Press Release 4/15/09
Potsdamsmartgrowth.org
Richard Brummel Organizer (315) 842-9173
Environmental Advocate Criticizes County Planning Process
The St Lawrence County Planning Board showed considerable contempt for the public in speedily approving the Potsdam hospital zone without a public hearing or an environmental review process.
Extensive concerns were expressed by neighbors and the nascent environmental advocate group Potsdam Smart Growth (PotsdamSmartGrowth.org) about the environment, the neighborhood, and general issues of finances and health-care policy.
But the planning board seemed to lack the vision to see where a complete re-design of the property would create more than minor or acceptable changes.
The board made a selective reading of the Potsdam comprehensive plan -- which embraced principles of smart growth and residential preservation as guiding principles.
The board also failed to analyze the long-term implications of the development in-place - whether it would be a continuous process of incremental expansion, as is logically predictable based on history.
Most significantly, the county planning board offered no insight into the context of growth and development in a broader community or regional perspective - how for instance the concentration of growth in a location not served by any major road arteries can be "good planning" practice.
Potsdam Smart Growth has argued strenuously that relocating the hospital to the former Clarkson University campus at the intersections of state routes 56, 11 and 11B, in the center of Potsdam, would logically offer a far better long-term option that should be explored.
Potsdam Smart Growth has also argued that full-scale Environmental Impact Statement is obligatory for such a major zoning change, as provided in the (NY) State Environmental Quality Review regulations of the Department of Environmental Conservation.
We urge the Mayor and village board to pause the process to allow proper public review to take place.
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