An Open Letter: Death of “The Process”

May 20, 2015

Supervisor Paul Feiner

Town Board
Town of Greenburgh
Town Hall
177 Hillside Avenue
Greenburgh, New York 10607

Dear Supervisor Feiner:

I am appealing to you in my capacity as the Vice-President of the Fulton Park Civic Association with respect to the application filed on behalf of GameOn 365 Sports, LLC seeking a zoning amendment that will negatively impact the entire Town in the future, initially allowing construction of a prohibitive commercial sports complex on Dobbs Ferry Road in the R-30 Zoning District.

As you will recall, at the Town Board meeting on April 8, 2015, an overwhelming majority of community members attended to steadfastly voice their opposition to GameOn 365’s application. In fact, the overwhelming sentiment was that the proposed zoning amendment should be rejected. Nonetheless, you and Town Board members, Ken Jones and Kevin Morgan, decided to blatantly disregard the will of the residents of the Town of Greenburgh by moving the GameOn 365 application forward by commencing the New York State Environmental Quality Review Act process and referring the matter to the Town of Greenburgh Planning Board for an “informal” review. This belies your collective statements of impartiality and removes all pretext of keeping an open mind! I am writing to advise you that the members of my association, as I’m sure the residents living in the vicinity of the golf ranch property, are greatly troubled by your actions and the actions of Councilman Morgan and Councilman Jones. 

I had written you a letter on April 8, 2015, pointing out a number of deficiencies in the long form Environmental Assessment Form prepared by GameOn 365. Regardless, you, in concert with Councilman Morgan and Councilman Jones, and over the objections of Councilmember’s Sheehan and Juettner, decided to declare the Town Board’s intent to act as Lead Agency under SEQRA and provide notice of this intent to interested and involved agencies, giving GameOn 365 the necessary ammunition to seek real financial investors. I believe this is purely endorsed semantics to move GameOn 365’s proposal forward! I reiterate that preceding any further with the SEQRA review is improper until the errors in the EAF are analyzed and corrected. To continue with the review would create a flawed environmental review process since the involved and interested agencies cannot accurately assess the impact of the zone change or the scope of the underlying project. Or, is that the actual plan? I ask that the Town Board immediately withdraw its intent to act or become Lead Agency, and, at the very least, require GameOn 365 to amend its EAF until the errors I previously pointed out are corrected.

The next troubling aspect of your actions is that you have continually acted as an advocate for GameOn 365. Although you contend that you are neutral and that you are merely following “the process”, there are many examples where you have chosen to proceed in a biased manner.  One example is that you have continually taken the position that the traffic impacts relating to Dobbs Ferry Road are not significant and that the project would not result in excessive traffic.  However, this is substantially different than the position that you took with respect to the Fortress Bible Church.  At that time, you were very concerned about the volume of traffic the Fortress Bible Church would add to Dobbs Ferry Road. The GameOn project would likely add more traffic, on a more regular basis, than the Fortress Bible Church proposal.

Your most recent statements that you were only concerned with site lines with respect to the Fortress Bible Church are directly contradicted by the record in that action and will invariably and rightly be part of any litigation concerning the proposed traffic impacts. Your statement that you spoke with the Chief of Police on occasions regarding the Fortress Bible project is also contradicted by your testimony in that case. These contradictions demonstrate that you are anything but neutral. Past performance has proven when you have a project you support, such as GameOn 365, you will do anything to move the application forward; but where you have a project you are against, such as Fortress Bible, you will do anything to oppose it including destruction of evidence and lying under oath. It is no wonder people have lost confidence in the process in our Town!

You have also continually questioned whether the traffic impacts studied by House of Sports should be considered when analyzing the GameOn 365 project. Despite your assertions to the contrary, the GameOn 365 facility will attract a similar amount of traffic as House of Sports. Furthermore, the number of spectators and participants will not in any way be limited by an alleged lack of seating or otherwise at the GameOn 365 facility. There is no doubt that when children come to GameOn 365, their parents, relatives and friends will attend practices, games and tournaments in large numbers.

The manner in which you have driven this process forward demonstrates bias and that you are acting as an advocate for GameOn 365.  As stated above, you have voted to declare the Town Board as Lead Agency, despite the deficiencies in the EAF and substantial evidence and testimony that property in the R-30 zone should not be zoned for commercial use. The only reason to have moved the environmental review process forward at this time is because you are in favor of the GameOn 365 application!

The formation of a “committee” for the purpose of hiring of a traffic consultant and planning consultant, is also highly suspect, is not typical in a SEQRA review and further establishes that you are treating the GameOn 365 application differently than other applications. The usual process for a zone change petition is for the applicant to submit studies in conjunction with a draft Environmental Impact Statement that the Town professionals can then analyze. It will be at that time that the Town could hire a planning consultant, traffic consultant and other professionals to review the applicant’s studies. The public would then be given the opportunity to hire its consultants to analyze the applicant’s studies and present information during the SEQRA review. It is entirely inappropriate for the Town to conduct studies on its own, prior to the applicant submitting its own studies and draft Environmental Impact Statement. This is true even if the applicant is paying for the studies, which further taints the process. What is even more disturbing is that if the Town’s consultants ultimately conclude that there are not any significant impacts from the project, it would be difficult, if not impossible, for the Town Board to reject or modify the application during either the SEQRA or site plan review process.

The supposedly “informal” referral of this application to the Planning Board is also not typical of a petition for a zoning amendment. As you are aware, Town Code § 285-64 requires the Planning Board to make a formal recommendation addressing specific areas of concern with respect to any petition for a zone change before the Town Board holds a public hearing. However, there is no provision for an “informal” Planning Board review in the Town Code. If you are seeking an advisory opinion from the Planning Board, I believe such advisory opinions are improper and illegal. Your attempt to somehow sidestep the formal recommendation process by asking the Planning Board to conduct an “informal” review is again contrary to the process and shows that you are taking a biased approach with respect to this particular applicant.

The bottom line is that communities throughout the Town of Greenburgh are against the GameOn 365’s petition for a zone change that will forever change the landscape of Greenburgh town wide. Yet you, Councilmen Jones and Morgan continue to support it at all costs. I insist you all to reconsider the current direction the Town Board has taken with respect to GameOn 365’s application and dismiss it.

Thomas Bock, 

Vice-President, Fulton Park Civic Association