Hancock rejects Bonacic’s Greenway

Fremont likely to follow suit

By CHARLIE BUTERBAUGH

HANCOCK, NY — If the Town of Fremont votes en rapport with the Town of Hancock against Senator John Bonacic’s Delaware River Greenway initiative, the self-described “sister towns” will form their second alliance in recent history opposing regional coordination.

The Hancock Town Board drew a line between itself and southerly towns bordering the Upper Delaware River on June 2, taking exception to Bonacic’s proposal, which has been endorsed over the past month by five out of the eight river municipalities selected for inclusion in the greenway.

Hancock and Fremont united against the Upper Delaware Scenic Byway in 2001, citing a concern about weakening home rule and a lack of documentation about the byway’s potential to encroach on bluestone and timber industry stability and growth, Hancock Supervisor Sam Rowe said.

And the reasoning behind Hancock’s June 2 decision to exclude itself from Bonacic’s Delaware River Greenway proposal is the same.

“I understand that the Town of Fremont opposes the resolution, and I’m sure we agree,” Rowe said at the meeting.

However, when board members voted on the motion disfavoring the proposal, Rowe showed that he does not share the opinion of his councilmen.

“The greenway might not be a good fit now, but I’d like to see it help towns downriver. It might be beneficial in the future, and Hancock might want to opt in,” Rowe said. The motion passed with a four-to-one vote. Fremont is expected to vote on a similar motion on June 9.

Fremont Supervisor Jim Greier said not one of his councilmen voiced support of the greenway at the board’s May meeting.

“Most of the board is very conservative. At this point, when all governments are in dire financial straights, it’s not the time to start another layer of government,” Greier said.

The model resolution drafted by Bonacic’s office and passed by the Towns of Deerpark, Lumberland, Highland, Cochecton and Delaware contains clauses that preclude a future greenway board from executing power of eminent domain, seeking lead agency on any land use decisions and purchasing private property, except in cases where the written consent of a seller is provided.

Bonacic sent a letter in February introducing his idea to selected Upper Delaware towns, writing that the greenway would avail participating towns of grant programs similar to those available to members of the Hudson River Valley Greenway. The Hudson River designation serves as a funding conduit for community planning, water access enhancement, historic landscape preservation, and it provides “legal preference in the state’s grant ranking system for infrastructure, land acquisition, or park assistance projects,” Bonacic wrote.

But Greier said the bluestone industry stands to lose too much. And Long Eddy resident Noel van Swol, who has expressed opposition to the greenway in letters to The River Reporter editors, said the logging industry would be equally threatened.

Regional bluestone quarries earn some $60 million per year, according to a position statement published by the New York State Bluestone Association in 1999. Five years later, association president Harry Triebe Sr. said $60 million is a conservative estimate.

The association was founded in 1999 in Deposit, NY to gather information and help bluestone businesses understand regulations imposed on exploratory mining by the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). It is meant to help businesses work with the DEC, Triebe said.

“No one from the DEC or the scenic byway could give us a guarantee that things wouldn’t change. No one could guarantee that the byway would not negatively effect the bluestone industry,” he said.

“And we’re finding the same to be the case with the greenway proposal.”

One major concern with both projects is that new bylaws might allow a larger governmental body to step in and criticize a quarry for visual pollution, Triebe said.

“It’s a possibility that the bluestone or timber industry could be impacted [by the scenic byway] in the future. Right now, it’s too early to tell,” Upper Delaware Council Executive Director William Douglass said.

The Towns of Hancock and Fremont are still not members of the Upper Delaware Scenic Byway, though the Village of Hancock has joined.

Douglass said that while a similar scenic byway project in the Hudson River Valley has assumed an agenda of environmental protection, the purpose of the Upper Delaware designation was to promote economic development.

“I applaud the communities of the river corridor for the serious consideration they have given the greenway initiative, and will soon be introducing legislation to move the greenway proposal forward,” Bonacic told TRR last week.