January 11, 2005
Philipstown Town Board
C/o Town Hall
238 Main Street
Cold Spring, NY
10516
To Whom It May Concern:
Following are the comments I made at the public hearing on
January 13, 2005 regarding the proposed Comprehensive Plan.
I want to begin with a big compliment. The work the Comprehensive Plan Special
Board has done so far is fabulous. Your
document is intelligent, well written, and, indeed comprehensive. I am very impressed with the amount of time
and energy you have put in, with the obvious commitment you have, with the
basic human decency I have witnessed time and again in the people who are
participating, and with the amount of outreach and openness that has
characterized the process. My hearty
congratulations, and my thanks for your contribution to our community!
I do have two specific concerns, which are important to me
as the director of a large institutional use.
- I am
uncomfortable about the language that says institutional uses should be
“controlled” (Goal 1(a)(6) and R 2.8).
I know that the Committee has considered this comment before, but
it has chosen to retain the troubling word: “controlled”. I
think this is unfortunate, and I urge you to reconsider.
I don’t think this is an idle
point. The word “control” suggests that
institutional uses are somehow a threat to the community. While I recognize that the most of the
drafters do not feel this way, I am not worried about the drafters. I am worried that language like this could
potentially be used to the detriment of institutional uses when they are
seeking to get permits for a project that would be good for the community but
might be opposed by a
vocal few. What I believe you really want to “control”
is the conversion of large institutions into residential or commercial
developments. I think it is critical
that this be clarified, since the reality is that this community’s fear over
that type of development is easily used by people with narrow interests to
fight even development that most land stewards believe is positive. I would therefore suggest any one of
the following possible changes that you feel best achieve the desired
results. I do not believe that any of these suggestions are inconsistent with
anything in the rest of the proposed plan.
- talk about facilitating, not
controlling
- talk about re-zoning these areas into
an "institutional zone"—this, I think, is the most sensible
thing if it is legally possible; most institutional uses are currently
zoned residential—since it is residential development that is most feared,
it makes sense to change the zoning so it is consistent with the current
use and inconsistent with the feared use—any such new zoning category
could then be designed to promote institutional survival on
land that institutions could never sell for residential use
- clarify what is there already by adding
a clear articulation that "encouraging" means creating rules
that enable institutional uses to make upgrades and improvements that
meet stated criteria as of right and that "controlling" means preventing
the transition of institutional sites into non-institutional uses that
would threaten open space and/or would strain Town resources—note,
the BAD institutional proposals in recent years have been the ones that
involved selling for non-institutional purposes; the GOOD ones have been
those that involved construction to further the purpose of the
institution—the Plan needs to articulate that we want to
"control" the former, not the latter
- simply substitute for the words
"maintain good zoning control over these uses" the
following: "establish zoning for these uses that is
consistent with the other goals in this Plan."
- In
Goal 6(i), I am also a little uncomfortable with the notion of developing
strategies for future re-use of large institutional properties. It gives me the image of someone
somewhere plotting what to do with my agency’s land without consulting me,
an image I find troubling. It
would be reassuring if you could add at the beginning of this sentence the
phrase: “Working together with the
Town’s large institutions, . . .” so it would be clear that this is a
process that involves the institutional landowners themselves. I believe a cooperative effort in this
regard would be more productive anyway.
I thank you for the opportunity to be heard, and I once
again extend my compliments and congratulations to the CPSB.
Sincerely,
Jordan Dale
Executive Director
/jd/neighbors/comp
plan comments