Draft Comprehensive Plan Meets the Public (by Maya Schubert/Kingston Wire)
(PLEASE SUPPORT LOCALLY SOURCED AND OWNED NEWS SOURCES BY SUBSCRIBING TO KINGSTON WIRE! About 100 or so Hurley citizens crowded into town hall Tuesday evening
to take in and comment on an information session on the latest update
to the town’s draft comprehensive plan. The presentation made by town
planner Bonnie Franson was followed by a public comment period in
which some 25 residents asked questions and offer opinions on the
draft.
The draft, prepared by environmental and land-use engineering firm
Nelson, Pope, and Voorhis, where Franson is a partner, was released to
the public in mid-April. A comprehensive plan is a document that
collects information about a municipality, details goals and suggests
improvements.
“Some of those recommendations may be immediate needs, immediate
actions, others may take some time to implement, and some are
continuing just ongoing implementation measures,” said Franson. “The
idea is to get input from the entire community to determine what
direction town-wide citizens want for the evolution of the town — how
it wants it to be directed. And, very importantly, it is an
opportunity to attract investment and support future funding
opportunities.”
Franson said land-use regulations and zoning cannot be changed unless
the changes align with a comprehensive plan. Therefore, she said, some
of the improvements suggested in the draft could not be made
otherwise. Both Franson and Town Supervisor Melinda McKnight noted
that the comprehensive plan does not require the changes, as it is not
law in itself, but more a vision statement upon which laws are based.
“It's not about thou shalt adopt this new law, new zoning, tomorrow,”
Franson said. “It's to provide the context to then be able to evaluate
the zoning changes as we go through another process.”
The town has stated that the suggestions in the draft plan reflect
feedback from an online survey and a workshop meeting conducted last
year. The online survey, Franson said, received about 200 responses;
the workshop meeting had about 70 attendees. The respondents named
Hurley’s rural, small-town character as its most valued attribute and
expressed concerns about development demands and housing prices.
Franson’s presentation examined the past, present and future of Hurley
based on statistics and public input and mostly addressed proposed
development provisions within the draft.
In 2020, Hurley’s census population was just over 6,100, with a median
age of approximately 50 years old. Franson noted that single-family
residences, as opposed to multi-family and accessory dwellings,
currently encompass approximately 73 percent of the town’s land use
and 91.7 percent of its residential land use. She also noted that
responses from the survey and workshop meeting indicate that Hurley
citizens prefer single-family residence developments to multi-family
dwelling proposals.
However, the comprehensive draft includes provisions for more
accessory dwelling units, housing for the elderly and multi-family
housing developments. The draft considers speeding up the application
process for accessory dwelling units by sidestepping the town planning
board and putting proposals immediately in front of the town board.
The draft suggests adding bonuses for development projects that
promote affordable, senior, or a “mix of housing options.”
Respondents to the survey and workshop meeting named a bakery or
specialty food shop as the most coveted economic development and a
farmers’ market as the best tourism use. The draft proposes two
floating zones that would allow non-residential developments related
to industry or tourism uses. In addition, it proposes new
nonresidential zones to cover existing large manufacturing areas in
residential zones, making it easier for the manufacturing already
there to expand.
The draft also suggests adding sidewalks in parts of the town to
protect schoolchildren and pedestrians, and additional road signage to
define town borders and limits more clearly.
Franson’s presentation was met with a range of responses from the
public. Former town supervisor John Perry was the first to speak and
questioned the locations of the provisions for housing and commercial
developments. “We don't know where they're going to happen,” he said.
Franson replied that after the comprehensive plan is adopted a map
will be developed to show possible development areas, but the draft
itself is vague because it needs some “wiggle-room,” as it’s based off
of current land uses and districts.
The majority of the draft’s suggestions, from streamlining the
accessory housing application process to adding extra road signage,
met both favor and opposition within the crowd. One resident claimed
that accessory dwellings, though temporary in nature, would remain
through generations and crowd up residential land.
Not all agreed. “As I age, I envision having an accessory dwelling on
my property near my garden, near my husband's woodshop, where I can
stay in place with his family,” countered another resident.
Even the notion of adding sidewalks caused contention, with some
citizens advocating for safer walking routes and others insisting that
sidewalks would compromise the town’s rural feel.
“We know where we can walk and we can't walk,” said one resident. “We
don't need sidewalks. We're all used to getting in our cars to go down
the road to grab a quart of milk. I think we're trying to make it more
like a city, and less like the country.”
Residents also brought up issues from karst formations under houses
bordering Marbletown, to concerns about a proposal in the Town of
Woodstock to build another gas station at the corner of Basin Road and
Route 28, that were not included in the draft.
A number of residents expressed concerns that the draft only voiced a
tiny portion of public opinion, as the 270 responses garnered in the
survey and workshop meeting comes to less than 5 percent of Hurley’s
population. At the mid-point of the meeting, one resident’s statement
that the draft’s reflection of public opinion was a “failure” was
drowned out by a chorus of attendants crying, “It’s a draft!”
“The draft, the work product that the planners are presenting will be
adjusted, considering all of the feedback we're getting,” said
Supervisor McKnight. “This is not a fait accompli. This is not the
plan that we're going to adopt. This is for your consideration.”
According to McKnight, the town board and the town planners will take
the comments into consideration and create a new draft within the next
few weeks before scheduling another public hearing.
In Other Hurley News:
Town Clerk Judy Mayhon Passes
Longtime Hurley Town Clerk Judy Mayhon died last Friday, June 2, after
an illness.
Mayhon was first elected town clerk in 2007 and was re-elected every
two years after that through 2021. She previously worked as a deputy
town clerk.
"I am so sorry to learn of Judy's passing," Hurley Town Supervisor
Melinda McKnight said in a statement. "Throughout her years in public
service, she served the town and its residents with dedication. I, the
Town Board and the staff send her family our deepest condolences."
Appointed to take over the town clerk post was Deputy Town Clerk Annie
Reed, who will finish the rest of Mayhon’s term, which ends Dec. 31,
2023. Reed joined the town hall staff in 2022 as executive assistant
to Supervisor McKnight and became a deputy town clerk later in the
year. She served in the town clerk’s capacity during Mayhon’s illness.
Arrangements for Mayhon’s funeral are by the George J. Moylan Funeral
Home Inc., 2053 Route 32, Rosendale. For complete obituary
information, click here:
https://www.gjmoylanfuneralhome.com/obituary/judy-mayhon
Free N95 Masks at Town Hall
N95 face masks, supplied by Ulster County, are available for free at
the Hurley Town Hall, 10 Wamsley Place, as the region deals with air
quality problems caused by smoke from Canadian wildfires.
The masks can be picked up during the Town Hall's weekday operating
hours, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.