News That Matters

Non-Conforming Lots and Zoning Codes
The public hearing is scheduled for May 13, 2009
Putnam Valley’s Town Board unanimously passed a Comprehensive Plan in December 2007. In a blatantly political move, the four opposition members of the Board decided that it would be in their best interests, not the Town’s, to delay passage of the accompanying Zoning Code. The code was completed and presented to the public in August of 2007. The writing of the code was a public and transparent process. Anyone could have contributed at any time. There were two attorneys on the committee, and two attorneys and two planners advising the committee. There was a member of the Planning Board on the committee.
Due to politics, the public hearing for this code was delayed until January 2008. At that public hearing, the only opposition expressed was from an engineer who is working on the HYH project in Roaring Brook.
Despite the support for the code, despite the legal difficulty in using a code that does not conform to the Comprehensive Plan, despite years and years of telling us that the code contains ambiguities and needs updating, despite taking public grant funds for the completion of the code, the Town Board refused to pass the code. Instead Mr. Tendy dismissed the Comprehensive Plan committee, and the Board members allowed that. Instead, the Zoning and Planning Boards have chosen to ignore the Comprehensive Plan in their decision making. Instead, Mr. Tendy decided that he wanted to have the code rewritten, with no planner, with no public input, with no Town Board input, with no minutes, with no attendance, with no accountability.
In Mr. Tendy’s own words, this state of affairs is a classic justification for a moratorium. He stated it quite well, in my opinion. (CMP is Comprehensive Master Plan.)
“If a town may drastically revise its CMP based on recent data obtained as a result of a thorough study, it makes no sense to continue to accept applications for development when the developer’s plans may turn out to be in conflict with the new CMP. A new CMP will result in many changes to the zoning and building codes of the town. Why permit building that ultimately might be in conflict with the rules and regulations that have been revised only a few months or perhaps weeks after the permit was issued? If, as the statute states, town government has the authority and responsibility to undertake comprehensive planning and to regulate land use for the purpose of protecting the public health, safety, and general welfare of its citizens it would make sense to impose a moratorium until all new codes and regulations are in effect. Developers, property owners, town planning and zoning boards would all be able to get on the same page vis-à-vis any and all new regulations and restrictions.”
Yet the Putnam Valley Town Board has done exactly what Mr. Tendy has said makes no sense. It should be remembered that two of the current Town Board members opposed a moratorium. Mr. Tendy and Ms. Keresey told us that we could go through this process, that we could complete the Comprehensive Plan, and the zoning code without a moratorium. Town Board member Wendy Whetsel told us that, in spite of the existing code protections against overly steep, overly long roads, she was supporting Mr. Santucci’s Marsh Hill Road because the new code would protect us in the future. Now she tells us that at some time in the future, we will be protected against the cost of new road construction, while she supports taking on new roads.
I would say that these three members of the Board are wrong, that no matter what they do at this point, they have fundamentally failed in serving the public; they have failed in protecting the public; they have failed in doing the job that they were elected to fulfill. Town Board members Keresey and Whetsel have had more than three years to do something. Mr. Tendy has had more than six years.
So how does this relate to non-conforming lots? Non-conforming lots are a major issue in the town’s zoning. When they pass a change in zoning, for example to 3 acre lot size, all existing smaller lots become non-conforming, and so, the way those lots are treated becomes vitally important to all of us.
Mr. Zutt has proposed four new laws on this topic. One repeals a piece of the existing code. One will make a prohibited use in an overlay district into a prohibited use in the base zoning. One would consider a non-conforming commercial lot to be residential. HUH?????
Non-conforming uses came up at the zoning board recently. The gas station on Bryant Pond Road is a prohibited use under our code. Now they are expanding. This is not a non-conforming use. One of Mr. Zutt’s four new laws would make it a non-conforming use. But, if the town code is left as it is, a gas station will be in the listed uses for a CC2 (community commercial 2) zone. It will be prohibited in the ground and surface water protection district. And this new law will now make this prohibition into a change in the base zoning. However, the base zoning will not change. Does this sound confusing?
Then, there was a house up on Tanglewylde Road. It burned down. The house is on .37 acres. This is not a large enough lot for septic or well, and would not be permitted in our code. However, the code allows a non-conforming structure to be rebuilt within two years. This is a non-conforming lot, not a non-conforming use. Rebuilding never was at issue and while it has been noted as relating to these four laws, I cannot see that this application would change under these new laws. The applicant has decided to expand the house to two stories. The expansion might be considered questionable. The zoning board is allowing it.
And then there is the cemetery’s non-conforming use. It is hard to say what effect these new proposed laws would make in this application. The newest law added says something about expansion of non-conforming uses in commercial zones. I was unable to obtain a copy. But the cemetery expansion could be stopped by the current law. If there is no will by the Boards or attorneys to uphold prohibitions that are in the law, then there won’t be any if we make the laws more circuitous.
Segmented and convoluted changes to the code make it more circuitous and byzantine.
When these zoning changes about non-conforming lots were presented by Town Board member Keresey, she wasn’t even able to explain what these changes were. Mr. Tendy and Mr. Yetter were rude when I attempted to find out what the changes meant.
These changes are not minor. Non-conforming use and non-conforming lots are not minor issues. This tinkering with provisions of the code as issues present themselves is piecemeal and destructive. It is also expensive. It costs the taxpayers money to go through this process. We should have had a moratorium while the politicos played this game.
The public hearing is on May 13. I doubt that the Board members will be listening.
DP

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