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In the Matter of a Public Hearing held in
the Matter of: Draft of Revised
Town of Chatham Zoning Law
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HELD AT: Tri-Village Fire Company 111 County Route 13 Old Chatham, New York 12136 August 2, 2018
BEFORE:
TOWN OF CHATHAM TOWN BOARD MEMBERS:
MARIA LULL, Supervisor
ROBERT BALCOM, Deputy Supervisor
JOHN WAPNER, Councilman
LANDRA HABER, Councilwoman
KEVIN WELDON, Councilman
BETH ANNE RIPPEL, Town Clerk
ALSO PRESENT:
JOHN LYONS, ESQ. Town Attorney
NAN STOLZENBURG, AICP CEP Principal Planner
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2SPEAKERS PAGE
SUPERVISOR LULL 3, 11
NAN STOLZENBURG 5
AVA HORST 12
JORY J. EMDE 13
KAREN MURPHY 15
MITCHELL KHOSROVA 19
VAN CALHOUN 26
RANDI WALKER 28
WENDY P. CARROLL 31
CINDY BOBSEINE 36
BOB LINVILLE 40
DONAL COLLINS 43
LINDA ZISKIND 45
HILARY CORSUN 49
HEATHER UHLER 50
ADELE BUENO 52
JEAN ROHDE 53
SCOTT STOCKMAN 54
ELIZABETH MARKS 56
RIC WERWAISS 60
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(OPENING REMARKS - SUPERVISOR LULL)
PUBLIC FORUM - 6:00 P.M.:
SUPERVISOR LULL: Please stand.
(WHEREUPON, THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE
WAS RECITED.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Good evening, ladies
and gentlemen. If you plan to speak before
the Town Board this evening and you haven't
signed up with Beth Anne, please do so now.
We will be taking the public comments in the
order that they are signed up.
Before I open the Public Hearing, I
want to review the order of the meeting this
evening. The purpose of this Public Hearing
is to give community members the opportunity
to speak to the Town Board, and to offer their
comments on the draft proposed Zoning Law.
The Zoning Law has been on the town website
and also has been available with the Town
Clerk in the Town Clerk's Office.
The Town Board will listen carefully
to all of your comments and consider them
during our further deliberations.
As I mentioned, please sign in if you
plan to speak.
Wait to be called. We are going to
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(OPENING REMARKS - SUPERVISOR LULL)
give each speaker at least a minimum of five
minutes. If you need a little more time,
that's fine. We want to hear your thoughts
and we are open to everyone's consideration.
When you come up to the podium, please
introduce yourself. We have a stenographer
here, and she will be taking notes for the
official record of this Public Hearing.
Please speak clearly for her because
there is no amplification in the room and we
want everybody to hear what you have to say.
Please be courteous. I have been told
by our town council that we have a very
courteous populous as far as our Town Board's
meetings, and I think that's because -- the
people that Chatham seems to generate.
And please, if you feel that someone
has said the same comments that you did, maybe
say it in a little different way, but don't
repeat the same thing over and over again.
If you do not feel that you want to
speak tonight, we are still taking emails,
letters, any type of documentation which we
will consider in our -- the Town Board will
consider in our next meeting. So, please feel
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(OPENING REMARKS - SUPERVISOR LULL)
free to continue to send your comments in.
And if you have neighbors that say: Oh, I
wish I would have come last night. Please
pass that along to them as well.
So, I'd like to first introduce our
Town Board. We have Councilwoman Landra
Haber, Councilman Kevin Weldon, Councilman
John Wapner, Deputy Supervisor Bob Balcom.
And I would like to introduce our town
planner, Nan Stolzenburg, and our town
attorney, John Lyons. And our stenographer is
Theresa Vining.
So, I think that we will start with
Nan giving a little background on this whole
planning, Comprehensive Plan, the ZIC
Committee, the Advisory Committee; and then
after Nan is finished with her presentation, I
will open the Public Hearing for comments.
So, Nan, would you, please.
MS. STOLZENBURG: Sure.
So, I just want to take a couple
minutes just to get everyone, kind of, on the
same way of length where we are at getting
here. The process for this really started in
2009 when the Town Comprehensive Plan was
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
adopted, and that was after a multi-year
effort to develop the plan and work with the
community to get that adopted.
After 2009, the Town Board had a
Zoning Implementation Committee that was
organized that was made up of several members
of the community, and they worked for quite a
while on taking the recommendations that were
in the Comprehensive Plan that relate to
zoning issues, and worked to do an updated
version of the zoning at that time. And they
completed that work in 2015.
At that time the Town Board asked me
to reengage with the community and review the
Zoning Implementation Committee's draft of the
zoning, compare it to the Comprehensive Plan
and what the Comprehensive Plan's direction
and policy guidance were related to zoning ;
and make recommendations as to what has been
accomplished, what has not been accomplished ,
and what other things still needed to be
addressed to imminent the Comprehensive Plan.
So, the zoning work is really to implement the
policy direction established in the
Comprehensive Plan back when it was adopted in
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
2009.
The Town Board had a second
Comprehensive Plan Implementation Advisory
Committee that worked diligently from 2016
through until recently, and they went through
all of the Zoning Implementation Committee --
the first committee's work, accepted most of
that -- so we are really building each step as
we have gone along; but the ZIC work didn't
incorporated all of the things that were in
the Comprehensive Plan.
So, the second committee, kind of,
took from where the ZIC group had ended.
There were a few changes that were recommended
to be made; and, kind of, methodically worked
through section by section of the
Comprehensive Plan and the zoning to try and
mesh the two so that the zoning implements the
Comprehensive Plan.
In June or July of last year was, kind
of, the first opportunity globally for the
committee to have submitted the draft to the
Town Board to start getting feedback on what
the Town Board felt about where the committee
had been. So, since, in the last year, what
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
has happened is the Town Board has been
reviewing it, the Comprehensive Plan
Implementation Group worked on -- we had
originally split it up into phrase one changes
and phase two changes -- they kind of got
melded together which has resulted in the
draft of the changes that you have before you
to be considered by the Town Board today.
So it's been multi-years in the
process, lots of committee work, lots of
consideration, lots of meetings on the Town
Board -- I think the Town Board has been
discussing these things twice a month for many
months now to get to it to the point where
it's ready for public comment.
So, the purpose of why we're -- I have
gone through this whole process, as I
mentioned, overall, is to make the land use
regulations consistent with the Comprehensive
Plan. The zoning is one piece of that.
We are going to be, shortly, starting
work on the subdivision law, which is the
other piece of the land use regulations in
town. That has -- needs to come along a
little bit more -- so that will be coming down
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
the road. But the main things that we really
needed to address, is, we want the zoning to
be clear. Vague zoning laws are not really
good zoning laws for the town, or the
Applicant or the Planning Board, so we wanted
to make sure we had clear definitions, lots of
definitions to make sure everybody was on the
same wave length of what the terms that are in
the zoning law mean.
We want to make sure that we have
spelled out the standards that you, as a
community, expect development to have. Again,
we wanted to try to get rid of vagueness. We
want to give the Planning Board flexibility
where there should be flexibility, and where
there are things that are more absolute that
are based in the goals that the community want
to promote -- we articulate those.
Another thing that this zoning draft
does, is, we have brought all of the
procedures up to be consistent with the
procedures of State Town Law; so, the time
frames, when we have a hearing, when the
notices are done, how the decisions are made
are all -- for the Zoning Board of Appeals,
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
the Planning Board for site plan review,
special permits -- we have updated all of
those so that we are consistent with the
process that's established by state law.
We wanted to give the right tools to
the Planning Board and the ZBA, so they can
ask the right questions, know how to review,
know what to review, and what the criteria are
when they're reviewing a project. So, we want
to make sure -- so that one of the other
reasons for the zoning update was to give this
toolbox for the groups who are administering
the law on behalf of the town to work with;
and we want to make sure that the
administration of these things are clear , that
we have the right enforcement sections so that
it becomes an efficient process.
The Comprehensive Plan was not
anti-growth by any means; but it was, let's
make sure we do it right, we do it
efficiently, we do it fairly, we treat
everybody fairly in their applications, and
that's what we tried to do by standardizing
the procedures and the language.
We also had tried to address some
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(NAN STOLZENBURG)
newer issues that have developed over the last
few years since the plan was developed -- I
call them the hot button items -- things that
a few years ago, like solar was not really an
issue like it is these days. There's a whole
series of topics that have arisen in
importance and in consciousness in the town of
things that are land use issues that need to
be addressed.
So, globally, those are the broad
changes of what we are trying to accomplish
with this draft, and I think one of the
handouts that you had was a little sheet that,
kind of, highlighted in more detail some of
those changes. So, that's a little
background.
And I'll hand it back to Maria.
SUPERVISOR LULL: John, do you want to
say anything?
MR. LYONS: No.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Beth Anne.
Where did she go?
UNIDENTIFIED SPEAKER: She went to get
more chairs.
SUPERVISOR LULL: For anyone who has
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(AVA HORST)
come in a little late and you would like to
speak before the Town Board, please come and
see Beth Anne and sign a sign-up sheet.
We will take you in the order that you
signed up.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am going to
call this Public Hearing to order. This
Public Hearing is on the Draft of the Revised
Town of Chatham Zoning Law.
Today is Thursday, August 2nd, 2018.
It's a little after 6 p.m. and we are located
at the Tri-Village Company, Fire Company, 111
County Route 13, Old Chatham, New York.
The first one to comment, Ava Horst.
Hurst.
MS. HORST: My name is Ava Horst.
H-o-r-s-t. I live on River Street, the bottom
of Highland Road in Chatham.
And I'd like to just make a general
comment that I feel that the job of law is to
provide protection from evil, not to punish
people who are law-abiding citizens; and I
believe that the Zoning Law as written is too
strict and takes away basic freedoms of
law-abiding citizens.
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(JORY J. EMDE)
Thank you.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you.
Beverly Frenkel.
MS. FRENKEL: I'm going to pass.
Thank you.
SUPERVISOR LULL: I have to apologize
now if I mispronounce your names. But I think
this is Jory Emde.
MS. EMDE: My name is Jory Emde,
E-m-d-e. I get nervous, so bear with me.
My name is Jory J. Emde, and I own and
live in Old Chatham, New York. This is a
strong move on the part of the Town of
Chatham, and one that I was happy to see being
presented. It addresses the residential and
agricultural history of the town. By clearly
designating areas appropriate for the types of
businesses listed in the zoning proposal, the
town is insuring managed growth, both from a
real estate value and business prospective.
This means the residential real estate
will continue to be valued by current and
potential residents. Housing prices will
continue to increase in the quiet residential
areas. Allowing for these types of businesses
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(JORY J. EMDE)
listed on the proposed zoning map to spread
beyond the specifically-zoned areas threatens
the very soul of Chatham. It would jeopardize
the reputation of Chatham as the most
attractive residential area in Columbia
County, bringing high traffic businesses to
residential neighborhoods that would
immediately diminish property values , and as a
result end up destroying existing businesses
that depend on a clientele of locals who moved
to Chatham for its quiet bucolic rolling hills
and comfortable residential neighborhoods.
Spreading business beyond business
districts would threaten the health of the
existing business districts and put
currently -- still requires quite a bit of
investment. Focusing business into the
specific areas that already have commercial
history will insure that the existing
commercial areas will continue to thrive; and
in time the derelict buildings and propert ies
that exist in these commercially-zoned areas
will finally be put to use.
We need look no further than the row
of businesses all for sale and dilapidating
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(JORY J. EMDE)
along 295 in East Chatham; or further down the
road to larger properties, such as the much
lamented bowling alley and the warehouses
adjacent to Sundog Solar, or the vacant
historic central square building in the heart
of downtown Chatham. And let's not forget the
void left behind by Price Chopper's departure.
As a protection in the investment my
family and I made to this town and our land is
for our health and happiness since 2005; and
as a standing representative of my family, as
well as my husband's family, the Palachios,
who are also property owners in Old Chatham
that could not be here tonight, I stand before
you to tell you that we are all in favor of
the proposed zoning restrictions.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Next, Karen Murphy.
MS. MURPHY: I want to thank you all
for all the work you have done. It's been an
amazing process -- one I only got involved in
at the end.
My name is Karen Murphy, and I am a
citizen of Old Chatham since 1995, and I was
working on the implementation committee that
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(KAREN MURPHY)
Nan referred to earlier.
I'm just going to speak on one topic,
and that is a topic that is a hot button topic
that Nan mentioned, which is short-term
rentals that are now part of the use table.
I wrote a letter to the Town Board on
July 15th of this year, and I emphasized what
our committee had incorporated into the use
table and the standards of the use table,
which that were, we were in favor, certainly,
of short-term rentals and people having the
ability to rent rooms, to rent their house;
and we, actually -- I think we probably
thought about more in terms of less
bureaucratic encumbrance than more
bureaucratic encumbrance. So, I was trying to
remove certain of those rentals from any kind
of permitting process.
We did stress the fact if people are
going to rent their properties, it should be
occasional, and that that definition should be
defined. We did stress, in our committee,
that the homes that will be subject to
short-term rental would be by permanent
residents of the town -- and I said that also
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(KAREN MURPHY)
in the letter -- that that also should be
defined; and there is a legal definition of
permanent residency -- it's primary residency,
and that has legal touch stones that define
it.
One last thing that was not in our
committee's use recommendation was the
question of why we would favor one -- and I am
talking about commercial short-term rentals,
like an Airbnb, where the owner actually puts
it on a national website, and says this is
available for your use -- for a fee. It's
about making money. It's commercial use.
I ask the question of why you would
favor one commercial use in a town, which is
historic in this town, which is
bed-and-breakfast's that require that at
anytime a guest is in the home of the owner of
a bed-and-breakfast, the owner of that home,
that bed-and-breakfast, be in residence. I
think that that's suggesting that the new hot
button, or new use would have an advantage
over our existing town uses, such as our
existing bed-and-breakfast uses -- would not
be fair. It's just not fair. It's just not
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(KAREN MURPHY)
right.
As a private citizen, my thoughts on
the topic are that we have zoning. We have
reinforced our residential zones to be low
density, to favor agriculture, to preserve
residents at a residential zone, by
introducing, as the last speaker said,
commericial into a residential area, you are
going to destroy both the commercial and the
resident.
So, we want to know our neighbors, we
want to be interacting with our neighbors; and
we don't want to have a use in our residential
areas that is commercial in nature, and that
would conflict with existing residential uses.
So, I hope the Town Board will go
beyond what we had originally recommended and
actually require that there be an in resident
-- if there is going to be a commercial
letting of a home, and that I think that would
be thoroughly consistent with the objectives
and the goals of the Comprehensive Plan as
stated in 2009; and as the world has changed
over those nine years that we see now. Thank
you.
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you, Karen.
Mitch Khosrova.
MR. KHOSROVA: Mitchell Khosrova,
K-h-o-s-r-o-v-a.
I am just going to read this.
(Indicating).
So, I think many of you know me --
maybe one or two don't. I come here, really,
with what I hope is more of an objective look.
Those that know me, know I spent 16 years as a
deputy chair of the ZBA. I spent two and a
half years on the ZIC that was mentioned
earlier. This process, these 182 pages that
are on the website -- which is a work in
process for, I think it's close to six years
in happening.
I know for a fact that the council
members care what's going on in this
community; and as stated earlier by the
supervisor, want to get input; and there's
always been a lot of talk since the change in
the last administration about transparency and
public input. This is a real chance to do
that. I have worked with both your attorney
and your consultant in the past and currently.
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
I have a lot of respect for what was done here
and for what you are trying to do; and I
recognize the largess of it makes it very,
very difficult.
I guess the long and the short -- and
I will go through some specific examples but
not many. I think that more time is needed.
I think that this was posted, literally, on
July 20th. I, certainly, have not had an
opportunity to go through it more than a few
pages; and I looked and highlighted some of
the things that I thought might be important.
I know at the last meeting, Dr.
Wapner -- he and I have, sometimes, disagreed
in the past -- but he had tried to put off a
Public Hearing. I do think that more time is
necessary. Also, if there are changes, which
I hope there will be, based on the input that
you are receiving, that there be another
public notice and a public hearing after those
changes.
This document did not highlight the
changes from the current law. It makes it
very, very difficult to focus on what needs to
be focused on. You literally have to read 182
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
pages. And many times there would be some
kind of a table or there's a red line. This
board has decided not to do that; and it
really is unfair to the public, especially in
a 12-day period, to give you final comments.
I know I cannot do that. I am unable to do
that.
(APPLAUSE.)
And I don't know -- it could very well
be the Town will, this time, take up Dr.
Wapner's motion from last month; and say,
yeah, let's put this out 60 days; or let's
rewrite based on comments and then put that
out for 60 days. I hope that you will do
that.
I just want to point out, I guess,
there are some things, like inconsistencies.
In one place, you say that a residential pond
needs a site plan review. In another place,
it says no permit is required. Again, I know
because it was a rush and largess of it,
things like that have to be knocked out. This
is a legal document. You are going to go to
Court -- if you try to enforce that, you are
going to lose that.
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
There's several things that I think
that may not really have, or at least explain
proper rationale to it. The three-car garage
limit. I think that -- as a practical matter,
it doesn't really make sense to me. I have
two children. If they were of age to drive,
that means we needed four cars. It's just
where we live. I also have a lawn mower, I
have a motorcycle. And to say and to limit on
any piece of property, without mention of size
or anything else -- what Nan referred to is
you wanted to standardize things -- really
doesn't make sense, and there's no rationale
for that prohibition. If someone has a larger
piece of property, and wants a bigger garage,
why not? It's not going to hurt anybody.
(APPLAUSE.)
I also think that some people may
think and look at this and read this in
saying -- you know, there are a lot of working
class people in this community. I know if you
try to get a contractor, repair person,
plumber, electrician -- it's really hard out
here. And it's one of the businesses that we
need and need to promote because everybody
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
needs those type of things. Specifically,
contractors have need for garages and places
to store things. And you are -- you know,
looking at those type of people, and right
away, you are penalizing them for their
business. And that goes into the --
(APPLAUSE.)
I love clapping, but hold on a second.
It goes into -- also the accessory use limit
that you have imposed. You have based it on
the square footage of the house. To me, that
easily could be deemed illegious because if
you can afford a $10,000 square foot house,
you are going to be allowed to have more
accessory uses; and I just don't see the
rationale. If you have a large piece of
property, and no one is going to see it, what
difference if someone has a shed, a pool, a
large garage, or any other type of -- a swing
set, all of those things -- anything that
would be considered a structure is limited now
as an accessory use. I just don't see the
rationale in that. I don't really think that
that was properly thought through. And to say
one-size-fits-all is not what zoning is
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
supposed to do. That's why you have special
permits.
SEQR is exactly the opposite. SEQR
specifically comes into existence so you take,
fact by fact, specific spaces, and say what is
proper for that particular application. You
are, kind of, going through that and negating
any of that need by saying you want to
standardize something.
I just have two more little examples.
The 100-foot buffer zone -- you know, whether
it's in a hamlet that could be near a creek or
a stream -- by the way, I don't think there's
a definition of a stream. If someone wants
to, simply, put a swing set, and they live in
a hamlet, it makes it impossible to do. Why
is that not allowed? Again, I am not sure
that was thought through.
Your mowing and construction
restrictions, I think also -- I mean, you have
it Saturday but not Sunday, you have it after
five. I mean, people like me work all day. I
get home and I mow. And it's never between 9
and 5; and I usually will do it on weekends.
And I don't have any neighbors in earshot.
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
Why can't I do it at 8 in the morning? Why
can't I do it after 5 o'clock at night?
Especially when it's light until 9 o'clock.
I think that those were rather quick
to go through. I won't even go into it
because I know other speakers will talk about
your town roads -- you don't differentiate
between gravel or paved.
The short-term leasing is also a large
problem. You don't define media. For me --
and I have worked on other municipality's
Airbnb issue. You know, if someone wants to
rent a room in their home where they live, you
don't have the transient issues about
all-night parties, about littering, about not
caring, and all those other issues. I don't
see why you would make someone, who is trying
to make a few extra bucks to have a guest in
their home -- have to go through a whole
obstacle course in order to do it. And you
don't differentiate between someone who wants
to -- and I thought Karen was very articulate
in the things that she said earlier about the
Airbnb. I think that that's a really
difficult issue. I know Hudson just passed
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(MITCHELL KHOSROVA)
it, and they thought it through, I think, a
little bit more than what this definition does
and what you allow.
So, to sum up, I really think that it
took a lot of time to do this. I think a lot
more review and input is necessary. I think
that if you make changes, we need more time to
look at those challenges. If this is passed
the way it is, you will lose lawsuits; and I
know the town doesn't want to do that, they
don't want to waste their money.
Thank you again for your effort and
your time for allowing me to speak.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Van Calhoun.
MR. CALHOUN: My name is Van Calhoun,
I live on Bushnell Road in Chatham. My family
has been on that farm since 1785. I am the
seventh generation. I worked on this plan for
15 years, starting the first few days in the
old schoolhouse down the road here, when it
was the Town Hall. I have to give everybody
in the town who has put their hard effort and
time over these 15 years a lot of credit --
whichever side of the coin you are on -- for
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(VAN CALHOUN)
certain regulations and certain rules.
We have put together a mass of people
hours and knowledge base and expertise that
few towns anywhere have. We have wrestled
with a lot of documents. It took six years to
put the plan on the table and get it to the
Town Board. And as Mitch said, it's been
another -- almost ten years since that time
that we have gotten to this point.
We have gone so long that we are
already seeing the evolution of new problems
coming along. And we still haven't
implemented a plan. We still don't have a
plan. And every time we get really close and
new things come along and new problems, we
want to have more hearings, and we want to
have more committee studies -- and believe me,
I believe in committees, I have served on -- I
served on three of them, and I have worked my
tail off -- I'm getting very tired of working
on committees, but still we haven't passed
anything. We haven't codified the bulk of
this. Ninety-five percent of something is
something, it's 95 percent, and you have a
good plan. This plan has built right into it
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(VAN CALHOUN)
that immediately after the plan is codified ,
the new changes go to work. The committees --
people like Mitch who want to refine and make
better and bolder -- it's supposed to happen
that way; but we are four years behind the
times, and not having it happen because we
haven't codified the plan yet.
So, my only plea here tonight is to
say that all of the comments that are going to
be made are valuable, they should be worked
into the plan, and worked through and
compromised -- a very key, important part of
the plan; but, please, can we think of the
things that we can bring into the process
after we have codification and start the
review of the changed process.
Again, I just want to congratulate you
all for being bold, strong council people and
leaders. Thank you.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you very much.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Randi Walker.
MS. WALKER: My name is Randi, it's
R-a-n-d-i, Walker, and I am from
Chatham Center. And I said whatever Van does,
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(RANDI WALKER)
I will do. So, since he spoke, I will speak.
I have been working alongside Van -- so, I
guess I'm just reminding you that I have been
working on this for 15 years.
I want to commend you for the open
process that we have had all during that time,
our open process on developing the
Comprehensive Plan, and the open process that
you've allowed for the various zoning and
implementation parts.
I think it was great that you provided
this document on line in May of this year. I
believe there was another version that was
available for people to review last year. So,
I want to thank you for that openness so that
people can be informing themselves if they
wanted to.
I appreciate, Nan, that you explained
to us in the last meeting that we shouldn't
treat this like a novel, and read it from
beginning to end; that if we really want to
get the meat out of it, we jump to the parts
that mean the most to us.
As you going through the next parts
and hearing people, I just want to remind you
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(RANDI WALKER)
about the balance that we struck with the
Comprehensive Plan, and the balance that we
struck with the version that was presented to
you last year.
It's important, I think, for people to
be able to have home-based occupations, for
people to be able to make money in their
homes, whether it's through Airbnb or
bed-and-breakfast, or if I want to have a
landscaping service out of my home. I
appreciate the fact that I live next to people
that have home-based businesses, and so I am
hoping that those parts still are maintained.
I live next to a painter, there's a
landscaper down the road -- you know, those
people are members of my community so I know
where to go for help. So, as you are moving
forward, continue to think about the balance
that we struck when we developed the
Comprehensive Plan; and the balance that we
struck when we developed the zoning that we
handed off to you last year.
Continue to think about people that
may need to make money because it is getting
to be a lot more expensive to be here. The
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(RANDI WALKER)
taxes are going up. Some people need to
Airbnb to actually afford those taxes. So,
please keep that balance in mind. And think
about people that -- they were born here,
maybe they want to stay here, be near their
family, be a part of the community, and just
think about that balance. I will leave it at
that.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you, Randi.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Wendy P. Carroll.
MS. CARROLL: Hello.
My name is Wendy P. Carroll, and I
live in the village. I am here to express my
concern that although much of the proposed
town code is valid and fulfills the
Comprehensive Plan's intent, there are
proposed prohibited uses on all town roads
that are not consistent with the intent of the
plan.
The Zoning Implementation Committee
worked long and hard to establish guidelines
consistent with the plan's intent. Such
prohibited uses on all town roads were never
included in any of the draft use tables.
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(WENDY P. CARROLL)
The Town Board added these prohibited
uses at the final stages, in an effort to
compromise with powers that fought loudly and
insistently to protect their dirt roads with
claims that such uses were intense and would
destroy the rural character of their town.
I strongly believe that horse-related
activities with similar impacts can coexist
with the proposed prohibited uses while
maintaining our rural character.
Just out of curiosity, to see the
impact, I made this map, and all the red zones
on our town are the prohibited use areas.
These are our town roads. Roughly, I will
show you guys --
SUPERVISOR LULL: Please show it to
the Town Board.
MS. CARROLL: Here we go. There's
roughly 1,786 parcels, almost 88 percent of
the town will be impacted by these
over-restricted regulations. The plan clearly
states recommendations to preserve the rural
character of our town, while balancing growth
and protecting our quality of life.
Nowhere in the plan are there any
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(WENDY P. CARROLL)
recommendations to prohibit uses such as day
camps, health clubs, membership clubs, outdoor
commercial recreation , facilities, et cetera,
on any town roads.
The Comprehensive Plan does include
Goals, such as places for our children
to engage in our natural environment, homes
for our elders, in close proximity to their
families and friends, and states:
Recreational facilities compliment our rural
character. The plan does not prohibit such
uses. The plan encourages uses such as that.
I also find it extremely challenging
to understand the difference between the
town's paved road and a county's paved road,
other than the obvious distinction of
ownership -- distinction without a difference.
Why will someone on a county paved road be
allowed a use, when someone three houses away
on an adjacent paved town road, will not be
allowed the same opportunity? Each one of
these roads are different. Each site is
different. And rather than blanket
regulations, I think we should consider each
site.
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(WENDY P. CARROLL)
Explicit recommendations to protect
and to preserve the rural character of the
town are included in the infrastructure
section of the plan. The list is long, and
due to time constraints, I will mention a few.
None of them include proposed prohibited uses.
Roads remain rural and design of maintenance,
institute rural road standards that will
maintain rural character . Develop and use
contact sensitive design standards for new
roads built in Chatham which are recognized
nationally for their flexibility and ability
to preserve rural character.
When I questioned the reason behind
the overly-restricted prohibited uses, I was
told, as far as the Town Board goes, the
choice became, limit the high impact uses or
prohibit them all together; thus, the
compromise. Surely, you would not want to see
those uses eliminated all together. No, I
would say that the uses should be based on a
case by case basis according to each use and
each site.
I was told the number one response
from the people was protect road character,
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(WENDY P. CARROLL)
and close behind, was protect open space --
yes. But the prohibited uses as proposed
would not, with rural road standard and
adequate review processes, destroy our open
space and rural character.
In addition, I was told, as one of the
members of the steering committee that
completed the plan -- I'll be finished in just
a minute -- I can assure you, we were told,
more than once by committee members living on
dirt roads, that they would lay down in front
of the road paver before they let their road
become blacktopped -- they were not kidding.
Is this the real impetus for such
heavy-handed prohibitive regulations? A
threat. And why, at the last minute, were the
prohibited uses included at all? The proposed
zoning can and should move forward without
such misguided and special interests
influencing prohibited uses on all town roads.
To justify these restrictions as
maintaining the rural character is nothing
less than unconscionable and an obvious
attempt to placate certain members of the
community at the expense of the entire town --
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(CINDY BOBSEINE)
and most definitely, not in compliance with
the intent of the Comprehensive Plan.
Thank you very much.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Wendy, can you enter
that?
MS. CARROLL: I can enter it, a longer
version with all the recommendations from the
town about the rural road standards.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you.
Cindy Bobseine.
MS. BOBSEINE: Cindy Bobseine,
B-o-b-s-e-i-n-e.
I have been a resident of the town
since 1978. I do live on a unpaved road, and
I love Chatham. I want to just start out
reiterating what some other people had said
about -- I realize how much work and time and
effort has gone into this by this group of
people and by many people in the audience; and
I know it's been a real labor of love, and I
appreciate it very much. I know there's lots
of intense feelings about things, and there's
been some difficult conversations so,
hopefully, at the end of all of this, we can
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(CINDY BOBSEINE)
agree on the majority of what's going on.
I really only want to talk about two
aspects of the plan. The first one is the
roads. I know that the discussion of the
committee that was working on all of this over
the last six months began to really look very
closely at roads as -- almost as an overlay
for the town. It's the way I understand it.
As a category of reality that could be
taken into account in terms of what would be
acceptable or not acceptable, which would be
zoned in or zoned out, looking at the first
page of the plan, which talks about general
provisions, which I know is based on the
Comprehensive Plan and that this document --
as I understand it, this proposed zoning
document is an interpretation of the
Comprehensive Plan that has, as Nan has said
many times, kind of, the meat on the bones of
how do you get there, how do you get a
community that was talked about in the
Comprehensive Plan, in the day-to-day
regulations and laws that govern this town.
So, as we go to the first page, I am
going to further purposes of the plan, number
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(CINDY BOBSEINE)
7, to maintain low volume and rural town
roads, minimize adverse traffic impacts and
insure the town has quality, aesthetically
pleasing and safe roads and pathways.
I guess, for me, in listening to some
of the comments that have been made so far, I
hear two things, at least. One thing is that
development in the town and the rights of
people who own property, to use their property
to have a business to make money, should be
preserved in some way. I don't disagree with
that.
On the other hand, I think that if you
allow or -- basically, if you allow all things
in all places, the town will become
homogenized, and we lose a lot of the rural
character of the town -- and that is something
I really don't want to happen in Chatham. I
think that the variability in the town is
wonderful. I think there's, what I would hope
is if something like this plan is put into
place, it would serve as a guide to people who
want to move to the area, to know this is
basically what you are moving into. Look
for -- if you have an idea about a particular
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(CINDY BOBSEINE)
kind of development, look for the kind of
property where you can make that development.
Don't buy a property and then say: Hey, I own
the property, I should be able to do whatever
I want here. So, I like this in terms of a
more planned growth. So that's about the
roads.
The second thing I want to talk about,
just a little bit, is the issue of short-term
rentals, and as I read through the plan, it
feels to me like it doesn't totally hang
together. First of all, we have
bed-and-breakfasts, and we have agritourism
bed-and-breakfasts, and they have very
specific regulations about how they are run,
how the owner has to be there -- that it's a
much more -- I'll call it a supervised
temporary housing. And then we have
occasional short-term rentals which I don't
see a definition for and commercial short -term
rentals. And in looking at the regulations
for the commercial short-term rentals, what I
take from that is that that is clearly -- that
could be construed, the way I read it, as an
opportunity for someone to come into Chatham,
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(CINDY BOBSEINE)
to buy a property with the specific intent of
turning it into -- essentially a full-time
rental -- not exactly a hotel but basically
they can advertise it, they can rent it
frequently. There are permitting issues,
there are regulations, but my concern is that,
especially in certain areas of the town, that
we would have a, essentially, a residence, a
house, which then becomes frequently rented
and I -- if it were on my road, I would have a
problem. I wouldn't know my neighbors. I'll
leave it at that. Okay. Thank you very much.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you very much.
Bob Linville.
MR. LINVILLE: Good evening, all. I'm
Bob Linville. Theresa knows how to spell my
name. I live in Old Chatham on Route 13. I
will pick up on some of the comments we have
heard earlier. First, as to legislative
process that you are following of giving us on
the web, 13 days ago, a final text of the
Comprehensive Plan -- and I side with Mitch
Khosrova in saying that it's really impossible
to analyze it in such a short period of time
and make pertinent comments tonight.
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(BOB LINVILLE)
I have had legislative experience in
Albany. I was on the ZIC myself for a number
of years. I would say to you that the process
followed in the Assembly and the Senate with
new statutes, new laws, is to place the old
law side by side with the new provision or
insert the new provision with X-outs in the
old law to show exactly, a reader, how there
is a change to be made.
(APPLAUSE.)
New material, of course, has nothing
to compare with and it stands alone; but the
analysis by the town residents of this new
Zoning Law is impossible with the text that
you have presented us. Absolutely impossible.
There's no cogent analysis possible for 182
pages in the absence of comparison of what
went on before.
I am not going to get into the
nitpicking or micro issues here. There are
many of them that need to have careful thought
as to whether or not they're appropriate in
this town. I had this strong feeling, as I
tried to read 182 pages or so, that much of
this was a draft from another town, just in
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(BOB LINVILLE)
bulk, big chunks from other places that are
not like Chatham, as though there's a template
for a Zoning Law which got cannibalized for
us. And I think that ignores the uniqueness
of our town and tries to stuff us into a mold
where we don't belong, a mold of some other
place than Chatham.
Now, I will say also, and I won't
belabor this, that my sense in reading it, is
that it ignores all the residents of the town.
In large measure, it's a play to specific
groups within the town. It is almost as
though Chatham is becoming a play thing or a
toy for people from far away; and that ignores
the residents of the town, which I have great
opposition to.
So, I recommend that the legislative
process that's time-honored in the state be
followed here, with comparison of text, and
more time, as Mitch asks, for careful
deliberation of the changes that we apparently
have already voted to promote.
Thank you.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Donal Collins.
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(DONAL COLLINS)
MR. COLLINS: Donal Collins, Bee Farm,
108 River Road, Chatham. At the end of the
CPIG meetings, there was a strong push from a
small group of people about placing the zoning
on the surface of the roads. I just wanted to
reiterate, the Comprehensive Plan directs you
to steer zoning towards your poorer soils,
which are irrespective of road surfaces, and
even zoning distance for that matter.
Also, I wanted to talk about the use
tables. Anything not listed as prohibited --
there are new enterprises being born every
day; and prohibited is very strong language, I
believe, to say if it is not listed, it's
prohibited.
As far as what Randi said, I'm sorry
for being redundant, but ancillary incomes in
some of these zoning districts -- if I have a
skill set and I live in RL2, if I can do
something in my garage to support my family,
that I have to start going through hoops of
Special Use Permits, and making it more cost
prohibitive to get that intermediate home
occupation, it might deter me from doing it
and providing extra income.
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(DONAL COLLINS)
A small comment on the noise
ordinance -- I haven't read the most recent
one, but it seems quite draconian.
Just another comment on what I heard
earlier about the appeal of rising real
estate, rising property values. I don't
believe that should be the ethos of this town.
We are a diverse community. The Comprehensive
Plan celebrates a traditional rural
lifestyle -- not polishing it to make it the
most appealing for the real estate market.
Actually, if you look at the
appendices of the Comprehensive Plan, we have
the SW0T acronym, strengths, weaknesses,
opportunities and threats; and the influence
of real estate agents is actually listed as a
threat in the housing subsection by the
Comprehensive Plan. That's all I have to say.
I would like to thank Randi for her
work and other members of the committee, Van.
And that's it. Bob, you too. Let's maintain
a you traditional rural lifestyle.
Thank you.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Emily.
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(LINDA ZISKIND)
MS. ZISKIND: Hi. Linda Ziskind,
Z-i-s-k-i-n-d. I live in Chatham, and I lived
here since 2000; but I was born and raised on
a chicken farm in rural New Jersey , so I do
understand farming communities and rural
communities.
I want to thank the board, the people
who developed the Comprehensive Plan. I was
so impressed when I found out I moved to a
community that had the development of a
Comprehensive Plan that interviewed people in
the town and took into account residents'
input. It was a multi-year process, and it
was kind of amazing to understand the work
that went into it and the work that's gone
into creating zoning laws out of the
Comprehensive Plan. So, for that, I thank
everyone involved. And we are lucky to live
in a place where that happened.
What I want to talk about is also the
short-term rental issue. And I understand
peer-to-peer economy has opened up a lot of
opportunities for people, one on one, to
create businesses, and it is a way to bring
more income into families; and I think that's
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(LINDA ZISKIND)
just great. Unfortunately, it also creates a
new set of issues because nobody has
encountered these things before and nobody
knows what the laws around them should be, and
how they can adversely affect communities, and
what you can do to make it fair to both people
operating these things and the communities in
which they're situated.
Fortunately, we are not the only
community in the country, or for that matter
in the world, that this is happening in. It's
happening all over the world, and there are
people who have studied it all over the world,
in cities, in small little communities
everywhere. There's a man called David
Wachsmuth. He's an assistant professor at
McGill University, School of Urban Planning.
He studied Airbnb rental practices around the
world, in cities and communities throughout
the United States and Europe. And he has
found that there's two big issues. One is
taxes. It's an off-the-books, kind of,
economy thing; and the other is the impact to
the community. Is it going to be a short-term
rental that's done in the spirit of a B-and-B,
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(LINDA ZISKIND)
where you rent out a room occasionally to
people, or is it someplace that somebody
buys -- for simply revenue generating
purposes -- doesn't live there, doesn't even
live in the community and rents it out.
In fact, in Boston today, more than
70 percent of the Airbnb listings are operated
by outside professional companies who buy
apartments and homes, and list them on the
Airbnb market. What Wachsmuth discovered was
that Airbnb has been happy to cooperate with
regulators about collecting taxes in order to
level the playing field with hotels and other
service businesses like that, but they'll
resist attempts -- until recently, have
resisted attempts to restrict how much
activity is allowed -- which means that many
places where short-terms rentals are illegal,
guests are instructed to lie and say they're
friends of the landlord, and herein lies the
problem.
Short-term, whole home Airbnb rentals,
where the owner doesn't live on the property
or even in the area, are an entirely different
proposition than subletting one's home for
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(LINDA ZISKIND)
months or years at a time. It's different
than inns, motels and hotels, because they all
have the protective presence of staff, and
bed-and-breakfasts, and many Airbnb have
owners present.
But that's not the case with whole
home short-term rentals. Whole home Airbnb
rentals find groups of strangers, showing up
weekly, or even daily, which only brings a
high possibility of noise, disturbance,
quality of life issues, and even security
issues. And for the properties that offer
whole -- short-term whole home rentals
full-time, the probability of issues arising
becomes even higher.
I encourage the Town Board and the
zoning committee of Chatham to preserve the
intent of residential rural area zoning and
take steps to regulate Airbnb or any
short-term rental through methods. And again,
there are best practices that other
communities have done, such as requiring hosts
to register with the town to determine if they
were operating in permitted areas.
Other communities have done this and
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(HILARY CORSUN)
Airbnb is actually working with these
committees to identify illegal listings.
So, thank you.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you very much.
Hilary Corsun.
MS. CORSUN: Hilary Corsun, I have a
diversified farm in Old Chatham. And I also
didn't get to read the whole thing, and would
very much welcome the side by side document.
The main things, I was mostly focused
on the agricultural components, and I was
surprised -- first of all, Beth Anne laughs at
how often I am in the Town Hall for the
various permits we're already pursuing; and I
guess I was surprised that there's no mention
of scale when it comes to agritourism and
other on-farm or other events that people
might be having. It seems like a waste of
everyone's time and resources, potentially for
low income events, to have to go through
the -- to go through some of these processes;
including things like the day camp. We had a
farm camp, and it was going to generate
$5,000, and we would have to go through the
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(HILARY CORSUN)
45-day process and -- I don't know, just seems
like it could be a poor use of resources.
And I think -- I was happy to see the
45-day process articulated. I don't know if
that's new, but in terms of being able to
pursue the modified site plan reviews, that
felt -- at the upper end, that felt
reasonable, but I wouldn't want it to be any
longer than that. And if processes like
putting in a farm pond could be expedited in
some way, I think that would be appreciated.
That's all I have for now.
Thank you all for the work you are
doing.
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you.
MS. UHLER: Heather Uhler. I am a
resident of Old Chatham. I have three
daughters in the Chatham School District, and
I grew up in North Chatham, so I am pretty
much a life-long resident.
I'd like to thank you for all the hard
work you have done in observing the rights of
farmers and our farmlands and this agriculture
community that I hope to pass down to my own
children eventually, so that's very important.
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(HEATHER UHLER)
I want to address the large
commercial, residential -- large commercial
use of residential properties. I don't really
think the issue, as some people have stated,
is just renting a room in your home. I think
the issue is whole homes with absentee owners
that are coming in and renting out homes for a
minimum of three-day blocks, for 500-plus
dollars a night. These people aren't here
more than a few times a year, and they are
clearly -- also, these people tend to have
more than one residence that they're doing
this with. Myself, I have one residence, so,
you know, it means a lot to me that I know my
neighbors and that there isn't that transient
population with buses of 20-plus people coming
in and out of my street, pulling into my
driveway at 10 p.m. and unpacking and asking
if they arrived. And I think there's got to
be some kind of restriction placed on this
type of activity. So, thank you very much.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: I think this says
Adele Bruno.
MS. BUENO: Adele Bueno, B-u-e-n-o.
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(ADELE BUENO)
I am one of those bad guys that have
been renting Airbnb -- and not only Airbnb,
also VRBO -- that's Vacation Home Rented By
Owners. That's been on the market for more
than 20 years.
I came to Chatham, but I came to
Chatham to visit someone, and I completely
fell in love. I came in August. In December,
I came and bought a house because I wanted to
retire here. I just love the whole community.
I employ three people to take care of my home.
I do have staff that's 24 hours taking care of
the home when I have guests.
I do rent the house. 59 percent of
the people that I rent is people that left
Chatham and came back to visit families.
Holidays is always rented for families of
people that leave here to come back for
Thanksgiving or Christmas. I just -- we are
not bad people.
I really want to move here but if I am
fortunate -- fortunately, I have
grandchildren, and we have made a goal that we
are not moving here until our granddaughter
goes to kindergarten -- that's going to be in
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(ADELE BUENO)
the next four years. But my house is taken
care of wonderfully -- the grounds, the house,
and I only it rent for families. We should
not be penalized because we cannot live in the
house.
I do come for summers; I spent the
whole summer here. And I do rent the house,
most times, in the winter. I think you guys
all should see the other side. The
people that -- I did not come here to be
labeled a bad person. I came here to have a
home, to take care of my home, but
unfortunately I cannot -- I cannot afford to
just keeping the home sitting there until I
can move.
Regulations from the town would be
fantastic and welcome. That's all I have to
say.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Jean.
MS. ROHDE: Jean Rohde, and I have
lived in Chatham for about -- I don't know, 45
years or so. I was on the original plan
committee, and I am so glad everybody is here
because I can't tell you the number of times
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(JEAN ROHDE)
we sat at a meeting and said: We have to
discuss this and that and the other thing, and
we have our ideas, but what about the other
people? How many times did I say that, Bob?
I am just glad.
I have been listening to the comments
here, and my reading of the plan and the
comments I have read in the minutes and in the
paper, and I think we have had some excellent
ideas. I think some of the ideas that we
had -- well, for instance, when we started the
plan, nobody knew whether it was an Airbnb --
so you have had to add those things as we have
gone along.
I agree that we need a little bit more
time to contemplate and digest, and we have
been -- some of the ideas we heard tonight,
along with what we are hearing from other
people.
So, I just thank everybody for their
ideas and for coming.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Scott.
MR. STOCKMAN: Hello. Scott Stockman,
S-c-o-t-t S-t-o-c-k-m-a-n. I actually live
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(SCOTT STOCKMAN)
in the Town of Stuyvesant, but I am a property
owner in the village. This whole thing is,
kind of, new to me, unfortunately; but I
wanted to point out a couple things quickly.
One was the point that Mitch made about
iterations of the plan and putting the onus of
trying to determine what has changed from one
iteration to the other. Putting that onus on
the public is, kind of, a bit of a tough
thing. It would have been much better if --
Microsoft Word has a little button that says,
Track Changes on it, of which the comments are
made, you can see exactly how a document was
changed -- having that document available to
the public would be very helpful to the
public; or at least a memo of the changes
that -- between one iteration to the next
would be very helpful.
The other thing I wanted to mention
was -- Wendy brought up the point that a bunch
of prohibited uses were added in one of these
iterations. If what she has here is correct,
which I am assuming that it is, because she is
a very intelligent woman, some of these uses
don't seem very intensive.
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(SCOTT STOCKMAN)
And the town itself has a Planning
Board which, ideally, if you have faith in
your Planning Board, they should be able to
take an individual project, be able to
evaluate it on its individual needs, and on an
individual basis, and be able to determine,
based on the Comprehensive Plan and the zoning
that you have, whether it is an accepted use
or not. And they can pass it or not pass it.
So, as a taxpayer in the town, my fear
is that spot zoning like this, and adding
these prohibited uses, as Mitch pointed out,
is going to invite lawsuits which, in turn,
invite lawyers to charge the town a lot of
money, which, in turn, invites the town to
raise my taxes. So, those are the two things
I wanted to mention.
I appreciate your time. I thank you
for listening to me.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Elizabeth Marks.
MS. MARKS: Hi, everybody. Elizabeth
Marks, M-a-r-k-s. I am a resident of Chatham.
I just really appreciate everyone's work, and
I know everyone in this room, really, just
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(ELIZABETH MARKS)
wants to preserve the rural character of
Chatham, and I don't have all the answers, but
I appreciate people working on it.
We have a property, tax crisis in New
York, and it is really hard to make a
full-time living in Columbia County. My
property taxes alone are 13 percent of my
gross income -- not my adjusted gross, but my
gross. It's probably worse for adjusted
gross. And Airbnb has been a Godsend to me.
It is the sole reason I have been able to keep
my home. I mean, there are some people in
this room who have sat with me when I sobbed
when I first got my first property tax bill
because I didn't know how I was going to pay
it. And I believe that Airbnb and VRBO has
been a tremendous economic boon to this town.
I have been shocked at how many people
have come, who come to my Airbnb, who just
want to hang out here, and they're spending
money, and they're, you know, keeping the
restaurants and businesses that I can't always
afford to shop in, but I'm glad that they're
here. They're keeping them in business. So,
I am opposed to all the regulations. I mean,
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(ELIZABETH MARKS)
in truth, they're probably just going to be an
annoyance for me. I can continue to operate
because I can fall within them but I am
against them because, one, I think they're
restricting business in the town; and, two, I
really feel like, as long as I am complying
with health codes, as long as I'm complying
with disturbance laws -- and I read the
disturbance laws, they're pretty specific,
they're pretty measurable. They apply to
short-term rentals, long-term rentals,
residents and part-time second homeowners; but
don't tell me how to -- that I can't --
restrict my ability to make money on my
land -- as long as I am complying with those
rules that everybody else is complying
against.
I don't like the limit of ten people
and three cars. There are people, like the
woman who spoke before me, who, you know,
hosts -- have houses available for family
reunions.
And I don't like the requirement that
short-term rentals be inspected and have to
pass building code, which will prohibit
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(ELIZABETH MARKS)
anybody with an older home -- I mean the
building codes are very strict. Again, my
house will pass fine, it just did, but anybody
who has an older home, or anybody who is
offering an alternative accommodation , such
as -- you know, like a tree house or whatever
that they want to put on their property that
people want to come and pay for to stay at.
So, I just urge everybody to really
look at that issue. Make sure if you do put
in regulations, that it is going to give you
the desire that you want, the end result that
you want; and I don't think these regulations
do.
And I just also question, why are
short-term rentals targeted, and not long-term
rentals?
And then just one other little beef I
had was the garbage cans -- bringing in
garbage cans after 24 hours for short-term
rentals; but also bringing in garbage cans
after 48 hours for other folks. I don't know
if there's a single person in here who hasn't
been guilty of that. So that might be a
nightmare to enforce.
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(RIC WERWAISS)
Anyway, thank you for your time; and I
appreciate the opportunity to speak.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Ric Werwaiss.
MR. WERWAISS: Ric Werwaiss,
W-e-r-w-a-i-s-s. I live in North Chatham. I
was at the first meeting, starting of the
Comprehensive Plan and have been involved, to
involving degrees, ever since. And one thing
that I try to keep in mind through this whole
process was, we haven't changed zoning since
1972 -- the original zoning, the zoning we
took from somewhere on Long Island and tried
to retrofit here.
Having been through the comprehensive
planning process, saw how long it took to get
to this point, I want to remind everybody that
what we are looking at is probably going to be
the zoning in this town for decades.
Those are the odds. So, a couple of
points about that, that I want to say. So,
when you talk about the Planning Board,
remember that this document is not for the
Planning Board we have today. It is for all
the Planning Boards going forward for quite a
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(RIC WERWAISS)
while, in all likelihood. So, those of you
who are finding it a little too prescriptive,
keep in mind that the Town also has -- and
taxes have come up -- has to keep in mind
expenses. And having worked on the road
aspect of this, I can tell you that the cost
of roads was a very high level discussion,
front of mind topic throughout the entire
room's discussion. We have routes in this
town that were designed for traffic.
We have roads -- which the town owns,
and only one of which, Rock City Road, is
really designed for traffic at this point.
The rest of them are just designed to get
people to their residences, or farmers to
their properties. That's how they were built
originally, that's how they have been
maintained ever since.
To change them because zoning wasn't
prescriptive enough, and a Planning Board, ten
years from now, said: Oh, what the hell, go
ahead -- means you are going to have to
regrade, pave that road, and you are looking
at big bills on a road that wasn't designed
for that.
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(RIC WERWAISS)
So, that was at the forefront of our
minds as we went through a lot of that work.
And I just want to -- if I am the last
speaker -- I guess I want to leave at that on
that note; but I just want to respond to
questions about the work that was done on
roads and the motivations behind it, and the
outcomes that we were shooting for. And we
constantly referenced the Comprehensive Plan
throughout that entire process, and keeping
the character and the rural nature , and
dealing with the cost of running the town were
always at the forefront of everybody's minds
in those discussions. Thanks.
(APPLAUSE.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: That's the end of
the sign-up list. I want to thank everybody
for their comments and their thoughts, and
reiterate that if you have any other thoughts
that you want to submit to the Town Board,
please do so.
I am going to call the Public Hearing
to a close at 7:18.
I would like a motion to adjourn.
(WHEREUPON, THE BOARD MADE A MOTION
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63TO ADJOURN, ALL IN FAVOR.)
SUPERVISOR LULL: Thank you.
(APPLAUSE.)
(WHEREUPON, THE ABOVE PROCEEDINGS
CONCLUDED.)
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64
C E R T I F I C A T I O NC E R T I F I C A T I O NC E R T I F I C A T I O NC E R T I F I C A T I O N
I, THERESA C. VINING, hereby certify and
say that I am a Court Reporter and Notary Public within
and for the State of New York; that I acted as the reporter
at the Public Hearing herein, and that the transcript to
which this originally-signed certification is annexed, is a
true, accurate and complete record of the minutes of the
Public Hearing to the best of my knowledge and belief.
THERESA C. VINING
DATED: August 10, 2018
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