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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1998-01-15 t TOWN OF GROTON PLANNING BOARD MEETING Thursday, 15 January 1998 Board Members (*absent) Others Present George Totman, Chairman Joan E. Fitch , Recording Secretary Monica Carey Sheldon Clark Verl Rankin Van Travis Cecil Twigg George Van Slyke The meeting was called to order at 8 :04 p .m. by Chairman George Totman. G. Totman : You've read the Minutes of the November meeting; have you read the Minutes of the December meeting? M. Carey: Not when they were just handed to me, no way . G. Totman: Do you want to pause for a minute to read them? C. Twigg: You want them approved tonight? G. Totman: There are 18 pages. C. Twigg: Then that's going to take more than a minute . G. Totman : All right. We'll wait until the next meeting. It says on the Agenda that the next thing is the Oath of Office . She normally leaves that book out here. She has a book that we're supposed to sign for the Oath of Office. It's a big book. V. Travis: I signed mine just the other day. Approval of November 20, 1997 Minutes G. Totman : I've signed it already, but the rest of them haven't. But it isn't here so we'll have to get it the next time around . I asked if anybody wanted to approve the Minutes of the November meeting. M. Carey: I move that we approve the November Minutes. C. Twigg: I'll second it. G. Totman : Anybody against it? Okay. Passed . Setting of 1998 Meeting Date G. Totman: And each year at the beginning of the year we're supposed to set our regular monthly meetings, and for the past few years we've always held them on the third Thursday of the month . Does anybody have anything against retaining what we've been doing? Let the Minutes show that we have set the third Thursday of the month for our regular monthly meetings . J. Fitch: You should have a motion to that affect. G. Van Slyke : I make a motion that we have our monthly meetings on the third Thursday of the month . C. Twigg: I'll second that. 1 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Totman : Anybody opposed to that? (No one was. ) Okay. Other Business G. Totman: Okay, the next thing on the Agenda isn't until 8:30 and they're not here. So is there anything that anybody would like to bring up to the Board, or does our new member have any questions he'd like to ask about the Board? M. Carey: Well, I've got something. On the County board that I'm on, we're going to have meetings next month -- I believe they're going to be towards the end of February - - on adult entertainment laws and cell tower laws. G. Totman: That's the Tompkins County Planning Federation. This is a joint meeting and, as I understand it, they're inviting members of planning boards throughout the County to come to this meeting. They are going to have specialists there and people that are in the know about these different things. V. Rankin: When is this meeting? M. Carey: Sometime in February. I don't know if they've really set a date . We had our meeting Tuesday night and there was no set date time, so sometime at the end of February or early March . G. Totman : Near the end of February. co Twigg: Is this a special meeting? Will you meet once a month? G. Totman: Cecil, you can call this part of your training thing. It's on cellular towers and adult entertainment. M. Carey: I think it's going to be more on adult entertainment than cellular towers right now, but we need to get knowledge on cellular towers because we're going to have to write . As soon as I hear from the County, I'll let you know. V. Travis: Do you think that will be before or after our next meeting? M. Carey: I think it's going to be at the end of the month . V. Travis: Most likely after then. M. Carey: When is our February meeting? G. Totman: The February meeting's the 19th . M. Carey: Are you going to New York this year? G. Totman: Yes, I am. Now, as long as we've got some time, Van , every year the NYS Association of Towns has a three-day meeting in New York City. And in that three-day meeting they have sessions for town board members, town attorneys, town assessors, town planners, town clerks, and planning board people. And they have meetings for -- part of the planning board sessions are for new board members, old board members. And you don't even have to attend the planning board sessions if you don't want to; you can attend the attorneys sessions, or whatever. But it's Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, starting on George Washington's birthday, the 16th of February. The Town pays up to $500, and they encourage everybody to go that wants to go . There is a bus leaving here, Town of Groton Town Hall, around 8 o'clock that Sunday morning. And right now there's about 20 people who have signed up for it, and it leaves New York at 12 : 30 on Wednesday. But if you want to go, we should get this thing in by the end of this week. And I've got the applications if you really want to go; I can give them to you . V. Travis: Do you have them here tonight? 2 , 1 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Totman: I didn't think about bringing them with me tonight. V. Travis: Okay. But you have them at home? G. Totman : I have them at home and I have them at work. In fact, I just sent one in today for one of the persons in Lansing. V. Travis: Okay. It looks free. G. Totman : It would be good if you can go. We have a bus and we have refreshments on the bus on the way down and back. This year the hotel rates have gone up a little bit, so it will probably cost you a little money. Five-hundred dollars use to cover it, but it really doesn't cover it all anymore because the registration fee itself is $75 and that covers one breakfast, and the cheapest hotel room in the Hilton, where most of the people stay, is $ 135 a night. So when you start adding that up $500 doesn't cover everything. This is a special rate, because it's usually over $200 a night. M. Carey: Who all is going from Groton? G. Totman: As far as I know right now, Teresa, Don Scheffler, Palmers, Arland Heffron, and myself. I think that is it. V. Rankin: Now your wife can go with you to these meetings if she wants to can't she? G. Totman : Yes, but she has to pay her own way and she has to register to have a tag to get into the meetings . V. Rankin: Is that another $75? G. Totman: Yes. Incidentally, Van , this gentlemen who has just come in is Sheldon Clark. V. Travis: Hi, Sheldon, Van Travis, G. Totman: We've got fifteen minutes before the next person is due on . Van is new to the Board and he's been very active in McLean on the new business that was started up over there. Did any of you see the article that was in the Ithaca Journal today? You all saw that. I just thought, since we got a few minutes, if Van wants to say anything about it. V. Travis: The only thing I would say about the Sirens issue is that, as you know, this thing is going to the Supreme Court and all kinds of proceedings - - we don't really know where it's going to go. If it comes before this Board , I'm going to recuse myself from the proceedings. I think that's only fair to the Town because it is almost impossible to say that I'm not prejudiced . G. Totman: This is the one reason I've brought this up . Van has been very, very active in all of this activity over there and I'm glad he said that. I was going to suggest that anyway because , for legal purposes, what I would really like to tell you , Van, is -- and I've told you many times before -- and I know a lot of people in McLean don't agree with me on this -- is that the last thing that we , as a Planning Board, wanted the Zoning Board of Appeals to do is to send it back to the Planning Board for a Site Plan Review. Because it's the way we interpret the thing, and they way that lawyers tell us we should interpret it, is that if we hold a Site Plan Review, it means that we approve of it and we're just setting the hours and regulations. I've told you that before . And at our last meeting, we determined - - and I think we were all here at that time -- V. Travis: Everyone was here but me , according to this. G. Totman: That we would tell the Town Clerk that if they came in and -- I was here the day they picked up some things, and I spoke with her. But if they bring it back, I have told the Town Clerk don't accept their money because the Planning Board will not hold a Site Plan Review. It is our determination that we don't want to be the people responsible for allowing that to happen, and the reason being for it is that in the Ordinance it says these are the things that are legal in the Town of Groton, and it lists all these things, and it doesn't list that. There's another section, and I can't remember the exact number, 3 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 that says that if the above are not mentioned, then they are not legal. And so the Planning Board decided that, with that, we're going to hang our hat and say let it go back to the courts . Where it would go from there, we're not sure. They apparently have decided that they didn't want to come to the Planning Board; I'm not sure where they got their criteria from. Now, regarding the cell towers, to bring the thing up to date a little bit, there's a lot of talk out there. They don't want anything like that and, as Van has said, most of the people that are probably complaining have a cell phone under their pillow or in their pocketbook or whatever. I think that one of the things we should be looking at, rather than trying to stop them completely -- it's just like these nude bars, nude entertainment things -- the FCC has said you can't regulate them. They are a public utility. What you can do is try to get them in the right place where they'll do the most good, and things like that. One of the things I think we should be looking at, more than just stopping them, is making sure there's provisions in our Ordinance that says when they are no longer needed , the person that put them up has got 90 days, or whatever, to take them down so we don't get stuck with them sitting all over the countryside. Because as modern technology goes, I'm sure that within five or ten years they aren't going to be needed. V. Travis: They will go digital; it will be satellite. G. Totman : That's right. And so we've got to make sure that once they get in here - - right now, as I understand it, and I can be corrected, the people with the cell towers can't afford the satellites at this particular point. But they can afford these towers. Once they get big enough and start buying each other out and they get more conglomerates in there , then they will be able to afford to use the satellites. And they won't need these towers. So we've got to make sure that when they get in there that we put it in our Ordinance that they have to be removed at their expense and not our expense . M. Carey: They do pay good rent on your land. V. Travis: Do they`? It seems to me another issue that 19ve seen mentioned in some of the articles is the possibility of sighting them on already existing towers where it's feasible . And it seems to me that this just makes good common sense . In fact, I think it would be economical for them as well, except that I realize they then have to pay rent to the - - G. Totman : They have to pay rent anyway. People where they've been already say that they're good rent. I think about it when I come home nights or go to work mornings . Up on the Sweeney farm, one of the highest points in our area over here , those silos that stick up in the air -- what would be wrong with putting one of those things -- I would think that would be a good place to put them. Harriet Tenney - Proposed Subdivision - Bossard Road - TM # 22- 1 - 23 . 2 G. Totman: Even though the people aren't here , let's talk about this Tenney rural subdivision . J. Fitch: George, in the letter you have from Attorney Henry, he said that he will not be attending the meeting. G. Totman: Yes, I read it to them before you came. M. Carey: I didn't hear you . V. Travis: You mentioned it to me while I was here . G. Totman : Well, anyway, Mr. Henry wrote us a letter that says "Please be advised that I am no longer representing Harriet Tenney in the above matter. Fred Beck of Thaler & Thaler is now representing Mrs. Tenney and I will only be representing the buyers . . . " so therefore he will not be at our meeting. That's Jim Henry. (Reference letter to Town of Groton Planning Board dated January 14, 1998 from James R. Henry.) So why don't we look it over, and ask questions. V. Travis: And why don't you just kind of coach me as you go along as to what are the issues and how we do all this, and that way I can kind of learn as you go along, but just do it in the normal process of things . My understanding here is that there was a tract here that one parcel, # 1 , had already 4 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 been taken out and they are now going to take the rest of it and divide it into two more parcels. Is that right? There's a red line that cuts across there which must be what -- is there a stream going across there or something? V. Rankin: Swamp . Nothing too valuable . V. Travis: Or is that the proposed boundary? And they claim it's a rural subdivision - - have I got the right terminology? C. Twigg: The junk yard is up here . I think Todd and Jimmy are the ones that are going to buy this. Then they might buy this, but they don't want this . V. Rankin: You mean this swampland here -- they're going to buy that? C. Twigg: Yes. M. Carey: What do they want it for? C. Twigg: Just a place to hunt. They already bought that 35 acres of White's. And now they're talking about buying this; they've put a purchase offer on it. V. Rankin: Well that's about all it's good for is hunting. Co Twigg: There might be a building lot out here on the road , but they're not too interested in this down here, I guess. V. Rankin: That's the only good part. C. Twigg: Well , they said it would be more expensive and they weren't interested in putting a lot of money into it. J. Fitch: When you say the part down here , what are you talking about - - for the Minutes? V. Rankin: Number three . C. Twigg: At Bossard Road and Spring Street there . So there will be no building on that #2 there anyway, unless they sell something along this road here . G. Totman : Basically, one of the things that you normally look for is ( 1 ) you need an acre of land for a building lot, it's got to be at least that. It's got to be at least 150 foot of road frontage . C. Twigg: Unless you got a flag lot. G. Totman : Unless you have a flag lot, yes. Then there's a different criteria for that. And out in the country -- to tell you the truth , in the Town of Groton we haven't had any major developers come in and want major subdivisions like they do in some towns; so it's a little bit different here than in like the Town of Lansing or the Town of Dryden or something like that. We have a thing in our subdivision where -- I think it's 340, the subdivision - - where you can hold a public hearing if you want to. You don't have to if you don't want to . If you don't see the need for it. If they were dividing this up into eight or nine lots and were going to change the character of the neighborhood, they we would probably call for a public hearing. Normally, on ones like this taking a large acre of land and you've got multiple acres in there , we look at least the criteria of the Zoning Ordinance as to size of lot and road frontage, and we pass it accordingly. Then they make a motion to bypass the public hearing, or whatever. V. Travis: Does this presentation meet the criteria of the Code? G. Totman: What happens is, if we pass this, then they have to have the land surveyed and bring the mylar copy of the survey in and then we have a stamp that we put on it and I sign it, or the Chairman of the Planning Board signs it. But they can't build on it or do anything with it until they bring the surveyor's map in to show us this is exactly what they did. Now there are some towns that 5 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 require that up front. And if you want to read our Ordinance in its entirety, we can require that. But our feeling is, why make them spend all that money if it doesn't pass. So we pass this and tell them that it's not really officially passed until they bring the surveyors maps in and have them stamped. Anything else? J. Fitch: Why isn't the SEAR form attached to the application? G. Totman: Good question. I don't see the folder out here on this. Do you have the folder for this? See, we have a new -- wait a minute . If I may explain this, Van -- V. Travis: I've been through it a couple times but you better explain it. G. Totman : This is the law of the land -- and if you don't do it and somebody finds out and they don't like the project, they can kill your affirmative vote. This is a Short-Form SEAR If we don't agree that we can put a negative dec on this, then we have to ask for the Long Form and then you can go to the EIS and the scoping and all that sort of thing. As yet, we in Groton have not really saw the need for that because we have never had anything over a small subdivision. There has been cases in New York where planning boards have approved something and it's got thrown out on this Article 78 because, in fact, it wasn't very long ago that we had a deal over in Lansing about a golf course that the ZBA passed where the Zoning Officer made a mistake, and the people found out too late that they could get an Article 78 against the Town . They got all the papers ready and hired a lawyer, and they applied for it, but they were ten days too late . They've got 30 days to apply for that. But we want to make sure -- and they told us in New York that about 95% to 99% of all SEQRs are negative decs like this. But when you get the big subdivisions, and they get drainage problems and all that other stuff, then you go for the Long Form to have engineers look at it. The Long Form SEAR is how the City of Ithaca beat Wal•Mart. They didn't vote yes or no they wanted it, they just never agreed on their SEAR process. A lot of people don't realize that. It never got to a vote whether they wanted it or didn't want it, they just never approved of the SEAR and it cost them so much money that after awhile they just gave up. George? Board Member George Van Slyke then reads aloud Part H of the Short Environmental Assessment Form, Negative responses were obtained to all questions in Part H. Therefore, it was determined by the Planning Board, upon the motion made by Monica Carey, seconded by Cecil Twigg, with all members present voting in favor, that the action, based on the information submitted, will not cause any significant adverse environmental impact, resulting in a negative declaration. V. Travis: What do those first two questions mean? G. Totman: I can get you what they call a "SEAR Cookbook" that you can look at. V. Travis: I'm not objecting to the results, but I'm just interested in it. You've studied up on it, I presume. Were they required to be here tonight? G. Totman : Normally they always show up. C. Twigg: But they are not necessarily required to. M. Carey: It's nice to have them here to answer our questions. G. Totman: Well , usually you like to have them here to answer questions, but you've got to realize when you do a subdivision you're only giving approval as to the dividing of the land and not what it's going to be used for. Because we do have the Site Plan Approval process in the Town of Groton . So if they're going . to use it for anything other than what the Zoning Officer can give a permit for, then they have to come back for Site Plan approval . Here, you could make a ruling that if they don't show up you don't approve it until the next meeting. But with something like this -- C. Twigg: But if Todd and Jimmy sell any more lots, they've got to come back anyway. G. Totman: Who's buying this? 6 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 M. Carey. Todd and Jimmy. C. Twigg: Todd and Jimmy. G. Totman: Your sons? C. Twigg: Todd, but not Jimmy -- they bought that White junkyard . M. Carey: You know Todd and Jimmy. C. Twigg: If they do anything with the land , they've got to come back in anyways . But I really don't think they are buying this parcel down here in the corner. G. Van Slyke : Well, it's obvious why they're subdividing it. C. Twigg: They didn't want that. G. Totman : See, you can subdivide one lot without a subdivision . C. Twigg: They own some across the road too, and I think they own some down here . G. Van Slyke : Wait a minute . One doesn't figure into this anymore does it? G. Totman: No , one doesn't figure into this. It's just two and three . M. Carey: Are we going to make a motion to approve this, or -- - C. Twigg: Do they have to have a mylar copy of this? G. Totman : They have to have stamped plans from a surveyor. I'd rather not say that they have to have mylar, because the County doesn't require them. It's an old rule -- they use to . But there's a lot of towns in the County that don't have subdivision rules and regulations. Like in the Town of Caroline, Newfield, or Enfield, you can sell up to four or five lots. There's no planning board, there's no zoning, there isn't anything. So when they file those things that they sell, they just take them down to the County and file them and the County doesn't require mylar. Only if it's five or more is when the County requires it. So what they have to do is bring in the stamped, signed plans from a surveyor so that we can say this is exactly what it is . And when they do that, I compare it with what we approved ; and if it's the same, then I sign the stamp that we put on it. So if you want to make a motion that we do it according to that, and bypass the public hearing -- M. Carey: I'll make that motion . G. Van Slyke: Second it. G. Totman: All in favor? (All members indicated they were in favor.) Carried. J. Fitch: So your motion reads that the subdivision is approved as requested and that you waive the public hearing, conditioned upon receipt of the subdivision map prepared by a Licensed Land Surveyor? G. Totman : Yes. That's the end of what I have for anything for the Agenda. It says "Any other business to come before the meeting. " Discussion - Floyd Kyes - 956 Salt Road - Amend Special Permit - TM # 17- 14 G. Van Slyke: Let's go back to the December thing with Kyes. What are you going to do about that? G. Totman: He's coming back in February. G. Van Slyke: Are we going to be prepared for this thing, or what's the deal? 7 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Totman: Well, what are you going to do? To go over it for Van , we gave him a permit to have his stuff there so long as he kept it so it wasn't visible from the road . Okay? I don't know if you read those Minutes. V. Travis: I've not read these, but I read the stuff in preparation for the December meeting. G. Totman: And now he's piling it so high within his fence that you can see it from the road . C. Twigg: I don't think that's a problem, personally. The junk -- if he was piling junk cars that high, I can see where maybe someone might say it doesn't look too good . But these are boxed, crated material that's going above the fence. It's not junk. It looks better than the fence does most of the way. I would say those wooden crates are more presentable than the fence he's got hiding them. So what is the matter with him putting crates above the fence? V. Rankin: What does our Ordinance say? I think we have to go by that. C. Twigg: Just the junk cars . I don't think those boxes if he was to set those boxes right out by the road -- I don't think our Ordinance would necessarily have anything against it. If us, as a Planning Board, didn't put restrictions on him piling boxes -- as long as they're piled in neat rows -- G. Totman: Have you see it up there? C. Twigg: I haven't paid a lot of attention to it, no . G. Van Slyke : I was by there the other day and there's only one stack that I could see and -- G. Totman: Cecil, I'm not going to argue with you , but what we've got to determine is -- whatever you do with a guy like him, you're setting a precedent. And he had a signed statement that said he would agree to the Site Plan Review that he got in the past. And then he didn't follow it. If he had come and said these are snowmobiles and whatever they are, and they are all new in the crates, would there by any harm with these showing? Then it would be a different story. C. Twigg: I see what you're talking about. G. Totman: And I'm trying to figure out whatever we say we can do and allow, we've got to make sure that we can do the same thing with anybody else that has the same type of situation. C. Twigg: I think he should have done that probably, but he's not using it for what he intended to when he had that first Site Plan Review. G. Totman: Well, he kept those inside the barn that burnt. Co Twigg: Yes, he had a barn there and he kept all those inside of it. Well then that burnt so he started stacking them outside. G. Totman: Now in all sincerity I can't believe that manufacturers will put out those two or three- thousand dollar machines and they wrap them up in cardboard and plastic and ship them off to a place in Groton where they store them out in a junkyard, so to speak, waiting to be sold . G. Van Slyke: They are trucking them every day. Harvey Hatfield trucks them out of there every day. There are two loads going out every day. V. Travis: What is this, a distribution center? C. Twigg: Kyes is a main distribution center. S. Clark: I've seen five tractor trailers waiting there in the morning -- North Star Trucking, G. Totman: They bring them there and leave them. Then the next day a truck comes and picks them up and takes them. 8 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Van Slyke : He's a central distribution point for the Northeast. The snowmobile and all of this watercraft business is not all that lucrative that an individual dealer can go ahead and say, okay, I'll take a whole truckload and bring them in here . What they do is Dusty has them brought in there. He stockpiles, he stores them. And when they get orders from the people, like Harvey's truck drivers will go over and load up a load that's going north -- about six or seven drops on that route. They'll deliver those and bring back the ones that were bad or had been returned or wasn't able to sell . So once in awhile they'll come back and there'll be a couple of them on the truck and they'll take them back over. That's what he's talking about storing over there were the ones that were sent back but he doesn't have any place for them to go . So he was just stacking them there , storing them. They're moving stuff out of there every day. Harvey had at least two trucks going every day, just about, out of there heading out for someplace . The one thing I'd like to bring up about this whole thing - - when he originally did the Site Plan Review, his plan was that he was going to build another building onto the building that he had, and that's why he agreed that he could put everything under cover. If I was going to work a business like that, and I had a big enough building that I could put everything under cover, I would have done that. I think he tried to do that. But what happened was - - when they had the snowstorm and the -- and I forget what the date was -- the year they had the big snowstorm and the quonset caved in on it -- V. Travis: It says March 15, 1994. G. Van Slyke : Yes, something like that. He kind of got caught between a rock and a hard place at that point. If the quonset but is gone , then he doesn't have interior storage anymore . That really wasn't any fault of his. V. Rankin: Why didn't he build another building? G. Van Slyke: I don't know if he can afford to build another building. V. Rankin: He must of got some insurance out of that one . G. Van Slyke: And that's the other point. Why wasn't that taken care of back then when the demolition occurred? Our zoning man went up there and gave approval for him to demolish that, to take that down . At that time, why wasn't the stipulation brought up that he couldn't store stuff outside so we wouldn't have this problem. Why did we wait three, four years and let the thing go and not have taken care of when he had the opportunity . He was right there approving the tearing down or whatever they did to the quonset but that caved in . S. Clark: He saved just a part of it, right? G. Van Slyke : Yes, I guess so. But the thing is, why wasn't that taken care of right then? The minute that they tore that down and there's stuff left out there in the open , he broke the restriction back in 1994. Why did he wait three years or four years to come back and say, okay, you're not in Code anymore? S. Clark: His business wasn't going like it is now then. G. Van Slyke: I think it was because I can remember going over there with Harvey with his truck one day. And you could back right up in that whole place and he'd come over and forklift it right on the truck and away he'd go . He was moving stuff out of there at that time . Why, all of a sudden -- Me Carey: Our Code Enforcement Officer has put us between a rock and a hard place on this because he waited all these years to do anything. C. Twigg: The Code Enforcement Officer we've got now wasn't on board when we did Dusty the first time and he probably didn't get his folder out and read it. G. Totman: He's been on board since 1989, C. Twigg: Was he on when Dusty did his -- 9 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Totman: Well, we've had Dusty two or three times. George has submitted his resignation as our Code Enforcement Officer for the Town of Groton and the Village of Freeville. He's going to stay on as the CEO for the Village of Groton . His stated reason was that he has turned 65 and that he can only earn $ 14, 500 and the Village doesn't take him over that. So he's retiring. And as soon as they find somebody here in Groton , George will not be the Zoning Officer anymore . But in the meantime, at our next meeting, Mr. Kyes is going to be here and we're going to talk to him and see what he wants to offer. V. Travis: I see here that he suggested the lowering of the stacks. Is that not acceptable? M. Carey: He offered, but he didn't want to do it. C. Twigg: Well, the low stacks people can pull up to it and load one on off a short stack. A high stack, a guy has to have the equipment to get it off the top . So he said it's safer in a high stack than a low stack. Safer from theft. When I mentioned locking the gate , he said they take bolt cutters and get in. G. Totman : Are we going to allow them to stick up above the fence, or not allow them to stick up above the fence? C. Twigg: As far as I'm concerned, I see no reason why they can't stick up above the fence . M. Carey. But then who comes next then -- the next person? C. Twigg: Well, as long as they're crated - - G. Totman : If you allow something to stick up above the fence, you've got to make very clear in the Minutes and the statement that's given to him on his approval, why we're allowing something to be visible. C. Twigg: I don't think that would be a big problem. G. Totman : But what I'm saying is that somebody else can't say well you let him do it. We're going to say to somebody else that if they want a junkyard, it's got to be fenced in . That's what he had in the first place . That if you want to have your cars above the fence, you've got to have them enclosed in plastic and you can't see what's in there -- so the product itself is not visible . And maybe we can do it that way. C. Twigg: I don't think you want a big old fuzzy thing setting up here with a bunch of plastic flapping in the wind off of it, but I think if it's in a wooden crate that looks neat and is piled neat, it isn't piled helter skelter, but set one on top of the other like it should be, I see nothing offensive about that . S. Clark: Looks better than some of the places around town . C. Twigg: Yes. You go out Route 81 and you're looking right down on a junkyard -- what good's a fence doing on that thing? The same way with the one down in Danby; you look up here on the side hill and there's all junk cars, and down below is the fence . The fence hides the first one or two cars . G. Totman : I understand all of that, but when we're making decisions here, we have to go by what's in our Ordinance . C. Twigg: When I go by a junkyard, what do I expect to find? I expect to see junk cars when I go by a junkyard . What do you expect to see? G. Totman: A fence . You're not listening to me. Our Ordinance says you have to have a fence and they can't be visible from the road . I agree with you about Contento's over there and the one in Danby. I've gone by them many times. It's too bad. The one over to Cortland is worse; it's the first thing you see when you get off 81 to come into Cortland . And they've had a lot of problems with him over that . 10 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 But that's not Groton . Our job is to comply with our Ordinance that we wrote ; and if we're going to deviate from it, then we've got to stipulate why we're deviating from it. C. Twigg: I think we can do that and be on the safe side . G. Totman : But what I'm saying is, the Planning Board members that are here tonight are going to be here when he comes in next month and we don't want to argue amongst ourselves in front of him. That's why we're talking about it now. No, seriously, does everybody agree with what is being said here? Does somebody have a different idea? M. Carey: As long as they're crated and kept crated and kept neat -- G. Totman: I think the product itself cannot be visible. And if it's crated and covered with plastic so that it's not going to become a wet, mushy mess - - C. Twigg: Well, I don't think we ought to allow just plastic being covered over it. M. Carey: No. I was just going to say that plastic gets to flapping in the wind . Crate it. G. Totman : Then it would be leaking onto the product. C. Twigg: No, they have plastic inside the crates. G. Totman : Okay. But it's going to be covered so that the product doesn't show. V. Travis: This is a shipping container is it not? From the manufacturer as opposed to some kind of makeshift -- G. Totman: They might elect to put plastic around it and staple it to the crate or something like that . M. Carey: As long as the plastic's not flapping in the wind. G. Totman: Okay. Just so that we understand what we're - - it's a lot better to sit here and do it than -- G. Van Slyke: You're going to say that they put plastic over them? C. Twigg: They don't have to, but if they do . G. Totman: Yes. If they do, it's got to be stapled down so it doesn't - - George, I can' t imagine -- and I might be naive, but you've got a new snowmobile that costs two, three, four-thousand dollars or more -- I have no idea what they cost. And they're wrapped up in cardboard, crates put around them -- those crates are not waterproof. You're going to set them out there and let it rain on them? G. Van Slyke: How are you so sure they're not waterproof? G. Totman : I never saw a wooden crate yet that was waterproof. G. Van Slyke : It's not a wooden crate . There's a crate that the thing is inside, but then there's the white covering that's like a plastic covering that's stapled on the crate individually. C. Twigg: But if he does want to cover it, we want it fastened down so it don't flap in the wind. We want it to look presentable from the highway. M. Carey: But he shouldn't because they are all individually wrapped. V. Travis: Let's be a little bit more restrictive -- can't we word it in such a way that we agree that it's permissible if they are stored and stacked in their original shipping crate from the manufacturer and that that is what we will allow? As soon as he starts putting tarps over things and everything, by the 11 1 . . Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 time spring comes, the wind around here has done its job. And he isn't going to buy a quality of tarp that is going to withstand one of these winters here. C. Twigg: They aren't his snowmobiles. He's just a middle man and they just come and go. V. Travis: It's almost like a freight-forwarding operation, isn't it? G. Van Slyke : All he does is just hold them until he gets the orders and then he makes a route and delivers them by flatbed truck and they drop off whatever number the dealership wants . V. Travis: Why are they accumulating in such numbers that they're now rising up above? This is snowmobile season. I could it see in July or August when they're getting ready to -- G. Van Slyke: Usually what happens is it's a seasonal thing. So your snowmobiles probably arrive somewhere in August. But it's supply and demand. The new models, like cars, come out in September. So he'll have a lot of snowmobiles. In the meantime, because they do watercraft also, there would be watercraft there . So at this time of the year what might be coming in is watercraft for the spring business. You've got to keep all of these things moving. V. Travis: That makes sense. G. Van Slyke: Now all he's doing is just standing there in the middle . Why has it taken so long to bring this up? V. Rankin: He's standing there in the middle making money and he can afford to build a building. But that's not our business . G. Totman : If you're George Senter, and somebody complains to the Town Supervisor, and that person goes to you or they call you directly to complain, and you don't do anything about it, then they go to the Town Board and say why do you have this guy? We call him up and we've got an Ordinance here and he's not doing anything. Normally, the job of the Code Enforcement Officer is to attend our meetings to bring us up to date and listen to us. C. Twigg: He attends most of our meetings. G. Totman : What we have to do here is look at it as a Board, not whether it's Joe or Jim or Bill or whoever. How does it meet the Ordinance? And regardless whether he got away with it for four or five years or not, that doesn't matter. It's here now and we've got to look at it the way it is. And maybe he should have been called in three or four years. S. Clark: I don't see nothing wrong with it. V. Travis: I haven't been up there. G. Totman: Do you know where it is? V. Travis: Well, there's a map here . G. Totman : Okay, C. Twigg: Sheldon don't want to say much because he's afraid Dusty will get back onto him about his bales of hay wrapped in white plastic . That's the rationale there . M. Carey: We've discussed this and have made up our minds; let's adjourn the meeting. V. Rankin: I move we adjourn . V. Travis: Second. V. Rankin: We know what we're going to tell him and that's that. 12 Groton Town Planning Board Meeting 15 January 1998 G. Totman : What are you going to tell him? V. Rankin: As long as those things are crated he can go three high . G. Totman: You guys -- I was going to tell you earlier, but I didn't get a chance , February 27th at 9:30 in the morning, if you're interested, and I'm sure Van is, is the Court hearing on the Article 78 against the Town of Groton in the Tompkins County Court House . Now, everyone in favor of adjourning? (All were in favor.) The meeting was adjourned at 99.25 p.m . an . Fitch Recording Secretary 13