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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2013-05-23Page 1 of 6 Draft Town of Dryden Planning Board May 23, 2013 Members Present: Joseph Lalley (Chair), Joseph Laquatra, Wendy Martin, Craig Anderson, David Weinstein, Tom Hatfield, Martin Hatch (excused) Staff Present: Mary Ann Sumner (Supervisor), Jane Nicholson (Town Planner) and Nick Goldsmith (Sustainability Planner) Town Board Liaison: Joe Solomon Community Guests: none Guests: Daniel Sullivan and Rick Bayo The meeting was called to order by Chairman Lalley at 7:02 PM. Review and approval of meetings from 28 March 2013. J. Laquatra asked that the attachment referred to on page four be attached to the meeting minutes. J. Laquatra moved to accept the minutes with suggested change. C. Anderson seconded the motion. D Weinstein and T Hatfield abstained. Minutes were approved. Sketch Plan Review for 980 Dryden Road, Daniel Sullivan Upon purchasing the property, Mr. Sullivan found out that it was zoned commercial and used to be a hockey store. He wants to turn the property back into a residence. Other than painting, nothing on the exterior is changing. Right now there is a gravel sidewalk and they would like to pave all of it but the Planning Department has suggested they wait for now, as the Town has plans to do some work in the area. Mr. Sullivan is going to add a fence enclosure for a dumpster/recycling bins. Mr. Sullivan had concerns about the zoning. D. Weinstein explained that the zoning is mixed commercial/residential zone which is perfectly fine for residential. J. Laquatra stated that Mr. Sullivan is basically turning a single family home into two apartments. Mr. Sullivan concurred saying that if a person was looking at the front of the house, the front half of the masonry side of it and the upstairs will create a 2 bedroom apartment and the back half and the addition will be an efficiency/studio apartment. D. Weinstein added that as a Varna resident, he is pleased with the improvements that Mr. Sullivan has made and his future plans. J. Laquatra asked about the future traffic circle and it’s relation to the property. D. Weinstein responded that Planning Department has indicated the traffic circle will fit in the space available. Resolution # 4, 980 Dryden Road Whereas, the Planning Board has reviewed the sketch plan for 980 Dryden Road; and Whereas, the Planning Board finds the project to be consistent with objectives of the Varna Hamlet master plan; Therefore, be it resolved that the Planning Board hereby waives the requirement for a Site Plan review. D. Weinstein moved to approve, T. Hatfield seconded, all members approved. Green Scenes Lawn and Garden – Rick Bayo Mr. Bayo has proposed moving part of his business to 2085 Dryden Road. He has already submitted a sketch plan which was reviewed and approved by the Planning Board at the January 2013 meeting. The new building will not have any retail space; it will primarily be used to store equipment and products. D. Weinstein asked about the salt storage and what preventative measures have been taken to prevent the salt from leeching into the ground/ water. Mr. Bayo responded that they have a layer of filter fabric, gravel and concrete, that is ultimately permeable. They will only use about 20 tons of salt/year. He also pointed out that the salt will be covered by a large hoop building but the pile of crusher run and pile of mulch will not be covered. J. Nicholson asked about a building or spot that looks like it might be covered along the edge of the property. A covered building is considered a structure which would have to be 25 feet from the property line. Mr. Bayo said they are moveable structures for temporary storage. They can be moved easily. D. Weinstein asked about lighting and the potential glare that may affect traffic or local residents. Mr. Bayo indicated that the lights will be motion sensor, aimed at the doors of the building and they are agreeable to adding cut sheets to the lights to cut down the area illuminated. The fence in the sketch will be around the dumpster in the back, out of view of general traffic. The shared driveway agreement with Steven’s Furniture is in place. The shrubs along the edge of the driveway in the drawing are not on their property. The shrubs are going to be added to fill the empty space created when the driveway splits. The Planning Department is not going to require a storm water plan but they will have to deal with that during the construction phase, via building permits. Signage will be on the building. They will not have facilities on the premises, they are simply going to use a port a john. (There is not an office and therefore they are not required to have a toilet) Their goal is to be in and out of the lot within 30 minutes. Most of their work is done on- site not at the storage center. J. Nicholson pointed out that we do not yet have the Engineering Report from TG M iller but the Board can still move forward with the Review. J. Lalley asked if Green Scene was required to do a full EAF (Environmental Assessment Form), in which case he feels a public hearing is necessary. D. Weinstein does not feel there will be any problems but he thinks it is better to let the public have a say. T. Hatfield argued that unless we can actually come up with a reason to think they might have issues, why not move forward? The construction season is not very long and he Page 3 of 6 Draft doesn’t think there is any reason to hold back. C. Anderson, J. Laquatra and W. Martin all agreed with T. Hatfield. Resolution # 5: 2085 Dryden Road public hearing Whereas, the Planning Board has reviewed the project entitled 2085 Dryden Road, Green Scene and Lawn and Garden; and Whereas, the Planning Board finds the project to be consistent with the zoning, design and comprehensive plan guidelines; Therefore, be it resolved that the Planning Board waives the requirement for a public hearing. T. Hatfield moved to approve and J. Laquatra seconded the resolution. All members voted aye. Resolution # 6: 2085 Dryden Road site plan Whereas, the Planning Board has reviewed the Site Plan submitted by Green Scene Lawn and Garden; and Whereas, the Planning Department has deemed the Site Plan complete; Therefore, let it be resolved that pending the approval of the engineering report and with the recommended changes, the Planning Board approves the Site Plan presented by Green Scene Lawn and Garden. J. Laquatra moved to approve and T. Hatfield seconded the resolution. All members voted aye. Fill Ordinance recommendation: D. Weinstein - The project on the corner of route 366 and Freese Road has been pulled. They had test borings done and have found that the fill is unstable. If someone wanted to build there, they will have to put in piers at least 30 feet deep (the depth to which the test borings were done).He believes that the Town needs an ordinance determining what kind and how much material can be used as fill, the frequency of compaction, and some kind of oversight by the Town. J. Laquatra pointed out that this is a teachable moment. The building project in Varna was a good idea and now it has to be changed or discarded. The owners are going to have a hard time selling the property due to the increased funds and work that will be involved. He also suggested that we need to pay attention to what materials are being used for fill, gravel could be easily compacted but clay and silt will need more compaction. Resolution # 7 Fill Ordinance Whereas, the Planning Board has reviewed a site plan for the corner of Freese Road and Route 366 in Varna; and Whereas, the project has been discontinued based on the test boring results; and Whereas, the Planning Board believes this situation could have been avoided with regulation; Therefore, the Planning Board requests that the Town Board consider adoption of a Fill Ordinance and volunteers to participate in the development of said ordinance. D. Weinstein moved to approve the motion, J. Laquatra seconded the motion. All approved. Comprehensive Plan – J. Nicholson and N. Goldsmith The Comprehensive Plan was adopted in 2005 which means that it is now 8 years old. It is recommended that Comprehensive plans be updated every 5-10 years. The buzz word is sustainability and trying to work sustainability into the guidelines. Using Greensboro, NC as an example: as they began to revisit their comprehensive plan, they came to the conclusion that they should look at all of their plans and how sustainability can be worked into each of them. They engaged in a 9 month study and then generated a report which provided suggestions for updating their plans. She believes that the question they ended up asking was a great way to assess the plans we currently have. The question was “did the documents support, hinder, block, or simply not address sustainability?” T. Hatfield asked what sustainability means? J. Nicholson - Sustainability is not going to mean the same thing to everybody in the community and N. Goldsmith was going to share what sustainability means to the Dryden community. J. Laquatra offered the traditional definition which states that sustainability is the use of resources by the current generation in such way so as to not limit the ability o f future generations to meet their own needs. J. Lalley added the Universities definition which includes “what is the economic bottom line, what is the social bottom line, what is the environmental bottom line?” T. Hatfield replied that he understands the meaning of the word but he is wondering what the definition is for the Planning Department. It is being used as a buzz word, so how are they defining it? Comparing us to Greensboro isn’t realistic when you consider the size of the two towns. J. Nicholson pointed out that it is not necessarily their definition but their process/approach that we want to use. N. Goldsmith – agreed that it is important to define sustainability, so we are talking about the same thing. Instead of the single bottom line, he see s a triple line of People, Planet, Profit. He suggests looking at all three pillars as one rather than separately to see how they work together. Referring to the attached packet. In the context of planning, if you look at the bottom paragraph (page 2), what could sustainability mean for Dryden. N. Goldsmith pointed out that it is already part of where we are going as a town. The Town of Varna Community Development Plan has aspects of sustainability in it already. Page 5 of 6 Draft The single bottom line, using just profit isn’t the best way to look at things. The first thing most people think of when you mention sustainability is the environment. Climate change is one of the things people think of despite the fact that it is happening no matter what we do. Reducing greenhouse gasses is beneficial though. Hydro-fracking can be looked at from an economics point of view. Dryden took a comprehensive approach to look at the broader implications more than just the economics. They used the triple bottom line. D. W einsten was looking at the list of things to be concerned about and, as he recalls from having been on the Planning Board when they first developed the Comprehensive Plan, most of those topics were covered. They didn’t explicitly talk about bicycle paths (multi-modal transportation) but they definitely covered economics, the quality of life and how it all integrates. J. Lalley likes to ask at the beginning “what’s the problem that we are trying to solve?” He then read from the Comprehensive Plan on page 32 which lists the goals and objectives. He believes the Planning Board should review the goals and objectives, determine whether they are still relevant and whether we need to add anything new. J. Nicholson feels that is a backward way to look at the revision. She th inks that if the Planning Board looks at the other plans first, they will come up with reasonable goals and objectives; the ideas will be generated by reviewing the associated documents. She is focusing on the methodology. J. Lalley believes we should start with what we have instead of looking at the other documents first. T. Hatfield feels we need to go back to what the community wants, do a survey and see what he public would like to see. J. Nicholson pointed out that we are not in the update stage, we need a plan to help direct where the Comprehensive Plan is headed. She would like the members to look at and analyze the 6 plans (the Dryden Zoning Code, Village of Dryden Zoning Code, Town of Dryden Design Guidelines, the Freeville Zoning Code, Varna Design Guidelines and the Town of Dryden Building Code) picking out the problem areas with each one. D. Weinstein asked how they were supposed to go about this? Should the members each take a plan or do we do what J. Lalley suggested and start with the goals and objectives. J. Nicholson strongly feels that starting with the plans already in place will give the Planning Board a direction, ideas for adjusting the goals and objectives, and by looking at them as a whole, they will fit together easier. The goals and objectives come out of the work, the evaluation of the plans. Supervisor Sumner asked if it isn’t possible to start applying the sustainability test to the list of objectives and start there? A short discussion then ensued regarding the method of sharing information and explaining what the Town Boards are doing. The language that is used may be causing a lot of back lash, words create triggers that lead to a shut down in communication. At the next meeting, the Planning Board will start looking at the goals and objectives of the Comprehensive Plan and how they relate to the sustainability goals of the Town. There being no further business, J. Laquatra made a motion adjourn. The motion was seconded by W. Martin and the meeting was adjourned at 8:30PM. Respectfully Submitted, Erin A. Bieber Deputy Town Clerk