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Indian Brook LLC Subdivision Approval Sets a Bad Precedent
Editor,
As an interested party and adjoining land owner, I have followed the proposed subdivision by Indian Brook LLC over the past two years. I have spoken before the Wetlands Committee and the Planning Board. The road for the parcel was originally approved for one home on the entire 25 acres. It was only after the road was built, that the subdivision came before the planning board. If the proposed subdivision came before the planning board before the original house was built, the road as it is built would not have been approved. The entire site would have been analyzed for steep slope and wetlands issues, not only the part of the site leading up to the original house. The subdivision as it was approved would probably not have been approved.
Over the past two years, I received only one notice of a Planning Board meeting to discuss the planned subdivision. It was not for the meeting at which the final decision was made. In a single meeting, whose agenda was not publicized, the long term future of the parcel was decided.
There has been much publicity surrounding the large (Morris) and more prominent (Capuchin) parcels, but there are numerous undeveloped parcels all around Philipstown that we take for granted. The open space group of Philipstown 2020 estimated that 12,000 acres are available for development, though half of that acreage has either wetlands or steep slope issues. Approval of this subdivision sets a bad precedent about the enforcement of the steep slope and wetlands regulations and the way the Planning Board transacts business.
If the future of Philipstown is important to you, I encourage you to write to Bill Mazzuca and George Cleantis, the Chairman of the Planning Board, or e-mail them at townclerk@philipstown.com , urging them to 1) make the Planning Board process more public with the full planning board agenda and identification of the street location of the proposed subdivision, not just the block and lot, which is unfamiliar to most residents and 2) encourage enforcement of the steep slope and wetlands regulations.
Otherwise, Philipstown as we know it, could cease to exist in our lifetime.
Howard Kaplowitz
Garrison
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