Town Board Gives OK to Forest City Zoning

by Judy Silberstein

(May 26, 2005) More than 30 residents appeared at the special public hearing on May 25 before the Town of Mamaroneck Board in a last-ditch and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to stop the rezoning of property at Madison and Myrtle to accommodate the proposal by developer Forest City Daly for a six-story apartment building. Most of the speakers were residents of the apartment house at nearby 14 North Chatsworth, and most voiced concerns over lack of parking in the area, but also over congestion, and potential burdens to the train station and the schools. There were also multiple challenges for the board to explain "What’s in it for Larchmont, what’s in it for the Town of Mamaroneck?”

George Kruse (left), from Forest City Daly, and Town Councilmembers Paul Winick, Ernie Odierna, Phyllis Witner and Supervisor Valerie O'Keeffe relax following the rezoning vote.

After close to three hours of hearings, each council member addressed the question before joining in a unanimous vote in favor of the zoning change.

Specific design plans still need to work their way through all the local land use boards and through county and state levels of scrutiny before they return to the Town Board for final acceptance. However, the rezoning vote cleared the last major regulatory obstacle in a process that has so far taken four years.

Some history: Before opening the public hearing, Supervisor Valerie O’Keeffe provided a brief overview going back to 2000, when Forest City Daly made its first proposal. She outlined the process that included a lengthy environmental review that culminated in March of 2005, with the board issuing its own statement (See: Town Board Completes Environmental Review - 159 Rental Apartments To Come?) Over the years, the Town had hired its own consultants and had undertaken studies of: alternate uses for the land (recreation, assisted living for seniors, etc.); traffic and parking; and economic viability of various options for the apartment development.

Andrew Tung of Divney Tung Schwalbe, the engineering and design firm, displayed site plans and reviewed the current status of the proposal. Notable changes from the original concept include: a reduction from 225 to 159; an increase in parking for residents (with one spot per unit included in the rental price) from 232 to 284; a greater setback from the street (to avoid what Supervisor O’Keeffe called a Queens Boulevard feeling); a redesigned parking lot for the retailers who will remain in the small shopping center adjacent to the apartments; the inclusion of 9 “work force” units (to be rented to those making no more than 80% of the county median income); and the installation of “green” roofs ( planted with ground cover or landscaping) on much of the building to aid in retention of storm water runoff.

Also, Forest City Daly will provide funds so the Town can erect a parking deck at Lot 3 on Myrtle Boulevard, which will add 70 new parking spots. Later discussion revealed this would take care of the 45 local residents now on the waiting list, including those who have been waiting for close to six years.

To allow for the plan, the board would need to modify the zoning on the property to allow for more residential units than is acceptable under present rules, explained Mamaroneck’s attorney, William Maker.

The hearing: Many of the residents speaking on Wednesday night had been following the proposal through its four years of review and were still unconvinced of its merits. Mary Paddock, a 14 N. Chatsworth resident, suggested, “Some of my parking concerns have been addressed,” but “traffic flow is paramount to those who live in the North Chatsworth area.”

“It is already a horror show – this development is only going to add to our problem,” she said.

Ron Lenney presented the board with a petition signed by 42 residents of 14 N. Chatsworth opposing the rezoning and reminded the board of mistakes that had been made by previous administrations. “There are just too many people living in too small an area,” he stressed.

Peg Cozzi, speaking on behalf of the Chatsworth Neighborhood Association, said her organization unanimously opposes zoning changes and cited potential impacts on over 1200 residents that include: noise, air pollution, and further burden on the already overloaded drainage, train station and parking resources. She noted dissatisfaction with the number of work force units and said that 18, rather than 9, would be an acceptable standard, a number also cited by both Roger and Mary Hotte later in the evening.

Mr. Tung provided further details and explained that the final design did add more impervious surfaces (.4 acres in a total of 2.8 acres), but that the green roofs, additional landscaping, and an underground detention and filtering system for storm water would result in an improvement over the current way rain runs off the site, largely unchecked and untreated.

On the question of affordable housing, Supervisor O’Keeffe suggested Iit was a question of money” – the amount of rental income Forest City Daly needed to make the project viable.

The lone resident to speak in favor of the project was John Coughlin, who grew up in Larchmont and is with Coughlin Group Insurance on Myrtle Boulevard. He praised both the developer and the board for their hard work.

May Hotte, from Sackett Drive, also recognized some of the advantages of the project, including “lovely new rental neighbors” but said she was looking for more of a “win – win” situation. She, like other speakers, wondered whether the board had retained an open mind on a project in which they had already invested four years. She asked, “Is this a decision – I hate to use the word – that is already preconceived?”

The vote: As the board closed the public hearing and began its own comments, each member laid out individual reasons leading to the same decision. The newest addition to the board, Paul Winick, spoke first and noted that he was coming to the deliberation without any investment and with “fresh eyes.” He saw a number of benefits to the Forest City project including added tax revenue and the parking deck. By going with the proposed project, the Town was avoiding possibilities that could be built without a zoning change, such as a CVS or other large-scale commercial option which “would be far worse than an apartment house,” he said.

Councilwoman Nancy Seligson reminded those in the courtroom that all board members are also residents who struggle with the awful traffic and parking, but that the project could be “a new beautiful building that would improve the aesthetics” of a corner of the Town that needed an uplift. “I desperately wanted to have more work force or affordable units,” she said, but the tradeoff would have been even more apartments and more bulk.

“A rental can make a lot of sense for seniors,” including many who are ready to sell their large Larchmont homes, commented Councilman Ernie Odierna, explaining some of his reasons for supporting the project from “an enthusiastic, very professional developer.”

Councilwoman Wittner countered the notion “that we were gung-ho on this project from day 1 – we were not,” she stated. “Up until we could agree on a smaller building with more work force housing, I did not see how it could go through,” she reported.

Larchmont's Goat Hill: photo from the Larchmont Library archives.

That brought the discussion back to Supervisor O’Keeffe who explained how her thinking had evolved, in part by reflecting on her childhood explorations of the neighborhood before I-95 and many of the current apartment buildings were built. She was sad when the goat woman and the rural feel of old Larchmont disappeared after buildings went up at Washington Square, but she ultimately grew to see the wisdom of the “founding mothers and fathers” who supported the development. She “tossed and turned” over this the current proposal and finally “tipped” in favor of the project, in part because of the various changes agreed to by the developer, particularly a higher ratio of parking spots per unit than anywhere else in Westchester.

“My conclusion is this is the best we can do – and it’s a gamble,” said Supervisor O’Keeffe. “But If we do nothing it’s a gamble, too.”

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