Letter to the Editor: “Venom”? Residents are entitled to raise concerns about Chappaqua Crossing

December 31, 2010
by Rob Greenstein

On December 14, 2010, Summit/Greenfield’s legal team sent a seven-page letter to the New Castle Town Board that was filled with inflammatory language and threats.  Perhaps the developer feels entitled to a zoning change and are frustrated residents are questioning its claims as to how their project will benefit our community.  Perhaps they are frustrated that our Town Board is carefully and diligently following the law.  Perhaps the developer is frustrated that their client’s only chance to minimize their loss from a bad investment has met resistance.  Perhaps they are posturing, seeking to placate a disappointed client.  One thing is clear, however: By calling residents’ opposition to the developer’s project “venom” and depicting the town board as “hoping to placate a recalcitrant public,” the developer is not presenting a persuasive legal or public policy argument. 

Exclusionary Housing

Most notably, for example, in regard to the exclusionary policy, the letter states the “Town’s leadership appears to have joined with those who by their actions seek to preserve the Town’s exclusionary past”.  The reference to “the Town’s exclusionary past” is a direct and obvious reference to the case of Berenson vs. Town of New Castle 38 N.Y.2d 102 (1975).  Basically, 35 years ago New Castle’s zoning laws were found to be unconstitutional because they prohibited multifamily structures from being built.  The Court held that towns had to not only consider the local housing needs but also regional housing needs. Towns had to provide for a balanced and integrated community by including multifamily housing so that persons of more modest income can live in the community as well.

As a result of Berenson, New Castle’s zoning laws were amended to allow multi-family structures.  As their legal team should know, Berenson was revisited by the Courts eight years later in Blitz v. New Castle, 94 A.D.2d 92 (2d Dept. 1983).  New Castle’s zoning ordinances were examined applying the test developed in Berenson and found to be satisfactory.  The Court found that regional multi-family housing was taken into consideration when the new zoning was passed and there was no exclusionary effect on lower priced housing.

As far as the application of the Berenson to this project, a Court will inquire whether there’s a local or regional need for condominiums and townhouses priced between $700,000 and $1 million, which is the price representatives for the developer have stated on the record.  And a Court will inquire whether there was any discriminatory intent to exclude multi-family units in this price category.

There is clearly no local need for condominiums and townhouses priced between $700,000 - $1 million.  As stated in a letter in NCNOW titled “Nearing the decision point on Chappaqua Crossing,”  Planning board chair Susan Carpenter noted, “I haven’t seen an analysis of the current need for most of the housing that’s proposed [in the Chappaqua Crossing plan].”  “I think you’re right,” said Sheila Crespi.  “Basically, we’re talking about very expensive condos, priced between $700,000 and $1 million, so we’re not providing a housing category that differs from what’s [in our town already].”

In short, construction of residences in the $700,000 to 1 million price range does not fit any unmet need in a community where the average house price is $866K and where there are at least 200 houses up for sale. 

There is also clearly no regional need for these market rate condominiums and townhouses priced between $700,000 - $1 million.  The Houlihan Lawrence website alone has almost one thousand listings in Westchester County priced between $700,000 - $1 million.

The developer’s market rate units will therefore do nothing to advance Berensons’s goal of providing for a balanced and integrated community so persons of modest income can live in the community.  These market rate units will not help create new housing opportunities, as they are priced well above what would be affordable to most fixed income and working class buyers.

Berenson also says that certain types of new construction can be limited (e.g., condos) where such units already exist and the town now has many such units – over 600 of New Castle’s 5500 households are condominiums.

With no local or regional need, and no discriminatory purpose to exclude the market rate units in this price category, Berenson is not applicable.

Affordable Housing

At another point in the letter, the legal team state “a community with one of the highest average household incomes in the nation that has managed to build three—three!—units of affordable housing since 2000, despite its role in the 1975 Berenson decision”.  But, again, Berenson was a New York State decision that dealt with mutli-family developments and exclusionary zoning laws.  The need for affordable housing stems from a settlement last year with Westchester County and the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development, a Federal agency.  This Westchester Fair Housing Settlement mandated the creation of 750 fair and affordable housing units in 31 Westchester communities, including New Castle, by 2015.  The 31 communities were chosen due to their low percentages of African American and Hispanic households, not because of any Berenson-type exclusionary housing practices. New Castle would be theoretically responsible to create 25 such units (750 units divided by 31 municipalities).

Summit Greenfield has offered to build 20 such affordable units.  The fact is that SG is not offering the 20 affordable units out of the goodness of their hearts.  They are hoping for the support of Westchester County, and possibly the Federal Government, for their project.  Ten of millions of dollars of HUD money are at stake with these settlement.  Although New Castle itself doesn’t receive HUD funds, the County does.  The county can’t afford to lose HUD monies and will put will put what pressure it can on the municipalities to comply.

The SG affordables, however,  don’t comply with multifamily planned development requirements. They are not located near shopping, community facilities and public transportation.  They are in an office park two miles from downtown, unconnected by sidewalks.  The bigger problem, however, is that their 20 affordable housing units are being bundled with a dense residential development (179 more units, 60 fee simple townhouses, 119 condos).  And the biggest problem is that the town board has no power to ensure when, or even if, these affordable units will be built.

And we have some real affordable alternatives here, such as the Hunts Lane property.  The Hunts Lane development proposal is responsive to the requirements, intentions and spirit of the Westchester Fair Housing Settlement.  The units are near shopping, community facilities and public transportation such as buses, taxis and the Metro-North train station. Unlike Summit Greenfield, the Hunts Lane developer specializes in the development and management of high-quality, affordable housing communities. Unlike Summit Greenfield’s proposal, these affordable units don’t come bundled with a dense residential development. Unlike Summit Greenfield’s proposal, these units don’t come at the expense of losing our last large commercially zoned property and they don’t risk bankrupting our school system by the addition of 199 market-rate condos (only 60 of the proposed units are fee-simple). The Hunts Lane project will provide the mandated affordable housing units we need. We don’t need Summit Greenfield’s non-compliant affordable housing units and market-rate, high-end condos.

“Stung by the venom of project opponents and hoping to placate a recalcitrant public”?

The letter by Summit Greenfield’s lawyers is very inflammatory when it states that Town Board members have been stung by the venom of project opponents and refers to a Town Board hoping to placate a recalcitrant public.

Accordingly to Merriam-Webster on-line dictionary, the Definition of RECALCITRANT (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/recalcitrant)

1 obstinately defiant of authority or restraint

2 a : difficult to manage or operate

  b : not responsive to treatment

  c : resistant

A cornerstone of the SEQR process is to encourage public participation.  It does not guarantee that the developer will only hear agreeable things said about his project. Residents of New Castle are exercising an important right.  As someone who has attended many of the public meetings on this application, I have seen that public comment has been highly informed and sophisticated, as many residents have expertise in real estate and planning issues.  The town board, its consultants and the residents of New Castle have identified many negative impacts of the proposal:

• An urban use in a non-urban area including two five-story apartment buildings in the heart of our community

• A project that will result in a further reduction in our miniscule commercial tax base

• A project will result in negative tax revenue for the Town and school district.

• A project with serious risks to the Chappaqua Central School District

• A project that doesn’t meet the criteria for creating a multi-family planned development (MFPD) zone.

• A project that doesn’t meet the criteria for affordable housing and no guarantee that the affordable units will ever be built.

• A project which is not consistent with the surrounding density, open space, architecture and rural atmosphere of our neighborhoods as set forth in the Town Development Plan

• A project with a negative impact on traffic & emergency response time in an area that already has traffic congestion

• A project with a negative impact on home values with increase in housing stock during a time when excess inventory already exists

• A project with a deficient parking management plan

• A project that that wants a sewer district extension while Random Farms, Riverwoods and Yeshiva.have been waiting for sewer access for years

We are not being defiant or venomous.  We live here, not the developers, and these are legitimate concerns.  We are entitled to raise these concerns, and offending us will not serve anyone’s interests.

“Glacial pace”?

The letter states “there are also real damages that have been sustained by our client as a result of the glacial pace at which the Town Board has moved in reviewing this Project”.

SummitGreenfield is well aware that a zone change application triggers the SEQRA process.  As this web site states, New York’s State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQR) requires all state and local government agencies to consider environmental impacts equally with social and economic factors during discretionary decision-making.  SEQR requires the agencies to balance the environmental impacts with social and economic factors when deciding to approve or undertake an “Action”.  http://www.dec.ny.gov/permits/6208.html  They are well aware that this process requires completion of an exhaustive environmental review process before any action can be taken on the zoning change petition, and it takes time.

According to the town code, the New Castle town board was required to ask New Castle’s planning board for input on the proposed land use change.  Many of these concerns raised by the planning board were noted in the Town Board’s resolution, and it was that resolution that triggered the nasty letter from the developer. 

The Town Board is now in the final process of assembling the information it requires.  It will then announce that it considers the information to be complete, issue its FEIS and then, and only then, render a decision on the proposed zoning request.

Whether you ultimately agree with the Town Board’s decision or not, one thing is crystal clear, our Town Board has handled this process both diligently and professionally as they attend to the requirements of SEQR, adhere to the town code and all legal mandates in carrying out their duties.

It is ironic that the legal team is talking tough with us.  We need to be the ones getting tough.  They are asking us to change the zoning for them and accept negative environmental, social & economic impacts so they can maximize their return on investment.  It is our community that will be forced to live with this project long after the developer has cashed out, and moved onto their next target acquisition.  They are proposing the biggest development in the history of our town, yet they are complaining that our community and its board are resisting an unjustifiable and harmful project.  They are proposing the biggest development in the history of our town, yet they are complaining that the Town Board is carefully and diligently following the law.

The developer is not entitled to the massive residential rezoning it seeks for Chappaqua Crossing.  The town does not need another condominium development, let alone one that only the affluent can afford and that risks breaking the back of our school district and community infrastructure. Enough is enough.  The Town Board should encourage further commercial development at Chappaqua Crossing and say No to residential rezoning.
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To view NCNOW’s archived articles and letters—in chronological order, newest to oldest—on Chappaqua Crossing and Summit Greenfield’s application for a zoning change, click HERE.