Kind of surprised by the supportive tone of this Ithaca Times editorial. Reference to Seneca Way project:
For The Good Of The City
If you've been following the local news over the last few months, you'll know that developer Bryan Warren, of Warren Real Estate fame, has plans to build a five-story, mixed-use building on the former Challenge Industries site. If you're the sort of immensely entertaining person who makes it a habit to study and understand city zoning charts, you might even know that the Challenge Industry parcel is zoned "B-4 commercial," which basically means that it's against the law to build a building above four stories.
You might also know that Bryan Warren has sought a height variance from the Board of Zoning Appeals to build a building that's 17-feet higher than what the law allows, since costs for construction on the site are exceedingly high and Warren claims this is the only way to make the building profitable. And you might know that a lot of neighbors in the area are frankly pretty upset about this.
It's understandable that they are upset. The East Hill neighborhood is a historic district, and it's seen a remarkable transformation in recent years, as rental properties have shifted over to single-family dwellings. Residents along East Seneca Street have poured untold dollars into their properties and have had to abide by the area's strict zoning regulations. Now along comes this developer who seems to be breaking rules left and right, proposing to erect this large, ultra-modern building right next door in a space where it doesn't quite fit the zoning footprint, and it all seems to be so drastically unfair, because all the neighbors ever wanted was not to stare at cement, and here they're being publicly criticized of destroying the environment by the founder of EcoVillage, and blogger Matt Yglesias is accusing them of NIMBYism to his 18,000 followers on Twitter.
There are a couple of things to say about this. The first is that we are actually dealing in this case with two neighborhoods, not one, since downtown is a neighborhood too, with its own unique demands and interests. This is the not an instance of the East Hill neighborhood being attacked by some evil hive of young professionals and empty nesters; this is an instance of two city neighborhoods with very different kinds of populations struggling to resolve a conflict. And second, Bryan Warren hasn't broken any rules. The city has engaged in no spot-zoning. No one has been paid off. The developer has presented a plan, has applied for a variance, and is doing his best to work with the neighbors, who insist that they aren't against development in general.
And what's more, the developer has made serious concessions, as was made evident at last Tuesday's meeting of the Planning Board, where Warren and his team unveiled a proposal to remove a large section of the top floor off of the rear of the building to minimize the impact to the neighbors along East Seneca Street. These are not superficial changes that the developers have made. This was not a cheap project to begin with, and it's dependent on bank financing, which means the developers are taking a real risk in making these alterations.
In short, this was a good faith effort by the developers to reach a compromise with the neighbors. It was wrong for the city to try to sneak in a zoning change for this parcel as it did last December, which would have given the developers the freedom to build the height they wanted, the neighbors be damned, but that's not what's happening here. The developers put forth a proposal; the neighbors expressed their concerns; the developers went back to the drawing board and made some significant changes.
The handful of citizens in this city whose odd and ridiculous fate it is to sit through hours and hours of public meetings on a weekly basis have heard many reasons given for why the Seneca Way project must move forward. We have heard that there is a demand for quality housing in the City of Ithaca. We have heard talk of "density," and how the city needs more of it. We have been warned of gas stations and brain drain and suburban sprawl and chaos in Libya.
To these dire warnings we might add another: thanks to a bleak fiscal environment, the City of Ithaca can no longer depend on the money it gets from the state of New York to pay for programs that keep local youth employed and out of jail. It costs just $7,000 a year to fund the Paul Schreurs Program at the Ithaca Youth Bureau, which has had a 100 percent success rate over the last three years in getting at-risk kids into college, but funding for that program is due to be cut in the Governor's budget.
But the city might be in a position to pick up the tab, if it were to expand its tax base. And the way we do that is by supporting economic development like the Seneca Way project, which will add roughly $150,000 a year to the city's tax rolls. Nor is the Seneca Way project an isolated case. The Downtown Alliance has set an awesomely ambitious goal of creating 1,500 units of new housing in downtown Ithaca by 2020. Times are tough, and they call for fiscal prudence, but we as a city we should be supportive of this new development, so that we can afford to be generous again 15 years from now.
Of course, this isn't a license to accept any and all development that comes along; the city must be smart about its economic growth, pursuing a development strategy that respects the cultural and aesthetic dignity of our historic homes and neighborhoods, while understanding that the future of our city depends on our willingness to make bold decisions in favor of economic development that will expand the tax base and ease the tax burden for us all.
Here's the link:
http://www.ithacatimes.com/main.asp?...57&TM=65101.92