you want to create more than you're allowed. MR. HAGEN-Okay. There's two issues to the stormwater which we got into. One is the off site and the other is the new stormwater management we're going to be implementing on site, which will accommodate what's there now and what we're proposing to increase. MR. SEGULJIC-Right, but I think you understand where I'm coming from. MR. HAGEN-Yes, I understand. You want awin/win situation where we can achieve what we want to do, but yet the community gains something as well, and I think we'd be willing to work to that extent. MR. SEGULJIC-Right, and I'm still a little concerned about, you know, what is the actual calculation? Has the Zoning Administrator weighed in on this at all? MR. OBORNE-As far as the permeability calculations? MR. SEGULJIC-Correct. MR. OBORNE-I brief him on that. I'm the one that accomplish those calculations. MR. SEGULJIC-So what is his opinion, then? MR. OBORNE-Craig's opinion? MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. MR. OBORNE-He hasn't really given me an opinion on it at this point. It is preliminary. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. OBORNE-We're looking for a recommendation, again, to the Zoning Board, based on that. MR. SEGULJIC-Because we have to be consistent as to whether we include it or not. MR. OBORNE-Yes. Your permeability has been an issue here as far as clarity, and Stefanie and I will agree with that, and we take great pains in communicating with each other to try to get it right. At this point I'm not convinced. However, it's the Zoning Board that needs to be convinced for this permeability issue. MRS. STEFFAN-Has the applicant considered a parking garage in the back of the building? MR. DUTCH-Economically it won't work. MRS. STEFFAN-It just won't. MR. DUTCH-All I can tell you is rents are not going up. They're going down, and the tenants are demanding more, asking for more. There's no way. I was in the parking business before, real estate development. There's no way a parking garage is (lost words). MRS. STEFFAN-That's unfortunate, because just the way the land slopes away from the building, I mean, it would be an ideal situation to have a parking garage in the back of the building. 13 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. DUTCH-First you need tenants anyway. So it's what's driving the bus, you know. I dare say there aren't any tenants up there right now. MRS. STEFFAN-I am concerned, you know, I understand the permeability issues, but one of the other issues, I mean, the reason that the Pineview Cemetery is called the Pineview Cemetery is because of the pine trees, and by taking out that large strip of trees, it's also detracting from that property that's been in existence for a long time. That's another issue. It's not THE issue, it's another issue. MR. DUTCH-Right. I understand. MS. HEISER-I just wanted to address some of the, a couple of comments. As far as, we've looked at every nook and cranny and corner on here to fit as many spaces as we can without compromising, you know, safety or things like that. Our goal was to take as, you know, as little amount of space as we could, and we knew that was going to be an issue, and we really did. If you've ever been back here, the grade changes back here are so severe, what you don't see on a flat plan is this, these huge retaining walls, and, you know, you can't put, you know, or squeeze anymore spaces back there because of the different grade changes back there. MRS. STEFFAN-It's actually fortunate that they are back there because they're ugly. There's just no, there's nothing pretty about them. Fortunately they're out of sight. MS. HEISER-Yes, they're back behind the building where you would never see them, unless you actually drove back there, but we did really look at trying to fit as many spaces as we can, you know, safety, adequately, as it was. So that was something we really looked at very finely. So that's one thing I wanted to address, and the stormwater is just a part of regulations for management when you re-development. Whether or not this parking is here or not we would still be designing the same way with the two systems, just to make sure, for now or anything future, that it would be well attended and kept for. That's it. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions or comments from the Board? MR. KREBS-I have a question, since you're a landscape architect. Looking here, and I notice that a lot of the trees you're taking out, would they be movable? Can you move an 18 inch tree, a 30 inch tree? MRS. STEFFAN-Probably not, and have it survive, no. MS. HEISER-Yes. To have them survive, no, that wouldn't be feasible. MR. KREBS-Because there seems to be enough space here on the cemetery property that if you could move some of those trees, you'd still have that buffer between there, and they said in their letter, as long as you didn't encroach beyond those two maintenance buildings, that that was a feasible situation for them. MS. HEISER-Down here. MR. KREBS-Or maybe if you were to plant more trees over here. MS. BITTER-Right, and initially we talked about the retaining walls (lost words). MR. OBORNE-If I can add to that, when you're talking about removing this buffer, my calculations are about three feet, and then a retaining wall starts, but a retaining wall isn't considered part of a buffer at all, and beyond that 50 foot buffer, Type C buffer that you're supposed to have in between these two zones, includes landscaping beyond that, which I really haven't taken into account. So if it wasn't for the cemetery being there, I think that as a planner it would be a little bit easier to swallow, for me. Again, I'm not trying to sway the Board in any way or another, but, you know, this needs to be balanced one way or another. MRS. STEFFAN-Well, and I have to admit, when I looked at the Code, you know, on the requirement for the Type C buffer, I mean, there's a reason for that, and especially with this particular parcel, you know, and as the applicant identified, it's in a very visible part of Town, that whole piece where the Walgreens and Chili's is going to be, right on Quaker Road. I mean, it's important that it's aesthetically pleasing. It's certainly right now. The mountain ash trees, I believe, that are along the Quaker Road are the only 14 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) real green item that's there. If they're taken down, they absolutely have to be replaced, but, you know, according to the Code, there should be a Type C buffer between the properties. That would certainly enhance the visual appeal of it, and I would be reluctant to let that go. MS. BITTER-I'm sorry, which trees were you talking about, Gretchen? Were you talking about the ones in the front? MRS. STEFFAN-Along the back of the property, right, along the property border between the cemetery and the applicant's property. MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me. You have an area on the northeast corner of the Traveler's building that's noted as deck and dock. What exactly is that? MR. DUTCH-That's an area back here at the lower level where there was an outdoor deck. It was used by the Travelers employees as a break area, and adjacent to that there's an actual loading dock to bring in supplies to the lower level of Travelers. MR. SEGULJIC-But you don't need that anymore. MR. HAGEN-Right now, no, we do not. MR. SEGULJIC-You can pick up some spaces there. MR. HAGEN-You'd pick up, actually, if you look at this plan, the way it's drawn, the details. MR. DUTCH-There may be a 13,000 foot office tenant there who would require that dock. We don't know. MR. HAGEN-This is the area in here. We're actually showing that being striped, and that deck area was coming out. That's existing condition. This is proposed. MR. SEGULJIC-So you're saying, so he just said you might need that for a future tenant, and you say you've already striped it. MR. HAGEN-We've striped it, yes. MR. SEGULJIC-So maybe you should tell your client that. MR. HAGEN-Exactly. I think, if I can summarize, the statement we made earlier that it is possible for us to make some changes to this, I think that would be appropriate to do that during the Site Plan Review process. I think we're talking about a few spaces. We may not be talking about 25 or 30 spaces. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, the other thing is, you have the parking islands in the back, which you might be able to do something with those also. MR. HAGEN-You're talking about like here? MR. SEGULJIC-These here. This here. MR. HAGEN-Again, there's a grade change there, but you might be able to pick up something there. Certainly we'd be willing to work with the Board on that. Recognizing that you also have regulations to introduce green space within parking fields as well. MR. SEGULJIC-It should be in the front, though. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions or comments from the Board? MR. KREBS-I was just going to say that rather than a stone wall or a concrete retaining wall, I would rather see along that area a row of arborvitaes, six feet high, that would prevent you from looking either direction. If you were driving along the parking area, you'd have this nice, green wall, and if you were on the cemetery side, you'd have a nice, green wall, as opposed to, and the problem with those others is that, after a while, the wire rusts. They start to fall apart, you know, they look good to begin with, but they don't look good on a long term basis. 15 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HAGEN-I think if you look at that in detail, it's hard in this small scale, what you'll see is that you've got topography of this property on the cemetery doing this and your topography of the parking lot doing something else, and it's not going to be one long, continuous wall. As I said earlier, you've got places where literally you'll be able to walk from the parking lot right across onto the cemetery property, or there's a couple of other locations where the cemetery property is actually higher, and I think it may be incumbent upon us to give you a more detailed plan, as part of the Site Plan Review, that would delineate those differences, and also allow us maybe the opportunity to eliminate a couple of spaces here or there and in doing so introduce some more green space and maybe some more vertical tree elements along that area, and just be a little more creative with the details than necessarily changing the overall concept of the plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. We do have a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone in the audience that wanted to address the Board on this application? We do have one. Good evening. PUBLIC HEARING OPEN MIKE GENIER MR. GENIER-Good evening. My name is Mike Genier. I'm the Superintendent of the Pineview Cemetery, and can I point something out? MR. HUNSINGER-Sure, take the microphone with you. MR. GENIER-This is a pretty good view of the whole area. One of the things I notice that could be misleading, this is our office right here, and what you have, in coming in the main entrance, the road actually goes over up around the trees and you can see it coming back across over in here. This is the Horicon section. So even though it looks like there's a lot of trees there, the road goes very close up and right out there. So it doesn't show that road. So it looks like you have a lot more space than you really do up in here. So the picture's kind of taken at a, more of an angle. MRS. STEFFAN-Mr. Genier, are those cemetery plots already sold in that section, or are they for sale? MR. GENIER-Approximately a third or less are sold in there. We have quite a bit, you know, quite a few that are still for sale, but because of the close proximity of the Plaza, when the people are in looking, especially at this time of the year, or in the early Spring or the Fall when the leaves are gone, they say, well, we don't want to be that close to the buildings, to the Plaza, so they go try to find some other area in the cemetery. So we haven't sold too many, but occasionally we do. I've written a letter to read into the record, but I'm wondering if you folks already have this. MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to say, if that's the letter dated February 11t", we do have it. MR. GENIER-Yes, because I didn't want to take your time up if you've already read it, but we would like to try to keep the barrier, as much of the barrier as we could there. The area that you can see, the circle area there and where the office, and that area was erected in about 1899, and it's quite a few, there's, you know, beautiful pines in there, and I don't know if you've ever been down to the Christmas Tree Shop down in Albany off Wolfe Road, but when you walk out in those parking lots, there's a big cemetery right off there, and you can go out and you can actually watch the services and sometimes hear them, and it's kind of marrying the commercial with the sacred. So, you know, we would oppose taking the barrier down. We realize it's a good project, if it could be rearranged a little bit for the tax base and for citizens and, you know, for the group here, but we'd like to go on record as trying to keep the barrier the majority of it. Okay. Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. KREBS-Thank you. MRS. STEFFAN-Mr. Genier, while you're here, would there be, the applicant is talking about taking down that barrier, which you're opposed to. I don't know if you got to see the retaining wall that was suggested by the landscape architect. MR. GENIER-Yes. Mr. Oborne gave me a set of drawings which I looked over. 16 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MRS. STEFFAN-I'm just wondering, without a map, I guess I don't know whether you can answer this for me. To the edge of the property, how close do the lots that are for sale go to the edge of the property? I mean, I know that there are normal setbacks, but you probably have some other guidelines. MR. GENIER-The hidden road that I pointed out, going up adjacent by the blue line, the lots go right to the road itself. So there's very little area, just probably the width of the road, whatever. It's a macadam road but it's fairly close in there. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. MR. TRAVER-So the road actually runs along that property line? MR. GENIER-It's pretty, well, it's fairly close because the way the picture is showing, the trees are overshadowing part of the road there. MR. HAGEN-If I may, this is a survey map which I can share with the Board also. MR. GENIER-Yes. MR. HAGEN-Here's the property line. These are the trees. That's your administration building. These are the maintenance buildings. This is the road. MR. GENIER-That's the road that goes around in there that we don't, we can't see it on that, yes. MR. HAGEN-I'll share this with the Board, but the plots you've got are on this side. They're not on the west side. MR. GENIER-They're not on to the west side. They're on the east side, because we'd be right into the woods there. MR. HAGEN-It's hard to see up close, but here's our property line. The administration building, maintenance buildings. This is the road, and then that's probably about 10, 15 foot wide, and the plots are on this side of the road. So there's still, there's a buffer on the cemetery property, which obviously we're not going to take credit for that. MR. KREBS-Right, and in fact you actually showed it on C-1. MR. HAGEN-We just don't have the road, which is shown on this map. MR. KREBS-It is shown on this, by the way. MR. GENIER-I think it's Drawing C1.1 on the plan. MR. KREBS-Yes, C1.1. MR. TRAVER-Thank you. MRS. STEFFAN-I guess I'm thinking out loud because we've obviously had some information presented tonight that we hadn't seen in the package, and the retaining wall that was offered, it's a three level retaining wall, that had some enhanced landscaping, it actually had a waterfall on which I know would not be part of any kind of retaining wall, but if, in order for the applicant to develop this parcel, which I'm not saying I'm in favor of, but if that buffer between the properties included a retaining wall that was very heavily landscaped, treed and decorative, and that was done on the cemetery's property, might that have value to the cemetery, to get both needs met? I mean, the applicant actually enhancing the cemetery's property by putting a decorative retaining wall with very beautiful landscaping, so that it would actually enhance that section of the cemetery. Obviously it's not the same as exists right now, but it may be an alternative to consider. MR. GENIER-I'd certainly bring that to the Cemetery Commission, and the Town Board. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. That may be an alternative that we haven't discussed yet. MR. GENIER-Would it be possible, some time, to get a copy of this picture for the Cemetery Commission? 17 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-Sure. MR. GENIER-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MRS. STEFFAN-Thank you, Mr. Genier. MR. HUNSINGER-Did we have any other? Yes, ma'am. BETTY MONAHAN MRS. MONAHAN-I, too, am concerned about the cemetery, the visual impact and the noise, and the reason those regulations, I'm sorry, Betty Monahan, Sunnyside. The reason those regulations went into effect, I was on the Town Board at the time, Pizza Hut went up next to the West Glens Falls cemetery, and we were horrified to find out we had no recourse, so the regulations went in, and if you look at a prior book on 179, it tells you why. The purpose, Cemeteries in the Town of Queensbury are uses which are important to the residents of the Town, and may have historical significance as well. Certain other land uses detract from the ceremony and aesthetic character of cemeteries. In order to protect cemeteries from degradation caused by adjoining land use, a buffer zone shall be required. Designated areas include all lots adjoining cemeteries in the Town of Queensbury with commercial or industrial uses, including multifamily residential uses, regulation, where any commercial or industrial use, as defined in this chapter, abuts a cemetery, said commercial or industrial use shall establish and maintain a 50 foot buffer zone from the adjoining lot line of the cemetery, and that's a history of how that came about. A retaining wall isn't going to do a thing to stop noise. If you're down there burying a loved one and you're listening to a lot of slammed doors and people talking, I don't think you're going to be too comfortable. So it's aesthetic and it's noise and etc. Also another thing I think you have to think of, and I was over there today, the number of lots that are left there unsold, near that area, frankly, I would not want to have one if those trees go down, and at the price that those lots go for now, for gravesites, we're talking about a big economic loss to the Town. I also. MRS. STEFFAN-Betty, do you have any idea approximately? I mean, I have not, I have no clue. MRS. MONAHAN-Six hundred dollars for one gravesite, right? MR. GENIER-Six hundred dollars for an individual lot. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. MRS. MONAHAN-Yes, and the other thing is, it looks to me like this plan, and I can remember George Stec making the remark, we're trying to put five pounds of sugar in a one pound bag, and maybe if the Chili's Restaurant wasn't there, we just did a Walgreens, everything would fit nicely. It seems to me that we're asking the Town to give up a lot in permeability, in the buffer zone from the cemetery, and, you know, I just wonder if this is the way we want the Town of Queensbury to go. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Anyone else? I will leave the public hearing open because we will be reviewing this for Site Plan at some point. And that was actually one of the questions that I had when I first looked at the Site Plan is, you know, you have some empty buildings. Is there any way to remodel or renovate any of the existing buildings to take care of either of the two new uses? MS. BITTER-I'm going to let Bill explain that. MR. DUTCH-It's an economic issue, that we looked at, in our business it's always highest and best use, but we have right now, I believe without the Home Depot, there's about 217,000 square feet of Gross Floor Area, building area approximately. My number may vary slightly from Jim's, which is probably more accurate, but we're in that neighborhood plus or minus. Of that, over 50% of the space in the center is vacant right now. I know this doesn't bear a lot of weight, and I listened to the woman explain about the maybe perhaps unmarketability of some cemetery lots and I'm sympathetic to that argument, and I understand. Last year we paid almost, well, we paid over a quarter million dollars in taxes on this property. The economic value of the property right now is about a third of what we're assessed for, based on what we call in place income. Unless we can improve that A, I might not be at this table as the owner of this property much 18 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) longer, and, B, I can't afford to lose Per Se Technologies because all that space in the back is useless and it's what's driving the bus here. It's a cart and horse thing. Per Se is talking about, if you read the letter from their broker, adding, not increasing the leasable area they're renting from me. They're talking about reducing rent, asking me for a huge contribution to remodel, money that is really hard to come by today, believe me, but they're also talking about adding 50 to 100 new desks in there and creating new jobs and enlarging their operation. Those are jobs for the community. Those are serious, forget my personal interest, those are serious considerations for this community when we're in a worldwide economic crisis. So whether I survive this or the property survives this, I have to think about what's in the greater good for the Town of Queensbury, not losing anymore jobs out of this community. I wish Travelers was still with us and maybe some of these things that we're trying to do wouldn't be necessary. We didn't create that situation. I'm sure you all know the history of what happened. It was a blow that was one that is almost impossible to recover in these times. I'm not asking for your sympathy. I'm just telling you what the real world is, in these times for a tenant to make a decision to come here, a retailer, we're talking about 2011 at the earliest. This is 2009. Somehow I have to figure out how to carry this property in the interim and make it work or somebody's going to be knocking on the door and taking it away from me, and so we have tried to maximize things but without being obtrusive, maintaining aesthetics. We put over five million dollars ourselves personally in this property to improve the look of that, remember that old green and white signature that you had when Steinbachs was there? We had about seven tenants go bankrupt on us over these times. This has not been a profitable home run for this. We were hoping, at the end of the day, that we could sell it. That might have happened had Travelers stayed. It isn't reality now. We're struggling. We need to revitalize the property, not only for our benefit, but for the Town's benefit. We need your help. I mean, it's a plea. It's a plea for the tax rolls. It's a plea the infiltration that we're adding, and I think what we're asking in return is a little deviation on a parking buffer so we can keep an office tenant who's going to expand 50 or 60 jobs here immediately, at least that's what they tell us, but they're not renting anymore space from me. They're just reconfiguring what they have, and I was telling the architect on the way up, who's a friend of mine as well, I said, I know that every one of those 50 or 60 people is going to want to drive their car and park it on this site. So unfortunately, you know, the rules of thumb don't always prevail, and so I'm a big believer in recyclable, you know, renewable energy. I don't believe in tearing things down. I believe in creating, but, you know, this is a real word situation that we're faced with, and it's a crisis for us. In a way, it's a trickle down to the Town, because, you know, if we can't fill this space, you know, there's going to be tax issues. You're going to collect less tax revenue. So, I'm very sympathetic to not being able to sell a $600 lot, but I am sympathetic to this community gaining 50 jobs right now when it needs it, and if we can, if we're successful in putting a retailer in here, I'm trying to guess maybe 70 to 100 jobs, maybe more. I know that's what an average Home Depot store employs. So if you extrapolate that and transpose it to another 60,000 feet of retail in the front, I wish this configuration was different. We're stuck with it. That's what we have to live with. So thank you for your time, and I'm sorry if I rambled on here, but I needed to say that. MR. SEGULJIC-How many people does Per Se employ now? MR. DUTCH-Per Se had 180 positions. The last count was between 170 and 180 positions. That may vary a little bit. I can't tell them how many people to herringbone into that space. I wish they would rent that other 13,000 feet across from me. That would help me, but what our architect Jim has done is provide drawings to them to show them how they could enhance their employee population and retain the same amount of rentable space. Am I correct, Jim? MR. HAGEN-That's correct. MR. DUTCH-You did that. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-Back to the stormwater. So you're going to pay for the stormwater controls being put in? MR. DUTCH-Yes, that is our proposal. MR. SEGULJIC-Down for the County? MR. DUTCH-Yes. 19 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-So the Zoning Board is looking for a recommendation from us on the permeability. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, permeability is directly tied to these new parking spaces, is that correct? MR. HUNSINGER-Right. Absolutely. MR. SEGULJIC-And overall I don't have a problem. I do have a problem with how the permeability is calculated, but, because I don't know which is the right way, but overall I don't have a problem with the permeability, if that makes sense. MS. BITTER-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-But I do have a problem with the removal of the trees along the cemetery, and I do have a problem with the woefully inadequate landscaping overall on this part of the site. I've got to believe that if you nip and tuck, you can pick up some spaces, and definitely reduce the impact along that, you know, the number of parking spaces you need. MR. DUTCH-I don't think, I mean, cutting out parking is not going to help our problem, but pruning fewer trees away, I mean, we walked the site this evening before we came over here, and I asked Jim selectively could we keep this tree, and Nicole wasn't with me unfortunately, could we keep this tree, because I'm not a big believer in raping the land, believe me, but if there's an attractive way to do this, I don't think the sound barrier is going to be any different, whether we have 50 or 60 more cars there, and be mindful of this, I believe, and again, I'm not the expert. I don't own the cemetery and I don't maintain it and I defer to the people who made their comments and I appreciate them, but I think that most of our traffic and most of our employees are there weekdays from eight to eighty-thirty to five, and that basically when I go visit my dad's grave it's usually on a weekend, where I want the peace and serenity, where I have the time. It's not during the work week. So I think that's important, the weekend aspect of what's there, and I think the visual impact, I agree with what the Superintendent said that in the winter and in the Spring when the leaves are not on the trees there's more of a visual impact to what you see from down there, but there is a pretty dramatic grade change as well, and you can't obviate that there is a shopping center next door to that cemetery. You can't blow it down, you know, for green space. The land's too valuable. So it's a give and take situation. MR. KREBS-I have a question, while you were talking about that, in the wintertime, is you're going to create a significantly larger paved surface here that you're going to have to plow for parking. Where are you going to put that snow? MR. DUTCH-Well, we had to deal with that earlier when the Board, there was an imposition on us not pushing snow onto the neighbor's property, particularly in the wetland. So our contractor would be instructed, well, first of all, you've got a barrier, the plantings. We certainly don't want to ruin those with rock salt or a substitute of that. So the contractor would be advised that the snow cannot be piled up against there or do anything to ruin the improvements that we've made. MR. SEGULJIC-How many parking spaces do you have in total around that, the building, the Per Se building, shall we say? I quickly counted and I came up with well over 150. MR. DUTCH-Well, I have to remind you of one thing, that I don't think possibly sunk in, or we didn't stress or emphasize enough. To accommodate Travelers years ago we had to put in well over a million and a half dollars, if I recall at the time, to renovate 15,000 square feet behind the Peter Harris store. The only access to that space is from those parking lots and stairways that we created to get into the space in the back, and I tried to get Per Se to lease the upper floor, because we have an elevator that connects it, and they wanted to be, their entire operation to be on a single floor, and they wouldn't take that space upstairs. The only way that we can lease it, and the only parking that's available, is in the back of the center. So there's 15,000 feet there, over and above what Per Se has, right above it, and then there's another 13,000 feet unfortunately, because of the way that Travelers was configured, that has to be leased or we can't pay the mortgage on the property unless we lease the space. It's that simple. So we need the parking back there to be able to rent those spaces to tenants, and again. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, to tenants, or to Per Se? 20 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. DUTCH-Both. Per Se is there, but we also have another 28,000 feet of vacant space that has to be leased. That's all, basically, an office park back there. MR. SEGULJIC-So you're saying you don't have adequate parking now? MR. DUTCH-Am I saying we don't have adequate parking now? MR. SEGULJIC-Right. MR. DUTCH-Well, the space is vacant right now, but we're providing. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, you're confusing me because you said you need these spaces for Per Se. MS. BITTER-The one thing you're missing, Tom, is that. MR. DUTCH-They're adding 50 or 60 people. MS. BITTER-That Travelers utilized that whole Retail A building now, and could enter from the front and had access to both an easement and to the upper level. MR. DUTCH-Exactly. MS. BITTER-Now obviously it's being configured so it's for retail, and it would be separated. So the basement, which is identified as Retail A on the Site Plan, would actually be accessed from the rear of the building. MR. DUTCH-Exactly what Stefanie said. The former Travelers space, the Travelers employees could park in the front, traverse across the bridges internally, through their office space, and utilize the front parking lots as well. That situation that is not, you know, logistically viable anymore, and that's why we're so concerned here, to be able to lease this space. MR. SEGULJIC-But Per Se is in the other building, next to, adjacent to Travelers. MR. DUTCH-Yes. MR. SEGULJIC-In the back. MR. DUTCH-Right, and above them is another 15,000 feet of unrented office space that was a vacancy that was created by Travelers. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, I think you can do better. MRS. STEFFAN-And there's no way to put a staircase, to reconfigure anything so that folks could enter from the front and then go down a floor? MR. DUTCH-We've studied that, and particularly if you're a retailer, you just don't want an office population. It was okay when it was all office space, there wasn't an objection. That's why the parking was configured the way it is. For retail use, for us to have any crack at renting that space, and I'll tell you, mixed use projects are not, you know, they're great for new urbanism and for downtown, but for suburban shopping centers, mixing office and retail doesn't work. We inherited the situation. Travelers was already a tenant when we bought this thing, and it was a difficult situation, but as long as they were there, we've made the best of it, and we had a great relationship with them. What happened was something we couldn't have predicted. It was totally out of control, and I dare say, you know, and I won't say for the record, I think that they were better off where they were than where they are now. I'm sorry. MRS. STEFFAN-You know, it's just, it's a shame that it worked out that way, because years ago when you used to have a little deli in that, in the connector section, there was a little deli. MR. DUTCH-There's a great Panera now. MRS. STEFFAN-But that's across the way, but folks could access that if there was a hallway. In lots of small shopping centers they have little malls, you know, with food vendors, and so if the folks from the back of the building and the basement could access 21 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) that section, you know, re-development could actually be quite handy, if it was food court and those kinds of things. MR. DUTCH-It would be great if the topography wasn't what it is, too, if we didn't have, you know, as much square footage in the back and in the basement, but that's the character, the trait of the site, and it's something that we, again, inherited. I don't know that if I were building this center from scratch, again, I would do it this way, but it's what we have. MR. HAGEN-I think what we're saying tonight is that we're looking for your support on a recommendation to the Zoning Board, and, depending on how you define, whether it's NPA I or the entire site, I think we're clearly looking at some type of Area Variance on the permeability issue, and we're hoping to gain your support for that. Certainly we've listened to what you've said tonight and we think there may be room to make some adjustments in the design of the area adjacent to the cemetery, both in terms of the design of the walls, maybe we can, by tucking some spaces, elsewhere on the site, eliminate a few parking spaces, but in doing so, open up enough area where you could put a substantial tree in rather than just a little shrub, and do something a little more creative along that area to benefit the adjacent property. I think what I'm saying is, what we're here for tonight is really Step One, the Area Variance. Clearly we're going to be back before this Board for Site Plan and we'd be willing to work with the Board in development of those additional details. So I guess what we're saying is we'd be looking for a recommendation, with the understanding that there would be modifications to the plan to accommodate your concerns. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Is the Board comfortable with that position? MR. KREBS-I have no problem with it. MR. HUNSINGER-I'm not going to try to put words in your mouth, Tom, but, you know, the permeability issue I think they've addressed. It's Site Plan related stuff that we need to flesh out. MR. KREBS-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-I think one of the problems we have is we don't even have an opinion from the Zoning Administrator as to what number is correct. MR. HUNSINGER-Other comments? MR. TRAVER-And we don't know what the final number would be because we haven't done Site Plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. TRAVER-So I think that issue, rightly, holds for Site Plan. DAVE KENNY MR. KENNY-Is there two variances being required? MR. HUNSINGER-No, just one. MR. OBORNE-It's a permeability variance. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. OBORNE-It's not a setback variance. It's a permeability. MR. KENNY-That 15 foot variance (lost words). MR. OBORNE-They'd need a variance because they're increasing their permeability at this point. MRS. STEFFAN-Just for the record, that was Dave Kenny from the audience who was speaking to Keith Oborne, so that when the minutes are transcribed, Maria will know who the voice was. 22 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. OBORNE-I do want to clarify one thing regarding Tom's concerns about the Zoning Administrator. He's empowered me to do the Site Plan Review. If I'm satisfied, and I don't want to put words in his mouth, he is generally satisfied. If there are major problems, he'll dive in, but at this point, he has entrusted me with this Site Plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. OBORNE-And also, on top of that, I am more than willing to work with Mr. Hagen on this. I'm more than willing to work with the applicants in coming up with a plan that will suit all parties. MRS. STEFFAN-I guess the other difficulty would, obviously the Zoning Board wants a recommendation from the Planning Board. The difficulty is if we recommend in favor, the Zoning Board grants the variance for permeability, then the applicant comes to us and obviously during Site Plan we have the ability to make recommendations for the plan, but then once the approval is in place, then the applicant can argue the case that we received the Zoning Board variance and therefore, if you want more landscaping, I mean, we don't have to meet that requirement. So it's, we're in kind of a Catch-22 situation. MS. BITTER-Right, but we're in a unique situation that Gretchen points out because we're here for a recommendation, where normally we don't see the Planning Board until after we've gotten the variances. So we're obviously aware of your concerns and we'll definitely return to address those. MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to say, I think the concerns are going to be on the record in the minutes. MR. DUTCH-I want to add, too, when we went through the Home Depot process, we were sympathetic, we were cooperative. I think our history has demonstrated that we do do what we say we will do and that we perform, and we take some pride in the property, visa vie our investment over the years. MS. BITTER-Not to mention the stormwater management facility project that they're incorporating is a huge benefit to the Town. MRS. STEFFAN-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Would anyone like to put forward a recommendation? MRS. STEFFAN-What will we be recommending? MR. SCHONEWOLF-A positive recommendation on the one percent. That's it. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, on the permeability, but I think, well, I mean, my own opinion is that I think we would want it on the record in the resolution that there were and there are Site Plan Review issues that need to be worked through, including maintenance of the buffer and landscaping. MR. KREBS-But I'm looking at the Zoning Board of Appeals record of resolution, and it says, and this is James Underwood, "Request by Zoning Board for a recommendation from the Planning Board regarding permeability requirements and proposed site improvements for proposed construction of Walgreens and Chili's. So it's not just permeability that they're looking for. MR. TRAVER-Right, but our recommendation to them regarding site improvements are going to be addressed through further Site Plan Review in front of us. So I think we can address both. That's a good point. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, thank you, Don. MRS. STEFFAN-So we're just going to make it on the one percent permeability recommendation? MR. HUNSINGER-Because that's all they're acting on. MRS. STEFFAN-I guess I'll make a recommendation. 23 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MOTION TO MAKE A RECOMMENDATION ON BEHALF OF THE PLANNING BOARD TO THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS REGARDING AREA VARIANCE NO. 77-2008 FOR NPA II, LLC WHICH IS NORTHWAY PLAZA. THAT THE PLANNING BOARD MAKES A POSITIVE RECOMMENDATION ON THE ONE PERCENT PERMEABILITY ISSUE. THE PLANNING BOARD FURTHER WILL CONTRIBUTE THAT THERE WILL BE SIGNIFICANT SITE PLAN REVIEW ISSUES, INCLUDING THE MAINTENANCE OF THE BUFFER AND LANDSCAPING, BUT WE WOULD MAKE A POSITIVE RECOMMENDATION ON THE PERMEABILITY., Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Krebs, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Traver, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MS. BITTER-Thank you very much. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. MR. DUTCH-Thank you very much for your time. MR. HUNSINGER-You're welcome. SITE PLAN 5-2009 FW 2-2009 SEAR TYPE UNLISTED RANDY SEVERANCE OWNER(S) RANDY & CINDY SEVERANCE ZONING RR-3A LOCATION 7 FOX ROAD APPLICANT HAS CONSTRUCTION UNDERWAY FORA 2,360 SQUARE FOOT SINGLE FAMILY DWELLING. HARD SURFACING WITHIN 50 FEET OF A WETLAND AND DEVELOPMENT WITHIN 100 FEET OF A WETLAND REQUIRES SITE PLAN/FRESHWATER WETLANDS REVIEW AND APPROVAL. PLANNING BOARD TO PROVIDE A RECOMMENDATION TO THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS. CROSS REFERENCE SEPTIC VAR. AV 4-09, SUB 1-70 WARREN CO. PLANNING 2/11/09 APA, DEC, ACOE, OTHER L G CEA LOT SIZE 0.79 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 266.1-1-20 SECTION 179-4-030; 179-6-060 RANDY SEVERANCE, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Keith, whenever you're ready to summarize Staff Notes. MR. OBORNE-Application Site Plan 5-2009 and Freshwater Wetlands 2-2009. The applicant's name is Randy Severance. Requested action is for Site Plan Review due to hard surfacing within 50 feet of a wetland and development within 100 feet of a wetland. Both of these actions require Planning Board review and approval. Location is 7 Fox Road. Existing zoning is RR-3A. SEQRA Status is Unlisted. We will need a SEQRA recommendation. The Zoning Board of Appeals will request a recommendation from the Planning Board concerning potential setback variance associated with the location of this house, relative to the wetlands on the site. What we are doing is we're trying to streamline this applicant, knowing that he needs zoning relief, due to setbacks from wetlands. It's typical, as per our previous conversations that when applicants require an Area Variance or any appearance before the Zoning Board and the Planning Board, they will seek a recommendation and Staff will streamline this issue by having the Planning Board give a recommendation prior to the ZBA meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Good evening. The floor is yours. MR. SEVERANCE-Hi. Good evening. My name is Randy Severance of 30 Clements Road, Queensbury. I'll give you a real brief summary of what's transpired to this point. We purchased a piece of property at 7 Fox Road in Queensbury. We have a house completely framed, enclosed. It's apre-existing subdivision, and the lot, we have existing homes all around us already. Unfortunately for myself and the Town, we were not aware of the wetlands on the back portion of our lot. It was quite the surprise when the APA came and made that judgment. Now we're in the process of making changes to comply with all the setbacks, Town Codes, drainage and all the other standards. I've given you updated drawings on the Site Plan, the paperwork, a detailed course of action to sufficiently handle the water runoff so as not to adversely effect the wetlands. The wetlands is our top priority, taking care of the wetlands, now that we know they are there. We don't want to make any adverse effect to them. We want to get all the impermeable 24 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) water runoff away from the wetlands so they don't go into the wetlands. I've proposed a drainage system there as far as getting all the back roof runoff away from the wetlands into a different area, the recharge basin, but like I said, we didn't expect this. The Town didn't expect this. There's houses existing around us. It's been quite the financial hardship on the family. It's been tough, but I've spoken with the Town. I said we're going to work together. We're going to get through this, and hopefully we can complete this project. As far as budget overruns, there's been many cost overruns, due to the changes that we've had to make. The septic system alone has been increased in cost. These new drainage proposals are all increased in cost, engineering costs have gone up, surveying increases. So we're going to do everything we can to comply with all the rules, but knowing that there is a financial effect here on what we're trying to do, and we do have proposed landscaping. Since the mound is in the front yard, which we didn't anticipate, it's a Wisconsin system. It's a low, three foot high mound. I propose putting shrubs along the west side of it to try and hide it from the neighbor's view. There is a concern about property value. I was concerned, in the beginning, of property value. I do not have any concern anymore. I feel the system, the way it sits, as far as a septic system, not that this is your department, but how I'm going to be able to manipulate the slope on it and kind of blend it in to the landscape, plus with the use of shrubberies, it shouldn't adversely effect anybody's property in the neighborhood. Plus my main concern is my property value. It has a effected it some, just the fact that I have a third of my lot now is wetlands, but I think, overall, I'll be happy with the situation when I get done. I guess that's it. I don't want to take up much of your time, but I do want to get this through. I'm not sure what the process is. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Well, thank you. I guess the next part is we would ask questions and go from there. MR. SEVERANCE-Okay. All right. MR. HUNSINGER-Questions, comments from the Board? MR. SEGULJIC-So how did you get here, no one knew there were wetlands on site? MR. SEVERANCE-No one knew there were wetlands on the property. There's, it's not on any of the mapping. Before I bought the property I researched it as far as perc ability, deep hole testing. I knew it was going to need a mound system right from the beginning, before I purchased it. There's houses around us that technically are now in violation because they don't meet the setbacks of the wetland, but none of us knew there were wetlands there. MR. SEGULJIC-So, you gave us a map tonight. So you've done these test pits then. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. Now I just have, I can feel for you, but I do have a few issues, not so much with you, but with the process. You got a septic system permit prior? MR. SEVERANCE-Prior, yes. MR. SEGULJIC-Now how did you ever get a permit when the Code says you need two test pits, but you only showed one in the area of the septic fields. MR. SEVERANCE-Well, my engineer did all of the drawing of the original septic system, which was placed in the back of the house, which was placed in what we now know is the wetlands. MR. SEGULJIC-I'm just concerned that this comes from the Health Department. They're issuing, you know, permits that don't follow their own rules. MR. KREBS-That's not Randy's fault. MR. SEGULJIC-I know. I know. I understand that. MR. KREBS-The Town gave them a building permit, too. MR. SEGULJIC-And that's another concern. You got a building permit for a building site in the Lake George CEA and the Lake George basin. Now I drive by that site a lot, and your impervious surface is greater than 1,000 square feet and it looks like you impacted more than 5,000 square feet. Which means you need a stormwater permit according to 25 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) 147, and the Town said nothing to you about that, and you went to the Zoning Administrator, the building permit. They didn't say anything. MR. SEVERANCE-No, sir. MR. SEGULJIC-I'm upset with them because they're not following the Codes we have in the Town. If they followed them, you would have had all the stormwater controls in place and it would have been a lot smoother. MR. SEVERANCE-The lot would not have been purchased. If things went correctly, there would be no house being built on there. MR. SEGULJIC-Also, the other thing is you're supposed to show a 50% reserve area for a septic field, and that's not shown. MR. SEVERANCE-I think, I'm not an engineer, but I don't know if, I believe, in the writing. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, there's plenty of room for it, but you're just supposed to show it, and the other curious thing is, on your original drawing it says engineer waiver. Per Section 75A.44, New York State DOH Wastewater Treatment Standards, and I think that's a 10 foot buffer requirement? I mean, the engineer just got himself a waiver. Is that what that's saying? MR. SEVERANCE-I believe my engineer was concerned about putting the toe of the septic right up against the property line. Mr. Mike Shaw with the Department of Health didn't quite see it the same way, but he wanted it in there, so it was put in there. As far as the 50% reserve capacity, I believe it was mentioned. I don't know if it's in any writing, but it was mentioned that if that system were to failed, it would have to be replaced where it is. It would have to be removed and rebuilt in the same location, due to the fact that there is such limited space on that lot. MR. SEGULJIC-I don't mean to beat you up. It's the process. MR. SEVERANCE-No, I understand. Yes. MR. OBORNE-If I can chime in on this, this, and I'm not going to throw Mr. Severance under the bus here, but maybe I am. Typically when the Building Department gets building permits, they don't run out and see if there's wetlands. There were no wetlands on the maps. There was stormwater controls with this permit. The only way that this was found out was through a neighbor. MR. SEVERANCE-Anonymous phone call. MR. OBORNE-An anonymous phone call pointing that out. Once that was found out, okay, but there are no maps in the Town record that state that there are wetlands on there. Yes, it's in a CEA. That doesn't automatically trigger it. MR. SEGULJIC-That should at least trigger a 147 review, and there's a stream on the map right behind the building. MR. OBORNE-147 review would be kicking over 15,000 square feet. That's my understanding, for a major stormwater. MR. SEGULJIC-That would make it major. MR. OBORNE-Right. MR. SEGULJIC-For it to be minor is 1,000 square feet of new impervious area, because I believe your house footprint is over 1,000, like 1200 square feet, and 5,000 square feet of disturbed soil. MR. OBORNE-Okay. Well, I can't speak to that. MR. SEGULJIC-And I believe you disturb more than 5,000, you've got to disturb more than 5,000. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes. 26 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SEGULJIC-It's the Code, but I'm all set. I spoke my piece. I feel better. MR. HUNSINGER-The plan that you gave us this evening was really helpful in sort of laying out the issue. How wet is the wetlands? MR. SEVERANCE-That's the other thing. Unfortunately, I hate to say it, but before we knew there were wetlands, we had bulldozer all through there, not sinking in. Actually we were in the process of building our mound system that we originally had planned and approved, which was back in, wetlands as we know it now. He was not sinking in at all. It was, I've walk through it. It's not wet. I mean, that was that particular time of the year, which was September, October, even August it was not wet, but I imagine in the Spring perhaps it is, wetter, but it didn't seem like it was an issue. MR. KREBS-Well, you know, Chris, generally, it isn't how wet the ground is. MR. HUNSINGER-I know. That's why I asked the question. Yes. Well, because I used to live off Ridge Road, and similar soil conditions and, you know, there was part of the backyard, a couple of months out of the year, would be, you know, too wet to like play on the grass, but, you know, or even to mow, but the other nine or ten months out of the year, you know it was lawn, I mean. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes, well, the APA said I can mow it when I get the grass up, whatever that means. MR. HUNSINGER-So that's why I asked the question. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes. I was fascinated. I put the grass seed down. That's another thing. I did comply. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, I saw that on your notes, yes. MR. SEVERANCE-I did everything they requested immediately, and the grass was starting to come up, so I asked him and he said, sure, you can mow it. I was kind of shocked but okay. If I can claim it as yard, I don't know if I can, but if I can mow the lawn back there, that would be nice. MR. HUNSINGER-Interesting. Other questions, comments from members of the Board? MR. KREBS-My comment is, nothing against this, but as a community, and not only our community, but many, many communities, are going to have to face this. We're going to have to put sewer systems in, because you put the roads in, the roads create blockage, where you had a natural drainage, you don't have a natural drainage anymore, or you put roads in, and the water drains off the roads and creates a wet spot, and then the APA comes along and says, look at this, it's a wetland. Well, it was created. MR. SEGULJIC-Pardon me, it's a mapped stream. You will see it as a stream on maps. There's a ravine there. So, just to clarify that. MR. KREBS-I'm not saying there isn't a ravine, but I'm saying that before all the other development, it changes. MR. SEVERANCE-It changes, yes. MR. KREBS-And we're going to see a lot of this because in the farming areas, where farmers used to, in order to keep their fields from getting too wet, they used to put drainage at the edge of the field, and they're not farming anymore so we're not putting those drains in anymore, and we're going to have a lot of wetlands. MR. TRAVER-And Quaker Road's a good example. MR. KREBS-Absolutely. MR. SEVERANCE-Okay. MR. KREBS-It's a comment not on this, but in general I see happening. MR. HUNSINGER-So what's the will of the Board? This, again, is a recommendation to the Zoning Board. 27 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SEGULJIC-Do we have a public comment on this? MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to say, we do have a public hearing scheduled. Is there anyone in the audience that wants to address the Board on this project? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. OBORNE-I do have comment. MR. HUNSINGER-You do have a written comment? MR. OBORNE-Yes. "Hi, Keith. Thanks for taking time to explain the process concerning the variance application for a Wisconsin mound system. As I mentioned, my wife and I are upset about how a plan was submitted for this and no wetland was shown. If anyone had walked that lot, they surely would have noticed the wetland on the south side and with a 2360 square foot residence with other required setbacks, any septic leaching field would be difficult. The review process for the permit was obviously not followed carefully and the Town should take responsibility for that. With that being said, we understand that not allowing Mr. Severance to install the mound system and not complete his residence, the eyesore would be worse. Therefore my wife and I would be agreeable to the system as long as the Zoning Board requires a completely obscure view from any angle. We feel the Town needs to be far more diligent in reviewing proposed planning and requirements and everyone be held to the same standards. Respectfully, Mace & Sue Comora 4 Knolls Road South" I have one more. To The Town of Queensbury, from Mr. and Mrs. David Kovacs, 20 Fox Road. Issues before various boards concerning construction by Randy & Cindy Severance at 7 Fox Road "To Whom It May Concern, With regard to a petition of neighbors submitted by Mr. Severance concerning the construction of a Wisconsin Mound septic system at 7 Fox Rd., I would like to go on record as having never been approached at any time by Mr. Severance on this matter or any other. My wife and I have resided at 20 Fox Road since April 2007. We live immediately next to the Lewins at 12 Fox Road. It appears that the majority of the neighbors who signed on to Mr. Severance's petition are not visually impacted by such a system. We live across the street and have a diagonal view of 7 Fox Road. Unlike many who may be unfamiliar with such a septic system, my wife and I have a family member who, in fact has such a system in the front lawn of her home. The mound is app. 2-3 feet above the surrounding lawn surface and is very unsightly. Aside from its appearance, the homeowner cannot plant anything on the mound whatsoever. Any and all attempts to disguise or otherwise hide the mound must be done with rather extensive landscaping and/or stonework around the mound's perimeter, thus making lawn maintenance and overall care somewhat difficult. Should a landscaping plan be considered, height requirements will be necessary if the mound is to be concealed or otherwise hidden. Since 7 Fox Road is a corner lot intersecting with Ridge Road (Route 9L) said height requirements will have to be somewhat restricted so as to afford motorists entering Ridge Road from Fox Road adequate vision to assure their safe entry. Prior to building our house at 20 Fox Road, we had visited Queensbury quite frequently over a 3 year period specifically looking for a place to build our retirement home. Finally, we found an available lot in the Cherry Ridge development, purchased it and proceeded to build. Looking back, had we entered Fox Road and found that the very first house on the street had such a septic system in its front lawn, we would not have entertained building a home in this particular development. Our greatest concern in this matter is the potential devaluation to our home and property should approval be given to construct the septic system in question. We strongly urge the town government and its various boards to first consider the protection of our property rights and values prior to approving Mr. Severance's application. We would like our concerns to be made part of the record in this matter and be considered at any and all meetings that may come about regarding 7 Fox Road. Sincerely, David P. Kovacs Penny Kovacs" I do have more. 2/13/09, that is the date, Town of Queensbury, John Whalen this is from. "Concerning the 2/17/09 and 2/23/09 public hearings of the Planning Board and Board of Health of the applications of Randy Severance for variance and approvals of hard surfacing, construction and sewage disposal adjacent to a wetland and side and front property setbacks. I am the owner of the property directly opposite, and to the north of 7 Fox Road. I am in favor of Randy Severance receiving approvals on all of the variances he has requested. I do not believe construction of a mound system will affect property values and feel it is in the best interest of the people along Fox Road and Queensbury to have these applications approved as presented, and to have this home completed and landscaped as soon as possible. Thank you, John Whalen" And I know I have one more in here. I don't have the other one. It was from a Mr. Lewin who discussed, had the same problems as Mr. Kovacs, I believe. Again, I don't see it here and I apologize, and 28 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) that will most likely be read into the record tomorrow night. It will be read into the record tomorrow night at the ZBA meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. What's the will of the Board on this one? MR. SEGULJIC-Well, what exactly is the ZBA asking for? MR. OBORNE-Actually, if I may, if I could finish this last one. MR. HUNSINGER-No, go ahead. MR. OBORNE-Just to complete, I apologize 12 Fox Road, Queensbury, New York, February 13t". Reference Randy Severance issues with the various Boards, OVERVIEW: Prior to the purchase of and town permits being issued Mr. Severance was advised of the water problems that existed on the lot 266.1-20.T The Town issued a permit to build on plans that were presented which did not show a Wetland, which then triggered this process. The applicant has now placed all in a position of forced compromise as none of us will be happy with an unfinished house sitting on a lot at the entrance to Fox Rd. All of this could have been averted if the plans were correct at the project's inception. From 12 Fox Rd. perspective there is one major issue at hand and that is the Wisconsin Mound System which has a visual impact for 12 Fox Rd. once constructed. We are the most impacted neighbor to this project's visual appearance. The loss on property value as a result of this eyesore should not be burdened by the neighborhood. I spoke with the applicant on this very issue who agreed there would be a property loss and understood this concern. The unanswered question that was not resolved is who should take the loss??? I requested in Nov. 09 a drawing or landscaping plan showing how the Visual Impact was going to be eliminated. I have not seen a plan nor do I see a plan in the Town Folder nor did Keith Oborne have any information on the issue. 12 FOX RD PERSPECTIVE: I request for consideration that a Landscaping plan is presented showing how the applicant intends to negate the visual impact for 12 Fox Rd. My family object to walking out the front door to look at a mound system of this magnitude. The Plan should be surveyed from 12 Fox Rd. <front door location> for the height of vegetation that is needed so we do not see the mound. Installation of height mandate to be done prior to issuance of any certificate of Occupancy. As we look at the front and west side of the mound a proper landscaping plan with Stipulated height should be mandated within the permit process. We therefore have no problem with a mound system this being our compromise providing the properties landscaping issue is addressed and mandated. I invite all the board members and staff during their inspections of this project to come to my front door and look at the situation and how it would look from our vantage point. As for the Setback of 0 feet from the front, the further back this mound is the more accommodation for the landscaping would be advantageous to the final outcome. ENTRANCE TO FOX RD. AND CHERRY RIDGE: Appropriate landscaping should be provided so this mound has no visual impact from the drive bys or anyone living in the area. In reference the petition of neighbors obtained by the Applicant. I wish to make the case that all except one are not impacted by the project. The prior owner of the lot who signed the petition does not even reside in Cherry Ridge. I would guesstimate that most neighbors would not know what a Wisconsin Mound system even looks like, and of course if you're not immediately affected then the issue becomes moot. Four years ago we purchased 12 Fox Rd. If there was a mound system across the road that Purchase would not have happened. Now we face a property devaluation unless the boards in question thru their infinite wisdom can make some accommodations to protect just that, our property value. This is a self inflicted problem by the applicant. I now ask that the town government intervene and make proper judgment in protecting our property value and rights. Sincerely, Peter Lewin" And that's it. MR. HUNSINGER-You should probably read into the record the petition as well. MR. SCHONEWOLF-There was a petition with eight names on it. MR. OBORNE-Would you care to read that in? MR. SCHONEWOLF-No, but it should be in the record. As long as it's in the record. You don't have to read it. MR. OBORNE-That's fine. MR. HUNSINGER-We all have copies of it. 29 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SCHONEWOLF-We all have copies of it. MR. HUNSINGER-The Zoning Board has requested a recommendation from Planning Board concerning the setback variances requested, relative to the wetlands on the site. MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-It would then come back to the Planning Board for Site Plan Review, is that my understanding? MR. OBORNE-That's correct, yes. MR. HUNSINGER-As well as the construction within 50 feet of the wetland. Okay. MR. OBORNE-Well, that's the zoning that they're going for. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Would anyone like to put forward a recommendation? MR. SEGULJIC-In the package we got, we had a drawing dated July 2008 that mapped the wetlands. MR. SEVERANCE-July 2008. MR. SEGULJIC-That seems to be the Board of Health's concerns. MR. SEVERANCE-It is. The date's got to be off on it. I think what happened is Van Dusen and Steves, there should be, that was updated. They were out there so many times. MR. SEGULJIC-This says date July 16tH MR. SEVERANCE-Is there any updated? MR. SEGULJIC-Well, there's a lot of updates after. MR. SEVERANCE-Well, check the updated date, please, and I think it should say that wetlands were updated. MR. SEGULJIC-There it is. Okay. I was just curious how this whole thing came about. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes. No, Van Dusen and Steves had to go out there about four or five times. MR. SEGULJIC-Painfully? MR. SEVERANCE-Well, yes, financially. MRS. STEFFAN-Just for the record, there are a lot of mound systems in Vermont, all over Vermont, and I've seen some beautifully landscaped mound systems in people's front yards. MR. SEVERANCE-I agree totally. MRS. STEFFAN-So they can be camouflaged very nicely. MR. SEVERANCE-Yes, and they will be, and it will be, and I'm just glad a Wisconsin system was finally resolved on, and that is it just a three foot mound, and my neighbors right next door to me are perfectly fine with it. MRS. STEFFAN-So the only thing that we're making a recommendation on is granting the setback? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, granting the setback, the setback variance. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. MOTION TO RECOMMEND TO THE ZONING BOARD OF APPEALS ON BEHALF OF THE PLANNING BOARD FOR AREA VARIANCE 4-2009, SITE PLAN NO. 5-2009 AND FRESHWATER WETLANDS PERMIT NO. 2-2009 FOR RANDY SEVERANCE. THE 30 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) PLANNING BOARD IS IN SUPPORT OF GRANTING THE SETBACK VARIANCE FOR THIS APPLICANT, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Thomas Seguljic: Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. HUNSINGER-Good luck. MR. SEVERANCE-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 64-2007 SEAR TYPE II BRIAN MC CALL AGENT(S) ALBERT MUGRACE OWNER(S) SAME ZONING HC-INTENSIVE LOCATION 274 QUAKER ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES ADDITION OF TWO WORK BAYS & STORAGE FOR TIRE WAREHOUSE. AUTO REPAIR AND RETAIL USES IN THE HC ZONE REQUIRE PLANNING BOARD REVIEW AND APPROVAL. CROSS REFERENCE AV 1-08, AV - 07, SV 59-01, SP 44-98 WARREN CO. PLANNING 1/9/08 LOT SIZE 0.58 ACRES, 0.09 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 302.8-1-39, 38 SECTION 179-4-020 ALBERT MUGRACE, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Since Keith stepped out, I'll summarize Staff Notes. Project Description: The applicant proposes to construct a 1,890 square foot addition to an existing structure on Quaker Road. The addition will include two (2) work bays and storage for tires. Staff Comments: Area Variance 1-2008 was approved on June 18, 2008. The applicant has reduced the size of the proposal from 2,550 square feet to 1,890 square feet and from three (3) work bays to two (2) work bays. The addition of two parking spaces has been provided for per 179-4-040, Table 5. Further, the new parking configuration should provide for smoother site circulation than previously proposed. Currently, the area to be built on has 5 storage containers for used tires. These containers are in violation of section 179-5-020. Ostensibly, these structures will no longer serve a purpose and be removed prior to construction. The floor is yours. Good evening. MR. MUGRACE-Good evening. My name is Albert Mugrace. I'm the architect for Tire Warehouse. I have here plans that I'd like to distribute at this point. They contain changes that we made based on a letter that we received from VISION Engineering on Friday. MR. HUNSINGER-If you could just go through the changes first, before you submit the. MR. MUGRACE-Yes. We could go through them, but if you wish to have these plans so that you can look at them. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, I mean, typically we don't accept new information the night of a meeting. MR. MUGRACE-Okay. I brought them because of a conversation that I had with Keith. MR. OBORNE-I will admit, I did ask him to bring it, with the hopes that you would possibly take a look at it, and again, no promises. I think if he goes through the plans, which I talked to Mr. Mugrace this morning, and he seems to have taken care of quite a few of the issues. Maybe if he can walk you through the issues that Dan Ryan has, without giving you the plans, maybe that would be fine, and then after the fact you could take the plans. MR. HUNSINGER-That's what I was suggesting, yes. MR. MUGRACE-That's fine. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. 31 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. MUGRACE-Let me just refer to the board here. The changes that we made, based on, you know, trying to improve the design of the site, and the accessibility, circulation and so on, and also based on the meetings that we had with the Zoning Board, include shrinking the size of the addition, both in width and in length as well. We moved parking from this location on the west side of the site to the rear of the addition, and we resolved the issue of the parking, without having to go for a variance. So we meet the requirements for parking. We're trying to improve accessibility in the rear of the building by reconfiguring this road in the back. We introduced some green space here, along with the parking here, and we have the trash receptacle in this particular area right there. We also are going to improve this area right here with some plantings and some green space, and those were the, you know, the primary changes that we made to the site. The variance obviously was granted for the FAR, which it's only about less than 900 square feet above the required Floor Area Ratio. MRS. STEFFAN-What about the soil tests that was mentioned in VISION Engineering's comments? MR. MUGRACE-Yes. The soil tests we ran basically through weather difficulties, you know, and granted we could do something now, but it's going to be, you know, it's best achieved if we did it in the Springtime, and I think that we pretty much agree on that, with the engineer, the Town Engineer. MR. OBORNE-Well, I don't know what Dan Ryan says. I know that a backhoe can be pulled out and he could do test pits, but you certainly want to, with the Homer Avenue project that's on board with this, you want to do this either in the winter or in the Fall. You don't want to do it during the heavy rain seasons and melt. So it would behoove you to do it as soon as possible. Talk to Dan about that. He's the one that has to sign off on it. MR. MUGRACE-Yes. From what I understand, Dan has been in communication with Deb Meyers who's our engineer that's doing the, you know, the design of the system. MR. OBORNE-Just for the Board's knowledge, you don't necessarily need to wait until the Spring to do test pits. You certainly can do them during the winter. MR. MUGRACE-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Questions, comments from the Board? MR. SCHONEWOLF-What percentage of that drainage project is complete and is connected to this land? MR. OBORNE-Well, zero is complete at this point, as far as it being taken care of. I believe that Tire Warehouse is the only one waiting to get on board, and from what I understand, the Town's paying a quarter of it. Minogue's is paying a quarter of it. Adelphia or Time Warner's paying a quarter of it and McCall's paying a quarter of it. Now I believe about 80% of the project is on the Tire Warehouse property. Now those percentages might be skewed a little bit, but my understanding is that we need signoff from Tire Warehouse before this moves forward. MRS. STEFFAN-And that's the piece in the front that's got the significant erosion? MR. OBORNE-And the whole pipe needs to be replaced right through the property. MRS. STEFFAN-Right. Okay. BOB MC CARTHY MR. MC CARTHY-I'm Bob McCarthy of counsel. That's actually not completely true. There was litigation with a homeowner down towards the end. MR. OBORNE-Miss Sullivan, yes. MR. MC CARTHY-In this area. There was a court conference last week, I think it was last week or early this week. So it's not necessarily just us. I had spoken to the Town. I needed a construction schedule and I haven't been provided with a construction schedule because my client is just concerned about most of the brunt of the work will be on his project, and it was discussed whether or not this could be done on a weekend, can it be done on a Sunday or so, haven't heard back from them. So it's not that we're 32 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) stalling anything. You still have litigation. You have the homeowner who's really starting this, who hasn't been resolved yet, and then you have this other issue, but everyone seems to be on board with it in theory. It just hasn't been done. It was Friday, the court conference. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. MC CARTHY-I just got a letter from the attorney for the homeowner, Mr. Burgess, wrote me a letter and advised me of what was going on. I'm the general counsel. There is an insurance company counsel that's handling that particular matter. So I wasn't at the conference. That's why I don't have the exact date. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-One of the comments from VISION Engineering was regarding the proposed parking at the rear should include measures to protect the building from vehicles. MR. MUGRACE-Yes. This, you know, we revised this drawing to show actual wheel curbs, concrete wheel curbs, and they're shown on this new plan right here. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. So they'd just be low to the ground. MR. MUGRACE-Exactly. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, okay. MR. MC CARTHY-What Mr. Mugrace was just going through coincides with everything on the letter, everything that was drafted in the letter of February 11t" is on the new plan, and he just went through it in maybe a different order. MRS. STEFFAN-Well, that's great, because, you know, one of the notes that I made here is that we have too many outstanding issues between Staff Notes and VISION Engineering comments. So, as we prepare for meetings, you know, you go through the plans and there are so many outstanding things that, you know, I certainly thought, coming into the meeting today, that it would be tabled to address all of these issues, and so if your drawings are complete and have addressed this. MR. MC CARTHY-If you'd like, we can go through it a little bit line by line to make it easier for you. MRS. STEFFAN-Because I think that, in that situation, then the outstanding issue, for example, the soil test that has to be conducted, you know, if you could do that in short order, then we might be able to get you on an agenda fairly quickly for an approval, as long as you have all these conditions met. This process, I know that we've been, seen you for a while. This application has been around for a while. So, you know, it sounds like we've got a lot of things resolved, but we need to have everything wrapped up so that we can get you the next step. MR. MUGRACE-Do you want to go through the VISION Engineering items first? MRS. STEFFAN-Yes. MR. MUGRACE-Number One the sentence that's in bold here, he requests that a note be placed on the plan that all proposed site drainage shall be coordinated with the Town Engineer prior to construction. Now we put the note on the new plan. It's already there, and it's also on the two plans that the engineer prepared. This is a Site Plan, basically shows the planametrics. The engineer has two additional drawings here, okay, and if you'd like to I can submit this. MRS. STEFFAN-Actually, since you've made the corrections that you're walking us through right now, if you just, when you hand those off to Keith, he'll make sure that when the Site Plan comes before us for the approval, we'll have copies of all of that. So, you know, if all these things are satisfied. MR. MUGRACE-The steel storage containers on site, again, are an issue, obviously, and we were asked to, again, provide a note on the drawing that states that the, you know, that a note should be provided on the plans that the no steel storage containers are allowed on the site without obtaining approval from the Town of Queensbury Planning 33 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) Board, and that's Note Number Four here on the new drawing that we prepared. Number Three, the proposed parking at the rear of the building should include measures to protect the building, and as I stated before, we have introduced parking wheel stops for that. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. Parking Space Nine with the dumpsters? MR. MUGRACE-Parking Space Nine conflicts with access to the dumpster. I think that there was, you know, some miscommunication there. The dumpster, I prepared some drawings here which detail how the dumpster is to be placed and where and accessibility for a truck, you know, to get it in and out of the dumpster enclosure, and it's all detailed on this drawing, okay. MRS. STEFFAN-So that covers Five, too. MR. MUGRACE-Yes. Six, the site drainage pipe connection to the proposed Town culvert should be designed to highest elevation possible. This is an issue that the engineer has taken care of on his drawings. It's already been taken care of. Number Seven, setbacks required should be shown on the plans for the new addition. Those are the basic 50 foot requirement for both sides, and 25 foot requirements, and I did put a note on my drawing here, that's all that is, I guess. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-And then a bulk table showing the required and proposed zoning information should be included on the Site Plan. We also took care of that with a note showing the FAR and, you know, the Area Variance that was granted for the FAR, and it's a spelled out here on the drawing, again. That was Number Eight, right? MRS. STEFFAN-Yes, and Nine we just talked about, that soil test has got to be done. MR. MUGRACE-Yes, Nine we just talked about. Ten, Eleven and Twelve are all engineering, part of the civil engineering design and they've all been taken care of in these drawings, again, Drawing One and Drawing Two, which were prepared by Meyers Engineers, you know, in terms of the maintenance and we moved the manhole. Number Eleven specifically refers to this manhole right here. Originally we had it following the property line, but we moved over about a couple of feet or so, so it doesn't interfere with the other property, and, Number Twelve, it's sediment control measures, which are identified on these drawings. MR. HUNSINGER-How about some of the Staff comments. Did you address the Staff comments as well? MRS. STEFFAN-The snow issue and the traffic flow, consolidation of. MR. MUGRACE-Yes. MR. MC CARTHY-I think those were addressed this evening, (lost word) the building down. As you've indicated (lost words) numerous times before, we're in the CEA, and most of those have been addressed. How we have the parking now, and we have the building shorter. I don't know what more the Board's requesting or asking that we can do. MRS. STEFFAN-Have the parcels been consolidated? MR. MC CARTHY-I prepared, I talk to the Town about two months ago. He advised me I can do that today, subject to, I've prepared the deeds. I have the deed description. So it's just a question of print on the computer and have it taken care of, but I was told I can do it, you know, like the day after approvals by Mr. Craig Brown. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. Craig Brown the Zoning Administrator. Okay, and do you have the construction sequencing on the plan now? MR. MUGRACE-The construction sequence was addressed also on these plans. The engineer and Dan Ryan discussed it and it's on the plans. MRS. STEFFAN-How about the snow storage? 34 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. MUGRACE-The snow storage, we did put a note here that it's going to take place in the front of the property, right in this area here, which is where they, you know, they're pretty much using now, if I'm not mistaken. MRS. STEFFAN-This year has certainly been a challenge. Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Any other questions or comments from the members of the Board? We do have a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone in the audience that wanted to address the Board on this application? You have a letter? PUBLIC HEARING OPEN MR. OBORNE-Yes, I do. This is from Tammy J. Sullivan, 18 Homer Avenue, Queensbury. "Dear Mr. Hunsinger: In connection with the above referenced matter," (Brian McCall Site Plan approval) "I oppose approval for any and all construction on this property or any property in the immediate area. Please be advised that the applicant and other parties are defendants in a civil action which I commenced relating to flooding/stormwater issues related to this property and surrounding area. Specifically, the repeated flooding of my property has been caused by an inadequate culvert system which passes underneath a portion of the applicant's property. From what I understand, the applicant is the only defendant that has not yet signed a draft written agreement that has been circulating between the Town of Queensbury, Time Warner Cable, Tire Warehouse, and M.T. Minogue, Inc., which allocates the breakdown in cost to replace the culvert system in question between the parties. I believe approval on this project will increase flooding in the area as the existing culvert is inadequate to handle the present flow of water. Unless the applicant is planning to address the culvert/flooding issues currently being litigated, prior to the proposed construction, I request that approval for any further construction of any kind in this area be denied. Very truly yours, Tammy Sullivan" MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MR. OBORNE-And that's it. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. ROB DOAN MR. DOAN-My name is Rob Doan, owner of the Adirondack Wine Merchants, and the property just to the east of the McCall property. My biggest concern is obviously traffic flow on the existing site and on the right of way that's to the rear of the property. That is a shared access with not only Minogues and Cablevision or Time Warner, but also Tom Ross and myself. I think when you look at things, when you look at the ZBA, what they did, every one of them on the ZBA, suggested that they've outgrown their site. I think my comment only is that they have, in fact, outgrown their site. The number of storage containers that they have and the square footage of those containers is far greater than what they're looking to add on. Again, I said this before in front of you guys, and I'll say it again, I don't have a problem with them increasing their business if it doesn't have a derrogtory impact on my property. We've gone to some lengths, which I'm sure you're quite aware of at this point, to protect our property as best we can, and I just want all of you to know that we're going to continue to do that as best we can, certainly within the guides of the law and certainly not trying to do anything or pull the wool over anybody's eyes. A lot of the information that has been presented to both the ZBA and to you guys may be accurate, may not be accurate. I think the best way to take a look at this project is to actually spend some time down there and look at the flow of traffic. Rob Minogue, I was here, and he put forth a lot of pictures, both to the ZBA and to you folks, and they're pretty straightforward. My biggest concern is the detriment to the property value next door, that being ours. Minogues, Time Warner, Tom Ross, they all may have their issues, I'm not here to speak about them. As long as you guy take a look, sincerely, at the traffic flow, how it is right now. As Jeff Meyer pointed out, who's representing me and still is, but he's not here, that there's a lot of stuff that you guys (lost word) didn't ask to happen in '97 for that Site Plan, '97, '98, for that Site Plan approval, that to this point still isn't done. I don't see how it makes sense to approve a new Site Plan without having those, 11 years later, completed. It raises a number of questions. As the letter pointed out, and as Staff pointed out, that there are, and nuances aside or timing aside, there are four parties that are involved in that lawsuit. One of them sits behind me and has not acknowledged either cooperation with the Town or the other two players. It just is an interesting fact, I think, and I am more than willing, and would be helpful as much as I can to help you guys see that the site, as it sits right now, is too small to capacitate the 35 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) building and the way the business operates. Their parking and their snowplowing in the front may or may not be on their property. I think somebody should take a look at the County line and see if not they're plowing onto the County property between Quaker Road and their property, and if, in fact, they're not parking cars there. That being said, you guys are the rules. So that's pretty much all I have to say. Thank you for your time. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Thank you. MRS. STEFFAN-Thank you. MR. MC CARTHY-Just a few comments on the comment period. With regards to the litigation, it's my understanding that the homeowner is looking for compensation, actual dollars compensation. Secondly, this plan does not proceed without that drainage system. That drainage system is part of the plan. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. MC CARTHY-So it's not in our best interest of that doesn't proceed. All of these (lost words) is running into there. MR. SCHONEWOLF-So three people have signed off on the drainage project and one hasn't. Is that what you're telling us? MR. MC CARTHY-No, no one has signed off on it. We've all talked about it, and I have a draft of the document. Everyone's had a draft of the document. You have litigation that's still pending, that I'm told that the woman is looking for monetary compensation for the damage to her house. Regardless of who's fault it was, if it was Time Warner's fault, the County's fault on changing the road across the street, but Hoffman's is an issue of whether or not that changed the flow of things. So, you know, you have someone that's looking for not only repair but also compensation. So that's an issue, and then as I've said, I've spoken to the Town and have asked for some type of schedule as to when we're going to look to do this and my client is the only one that's going to be affected by this in the actual building. I haven't gotten a response yet. So it's not a situation that this is not going to happen. It's out of my hands, it's out of my client's hands as to the extent that an insurance carrier for Time Warner, ourselves and the third party is going to have to figure out how much money their going to put up to make the homeowner happy. MR. HUNSINGER-The last commentator that came up had brought up a letter that goes, it's actually dated February 26, 2008, from his attorney, and one of the issues that was in there was regarding the width of the right of way that extends across the back of the property lines. Were those issues ever resolved? MR. MC CARTHY-I believe so. I mean, we have a survey. We meet all the requirements, but (lost words) you were specifically referring to, but that attorney was here on one of the numerous times we were here. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. I remember we spent a lot of time talking about it. MR. MC CARTHY-We addressed, I believe, all of his concerns. I mean, he's not here, so I can't really comment on what he's looking for. I know, with regards to this gentleman's place, he put boulders up all along the property line. So, and anything my client does is not going to affect his property. He can't get around it, but once again, it is a tight situation. Mr. Minogue has brought you pictures of times in which, you know, people were on his side, I've brought you the same pictures that his truck pulls up and a forklift goes on the back of the truck, they drive on our property, and deliver, you know, I've been there on Memorial Day. I've been there on Labor Day. That place is packed. My client's closed, and there's customers parked all over the place. I mean, we're trying to be a good neighborhood. We're not making an issue of that. If it happens, we'll do everything in our power. With that said, on one side, we can't do anything more because the pole is there. The other side, you know, we don't want to be a bad neighbor. Unfortunately, it is very tight but it meets all the requirements. MR. HUNSINGER-I mean, one of the things that the Comprehensive Land Use Plan encourages is right of ways between commercial properties so that you can go from one commercial use to another without having to go back out onto the roadways. MR. MUGRACE-We're actually (lost words) interconnect. MR. MC CARTHY-That was actually required, I think, by this Board. 36 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. MC CARTHY-And we put them in. One of them you can't use because (lost words). MR. MUGRACE-But they are there. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-Well, one of the theories behind that is, if it's not an option today, as long as it can be an option in the future, if there's re-development, that, you know, for example, if the boulders got removed, then there would be the opportunity for interconnects. Okay. MR. HUNSINGER-So where are we? MRS. STEFFAN-Well, there's two big things that have to be done. There's the test pits. MR. MC CARTHY-The request was that the test pits be done, witnessed by the Town Engineer. That's not necessarily something that needs to occur immediately. So what we were hoping for, in conjunction with the whole project, is to get this moving as soon as possible, with the provision that obviously we would have the engineer there during the test pits. MRS. STEFFAN-Well, that can certainly be a condition for approval. MR. OBORNE-If I may, if you are leaning towards a conditional approval, are you not? MRS. STEFFAN-No. They have to come back. MR. OBORNE-Then I withdraw if I may, then. MRS. STEFFAN-I think that they need to come back to make sure that all the comments are satisfied. Obviously they have a plan to submit that they believe has addressed VISION Engineering, but we want them to make sure that the plan does address VISION Engineering comments, that it does address Staff comments, and then when we have that complete plan, then we'll be ready to the next step. MR. OBORNE-And for what it's worth, I mean, they've made great strides in recent time, and this project has to be vetted against the Homer Avenue project. There's no way around it. They're married. MR. MC CARTHY-I don't disagree. MR. OBORNE-Okay. So if you want action by the Planning Department or by Craig Brown to get this rolling, to get papers signed, whatever needs to happen, I will facilitate that to the best of my ability. MR. MC CARTHY-Unfortunately that's out of my control. You have a woman who's got a complaint that (lost words). MR. OBORNE-But that's separate from what the Town wants done. MR. MC CARTHY-Not really. I mean, it's all tied up together. You have different parties there that want the matter resolved complete. I mean, I understand what you're saying. I'm not going to be the one that doesn't go forward with that. I've looked at the agreement. There's something I still need from the Town, because of what I indicated, I haven't gotten a response to that yet. MR. OBORNE-Well, what is it that you need? MR. MC CARTHY-I need some type of construction schedule. The last we heard, we weren't even sure how it was going to be bid, whether or not the Town was going to bid it, whether or not it had to go out to bid. So there are lots of issues that we just don't know, but that is going to run directly down. MR. OBORNE-Right, and I will agree that not to communicate is not going to help, on either party's, whatever it is at this point, and again, I will do to the best of my ability to move this forward. AI and I are in pretty much weekly, we talk quite often. We facilitated 37 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) a meeting with your applicant, the two of us. We want to see this move forward in a big way, we really do. It's been going on for quite a while, before I even got here. So whatever I can do to move that forward I will, and I'll be in touch. I need to probably get in touch with you, if that's the case. So we can exchange cards and we'll go on from there. MR. TRAVER-So, Keith, it sounds as though the engineering side of it basically is set. It is rather the liability side and the who is going to enable that engineering, those plans to take place, in terms of funding and so on. That is the unresolved. MR. OBORNE-That is unresolved. I think that it is, and I don't want to misstep when I say this, it's three-quarters of the way there, but, you know, be that as it may, the design is in place. It does need to go out to bid. Is the Town Highway Department going to do it? We don't know, but one thing we do know is that this has to be done. MR. TRAVER-Right, and there's a plan to get it done. MR. OBORNE-Halfway Brook is being compromised, for lack of a better term, and litigation is not helping. That's for sure, but I'm probably overstepping my bounds. I'm just a lowly planner, but that's the way I feel. MR. HUNSINGER-Is there anything, in addition to the drawings that you have this evening, that you need to submit? MR. MC CARTHY-I believe that we have answered all of your comments, all the engineering and all the Staff comments, and I would only ask that if there is something new, that you could just let us know as soon as possible so we can address those issues, but once again, this project is subject to that entire litigation. I mean, that's part of our drainage system. So, if that doesn't go, we don't go. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. MUGRACE-And that was in conjunction with the (lost words). MR. HUNSINGER-How quickly would the temporary steel containers be removed from, following approval? MR. MC CARTHY-Relatively quickly because we're hoping to do the construction all together. We're hoping to have the Town come in, whoever's going to do that, do that part of it, you know, we clean it out, do that part of it, and then we'd start construction. So once it's down, you know, once the business is going to be down, it's down for a short period of time. That's the game plan, and that's why I'd asked for some type of construction, is this a week project, is this a month project? Is this going to be a weekend project? What I'm told is we don't know yet because we don't know who's doing it. If it's a contractor, he might do it on the weekend. If it's the Town, then obviously it'll probably be done during the week. So those are the same types of things we need to know. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. My thinking is that since today's the submission deadline for March, that we could put them in, and they submitted it. It's not close of business, but, you know, put them in one of the March meetings. MR. OBORNE-Yes. You have two to choose from, obviously. You have two spots open. MR. MC CARTHY-Whichever one has the first slot available. MRS. STEFFAN-The list is fairly long. I would say the 24tH MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. I will make a motion to table Site Plan 64-2007 for Brian McCall. This application is tabled to the March 24t" Planning Board meeting, so that the applicant can satisfy VISION Engineering comments as well as Staff comments provided. MR. OBORNE-If I may, could we have a submission date for that, for the new plans? MR. HUNSINGER-He's going to give them to you now. MR. MUGRACE-Partially. 38 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. OBORNE-Partial. Right. If it's not complete. MR. MUGRACE-No, all I've got is seven copies here. MR. OBORNE-I see what you're saying. Okay. MR. MUGRACE-The plans are done. MR. OBORNE-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-I assumed that they were done. That's why I didn't. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, that's why I asked the question. You just need more copies, is that the issue? MR. MUGRACE-We need more copies. We've only got seven here. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. OBORNE-Can we spell it out, and can we have all copies by February 20t", which would be Friday? MR. HUNSINGER-Is that okay? MR. MUGRACE-Yes. That's fine. MR. HUNSINGER-I was going to say, I'd look to you, Keith, for that date. MR. OBORNE-That's what, I really want that spelled out, if you could. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. Let me try that motion again. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 64-2007 BRIAN MC CALL, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: This application is tabled to the March 24t" Planning Board meeting, so that the applicant satisfy VISION Engineering comments as well as Staff Notes provided. The applicant, although they are submitting plans tonight, don't have the required number of copies, and so they will need to submit all the required copies to the Community Development Office by Friday, February 20tH Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Krebs, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Traver, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. HUNSINGER-And just let the record show that we did leave the public hearing open. We'll see you next month. MR. MUGRACE-Okay. Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 7-2007 MODIFICATION SEAR TYPE UNLISTED JOLLEY ASSOCIATES c/o SEAN CRUMB AGENT(S) BOHLER ENGINEERING OWNER(S) SAME ZONING HC INTENSIVE LOCATION 474 AVIATION ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES A MODIFICATION TO THEIR APPROVED SITE PLAN; SPECIFICALLY A CHANGE IN LIGHTING TYPE AND LOCATION. SITE PLAN MODIFICATIONS REQUIRE PLANNING BOARD REVIEW AND APPROVAL. CROSS REFERENCE BP 08-358, 446, 447, 499, 521, 601, 602; SV 2-09 WARREN CO. PLANNING 3/14/07 LOT SIZE 2.5 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 302.5-1-98 SECTION 179-4-020 MR. HUNSINGER-The applicant has requested that we table the application to a March meeting. Is there any additional information that we're looking for from them, other than what's in Staff comments? 39 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. OBORNE-No. They need to come in with cut sheets and lumens that are at least shown and within Code. I know that there are problems with the Exit 20 one. So, with that said, no, I don't think there's anything else that they're required, besides what you tabled them for last month. MRS. STEFFAN-I'd like to congratulate Staff on their Staff Notes. Just regarding the site lighting plan and the foot candles, 900% higher than what is allowed in the Code section, and I certainly think this warrants a review. MR. HUNSINGER-Well, I mean, I wonder if the applicant had the Staff comments, if they would want to submit new information, is a part of where I think I was going with that. MR. OBORNE-Well, I'm sure the applicant has the Staff comments, now, that were sent out. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, right. MR. OBORNE-I certainly can correspond with Mr. Crumb who I have a good relationship with. MRS. STEFFAN-I really think that, based on the comments, and that today is the application deadline for materials, I think that they should be tabled until the April meeting. MR. OBORNE-I can't disagree with you. Absolutely. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-Based on what we've got in backlog, I think that would be reasonable. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. We will have to deal with them one at a time. The first one is Site Plan 7-2007. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 7-2007 MODIFICATION JOLLEY ASSOCIATES c/o SEAN CRUMB, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Paul Schonewolf: For the 474 Aviation Road site. For two reasons. One that the applicant requested it, and Number Two, so that the applicant can satisfy the conditions on the prior tabling motion. We would like to table that until the first meeting in April which would be April 21St. That would mean they have an application deadline of March 16t" for new materials. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Schonewolf, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. HUNSINGER-And the same as the last project, let the record show that the public hearing was left open. SITE PLAN NO. 22-2007 MODIFICATION SEAR TYPE UNLISTED JOLLEY ASSOCIATES AGENT(S) NACE ENGINEERING OWNER(S) SAME ZONING HC- INT. LOCATION 1412 STATE ROUTE 9 APPLICANT PROPOSES A MODIFICATION TO THEIR APPROVED SITE PLAN. THE MODIFICATION IS TO ADD TWO BUILDING MOUNTED SITE LIGHTS AND THREE FLOOD LIGHTS ILLUMINATING THE JOLLEY NAME ON THE BUILDING FRONT. MODIFICATIONS TO APPROVED SITE PLANS REQUIRE REVIEW AND APPROVAL BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE SV 46-08 LOT SIZE 1.5 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 288.16-1-3 SECTION 179-4-020 MR. HUNSINGER-The same exercise. MR. OBORNE-Excuse me. I'm so sorry. Was the public hearing open for Site Plan 22- 2007? 40 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-I'm sorry, it's not required for modification. MR. OBORNE-Right. We did advertise for it, though. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. Well, good. MR. OBORNE-So as Staff, I would recommend that you do open up the public hearing. MS. HEMINGWAY-Not this one. Do not open the public hearing because this was done prior to the regulation. MR. OBORNE-We had a meeting this morning. Site Plan 7-2007 did not need to be open, but Site Plan 22-2007 does. MR. HUNSINGER-Were any of you gentlemen here for that project? The record will show the public hearing will be held open. MR. OBORNE-Thank you. MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 22-2007 MODIFICATION JOLLEY ASSOCIATES, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: 1412 State Route 9. Tabled to the April 21St Planning Board meeting and that will mean that the applicant will have a submission deadline of March 16t". It is tabled at the request of the applicant, but also so that the applicant can satisfy Staff comments. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Krebs, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. HUNSINGER-And just to remind Staff that we will treat the two Jolley Associates as just one item for purposes of agenda control. So we will have seven items on that evening. MR. OBORNE-Okay, and I will continue to do my Site Plan in a separate manner, but we will treat them as a single entity. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, just for purposes of agenda control. MR. OBORNE-Yes, I understand. SITE PLAN NO. 3-2009 SEAR TYPE II ADIRONDACK FACTORY OUTLET CENTER, INC. OWNER(S) DAVID KENNY ZONING HC INTENSIVE LOCATION 1454 STATE ROUTE 9 APPLICANT PROPOSES AN ALTERATION TO EXISTING COMMERCIAL BUILDING -REPLACEMENT OF EXISTING AWNING/FACADE WITH NEW FACADE. COMMERCIAL UPGRADES THAT NEED A BUILDING PERMIT REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW BY THE PLANNING BOARD. CROSS REFERENCE SP 19-06, SP 8-08 WARREN CO. PLANNING 1/14/09 LOT SIZE 6.93 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 288.12-1- 22, 23 SECTION 179-4-020; 179-9-010 DAVE KENNY, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Whenever you're ready to summarize Staff Notes, Keith. MR. OBORNE-Site Plan 3-2009, Adirondack Factory Outlet. Requested action is Site Plan Review for commercial upgrade, that requires a building permit. Location is 1454 State Route 9. Zoning is Highway Commercial Intensive. This is an Unlisted Action. Project Description. Applicant proposes an alteration to existing commercial building with replacement of existing fagade with a new fagade. Commercial upgrades that need a building permit require Site Plan Review by the Planning Board. Staff comments. The applicant is proposing approximately 488 linear feet of fagade changes. The location of the fagade changes are highlighted on the submitted plans. The proposal calls for a change from the southwestern style fagade to a more Adirondack style. Lighting, as 41 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) noted by the applicant, will be changed from a two row fluorescent configuration to a one row configuration. Further new wall lighting appears to be proposed on the south fagade. The applicant has requested waivers for landscaping, stormwater and grading. I think the only real issue that's glaring with plan review would be the signs, if they are compliant or not, and there is new lighting proposed for Liz Claiborne entrance. We may need cut sheets if the Planning Board so wishes. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. The floor is yours. MR. KENNY-Good evening. My name is Dave Kenny, the President of Adirondack Factory Outlets, and developer. What we're proposing to do is connect the exits to bring the building to (lost words). I had a couple of tenants leave, and to attract new tenants (lost words). Basically in the front the only places where the changes occur is (lost words) to square, some stonework instead of the stucco to more Adirondack. As you go around the building, the same thing, again some stonework, the archway made straighter. The big change, the existing fagade, a more Adirondack look. MRS. STEFFAN-Talk to us about the lighting. MR. KENNY-The lighting, right now it's backlit, and it turns out. The new lighting will be, something like this here, up here, will be built out. So a balance one row of fluorescent shining straight down. So you won't see the lighting at all. MRS. STEFFAN-Straight down, onto the walkways, okay. MR. KENNY-Which is (lost words). There won't be any backlighting at all. MRS. STEFFAN-So no illuminating strips or anything like that. MR. KENNY-In the fagade there will be a fluorescent. MRS. STEFFAN-Underneath the canopy. Okay. MR. TRAVER-What about the freestanding sign. Is that going to be a design change as well? MR. KENNY-No. Which one, the one on the road you're talking about? MRS. STEFFAN-The one on the road. MR. TRAVER-Yes. MR. KENNY-No, that hasn't been proposed to be changed at all. If there is any changes to that, looking at it now, (lost words). There would be no changes at this point. MR. TRAVER-Okay. That's a change. MR. KENNY-(Lost words) modifications which we haven't looked at. MR. OBORNE-For consistency purposes, for that corridor, there's design guidelines that need to be followed, and it's music to my ears saying that you're going to paint it to match. MR. KENNY-Whatever you want. It's something that hasn't been looked at, quite frankly, until you just raised it. I'm assuming the sign will have to match. MR. TRAVER-It is something that we need to look at. MR. OBORNE-Absolutely. MRS. STEFFAN-Can we take a look at the color pictures? I mean, we have the details, but it would be nice to see them. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, it's hard to tell with the black and white. MRS. STEFFAN-Thanks. MR. KENNY-And to answer your question, all the signs have to be to Code. 42 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. OBORNE-Code compliant. MR. HUNSINGER-So the primary color of the building, is it Garden Sage? MR. KENNY-The color on top there? MR. HUNSINGER-It's the lighter green? MR. KENNY-Yes. It's the lighter green. MR. HUNSINGER-With dark green. MR. KENNY-Trim. It's more of an Adirondack look. MRS. STEFFAN-Yes. It has more visual interest, I think. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, absolutely. MR. KREBS-My comment to Steve was the other building looked like it should be in New Mexico. The original. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, that's what I just said. It wasn't that long ago that you remodeled it, though, was it? MR. KENNY-I think it's been 12. It doesn't seem that long ago, but. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Questions, comments, concerns from the members of the Board? MR. SCHONEWOLF-It's fine with me. MR. HUNSINGER-We do have a public hearing scheduled this evening. Is there anyone in the audience that wanted to address the Board on this application? PUBLIC HEARING OPENED MR. HUNSINGER-Let the record show that there were no takers. MRS. STEFFAN-I'm certainly okay with, from my point of view, waivers on landscaping, stormwater and grading, because these don't really change those things. I do think that we, for consistency purposes, we should have cut sheets on the lights. Sometimes we require lighting plans on the redevelopments, but this really isn't a redevelopment of major magnitude. MR. HUNSINGER-Do you know what the existing wattage lights are and what the proposed wattage lights are? I mean, is it two for one reduction? MR. KENNY-Yes. Right now (lost words) there's two rows of fluorescents. There will be one row of fluorescents coming straight down. MR. HUNSINGER-So the one row will have the same wattage as the current bulbs that are there? MR. KENNY-Yes. MR. HUNSINGER-So there's going to be half as much light. Yes. MR. OBORNE-Now that's assuming that you're going to use the same bulb. I don't know if you're going to. MR. HUNSINGER-That's why I was asking the questions, yes. MR. KENNY-They'll probably be a greater reduction in that. Because they used (lost words) high energy. There's a less wattage bulb, but it's not the same high lumens. There's just one row, and they will shine down. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. What do you have, a lighting manual, Keith? MR. OBORNE-Yes. Of course. 43 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-What kind of language can we put in the resolution to address that? MR. TRAVER-Cut sheets can be signed off on, right? Maybe we can condition it on just the sign off. MRS. STEFFAN-Can you get a cut sheet for a fluorescent, though? MR. OBORNE-Not really. I think building entrances, or building exteriors is 1.0. Of course you can change that. That seems light. Building entrances are five foot candles. I don't know if you want to ask the applicant to get luminents from an engineer. That may be overreaching, but. MR. SEGULJIC-Did you plan to change the fixtures, also, orjust the bulbs? MR. KENNY-The fixtures we'll be taking out the one, there's two rows of fixtures there now. One row is up above. MR. SEGULJIC-So you're going to change the whole lighting. MR. KENNY-The whole, what's there now comes down. MR. SEGULJIC-Can we then say that just, they won't exceed the five foot candles? MR. KENNY-We're only using one of the rows. We're using the same fixtures. MR. SEGULJIC-Yes, but the problem is, these days, the wattage. MR. HUNSINGER-You are going to use the same fixtures. MR. KENNY-The same wattage. Now if they don't meet the Code, from an energy standpoint. MR. HUNSINGER-Right. MR. KENNY-I mean, in all the stores we've tried to (lost words) PA lights, the smaller lights, but the light fixture will be (lost words). The reason why there's two now is because there's only one row down lights (lost words) which won't be visible. MR. SEGULJIC-Well, can we just put a condition that the lighting will be Code compliant? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Sure. MR. KENNY-What was the Code? MR. OBORNE-Well, it's difficult without having an engineer run the numbers. MR. KENNY-What's the Code say? MR. OBORNE-It's 1.0 for building sides and 5.0 for entrances, and this would be considered neither, or both. I mean, not to muddle the situation here, because it's a breezeway more than anything, is it not? MR. KENNY-It's in front of the whole building. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, right. MR. OBORNE-There's nothing illuminating the signs? MR. KENNY-Well, the signs are incorporated into that fagade, but the light will be the same throughout. MR. OBORNE-I can't give you an answer as far as wattage, which would be firm. MR. KENNY-Foot candles are on the ground, right? MR. OBORNE-Yes, foot candles are measured on the ground, that is correct. 44 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MRS. STEFFAN-How about the utilities. On the Staff Notes it says please locate the utilities on the survey. Was that done anywhere? No, I don't see it. I see a cable box. MR. HUNSINGER-No lines shown. MRS. STEFFAN-In the corner there's. MR. KENNY-That's utilities, and transformers back here. One transformer here and one transformer here. MRS. STEFFAN-Are you seeing that, Keith? MR. OBORNE-What's that? MRS. STEFFAN-That the utilities. MR. OBORNE-I'm sorry. MR. KENNY-There's two services to the building. MR. OBORNE-Okay, but where is it coming in? MR. KENNY-Underground, under the parking lot. Where does it come in from the? Underground. MRS. STEFFAN-So that needs to be noted. That's what they want noted on the plan. MR. OBORNE-Where are they coming in, though? MR. KENNY-This one comes straight in here. MR. OBORNE-Okay. I'm certainly going to want to know, what I'm looking for is to get, do that on your final application. MRS. STEFFAN-All right. So these are all conditions. MR. KENNY-Did you want me to highlight where the sewer comes in? MR. OBORNE-Sewer, water and electric. MR. HUNSINGER-Water, electric. MR. OBORNE-And gas if necessary. MR. HUNSINGER-Did I close the public hearing? I think I did close. I did, because I said let the record show there were no public comments. PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MR. HUNSINGER-Type II. We're ready to roll. MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 3-2009 ADIRONDACK FACTORY OUTLET CENTER, INC., Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: 1) A site plan application has been made to the Queensbury Planning Board for the following: Applicant proposes an alteration to existing commercial building - replacement of existing awning/facade with new fagade. Commercial upgrades that need a building permit require Site Plan Review by the Planning Board. 2) A public hearing was advertised and held on 2/17/09; and 3) This application is supported with all documentation, public comment and application material in the file of record; 4) MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 3-2009 ADIRONDACK FACTORY OUTLET CENTER, Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: 45 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) According to the resolution prepared by Staff. Paragraph Four A complies. Paragraph Four B, this is a Type II action [removed]. The Planning Board will grant waivers for landscaping, stormwater, and grading. This is approved with the following conditions: a) Pursuant to relevant sections of the Town of Queensbury Zoning Code [Chapter 179], the Planning Board has determined that this proposal complies with the requirements as stated in the Zoning Code; and b) Final approved plans, in compliance with the Site Plan, must be submitted to the Community Development Department before any further review by the Zoning Administrator or Building and Codes personnel. The applicant must meet with Staff after approval and prior to issuance of Building Permit and/or the beginning of any site work. Subsequent issuance of further permits, including building permits is dependent on compliance with this and all other conditions of this resolution. c) The applicant will provide as-built plans to certify that the site plan is developed according to the approved plans prior to issuance of the certificate of occupancy; and d) If applicable, Item 7 to be combined with a letter of credit; and e) The Sanitary Sewer connection plan must be submitted to the Wastewater Department for its review, approval, permitting and inspection; and f) That on the final survey, that the applicant will locate the above ground and underground utilities on the survey for water, sewer and electric and gas. g) All signage for this building must be Code compliant. h) That lighting for this particular modification will be downcast cut off and directed to the ground per 179-6-020. Regarding lighting, the lighting must not exceed the Code requirements for lumen. i) That any new signage that will be added to this particular project will be Code compliant. j) The freestanding at the road will be upgraded to match the proposed fagade for design continuity. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: MR. OBORNE-Was there a light on the Claiborne's, an outside light? I thought I saw one? MR. KENNY-He has a light that looks like it's (lost words). MR. OBORNE-Right, on the Claiborne, it's on the last page. MR. HUNSINGER-I didn't even notice that. MR. KENNY-I didn't notice that, either. MR. OBORNE-And those are going to be on there? MR. KENNY-I doubt it. If you tell me not to put them on. MRS. STEFFAN-So the round lights on the front? MR. KENNY-They're not on the front. Are they? MR. OBORNE-Yes, they're on the Liz Claiborne. MRS. STEFFAN-Yes, but even though, the way that I have worded the motion, that they would have to be downcast. They would have to be. MR. OBORNE-Tell them that you'll agree to remove it. 46 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. KENNY-Not on this one. I can't say (lost words). MR. OBORNE-So he'll remove them from the plan. MR. KENNY-I'll remove those two. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-Actually I still think I'm covered because I said that all the light had to be downcast. MR. HUNSINGER-You're okay. Yes. MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. KENNY-Thank you. MR. HUNSINGER-Good luck. You're welcome. MR. KENNY-One question. On this, do I get a copy of that motion? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, you will. MR. OBORNE-That will be mailed to you. Those conditions on it. We need to meet those conditions. Thank you, Mr. Kenny. MR. KENNY-Thank you. SITE PLAN NO. 4-2009 SEAR TYPE II HAUN WELDING SUPPLY, INC. AGENT(S) STEPHEN RAKE OWNER(S) NICHOLAS DAIGLE ZONING CI-1A LOCATION 15 BOULEVARD APPLICANT PROPOSES INSTALLATION OF A 1,500 GALLON LIQUID OXYGEN TANK ON A 15 X 30 CONCRETE PAD, 10 X 10 SPILL PAD AND FENCED AREA. COMMERCIAL PROJECTS REQUIRING A BUILDING PERMIT IN THE CI ZONE REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW AND APPROVAL. CROSS REFERENCE AV 31-07, AV 78-05, AV 59-05 WARREN CO. PLANNING 1/14/09 LOT SIZE 1.3 ACRES TAX MAP NO. 303.20-2-34 SECTION 179-9-020 STEPHEN RAKE, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT MR. HUNSINGER-Whenever you're ready, Keith. MR. OBORNE-I'm at a loss here. I don't seem to have Haun Welding. Thank you, ma'am. Site Plan 4-2009, Haun Welding Supply, Inc. Site Plan Review for a commercial project requiring a building permit. Location is 15 Boulevard. Existing zoning, Highway Commercial Intensive. This is SEQRA Type II. No SEQRA determination required. Project Description: Applicant proposes installation of a 15.6 foot tall, five foot wide, 7,000 pound, 1500 gallon refrigerated liquid oxygen tank on a 15 by 30 foot concrete pad, along with a 10 foot by 10 foot spill pad. The 15 by 30 foot pad has bollards spaced at four foot intervals with associated fencing and gate. Staff comments. The applicant has installed the pad and fencing in late 2008 and there was no malicious intent. The pad and its associated weight carrying capacity will need to be verified prior to installation by the Building and Codes Department. As you can see, Site Plan Review follows, and I assume that the Planning Board has read that. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Good evening. MR. RAKE-Good evening. My name's Steve Rake. I'm with Haun Welding Supply. This is Warren (lost word) also with Haun Welding Supply. We were told we had to come before this Board for a Site Plan Review for a fence which surrounds a pad, a 15 by 30 foot pad. The pad is in. The fence is in. I didn't know, at the time, that we were required to come before the Board. I asked Building and Codes, I asked specifically if we would need building permits (lost words) said no. Basically what we want to do is put in a 1500 gallon oxygen tank. The pad is built to support a maximum of 3,000 gallons, if we ever 47 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) wanted to upgrade in the future. There's a four foot frost wall built in the pad, which is not required, structurally, to hold the tank. It's overkill on the pad structure. MR. SCHONEWOLF-The spill pad's in, too, right, by the looks of this. MR. RAKE-The spill pad is in. I notified Craig Brown on December 17t", that because of the weather and the conditions that we were going to go ahead and pour the spill pad. MR. KREBS-Are you going to fill this at night? MR. RAKE-I don't expect to. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Okay. MR. RAKE-The lighting will have to be put in, because I'm going to need to have an operator be able to get to the tank in the Fall, when it gets darker earlier. MR. SCHONEWOLF-But if you're going to fill it at night, that brings up different parts of the State Fire Code, as you know, as opposed to just filling it during normal times, but we have a Fire Marshal. It's up to him. MR. HUNSINGER-Right, and we got a letter from him. MR. TRAVER-Keith, that image that you just put up, is that the, that's the pad and the fence? MR. RAKE-Yes, it is. MR. SEGULJIC-It seems very straightforward to me. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. So how many delivery trucks do you have, just one? MR. RAKE-Three. MR. HUNSINGER-Three. MR. RAKE-Three trucks load off of that loading dock, near the building. MR. HUNSINGER-Let me ask the question differently. Bulk oxygen trucks, how many will you have? MR. RAKE-Just one. MR. HUNSINGER-Just one, yes. MR. RAKE-Just one, based in Syracuse, and we anticipate once every two weeks, maybe once a week, him filling that tank. MR. TRAVER-Just a technical question. I understand this is going to be a refrigerated liquid oxygen tank. Is that to maintain the pressure? MR. RAKE-It's not refrigerated. MR. TRAVER-It's not refrigerated. MR. RAKE-No, it is not refrigerated. Bulk tanks, the easiest way I can explain it to you is a vessel within a vessel. MR. TRAVER-Okay. So it's insulated. MR. RAKE-It's insulated. It's much the same as a thermos, when you were a kid. When you would drop it, the glass used to break. They put a vacuum, they pull a vacuum on the space in between the tanks, and that's what keeps the liquid cool. MR. TRAVER-Right. Very cool, right? MR. RAKE-Two hundred and ninety-seven degrees below zero. MR. TRAVER-Right, that's cool. 48 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. SCHONEWOLF-Now does that go into the building, too, to fill small tanks MR. RAKE-The vapor will go into the building. There's a vapor line, a one inch vapor line, and a 5/161h's, 3/161h's stainless line also comes in this building. MR. SCHONEWOLF-So you deliver the small tanks to sick people and stuff like that? MR. RAKE-Yes. Well, yes. MR. SCHONEWOLF-I thought I'd see your trucks. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other questions, comments or concerns? MRS. STEFFAN-What about the comments from Staff, ingress and egress to and from the rear of the building onto State Route 32B should be one way. MR. RAKE-That's fine. That's not a problem. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Do you have the tank already? MR. RAKE-We have purchased the tank. There's $84,000 in equipment that's on hold waiting for the go ahead. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Okay, because the Fire Marshal will want to inspect the tank when it gets here. MR. RAKE-That's fine. Also I had offered to take him to our Plattsburgh operation where we have one of these tanks installed and running, so he could look at it and familiarize himself. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Out there you're on your own. MR. OBORNE-Well, there is a similar tank installed at another location in the Town that he's aware of, and he needs to follow his Code. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Right. MR. HUNSINGER-We do have a public hearing scheduled. Since there's no one in the audience, I don't think we have any takers, but I will open the public hearing and we'll close the public hearing. PUBLIC HEARING OPENED NO COMMENT PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. Then I'll make a motion. MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 4-2009 HAUN WELDING SUPPLY, INC., Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: 1) A site plan application has been made to the Queensbury Planning Board for the following: Applicant proposes installation of a 1,500 gallon liquid oxygen tank on a 15 x 30 [concrete pad, 10 x 10 spill pad and fenced area. Commercial projects requiring a building permit in the CI zone require Site Plan Review and approval. 2) A public hearing was advertised and held on 2/17/09; and 3) This application is supported with all documentation, public comment and application material in the file of record; and 4) MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 4-2009 HAUN WELDING SUPPLY, INC., Introduced by Gretchen Steffan who moved for its adoption, seconded by Stephen Traver: 49 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) According to the resolution prepared by Staff. Paragraph Four A complies. Paragraph Four B, this is a Type II action [removed]. Paragraph Four E does not apply [removed]. Paragraph Four F does not apply removed]. This is approved with the following conditions: a) Pursuant to relevant sections of the Town of Queensbury Zoning Code [Chapter 179], the Planning Board has determined that this proposal complies with the requirements as stated in the Zoning Code; and b) Final approved plans, in compliance with the Site Plan, must be submitted to the Community Development Department before any further review by the Zoning Administrator or Building and Codes personnel. The applicant must meet with Staff after approval and prior to issuance of Building Permit and/or the beginning of any site work. Subsequent issuance of further permits, including building permits is dependent on compliance with this and all other conditions of this resolution. c) The Sanitary Sewer connection plan must be submitted to the Wastewater Department for its review, approval, permitting and inspection; and d) The applicant will satisfy the Staff Note regarding ingress and egress to and from the rear of the building onto State Route 32B will be one way. e) That the applicant must obtain building permits of approved and prior to installation. f) That the Fire Marshal's office must inspect the installed cylinder and the site for consistency with submitted material and Fire Codes prior to installation. Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford MR. HUNSINGER-Good luck. MR. RAKE-Thank you very much. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. Before we adjourn, Keith did give me a copy of the list of applicants that are currently on file. There's 21 for the March meeting, and this is even after we have the Special Meeting on March 3rd. So we may need to consider a third meeting in April, but, just to kind of put everybody on alert. We can talk about it in February, at the February meetings. MR. TRAVER-That's amazing. It is that time of year, though. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. There was also the e-mail discussion today that I suggested could be a good topic for a workshop with Counsel's guidance and assistance, and I just wanted to bring that up for consideration as well. MR. TRAVER-I think that's a good idea. MRS. STEFFAN-That's a good idea. MR. OBORNE-Was that the CLUP? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, and just philosophy behind Planning/Zoning. We had talked about that. MR. KREBS-Well, I mean, there's stuff going out of here that you see, you don't want tied to a particular person. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. OBORNE-If you want counsel, that's fine. I don't think it's necessary, but if there's a level of comfort achieved by that, absolutely. 50 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. Well, I mean, our counselor, you know, spends a lot of, I shouldn't say a lot of his time, but I mean, he frequently is a speaker in conferences and seminars and since he's, you know, one of the best in the business, I think we should take advantage of that. I included him on my response. MR. SCHONEWOLF-You did? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. STEFFAN-But I think that the timing would be pretty good if we could put something together, you know, maybe in March, depending on how next Tuesday's meeting goes. We may want to talk about the new zoning, because there's a meeting, I'm sure everybody's aware, the reason they moved our Planning Board meeting. MR. HUNSINGER-That's right, because we'll need training on the new Ordinance if that is every adopted. MR. OBORNE-The meeting is Thursday and not Tuesday. I just want to make sure that you're aware of that. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, we're back here in two nights. MRS. STEFFAN-Our Planning Board meeting, yes, is this Thursday. MR. HUNSINGER-But she's talking about the. MRS. STEFFAN-Next Tuesday the 24t" is the Zoning, is the public hearing on the Town Board's re-write of the Zoning Code, and so, you know, if everybody's available that night, it would certainly be a great idea to go, and if that's adopted, because there's only one Town Board public hearing scheduled on the Zoning Code. So if that's adopted quickly, then we're going to need a workshop on becoming educated on the new Zoning Code. I do have a copy of the new, the proposed for the public hearing that I have to go over this weekend. So that may be a good combination workshop if we could have, and I think that there's some outstanding SEQRA questions I think that we could probably ask, too, because Mark's an expert on SEQRA. MR. OBORNE-Yes, and that does bring. MR. HUNSINGER-And it would also count towards our four hours of State mandated annual training. MR. OBORNE-That's important. Absolutely. MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MR. OBORNE-I do want to bring up a SEQRA tidbit. MR. KREBS-Just one question, before you get into that. How many people do we have that are going to be missing, though, if we do this during March? MRS. STEFFAN-Probably a lot. MR. KREBS-Yes. MRS. STEFFAN-So April's probably a better time. MR. KREBS-I was just thinking, because I was remembering all the people who were missing. MR. OBORNE-Well, by all means, talk amongst yourselves and come up with a plan and drop me a line and we'll figure something out. MR. KREBS-Well, I was just thinking, Don Sipp was in Florida. MR. TRAVER-They're also advertising for alternates, again. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Yes, they're advertising for alternates. You might be able to grab an alternate and get him in on it, too. 51 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MR. HUNSINGER-Yes. MRS. STEFFAN-That's true, if they pick an alternate by then. That's a good idea. So we'll shoot for April, then. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. I'm sorry, Keith, you had a SEQRA question? MR. OBORNE-General Timber was tabled in Lake George. Remember General Timber with Mr. Koskinen? MR. HUNSINGER-Yes, and it was tabled because Lake George now wants to seek Lead Agency status for the project. So I have yet to receive a letter on that. I should receive that soon. Now you're under no obligation to accept that, if you want to do your own review on that parcel. They're specifically keeping it an Unlisted action, and I'm not sure exactly which SEQRA form they're going to go with. I have no influence over that at all, but I did want to bring that to your attention. That'll be coming down. Hopefully I can get you something by Tuesday, Thursday, concerning that, and it specifically has to do with their stormwater controls on the road they need to put in and the road leading up to our parcel in Queensbury. That's my understanding, the Board's not comfortable with what they have so far. They need to get an engineer and the like, and they seem to be disturbing a lot more than what was thought. Again, that may be hyperbole on my part, and I don't want to say it's outrageous, but I think I'm pretty consistent on that. So, the Planning Board, and I bring this up, the Planning Board may want to do a coordinated review with them, or do their separate review. It's all based on how you feel as a Board to move forward. I just wanted to bring that up and let you know that Lake George has done that with this project. MR. HUNSINGER-Thank you. I appreciate that. MR. TRAVER-It's fortunate for the applicant that the last time they were here we asked them for a bit more detail in their plan. So that got them in that process of being able to respond to Lake George. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Is most of the road in Lake George or is most of it in Queensbury? MR. OBORNE-Well, they're putting in an access off of Bloody Pond Road. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Yes, I know, but is that in Lake George, is the whole road in Lake George? MRS. STEFFAN-The logging road, the log landing is in Lake George. MR. SCHONEWOLF-The whole road is in Lake George? MR. OBORNE-Well, yes, the whole access, absolutely, the landing is in Lake George. MR. SCHONEWOLF-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-There was some neighborhood dissent when they initially had public hearing for that as I recall from the testimony. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MRS. STEFFAN-So I can see why they would want Lead Agency. MR. OBORNE-And those minutes should be on line. I've been keeping up with them. I talked to Rob Hickey, who's the Code Enforcement individual there. He's in New York right now, but when he gets back I'll be brought up to speed. We talk back and forth quite a bit about numerous projects, but this one in particular. MR. KREBS-Keith, did you do your debriefings for the two January meetings? MR. OBORNE-Yes. MR. KREBS-For some reason I didn't get a copy. MR. OBORNE-Did everybody else get a copy? 52 (Queensbury Planning Board 02/17/09) MRS. STEFFAN-No. MR. OBORNE-Maybe I neglected to send it out. MR. KREBS-Okay, because I use them all the time for a reference point. I have a separate binder and everything for them. MR. OBORNE-Well, look for the month of January and this meeting here tomorrow. MR. HUNSINGER-Okay. MR. KREBS-Okay. MR. OBORNE-I apologize. MR. HUNSINGER-Any other business? MR. SCHONEWOLF-I move we adjourn. MOTION TO ADJOURN THE QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING OF FEBRUARY 17, 2009, Introduced by Paul Schonewolf who moved for its adoption, seconded by Donald Krebs: Duly adopted this 17t" day of February, 2009, by the following vote: AYES: Mr. Traver, Mr. Krebs, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Schonewolf, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Hunsinger NOES: NONE ABSENT: Mr. Ford On motion meeting was adjourned. RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED, Chris Hunsinger, Chairman 53