REVISIONS COMPLETE, ANCRAM CONDUCTS NEW HEARING ON COMPREHENSIVE PLAN

Mike McCagg

ccSCOOP News

06-18-09 - 12:44 a.m. - A public hearing on the revised Ancram Comprehensive Plan will take place Monday, June 22, at the Town Hall. The hearing will begin at 7 p.m.   A hearing last spring and a subsequent ten-day written comment period resulted in between 40 and 50 public comments on the plan, which Comprehensive Plan Committee Chairman Art Bassin said led to the committee’s decision to revise the plan and conduct a second public hearing. Initially the comprehensive plan, which was more than two years in the making, was slated to go before the Town Board in May.

Bassin said several changes were made to the plan to clarify certain statements made in the lengthy document and to revise other proposals. Among them were:

• Changing the tone of the document to state clearly that the town places equal value on agriculture and non-agriculture businesses;
• Reducing the protected area called for around vernal pools—wetlands that appear during rainy seasons or when snow melts—from 150 feet to 100 feet.
• Reducing the wetland area protection around all wetlands to 100 feet.

“People told us that if DEC [Department of Environmental Conservation] said 100 feet was enough, than 100 feet is enough, and we made a change to reflect that,” Bassin said.

Other changes, Bassin said, included “clarifications of language where people read one thing and we meant something else.”

As proposed, the Comprehensive Plan envisions an Ancram in 2030 that is the same as it is now. “The bottom line is the community wants Ancram in twenty years to look like what it does today,” Bassin said.

The plan’s vision statement makes the point clearly: “Ancram in 2030 will look and feel much like it does in 2008, maintaining its predominantly rural character. We have successfully met many of the challenges facing our community, and continue to address issues that impact us. Ancram focuses on establishing policies and programs to preserve the important elements which define its rural character, which include working agricultural landscapes, open space, a strong sense of community, well-maintained hamlets, low density housing in the countryside, small businesses serving our needs, and infrastructure appropriate for a small, rural town.”

The Comprehensive Plan Committee has taken a number of steps to gather public comment as it developed the plan. A series of public meetings were conducted, a written survey was mailed to residents, informational emails and newsletters were distributed, and a public hearing was conducted.

“It has and continues to be a very open process,” said Bassin.