The Town of Tuxedo Planning Board met on August 14, 2007

James Latini presented site plans FOR Duck Cedar Plaza to the board for preliminary approval. As previously reported, Mr. Latini hopes to change the old Duck Cedar Inn into a plaza, which will contain both a pre-school daycare center as well as a small factory for his sheet metal business. In addition, Mr. Latini hopes to include 2 or 3 smaller businesses, which will be retail in nature.

The plans showed the daycare center located on the south side of the building, with the retail businesses on the north and the factory in the rear. The front of the building will be given an entirely new façade. The main entrances and exits to the parking lot we will be reconstructed, with the main entrance being moved north from where it is now, so that the retail and factory traffic will not interfere with the daycare.

The presentation was followed by a public hearing.Although, there were no questions raised by the public, the Board voted to continue the public hearing at next month’s Planning Board meeting on September 11, 2007, at which point they expect to make a resolution.

The public hearing for Northridge, the first phase of Tuxedo Reserve, was continued. Marianne Carroll of Sloatsburg made an impassioned statement, which raised several important issues, specifically construction traffic on both Park Avenue and 199 Orange Turnpike as well as run-off and other drainage issues with the site. She had several photos as part of her presentation, which showed the area in various stages of flooding over the last year and asked what plans were in place for potential flash flooding at the Northridge site before the drainage system has been installed.

Peter Regna of Tuxedo Park inquired about the water source and emergency water source for the project. He stated that since Tuxedo Reserve had originally hoped to use the Tuxedo Lake as their emergency water source and had been denied this privilege, he wanted to know if a new source had been located and, if procuring such a source was a requirement for forward movement on the project in general. Representatives from Tuxedo Reserve explained to Mr. Regna that all the water for the development will be coming from 5 onsite wells, with the 5th well being reserved for emergencies. Mr. Regna then inquired about the source of water to these wells and wondered if the ground water supply was not somehow connected to the Tuxedo Lake. He was assured that the wells had all been tested and that there was no connection. He was then referred to a document called Tuxedo Reserve Aquifer Testing. Questions were raised about the timing of the well testing and it was suggested that because this testing had been done in the spring, when water levels were naturally high, that the results might not be indicative of the rest of the year.

Ulrich Pendl of Tuxedo Park asked the Board how far they were from granting Tuxedo Reserve approval and was told that they are far from granting approval at this time. The public hearing on Northridge will be continued at the September 11 Planning Board meeting.

Following the public hearing the board voted to pass resolutions granting Tuxedo Reserve the lot-line change they had requested at the July meeting as well as the bulk land transfer revision also requested at that time.

 

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