Planning Board, 4-25-2016

The applicant is requesting a site plan modification allowing for a change in a portion of the curbing to facilitate trucks. The board had no issue with the request and will prepare a resolution for a vote at the next meeting.

After the applicant made some changes to the sign plan pursuant to ABACA requests, the board approved the plan.

A representative of Signs Ink was before the board to discuss a Master Sign Plan for the site. The applicant will have to go ABACA for plan review, including the individual store signs and a proposed monument sign. 

Mr. Tegeder noted that the Master Plan requirement, originally intended for commercial complexes such as the Staples Shopping Center, should probably be tweaked to eliminate any possible confusion that a Master Plan was needed for a smaller shopping area such as the PEG Realty site.

Explaining that he felt the $250,000 bond was a burden on small developers (in this case the owner of the A&S Pork Store), Supervisor Grace told the board he felt  that performance bonds should  be  only if site improvements were external to the site, such as sidewalks.  He said the town would never “call” the bond if the property owner didn’t finish work that just involved the owner’s site. Members of the Planning Board and Planning Director Tegeder explained, however, that the bond requirement was needed to assure that stormwater and utility connections done on site but which involve external factors, were satisfactorily completed.  They also raised the issue of what might happen if a building was started but never completed. It was agreed that in the future, the amount of the bond requirement, that is determined by the town engineer and is a percentage of overall site development costs, will be broken down into those improvements that involve town concerns and those that don’t.

During the regular session, the applicant needs to make a change (steeper) in the grade of the roadway connecting his parking lot with that of the adjacent bowling alley.  This is necessary because of an error in the original survey.  The drainage remains the same, there will be no change in the number of parking spaces and the area is curbed which will contain cars.  The Planning Board approved this change.

During the work session portion of the meeting, there was discussion of the performance bond situation for this project.  The Planning Board required a performance bond, the applicant acquired the funds and received his permit to install his building’s foundations while the weather still permitted.  However, the Town Board refused his check for the bond.  This was the first the applicant knew of this situation. The bond was for stormwater and parking lot work on private property, but which could impact public spaces if done incorrectly. Therefore the Planning Board requires a bond for protection, which is now lacking in this case because the Town Board would not accept the bond.  The Planning Board will keep the bonding requirement in its approval resolution, and Mr. Tegeder will draft a letter to the Town Board.

(See Planning Board, 11-24-2014.)

In an item not on the agenda, the board was given a resolution to accept a check for $231,097 as a performance bond for site work for the Valley Commons commercial development on Hill Boulevard.

Supervisor Grace and Councilman Murphy took strong exception to the proposed resolution  on the grounds that it was unfair to keep and tie up someone’s money for infrastructure improvements that were on the applicant’s property and would not be turned over to the town.  Supervisor Grace explained the rational for performance bonds and said he would propose a resolution at the next board meeting to change the Planning Board’s policy requirement for performance  bonds for commercial projects.

Councilwoman-elect Siegel, who had attended Monday’s Planning Board meeting when the issue was discussed, tried to explain the background that led up to the receipt of the check but the supervisor and councilman were not interested in what had transpired.

The board approved a one year extension on the approval of an 11,600 SF commercial building