Letters to the Editor September 29

Posted 8/21/12

Save our town: follow our existing laws

Dear neighbors, the Town of Tusten is going through growing pains. Zoning laws are being reviewed and rewritten by very dedicated people of this township. …

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Letters to the Editor September 29

Posted

Save our town: follow our existing laws

Dear neighbors, the Town of Tusten is going through growing pains. Zoning laws are being reviewed and rewritten by very dedicated people of this township. I ask, are zoning laws protecting our neighborhoods now?

This past year I spent most of my time reading town zoning laws, trying to understand why six of the seven planning board members would dismiss so many laws (abandonment, density, lot conforming to name a few) that shape this beautiful area in considering the proposed development on Route 25. Do they realize what they have done?

If you give special treatment to a project that enters our town, the next developers are going to say, “You gave it to him, why not to me?” It’s setting a precedent, a standard for the way this town follows the laws. If a 10-family commercial apartment complex is allowed on a single-family plot in a R1 Rural Residential District, will the planning board allow many more special-use, multiple-family apartment complexes to be created on single-family plots?

It’s a question of whether it would even be possible to prevent this from happening in the future if it’s done now. It was very unsettling when the planning board chairman uttered the phrase “when we pass this” in the middle of a public hearing. The idea that a “single” multiple-family dwelling does not have to follow the multiple family zoning laws is a word game to hide the incredible number of people per acre involved. This can be seen as a direct violation of our zoning law!

It is our hope that the laws we have right now will be used to protect our rural community of Tusten/Nar rowsburg. Permits have been issued; it is now time to go to the Zoning Board of Appeals. If you would like to read up on this, please visit www.tinyurl.com/TheNarrowsburgproblem.

To handle rising legal costs we also started a Go Fund Me at https://www.gofundme.com/savenarrowsburg.

Please come to support us at the ZBA meetings this October 3 and November 7, and help save our town.

Wanda Gangel

Narrowsburg, NY

In support of Pramilla Malick

I’ve known Pramilla Malick for four years through our work to protect the environment, both in her hometown and nationwide. Pramilla always shows us, actually leads us, in how to push harder and further toward our goals of protecting our families and our environment. As a mother of four, Pramilla knows what it’s like to fear for her children’s health and safety. She’s not afraid to stand up to long-established, self-serving interests. She never stops seeking solutions.

Pramilla is exactly the kind of person we need representing us in Albany. Pramilla has faced down powerful corporations and entrenched corruption. She’ll stand up for you and won’t give up. Please vote for Pramilla Malick for New York State Senate, District 42, on November 8.

Linda Reik

Livingston Manor, NY

No Trump

I’m not going to vote for someone who has spent a lifetime cheating workers, cheating contractors, cheating small businessmen.

Bruce Ferguson

Callicoon Center, NY

Putting things in perspective

As the TRR proves once again in last week’s editorial, a great way to promote a shaky thesis is neglecting to put it into perspective.

Logically, if a singular 22,000 hp gas compressor station on 1/4 of an acre in the middle of the woods causes illness, bloody noses, mental health ramifications and other negative impacts, why aren’t urbanites keeling over in great numbers when surrounded by two million cars, buses, airplanes, electrical transfer stations and gas-powered plants producing millions of tons of off-gassing on a 24-hour basis, seven days a week? Or why is Luxembourg the sought-after homestead of the most sophisticated families in the world when it’s choked with traffic, has an off-gassing nuclear plant within earshot, has an airport and related jet engines with horsepower in the tens of thousands? You can’t make hysterical claims about health impacts and then refuse to explain why others exposed to higher levels of pollutants don’t die younger or get sick more often.

And the real estate value argument is weak as well. Sure, the property values might decline, but they might decline if a shopping mall, housing development, mobile home, newspaper publishers or trucking warehouse were built across the street as well. They could very well decline if an ugly house is built within eyeshot.

And as far as mental health suffering, I think you can give editorials such at last week’s TRR as much credit for negative mental health impacts as any real impact from a compressor station in middle of the woods. It’s all fine and dandy to be opposed to fossil fuel infrastructure while depending on it for life’s finer offerings, but getting the applause from your base isn’t the same as working to help a community understand the real impacts of this economic development project.

Charles Petersheim

Eldred, NY

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