DRAFT FILED: 9/23/02
FINAL: 10/16/02
WATER CONTROL COMMISSION MEETING MINUTES FOR
SEPTEMBER 18, 2002
MEMBERS PRESENT: Charles Kane, Chairman
Mark Goldfarb
Stuart Greenbaum
Marc Albrecht
Meeting came to order at 7:30 P.M.
The chairman of the Board announced the location of fire exists to all in attendance of the meeting.
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
The WCC announced that the Village Board appointed Charles Kane as Chairman of the Water Control Commission.
HEARINGS:
Jeanette & Michael Altamura, 327 Albany Post Road, Section 67.14 Block 3 Lot 8, Located in a RA-40 District. Request for a Wetlands Activity Permit with respect to the proposed construction of a new deck.
John Wiess, North Woods Builders - Represented the Altamura's. - The Altamura's and I have designed a new proposed deck. The existing deck is in need of repair. It is falling off the house. There is a pond on the site. There will be silt fencing and any earth that will be removed will be moved to another part of the site or moved from the site.
Kane - I inspected the site last week. Where will you store the excess material?
Wiess - On the other side of the property.
Kane - My concern is storage near the pond area.
Wiess - We will agree to a provision that it will be wheel barrowed away from that area to another area on site.
Greenbaum - How close is the deck to the pond?
Weiss - The dimension is on the plot plan.
Discussion followed over plot plan.
Greenbuam - According to the plot plan, it looks like it is on top of the pond.
Wiess - The drawing is to scale. The dimension is approximately nine or ten feet from the edge of the deck to the watercourse.
Greenbaum - That is not acceptable. It is within the 20 ft. buffer zone.
Wiess - The actual deck is eight feet from the building and it is close to the pond. The existing deck is in bad shape and not safe.
Greenbaum - Is the existing deck within the prohibited buffer zone?
Wiess - There is nothing else for us to do but rebuild. The existing condition is bad.
Kane - How wide is the current structure from the foundation.
Wiess - Eight feet from the cantilever.
Kane - So you are actually adding another eight feet?
Wiess - Look at the site plan.
Discussion followed over plans.
Greenbuam - How old is the existing deck?
Wiess - It was built approximately 1970.
Greenbuam - I am not sure whether or not the pre-existing deck is the dame dimension and if it encroaches the same amount , and whether you are allowed to be grandfathered in. Our guidelines have a 20 ft. Prohibited Buffer Zone.
Wiess - Whatever needs to be done, the deck is there now and there are boards missing. It is a safety issue.
Greenbaum - But, what I am unsure of is whether or not you can design a deck within the 20 ft. Prohibited Buffer Zone.
Weiss - If I complied with the prohibited buffer zone, than there would be no deck.
Greenbaum - I do not know if we have the authority to say you can build within the twenty-foot buffer zone. We need to make sure that anything built conforms to the guidelines we are issued.
Wiess - Do you feel that because the existing deck is already within that zone that it can be grandfathered?
Discussion followed over plans.
Golfarb - I assume it will be slightly closer than the existing deck.
Wiess - I would like to keep the proposed design that was planned for them.
The Board agreed to adjourn the decision until next month in order to determine if the new construction can be grand-fathered and if any construction can take place within the twenty foot Prohibited Buffer Zone.
Hearing Closed
Decision adjourned until October 16, 2002.
Anthony DeSantis, 40 Prospect Place, Section 67.20 Block 4 Lot 20. Located in a RA-25 District. Request for a Wetlands Activity Permit with respect to proposed drainage plans.
DeSantis - I live at 40 Prospect Place. I am revising the drainage on my property. I have prepared drawings and outlines showing the specifications. The latest drawing shows my property relative to the contours of the block, from Albany Post Road to Prospect, to High Street. The principal request I am asking for and the key to this entire thing is to complete what has already been in place for some time. The insulations of the catch basin are shown on the drawings and it will complete a drainage system that goes to the pond below. The catch basin would have an inlet grate three feet by six feet by five feet deep. It will move into a 24 inch settling pipe and then it will go to another 24 inch settling pipe and then to an outlet in the settling pond.
Kane - The outlet of you sediment collection point, will that be new piping or existing pipe?
DeSantis - It is existing. It is old. We would connect two pipes in a manhole and we would have access for cleaning and it would protect the pond from sediments. We would pick up sediment at the top of the catch basin. There is no way it will be carried by velocity, because the water will never pick up speed. It is all done within my property. The secondary system is if the water volume becomes too great to absorb for the catch basin. There is a one percent slope drainage ditch tat runs to an existing swale. It runs about one degree slope and it goes into a pond. There are times during storms like "Floyd" and "Allison" where the quantity of water is enormous. Such as the one hundred year storms, there is no way we can anticipate or provide for
one of these storms. That is what happened with "Floyd."
Greenbuam - What happened during "Floyd" to the pond and water. Where did it go?
DeSantis - Where the catch basin is shown on the plans, is where it enters the property. There is a natural swale that runs outside the building and it tore a four-foot trench into the road and it went across the lawn and it took the road out, but it did not do much damage to the lawn. It then goes into the pond and then it goes over the weir and then it picks up speed again. This pond stops all the water and then it goes over the weir and takes off again.
Kane - From the top we see it is steep and there is over thirty feet of drop. Within a short distance the topography drops significantly.
DeSantis - There is the weir and it comes down over the rocks and it goes over twenty feet and there is another drop. There are three weirs and within another ten feet it drops again and then takes off.
Kane - I was just given your topography this evening. I have had no chance to review it.
DeSantis - I apologize for the short time in presenting the topo.
Kane - Will this plan increase the amount of water in the pond.
DeSantis - No. It will only increase the amount of water the weir will allow.
Goldfarb - Will this increase the rate that the water will get to the pond?
DeSantis - No. We haven't increased the steepness.
Goldfarb - Won't it increase the water that will infiltrate into the ground?
DeSantis - First of all the ground is saturated. I have had this property thirty years and at first there was just a trickle of water and now during big storms the water has increased due to all of the development that has taken place on property up the hill from us. All we can do is try to slow it down and stop it in any way we can.
Kane - The Village has contracted "Bartilucci" as an Engineering Firm and a report is due soon on this sub-drainage basin where your property is located. The report will tell us how much water is flowing in this basin and this study is important to the Village due to the tremendous amount of water that comes in that area. The report is due sometime in October or November.
DeSantis - I am aware of the study and I approve of it but, I know from having been a design professional for forty years, that from the time the report arrives and the time when action is taken on it, could take months and years. A lot of considerations need to be taken into account. If all the necessary considerations are given to this plan, it could take one year or so. I am willing to put in the pond on a temporary basis contingent on it and being harmonious with the engineers report, at which time I will make whatever revisions are necessary or required.
Kane - I am concerned about the swale and the change that can take place in the topography and I am concerned that if you change the topography in grade, it will change the study.
DeSantis - This will not change the topography.
Kane - The swale will not change the topography?
DeSantis - Oh no, it will not change the swale at all. There will be no change in grade.
There will be no grading or grass cutting whatsoever, it is already there.
Discussion followed over plans.
The Board agreed that Kary Ioannou, Village Engineer, needs an opportunity to review the plans that were submitted this evening, before the WCC can make any decision.
Anyone else like to be heard?
Sharon Ianzaroff (***check spelling of name - Neighbor of DeSantis for twenty seven years. I own the property below Mr. DeSantis. The stream continues to flow freely on my property on Hillside Avenue. The gorge goes through my property and then underground in a culvert for two properties. I have lived through these storms and they are amazing. The stream Mr. DeSantis refers to was once a trickle. It was ten feet high and ten feet wide during the last hurricane. From my point of view, a clean out keeps the pond from silting. Any extra flow would not be good. It is already over capacity for the existing house. The amount already coming in is unmanageable. So, you cannot do anything to increase the water for the down stream homeowners.
Dan Maguire - 17 High Street - The dam is still a good dam. The water that comes down the hill is not his fault. The pond has been widened over the years. The high intensity of rain goes over his weir. That, I feel is not adequate. There has to be a correction in the dam itself. If it is to function properly, it has to be higher or lower. It will help to bring water flow to zero. That is important that is a correction that needs to be made in the dam. It is beautiful and nice to look at, but when there is water below the spillway, it is stagnant and anytime we could have mosquito problems. Maybe there should be some kind of circulation down there. There is no movement of water at all. I think myself and others in this room should wait for the report and see what
the Village can do for us. Maybe they could correct a lot of this problem for us.
Bill DiVito - I live behind his property. He does not show the bamboo heavy grass and brush that this water has to go through. He does not show that.
Discussion followed over pictures Mr. DiVito submitted for the Boards review.
DiVitto - If Mrs. Ianzaroff (***check spelling of name) tells us that the brook goes ten feet times its size, what about when the water lays there? Will there be nothing but mosquitos? The stream ran under his house. That is what the builder had to do. I see a twenty-four inch pipe. Who gave him permission to put that pipe in? He never came to the Water Control Commission. There was a small pond and the water flowed with no problem. DeSantis made the pond ten times the original size and that is when the problem started. That pipe was existing two years ago. I want to know if he came to the Water Control Commission when he enlarged the pond. I do not care that he diverted the water, but lets put it underground as well. The swale he talks about, he does not have it
on his plans. I want to know if he got permission to enlarge that pond in a wetland and for the twenty-four inch pipe that was installed. Ever since this was installed the people down stream have had problems and I do not want mosquitos or West Nile disease. We should have an investigation on this.
DeSantis - Can I answer some of these statements?
DeSantis - I have a copy of the Resolution showing permission for the cleaning and enlargement of the pond. My Attorney could not find it two years ago.
Copy of Resolution given to Mr. DiVito for review.
David Wallace - neighbor and tenant of Mr. DeSantis - We were scheduled to move in one week after the fathers day storm and our basement was inundated with water. The water has to go some place. What he is trying to do is defend his house against the onslaught of the storms. I had things stored in the basement. I need a humidifier all summer long. I am an architect and designer by profession. It seems immediate action is needed. We cannot live with the threat of a storm all the time.
Mrs. Ianzaroff (***check name) - Sometimes not all of the interested parties are notified. I was not notified for the last meeting. I was told about it by my neighbors.
Kathleen Riedy, Attorney, - My Clients are the DiVito's of 43 High Street. I want to make one request and raise one concern. On September 13, 2002, I went to the Village Office seeking the application that this Board was to receive this evening. I understand from the comments this evening that you just receive a topographical map this evening. It makes a critical impossibility to receive or make analysis of this. I request that you decline to make a decision, so we can review this topographical map that was presented one hour ago.
Busky - 2 Hillside - The two drains that you mentioned, are they the Village's responsibility to clean the catch basins?
Kane - The ones located on the DeSantis property?
Busky - Yes.
Kane - No. They are on private property. They would be maintained by the property owner.
Busky - That is a problem. I have two basins and they are always full. I clean them out, but I think this needs to be addressed. I think the study should be completed and I think that Hudson National should have some responsibility to hold water on their property and not allow it to flow down onto our property.
Neighbor - Are they going to let the neighbors be interviewed before they complete the study?
DeSantis - There will be no digging. The only digging will be a six-foot hole for the pre-cast concrete box and the existing pipe is cemented into the side of it and there is a grade.
Kane - Rain flow will be entered into this program.
Neighbor - When you see something ten feet wide and ten feet high, it is frightening and it needs to be addressed, but I do not think they will get it from a computer study.
Kane - They are professional engineers and there is a way of doing this study. I do not exactly what it is, but this would be a good question for the Village Board. Next Monday is the next Village Board meeting.
Peter Lavery - 38 Prospect - Mrs. Lazaroff (*** check spelling) was talking about the terror of this water. I am located in the middle near Mr. DeSantis' property. I want to quantify what an awful lot of water is. We heard bumping in the night and when we went down stairs, there was water four feet up our basement walls. Hurricane "Floyd" crashed through our basement shooting debris and ripping wood doors in half. We are talking about an incredible amount of water. I think the proposition this evening is will the proposal alleviate the problem. When you have that much water coming in that rapidly, it is an understatement and serious problem.
Kane - Mr. Maguire at a prior meeting showed us pictures of the damage the storm did to his property. We are well aware of the problems in this area.
DiVito - He wants to set it over the top of the swale that is not a swale, but heavy brush. Do it the right way. There will be erosion to my property and it will be mosquito infested. He was going to do this with no permission. I wonder if officials should take a walk of the property and take a look at the swale. My guess is that it is not going to go away.
Kane - I walked the property last weekend.
DeSantis - If we do not want to the water to pick up speed, the drainage ditch is a definite plus.
Maguire - The sad thing is that this problem starts higher than us. If every neighbor higher than us would do what they should do to control this water, there would be no problem. We should start with the Golf Course. If everyone did it there would be a big difference.
DiVito - What about the water that stays there and becomes stagnant? That is what I am concerned about. Are we going to call the board of Health and the Environmental authorities?
Kane - We will try to address this issue.
Maguire - First this is going to cost a lot of money. Lets hope when they do come up with a solution it will be a darn good one. We need to solve this problem.
Kane - I cannot over emphasize that this is the first basin being studied and we took your issues seriously. In face every basin should be inspected, but we chose to take your basin into consideration first.
The Board agreed to adjourn the hearing until next month October 16, 2002 at 7:30 P.M. in order to give the Village Engineer time to review the topographical map submitted this evening.
Hearing adjourned
Respectfully submitted,
Janice Fuentes
WCC Secretary
9/18/02
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