2005-07-26
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING
SECOND REGULAR MEETING
JULY 26, 2005
INDEX
Site Plan No. 20-2005 Jeffrey Lejuez 2.
Tax Map No. 226.19-1-51
Site Plan No. 44-2005 Darren Miles 10.
Tax Map No. 290-1-86
Site Plan No. 17-2004 M & C Ventures 21.
MODIFICATION Tax Map No. 309.5-1-3.11
Subdivision No. 10-73 Linda Wohlers
30.
MODIFICATION
Subdivision No. 4-2005 George Amedore
33.
SKETCH Tax Map No. 302.8-1-13, 14, 15
PRELIMINARY STAGE
FINAL STAGE
THESE ARE NOT OFFICIALLY ADOPTED MINUTES AND ARE SUBJECT TO BOARD
AND STAFF REVISIONS. REVISIONS WILL APPEAR ON THE FOLLOWING
MONTHS MINUTES (IF ANY) AND WILL STATE SUCH APPROVAL OF SAID
MINUTES.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD MEETING
SECOND REGULAR MEETING
JULY 26, 2005
7:00 P.M.
MEMBERS PRESENT
ROBERT VOLLARO, ACTING CHAIRMAN
GRETCHEN STEFFAN, SECRETARY
RICHARD SANFORD
THOMAS SEGULJIC
GEORGE GOETZ
MEMBERS ABSENT
CHRIS HUNSINGER
ANTHONY METIVIER
LAND USE PLANNER-SUSAN BARDEN
TOWN COUNSEL-MILLER, MANNIX, SCHACHNER, & HAFNER-MARK
SCHACHNER
STENOGRAPHER-SUE HEMINGWAY
MR. SANFORD-How many are we going to have here?
MR. SEGULJIC-Chris isn’t coming, that’s all I can say.
MR. VOLLARO-There’s only five of us tonight.
MR. SEGULJIC-There’s five people. To pass something it’s got to be four to one.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes.
MR. SANFORD-You’ve got to have a majority of the Board, not of those present. So you
have to have four. That is the same as a non-acceptance, a three to two. It’s a no. You
can check with legal on that, but let me put it to you this way, I’m 99% sure on that.
MR. VOLLARO-To pass, we need four to one. If we go three to two, it doesn’t carry.
MR. SANFORD-No, because you need a majority of the Board, and the Board is seven
people. We’ve been through this before. That’s why I’m so sure on it. This isn’t the first
time. Will we have Counsel here tonight?
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MRS. BARDEN-I guess it’s the applicant’s right to say, if there’s not four votes, to
withdraw.
MR. SANFORD-I’m not sure it is, actually.
MRS. BARDEN-I thought that they could come back and petition the Board when there
was a full Board. Well, let’s see what it says.
MR. SANFORD-You look it up if you need to, but I think we’re going to find that it’s a,
we need to have a majority of the Board.
MRS. BARDEN-Okay.
MRS. BARDEN-Yes, but a little bit later, 8:30, 9:00.
MR. SANFORD-Because we’re wondering, and I’m also positive on this, that if we only
have, let’s say, if we only have five here. To pass anything we need four positive votes.
The majority of the Board, not of the quorum.
MRS. BARDEN-That sounds about right.
MR. SANFORD-They were asking that question, and I recall that to be the case, but I
wanted confirmation.
MR. VOLLARO-Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the meeting of the
Planning Board of July 26, 2005. My name is Bob Vollaro. I’m going to be your Chair for
tonight. My sign somehow disappeared. I hope that’s not a portent for the future. It
might be, though.
MR. SANFORD-Before we begin, Mr. Vollaro, if I could just have the pleasure of the
Board, I’d like to hand out a letter that I received yesterday, and request that the Board
Secretary please read it into the record.
MR. VOLLARO-Sure.
MR. SANFORD-This letter is a determination from the Ethics Committee and I see that
it’s fitting, almost as a quid pro quo, that since the Ethics complaint was announced at a
public meeting, namely at this Planning Board, that the determination also be
announced at a public meeting. I did check with the Ethics Board regarding the issue of
confidentiality and how it applies, and they told me that I was free to do as I saw fit. So
I’d like to have this letter read into the record. Another reason I feel it’s important is
because since the complaint was filed, a number of Planning Board members have
addressed me and expressed that they have concerns that in addition to other reasons,
that this was in fact perhaps a form of intimidation to the Board, and that this would
perhaps cause them some concern in reviewing and addressing future applications that
come in front of this Board. We certainly don’t want that to happen. We want to be fair
and objective, and we want to represent the best interests of the Town. So with that in
mind, I’m going to distribute this and ask that Gretchen please read it into the record.
MRS. STEFFAN-Okay. This letter is on Town of Queensbury stationary, dated July 21,
2005. It’s addressed to Michael and Paul Hayes, Hayes Construction LLC, 395 Big Bay
Road, Queensbury, NY 12804. “Dear Michael and Paul Hayes: Thank you for
submitting your complaint for the Ethics Board’s determination. Serving our function
while following protocol was more difficult and complicated than usual since your
complaint was made available to The Post Star. As stated in Paragraph C of Ethics
Board Procedures, all proceedings of the Ethics Board shall be closed to the public. We
decided unanimously that the behavior of Mr. Sanford, as you described in your
complaint, did not meet the standards of ethical misconduct. Combining the nature of
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Mr. Sanford’s actions themselves, the more than four months between the time the
claimed unethical behavior and your complaint, and finally the discrepancy between
your claimed Mr. Sanford’s concealment of his residence location with, in reality, the
common knowledge of his residence being referred to often and openly during the
Planning Board meetings, persuaded us that your complaint was not pursuable. We
regret that you may not be satisfied with our interpretation of your complaint and/or the
materials you provided to support your claim, but you must acknowledge that we did
invite you to attend our meeting and while we expected to see you, as you accepted our
invitation, you did not attend. Sincerely, Paul Abbess, Chairman Gordon Ostrander,
Kathleen Flynn Irion, and Thomas Haley, Secretary”
MR. SANFORD-Thank you, and that’s all I have, Mr. Chairman.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Thanks a lot, Mr. Sanford.
NEW BUSINESS:
SITE PLAN NO. 20-2005 SEQR TYPE II JEFFREY LEJUEZ AGENT(S): DARIN
MABB OWNER(S): SAME ZONING WR-1A LOCATION: 6 CHERRY TREE LANE
APPLICANT PROPOSES A 380 SQ. FT. RESIDENTIAL ADDITION ALONG WITH
A 216 SQ. FT. DECK. EXPANSION OF NON-CONFORMING USES IN A CRITICAL
ENVIRONMENTAL AREA REQUIRES SITE PLAN REVIEW. CROSS REF. AV 53-
05 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING 7/13/05 LOT SIZE: 0.38 ACRES TAX MAP NO.
226.19-1-51 SECTION 179-4-020
JEFFREY LEJUEZ, PRESENT
MR. VOLLARO-Let me ask the Board members a question. Has everybody read the
Staff notes on this? Are we all familiar with it? Have you seen the Staff notes?
MR. LEJUEZ-Yes, I have.
MR. VOLLARO-You have a copy of them. I don’t think it’s necessary for the Staff notes
to be read on this particular one. This is a SEQR Type II. So there’s no SEQR on this, but
there is a public hearing this evening, for anybody who wants to speak. Mr. Lejuez, the
floor is yours. Just tell us what you want to do.
MR. LEJUEZ-Well, as in my application, I am asking to put on an addition to my home
at 6 Cherry Tree Lane, which includes an expansion of an existing bedroom, not an
additional bedroom, and an expansion of the kitchen, to provide an eating area, and a
deck space at the kitchen level, and a screened in porch. The APA had marked off the
area for me to come up with a site plan survey, and have indicated that there’s no
impact on my proposed addition, and the ZBA meeting as of last week also approved
the variance that I asked for. The reason I had to ask for a variance is the house was
originally situated improperly 16 years ago, at a slight angle, and one corner of it
actually encroached on the 30 foot setback from the road, which I didn’t know until I
applied for a permit, and so the original plan called to go straight out and to the left, but
as we were reviewing the plan, we decided that we could cut it back on the application
and maybe have to do it twice. So the plan is already modified with a little jag in it. So
it’s set back further from the original, and I don’t know what else I need to say about it.
MR. VOLLARO-When you were at the ZBA meeting, because I was there and listened to
your application at that meeting, and you had sort of a display that you used. Did you
want to use that this evening?
MR. LEJUEZ-Well, yes. I didn’t know what materials you had present. This shows the
existing house up here, and I’m coming out to the left, which you can see in the aerial
photograph, over here is, towards an area of what they consider the wetlands back here.
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The only house on the block is my neighbor to the other side of the project. The deck
here is so I can have access into the house. There was a deck here that actually was four
feet closer to the road. Again, I did not realize that that was in violation.
MR. VOLLARO-Do you plan to make that a covered deck, do you know?
MR. LEJUEZ-That’s covered, yes.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Thank you.
MR. LEJUEZ-This portion here is covered, the entrance into the house. This is an open
deck, and that’s on level with the kitchen, and then the screen porch.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. LEJUEZ-The height is the same as the existing house. We’re not going up any
higher, and the area that was marked here as wetlands, I was a little confused at the
meeting what shoreline was, because I was asking for a variance from the shoreline, and
my understanding from the ZBA was that, from the APA was that it was the mean high
water mark and that the water is quite a bit distance from here, but.
MR. VOLLARO-The edge of wetlands is usually referred to in that manner.
MR. LEJUEZ-It turned out to be moot, since they did review the property and they gave
me the variation, but I was confused at that point, but it turned out okay. My contractor
here, Mr. Mabb, had suggested that I put in two catch basins here to increase the water
management. Right now there isn’t any water management, other than gutters. He
suggested that I put these in, which I plan to go ahead with if I’m permitted, to help
with the water management.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. That’s a pretty good description, I think.
MR. LEJUEZ-Anything else?
MR. VOLLARO-I don’t think so, unless you have anything else to say. I’ll see whether,
how the Board feels about some of this. I’ll start. We’ve all reviewed this. We’ve all
been to your site. Most of us have been to your site, I believe everybody has one way or
another. So we’ve seen it, and we’ll let the meeting proceed from there. Thank you.
How do the Board members feel about this? You’ve all had a chance to look at this and
examine it.
MR. SEGULJIC-Well, Mr. Chairman, I have a question. When we were there, I guess it
was a week ago Saturday, there was quite a bit of excavation done in the side yard.
MR. LEJUEZ-Yes.
MR. SEGULJIC-And what was that for?
MR. LEJUEZ-That was the ripping off of the decks, and the start of the foundation, the
footings.
MR. SEGULJIC-So you started and then found out you needed to?
DJMABB
MR. MABB-I’ve done a lot of work in the Town, around the lake and stuff.
MR. VOLLARO-Would you identify yourself for the record, please.
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MR. MABB-Sorry about that. DJ Mabb. I’m a local contractor, and I’ve done a lot of
work around there, and worked with Dave in the Building Department here for quite a
few years.
MR. VOLLARO-That is Dave Hatin?
MR. MABB-Yes. He said go ahead, start your, you know, we got the project beginning,
starting, tearing out all the old stuff. In the process of tearing out all the old stuff, I dug
the holes for the footings, to have it ready, because we really didn’t think that we were
going to have this many issues with this small of a project, but we did. So he said stop,
and we stopped, and this is where we are. We’re going through the process at this
point.
MR. SANFORD-Could you please take a minute and just review your septic system? As
I read it, I’m jumping to a conclusion that it’s the holding tank that you periodically
have pumped out. Is that correct?
MR. MABB-That’s correct.
MR. SANFORD-Okay. So, in other words, there’s no dependency on any leaching or
anything along those lines.
MR. MABB-No. It’s a 3500 gallon tank. It has an alarm, water shutoff. We typically
have it pumped out twice a summer, sometimes three, depending on how many friends
the kids bring up.
MR. SANFORD-Because when it comes to expansion on the lake, one of our primary
concerns is that the construction could get big enough to overtax the septic system and
we’re concerned about the lake quality, but, in this case, it’s all in a holding tank and
pumped away and taken away.
MR. MABB-Yes.
MR. SANFORD-So that particular concern is not really present here. So that’s my only
clarification I wanted.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Mr. Sanford, at the ZBA meeting, I have the copy of the ZBA
Board of Appeals resolution, and the condition of acceptance there was very close to
what you were talking about. They had asked for an upgrade of the existing septic
system to acceptable standards, including the on-site wastewater treatment if necessary.
Now, I don’t think that that site can handle, myself, after looking at it, we could talk
about it, I don’t think that site could handle on-site septic system. I think what he has
there, as a holding tank, is probably the best he’s going to get for that site. My only
question is that I want to make sure that the alarm system on that site is working, and
that when the alarm goes off, it shuts the input to the house water down, and that’s
something that I would make as part of any resolution here that was prepared this
evening. It’s got to be examined probably by Dave Hatin or somebody else in his
Department.
MR. LEJUEZ-Yes. It was my assumption from the ZBA meeting that I would need to get
it inspected and get a certificate.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. Normally what happens when anything up at the lake undergoes
a renovation, let’s say that there’s a house that’s been there a while, and goes under
renovation, the septic system has to be looked at. Now, I know at the ZBA meeting you
talked about an additional bedroom. Tonight you said.
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MR. LEJUEZ-No.
MR. VOLLARO-This evening you said an expansion of the bedroom.
MR. LEJUEZ-No. A Board member asked me if I was putting an additional bedroom,
and my answer was no, it’s an expansion of an existing.
MR. VOLLARO-Of an existing bedroom, and is that to house additional people?
MR. LEJUEZ-No. It’s my master bedroom. The existing bedroom is going to be a closet
and a dressing area. It’s not an addition.
MR. VOLLARO-Tom, do you have anything you want to say on this application?
MR. SEGULJIC-The only thing I have to add is the Warren County Planning
Department, in their Project Review and Referral Form, noted was that the County
Planning Board recommends that an appropriate stormwater and erosion control
measures be implemented during the construction process. So just putting silt fences
around and hay bales, appropriate stormwater controls. Okay. That’s all I have to add.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. George?
MR. GOETZ-I don’t have anything.
MR. VOLLARO-Gretchen?
MRS. STEFFAN-Me, too.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. I have some things that I have to bring up myself. I noticed on
your plan, there’s a statement on the plan, and it talks about the edge of wetlands, and it
says that the edge of wetlands as reputedly flagged by the Adirondack Park Agency on
April 2005. Now, I haven’t seen anything from the APA. We have a wetland policy,
land policy, that was, is dated June 3, 2004. It’s called Policy Regarding Wetlands, and it
was put out by Chris Round, who was our former Director of Community Development.
Now, it says in here that in APA jurisdictional wetlands, a letter from the APA
confirming its delineation and jurisdictional status, this item must be received prior to
final action by any local Board. Now, I don’t see anything like that in here at all from
the APA that complies with the wetland policy that we have. I usually look for a
delineation letter that says, yes, indeed, we’ve been there and this is what we’ve done,
and that’s why I believe whoever did the plan on this wrote that down, and he said
purportedly, that’s the words that I think your land surveyor, Mr. Pigeon, used, and he
talked about as reputedly flagged by the Adirondack Park Agency, and I think he put
that in there because he didn’t have any justification other than possibly some stakes in
the ground. So I think we need a letter of jurisdictional interest from the APA that says,
yes, we’ve been there according to that policy letter that I read which is dated June 3,
2004. Now, there’s a couple of other things I want to get into.
MR. LEJUEZ-Is the letter from the APA not sufficient?
MR. VOLLARO-If you have a letter from the APA, that’s fine. It’s not in my packet. I
didn’t see it.
MR. LEJUEZ-Do you want me to just read the paragraph that I believe applies.
MR. VOLLARO-Does Staff have this letter?
MRS. BARDEN-We do not.
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MR. VOLLARO-You do not.
MR. LEJUEZ-Okay. It’s dated April 20, to DJ, myself, and to Craig Brown, that’s why I
th
assumed you had it.
MR. VOLLARO-No. Does any other member of the Board have a letter from the APA?
MR. SEGULJIC-No.
MR. LEJUEZ-I would like to submit this letter, then, to you.
MR. VOLLARO-I would give this letter to Staff right now, to Susan Barden, and, Sue,
would you please just look it over and read the pertinent area for me, so that I know
what it says.
MRS. BARDEN-The proposed single family dwelling expansion project, as described in
the materials you submitted on behalf of your clients, Jeffrey and Sandra Lejuez, on
February 3, 2005, and following a site visit by Agency Biologist Mark Rooks on April 13,
2005, does not require a permit or variance from this Agency, provided the facts
submitted are accurate and complete, and it also says, Mr. Rooks has determined that
installing silt fencing along the border of wetlands will ensure that no wetlands, subject
to Agency jurisdiction, will be involved or affected by the project. Those wetlands
seemed to be up when I did my site visit.
MR. VOLLARO-They were there, too, but I just wanted to make sure that there was a
jurisdictional letter from the APA.
MRS. BARDEN-It looks good.
MR. VOLLARO-Apparently it was never submitted, but it’s in file now.
MR. SANFORD-Not technically correct. It appears it was submitted, but it didn’t get to
us.
MR. VOLLARO-Correct, that’s correct. In reviewing that, I didn’t have the benefit of
that letter. That’s what it’s really all about here. Usually when we review things, if we
don’t have a complete packet, we just don’t know about it. Okay. I’m going to go down
into your site development data sheet. Now, your property is stated on the map as
16,500 square feet.
MR. LEJUEZ-I believe that’s correct.
MR. VOLLARO-Lot area. Okay. All of the calculations that were made on the site
development data sheet were based on 26,500 square feet. Now, there’s a big
discrepancy in the site development data sheet totally. I mean, all the numbers get
skewed pretty badly when you don’t use the correct parcel area for the determination.
MR. LEJUEZ-Well, I’m not sure if it was factored in, but I did buy the piece of property
to the west of those two lots, that double lot. I don’t know if that was included, for some
reason.
MR. VOLLARO-The site plan that we got from you was lot area of 16,500 square feet.
MR. LEJUEZ-Yes, that’s what it should be. Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s what it should be, but the calculations were done for this lot, or
for this whole operation, on 26,500 square feet.
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MR. MABB-That must be a number for the two lots. Because he has two lots right there.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, we’re not reviewing the other lot. We’re only reviewing the lot
that’s on this site plan.
MR. LEJUEZ-Yes, that’s a double lot. I believe 16,000 is the two lots. I believe it is. I
don’t know where the 26,000 came from.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Well, in any event, the site development data sheet is incorrect,
and I went over and I re-did all the numbers for you, and myself, and at the end of this
meeting, if you’d like for whatever reason, you can have this, my calculations, but I
started off with the lot area is not 26,500, but 16,500. Now the existing house, and I’m
not going to belabor all of this, what I’ve done is I’ve done all the calculations here. I can
give them to you. You’re allowed to build up to 3,630 square feet. That’s your, in other
words, you can use up to 20% of your lot. Twenty-two percent of your lot comes out to
3,630 square feet. That’s how much, and you’re now up, on my calculations, you’re at
3306, just underneath that. So your allowed future development on this lot would be
324 square feet. You’re right up to the limit at this point.
MR. SANFORD-With the proposed addition, Bob?
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, with the proposed addition.
MR. SANFORD-So they’re within the constraints.
MR. VOLLARO-They’re within 324 square foot of the spec, they’re just under. So it’s
okay, but I just wanted to make sure that they didn’t think they had as much expansion
as they show on their sheet. There’s the, let’s call it a floor area ratio worksheet, and that
gives you the lot area, and then the allowable floor area that you can build to is 22% of
that. What you had was that you could build another 3,598 square feet. What you can
build is another 324 square feet. So I didn’t want anybody thinking, I didn’t want the
record to show that that’s how much you had to go.
MR. LEJUEZ-I accept your calculations without reviewing them.
MR. VOLLARO-I’d just make a comment that when these floor area ratio worksheets
and site development data sheets are presented to this Board, I’d certainly like to see
that they were at least accurate. I go through them and invariably I find severe mistakes
on these site development sheets and floor area ratio worksheets. If we’re not going to
use these in the future, then let’s not use them at all, because I find I spend a tremendous
amount of my personal time just trying to make sure that the numbers are correct. So
that a year from now, when people go into the file, they can see a reasonably accurate
application.
MRS. BARDEN-I spent a tremendous amount of time as well, and mine has the correct
site development data.
MR. VOLLARO-Did you re-do it?
MRS. BARDEN-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MRS. BARDEN-And if it’s pertinent to what they’re asking for, then I put it in my Staff
notes. In this case it doesn’t affect permeability or anything. So I didn’t (lost word).
MR. VOLLARO-All it does is affect, Susan, is that the record would show that he had
3,598 square feet to go, and the lot area should really be corrected, 16,500, I think.
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MR. SANFORD-Actually I have to take an issue with Staff. I do think it’s relevant that
there is meaning to this because we don’t want to leave the applicant with the incorrect
understanding that they have a property that can further be expanded, and that they go
through effort and expense, only to find out that they can’t, and so I think that the
application should reflect the true specs. So it’s relevant in any case.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, I believe so.
MRS. BARDEN-Well, you can ask the applicant to resubmit the information.
MR. VOLLARO-I’m going to give him my calculations and he can go ahead and do that,
if he likes, but I think they should be submitted by the applicant for the record, and
should be submitted directly, and with that, with the APA letter that you have, the only
other thing that I would do on this application is to make sure that the holding tank does
have the correct alarm systems on it. I’ll make that a condition of the approval. Okay.
There is a public hearing tonight. There’s no SEQRA, but there’s a public hearing, and
would anybody in this room like to speak to this application?
PUBLIC HEARING OPENED
NO COMMENT
PUBLIC HEARING CLOSED
MR. VOLLARO-And we can go directly to a, since there’s no SEQRA, we can go directly
to a motion.
MR. SEGULJIC-I just have one question for you, Mr. Chairman. The gentleman who
had indicated they were going to install two catch basins outside. Do we need those to
be on the site plan?
MR. VOLLARO-They can certainly be put into the motion, and identify the position of
those septics, or catch basins. We can make it part of the motion.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay.
MR. VOLLARO-Does anybody want to make a motion?
MR. SEGULJIC-Well, I guess I can make it, but I’d just like to go over the motion first.
MR. VOLLARO-Sure.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. Inspect the holding tank to ensure it’s functioning properly.
MR. VOLLARO-Right, that the alarm system is.
MR. SEGULJIC-And interconnect the alarm system so it shuts off the water going,
interconnect the alarm system with the residence’s water supply, so that the alarm
activates the water shutoff.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s correct. That’s what the alarm does on a holding tank.
MR. SEGULJIC-Install and maintain appropriate stormwater and erosion controls
during construction, and I believe they requested a waiver from stormwater
management plan, grading, lighting and landscaping, and then a submission of
corrected floor area ratio worksheet.
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MR. VOLLARO-Both the site development data worksheet and the floor area ratio
worksheet have to be corrected, yes.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay, and then to locate the proposed, two proposed catch basins on the
site plan.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s correct.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay.
MR. SANFORD-You missed one thing, I think, that was your request, Tom, unless I
missed it, which was to, during construction period, that they provide mitigation of
runoff.
MR. VOLLARO-I think he did that.
MRS. STEFFAN-He used different language.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, Tom, feel free to go forward with that, then. One other thing, I
think, in the motion. Susan, can you just give us the date of the APA letter? I think we’d
like to put that in the motion, since we didn’t have it as part of.
MRS. BARDEN-This is April 20, 2005, and this was, I think, in response to a violation, or
a potential violation. Has that been corrected?
MR. LEJUEZ-I’m not aware of that.
MR. MABB-No, it wasn’t for any violation. What it was was when I had them come out
to spot the wetlands, that was basically their answer back to me saying that there was no
issues, they had no issues. They wanted no permits. There you are, go ahead to Town
of Queensbury, and good luck.
MR. VOLLARO-Is that what that letter says?
MRS. BARDEN-I don’t know if it’s because maybe you started excavating or you started
your construction and then.
MR. MABB-That had no bearing on the APA, at all, as far as starting. Most of the
digging that was done there, like I said before, was done because the old footings from
the old decks and stuff like that. I just went a little further ahead because I didn’t realize
that this was, you know, we were going to have to go through all this for a 400 foot.
MRS. BARDEN-But it sounds like you went to the APA after the fact. It says, it appears.
MR. MABB-Yes, Dave told me, or Craig Brown actually told me that we had to get the
APA involved. As soon as he did, I did.
MRS. BARDEN-Okay, and because you have this jurisdictional determination, there is
no enforcement action.
MR. MABB-Right.
MR. VOLLARO-And the date of the letter is April 20, 2005?
MRS. BARDEN-April 20, 2005.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MRS. BARDEN-To Mr. Mabb from Nancy Heath, Project Administrator.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. MABB-Yes, and she did say she was going to send a copy of that to Craig Brown,
too.
MRS. BARDEN-Thanks for bringing it.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Tom, just put that in your motion, that we have a letter from the
APA of jurisdictional interest, or jurisdictional non-interest dated April 20, 2005.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay.
MOTION TO APPROVE SITE PLAN NO. 20-2005 JEFFREY LEJUEZ, Introduced by
Thomas Seguljic who moved for its adoption, seconded by Robert Vollaro:
WHEREAS, an application has been made to this Board for the following:
380 sq. ft. residential addition along with a 216 sq. ft. deck
WHEREAS, the application was received on February 2005; and
WHEREAS, the application is supported with all documentation, public comment, and
application materials in file of record; and
WHEREAS, pursuant to Art. 9 of the Zoning Ordinance of the Code of the Town of
Queensbury a public hearing was advertised and was held on July 26, 2005; and
WHEREAS, the Planning Board has determined that the proposal complies with the Site
Plan application requirements of the Code of the Town Queensbury (Zoning); and
WHEREAS, the Planning Board has considered the environmental factors found in the
Code of the Town of Queensbury (Zoning); and
WHEREAS, this approval does not relieve the applicant from obtaining all necessary
permits whether Federal, State or Local, and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that
We find the following:
The application is hereby Approved in accordance with the resolution prepared by Staff
and is subject to the following conditions which shall be listed on the final plans
submitted to the Zoning Administrator:
1. The existing holding tank be inspected to ensure it’s functioning properly.
2. The holding tank’s alarm be interconnected with the residence’s water supply,
such that when the alarm sounds, the water supply to the house is turned off.
3. Install and maintain appropriate stormwater and erosion control during
construction.
4. Grant waivers from stormwater management plan, grading, lighting, &
landscaping.
5. The Floor Area Ratio worksheet to be resubmitted.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
6. The Site Development Data worksheet to be resubmitted.
7. The proposed catch basins will be located on the site plan.
8. It should be noted that a letter of jurisdictional non-interest was submitted from
the APA dated April 20, 2005 [copy in file].
9. Final, approved plans in compliance with this site plan must be submitted to the
Community Development Dept. before any further review by the Zoning
Administrator or Building & Codes personnel. Subsequent issuance of further
permits; including building permits are dependent on receipt.
Duly adopted this 26 day of July, 2005, by the following vote:
h
MR. GOETZ-I’d just like to say that I am concerned that we seem to have more and
more people coming in who’ve previously started to work before they actually have
taken it to the appropriate spots, and I think we’re going to have to eventually address
this as a Board.
AYES: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Goetz, Mr. Sanford, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Vollaro
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mr. Metivier, Mr. Hunsinger
MR. VOLLARO-That’s it. You’ve got it.
MR. LEJUEZ-Thank you very much.
SITE PLAN NO. 44-2005 SEQR TYPE II DARREN MILES AGENT(S): STEVEN
MILES OWNER(S): LARRY KING, III ZONING SR-1A LOCATION RIDGE RD.
NO. OF DAN’S GARAGE APPLICANT PROPOSES TO CONSTRUCT A 2,464 SQ.
FT. SINGLE FAMILY HOME ON A PROPERTY CONTAINING WETLANDS.
PLACEMENT OF FILL TO COVER 0.46 ACRES OF THE LOT. FILLING WITHIN 50
FEET OF THE SHORELINE OF A WETLAND REQUIRES SITE PLAN REVIEW.
CROSS REF. SP 17-2005 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING 7/13/05 LOT SIZE 11.86
ACRES TAX MAP NO. 290.-1-86 SECTION 179-4
STEVEN MILES & MICHAEL O’CONNOR, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
MR. VOLLARO-For the record, sir, you are?
MR. O'CONNOR-Good evening, Mr. Chairman. For the record, I’m Michael O’Connor
from the law firm of Little & O’Connor. I am representing the applicant tonight. The
applicant’s agent is sitting here with me, Steve Miles, and with us in the audience are the
present owners or some of the present owners of the particular lot that we’re talking
about. I’ve gone over, apparently, Staff comments, and I’m not sure, I talked to Craig
Brown this afternoon, and asked him what was the nature of the comments, and he
didn’t think that there was any requirement for a variance, but as I read through the
Staff comments that are presented tonight, it looks like somebody has raised some issues
that possibly there are variances required, and I’m concerned that this application would
be considered in that light. I would like to have Staff either or affirm or dis-affirm
whether or not they think there are variances required, because if there are variances
required, obviously we should go to the ZBA first and resolve those issues before we
come to you.
MR. VOLLARO-That is correct. I can only offer this. I was going to bring it up during
the course of our deliberations here, but in the Staff data, on the second paragraph, it
12
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
talks about, it will not meet the 75 foot Travel Corridor Overlay setback for Route 9L,
and I looked that up in the Code myself, just to make sure. So what I did, based on this
drawing that I received from the applicant, I deduced myself that this drawing is a one
to twenty scale. The scale is not on here.
MR. MILES-It should be on top. Every square is five by five.
MR. VOLLARO-Is that what that means?
MR. MILES-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. So that’s one to twenty.
MR. MILES-One to twenty five.
MR. VOLLARO-One to twenty five.
MR. O'CONNOR-Each square is five by five.
MR. VOLLARO-These are the squares that are almost.
MR. O'CONNOR-It looks like there are five squares in an inch.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. In any event, we’re close, but what I did is I set you back at one
to twenty, and putting the house here, and there are certain requirements that we have
in the Code. One is that the septic system be at least 100 feet from what is determined to
be the edge of the wetland. I assume this fill line determined the edge of the wetland
here. I made that assumption. Is that correct?
MR. O'CONNOR-That’s correct.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. O'CONNOR-But the problem with just sliding the house back, which is what my
first comment was when I saw the Staff comments was, then you wouldn’t meet the
requirement of the setback from the structure to the wetland.
MR. VOLLARO-Which should be, again, 75 feet.
MR. O'CONNOR-I don’t think the overlay, Travel Corridor Overlay, prevents you from
putting a septic system in that front yard, but it would prevent you from putting a
structure above ground in that yard, without a variance.
MR. VOLLARO-Even if you do, I’ve done the 100 foot analysis, the septic tank only has
to be 50 feet, the D box and the field have to be 100, and I’ve quickly calculated with my
own rule that even if, this is transposing the house from here to here, and the original
septic line was here. You’re putting in an Eljen System, I suspect, and this area here falls
within 100 feet of that line, just about, a little over.
MR. O'CONNOR-But there’s probably no reason you couldn’t leave the septic system
back where it was originally shown, and just.
MR. VOLLARO-No, you can put it anywhere. I’ve played around with this.
MR. O'CONNOR-And pump it, but my question, I guess, is it Staff’s position that the 75
foot Travel Corridor Overlay applies?
MR. VOLLARO-That does apply.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MRS. BARDEN-It does apply.
MR. O'CONNOR-Then why did you deem the application complete that would allow it
to come to the Board to be on the agenda?
MR. VOLLARO-I’m glad you asked that question, and not me.
MRS. BARDEN-I believe, and I did not review this project, but I believe the question as
just made, if you met with Craig Brown, which I know that you have, he would have
been able to tell you whether or not you needed variances, but it looks as if it’s just
unclear if you meet the required 75 foot setback from the Travel Corridor.
MR. O'CONNOR-The house is 30 feet from the edge of the boundary.
MR. VOLLARO-The house is 30 feet from the road.
MR. O'CONNOR-From the road.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s correct. What I wanted to ask Staff was, I have a blank pre-
application conference meeting sheet here.
MR. O'CONNOR-I think they’ve had more than one.
MR. MILES-Yes, we’ve actually had two.
MR. VOLLARO-So, see, what I’m looking at is, again, when Board members sit all by
themselves in their house, trying to look at this stuff, if they don’t have a complete
package, it gets very difficult, and I look at this and say, gee, that’s nice. There’s an
applicant’s signature here, but there’s no statement of what took place at the pre-
application conference.
MR. O'CONNOR-That’s not necessarily unusual though, Mr. Vollaro. If you’re in full
compliance, you do not end up with comments on there, typically.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s correct, but obviously there should have been something on
there.
MR. O'CONNOR-I’m presuming, I don’t know who did this. They don’t sign them. I
don’t know who did the Staff review, and I’m not trying to point fingers.
MR. VOLLARO-I don’t know that, either, I really don’t.
MRS. STEFFAN-I’m also not sure, I just wanted to weigh in, because the Staff comments
start by saying the Planning Board recently reviewed an almost identical application,
Site Plan 17-2005 for this site, and I know I put it in the package, so I didn’t keep that
package. So I don’t know whether there’s a pre-conference application with the original
submission. So there may very well be other notes in the file that we don’t have.
MR. O'CONNOR-I think this is the first time anybody has talked about Travel Corridor
setback.
MRS. STEFFAN-I don’t remember it the last time when we talked.
MR. O'CONNOR-I’m not sure what the genesis of that is.
MR. VOLLARO-The genesis is really out of the Code Book. That’s where it starts, but
you’re asking who, not what.
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MR. SANFORD-Again, since we’re talking in terms of procedure, I have a question.
Susan, it’s probably directed to you as much as anybody, but I just have, I’m very
concerned and perhaps you can clarify it, but in May, I think, of this year, this
application was in front of us, virtually identical application, and it was not approved.
MRS. BARDEN-That’s right.
MR. SANFORD-And I guess, is it part of the policies of the Staff of Queensbury just to
allow an applicant to repackage the same application and come back a month or two
later for another complete hearing?
MRS. BARDEN-They can do that.
MR. SANFORD-Can they do it a third time if it’s denied?
MRS. BARDEN-They can do it as many times as they want.
MR. SANFORD-So we might be seeing Mr. O’Connor and the applicant here for the next
24 months? I just want clarification on that.
MR. O'CONNOR-No, you won’t.
MRS. BARDEN-It wouldn’t be wise of the applicant to submit the same application to
you. That’s why it’s different.
MR. SANFORD-But basically in Staff notes you basically say it’s essentially identical.
That’s the quote I read.
MR. O'CONNOR-I could distinguish this in significant ways from the prior application.
MR. SANFORD-Right now I’m just asking Staff about our Staff policies on how this is
handled.
MR. O'CONNOR-You’re presuming that it’s the same application. I think you have to
kind of say, presuming that the Staff is correct, that it is identical.
MR. SANFORD-Well, an almost identical application was actually the wording that Staff
used, but again, I think that this is a topic for workshop, and I’m not sure if this is a
discretionary policy that Staff has implemented or if it is governed by State law, that
applicants that have been denied can continue to keep coming back, so I just want to
reference that and have that as a topic of discussion, perhaps tomorrow at our Staff
meeting.
MRS. BARDEN-Sure.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s a good point.
MR. O'CONNOR-For the purpose of the record, I would like to distinguish this
application from the prior application, if I can, just briefly.
MR. VOLLARO-And that would be based on what? The re-location of the house from
one spot to another?
MR. MILES-The relocation of the house, the downsizing of the house by a few hundred
square foot, and also by totally changing the style of the house. It’s a totally different
house. It’s a raised ranch, which requires much less fill. Those were all concerns at the
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
last time. So we changed everything and relocated everything and went with a whole
different house.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. One thing, and that’s a basis, I mean, that forms a basis for a new
application, I guess, based on what Staff says. I have a question, though, under Special
Conditions that were stated by the Department of the Army in their letter of October 20,
2004.
MR. O'CONNOR-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-And they have Special Condition A. The Committee shall effect a
transfer of deed on the 10.26 acres of the remaining parcel to a local conservation
organization. If a transfer of deed is not possible, permittee shall secure a conservation
easement or deed restriction on the remaining 10.26 acres of wetlands on the site to
guarantee its preservation for wetland and wildlife resources. Copies of the instrument
effecting such easement shall be submitted to the New York District Corps of Engineer
for approval prior to execution, and the instrument shall be executed and recorded
within the Warren County Registrar of Deeds within six months of the date of this letter,
and that would be April 20, 2005. Has that been done?
MR. O'CONNOR-Okay. I have addressed that. Until we know the area of the fill, which
is going to be dictated by this Board’s determination, we can’t actually draw in the area
that’s not going to be filled and the area that’s going to be restricted. I wrote to the
Army Corps, I spoke to the people at the Army Corps, and wrote to them because we
were concerned about the six month period, and they basically said if you do this within
two years, you don’t need to come back and get another renewal, or you don’t, we will
honor it, is what they’ve said to us.
MR. VOLLARO-Is there a supplement to this letter that they would supply to us, so that
this letter is supplemented under the conditions?
MR. O'CONNOR-They would not respond, let me just read you my letter and see how I
did it. I wrote to Kevin Bruce, who is the Albany Office, New York State District Corps
of Engineers, Department of the Army, Albany Field Office, RE: Permit. Dear Mr.
Bruce: Please be advised we represent Larry N. King and write you on his behalf in
connection with the above referenced permit. The permit was issued under the date of
October 20, 2004 and pursuant to Special Conditions on Page Two, Paragraph A, the
permittee was to transfer conservation easement or deed restriction on the remaining
10.26 acres of wetland and record the instrument with the Warren County Clerk within
six months from the date of your permit letter. That would be April 24, 2005. To date,
no filling of wetland has occurred. The property has been put under contract of sale,
and purchaser attempting to finalize necessary local permits which will then give us the
exact area of the area to be filled and we can describe, for the purposes of the
conservation easement, the area not to be filled. It is my understanding that this
property is located in the Town of Queensbury and the Town has the following
requirements. To place fill within 50 feet of a wetland, a site plan approval is necessary
by the Queensbury Planning Board. The single home which is to be constructed must be
set back 75 feet from the wetland and a septic system must be 100 feet from the wetland.
As I dictate this letter, I’m not sure who the engineer for the purchaser is, but I’m trying
to work out a proper site plan as approval by the Town of Queensbury. I have,
however, contacted Craig Brown, the Zoning Administrator for the Town of
Queensbury, and he has verified that he’s working with the purchaser to obtain the
necessary information. I enclose a copy of the New York State Department of
Environmental Conservation letter dated December 16, 2004, re: Notice of 401 Water
Quality Certification Waiver. We would ask that you consider this letter an application
for extension of 60 days for the date to comply with Condition A above referred to, and
in the alternative, we would state to you there have been no change in circumstances
from the date of the original application, and if necessary, you consider this letter a
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
second application and you issue a new permit letter with a new case number assigned.
Subsequent to that letter, I had telephone conversations with them. They said they don’t
do, it’s not necessary to extend it. It’s not necessary to issue a new permit, as long as we
get this thing completed within two years. Even if you went outside the two years, all
you would have to do is re-submit it to them. There have been no changes in the Army
Corps Rules and Regulations and basically that’s what happens if you run past that two
years. You have to resubmit, which, obviously, we would like to avoid because of the, it
wasn’t simple to get, they came up, and I’m not sure what you’ve listened or considered
at the last meeting. They actually came up and site inspected. This is not a nationwide
permit. If you read the first part of their letter, they said they visited the site, and based
upon their visitation, based upon their rules and regulations, as a property owner,
you’re entitled to a reasonable use of the property and you can fill one half acre and not
harm the waters of the United States government, which is what all wetlands is about,
protecting the waters of the United States.
MR. VOLLARO-And they use a figure there of .46 acres, so that that’s how they got to
10.26, and what I guess they were saying is no matter where you put that .45, or close to
a half acre of fill, doesn’t make much difference to them. That’s what they’re giving you
as an intrusion to the wetland.
MR. O'CONNOR-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-And so, it seems to me that once you know that piece of information,
that you could have applied and got the 10.26, because you could have taken the full
half acre, I think they’ll give you a full half, I believe, well, they say a maximum of .45.
MR. O'CONNOR-Yes, but this thing flip flopped from one end of the site to the other
end of the site, because somebody was concerned about impact upon neighbors.
MR. VOLLARO-Right. That was Dan’s Garage that talked to us the last time that the
applicant was in front of us.
MR. O’CONNOR-Okay. So the applicant tried to comply with that. I mean, if we had
submitted a conservation easement, I can’t imagine undoing a conservation easement to
the benefit of the United States. I don’t want to put a conservation easement for the
benefit of the United States on record until I’m sure that it’s 100% correct.
MR. SANFORD-Bob, you know, this is kind of putting the cart in front of the horse type
of thing. I mean, we have setbacks and certain requirements and we have fill that hasn’t
taken place, and so the question is, how do we know that the appropriate clearances
could be met on this project anyway?
MR. VOLLARO-Well, I think the applicant will, this should be a submission here of the
drawing with the 75 foot setback. I think this, frankly, has to be re-submitted. I mean, I
think what we’ve got here now does not show really the 75 foot setback. It doesn’t show
the 100 foot to the D-Box or to the Eljen System. It doesn’t show the distance from the
house to the fill line. We need a really good depiction of what this is going to look like
when it’s finished. This is not what it’s going to look like.
MRS. STEFFAN-Well, I just want to say that I remember the discussion we had, and the
Board was very divided on this project the last time we saw it, obviously in a different
form, but I don’t remember any discussion about the traffic corridor overlay during that
time period.
MR. VOLLARO-It wasn’t in there.
MRS. STEFFAN-No, and so this is a new development.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. VOLLARO-It’s a new application and it’s subject to, any new application is subject
to.
MRS. STEFFAN-I understand that, but I think that one of the things that the applicant is
trying to do, as he identified, is he’s made some changes to the submission, and there’s
also a letter from the gentleman who owns Dan’s Garage, saying that he now supports
the development, and his public comment was a major consideration for us when we
heard this application originally.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s true.
MR. MILES-Could I also say that I met first with Craig Brown who reviewed it, and then
the second time was with George Hilton, and neither time this was made notice to me.
The only time this came up was Saturday in the mail about the 75 foot corridor overlay,
and I didn’t even know what it was, to be quite honest, because I’d never been in front
of this Board. Never heard of it. So if that was an issue, we would have taken care of it.
MR. O'CONNOR-(Lost word) he thought it was 75 foot setback from the wetland,
because right in that same sentence, the next sentence you start talking about wetlands
75 feet, which I understand a layperson looking at it trying to figure out what’s what, or
whatever. My impression is that, I would respectfully ask that we table the application,
or the Board table the application, and if you have other comments, other than that you
actually don’t have something in front of you, apparently, with dimensional setbacks on
it, are there other comments that you also think you would like to see when this comes
back to you?
MRS. STEFFAN-I think I’d be comfortable if C.T. Male could take a look at it, because
that was one thing that was missing from the package, and in a situation like this, where
we are considering the wetlands, we do have the letter from the Army Corps, but I’d feel
a lot better if C.T. Male took a look at it, because they’re, obviously they’re engineers,
I’m not.
MR. O’CONNOR-Okay, but that, you have to direct your Staff to do that, I can’t ask C.T.
Male to look at an application.
MR. VOLLARO-Sure.
MRS. STEFFAN-Right, and you need to provide the information that they’re going to
look for. So from that point of view, I would ask Staff to have C.T. Male look at it, to
make sure that the criteria that you provide will meet their level of review.
MR. SANFORD-Well, I mean, one of my big concerns last time, and still is a very, very
big concern this time, is we want to make sure that whoever purchases this property is
going to be able to have septic systems that work over time, and do not fail. This is a
very wet piece of property, and the comfort zone hasn’t been here in the prior
application, and of course we have nothing to really address at this particular time
around. So we are very interested in making sure that toilets are going to be able to be
flushed, and that you bring in Town water and it’s going to be left on that site, and that
this is not going to cause problems to the new homeowners, as well as ecological
problems. So we really need to have those types of items thoroughly addressed.
MR. O'CONNOR-Was the property immediately to the north subject to a review? That’s
the existing house immediately to the north.
MR. VOLLARO-I know the house you’re looking at, because we pulled in the driveway
to turn around, yes. I can’t answer that, Mr. O’Connor. I don’t know.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. O'CONNOR-I don’t think the soils or anything through that whole area, are a lot
different.
MR. SANFORD-Again, we can’t go back and look at what has been done and whether or
not that was done appropriately or not, but in this particular case, we want to make sure
that the site can support septic systems.
MR. O'CONNOR-I’m just asking for more justification, if you had that and you
approved it, I understand that house was built since 1988, so there shouldn’t be any
Ordinance change, and if you had justification on that soil, that site.
MR. SANFORD-That may not have been subject to site plan review for all I know, that
particular home. Again, this is in front of us because of, I think what, the Army Corps
involvement, Bob?
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. Primarily I think that’s why it’s in front of us, it has to do with
wetlands.
MR. O'CONNOR-I’m not trying to be defensive, okay. I understand your comment. We
will come back with an engineer’s certification as to whether or not the septic system
will work. Hopefully that will satisfy you. You can have your engineer look at it.
MR. SANFORD-Right, and we certainly will want to do that.
MR. GOETZ-I think Mr. O’Connor has made a good point. Essentially you’re saying
table it, and that would give us a chance to go to C.T. Male, because I had that same
concern previously, and I voted against it last time, because I was afraid of what would
happen to septic. Because when I went to the property, I would have needed some hip
boots to wade through it, and I’m not very good at that. So I didn’t. So I would say
maybe table it and do what the Board has requested and we’ll see what goes on.
MR. O'CONNOR-Anything else?
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, one other thing. When you do the new drawing, once you set your
site, try to give me an analysis of the slope of the driveway. It should not be in excess of
10%.
MR. SANFORD-Bob, I think you should do the tabling motion. You seem to have all the
issues lined up, but one additional comment is how do you want to, in your tabling
motion, how do you want to address the execution of the conservation easements and
the sequencing of that? Because it seems to me that one of the things, and I appreciate
Mr. O’Connor’s explanation, and it is difficult to sequence it, but it seems to me that
what we should be having in front of us is, okay, if this approval goes forward, then
here’s what’s going to happen to this remaining 10.26 or whatever acres of wetland, and
we need to have a clear understanding of that.
MR. O'CONNOR-What we’ve done in the past in that area is make your approval
subject to us presenting to the Town Attorney a recordable restrictive covenant
satisfactory to accomplish the purposes of the easement, and that’s a simple way of
doing it, rather than having six, seven people trying to hash it out, have the attorney
take it in his own private office, and he will, your idea is that there will be no building,
no further fill on the remainder of the land, at least that’s what I read from the Army
Corps permit. We can parrot the language from the Army Corps permit, and all we do
is Attach a Schedule A, which is a metes and bounds description from the survey of the
remainder land.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s a mouthful, for me to put in a motion.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. O'CONNOR-Okay, but I think Mr. Sanford has raised it. I would think you don’t
necessarily need that at this point, if you feel comfortable with the idea of saying,
understand, applicant, any approval will be subject to a condition that you satisfy the
needs of the Town Attorney to have an effective easement, that won’t allow the filling or
use of the balance of the property, and I don’t know, I don’t think that we have a
conservation trust, yet, in the Town.
MR. VOLLARO-No, we don’t.
MR. O'CONNOR-That effectively will take properties.
MR. SANFORD-There’s the other organization that’s not part of the Town, that was
created a number of years ago, which land can be.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s the Land Conservancy.
MR. SANFORD-Yes. I don’t know how that would, whether that would be suitable.
MR. O'CONNOR-I don’t think they’re taking any land, Mr. Sanford. I’ll just tell you for
the record, I don’t think they’ve taken any land at this point. They then get into
maintenance, liability insurance, they get into all kinds of things. We aren’t set up for it.
Typically you have a Rec fee. Somebody has suggested that maybe you have a
conservation fee as well as a rec fee, and that everybody who comes in for a
development has to put something into the kitty, so that you will have a funded source
to actually purchase land that you think is not developable, and they do that in other
communities. So I think probably the only course that we’re going to follow here is a
restrictive covenant, because I think that’s the only thing that’s available to us.
MRS. BARDEN-Mr. Chairman, two things. You do need to open the public hearing.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, I know.
MRS. BARDEN-And when and if you table this application, if you could be specific on
the information that you’d like the applicant to submit, for the next available meeting,
next month.
MR. VOLLARO-I’ll be specific all right, Mrs. Barden.
MR. SANFORD-Bob, and when you make a tabling motion, I’d hate to table this, give
them a laundry list, have them come back, and then find out that variances from the
ZBA are, in fact, needed.
MR. O'CONNOR-I will explore that.
MR. SANFORD-Yes, okay, but again, I just don’t want to mislead the applicant, at our
end, by suggesting that, by telling you what we’re looking for, having you do it, and
then come back and scratch our heads and say, yes, but you know we kind of think you
do need to go to the ZBA. I think Staff needs to make a definitive determination on that.
MR. VOLLARO-I think it’s a good point.
MR. O'CONNOR-I wouldn’t come back without getting a definitive answer. I don’t
want to waste the applicant’s money either.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Let me try to put together a motion here. I’ll put it together
slowly, and definitively. Is there a prepared motion?
MR. O'CONNOR-It would be a motion to table.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. SANFORD-Did you open up a public hearing, Mr. Vollaro?
MR. VOLLARO-Not, yet, no.
MRS. BARDEN-Mr. Sanford, you have something from Mr. King that he submitted.
MR. VOLLARO-I’m going to open up the public hearing now, for anybody that wants to
talk to this application.
PUBLIC HEARING OPENED
LARRY KING
MR. KING-Yes, I would. My name’s Larry King. I’m one of the owners of the property,
and I have a letter in front of you people. I’d like to read it to you. We purchased this
land 18 years ago, and at the time we investigated with the Town of Queensbury office
to make sure it wasn’t wetlands. We were told it had a high water table, but it was not
designated wetlands. The Town also told us, and this was 18 years ago, that
Queensbury had no restrictions on development of any land, even wetlands, under 12
acres. Our land was 11.26 acres. Our land never was mapped as wetlands, and isn’t
now, and Halfway Brook is not on our land. Working with Craig Brown of the
Queensbury Planning Office, we obtained a permit from the Corps of Engineers, which
you’ve looked at, to fill in one half acre of the roadside to build one house and to deed
the remaining 10 and a half acres forever wild. We then received the approval from
DEC to fill in that one half acre and to build one home. Adjacent properties on the
north, south, west of our land have all been granted permits and did have to fill in their
lots, so that they could build. These properties were developed within the past couple
of years. The Army Corps of Engineers agreed we were entitled to a reasonable solution
to solve the problem. DEC has also agreed. In 1993, the Town reappraised the land
from $38,600 to $92,700. We appealed, as we knew that the land needed clearing and
filling. This year, even though we were working with Craig Brown on the sale of this
land, the value and taxes of the land was again increased by $6,000. We appealed, as we
have a contract to sell for much less than the assessed value. Other prospective buyers
wanted to develop all 11 acres. So previous potential sales fell through. If the Town
considers that this property is worth that kind of value, we should be able to build one
house on an 11 acre parcel. Within the last year, we also had to pay to have the land
surveyed to settle an encroachment issue, which also cost us legal fees to resolve. Why
would we do this if we thought that the Town would deny our request to build one
home? The Army Corp of Engineers putting new restrictions and giving us a permit,
how can Queensbury deny us reasonable resolution? If Queensbury doesn’t want one
house on the roadside, on 10.5 acres forever wild, with continued taxes generated on this
residence, then we propose, or will propose, that the Town buy our land for our
purchase price, 18 years of taxes plus legal and survey fees, then take all 11 acres off the
tax rolls forever. We understand that there are State monies available for this purpose.
Please be reasonable with our request. We have done everything we’ve been asked to
do, and with the guidance of the Queensbury Planning Office. We are only asking that
four percent of the total property be developed. The remaining 96% to be forever wild,
and we talked about Dan Imrie, on the last application. I’ve received a letter from him
where he signed a document attached to your letter up there, that providing the
proposed building is to be located on the northernmost part of the property, then I don’t
have any objection to the request for a building permit. I think that settles that issue.
MR. SANFORD-Mr. Chairman, just a quick comment. I appreciate your letter. Well
written, and I appreciate the points that you’re making in it. However, while I think you
make good points, they really don’t pertain to what we do as a Planning Board. We
have absolutely nothing to do with assessments and appraisals of property, and from
time to time we have people who make appeals like this, very logical appeals, that speak
21
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
in terms of the appraisals of their properties, and how they’re not realistic, and while we
might, on a personal level, have sympathy for you, it really doesn’t enter into our
jurisdiction as we draw conclusions and make site plan decisions. You need to address
that with another arm of government. I would suggest you consider talking to the Town
Board as a starting place, okay, but I appreciate your comments. I do have a question.
At the end of your prepared letter, you have 1993 tax notice for $92,700 and then you
have 2005 tax notice for $33,300. So, what happened?
MR. KING-We appealed.
MR. SANFORD-And you got it reduced.
MR. KING-Yes.
MR. KING-Our present assessment is $33,300. We have appealed that. We have a
verbal assignment that they are going to assess it to the total value of what Steve was
paying for the property.
MR. SANFORD-Okay. I think I understand it now. I don’t know what the heck they
were thinking of back in 1992 or 3, but okay.
MR. O’CONNOR-How about 2004 or 2005, the other assessments.
MR. SANFORD-Okay, but at any rate, this is topic that we constantly get warned by
Counsel, when Counsel is here, that it’s really not our jurisdiction to deal with these
types of issues regarding assessment, but it looks like you may want to pursue that
elsewhere.
MR. KING-I appreciate your comments, too, but I just want to emphasize that what
we’re asking for is a reasonable solution to our request. That’s all.
MIKE STEVENS
MR. STEVENS-Hi. My name is Mike Stevens, and I own 4.7 acres a few thousand feet
north of these people, the same side of the road, and I’m going to have to go through
some of this stuff in the future. I’m trying to build a house on it now, but it seems to me,
listening to all you people, with all due respect, there seemed to be just two kinds of
issues here, and again, I don’t know these people but you, sir, I don’t know your name
and I don’t mean to point, but you brought up something about the septic system, and
you were uncomfortable with the septic system. I don’t know what these people have
shown you, but I would assume that at this stage they may be, handed in a septic system
proposal with an engineered stamp on it. I’m not sure, I would just think they would
have by now.
MR. SANFORD-Not in this application. I don’t have anything like that in my packet.
MR. STEVENS-Okay. I would think that they, that would have been done by now, but
what next door, the raised ranch that was built right next to this property, and I thought
I heard it was built in ’88, maybe my ears weren’t right, but I don’t think that’s the right
year. It was built not too long ago, and as anybody knows that goes up Ridge Road, that
was filled in, and blah, blah, blah, but that’s all behind us now. The point is, that seems
to be working quite well. Your concern, which seems to be only a couple of concerns
here really, when you just sit back here and listen to everybody, is, Number One, about
the septic system, which is a big issue, but anybody that went to any engineer and had it
perc tested and went to any engineer today, whether you’re even walking in standing
water, they can develop a system, bringing in fill, that will handle this with no problem
at all. Now, I’m not trying to take sides, and I’m not trying to talk like a lawyer here, but
it’s not the issue it was 20 years ago, where they fail like crazy. They’ve come a long
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
way with septic systems. I have no doubt that one could be put in there with a very
simple system. Why it wasn’t brought to your attention at this point, I can’t answer that,
but that seems to be one big issue here. The other issue that I, that kind of bothers me is,
as a fellow landowner is, you’ve got one little house going in 10, 11 acres, and just like
what was said here, take a ride in your cars and look what’s going on in that whole area.
People are building all over in swamp land, and I really find it aggravating to me that
with all due respect, that we’re kind of all stalled here over where this house is going to
be five foot to Sunday. It really is immaterial where that goes. As you said, sir, and I
don’t mean to point, you walked out there. It’s wet. It doesn’t matter if it’s five feet this
way, five feet this way, five feet this way. It’s going to have to have a little bit of fill. It’s
going to have an engineered system which an engineer will have to stamp it before the
Building Department will allow them to build anyway. It’s really a non-issue here, as
far as I’m concerned. I really think you’ve stalled over non-issues. I really feel it should
move forward, in my opinion, because those two issues I really, you’ve already taken
care of them. The Building Department will want an engineered stamp by a certified
engineer and will take care of the septic system. You’re taken care of there, and as far as
where that house goes, I think it’s a very moot point whether it’s a few feet here or there
when you’ve got that much land. They’re going to donate 10 plus acres. Whether it’s
10.26, 10.15, aren’t we kind of splitting hairs here?
MR. VOLLARO-That’s what dictated in the letter, sir. We don’t pick the numbers. We
don’t pick the numbers.
MR. STEVENS-Well, that’s what I’m saying. The numbers seem to be kind of arbitrary,
whether it’s a few feet. I really wouldn’t think, as a landowner, on one house, on 10 or
11 acres, shouldn’t be this much of an issue. That’s just my opinion. No disrespect
intended.
MR. SANFORD-I appreciate what you’re saying. First of all, just so you understand a
little bit more of the background. We ordinarily do not review single home construction
on properties in the Town of Queensbury as a Planning Board. This is particularly
unique, and we are being told that we have to do this site plan review on this, probably
because of the Army Corps and the requirements that they have with the wetland, but
typically if an individual owns a parcel of property and they want to build a home on it,
it doesn’t come through here, and believe me, we didn’t request to see this and hear this,
but this is a requirement that we do it, and we have our standards and our criteria that
we have to review, and the concerns that we’re raising are legitimate ones, and we need
to know the answers to these things. Now, there was septic engineering submitted
when this application came in front of us in May, but this is a new application, and in
this application, not a thing, and so, again, that application in May was denied, and the
reasons were stated. We don’t need to re-hash that. Now it’s in front of us again. We
have every reason to expect a completed application, and that does mean we’d have to
look at the engineered, engineering for the septic system and have our engineer look at it
and sign off, but I appreciate it, but I want to let you know that ordinarily, you know,
we’re not here talking about an individual that wants to build a home. That’s not what
we typically do, but this is unique, and, you know, not everybody who wants to build a
home has to come in front of this Planning Board.
MR. STEVENS-Well, and don’t take my comments the wrong way. They were meant
with respect, but just when you sit in the background, it just sounds to me like I don’t
want to have to go through this, and I can understand some other people’s aggravation
in this, because I’ve already started this process. I’m a year and a half into it, and you’re
getting to, oh, by the way’s. It’s how many how many hoops you have to jump through
and oh by the way now you need this. You get up to where these people are, I couldn’t
hear very well, but I guess Saturday they got an, oh, by the way, and, you know, no
disrespect to you. I don’t even think it had anything to do with you people, but there’s a
lot of, oh, by the way’s in these permit applications lately that really should be resolved.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
I know it’s not your place to do so, but I’d like it on record that I don’t find it to be very
compatible with trying to build a house. It makes it very difficult.
MR. SANFORD-Actually, you’ll find that this Board unanimously recommended that
the Town Board consider a moratorium to address all those issues that you’re just
talking about, the process, how to make it better, how make it more efficient, how to
revise codes, and how to revise our criteria and our process and it got nowhere. Many
individuals, some perhaps you know, strongly resented us taking the time to iron out
those types of thing, and make it a better process, and so we’re doing the very best we
can. However, many of those codes and policies and procedures have not been refined
and reevaluated at this point.
MR. STEVENS-And I would just like to say, I don’t think it’s your fault at all. I don’t
imply that in any way, shape or form. It’s the nature of this beast that’s been created.
The Town of Queensbury’s gotten very big. A lot of building going on. It’s
overwhelming and everybody knows it. So it’s not against this Board. Thank you.
MR. GOETZ-Your point’s well taken.
MR. O'CONNOR-Mr. Chairman, are there other comments?
MR. VOLLARO-I don’t know. Is there anybody else who’d like to speak to this
application?
MRS. BARDEN-I would keep the public hearing open.
MRS. STEFFAN-If it comes back, we need to keep this, just end for this evening, not to
close it.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, they’re bringing a brand new application in. A brand spanking
new application.
MR. O'CONNOR-No, we’re going to supplement what you have here. Why would we
bring a brand new application in?
MR. VOLLARO-Well, I think what I’m trying to, you know, I’m going to be stating that
in the motion. All new drawings shall be sent to C.T. Male for review. You’re coming
back with a new drawing. Isn’t that correct? I mean, this is going to be a new
application. You’re going to re-think this thing.
MR. SANFORD-Bob, in this case, sure, all that has to take place with the drawings, but I
think what they’re requesting is a tabling of this application, not a resubmittal of new
one.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Fine.
MR. SANFORD-And I certainly think it wouldn’t be fair to the public to close the public
hearing at this time.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. We’ll leave the public hearing open. All right. Fine.
MR. O'CONNOR-I’d make one comment, though. Mr. Sanford, you talk about a
moratorium solving the problems of the world. That’s not going to solve, and I won’t be
apologetic. That’s not going to solve incompetency, and I think that the fact that this
thing has been through the mill twice, and nobody has talked about Travel Corridor
setback, up until this point, it falls in the area of incompetency. It may solve some
problems, like my conversation today with Craig Brown, when I went over the four
issues, as to why it was turned down, and his comment as to the septic system could
24
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
also prove problematic and may possibly fail, that’s something not for the Planning
Board. That’s for the Building Department to determine. That may be something you
want to address. I don’t mean to get into a debate with you.
MR. SANFORD-No, no, and I don’t want to debate with you, either, particularly, on this
topic. I will say that, as I understand what you’re saying right now, I more closely agree
than don’t with what your point is. Not too long ago we had a similar discussion with a
different application, and I was quick to point out that the Planning Board receives the
material from the Staff. We review it to the best of our ability, and we do not deal with
personnel issues within the Town of Queensbury, and if there are incomplete reviews
that are done at that particular level, then the responsible entity to make sure that the
Staff who is doing this work performs up to a particular standard is the Town Board,
and at that time I requested to the other applicant that perhaps they should address the
Town Board, and air some of their displeasure with how things are being done. We do
not have a personnel function within the Town of Queensbury. Even though the Staff
serves as a support to us, we don’t have any linkage in that regard. So the argument
really that you’re making may very well be a good one, should be directed to the Town
Board.
MRS. STEFFAN-Tabling motion?
MR. VOLLARO-I’m prepared to make a tabling motion, and I will do that.
MOTION TO TABLE SITE PLAN NO. 44-2005 DARREN MILES, Introduced by
Robert Vollaro who moved its adoption seconded by Richard Sanford:
The application is hereby TABLED with the following conditions:
1. A new map plan showing all setbacks, including the 75 foot Travel Corridor
Overlay, 75 foot setback of the house from the specified wetland, 100 feet from
the septic field, from the wetland shall be submitted. Map should show a scale
and a north arrow.
2. A calculation of the slope of the driveway shall be submitted, should be in the
order of no greater than 10%.
3. All new drawings and supporting documentation including septic system design
shall be submitted to C.T. Male Associates for their review.
4. The site development data sheet should reflect the height of the building at 24
feet rather than 29.6. Revised data sheet shall be resubmitted.
5. That all necessary variances, if any, be identified and received prior to re-
submittal to the Planning Board.
Duly adopted this 26 day of July, 2005, by the following vote:
h
MR. VOLLARO-Also the execution of a conservation easement written to the
satisfaction of our Town Attorney, per the Department of Army letter, under their
Special Condition A, letter of the Department of the Army dated October 20, 2004.
MRS. STEFFAN-Bob, you used the term, execution of a conservation easement. Wasn’t
our discussion that it couldn’t be done until this was completed, but we could condition
approval, and so by asking for execution of a conservation easement, I don’t know
whether that’s realistic or not.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, once they know, it seems to me, once they know, well, we can say
execution of a conservation easement subsequent to approval.
25
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MRS. STEFFAN-Or draft, because we can condition the approval.
MR. O'CONNOR-Why don’t you say acknowledgement that any approval will be
subject to execution of a satisfactory easement.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, I say satisfactory to our Town Attorney.
MR. O'CONNOR-Everything else is fine, but I would just as soon that the approval be
subject to that, if we get to a point of approval, and then we can draw it with the Town
Attorney. We’ve done that with a number of things.
MR. VOLLARO-I just want to get this execution of the conservation easement set up
correctly. I would like to change that to provide a draft of the proposed conservation
easement, written to satisfy the Town Attorney, per the Department of the Army letter
Special Condition A, dated October 20, 2004. We could provide a draft so that we have
something to see that our Town Attorney can look at and say, yes, when we execute this.
MR. O'CONNOR-You’re talking about spending the applicant’s money. I think he
understands that a lot of what he’s doing is at risk, but I think that you’re not
accomplishing anything. It’s not something that this Board is going approve. It
ultimately is going to be approved by the Town Attorney, and the same thing, you’re
wasting the Town Attorney time and effort by approving something that may or may
not get off the table. I would add it to your final approval. We acknowledge that you’re
going to do that, and we understand that we’ve got to comply with that. We have to
comply with that, Bob, in order to keep our valid Army Corps permit, or keep our Army
Corps permit valid.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, I just want something in here that we have a document like this,
that’s stated that this should be done within six months of the application, that’s all.
MR. SEGULJIC-It’s on the record now.
MRS. STEFFAN-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-We’re in agreement that we’re not going to mention this conservation
easement at all. He has to come back with it in any event.
MR. SEGULJIC-Correct.
MRS. STEFFAN-Correct.
MR. GOETZ-That’s correct.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Goetz, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sanford, Mr. Vollaro
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mr. Metivier, Mr. Hunsinger
MR. MILES-Thank you.
OLD BUSINESS:
SITE PLAN NO. 17-2004 MOD. SEQR TYPE PREVIOUS SEQR M & C VENTURES
AGENT(S): NACE ENG., JONATHAN LAPPER OWNER(S): SAME ZONING: RC-
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
15 LOCATION: SHERMAN AVENUE APPLICANT PROPOSES TO MODIFY A
PREVIOUSLY APPROVED SITE PLAN FOR AN INDOOR SPORTS DOME FROM
169,975 SQ. FT. TO 171,006 SQ. FT. AND REDUCING THE HEIGHT OF THE DOME
FROM 75 FT. TO 68 FT. MODIFICATIONS TO PREVIOUSLY APPROVED PLANS
REQUIRE SITE PLAN REVIEW AND APPROVAL FROM THE PLANNING BOARD.
CROSS REF. PZ 2-2003 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING N/A LOT SIZE: 19.42
ACRES TAX MAP NO. 309.5-1-3.11 SECTION 179-4-020
JON LAPPER, TOM NACE, & DOUG MILLER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT,
PRESENT
MR. VOLLARO-For the record?
MR. LAPPER-For the record, Jon Lapper, project engineer, Tom Nace, and Doug Miller.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. LAPPER-We are here seeking what we hope you will view as a very minor
modification to the site plan for the sports complex. There are three aspects of this that
need to be changed because of just changes in the scope of the project before
construction. I know that you’ve all been out to the site, and you can see that a lot of
work’s been done and they’re ready to pour the footings. They are hoping to be in
operation by November for the indoor soccer season, as well as indoor field hockey and
lacrosse, and they have a lot of interest in this from the leagues in the area really up and
down the Northway corridor. There are really three aspects that we want to discuss.
One is the buffer along the Northway, and that is a very small area, just at the very
corner of the relocated parking lot. Tom Nace has proposed, I think, seven, spruce trees
to make up for the five foot difference in the buffer, but Doug has gone out, even today,
to take photographs. There’s 100 foot of very dense buffer between this site and the
Northway, and we’ve got some photos for you to see that it’s just, it’s not visible at all
from the Northway, and that’s these two sets.
MR. SANFORD-Before we go into this, I just have a question. I’m a little bit confused
and perhaps you or Staff can help me out on this. This was in front of the ZBA recently,
and I received.
MR. LAPPER-What was before the ZBA, I think, was Henri Langevin. He’s doing an
indoor hockey training facility, and that was, in order to have one driveway for both
facilities, this is an anomaly that needs to get cleaned up in the Ordinance, that even if
you’re having a shared driveway and you have access onto the road, which this does, if
you’re not using your frontage for access, you still need to get a variance, which is kind
of silly since you want to have fewer driveways rather than more. So that was Henry’s
project.
MR. SANFORD-Well, because it says on the Zoning Board of Appeals record of
resolution, projects for Doug and Theresa Miller, and it talks in terms of an Area
Variance, and it looks to me unclear. It certainly looks like the Area Variance was not
approved at this particular point in time, and I saw there’s some form of a clarifying
memorandum from Marilyn to the ZBA which outlines her position on it, and she may
or may not be accurate in how she’s interpreting jurisdiction on this, but I certainly
think, in keeping with our past procedures, before we can move forward and approve,
the applicant has to get through the ZBA on this.
MR. LAPPER-I have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t think that has anything
to do with this, but I’m confused.
MR. SANFORD-That’s why I’m asking for clarification on this.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. VOLLARO-I have the same thing that he has here.
MR. NACE-Can we see a copy?
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, sure.
MR. MILLER-Henry’s project is completely separate from this project.
MRS. STEFFAN-It’s different.
MR. VOLLARO-Read that, and then you’ll know why Mr. Sanford and others are
confused.
MRS. BARDEN-An issue was brought up at the last Zoning Board meeting, and I believe
it was the 20, inquiring about some plans were not, conditions of approval of their
th
variance were not done appropriately, or they didn’t think that the site was being
constructed as per the plans, and they asked Staff to look into this. Staff has said that
there is no violation on the site, that it’s been inspected a dozen times by the Code
Enforcement Officer and there are no violations on site. So there is no variance. This
was a resolution that the Board passed asking to inspect the site and see if there were
any violations.
MR. SANFORD-Yes, and I guess what I’m wondering here is, whether there’s merit to
their statement or not, isn’t it appropriate for them to re-evaluate their position and
clarify it? For instance, if we made a denial here at the Planning Board, and then
Marilyn and Staff, through their debriefing meeting the next day, didn’t agree with it,
that would be fine, but it wouldn’t change our decision. Our decision would have to be
altered by this Board. My question to you is, is the ZBA makes a statement in there, an
official statement, and Marilyn’s saying I don’t think you’re right, ZBA, but don’t we
have to get the ZBA to basically change their position?
MRS. BARDEN-There is no enforcement action. This was not something that was in
front of the Board on July 20 for a variance. This was something that they, someone
th
witnessed, and thought that there was a violation.
MR. SANFORD-May I see that again, though, because I think that what they’re doing in
that, and I’m not speaking to the merits of what they’re saying, but I think in their
resolution, they think it’s appropriate for us to vote as a Board, that we would expect an
immediate action to be taken by the Town in regards to this, up to and including a Stop
Work Order until the problem is rectified. Now, I guess what I’m trying to say here is, if
we move forward and give certain kinds of approvals, we’re basically, without giving
the ZBA an opportunity to retract their position, we’re basically going cross grain with
their decision. To me, it seems like, if you do the homework in the proper order, this has
to be clarified and the ZBA basically has to make a statement to the effect that, hey, yes,
we appreciate your letter, Marilyn, and you’re right, we’re wrong. So we revoke our
resolution that we made. For us to do it is very arbitrary.
MRS. BARDEN-They plan on doing that at the next meeting.
MR. LAPPER-I think I can clarify this. This has nothing whatsoever to do with this
project. This was the subject of a subdivision, and what they’re talking about is Henri
Langevin’s project, which is at the northwest corner of the site on Sherman Avenue,
where he’s doing this completely different facility for a hockey training camp.
MR. VOLLARO-Is the letter mislabeled, Mr. Lapper? Is that what the problem is?
MR. LAPPER-This came up, apparently, at a Zoning Board meeting that of course we
didn’t get any notice that this was going to be on the agenda, and we could have
28
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
clarified it at the time, but they’re talking about Henry’s project, which is on this other
piece of property, and they went out. I mean, what the Marilyn verifies is that nothing
that Doug has done is in violation whatsoever of any of his approvals.
MR. VOLLARO-I think Mr. Sanford has a point, though. Marilyn doesn’t really speak
for this Board. That’s a problem that I have.
MR. LAPPER-But see, if the Zoning Board just drove by and someone said, gee, I
wonder if this is in compliance, I mean, they didn’t have the plans in front of them.
They’re just sort of shooting from the hip saying now that it’s cleared, I wonder if this is
right or wrong, and the Staff, Bruce Frank is the Code Enforcement Officer, and he went
out.
MRS. BARDEN-Mr. Lapper, that’s exactly what happened.
MR. SANFORD-Jon, there’s no disputing what you’re saying. I guess what I’m saying
is, there’s a lot of decisions that are made by a lot of Boards that, quite honestly, I don’t
agree with. However, I feel I have to respect them until those Boards revise their
position, and I guess what I hate to do here say, well, based on your representations, I
guess we don’t have to pay attention.
MR. LAPPER-And I’m not asking you to believe me. I’m saying we have Marilyn
saying.
MR. SANFORD-Marilyn’s not the ZBA. I mean, that’s as simple as that.
MR. LAPPER-But we have verification from the Planning Staff that there was no
violation of Doug’s approvals.
MR. SANFORD-I know.
MR. LAPPER-I guess what I would ask is that if you feel you need to table it, could we
have a special meeting next week.
MR. SANFORD-Mr. Vollaro, you’re the Chairman. You could poll the Board on it. I just
wanted to know what this was all about. I feel uncomfortable moving forward when the
ZBA makes a statement like that, and that’s why I brought it up. I didn’t come in here
with a pre-determined position on this. I just want to know what goes with it, and then
it does open up the process.
MR. LAPPER-Well, it sure would have been nice if we knew about this last week, just in
terms of process, that somebody could have told us, too.
MR. SANFORD-I would have thought you would have known.
MR. LAPPER-Yes. We didn’t know it was at the meeting, it was discussed, and we
didn’t know afterwards that a resolution was passed, which is a problem, but I think
that Marilyn went pretty far to cover it and say that Doug is completely in compliance,
but I’ll let the applicant speak.
MR. MILLER-I think part of what happened, this goes back to last fall when Henry
started his work.
MR. LAPPER-Show them where Henry’s piece is.
MR. MILLER-Part of what this Board did, and the Town Board did a couple of years
ago, we’ve subdivided this lot and sold off this 1.2 acre parcel to Henri Langevin to
develop his skate training facility. I think part of the variance issue is there’s supposed
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
to be one entrance, and, Jonathan, you can speak more clearly to that than I can, but the
problem occurred, when Henry went in to start clearing last fall, I didn’t know he was
going in clearing his lot. It’s his lot. He can do the clearing without notifying me, but
rather than go in where the entrance has occurred and is correctly established at this
point in time, Henry went in right in this corner here, and that was supposed to be
buffered and maintain that buffer, and in the process of going in, he took down a tree or
two, and Planning Staff found out about it and correctly corrected the situation, and I
think that’s what this is addressing, and it’s still, I look at it and it’s still got the tax map
number for our parcel. Everybody’s looking at this as one parcel, Doug and Theresa
Miller, when it’s not. It’s been subdivided. That’s been sold off to Henry, and this
corner right here is where the problem occurs. If it was here, I’d say, yes, okay, maybe
we’ve got some issues here, too, but it’s on a corner that buffers Niagara Mohawk, and
Sherman Avenue. So I don’t know if that helps clarify for you a little bit.
MR. VOLLARO-Was Niagara Mohawk’s letter directed at that activity?
MR. MILLER-No. Niagara Mohawk’s letter is directed to trees that Jonathan will speak
about, in this area here.
MR. SEGULJIC-I can understand your concerns, but can we move forward as part of our
approvals or whatever, or table and condition it that they get the ZBA to renege that?
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, that was my thought. I think we ought to move forward with this
and base our approval/disapproval, whatever, on the fact that the ZBA would retract
that letter of, and I don’t have it in front of me now.
MR. LAPPER-Resolution of July 20, 2005, last Wednesday.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, would retract their resolution of July.
MR. LAPPER-I don’t blame Mr. Sanford. This is very strong language. It’s just that they
got the facts wrong. It’s not this applicant.
MR. SANFORD-Fine, although I think that, the way I’m hearing this, it seems pretty
clear cut that there’s been a number of misunderstandings. I could see down the road
there being similar situations where there’s not quite as obvious of an issue, and as a
matter of protocol, do we merely take the representations of the applicant and their
agent and/or Staff, or do we abide by our process of having to get ZBA stuff handled
before we deal with our stuff, and again, if for this particular matter the pleasure of the
Board is to proceed, I’m not going to object to that. I just feel that it’s an uncomfortable
position to be in, because not everything may be as apparent as this, and then you get
into splitting hairs, and I do know that Marilyn, you know, may be very well respected
by some, the reason you do have these Boards is to make these decisions and you don’t
have Staff make these decisions. Okay.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s all true, Dick. However, I think that the applicant has pointed
out probably that this occurred off their property. The action by the ZBA probably
didn’t realize that there was this subdivision, and therefore they put this motion out
against Doug and Theresa Miller, unknowingly.
MR. GOETZ-I think it would be a shame to table this at this time. I mean, not only do
we have what the applicant said, but Susan Barden, who’s with the Staff, confirmed it,
and I understand your point, and obviously you have a lot more experience at this than I
do, but I think for the applicant I think it would be very unfair to send them packing
again tonight.
MR. SANFORD-Let’s move forward, then.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. We’ll make it a condition of whatever comes out of this, that we’ll
notify.
MR. LAPPER-Thank you. I just want to read into the record, just so it’s in the record,
this one short second paragraph from Marilyn. Please note that there is no violation
found by Staff. Our Code Compliance Officer, Bruce Frank, was contacted by the
Millers at the start of the project. Since then Mr. Frank has been at the site dozens of
times, all documented. The site has been developed in conformance with all plans, in
fact, the Millers will be coming before the Planning Board for modifications, none of
which have yet taken place. So that was a shock to us, but thank you for your
consideration.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. LAPPER-We’re back to three issues. One is the buffer strip along the Northway,
and in order to slightly relocate the parking lot, and I guess in the big picture, I’m going
to ask Tom to show you on the map, but this is all being done so that they can stage the
development and build the one dome first, which is going to have most of the activity
and build the tennis dome later, and as a result of that, they propose to move the
parking around slightly.
MR. NACE-Okay. What you’re looking at in the pictures occurs right in this corner, or,
I’m sorry, this corner right here. This is the original approved site plan, and you’ll note
that the main dome is wider. The track is located around the soccer fields inside the
dome, and there’s only a single double aisle of parking here. The tennis dome was
smaller. We had two full aisles of parking in front of it. In order to move the track from
this dome to this dome, this one became smaller, and consequently lower, and narrower.
This one became wider. We lost one of the aisles of parking here. So we had to replace
it over here. When we did that, this closest corner of disturbance here at the edge of the
pavement moved five feet out toward the property line, just that corner. Okay, and
that’s where Staff has noted we’re encroaching a little further towards the property line
than we were before, and as a mitigation for that, we’ve proposed planting seven spruce
trees, which will provide a low in-fill in that area.
MR. MILLER-Which it doesn’t show in here. It does on our first map, Tom had, is the
100 foot buffer along the Northway, the scenic buffer, which is still intact. The two
photos I gave you, the photo that says facing east, you can see there’s a gentleman
standing on the bank there. That is the topsoil that’s been piled up, stripped and stored
temporarily. Let me just refer back to this. Here’s our 10 foot buffer, which we are
maintaining. We have not gotten into that, and then there is the additional 100 foot
buffer, and we’re looking towards this buffer. The gentleman that’s standing on the
bank is standing just about where this test pit is, that test pit point, and the birch trees
with the opening between them is right where this narrowing or getting closer to the
buffer occurs. The second picture that is up there, or that I have given you, is looking
right in there. We’re looking right at the Northway. You can’t see through there.
MR. SEGULJIC-Excuse me. So that’s where you’re going to be putting the new
plantings?
MR. MILLER-That’s where Staff has asked us to plant some additional trees and we’re
going to put those in that area right in there, too. I think I could even give you another
photo, photo facing east, number four shows, I mean, there’s some undergrowth in that
canopy that’s going to clearly flourish now that the canopy’s been opened up, and going
to fill in very nicely.
MR. SEGULJIC-The soil we see piled up in the pictures.
MR. MILLER-That’s topsoil that will be screened and then spread back over the site, and
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part of the grading process, the topsoil is stripped off, stored, the grading is done. The
cuts and fills are done, and then the topsoil is screened and then put back down.
MR. LAPPER-The next issue is along the NiMo power line there are a few trees, one tree
actually fell down on the NiMo lines and cut off power to 1800 homes. So NiMo has
said that they want these few trees cut down, and the reason is because the way that
they were developed, all of the branches are facing the NiMo power line. So it’s just
protecting the power corridor, but what we want to show you is that it doesn’t affect the
neighbors because there are two NiMo power corridors, and there’s a large line of trees
in between.
MR. SANFORD-Why did they fall down?
MR. LAPPER-One fell down.
MR. VOLLARO-Wind or something.
MR. SANFORD-No, the reason I mention it is we’ve had other applications where, due
to the clearing, they’ve managed to leave the existing trees more vulnerable to wind and
other potential problems, and then they pose a risk of falling onto power lines where, if
they had a thicker area of trees to begin with, they wouldn’t have had that problem, and
scratch my head because these projects bring in engineers, they look at it, and I guess,
why didn’t they get it right?
MR. NACE-I understand what you’re saying. Well, we understand what you’re saying,
okay. There are about a dozen of these tall trees that were left there. I reality, they
should have probably been either removed, or something different done, but the
difference between this and the project you’re talking about is that we’re not relying on
that buffer to screen anything. We have the additional buffer between the power lines to
screen any view port from the west. So they’re not in any way, shape or form a critical
element of buffering the site.
MR. SANFORD-Yes, I appreciate that.
MR. MILLER-To help clarify a little bit, the four pictures that I just gave you, the top
one, which is tree problem, 009, is looked from Sherman Avenue south. To the left is to
the east, which is where our project is, and you can see almost in the middle, the picture
just to the left of the pole, there are some trees that are heavily canopied on the one side,
the pole line side, and it’s in that area that one of the trees just by shear weight of the
trees, or the canopy all being on one side, that tree came down and locked out the
Ogdenburg substation. We’ve interrupted 1800 customers for an hour or so a couple of
weeks ago, about a month ago now. Niagara Mohawk came through and said that those
are danger trees, and you guys, I think, have a letter to that effect from Niagara
Mohawk. Picture Number 008 at the bottom of that same page is the same grouping of
trees, taken from our property, looking back towards the power line. The next two
pictures, 014, is looking from the south back at that grouping of trees, actually from the
south, we’re looking northwest in this picture, and there is, as Tom said, there’s about 12
trees that are considered dangerous. Picture 16 is looking in the same general direction,
just a little further south, where there were no trees, and we stayed within our clearing
limits, and what was left were no danger trees, and that shows the canopy that is left
and the canopy that will be left if we take these danger trees down, and that’s the full
canopy between the distribution line and Niagara Mohawk’s transmission line that are
shown on the aerial overhead picture.
MR. VOLLARO-I guess, this is the overhead you’re talking about here.
MR. NACE-Yes. The other thing to consider is in that area that’s being left on Doug’s
property as a buffer, the smaller trees, now that the pine canopy is gone, will have a
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chance to develop and grow up. So there’ll be some hardwoods in there that will
provide some buffer over time.
MR. MILLER-Those pictures that you have I took about a month ago, right after the
problem occurred, and when I submitted the letter to Craig, or Niagara Mohawk
submitted the letter, I’ve got a picture here I’m going to pass around today. This is
actually might almost show it a little more clearly for some of you. It clearly shows the
power line going through there, and it shows the cluster of trees that are creating the
danger. It’s, again, the same trees, but just from a little different angle.
MR. VOLLARO-I guess in some fashion Niagara Mohawk should share a little bit in
making sure that they’re lines are clean as well.
MR. MILLER-I’d love to have them take care of that.
MR. LAPPER-The last issue is the change in the size of the two domes, and the numbers
are a little bit different in the application and in the Staff notes, and actually what we’re
seeking. The total is 1643 square feet that it would be bigger than what was approved.
In terms of the mass of the project, it’s still going to seem smaller because the main thing
is that the bigger building, the big dome, that getting reduced in size makes a bigger
difference than a smaller one getting made a little bit bigger because it reduces the
height, 78 feet to 65 feet, which is a pretty significant change for the height of the dome,
but the total that we’re asking for is 1643 square feet on the whole facility to be bigger,
which is a very small percentage of what’s here.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. I looked at both the Phase I and the modification of buildings, and
the building areas that are listed there.
MR. LAPPER-It’s not exactly right on what you have, Bob.
MR. VOLLARO-Phase I was to be 109,085. Is that right? This was building at 12% of the
site, and the modification is 171,000, basically, or 20% of the site.
MR. LAPPER-Tom’s letter covers that.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s in the lower left hand corner, up under site statistics. Buildings
proposed is 171,060, or 20.7%, and that’s on the site plan mod.
MR. NACE-As is shown on the modified site plan, correct.
MR. VOLLARO-And that is a correct number.
MR. LAPPER-We have different numbers now, though. Just slightly. The number is the
1643 that I mentioned.
MR. VOLLARO-1643 over Phase I 109.
MR. LAPPER-No, for both phases, for the whole thing, the whole project.
MR. VOLLARO-Is now?
MR. LAPPER-1643 square feet larger than what was approved, and we’ll re-submit that,
show you that.
MR. VOLLARO-So this is an additional 1600 square feet?
MR. LAPPER-Yes.
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MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. LAPPER-And we’ll just submit a new site plan that shows that.
MR. VOLLARO-I sit here and a lot of times in the seats and sit here in the chair and it is
certainly difficult for a Board like this to try to come to grips with a lot of this stuff,
because it seems to be almost ongoing, you know, the changes that take place come
faster than what we’re able to review. So that when we make statements, it sounds like
we probably haven’t even looked at the thing. It’s really difficult.
MR. LAPPER-And this is our fault. What we submitted has changed slightly.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MRS. STEFFAN-Plus, Bob, no one would ever believe that you didn’t come prepared to
a meeting.
MR. Lapper-Yes, that’s true, too.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, that’s not the issue. The issue is that this stuff should be right,
you know.
MR. LAPPER-Our main point is that dropping the height down by 13 feet is a pretty
significant change, and the 1600 and change square feet of the footprint is really minor.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s a minor change. I agree, it’s a minor change. I’m just making a
point here.
MR. LAPPER-Yes, we don’t mean to be a moving target.
MR. VOLLARO-The one condition I had here to look at, the one that I really looked at,
was the site lighting had been modified from the previous approval, and it does show
fewer lights.
MR. NACE-Correct.
MR. VOLLARO-However, the statistics are identical from Phase I to the mod. That
hasn’t changed.
MR. NACE-That’s a true drafting error that I had the wrong layer turned on on the
drawing.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. NACE-Did you get my response letter from yesterday?
MR. VOLLARO-No, I did not. Is that response to C.T. Male?
MR. NACE-That was in response to C.T. Male and Staff comments, okay.
MR. LAPPER-That’s what Tom admitted, that there was an error.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. I haven’t seen that. We don’t have any of that.
MR. NACE-That did, I did correct the schedules and the luminaire figures in that
submission.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
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MR. NACE-There are fewer lights, as compared to the previously approved plan, the
difference is that we eliminated, there were six hot lights underneath the canopy, which
created some very hot spots, I think they were up around 35 or 36 lumens. Those are
gone, okay. Those are no longer there. We took away the one light that was beside the
entrance, the one pole light was removed and we’re now relying on just two under
canopy lights. That’s going to be more on the order of 10 lumens underneath the
canopy. The rest of the site, we simply redistributed the lights with about the same
spacing, and the actual lumens for the parking area, for the drive area, for the circulation
areas, changed by just tenths of a lumen.
MR. SANFORD-You probably are addressing it, you’re just using a different description,
but the entrance, according to Staff notes, they indicate an average intensity of 35.2.
MR. NACE-That’s the under canopy lights I was talking about. They’re gone.
MR. SANFORD-And so where are you now, because they’re saying much higher than
the five foot candles that is allowed by the Zoning Code.
MR. NACE-Right directly under the light is just under 10 lumens.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, if I take a look at your, when I go to site statistics, I take a look at
our Code and see if you come reasonably close, and then I go to the average over the
min and see how you do with uniformity ratio in those areas.
MR. NACE-Right.
MR. VOLLARO-And the uniformity ratio, from what I looked at, is quite a long way
from our four to one.
MR. NACE-Okay. With the new full site, on the parking areas, which is probably the
most important, the average to min is 7.8 to 1.
MR. VOLLARO-As opposed to four to one.
MR. NACE-As opposed to four to one, okay, and that is simply because we’re allowing
the minimum to go down to four tenths of a foot candle in places, but it’s adequate
safety lighting. For the driveways and the rear entry area and the road entrance, we do
have some spots that are down right at the edge of the road that are down to zero. So
that uniformity ratio goes away.
MR. VOLLARO-Essentially goes away, that’s right. This whole lighting thing has to be
re-examined.
MR. NACE-Amen.
MR. VOLLARO-I’ve been doing some work on the side, my own, trying to, when we
ever get to our PORC Committee, if that ever gets off ground in any way at all, I would
then probably recommend some of the stuff that I’ve done for the lighting thing, because
I think the four to one ratio is very, very difficult to achieve, on an area by area basis.
MR. NACE-It’s nice for a room like this, but for site lighting, it’s very impractical.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s difficult. Yet, you know, the American Society of Lighting
Engineers, that’s where that comes from, and, you know, they got themselves a spec,
and I don’t know how that was done. Somebody at a desk, I guess.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. LAPPER-One more final request. Your resolutions always provide for a one year
expiration of the approvals, and because this is a two phase project, what Doug would
like to do, obviously he’s ready to pour the footings immediately for the big dome, and
he’d like to have an extension of time, so we don’t have to come back and ask for an
extension. He doesn’t plan on building the tennis facility for two to three years, because
he’s just got to get his programs off the ground for the soccer, the outdoor fields in the
summer and the indoor fields in the big dome. So we’d like to request, if the Board
would consider it, to extend it for two to three years for the second phase.
MR. VOLLARO-Usually that’s a very minor problem. We usually give that a, it’s
usually done just that way.
MR. LAPPER-Right. It’s just a matter of convenience and however you want to handle it
is fine.
MR. VOLLARO-I would just as soon let Doug move along when he needs an approval,
let us know. We normally give them as a matter of, I have never seen one turned down.
It goes in about three minutes, as opposed to three hours.
MR. MILLER-And part of what we were looking for is just, with everything getting off
the ground, I didn’t want that timeframe to slip by and we miss the date and all of a
sudden we’re out of compliance now, and then we’d have to start back at Square One,
the way the procedure normally goes.
MR. VOLLARO-How does the Board feel about that? Do you want to go along with the
approval of that extension now, or do you want to wait until the end time, and approval
as they come?
MR. MILLER-And part of why we put that tennis facility on the site plan was so that
you folks and the Town Board could see the entire scope of the project, as we envisioned
it, if we get to that point, because I didn’t want to bring part now and part later.
MR. SANFORD-I would prefer to sequence it like you were saying, Mr. Vollaro, which
is no big deal, but when they realize that they’re not going to be able to do it, to then
come back, because that will give us the added benefit of seeing what’s existing at this
particular point.
MR. VOLLARO-I would prefer that. I don’t like to give long blankets.
MR. LAPPER-That’s fine. We just figured we’d ask, since we’re here.
MR. VOLLARO-We’re doing this against a previous SEQRA. So I suspect there’s no
SEQRA review tonight, and there’s no public hearing scheduled for this this evening, as
well. I do want to condition this on an approval of the C.T. Male, of their 7/21/05 letter.
MR. LAPPER-Sure.
MR. VOLLARO-Now, there was a comment in the Staff notes about submitting the
revised clearing plan of additional trees to be removed by NiMo, if any, prior to the final
signature of the Zoning Administrator.
MR. LAPPER-We’ll do that.
MR. NACE-Yes. My response to Staff includes a revision of that clearing plan to show
those trees and so note that they’re to be removed. So that’s already been submitted to
Staff.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. We’ll still make it a condition.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. LAPPER-Certainly.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. I’ll just go over the conditions that I’ve written down. Removal
of the Type A freestanding light fixture near the building entrance. You’ve done that.
Correct the luminare schedule to reflect the modified plan. That’s done. Modify the site
light statistics to be closer to Code and to bring parking and roadway uniformity ratios
closer to four to one. You’ve also done that.
MR. NACE-Correct.
MR. VOLLARO-Submit a revised clearing plan of additional trees to be removed by
NiMo, if any, prior to final signature by the Zoning Administrator. You will do that.
MR. NACE-We have done it, yes.
MR. VOLLARO-And a C.T. Male signoff of their letter on 7/21/05. Those are the
conditions I plan to put on this. Is that satisfactory to the Board?
MR. SEGULJIC-That’s fine.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MOTION TO APPROVE MODIFICATION TO SITE PLAN NO. 17-2004 M & C
VENTURES, Introduced by Robert Vollaro who moved for its adoption, seconded by
Thomas Seguljic:
WHEREAS, an application has been made to this Board for the following:
Applicant proposes to modify a previously approved site plan for an indoor sports
dome from 169,975 sq. ft. to 171,006 sq. ft. and reducing the height of the dome from 75
ft. to 68 ft. Modifications to previously approved plans require site plan review and
approval from the Planning Board.
WHEREAS, the application was received on June 14, 2005; and
WHEREAS, the application is supported with all documentation, public comment, and
application materials in file of record; and
WHEREAS, a public hearing is not required for a modification; and
WHEREAS, the Planning Board has determined that the proposal complies with the Site
Plan application requirements of the Code of the Town Queensbury (Zoning); and
WHEREAS, the Planning Board has considered the environmental factors found in the
Code of the Town of Queensbury (Zoning); and
WHEREAS, this approval does not relieve the applicant from obtaining all necessary
permits whether Federal, State or Local, and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that
We find the following:
The application is hereby Approved in accordance with the resolution prepared by Staff
and is subject to the following conditions which shall be listed on the final plans
submitted to the Zoning Administrator:
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
1. Remove the Type A freestanding light fixture near the building entrance.
2. Correct the luminaire schedule to reflect the modified plan.
3. Modify the site lighting statistics to be closer to Code and bring the parking and
roadway uniformity ratio closer to four to one.
4. Submit a revised clearing plan of additional trees to be removed by Niagara
Mohawk, if any, prior to final signature of the Zoning Administrator.
5. C.T. Male Associates sign-off of their letter of 7/21/05.
6. All lighting fixtures will be downcast, cut off fixtures.
7. Staff to inspect the light fixtures for compliance prior to their installation.
Lighting poles and bulbs for inspection on the ground before placing upright
8. Final, approved plans in compliance with this site plan must be submitted to the
Community Development Dept. before any further review by the Zoning
Administrator or Building & Codes personnel. Subsequent issuance of further
permits; including building permits are dependent on receipt.
Duly adopted this 26 day of July, 2005, by the following vote:
h
AYES: Mr. Sanford, Mr. Goetz, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Vollaro
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mr. Metivier, Mr. Hunsinger
MR. LAPPER-Thank you all very much.
SUBDIVISION NO. 10-73 MOD SEQR TYPE UNLISTED LINDA WOHLERS
OWNER(S): L. WOHLERS & WEST. MT. LIQ. PARTNERS ZONING SR-1A, RC-3A
LOCATION: 151 WEST MT. ROAD APPLICANT PROPOSES TO MODIFY THE
PREVIOUSLY APPROVED NORTHWEST VILLAGE SUBDIVISION, SUB 10-1973.
MODIFICATIONS OF PREVIOUSLY APPROVED SUBDIVISIONS REQUIRE RE-
APPROVAL BY THE PLANNING BOARD. WARREN COUNTY PLANNING N/A
CROSS REF. SUB/NORTHWEST VILLAGE LOT SIZE: 3.59 AC., PORTION OF 3.88
AC. SECTION A-183
JON LAPPER, REPRESENTING APPLICANT & LINDA WOHLERS, PRESENT
MS. WOHLERS-My name is Linda Wohlers, and Jonathan Lapper will be representing
me in this manner.
MR. LAPPER-I’m not on the Agency designation. This went in as a very simple
application for a modification of a subdivision that subsequently got less simple.
MR. VOLLARO-Is it different than where I’ve reviewed, Mr. Lapper?
MR. LAPPER-No. We just got a letter today from Planning Staff that was news to us.
MR. VOLLARO-We didn’t get a letter from Planning Staff, that’s news to me.
MRS. STEFFAN-You mean Staff notes?
MR. LAPPER-Staff notes.
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MR. VOLLARO-You got a new set of Staff notes today?
MR. LAPPER-No, I just did.
MRS. BARDEN-He just got them.
MR. LAPPER-They probably were out a few days ago.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. LAPPER-I guess just the bottom line is that Linda owns enough land, with frontage
on West Mountain Road, that under Zoning Code she could have a driveway to West
Mountain Road to access the parcel in the back, which would be a simple subdivision,
and what she was hoping to do was to have the rear lot access Stonebridge Road, which
is the subdivision road in Northwest Village, because it would be better to be on the
road with less traffic than the road with more traffic, and she has a contract from Mike
Brandt, from West Mountain Liquidating Corp. to convey this less than half acre piece of
property that would create the connection between Stonebridge Road and her parcel in
the back, and the proposal was to merge that so that it wouldn’t be creating any new lot,
it would just be, end up with two lots, and the building lot would be in the back. Staff
pointed out that there’s a question about whether or not there was a conveyance to other
properties along with West Mountain Corp. She has an agreement from West Mountain
Corp. to transfer their rights, and it’s a question of whether or not she needs additional
rights, which is something that she was not aware of, and she and I hadn’t discussed
until we saw this. So to the extent that it’s owned by West Mountain Liquidating Corp.,
they’ve agreed to convey this to her. She has proposed, in her letter application, that
this would be, except for the driveway, this would all be forever wild anyway, the way
it is now. So it doesn’t change anything other than a driveway and this is just a better,
safer place to access a driveway, rather than West Mountain Road.
MR. SANFORD-What is the zoning? I’m looking at this, and I see, the zoning they have
SR-1A and then they have RC-3A. This particular property in question, one or the
other?
MR. LAPPER-SR-1A. The RC is the Recreation Commercial. That’s the Mountain.
MR. SANFORD-Okay.
MR. VOLLARO-This piece of property is in SR-1A, and I had the same question as
Richard did. There’s no RC-3A in this.
MR. LAPPER-I don’t have my map with me. Susan probably has hers, so we could just
verify that.
MR. VOLLARO-In other words, I was looking for a split zone here, and I didn’t see it on
the map. It’s not there. So I didn’t understand why we had two zones, unless this
property was split zoned, and I don’t think it is.
MR. SANFORD-Give us the zone. Don’t give us an unrelated zone.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, Rich, I agree with you 100%. I had the same question.
MR. LAPPER-You know why I think it’s probably there, because other land of West
Mountain Liquidating Partners, the Mountain is in that Recreation Commercial.
MR. VOLLARO-We’re not looking at that. We’re looking at a site plan.
39
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MRS. BARDEN-You’re modifying that plan, the Northwest Village plan. You’re
modifying this whole plan that’s not here.
MR. VOLLARO-We are?
MRS. BARDEN-Yes. It’s a modification. It’s a subdivision modification.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s a subdivision modification. Subdivision 10-1973. Is that what
you’re saying?
MR. LAPPER-Because that’s when West Mountain was subdivided for the Northwest
Village residential.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. It has really no bearing on this particular application. We’re not
considering it.
MRS. BARDEN-Well, it does, because this strip that Ms. Wohlers wants to convey is part
of that approved subdivision.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, okay, in that area I have a question. I have a question as to what
interest do lot owners of Lot 16 through 30, and I think it’s really depicted as 1 through
15 on this drawing. What interest do they have in this .432 acres of green space? Do
they have one-fifteenth of an interest each?
MRS. BARDEN-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, and the fact that the West Mountain Liquidating Partnership is
willing to transfer that still has to do with the one-fifteenth ownership of each of the
folks that are in those lots, and do they want to transfer that without consideration.
That’s my thought. That’s what my question was.
MR. LAPPER-And that wasn’t something that was raised when Linda met with Mike
Brandt. So she wasn’t made aware of that. She hasn’t run the title yet because until she
gets approval of the subdivision, not getting towards a closing. So the first time that we
were made aware of that was in the Staff notes.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, but it’s still a valid consideration, I think, the other 15 people say,
why are you giving away my land.
MR. SANFORD-I mean, do we move forward and condition it upon satisfactory and the
resolution on this?
MR. VOLLARO-I don’t know how we can, because I don’t know what the position of
the other 15 folks are who own one-fifteenth of the parcel.
MR. SANFORD-I hear what we’ve got here. What do we do with this?
MR. LAPPER-Well, what Linda just suggested is that, her application was that it would
be, all she needs that parcel for is just for the access, and so she was proposing to merge
it, so that we’d have a 1.573 acre parcel for Parcel B, which is obviously bigger than the
one acre minimum required. If she kept the 4.32, it would still be almost 1.2 acres. So if
she kept that as a separate parcel, and just used the rights that she’s getting from Mike
for a driveway, that would be okay with her.
MR. SANFORD-Doesn’t Mike have to, I guess what I’m understanding is there’s these
other owners here that have an interest in this, and don’t they have to sign off on it?
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. VOLLARO-I believe so. I mean, if I owned one-fifteenth of that property, for
whatever it was worth, I would want to know that either I’m giving it away or it’s being
conveyed with consideration.
MR. SANFORD-So are we basically saying go ahead and get the signoffs and then come
back?
MR. VOLLARO-That would be what my position is.
MR. SANFORD-Yes, I mean.
MR. LAPPER-If that’s your position, we will go look into it and figure it out.
MR. SANFORD-Personally, I don’t see an issue with what you’re trying to do, but we
can’t really go forward with it unless you have all the appropriate signoffs.
MR. LAPPER-If we would have known about it before tonight, we certainly would have
dealt with it.
MR. SANFORD-Well, what do you want us to do, just table it until you come back to us?
MR. LAPPER-Sure.
MR. VOLLARO-Before you do that, and I think it’s a good idea that we table it, but as
long as it’s up in front of us, I’ve got just a quick comment on it and then I will get on
with it, but if this .432, basically a half acre we’re talking about, is made part of Parcel B,
then that Parcel B now becomes a little over two acres.
MR. LAPPER-I have that wrong. 1.57 is what it is now, and it’s two acres with that
together. Yes. I misspoke.
MR. VOLLARO-It’s okay, not a problem, but I see this, if it’s made part and parcel of
your other parcel, that in the future it could really be sold as a two acre lot, and, you
know, normally what we do on the Planning Board, when we get into that position, is
we put a no further development stipulation on that. So when you come back, you
might be faced with that.
MR. LAPPER-That’s okay as a condition.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. So we’re going to table this.
MR. SANFORD-Why don’t you just table it, Bob, and we’ll move on.
MOTION TO TABLE MODIFICATION TO SUBDIVISION NO. 10-1973 LINDA
WOHLERS, Introduced by Robert Vollaro who moved its adoption seconded by George
Goetz:
The application is hereby TABLED with the following condition:
1. In order for the applicant to come back to get information from the other 15
owners of this lot, whether or not they would sign-off on the conveyance of this
lot, or sign-off on the conveyance with some considerations.
Duly adopted this 26 day of July, 2005, by the following vote:
h
AYES: Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Sanford, Mr. Goetz, Mr. Vollaro
NOES: NONE
41
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
ABSENT: Mr. Metivier, Mr. Hunsinger
MR. LAPPER-Thank you.
MRS. STEFFAN-We’ll see you again.
SUBDIVISION NO. 4-2005 SKETCH, PRELIMINARY, FINAL SEQR TYPE
UNLISTED GEORGE AMEDORE AMEDORE HOMES AGENT(S): JONATHAN
LAPPER, B P S R CHRIS ROUND, CHAZEN CO. ZONING MR-5 LOCATION:
314, 320, & 322 BAY RD. APPLICANT PROPOSES CONSTRUCTION OF A 44 UNIT
CONDOMINIUM COMPLEX AND ASSOCIATED SITE IMPROVEMENTS.
CONDOMINIUM USES REQUIRE SUBDIVISION APPROVAL. CROSS REF. PZ 2-
2005, SP 62-99 WARREN COUNTY PLANNING N/A LOT SIZE: 0.12 AC., 2.87 AC.
& 3.83 AC. TAX MAP NO. 302.8-1-13, 14, 15 SECTION 179-4-020, A-183
JON LAPPER & CHRIS ROUND, REPRESENTING APPLICANT, PRESENT
MR. VOLLARO-For the record?
MR. LAPPER-Jon Lapper and Chris Round. We’ve been before you generally on this
project, previously, for the rezoning, which this Board unanimously supported, and the
Town Board voted on, and now we’re back for the subdivision for the condominium
project. We have some detailed Staff comments and detailed C.T. Male comments.
We’ve responded to C.T. Male, but we don’t have their response to us yet. So we
thought we would just start getting into the issues and see how far we can get.
MR. VOLLARO-Since this is a kind of condominium project, and we’re really here on
subdivision, but it’s sort of melded together into subdivision and a little bit of site plan.
So I think we can comment on site plan issues tonight as well.
MR. LAPPER-Absolutely. In truth, this ought to not be here for subdivision, because in
a condominium project, legally, it’s all owned by the condominium corporation, and
you own your piece of your space.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes.
MR. LAPPER-And we went through this last time. As compared to a townhouse project
that you’re more familiar with and is done here more frequently, the townhouse you
own your footprint, but here there were some second floor units and that’s what made it
have to be a condominium. All it is, either way, is just ensuring that whatever you’re
buying, that you have those rights. So here there are some upstairs units. So it’s a
condominium. Under the Queensbury Code, even though condominium isn’t
technically a land subdivision under the Queensbury it is considered a subdivision and
requires subdivision approval. So that’s why it’s in here for subdivision rather than site
plan.
MR. VOLLARO-As long as we’re on that subject, I’d like to ask Counsel a question. We
have a declaration of Turnberry Condominiums, basically, it’s an offering plan, what
looks to me like an offering plan, and it probably ought to be reviewed by legal
eventually, and I don’t know whether you’d want a copy of that now, because I don’t
think this is going to be very germane to this discussion tonight, but if you’d like to have
my copy of this to review it.
MR. SCHACHNER-If it’s going to be germane to some Board discussion at some time in
the future, sure.
MR. VOLLARO-It definitely is.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. LAPPER-And that is fairly boilerplate, what I submitted for the condominium.
Okay. With that, I’ll hand it over to Chris to talk to you about the details.
MR. ROUND-Sure. Chris Round, for the record. I think the engineering comments, we
do have response. I don’t know if the Staff has provided those copies to you because of
the policies. I have copies of those, if you’d like those tonight, our response to C.T. Male,
and we viewed the comments. Let me just first say that, I think Jim Houston from C.T.
Male struggled, his first comment was, is this a subdivision or site plan, and how do I
review this, and I think a large majority of his comments related to his impression that
all this infrastructure was going to be accepted and owned by the Town, and that’s not
the case, and so I think a lot of his comments go away. I mean, there are some valid
technical issues that we have addressed, but I think the breath of the comments were
just with that in mind.
MR. VOLLARO-When I looked at 33 comments, I said, wow.
MR. ROUND-Yes, and I think that’s, you know, at face value that does look like, hey,
that’s a lot of comments but maybe my explanation of the project will help alleviate
some of your concerns there. As you’ve seen previously, it’s a 44 unit dwelling unit
project. It has municipal water, municipal sewer. We’ve had correspondence from Mike
Shaw at the Wastewater Department on several minor issues that he has with the
project, none of them relating to receiving capacity, but more to the location of our
detention, retention ponds, our wet pond, and the easement issue, and I had a
conversation with Mike before he left on vacation, and he thought the issues were all
manageable and could be dealt with with some minor revisions. I think we had
presented as a part of our SEQRA review a traffic impact statement. I know there were
some questions on that, and some additional information you wanted, and we’ll touched
on that. We have developed a stormwater management, or stormwater pollution
prevention plan, as is required by DEC. C.T. Male has commented on that.
MR. VOLLARO-Did you provide a traffic study?
MR. ROUND-Yes. We did, as a part of the SEQRA process. So you saw that. We did
not resubmit that. We had made that as a part of our submission back in April, when
you reviewed the project. We have, you know, a lot of the issues that we would
normally be discussing have been resolved, as part of the SEQRA review process, the
cultural resources investigation that we completed, our wetlands mitigation issue, but
let me just back up and walk you back through some of these infrastructure issues.
Stormwater management, we’re dealing with, all stormwater is being dealt with on site,
with what we call a wetland, and that’s that pond at the north part of the site you see on
our color rendering, and what that does, there’s a four bay and a pond, and the four bay
deals with treatment and trying to take out sediments from the stormwater, and the
pond itself actually retains volume, so that the water’s discharged in a volume consistent
with pre-development conditions, and that’s the case here. I think that C.T. Male’s
comments related to a fence around the four bay, in lieu of what they call an aquatic
bench, and, you know, the typical standard that DEC provides that says you need to
provide an aquatic bench. I this case it was our position from an engineering
perspective that the four bay’s too small for an aquatic bench. It would basically double
the size of that four bay unnecessarily and create a larger hazard and not provide any
additional biological treatment, which is the purpose for an aquatic bench. An aquatic
bench is the pond that comes up, there’s a step that’s underwater, and it would allow for
vegetation, and it’s also a safety feature. So if somebody falls in the pond that it would
only fall into a foot of water versus a stronger, a deeper pond.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. It’s very similar to what the Hayes brothers are doing on West
Mountain Road.
43
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. ROUND-Right, and it’s a conventional design element, as a part of a stormwater.
What you need to know, that’s a conventional element, and the boilerplate says you
need one. The regulations allow you to not install one, and we’ve not installed one, and
as long as you have a fence, and we have a fence.
MR. VOLLARO-What’s the method of conveyance for stormwater off to that retention
pond? Is that strictly an over ground type of conveyance, or have you got some
definite?
MR. ROUND-No, it’s not. Let me just flip to a section here. Here’s our grading and
drainage plan. There’s two stormwater features that you need to be aware of. The first
is there’s an existing drainage pattern that trends through the site, and groundwater,
today, daylights at this area right about here, travels through the surface, and comes
through this wetland feature and goes off site, and so what we’ve done with that is
we’ve intercepted that with a manhole. It is right now, from here south it’s in a
structure, a culvert. So we’ve picked that structure up and conveyed it and released it at
an identical location.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. You diverted the flow.
MR. ROUND-We diverted the flow, and the concern, I know, from the residents
previously is that, hey, that drainage feature shouldn’t be impacted because that will
cause flooding upstream. That’s not the case, and so that’s the way we dealt with that
particular issue. The balance of the site, drainage is intercepted in a series of catch
basins throughout the site, and you can see those on the utility plan. I don’t have to
point those out, but what they do is they do discharge to this four bay, and then there’s
treatment in this, and then it overflows into the pond, and then there’s an orifice that
falls out of that, again, into the wetland.
MR. VOLLARO-Into the wetland. I see the distribution.
MR. ROUND-So, in a nutshell, that’s how stormwater’s dealt with. The pond meets the
DEC permit requirements. We have a SWPPP that goes through that process, and the
SWPPP process is that as this project’s approved, a Notice Of Intent needs to go the
Town and to DEC, and it’s on record, and in this case it’s a traditional review. If we
were using non-conventional treatment methods, we would have to have a 60 day delay
to allow DEC. In this case it’s just engineer certification that it’s going to happen. You
send an NOI, and then you have like a five business day waiting time. If DEC doesn’t
respond within five days, then you’re good to go, and you have the protection that your
Town engineer is reviewing the project as well. So that’s stormwater. Do you have any
questions on the stormwater elements?
MR. VOLLARO-It’s a pretty conventional method of handling it, and it looks
straightforward to me.
MR. ROUND-Jim’s comments on stormwater related, again, to wetland impacts, and his
question is, are you in a floodplain. He did not see our reference in the SWPPP, which
the answer was in the SWPPP, which was basically we’re not in a floodplain. We’re
outside the 100 year floodplain.
MRS. STEFFAN-That was a conflict that I had.
MR. ROUND-Yes. So I have another map, if you’d like. Basically it’s the Town’s
floodplain map, that says we’re not in a floodplain.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, I saw the note.
44
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. ROUND-So there’s about eight or ten comments. So, 33, let’s lose 8 of those,
because 8 or 10 of those relate to potential for flooding, as a result of bringing fill on the
site. We are bringing fill on the site, in some cases up to six feet, and his concern was
placement of fill. If that fill is within a floodplain, you’re going to be raising, potentially
raising the flood elevation.
MR. VOLLARO-Sure.
MR. ROUND-We’re not doing that, you know, I’ve talked to him. He’s okay with that,
but he needs to respond to you folks to verify that.
MR. LAPPER-Jim’s particularly aware of that, because he did the design for the Lowe’s
project, where it was in a floodplain.
MR. ROUND-Yes, and that entire site north of us, the Lowe’s project, was a huge fill
project, and it did, they had to do some remedial activities, and C.T. Male designed that
project. So here we are bringing fill on the site. We’re dealing with stormwater. So the
issues of flooding, and I just wanted to make sure the record is clear, is that, you know,
flooding occurs if you’re going to raise a flood elevation. We’re not doing that because
we’re not filling in a flood area. It would occur if you were releasing stormwater in a
more rapid fashion, and so you’re going to basically exacerbate an existing drainage
problem. We’re not doing that in this case. It would also occur if you were altering
flows or increasing stormwater runoff. We’re not doing that. So the existing drainage
pattern is consistent with pre-development, the flows, treatments are consistent with
pre-development. So that was the concerns with regard to stormwater. If you talk about
wetlands right here, as you see, there is this peninsula type feature is a wetland. If
you’ve been on the site, it’s not much of a wetland, per se. It does not have high
biological value or characteristics, in the mind of a wetlands biologist. It’s a drainage
feature. It’s a surface drainage feature. It’s not a stream. Jim raised an issue of, hey, is
this a stream, would the Corps be concerned that this is a stream. It’s our position it’s
not a stream. The Corps is going to review our wetlands, what basically occurs is there’s
a pre-construction notification for wetlands projects. If we’re falling below one half an
acre of fill, in a wetland, the process allows you to do that, provided you make a pre-
construction notification to the Army Corps of Engineers, and we will be doing that. I
mean, it will occur momentarily within days, and with that, you need to propose, if you
don’t propose it, you’ll be asked to propose, wetlands mitigation, and so what we have
proposed are two areas of wetlands, or actually four areas of wetlands mitigation, and
basically a two to one replacement, and that’s as much as the Corps will ask for in this
case, in our opinion. So for every square foot of wetland that we are disturbing, we are
constructing two square feet of wetland, and that helps with the flood issue, is that we’re
losing wetlands, and the concern is wetlands are a flood mitigation feature. We’re
adding twice the area of wetlands. So we’ll replace that flood mitigation feature. So
that’s another issue.
MR. VOLLARO-Chris, you sent a wetland delineation report to the Army Corps of
Engineers on March 16, 2005.
MR. ROUND-That’s correct.
MR. VOLLARO-And then there was a letter that came right after that, their letter of
March 21, 2005. That didn’t seem to respond to your March 16. That’s still coming is it?
I notice that the time between the two is too rapid for them to have answered your
March 16 letter.
th
MR. ROUND-I’m not sure what the 16, what the chain was there, Bob, to be frank with
th
you.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. You’re still waiting for a reply from them?
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. ROUND-Yes. What happens is the Corps, Number One, won’t issue a permit until
SEQRA is resolved. SEQRA has been resolved. So in one instance they were waiting for
that, and the other issue is that the applicant doesn’t want to go out and obtain a permit
for a project that he doesn’t yet have approved, and so there’s this catch-22, is that the
local Board wants to know that this is approved by the Corps, but the applicant also
needs some level of comfort that, hey, this is the way that the project is going to get
designed, and therefore this is the mitigation that I’m going to apply for.
MR. VOLLARO-We always have the cart and the horse problem.
MR. ROUND-Yes, and that’s always been a struggle for wetlands issues, and how does
that process work between the Corps and between the local Board, but we’re confident
that these are adequate mitigation areas, that this falls below the one half acre threshold
that we’re allowed under nationwide permit 39, and that we’ll proceed, you know, once
we obtain the local approval, that we’ll be able to obtain the Corps permit.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, we’ll get a letter from C.T. Male on your response to him, and
then essentially his signoff.
MR. ROUND-Correct, and I don’t think there were any, in my conversation, Jim and I
traded e-mails. I said, hey, these are all just loose ends in your mind, yes, they are, you
know, with exception they do have concerns about the floodplain issue. We’ve since
resolved that. We gave them the documentation, and pointed them in the right direction
for the response, and so I don’t think there’s going to be an engineering issue that’s
going to change what you see here. It’s going to be very much superficial.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. The only thing that even borders on an engineering issue is the
Town of Queensbury Water Department letter concerning the size of the pipe. That
might be something that, he questions that, I believe. I have his letter in here that
questions the drawings.
MR. ROUND-You’re talking C.T. Male’s comments?
MR. VOLLARO-No. This is not C.T. Male. This is a comment from the Water
Department.
MR. ROUND-I didn’t get a copy of that.
MR. VOLLARO-It says here that, you can read it, the one and a quarter service line
shown on (lost word) Queensbury water district. I think he makes a comment to that.
Did you get a copy of that?
MR. ROUND-No, I haven’t seen it, but you change it to an inch and a half. That’s not a
big deal.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, because I would want to make sure that you got the inch and a half
in there so it doesn’t become an issue downstream when it gets into the ground.
MR. ROUND-Yes, and it’s a construction type of issue, really, not a design issue, per say,
but we need to resolve that to his satisfaction.
MR. VOLLARO-Right.
MR. ROUND-So that’s basically the stormwater, the floodplain issue and the wetlands
issue, as it relates to the project.
46
(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
MR. VOLLARO-You’ve got to go lighting, because I’ve got a lot of questions on the
lighting plan.
MR. ROUND-Okay.
MR. VOLLARO-To cut to the chase real quick on the lighting plan, we need a lighting
statistical block that gives me things like average, max, min, max over min and average
over min, so that we can do some uniformity ratio calculations. Usually there’s a site
statistic block, a lighting block, that, and breaking it down into areas, you know.
MR. ROUND-Again, there’s a subdivision or site plan standard that we’re trying to
apply to the project.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s right. As long as we’re talking, we’re in the mix here. So I want
to throw it out that you really need a site plan that, when we get down to that, we really
need to talk about the lighting on this property.
MR. ROUND-I guess what I’m going to be able to tell you, though, is that it is a
residential project. So it’s not going to be lit like a commercial project, and so that
uniformity ratio is going to go right out the window. Because if we try to do that, we’re
going to put more light on the site, to meet that uniformity ratio, because basically
there’s yard lamps and there’s a light at an entrance for safety purposes, and if you try
to, you know, a lot of these things just don’t render themselves, if you have like a wall
pack or a side, they really don’t produce an isometric or a lighting iso point that’s a
projection on the ground that’s going to give you the information that you’re looking
for.
MR. VOLLARO-What happens in your case if you have a dimly lit site, your average
over min usually equals zero, almost, and so there is no uniformity ratio at that
particular point.
MR. ROUND-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-So, you know, but that’s what I’m really looking for is that, some
characteristics of the lighting that I can understand.
MR. SANFORD-Is here in front of us, Bob, for subdivision or site plan?
MR. VOLLARO-It’s here for subdivision.
MR. ROUND-Yes. We submitted a subdivision. In our application we either asked,
when we spoke to Staff is wasn’t clear whether a lighting plan was required or we ask
for a waiver from that. So I’d ask you tonight, is that really necessary for you to make a
judgment on the lighting of the site. Do you need that?
MR. VOLLARO-Well, if we get into a strict site plan review, yes, to me it’s.
MR. LAPPER-We’re not planning on submitting for a site plan, other than we think all
the site plan issues were covered, but because the Planning Staff asked this to be treated
as a subdivision, we submitted it as a subdivision.
MR. SANFORD-So next step, assuming you get beyond all that, is come in front of us for
site plan?
MR. LAPPER-Not to our minds.
MR. VOLLARO-So that’s why I’m raising site plan issues now.
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MR. SANFORD-I think you need to. I didn’t know if we were going to see this again
and then be looking at lighting. If we’re not, we want to look at the lighting.
MR. VOLLARO-I do.
MR. LAPPER-Whatever you want is our answer.
MR. SANFORD-I was not sure of how we were going to proceed.
MR. ROUND-Well, let me offer you this. Throw away the word “site plan”. Throw
away the word “subdivision”. You’re looking at a project, you have the information you
need to pass judgment on the project, and if you tell us you need a lighting plan to help
make that decision, we’ll provide a lighting plan. I guess I would offer that a project like
this really doesn’t demand a lighting plan. I think the concerns, from a lighting
standpoint, are our you providing too much lighting, and are you going to impact
neighbors, and, you know, we can either handle that through, okay, we need the
detailed cut sheets, or we can produce a lighting plan, you know, we’ll take your
direction on it.
MR. VOLLARO-The lighting plan is usually pretty characteristic for what we look at.
We’ve had lighting plans from most of our, well, you know.
MR. LAPPER-Yes. It’s just going to be different than what you’re used to with a
commercial plan. Because the nature of the lights are different.
MR. VOLLARO-Sure. I understand that, but this is a fairly large project, and I think
lighting, I just want to make sure that the lighting is not, and from what you say, Mr.
Round, it’s not going to be obtrusive in that area. I just wanted to see a lighting plan.
MR. ROUND-We’ll have to demonstrate that to your satisfaction.
MR. SANFORD-Right. Staff does talk about rear deck lighting, specifically for Units 7, 8,
9, 10, and 11. Because they could impact the single family residence to the south, and so
we want to make sure that your lighting is going to be okay.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, and I agree that this may not fit the uniformity ratio. As I said to
the last applicant when you were here, that the whole uniformity ratio thing has to be
looked at in our Code. It’s not clear and it’s not well written at all.
MR. ROUND-Yes. You just need to apply some practical judgment in this case, too. It is
a residential project. When these projects do get sold, people will be able to install a
light, you know, it’s not like you have the same control over a site plan. So, what’s the
litmus test that you need to apply to this, and we’ll take your suggestion to provide you
with a lighting plan.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. ROUND-Let me just talk to traffic, pedestrian issues. I know that was a Staff
comment, and I know the last time Mr. Sanford had concerns about additional vehicles
being added to the queue at the turn, and whether that would impact commercial
driveways on the opposite side of the road, and it was in the traffic report that we
presented, but we weren’t able to pull it out for you, and I had our traffic engineer do
just that, and during the AM peak, there’s .1 vehicle that is added to the queue at the
northbound left hand turn lane. The concern was, as I understood it, as vehicles exit and
add to this queue, that they would block vehicles from either making a left hand turn
and getting out to the site, whether they wanted to travel west or whether they wanted
to travel north, and so in the AM peak they’re adding .1, and I think one of the Board
members commented, well, the total new vehicle trips, just as a refresher, we were
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looking at, during the AM period, a left out, there were 13 vehicle during an hour. So
that was, if you divide 60 by 13, there was very few vehicles, you know, one every four
minutes, roughly, and so that equates to .1 vehicles in a queue for that northbound left
hand turn lane.
MR. VOLLARO-One additional.
MR. ROUND-.1, a tenth of a vehicle, you know, because it just doesn’t, it goes from two
vehicles in that queue, according to the model, to 2.1, but the PM it does add 1.3 vehicles
in the queue. So you are adding a full vehicle in the PM peak to that, and the queue is
up to six vehicles in that left hand turn lane, during a peak period.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s based on traffic counts that they made at that particular location.
MR. ROUND-At that intersection, using the County’s recent traffic counts, and using the
County’s model for that intersection.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Because I know from using that corner a lot myself, that left turn
does get to be quite congested, and I know that occasionally people coming out of the
Hollywood Video, and that’s what that, I think that’s either Hannaford or Hollywood.
MR. ROUND-Right, they are close to one another.
MR. VOLLARO-They’re very close. People get queued up in there waiting for traffic to
go by them to make a left turn out.
MR. ROUND-Right.
MR. SANFORD-Well, that was, the concern was, will this make it longer and so people
trying to get out into that, into, heading north on Bay, just before Quaker, would they be
running into a line of cars.
MR. VOLLARO-The people exiting this site.
MR. SANFORD-No, the people exiting Hollywood, and/or Hannaford, because of the
added traffic.
MR. VOLLARO-I see them doing that now.
MR. SANFORD-Well, I don’t know so much, I’ll tell you, coming from Ridge, heading
up west, at around four o’clock in the afternoon, I sometimes have to wait three times to
get through the light, three or four times, on that intersection, on Bay and Quaker, just to
go straight.
MR. ROUND-I guess our response to that is it is an existing problem. Our conversations
with the County is are that they are trying to add different striping to allow better
through movements at that intersection, and the traffic problem, the turning problem.
MR. LAPPER-One part of that is that I’m working with them, with the owners of
Lowe’s, that they’re going to put in a right turn lane, right at the corner by the bridge,
where the Applebee’s sign is, so that you don’t have to stack and wait, that if someone
wants to make, if they’re coming the way Dick’s coming, to turn right onto Bay to go
north, there’ll be a designated turn lane for that. So you’ll be able to go and make the
right turn on red.
MR. VOLLARO-You should be able to do that now.
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MR. LAPPER-If someone’s going straight, because both of those lanes, people go
straight. So you could be waiting for somebody to go straight in front of you to go
through, instead now you could just make a right, and that’s something the County’s
been working on.
MR. VOLLARO-That’ll be a designated right hand turn, so you know nobody’s just
parked there.
MR. LAPPER-Yes, and they want to put that in before winter this year.
MR. SANFORD-Well, we already passed SEQRA on this. Didn’t we?
MR. LAPPER-Yes.
MR. SANFORD-So I mean we’re kind of, you know, it’s a nice conversation, but it’s not
going to make a difference.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. That’s right. We’ve been through SEQRA.
MR. ROUND-We want to make sure that you have the information.
MR. SCHACHNER-If I understood Rich’s comment, I’m not sure that I agree.
Remember that, when you say pass SEQRA, what I think you mean is that there’s
already a negative declaration issued on an entire project, in the context done at the time
of the rezoning. The fact that a negative declaration has been issued means that there
are no significant adverse environmental impacts requiring the preparation of an
Environmental Impact Statement. That does not take traffic out of the mix for things
you have to review or you can review, opportunity to review when reviewing a
subdivision.
MR. SANFORD-Okay. I think that clarifies it.
MR. GOETZ-Well, I think what lead to this conversation anyway was a Staff idea to try
to get a location where you could cross over to the other side.
MR. LAPPER-That’s really an issue that we have to review with the County Highway
Department.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, I have a notice. You have to get a warrant, too, because if we’re
going to do that, there’s going to be a crosswalk there, there’ll need to be a warrant for a
light, I’m sure.
MR. ROUND-Yes, we’ll work with the County on that, but I think the County’s going to
react that there’s two, this is not a proper location for a crosswalk. You don’t put one
where there’s not a traffic signal, and so you would, the County, in their review of the
Quaker and Bay intersection, they’ll look at that we need to put in a pedestrian face
signal there, and/or a crosswalk. The other option, we’ve talked to the County, but
we’re waiting for a response from them.
MR. VOLLARO-Because I know that Remington wouldn’t be giving us a warrant on
that, just based on that traffic situation. You’re going to need a warrant to put a light
right there.
MR. ROUND-The other issue is just to the south you have the bike path, which is a
signed crossing, and the bike path is a multi-use trail, and people can travel south and
cross at the bike path. I know that they are, they’re acutely aware that they need to
improve the safety of the bike crossing, and it’s my understanding that they’re either
going to be providing bump outs at that location, whether they’re structures or striping.
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(Queensbury Planning Board 07/26/05)
So what they would want to do is narrow that drive lane so that you have to slow down
at the bike crossing and heighten your awareness that you have pedestrians and bicycles
crossing Bay Road.
MR. SEGULJIC-I’ll tell you what, though, I’ve got to believe you’re going to have people
crossing the street there anyway.
MR. ROUND-At this location. Well, yes, that’s the case anywhere in the world, is that
you do, you route people to the safe locations, and I think the safe locations are the
intersection and the.
MR. SEGULJIC-I don’t think people are going to do that.
MR. SANFORD-I think you’ve got the bike trail. Maybe we can get the County to put
up a pedestrian bridge and pay for it, to go from the complex over to Hannaford.
MR. ROUND-You know somebody that I don’t know there, Rich. I mean, you have a
good relationship with a certain Supervisor.
MR. SANFORD-Well, you’ve got a bike trail. You’ve got all the components.
MR. ROUND-Yes. I guess, I agree with you. You hear people say, why don’t the kids
walk on the sidewalks today. We can’t control human behavior. We can provide safe
routes and safe features. Can we mandate them to use them? That’s an enforcement
issue. That’s a human behavior issue that we’re not going to address.
MR. LAPPER-A question that Staff asked is whether there should be a pedestrian walk
right there, crosswalk, and that would be subject to the County. So we’ll talk to the
County and say that Staff’s recommended it and what do you think, and we’ll see what
they say.
MR. VOLLARO-I’m sure the issue is going to come down to whether or not they’ll grant
a warrant. I’ve been with Remington. They’re not going to put a signal.
MR. LAPPER-I’m not talking about a signal. I’m talking about a crosswalk with a small
light, where you push the button.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, but usually that light controls the traffic light. Doesn’t it?
MR. LAPPER-Yes.
MR. ROUND-Yes, but my gut says that’s just not going to fly.
MR. SANFORD-I don’t think it’s going to fly either. I actually think if you go further
south and you try to do some improvement with the bike trail crossing Bay is probably
as good as you’re going to get. Although that is, I’m not sure, that’s a pretty good walk,
isn’t it?
MR. SEGULJIC-That’s a very good walk.
MR. SANFORD-From the, yes.
MR. LAPPER-We’ll get some answers.
MR. SEGULJIC-Humans have a tendency to take the shortest path possible.
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MR. GOETZ-Did I hear one of you say that you couldn’t have a crosswalk without a
light? I don’t think that’s correct. Because I’ve been many places where there’s
crosswalks without lights.
MR. ROUND-I think you’ve got to look at the environment. You’re not going to put a
crosswalk anywhere on Route 9 without a light. I think that’s, so you’ve got to take that
Bay Road, at this location, is very similar to Route 9 in the character of the traffic, the
volumes of the traffic, and so you’re generally not going to put the pedestrian at a
hazard. You’re basically asking a pedestrian, here’s a crosswalk, go ahead and cross.
The cross walk does not make it safe for pedestrians to cross the road. It’s driver
awareness. It’s a safety signal.
MR. VOLLARO-I think what you folks have said is you’re going to take this up with
Remington.
MR. ROUND-Yes.
MR. SEGULJIC-Just don’t bring it up with them. Hopefully have a little force into it,
too.
MR. LAPPER-We’ll tell him that the Town’s asked us to look into it.
MR. SEGULJIC-I have a concern about that. You’re going to have people living there.
You’re 13 years old, 15 years old. You have Hannaford across the way, CVS and
Hollywood Video, and you’re with your friends and you want to go do something, what
are you going to do? You’re going to want to dart across that street.
MRS. STEFFAN-As Chris said, you can’t regulate human behavior. There are going to
be people that will do that.
MR. LAPPER-There are people that live on Homer right now. That’s all residential.
MR. SEGULJIC-That’s true, but.
MR. ROUND-I guess, as Jon said, we’ll ask, I think.
MR. SEGULJIC-Right. What I’m saying is just don’t ask.
MR. VOLLARO-If he doesn’t ask, what does he do?
MR. SEGULJIC-I guess it’s one thing just to ask, but it’s another thing to press the issue
with them.
MR. LAPPER-We’ll submit a letter stating that we’ve been asked to require. So we
won’t say.
MR. SEGULJIC-Yes.
MR. LAPPER-The other problem is that a stop traffic there, it’s very close to the big
intersection. So that’s probably going to be something, they’re not going to be interested
in putting it right there, but we’ll see what they say.
MR. VOLLARO-Let’s talk about another subject. I just have one down. The bike path
itself, now, would this be accessed by our, in other words, if somebody came out with a
bike.
MR. LAPPER-There’s a shoulder on Bay.
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MR. VOLLARO-He makes a left turn, is there a sidewalk there to take him all the way
down to the bike path, or her?
MR. LAPPER-There’s a shoulder.
MR. ROUND-There’s a sidewalk on the same side of the road.
MR. LAPPER-Yes. I don’t know if it goes all.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, but he’d be on the road. He could take Bay Road down, from
there all the way to the bike path.
MRS. STEFFAN-There’s a very good size shoulder on Bay Road.
MR. SANFORD-Yes. It’s been a long time since I got into bike safety, but I think it’s a
no-no to encourage riding on sidewalks.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. SCHACHNER-You’re generally better off riding on the road.
MR. SANFORD-Right.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, okay.
MRS. STEFFAN-What about parking? That’s one of the questions. The drawings
weren’t clear. There was a lot going on on all of the drawings. There wasn’t a separate
parking drawing, and there was some discussion that there’s supposed to be 100
parking spaces.
MR. LAPPER-That’s kind of a funny issue, because when we have 100, that includes a
garages, which isn’t, and this is also sort of a, because it’s residential site
plan/subdivision, it’s also a little bit different animal, but in terms of meeting the
parking requirement, we’re counting the inside of the garages as a space, but in terms of
the on-site, exterior parking, as to whether or not we have too many spaces, you never
count somebody’s garage in Queensbury.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, we could give you, by Code, 79 spaces. You have 44 units, one
and a half cars per unit.
MR. LAPPER-Right. We’re saying that we have fewer than 79 spaces outside of the
building. So we don’t believe we need a variance, but in terms of meeting the parking
requirement, we’re asking that we have a minimum, we’re asking you to take into
account that people will be parking in their garages.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, one of the things I’m concerned about there is that, you know, this
goes counter to our Code, but I’m almost concerned that on the weekends, if there’s a lot
of, let’s say there’s a lot of visitors in there and there’s no room in the inn. They’re going
to park on the road.
MR. LAPPER-The Town Board asked that question, and we added spaces. When we
were at the rezoning, we added spaces because the Town Board suggested just that, and
so that’s why we have the additional exterior spaces.
MR. SANFORD-Bob, if they’re not going to count the garage as a space, and they don’t
have to, then 20% over the 66 is 79.
MR. VOLLARO-Twenty percent over our sixty.
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MR. SANFORD-Anyway, it comes to an allowable 79 spaces, according to this
calculation.
MR. VOLLARO-Right.
MR. SANFORD-And I guess my point is, if that works for them, then that should work
for us.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, I don’t see reducing those spaces at all.
MR. SANFORD-No, but I mean, I certainly didn’t want to go to 100, which is what I
thought they were going at here.
MR. VOLLARO-No.
MR. SANFORD-I was wrong, I guess.
MR. VOLLARO-If you don’t count the garages as a space, you know.
MR. SANFORD-Then they’ll have plenty with, you’ll have more than enough for
visitors and everything else.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes.
MR. SANFORD-What are you asking for?
MR. ROUND-What we propose is what we’re asking for.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, pull the garages out of the 100, and then.
MR. ROUND-So you lose 44. So now you’ve got 56.
MR. VOLLARO-Now you’ve got 56.
MR. SANFORD-And that’s good.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s fine. I would go along with that. Sixty, let’s say.
MR. ROUND-What the concern was, that the standard’s one and a half per dwelling
unit. We have two per dwelling unit, garage and driveway. We have some overflow
parking to deal with the visitation issue. Amedore has similar projects, similar products
like this. They’re comfortable with the parking requirement. The thing with parking is
you’re trying to avoid on street parking because it causes congestion, and parking
prohibited in this area is a safety issue. So we don’t think it’s going to be an issue.
MR. VOLLARO-But, you know what, people will do it anyway. They’ll park on Bay
Road, if they’re going in to visit somebody and there’s no room. So I want to make sure
there’s enough overflow parking there to accommodate visitors.
MR. SANFORD-I don’t know, I think it’s a no-brainer here. If you’re going to have a
garage for each unit, and then in addition to that you’re going to put in some 60 some
odd spots.
MR. VOLLARO-It sounds to me like that would be fine.
MR. SANFORD-Yes.
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MR. VOLLARO-I don’t see any problem with that.
MR. SANFORD-Yes.
MR. VOLLARO-I just want to make sure we don’t.
MR. SANFORD-These sites look better when they’re not all paved either. I mean, the
aesthetics of the complex is going to look nicer without excessive parking.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, there’s no question about that.
MR. SEGULJIC-So you’re saying each unit has a garage, and there’s a spot in the
driveway. So in theory each unit has two.
MR. ROUND-Correct.
MR. SEGULJIC-And then you have the eight or something there.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s kind of a visitor’s parking lot. I think that’s. I’m comfortable
with that.
MRS. STEFFAN-Thank you for explaining that.
MR. VOLLARO-I don’t have any other comments on my sheet here. We need a letter
from the ACOE that responds to your letter.
MR. ROUND-Yes. I’m not sure that you’re going to get that until they’re into the permit
process.
MR. LAPPER-So we might ask for that to be a condition, that it happen in four months.
MR. ROUND-Yes, I mean, prior to pulling a building permit for the project, we’ll need a
Corps permit in hand and what we’d like to do is present that to the.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes. I’m looking for something here.
MR. GOETZ-While you’re looking, I have a question which really doesn’t have any
bearing on this, except for, just out of curiosity, you mentioned that they have built
similar projects like this. Are there any around here?
MR. LAPPER-The Capital District.
MR. GOETZ-The Capital District. Is there any place like if we wanted to go look, we
could go see the quality of the construction?
MR. ROUND-Yes, I can forward you that information. You raise that issue, and I know
one of the concerns of the residents when they were, when we had public in attendance
at the last meeting, what was the rear of the structure going to look like, and that’s what
this drawing is right here. So this is the color elevation that I have out, and this is the
rear of the structure. So you can see it’s, there is an optional patio deck, depending on if
the person chooses that, and then there’s an optional deck, second story deck. So these
are shown without it, if somebody does not choose the option. These are shown with it
if they do choose the option. So that’s the two options that they offer.
MR. SEGULJIC-How does that work?
MR. ROUND-When you go to build out, when you go to pull permits.
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MR. LAPPER-Unit by unit.
MR. SEGULJIC-So they’ll build the whole structure and then come in and purchase and
say, I want the deck.
MR. LAPPER-Usually they don’t construct it unless they have them pre-sold.
MR. ROUND-They’ll know that. So they may build one on spec, but they’ll know what
the customer wants.
MR. GOETZ-So you could come up with an address to go with that.
MR. ROUND-Yes, we could. I think this, there’s two or three of these very similar
projects.
MR. SEGULJIC-I have a couple of other questions also. Are you all set?
MR. GOETZ-Yes.
MR. SEGULJIC-In looking at your, I think it’s your stormwater plan, yes, stormwater
pollution prevention plan, the drawings. You have the wetland mitigation areas. Now
what exactly is the wetland mitigation area?
MR. LAPPER-New wetland that’s going to be created to make up for the wetlands to be
disturbed.
MR. SEGULJIC-Okay. Because then when I look at your drawing, it doesn’t seem to
match up, because those areas seem to be still treed.
MR. LAPPER-Right.
MR. SEGULJIC-So how would you create the wetland?
MR. LAPPER-You can have wetlands. That can mean trees, shrubs.
MR. ROUND-There’s a wetland area here. There’s partial trees in there.
MR. LAPPER-You have to plant wetland vegetation.
MR. SEGULJIC-Well, I guess most in particular on the northeast corner you show the
wetland mitigation all the way up against the border, right up in there, yes.
MR. ROUND-And wetlands can be forested. They’re going to dictate.
MR. LAPPER-What type of vegetation.
MR. ROUND-And some wetlands they’ll dictate that you need to have an aquatic
species. Some will say that it’s maples.
MR. LAPPER-There are wetland trees.
MR. ROUND-It’ll be a detailed engineering design that the Corps.
MR. LAPPER-The Corps requires a three year management plan where you have to
actually file reports for three years to prove that you didn’t just put it in, the stuff died,
you have to have a biologist come back.
MR. ROUND-Do inspections.
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MR. SEGULJIC-So that area would be treed.
MR. LAPPER-It’ll be vegetated.
MR. SEGULJIC-Vegetated. That’s the word I’m looking for. Okay. Then with regards
to a bus stop, is there one in this area?
MR. ROUND-No, there’s not.
MR. LAPPER-Bay Road is a bus route.
MR. SEGULJIC-Well, would it make sense to put a bus stop right at the entrance of this
area?
MR. LAPPER-That came up when we were dealing with the Grand Union 100 years ago.
We can talk to the Glens Falls Transportation.
MR. ROUND-What they do is you stop on the street. You see the bus, you wave.
MR. LAPPER-You’re asking if there can be a kiosk.
MR. SEGULJIC-Yes. I mean, is there one in this area? Maybe there’s one on the corner
of Bay and Quaker.
MR. SANFORD-In this area there’s not one person who rides the buses. They’re terribly
underutilized, unfortunately.
MR. SEGULJIC-I would agree with you, and then how about screening to the south of
this site? If I have my directions correct. You have some trees there, but not all the way
across.
MR. LAPPER-There’s that big office building. So there’s a whole parcel between the
residential units on Homer.
MR. SEGULJIC-Right, and that’s what’s asphalt parking, now, I guess, and gravel.
MR. LAPPER-It doesn’t go that far back. Chris has it right there. You can see where the
parking is.
MR. ROUND-Here’s the limits of the parking area here. This rendering was produced
before producing the final drawing. So this landscaping plan right here (lost words).
You have this drawing set, and this does show an evergreen planting detail. These first
couple of structures in here, it doesn’t continue on back in this location the way it’s
presented tonight. As we said, this is, if you look, it’s pretty much an open meadow
right here, and then the residences are further separated by this. So, I mean, we could
add some additional plantings in here if you’d like.
MR. SANFORD-Well, who owns that property, though, that you were just representing?
MR. ROUND-This is Cost Control Associates, and it’s Keith Lake. We actually met
Keith on the site, and had a conversation with him, actually met him here after our
meeting, and he didn’t have any objections to the project, but we can certainly add some
landscaping here.
MR. SANFORD-Well, I’m just wondering what, if anything, will happen on those
properties in the future.
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MR. ROUND-Well, these are all residential in here, these are all single family homes
down here. See, these are back yards of people’s homes. This is just his green space. he
doesn’t use all this. He says he has no plans for this, in his words, and it’s tough. He’s
got to come in this narrow driveway to get back in here, and so it’s tough to do any
more development back there I would think. It’s a very narrow lot as well.
MR. SANFORD-All right, Mr. Chairman, where do we go with this?
MR. VOLLARO-Well, I’m going to go one more step and then we’ll make that decision.
I’m looking at this Army Corps letter, I guess it’s dated, it’s stamped over, but it looks
like it’s March 21, and it is March 21. Chris, I hate to throw this at you. This is a
wetland policy that you developed back in June 3, 2004, but it talks about the applicant
or agent should acknowledge any and all risks, including enforcement action, that come
with moving forward without a jurisdictional letter, and we don’t have that yet from
them, according to the way I read that. You’re still waiting for a reply from your own
letter.
MR. LAPPER-We’re not trying to say that this is non-jurisdictional. We’re
acknowledging it’s jurisdictional. We need an actual permit here.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. You need an actual permit, yes. It says we recognize
jurisdictional determination, but has he made a jurisdictional determination on those
wetlands?
MR. LAPPER-We’re conceding it’s jurisdictional.
MR. ROUND-Yes. The way the process works with the Corps is that you can go do a
delineation. The Corps will not come out, on a regular basis, and confirm your
delineation, and then the next step is you file a report with the Corps. You provide your
delineation report. You send that to the Corps. That has been done. The next step is
that once you have a project, you apply for coverage under nationwide permit, and they
have review authority under that, and so they will make a judgment about whether your
project falls under a certain class of permits. Again, you’ve seen projects come in the
door on a regular basis. You do not have a court, you know, 99% of the time, you do not
have a Corps permit or a Corps signoff for projects you’re reviewing. The approval’s
contingent upon you. We would concede that we’re not going to pull a building permit
for a project until we have a wetland permit from.
MR. VOLLARO-I’m just trying to get.
MR. ROUND-We didn’t get a copy of this, Bob. This is addressed to Craig Brown, and
it’s copied to DEC, but it was not copied to us.
MR. VOLLARO-I see. Would you like to have a copy of that?
MR. ROUND-Yes, I’d love it, and he references some information, but he doesn’t say
what the information is that’s attached.
MR. VOLLARO-I had the same problem with it.
MR. ROUND-He just says that there are Federal wetlands on the site, and we’ve
acknowledged that and we’ve delineated them, and then he just gives you, this is
boilerplate language that, hey, we regulate these activities, blah, blah, blah. We
recommend the applicant limit the project to those upland areas, and we acknowledge
that, and we may qualify for a nationwide permit, and that’s what we’re applying for.
So it says to apply for a Department of Army permit, the applicant should submit a
completed joint application for a permit form, which we will be doing. So we’re
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complying with his letter, and we won’t get a signoff until we actually, until the Corps
has reviewed.
MR. VOLLARO-I was really trying to establish where that letter fit in the scheme of
things.
MR. ROUND-As a matter of procedure, Bob, it would be just nice that if the Town Staff
is communicating with the Corps and getting correspondence back, they should let the
applicant know.
MR. VOLLARO-No comment from me, sir.
MR. LAPPER-Gotcha.
MR. VOLLARO-Mr. Sanford asked where are we going with this, and I don’t know. Are
we expected to make a signoff on this, not a signoff, but was this just informational
tonight?
MR. LAPPER-No.
MR. ROUND-There’s a public hearing tonight. There’s a public hearing on the
subdivision.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, but there’s obviously nobody here but Mr. Strough.
MR. ROUND-That’s your judgment, do you have enough information to make a
decision? Are you comfortable making conditional approvals, you’ve given us a couple
of things that you’ve asked us for additional information. We could come back with that
if requested.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. So it’s not a, it won’t come out as a tabling, or will it? I mean,
are we tabling this for you to come back with additional information?
MR. SCHACHNER-I’m a little uncomfortable, it seems like you’re looking to the
applicant to drive the ship here.
MR. VOLLARO-No.
MR. SCHACHNER-I’m just telling you my perception. I think some of your Board
members are sharing that perception.
MR. VOLLARO-All right. I know what we have to do. We’ll table this application and
the tabling will be based on the things that we’ve asked for.
MR. SEGULJIC-And I guess quickly review the lighting plan.
MR. VOLLARO-I know what they are. So, there’s a public hearing tonight, but there’s
nobody here. So I will open the public hearing.
PUBLIC HEARING OPENED
MR. VOLLARO-And we’ll be tabling this application, and we’ll be tabling it for the
following conditions.
MOTION TO TABLE SUBDIVISION NO. 4-2005 GEORGE AMEDORE / AMEDORE
HOMES, Introduced by Robert Vollaro who moved its adoption seconded by Richard
Sanford:
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The application is hereby TABLED for the applicant to return with the following
information:
1. With a sign-off on this project from C.T. Male Associates.
2. The lighting provide statistics by area for showing the average, the max, the
minimum, the maximum over minimum and the average over minimum and
that’s per our Code 179-6-020.
3. Response to the Water Department letter of 7/18/05, that they will replace this
with one and a half inch pipe.
4. That there will be a letter eventually that will respond to Chazen’s letter of
March 16, 2005 to the Army Corps of Engineers.
5. The crosswalk, they need to go back to the Warren County DOT to talk about
that crosswalk, discuss that with them and bring back their resolution on the
crosswalk.
6. Additional landscaping along the southern boundary, for screening of those
houses on that side.
7. Contact Glens Falls Transit about having a bus stop in there.
8. Provide examples of other homes by Amedore Homes.
Duly adopted this 26 day of July, 2005, by the following vote:
th
MR. VOLLARO-That there will be a letter eventually that will respond to Chazen’s
letter, I guess Chazen wrote a letter dated March 16, 2005, to the Army Corps of
Engineers, and we would expect a response to that letter.
MR. LAPPER-Well, we would probably look at that as ask you to just accept the permit
from them, which will probably be after your approval.
MR. ROUND-What I’d like to give you, Bob, is our pre-construction, what we would call
our pre-construction notification. It’s the wetlands delineation, it’s the correspondence
to the Corps. We can provide a copy of that to you.
MR. VOLLARO-Would that answer your letter to them of 16 March 2005? In other
words, what did your letter of March 16?
th
MR. ROUND-They don’t say that’s a Chazen letter, though, do they? They say that
there’s something from March 16. It doesn’t say.
th
MR. LAPPER-I think that’s to Craig.
MR. VOLLARO-That says wetland delineation report from Chazen dated March 16,
2005 to the Army Corps of Engineers.
MR. ROUND-It does say that. Right.
MR. VOLLARO-That’s what it say.
MR. ROUND-Well, our responses will be the pre-construction notifications. So we’ll
give you that.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. I understand.
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AYES: Mr. Seguljic, Mr. Goetz, Mrs. Steffan, Mr. Sanford, Mr. Vollaro
NOES: NONE
ABSENT: Mr. Metivier, Mr. Hunsinger
MR. LAPPER-Thank you.
MR. VOLLARO-You’re welcome.
MR. ROUND-Now, normal deadlines would apply to this submittal of information?
MR. VOLLARO-I would think so, yes.
MR. LAPPER-So we’ll get it in for August 15, for the September meeting. Thank you.
th
MR. VOLLARO-That sounds good to me. You’re welcome. It looks like it’s going to be
a nice project. I just want to make sure, I asked this question to a representative from
your firm who sat on our last meeting.
MR. SCHACHNER-That’s Mike Hill.
MR. VOLLARO-Yes, and I asked him if he would please research whether any papers
had been filed by the Hayes Corporation or Hayes brothers, Mickey and his brother,
concerning a possible suit against this Board because it was stated in the press he made
that comment, and I thought it might have been an off handed comment. I just wanted
to make sure that this Board is not under any threat of suit or proposed suit of any kind.
MR. SCHACHNER-That doesn’t make sense what you’re asking. The Board is always
under threat of a proposed suit. You never know.
MR. VOLLARO-Has he filed papers, yes or no?
MR. SCHACHNER-No.
MR. VOLLARO-End of story. Thank you.
MR. SCHACHNER-Wait, Bob, excuse me. They could have been filed today. I mean,
they have not been filed and served properly on the Town to the extent that a litigation
action has not been started, that we’re aware of.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay, because I asked him to get back to us on that last week, and he
said he would get back to us.
MR. SCHACHNER-I’m getting back to you now and telling you that nothing’s been
served on the Town to date, to effectively start any litigation action.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. SCHACHNER-Whether there’s a threat or whatever, I can’t.
MR. SANFORD-But even more to the point, even if it did, it probably shouldn’t
prejudice any application that they care to bring in front of us.
MR. VOLLARO-No, that’s absolutely true, no question.
MR. SCHACHNER-I assume that Mr. Vollaro was just asking for a point of information.
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MR. VOLLARO-Point of information. Well, some Board members, and one of them
who’s not here tonight, had that said if that was the case, that we were under any sort of
potential suit, that he would recuse himself from that.
MR. SCHACHNER-Okay. I’m still not making myself clear. There’s always potential.
MR. VOLLARO-Well, yes, but that’s farfetched. I mean, I think that’s way off the
scheme of things.
MR. SCHACHNER-Not in my business.
MR. VOLLARO-They’re either in posture to do it or not in posture to do it.
MR. SCHACHNER-No, I think you’re being mislead, Bob. I’m being serious now.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay. Go ahead.
MR. SCHACHNER-There may be any number of people with stacks of paper, ready to
serve them tomorrow. I don’t think you have a way of knowing, of getting inside
litigant’s heads. I think this Board, and I think maybe Rich is saying the same thing,
maybe we’re using different words. This Board and any other Board, Town Board, ZBA,
Planning Board, any other Board, any other place, you do your job. If somebody sues
you and starts a litigation action, we’ll let you know right away, and we’re going to tell
you, it shouldn’t change how you do your job.
MR. VOLLARO-Okay.
MR. SANFORD-Anybody has the right to sue anybody, and it doesn’t necessarily
pertain to the application that they’re in front of us for.
MR. SCHACHNER-And furthermore, I don’t have a crystal ball to tell you whether
you’re under threat of litigation or not, other than to say that in my business, you’re
always under threat of litigation. We think you do a very good job. We help make sure
you do the legal T crossing and I dotting, and I think I’m going to agree with Rich
Sanford and say don’t let it affect your job.
MR. VOLLARO-It never does. It never affects mine. This meeting is adjourned.
On motion meeting was adjourned.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
Robert Vollaro, Acting Chairman
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