HomeMy WebLinkAbout2013-01-16-PIM & PH Town of Ulysses
Public Informational Meeting and Public Hearing
January 16, 2013
* * audio available on www. ulysses . ny.us
Present : Supervisor Roxanne Marino ; Councilpersons David Kerness, Lucia Tyler, Kevin
Romer; Deputy Supervisor Sue Poelvoorde ; Environmental Planner/Zoning Officer
Darby Kiley; and Recording Secretary Robin Carlisle-Peck .
Others Present: Sign in sheet on file in Clerk ' s Office .
Supervisor Marino called the meeting to order at 7 : 00 p . m . and explained the procedure
for tonight starting with the Public Informational Meeting with a presentation by
Environmental Planner/Zoning Officer Darby Kiley and then a Public Hearing on the
Draft Ulysses Agricultural Farmland Protection Plan dated November 27, 2012 .
Public Informational Meeting
Ms . Marino opened the informational meeting by introducing the members of the Town
Board, Deputy Supervisor Sue Poelvoorde and Environmental Planner/Zoning Officer
Darby Kiley.
Ms. Marino said that the evening will be divided into two parts starting with the Public
Informational Meeting, which will consist of a presentation by Ms . Kiley describing the
plan and the process used to develop plan. When the presentation wraps up there will be
time for questions . At the close of the Public Informational Meeting the Supervisor will
open the Public Hearing.
Ms . Marino turned over the floor to Ms . Kiley.
Ms . Kiley gave her presentation. *Note : audio available at www. ulysses . ny . us
Ms . Kiley open the floor for questions and any clarifications on the presentation and
noted that written comments will be taken until February 1 , 2013 .
Ms . Marino recognize the full Ag Committee that worked on the plan and listed their
names ; also introduced Doug Austic who was Supervisor who set up the committee and
got things going in 2009 . With that Ms . Marino opened the floor for questions .
John Wertis : on the cover of the document a name of Tom Daniels was identified and
wished to know his role in the document.
Ms. Poelvoorde said that he was brought in as a consultant by Bergman Associates which
was part of the original contract .
Unidentified speaker: asked about inaccuracies in the document and how could someone
go about having them corrected.
Ms . Kiley: first would have to know what the inaccuracies are ; maps have been updated
based on new information; dated up through 2009 and tried to update a few things but in
otherwise it has been a little tricky so we have said every five years as it is updated we
can make sure that dated is moved forward.
Unidentified speaker: how can decisions be made without updated information
Ms . Marino : said that there are only certain data bases that are made available by the
County which were used to produce these maps . We can certainly look at that.
Cho Chang : on committee and started off with maps and was not sure how they were
generated, a lot were based on aerial photos and some kind of software to figure it out.
The committee kind of struggled about changing a lot of that from there own knowledge
but it became very time consuming at a certain point accepted the map they had.
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David Means : said that along those same lines the County is trying to re-assess the
agriculture land and that will probably be done with a computer in an office and he does
not know if the committee can have the assessment office come out and look at some of
the land.
Monica Roth:: commented that the County Assessor is coming to the County Ag and
Farmland Board meeting next Wednesday and will also be included as a topic at the Ag
Summit the last of February where Jay Franklin, TC Assessment Director will talk about
the process of the reevaluation of agricultural land
Robert Howarth : also on the committee ; commented on the data of the maps and agrees
with Mr. Chang that the committee tried to use local knowledge and make it make sense ;
two sets of data that go into the one and one is County sources such as tax records and
then there are the aerial photos from Bergman. The appendixes do a pretty good job of
explaining the derivation of the data behind that but they do not agree and makes for a lot
of grey area across the data sets . He feels the data is still pretty good overall but not
perfect but that is just a reality.
John Wertis : what he hears from several people that although density based and fixed
area ration zoning is mentioned a fare amount in planning it is probably the most difficult
part for people to understand and asked Ms. Kiley to give it a shot.
Ms . Kiley said that she would rather not, does not have the information in front of her. If
someone would like to sit down with her she would be glad to sit down with the
document and explain.
Ms . Marino said she thinks there are concepts that are implemented in different ways and
in different towns like many other things listed. This is an outline, a tool to look at and
the details of how any of them will be implemented is really specific to our town and
maybe some will be explored and some will not. This is a guiding document and not a
zoning law change to help into the future .
John Wertis : this document will be used partly as a model as you go into discussions
about zoning which said is a high priority item
Ms . Kiley : everything in that land use, except for development rights, are high priority
and relevant to the mix
John Wertis : said that he thinks it was the Free Press reporter after some conversation
with Ms . Kiley and himself where he came up with a conclusion that he would like Ms .
Kiley to comment about and that' s that it seems as if those approaches mite put a cap on
the number of times a parcel of land could be divided in the future or existing plans seem
to do that.
Ms . Kiley says it does say you can divide so many parcels out of a lot.
John Wertis : this is partly a problem with some of the members of the past committee in
a sense when you put limitations on the subdivision of land because land is capital for a
farmer; it is capital in the way he grows stuff on the land and produces and makes money
but it also is capital in that he sometimes has to go to the bank and borrow money on the
land or he has to sell . In practice what is being sold are the odd corners, wooded lots so
that is a reservation that Mr. Wertis hopes everyone can keep in mind .
Unidentified speaker: asked if districts will be dealt with individually, like the lakefront
district or will that be bundled in with the entire policy.
Ms . Kiley : the Town is working on a lakeshore and conservation zone instead of
working on a full overhaul of the zoning document these are being worked on and the
agricultural zone will be taken on next.
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Unidentified speaker : based on the chart he wondered if any consideration to have a
farmer participate on the lakefront zoning committee
Ms . Marino said that John Wertis was on that committee . The committee turned over
their draft and a public informational meeting was held. A copy of the draft document is
available on the Ulysses website .
Ms . Kiley is pretty sure that there was no agricultural districts in the lakeshore zone.
Mark Ochs : was on the original committee and has some questions ; as far as this final
document plan and what the committees discussion was ; is this more of what the
consultant put together and what the committee put together; how much of this document
represents what was actually recommended and discussed by the committee .
Ms . Kiley : in terms of the recommendations the goals and objective sections are only
things that changed in the language and then the new part added was the executive
summary at the very beginning, some section headers written as introductory materials
and then Section 6 was the implementation on the plan maintenance .
Ms . Marino : part of that was in response to information that was received by the officer
at the State Agricultural Market who gave the Town the grant, who reviewed and said
they wanted very much three or four targeted things that were highlighted as a priority.
Ms. Marino said that everything in Section 4 which is the vision statement and the goals
and the strategies put forward are what the committee wrote and what the committee
pasted in February 2011 with the exact same rankings . Ms . Marino has personally
reviewed documents because she has heard that this is not what the committee did. She
went back to March of 2010 and it is in extremely parallel in all those structures .
Mark Ochs : in Section 5 . 1 regarding the statement establishing minimum lot size of 20
or 25 acres as it relates to the minimum size of a viable farm; was that the committee
Ms . Marino said yes .
Mark Ochs said he must have amnesia because he just does not recall anything like that.
Mr. Ochs said he would make some comments as to things in the document that seem too
morphed since the committee .
Ms . Marino asked if he wanted to do that at the public hearing .
Mark Ochs said he would send a letter because there are several situations .
Ms. Marino said that she can put the actual February 2011 adopted committee document
on the web so people can compare .
Unidentified speaker : if we are trying to conserve agriculture and the right to farm why
can' t there be agriculture in all of the districts and have that as a priority.
Ms. Kiley ; agriculture is an allowable use in the districts and the Right to Farm Law
should apply to the entire Town.
Robert Howarth said he too went back through the plan that was approved February 2011
by the committee nearly unanimously and what is currently on the web site and with what
was approved in March 2010 . He said that word for word what is in there for the 25
acres has been in there and has no changes in three years .
Monika Roth : said that we should move along the process to some extend because she
thinks the really important thing is that we get an agricultural committee active and
working in the Town because then a group will be active looking at this plan and working
on strategies. Ms. Roth encourages Ulysses to consider moving forward because the only
way things in this plan will get addressed is that you have a committee . Ms . Roth
thanked the farmers for all the hours they struggled going through all the documents that
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had to be reviewed for this plan and coming up with the information in the plan. A lot of
work, not the final that might be implemented but there is a lot in the plan to work with.
Hearing no further comments or questions Ms . Marino closed the Public Informational
meeting at 7 : 54 p . m .
Public Hearing
Ms. Marino opened the public hearing at 7 : 55 p .m . . Ms . Marino stated the propose of a
public hearing is to afford the public an opportunity to make statements and comments
about the proposed Town of Ulysses Agricultural and Farmland Protection Plan. Public
hearings are required when a Town considers adoption of a land use plan or guidance
document such as the proposed document; they are not question and answer sessions so
people can just come forward and make comments and the Board will listen to them.
The date of the public hearing was set by resolution of the Town Board on November 27 ,
2012 and notice of the hearing was published in the Ithaca Journal on January 7 , 2013 ,
additionally press releases were published during the weeks of December 17 , 2012 and
January 7 , 2013 ; also posters advertising the informational meeting and this public
hearing in the Town Hall and different locations around Town. Articles about the plan
appeared in the Free Press, the Tompkins Weekly and the draft plan has been available
since the public hearing was set on the Town' s website and hard copy available in the
Town Hall and at the Ulysses Library.
The comments at the public hearing will be taken into consideration by the Board. A
resolution was adopted by the Town Board to allow additional written comments which
will be through February 1 , 2013 .
Ms . Marino requested that each speaker state their name and speak clearly so as to record
the comments clearly .
John Wertis : said that what he had in hand is the PowerPoint presentation that Ms . Kiley
gave to the TC Agriculture and Farmland Committee and he has asked a number of
people to look at page 4 and the final questioned he asked was "do you see that as a
factual summary of consideration or do you see it as recommendations ' . Almost entirely
he gets the response as "they are recommending this" . A lot of the focus is the zoning
and it is a matter of perception and there is some difference of opinions of the 20 or 25
acre lot size. Maybe it would be good to get the committee together again and take a
look at things and see if that is what the committee said .
Cho Chang : he was on the committee as well and he feels that it is somewhat
embarrassing but he feels the same sentiment as both Mark Ochs and John Wertis that
there was certain parts of the plan that he rather went "WOW where did that come from"
in particular the 20 to 25 minimum acre lot size because he specifically remembers
discussing that the committee felt the opposite was important that a minimum lot size be
as small as possible to prevent the lose of farmland. This is especially true in the ag zone
in the discussions they had because in ag zones you have very large tracks of land and
spiting them up into 25 acre tracks makes it much harder for a field crop farmer to work
around and a much greater lose of farmland. I do recall about talking about the fixed area
and density based ratio but he does not think they discussed well enough and found it
confusing and morphs like Darby suggested in the information section. These are his two
biggest concerns about what we apparently voted on.
Greg Reynolds : as he has attended many meetings over the years ; is a resident in the
community and farming in family over 80 years he is very passionate about this . When
you get older, like his grandparents, you have to sell land off and if you are restricted on
how you do that could be problem. There are people in the community who do not get
social security because it was not around for them . Options are important to protect for
today to farm and use but it also is important for you tomorrow to be able to do what you
need with it to support yourself and family. Be careful both directions because it is
important for all of us ; we are in it together.
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Ed Gage, Seneca Valley Farms : land on Williamee Rd. and Swamp College Rd. and he
has observed over the years evolution in farmland and particular the 25 acre size bothers
him. What ' s going to happen is a new land owner of that parcel will put his house in the
middle of the 25 acres and then he will get excited and build a pond, then plant a bunch
of evergreens . When you get done you will not have anything that you can farm because
he will have it 25 acre residential area that is completely converted .
Bob Howarth : member of the committee — he thinks that it is important to point out that
the committee spent a lot of time talking about these issues and a lot of it is complicated .
He spent a lot of time going back through his notes and the minutes and when they first
started talking about zoning and the density issues in October/November 2009 . They
were given a lot of guidance from Bergman Association in December, who had put a lot
of work in the plan, they came back in January ; all of the meetings of January and
February 2010 were spent talking about it. They approved more or less the final
language as it is today in March of 2010 . They came back and talked about it later and
many times around because there are a lot stuff to talk about, like the comments we are
hearing now and most of which he agrees with by the way. We never recommended that
the 25 acre zones are the way to go and with that we did not recommend any particular
way to go . What they did was to lay out a whole bunch of plans that other towns and
communities have used and tried to talk some of the plus and minus were and said that it
was beyond the ability of our committee to make a final recommendation in what the
future should be, but these are the kinds of things the Town should be considering . The
plan was a start towards doing that. Personally he thinks some of the fixed density ideas
are a great way to go and he thinks they are reasonably well described in the plan
sometimes and picked them up and done so in different ways and does not know if there
is a perfect way to do it. The piece of land they own is 93 acres of farmland and if they
ever wanted to develop it he would image picking off 5 housing lots or something of that
sort and he personally would hate to divide it up into 20 or 25 acre lots . It would be
better having 1 or 2 acre lots all clustered together and the rest of the land permanently
protected as farmland. This is the sort of thing that the Town could encourage, which
would allow farmers the ability to use the capital from their land and also provide long
it term protection to the land so people 50 years from now will still have the opportunity to
farm the land and he thinks we owe that to future generations as well . It is a complicated
plan, the committee worked very hard on it and he thinks the Town Board should adopt it
and he thinks there is a lot there to discuss .
Mark Ochs : further comments on the 25 acre lot size- in reading over the plan there is
definitely a lot of interest in promoting small farms, young farmers and allowing people
the opportunity to get into production agriculture . The idea that it takes 25 acres to do
that is not accurate in his experience . He deals with farms that are 2 acres and farms that
are 2200 acres which depends upon the operation . He thinks the comment earlier from
Ed Gage of Seneca Valley Farm was very appropriate and his observations as well . He
has spent the last 30 years in agro business, he has his own consulting company in
production agriculture . He covers a 70 county area, has an incredible interest in
maintaining viable agriculture land, as agricultural . He also has an incredible interest in
allowing young people an entry point. If we are going to do that we need to offer
opportunities for some productive agricultural land to be sold in smaller increments,
perhaps by using ultra value crops, tunnel greenhouses ; there are a lot of different
farming that we can promote and the idea he sees is to develop a plan that both promotes
the opportunity for the small producer and the large and not just focus on one type of
farming operation. In looking at the overall acreage in the Township you have over
7,000 acres of agricultural land and is not all going to go fresh market; not in the near
future in his opinion. We have to allow large dairy farms, cash grain operations,
vegetable production, you pick and he would strongly encourage the plan to encourage all
types of operations big and small .
Vivian Rose : I come from Washington State where her home was surrounded by
agricultural land and it is now surrounded by subdivisions, condos , apartments, subway
shops and other things like that; in that county agricultural farming was not a priority.
Small areas were cut off from farms and became houses, taxes went up and farms
gradually became something that was 30 miles away from her home . She notices that
this is happening all around Ithaca and so she applauds this township for looking at this
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and trying to figure out how to maintain an essential quality of life here . It is not, in her
opinion, only the farmers who are effective by farming in the area that we live . In fact
this is an essential characteristic of this area which desperately needs to be preserved
because it not only gives us food and funds it also gives us a night' s sky, different kinds
of air currents . Personally she would like to commend the committee and the Town
Board for taking this on but would like to also ask — Will you consider ways to maintain
farming in all those districts within this township and make sure the road frontage and
splitting off of little farms does not change tax basis so that farming is no longer viable in
this community . Look to the other values of the community that the farmers maintain,
the way that they feed this community, the way that the landscape contributes to the
beauty of this area, the wild life . Her experience is that we often look at one little piece
and forget all of the other pieces , water quality, etc . I came tonight to say thank you to
the farmers and thank you for trying to figure out how to continue this .
Ms . Marino asked if there are any further comments and the Board really welcomes
input, so call, send emails , send comments in writing . The Board will be looking at them
when reviewing the plan. The Town does not have specific schedule for this but would
really like to move this to the next step so that we could get going with having a
committee that starts working on some of these things as Ithaca is successfully doing . It is
not an easy issue, there is a lot to balance and they are quite cognizant of that and trying
our best to have many options to consider. Thanked everyone for coming out tonight and
participating . If anyone thinks they might be interested in continuing to participating
further as part of a committee let us know or sign up tonight. If anyone would like to
leave their contact information we can keep you apprised of how things are going .
Robert Weatherby : what is the procedure or what is the next step .
Ms . Marino said the comments will be reviewed, the plan will be finalized and the Town
Board needs to adopt, goes to Tompkins County Agricultural Farmland Protection Board
for approval , then it goes to the Commissioner of NYS Ag and Markets for approval ;
when all that is done the Town will have an adopted plan that they can start
implementing . The Towns first step would be getting a committee together to work with
the Town Board and take beyond that.
Several unidentified speakers spoke at the same time .
Hearing no further comments Ms . Marino thanked everyone for coming and adjourned
the public hearing at 8 : 25 p . m . .