Woodstock town supervisor Bill McKenna looks ahead to his fourth elected term, having won in a landslide against council member Bennet Ratcliff in a contentious race that lasted almost a year.
The first accomplishment apparent to those heading up to the nerve center of town government on Comeau Drive for town business will be the new addition, which should open some time in January. “The second or third week in January, we should be able to move in,” McKenna said. “Hopefully, by the beginning to middle of February we start the second phase on the house. So that’s the plan.”
All that is left to be done to complete the addition is the electrical hookup, which has been delayed due to Central Hudson scheduling problems.
Recently, the town buried electric and other utilities under Comeau Drive to reduce the likelihood of power outages. The power now coming through the woods from Broadview Road is difficult to access after storm damage.
A Central Hudson crew is needed to hook the newly buried power cable up to the line on Tinker Street. “Then they’ll get the heat running and bring the heat up to temperature,” McKenna said.
Once the departments are moved in, renovation will begin on the existing circa-1900 home’s large meeting room and the clerk’s offices. The upstairs offices will mainly be moved to the addition, and the vacated space will be used for some meetings.
Zoning changes are big on the to-do list in the coming year, with the hope they will encourage affordable housing.
“There’s a lot in there about protecting the environment,” McKenna said.
“And so it’s not like it’s opening the floodgates [to development]. It’s actually offering a lot of different protections that we don’t presently have, and also will allow for clustering and other options with regard to accessory dwelling units.”
Accessory dwelling units, or ADUs, are apartments above garages or cottages on the property that can serve as affordable housing without new development. “So I think there’s a lot of good potential in there, and I’m excited about seeing that through,” McKenna said.
Progress is on the horizon for a new youth center. McKenna appointed a task force earlier this year to determine whether the town should renovate the existing home on Rock City Road currently used for the youth center or build a new facility. The task force will look at the property as a whole and come up with ideas.
“I know they’ve got a lot of different potential ideas, knowing the youth center would be the first thing,” McKenna said. “I believe that in January or February they’re going to have some listening sessions and take in some more input from the general public. And then some time after that, they’ll be ready to make recommendations to the town board.”
More pickleball possibilities are on the horizon. “I’m excited to see that we do have a second pickleball court over there at Andy Lee [Field],” said McKenna. “Next year, we’re going to have the tennis courts resurfaced and repainted. and at that time we’ll make more pickleball courts so that you can have either pickleball or tennis.”
Discussions with McKenna wouldn’t be complete without bringing up the elephant in the room … 10 Church Road in Shady.
As far as McKenna is concerned, the matter is out of the town government’s hands. “So we did have the first lawsuit, and the town feels pretty good about how that ended up,” he said. “There’s the second lawsuit is out there, and we’re awaiting some ruling on that.”
Recently, state Supreme Court judge David Gandin invalidated the building permit for remediation, saying it violated the town’s own fill and grading law. The ruling did not force the town to demand full removal of the contaminated fill as requested by Frank and Pam Eighmey, Reynolds Lane residents whose back yard was buried by a landslide of debris.
In his ruling, Gandin wrote that civil action was the avenue for redress. That lawsuit is already under way.
McKenna said he hoped the Eighmeys would get legal relief because there has been damage to their property even though the soil has been removed from their side of it. “They’re entitled to be compensated for that,” McKenna said.
McKenna has insisted all the contaminated material has been removed. Letters from the DEC that say there is no issue, only minor exceedances of certain chemicals.
The neighbors now being told not to drink their water beg to differ. The fill material was found to contain benzo[a]anthracine, benzo[a]pyrene, benzo[k]flouranthene, chrysene, ideno[1,2,3-cd]pyrene and PFAS.
Some have complained the town payment of engineering and legal fees constitutes a loan to the property owner. McKenna balks at that.
“The law does still permit for us any fees that we incur, any costs that we incur in the cleanup, will be billed to the homeowner,” said the veteran Woodstock town supervisor. “So they can stomp all they want. Ultimately, [landowner Vincent] Conigliaro will get the bill for that. His lawyer has been told as much.”
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