At the February Board meeting I made statements concerning the January Town Board decision regarding allowing a grandfathered pit to store bagged mulch from another site in the Township. There is a long history to this whole issue, including Board Ordinance enforcement requiring removal of this product once already.
There was later a public hearing on it and the Planning Commission recommended denial based on Ordinance language and the public input. The Board denied this use, but it didn't stop there.
Butch Hansen and Mark Ceminsky kept working it and it was rehashed yet again at the January meeting. Following are my comments regarding this rehash.
Members of the Board:
I do not feel I would be doing my duty as a past Planning Commissioner, Board Supervisor, Primary Attorney Contact, and Planning Commission Chair if I were not to comment on what transpired at the January Town Board meeting concerning gravel pit storage.
1. Resolution 2015-03 was added to your agenda, by all appearances by Mr. Hansen. However, there was no placement of this Resolution in your packets. Mr. Hansen, in fact, prefaced his distribution of that document during the meeting itself with words close to “I knew it wouldn’t be in the packets.” Why would this be the case? If he did add the agenda item, he should have asked the Clerk to place this document in your packets for your thorough review before the meeting. The Board Chair could have asked the Clerk to do so. The Clerk could take it upon him or herself to do so since it was added to the agenda.
2. There was no public copy provided until I specifically asked for one. This is contradictory to your general basic policy and the Open Meeting Law. Surely, a Board Supervisor must know better than this. It has come up during meetings enough times, again and again!
3. “Springing” important information on the Board concerning what has been a contentious topic is far from open or transparent in my opinion and it lends itself to speculation about the motivation of such a move. Is that the appearance the Board wants to present to citizens? Do you really think that as a Supervisor you can give proper consideration to this issue when you haven’t had the opportunity to review? When the concerned pit owner has presumably been invited to attend and has come to the front on his own to sit before you for an at-the-moment decision? Do you feel you are thinking clearly about this under these circumstances?
When I was on the Board, we had a policy that any materials presented during the meeting and not in the packets could not be acted upon at that meeting, but must be delayed until at least the following meeting to allow for proper consideration and examination. Why let yourselves be led down this path? Someone may try, but you don’t have to follow.
4. If you had been reading clearly, you would have discerned that the storage on minerals and topsoil excavated off site that may be stored on the property as defined in the term “accessory use” in Ord. 6, Ch.3 is expressly governed by Ord. 6, Ch. 7, Section 1, Subsection K and by Ord. 6, Chapter 7, Section 1(B) as follows:
K. Accessory Uses. Accessory uses must be identified in the permit. Accessory uses not identified in the permit are not allowed. The accessory uses of a concrete block production plant or ready-mix concrete production plant (Level 3 permits allow dry ready-mix concrete production plants) or asphalt production plant, shall be strictly prohibited. A concrete recycling plant and an asphalt recycling plant are also prohibited, except as stated in Chapter 7, Section 1(B). The storage, stockpiling, sale, and mixing of materials that have been excavated off-site are strictly prohibited, except for the mixing of materials as provided in Chapter 7, Section 1(B). Accessory uses will terminate when the principal use terminates. Accessory uses may not collectively account for more than 50% of total mine operations based upon the volume of minerals extracted from the subject property, so that primary uses account for greater than 50% of the total mine operation as measured by volume.
AND
B. Source of Materials. Only minerals from the site shall be processed at the mineral extraction facility subject, however, to the following exceptions:
1. Recyclable concrete and recyclable asphalt may be crushed and mixed on site if the crushing and mixing do not exceed fifteen (15) working days per calendar year and if the recyclable concrete and recyclable asphalt originated from a road demolition or road repair project in the Township of Eureka.
2. The Operator may import off-site minerals onto the subject property for the purpose of mixing with minerals from the subject property provided the imported minerals on an annual basis do not exceed 25% of the minerals extracted from the subject property on an annual basis. Accessory uses may not exceed 25% off-site materials used in conjunction with each specified accessory use; therefore off-site materials may not be aggregated to a single accessory use, allowing a specific accessory use to exceed 25% of off-site minerals used in conjunction with the specific accessory use.
5. I will leave aside for the moment the contortion of the definition of “topsoil” to include “mulch,” which does not even appear in the Ordinance language, except to say that your everyday amateur gardener knows that these are two separate products and are not synonymous!
6. This is not the first time that promises contrary to the Ordinances appear to have been made to individuals by certain supervisors. One of the last times this occurred, I stepped out to speak to the two representatives from a Level 3 pit who told me they had been informed by these two supervisors-incorrectly- that all they had to do to crush concrete from outside the Township throughout the summer was to apply for an Interim Use Permit (IUP), and, further, that this could be handled at the Board meeting that night, with no mention of Commission review, publication, and public hearing, etc. And this is in spite of the fact that NO such even IUP exists!
Do we not understand the process of applying for a Text Amendment? If one desires a use not permitted in the current Ordinances, THAT is the road to travel.
7. We have to stop having this bouncing back and forth between enforcing the Ordinances as written and what someone WISHES they stated. I ask you to consider my comments.
