To the Editor:
The Warwick Planning Board’s handling of the proposed 200-bed, all-male dormitory inside Sterling Forest State Park has become a case study in negligence.
Residents filed an Article 78 action, New York’s process for asking a court to determine whether a government board acted lawfully. The Palisades Interstate Park Commission filed its own brief. Both identified serious environmental and procedural failures the Planning Board ignored.
When the judge ordered the Board to address those concerns and report back, the Board appears to have simply forwarded the court’s directive to the developer. The developer then submitted a lengthy rebuttal and thousands of pages of recycled paperwork, and now seems to be speaking to the Court as if it represents the Town itself.
I’m told the submission included no new environmental analysis, no clarifications, and no evidence of any review by the Board. It appears the Board quietly ceded its authority, and its responsibility to the public, to the very applicant it is supposed to regulate.
Is the developer’s now speaking for the Town? Did the Planning Board conduct any Article 78 review? Has the Board surrendered its authority to a private developer? How can the public trust a Board that lets an applicant defend the Board’s own decisions?
Sterling Forest is one of New York’s most sensitive ecological resources. The Board’s conduct has undermined public trust and the integrity of the land-use process.
Regardless of how the Article 78 ends, this Board must be replaced.
Lee Schulz
Warwick