This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Community Corner

FASNY: CLEAR CUT DECISION

Dear Ms. Smayda,    
      It is difficult to understand why at this point you persist in supporting the idea that educational facilities are due special consideration under R1-30 single family residential zoning district. This is legal sophistry despite what you have indicated that you have been told by your colleagues on the Common Council.  This is nonsense. You are being misled.                
      FASNY has NO special right to a special permit.  Mayor Roach (and I believe you agreed with a head nod at the League of Women Voters Forum a few weeks ago) stated that FASNY has a right to apply for a special permit. The right to apply is not that special; almost any institution or landowner can apply for a special permit and get a fair hearing.
      Your job is not to play lawyer but to study the case carefully that is being presented by FASNY.  It would be wise to study what FASNY presents as well as the various reports by experts. Your job is not to get in bed with the developer (FASNY) to find a way to make their project work.
       The Council has been hoodwinked into believing they must consent to a special permit because FASNY is an educational institution. This is not true and is in direct conflict with the spirit of the law.
       Suppose FASNY was a small culturally unpopular institution imposing little traffic and safety issues mostly serving a local community. Suppose further that the Common Council denied their request for a special permit primarily because Council felt that while there were no real substantive issues but just that the community did not like FASNY.
       Here the spirit of the law comes into play where a school has presumptive benefits to the community. The decision by Council may be appealed and a court may be justified in overturning the Council’s decision.  Can you see the difference between this situation and FASNY’s invasion of Gedney Farms?
        You can now relax and not worry all about whether it is your responsibility or Council’s to find a way to paper over all the unmitigated problems and costs associated with FASNY’s proposed location.You can assess the facts and make a clear cut decision.  
         You do not have to deal with aspirational, hypothetical mitigation efforts proposed even after your own experts tell you that FASNY’s plans are full of holes and misleading.    
          This is not about people who speak funny or like to eat bread with low gluten levels. With FASNY it is not political or cultural animus.   It is traffic, safety and shifting negative externalities and costs to the community.  It is your duty to assess FASNY’s proposal, not to engage in legal legerdemain to shoe-horn a regional educational enterprise and campus into a quiet residential neighborhood.
         You must vote NO to issuing FASNY a special permit.  You must find based on the facts (real facts not made up facts or hypothetical mitigation policies) that there are substantial environmental, traffic, safety and other issues that cannot be realistically mitigated and therefore the project should not go forward.  Council has bent over backwards giving FASNY every opportunity to make their case.
         FASNY has continued to attempt to confuse important issues and even deny there are any problems. FASNY has attempted to convince you of their right, no matter the devastating effects on the community, to a special permit.  
         Do not let FASNY, their slick marketing firm or their legal spin makers get away with this easily seen through nonsense.
Thank you.
Charles Diamond, Ph.D. (Economics)
39 Hathaway Lane, White Plains, NY 10605   646-265-3638.

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