HomeMy WebLinkAbout1971-11-04 • GROTON TOWN PLANNING BOARD MEETING
Wednesday , November 4 , 1970
PRESENT : D . Carey , Chairman
G . Totman , Vice - Chairman
J . Bell , Secretary
R . Cotanch
H . Dow
F . Scheffler
The meeting was called to order at 8 * 00 P . M . and G . Totman passed out
copies of the minutes of the last meeting held October 21 , 1970 for all to
read .
R . Cotanch ; I saw Roger Gleason and gave him a copy of the 701 meeting
minutes . He said he had to go to a meeting in Cortland but
will be here at around 9 : 00 P . M.
D . Carey ; Are there any corrections or omissions in the minutes of our
last meeting ?
H . Dow : They are readable and well done , Josephine , and so far as I
• can see they are correct .
D . Carey ; Any corrections or omissions ?
R . Cotanch : No .
D . Carey ; If not , they stand approved .
D . Carey : Any report on 701 , Ron ?
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R . Cotanch : Yes , you have the Minutes ( he passed out the Minutes of the
October 701 meeting to all present ) . At our next meeting ,
November 19th , we will be going over the Village Characteristics
at that time .
H . Dow read from notes that he had taken at the Homowack meeting re ,
important items and / or stages to be of concern to a Planning Board as follows ;
" Power and Action of Planning Board ( you cannot plan in a vacuum) .
FOUR. CONCEPTS IN CREATION OF PLANNING BOARD :
1 . You must know community
study and analyze thoroughly ,
what are basic factors in community ?
• ( a ) Present land use , population , ecology , cultural ,
resources , economy ?
( b ) What about manpower and local expertice ?
( c ) What are various values and ideologies ? It is not
enough that just the welfare of community is at stake .
( d ) What is the framework of inter - governmental relations ?
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2 . Must decide what local Planning Board is attempting to
• plan IMP - community growth or shrinking ,
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distinguish between change and growth .
( a ) What are local needs as compatible with County or State
level needs ?
(b ) What evidence of community concern ?
( c ) What is optimal scope of community activity ?
( d ) Get enough persons of positive mind and influence to
bear on the success of the enterprise .
( e ) What optimum time span is most appropriate for satisfying
any particular need ?
3 . You must organize to manage planning .
( a ) What is basic nature of Planning Board ? ( Outer directed
more than inner directed )
( b ) What is status of Planning Board ? Sponsors ? Limits
imposed ? It ' s status is closely related to its powers .
( c ) What resources and means at Planning Board ' s disposal ?
( d ) Through what methods and procedures will Planning Board ' s
activities be channelled ?
( e ) A federation of Planning Boards often provides but means f
of attacking problems . t'
4 . Planning must lead to action plans . Y
(a ) What degree of realism in the plan ?
( b ) What form of plan ? Time , conditions , costs ?
Composity with short and / or long term planning .
" • ( c ) What degree of detail in planning ?
SIX PRINCIPLES NECESSARY IN OPERATION OF A PLANNING BOARD `
Law referenced = - ( Village - 179F on Read : Fred Blair on 8th day `
( Town - 271 on Robt . Anderson on N . Y . State
etc .
1 . - Must understand the law involved .
2 . - Must understand your authority . y
3 . - Must understand your municipal corporation , its resources ,
taxes , etc .
4 . - Must understand people of the community - - where they t>
w6rk , etc . , their aspirations , etc .
5 . - Must understand your physical community - swamps , stone layers , etc .
6 . - Must understand how your community relates to surrounding
areas , e
THE CARDINAL 5 C ' s OF CONCERN TO ANY PLANNING BOARD : - -
1 . Have a Comprehensive plan .
2 . Coordination of plans necessary . gs,
3 . Sense of Crisis . A planning board can best bring sense ^
of crisis to public .
4 . Sense of Constituency .
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5 . Have source of Cash to effect any plan .
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H . Dow : I. think that ' s about it - INN the, Buitimation of the wh (-) lc thing is
details of advice to planning boards .
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D . Carey ; Actually , Hicks , I listened to that talk too and I think it ' s
good to review these things but in one way or another those of
• us on the Board all the time have these things in our minds .
G . Totman : It ' s good to read that because each time we have a new member
coming to the Board , sometimes the new member sits back and
doesn ' t know what we ' re talking about .
D . Carey : I think you ' re right ,
R . Cotanch ; Who was the guy who gave this talk ?
H . Dow : I don ' t kno w .
D . Carey : We ' ll get all that information . The texts of the talks were
supposed to be turned in and we ' ll receive copies of them all
later on .
R . Cotanch : The letter of intent that you , and the Village , asked me to
write - - I wrote this on October 26 to Bob Hanson in Syracuse
and have a copy of that letter and also a copy of a letter
dated November 2nd signed by Thomas J . MacDonald acknowledging
receipt of the letter of intent , so that we ' re in business up
to date . On the same day , November 2nd , I received a letter
from Tom Niederkorn enclosing a scope of service for the
second phase and the total dollars was $ 5 , 570 which means , with
the State administrative charge , it would cost us about $ 12000
• to $ 1 , 300 total which , of course , would be divided in half again . lie
D . Carey ; Do you have anything more , Ron ?
R . Cotanch ; No I ' m all through .
A lengthy discussion was held about the news release reported in the Ithaca
Journal by Art Clark regarding the 701 Committee Reports furnished by Nieder - K
korn not being reported in context and upsetting quite a few village and
town residents ,
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D . Carey : What are we going to do about this Ithaca Journal situation ?
R . Cotanch : So far as I can see , there ' s nothing you can do other than make
the editor aware you do not approve .
H . Dow : Who will you direct these remarks to ? F
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G . Totman ; I think it ought to be part of our records that we do not agree
with the way Art reports on our meetings . I think maybe we ought
to write a letter to the Editor saying we appreciate coverage and v
need it but feel it should not be sensational news but news of
what we are actually doing . ;
R . Cotanch ; I askcd him to write an article on tliut cind 'TIII: S if; what lie wrote '. i!
• F . Scheffler : You can ' t stop what he puts in . .
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G . Totman : No , but I think it should be more objective and not sensational .
H . Dow : Put it just exactly as George said . The Board has decided the ix
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best purpose can be served by stressing objectivity and just
want the facts to get to the paper .
• R . Cotanch : That ' s fairly put .
Further discussion was held on this subject and also discussion on whether or
not the editor of the Ithaca Journal should be asked to speak to A . Clark .
D . Carey : Any further old business now ?
G . Totman : No .
D . Carey : Do you have any old business ?
H . Dow : No , I haven ' t Dan . I know that - - incidentally did you get your
voucher in to Glenn Munson ?
D . Carey : No , I didn ' t . When does the Board meet2
G . Totman : They met this past Monday night .
R . Cotanch : They granted us an O . K. to spend somewhere around $ 400 .
Some discussion was held on this subject by D . Carey and others present .
G . Totman : Under old business . Last week we invited the Town Board to
come to our meeting and , hopefully , the intent was to have
• them realize our concern re . their inactivity of enforcing the
ordinances that have been passed and I think we got the point
across to them alright . I think we should make a note that we
should have a follow- up on this and not just accept promises and
call them back and let it be known we are going to really
pressure them . There ' s no sense of us working towards a zoning
ordinance if nothing more is being done than has been done in
the past with the ordinances we now have . I thought the excuse
we got on the ,junk yard ordinance was very , very poor because !
the excuse was that Ben Bucko said it wasn ' t worded right and
that was the reason it wasn ' t enforced .
D . Carey : Of course he has to change the dates on it .
G . Totman : They gave it to him a year and a half ago '. 1
D . Carey : I think as far as the junk yard ordinance is concerned they will
probably move on that because of the condition on Lafayette as 1;
they ' re getting a lot of pressure on that .
R . Cotanch : Frank has got a lot worse eye sore along his road '. Y;
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F . Scheffler : Whitey ? ;
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D . Carey : And another one on the Town Line .
• F . Scheffler : Bixler took his Out of town and put their in the 'Town of Locke k,
just over the border .
R . Cotanch : Kyes did that at Summerhill too when we passed it .
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D . Carey : I think - - I have been doing a lot of thinking on this mobile
. home ordinance and I don ' t think we should wait until we have
a zoning ordinance re . the mobile homes ' ordinance .
H . Dow ; They are doing tremendous harm already .
F . Schefflere Doesn ' t he have to put out permits ?
Some discussion was held on this subject by all those present .
G . Totman ; May I make another statement concerning junk car business and the
inactivity of the Board ? Monday night of this week we attended
a Town Board meeting . They did have some good points . A couple
of boys came over from McLean Fire Department and they were saying
to the Town Board you are not giving us the money we asked for
because you are trying to hold the taxes in line but yet you are
spending money on the Planning Board and letting them draw up
ordinances that you refuse to recognize . Now this is coming
from the general public . You have a junk yard ordinance that
has been in force for two years and are not doing a thing about
enforcing it .
H . Dow : They were not condemning the Planning Board ?
G . Totman : No , they were saying why are you spending money on a Planning Board
as you won ' t recognize the ordinances they got ? This is the
comment they made the other night . It ' s exactly what we are
• talking about .
Further discussion was held on this subject by all .
G . Totman : You were mentioning trailers and that we ought to do something
about them before we get into the zoning ordinance , which will
probably be a year or so away , and we also mentioned at our
last meeting that we will outlaw trailers except in a park .
There were lots of comments re . is this legal and at these
articles that we signed up for at Homowack there was a very in-
teresting one and you can make an ordinance that will eliminate
house trailers completely , and not even mention the word trailers
and mobile homes , that will stand up in court because they had a
court case on it in Corning vs . Town of Ontario : they had a zoning
ordinance which , among other things , said ; " Every building used or
designed to be used for residence purposes shall be built upon
permanent foundation walls and shall occupy a minimum ground area
size of 900 square feet for a structure of less than two stories
in "A " District . "
The judge ' s summary was that it was legal because they were not
discriminating against a particular building . He said : "Certainly
the exclusion of small dwellings of less than a 900 square foot
area from a residential district is no more unr (. a4 , Onsh *1. c O )-
arbitrary than the exclusion of large apartment houses from such
a district . Neither is the exclusion from such a district of a
• small house trailer , used as a residence , any more unreasonable
than the exclusion of a small residence constructed on the premises . "
So if we are careful as to how we write this up and don ' t name any
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particular building we can have it stand up in Court .
A discussion was held on this subject by H . Dow , D . Carey , G . Totman , R .
Cotanch and F . Scheffler .
R . Cotanch : You have to have a place for them to go in order for it to stand
up . Our zoning ordinance won ' t be in effect before 1971 .
H . Dow : Who will originate and correct these for approval of other people ?
G . Totman : We are working on these each month .
H . Dow : Are they coming into being ?
R . Cotanch : They will be coming into being probably by the first of the year .
The part on zoning brought up so far is just the legal aspects of
it .
A further discussion was held re . mobile homes and the future zoning ordinance
by all present .
H . Dow : Our next 701 meeting is the 19th ?
R . Cotanch : Yes , the 19th November in the Village Hall .
Further discussion was held on the present zoning ordinance on trailers not being
properly enforced by Dana Snell and that set - back seems to be the main criteria
he ' s working on by G . Totman , R . Cotanch and others .
H . Dow : I think that what has been said the last 25 minutes is good because
it ' s pointing a finger at the need of enforcement that has to be
met and I can see that if it isn ' t governed in some way the whole
Town of Groton will suffer . Some of the property that has been
formerly desirable won ' t be desirable if it ' s in a community where
just anything is built . It has been true in every other community
and it will be true here so I think the Town Board and the Planning
Board have an obligation to the Town to do the thing right .
R . Cotanch : Are we under new business yet ?
D . Carey : Are we through with old business ?
G . Totmane Yes .
R . Cotanch : We have a board member lacking still and the Town Board doesn ' t seem
to know of anybody or they haven ' t got around to appointing anybody
else . Any time I approach them they say who do you suggest , so let ' s
suggest some names tonight .
D . Carey : I ' ve done the same thing and come out and asked two or three people
but they are all too busy .
H . Dow : Which Board are you referring to ?
R . Cotanch : This board .
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A discussion was held on this by all and the following names recommended to be
submitted to the Town Board for consideration :
Donald Payne , 1059 Cortland Road
Paul Cook , 1247 Cortland Road
Oren H . Cornell , 735 Salt Road
Roy Diedrickson , 438 McLean Road
Mrs . Donald Kane , 599 Champlin Road
Edward McLaughlin , W . Groton Road .
The meeting was adjourned at 10 : 15 P . M . by Mr , Carey .
Respectfully submitted ,
Jo ephinV Bell
Se retary
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