The Saugerties Town Board voted unanimously last week to appoint itself as the lead agency for a comprehensive State Environmental Quality Review Act study of the project proposed by local developers for Winston Farm.
Town Supervisor Fred Costello said the board, which welcomed new member Zach Horton this year, did not receive any comment from the public as to why it should not be the lead agency on the project.
The project has been proposed by local developers John Mullen, Anthony Montano and Randy Richers, who purchased Winston Farm in 2020. The project could include single- and multi-family housing, a jobs incubator, public multi-use trails, camping and an amphitheater to the site of the Woodstock ’94 Festival west of the Thruway. Developers have also said they will help the Village of Saugerties tap into an aquifer on the site for a second municipal water source supplementing the Village’s Blue Mountain reservoir.
The project has already attracted some opposition, including from the environmental group Catskill Mountainkeeper along with some area residents who have formed the group beautifulsaugerties.com, which has expressed concern about the scale of the project while stopping short of opposing any form of development at Winston Farm. Chief among their concerns are deforestation on the property to make way for the proposed development along with worries about increased traffic in the vicinity of the development.
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