Woodstone withdraws application

Developer backs out of Toronto project

By CHRIS CONROY

BETHEL — Millions of dollars in new tax ratables may have been delayed Tuesday amid a dispute over state and local planning review.

In February, Woodstone Lakes Development presented a plan to the Town of Bethel Planning Board detailing a golf course project and the planning board designated itself as lead agency for the project.

At the April 10 meeting, the board announced that Woodstone Lakes had withdrawn the project proposal.

According to a letter from Woodstone Lakes read at the meeting by planning board chair Herman Bressler, the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) had taken issue with the Bethel planning board being designated lead agency. This conflict was presented as one reason for the withdrawal of the proposal.

According to Woodstone Development's Steve Dubrovsky, the application was withdrawn in order to review and rework the proposal, making it better than it already is. "We feel we can do better," he said.

Bressler has his own opinions about why the DEC would want to make an issue about the lead agency in the project. “I think the DEC is going to give [Dubrovsky] so much trouble that he’ll be pressured to sell the property to them…They [the DEC] have always wanted that land.”

Woodstone Lakes is one of several development companies operated by Steve Dubrovsky, a Bethel resident and renowned custom home builder. All share the Woodstone name.

The proposed golf course was to be placed on a parcel of land that covers about 5000 acres that spans the towns of Bethel, Lumberland and Highland. Also located in those 5000 acres are planned housing developments, which will not be effected by withdrawn proposal. When designated as lead agency, the planning board was required to send out notices to the other municipalities and organizations involved requesting approval of the status. At the March 13 meeting where no quorum was present, and no official action could be taken, it was announced that the majority of the support was positive, that The Town of Lumberland had not responded and that the DEC had challenged the decision, suggesting that it should be the lead agency in the project.

Subsequently, correspondence from the Town of Lumberland Planning Board, read at the April meeting, expressed concern that it had not been included in two meetings, one on March 15 and another on March 19, where the lead agency status was discussed.

“There were no such meetings,” Bressler stated during a discussion of the letter. The only time the subject was discussed, he said, was at the regular planning board meeting. “Anyone is welcome to come [to the regular meetings],” he said.

“We have still not received a [direct] response from the letter [regarding lead agency approval] we sent to Lumberland,” Bressler said.

At presstime, DEC officials could not be reached for comment.

The board stated that this would have no effect on other Woodstone-related developments already underway.