Tonight (2020-12-07) was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls Zoning Board.
From a content point of view, there really isn’t much to say about the meeting. But from a format point of view, there is so much that could be said.
Topic of the evening was Wolfsberger Park, off of North Main Street. Brian (Board Chair) made a number of important points:
There would be no approval tonight.
This application is for subdivision, not for building anything.
Any building would require additional applications and approvals, at a later date.
Due to audio quality, I can’t say too much about the discussion. It had the feel of continuing the process, and working through details. I didn’t hear anything that sounded like a ‘deal breaker’, just issues to address for next time.
Some very nice maps were made available on the Village’s website before the meeting. They show a before and after view of the property. While I fully expect some details to change on the after, I think it looks like a decent enough usage of the land. Eyeballing it, the amount of flood plain turned into road/house seems questionable, but that’s what engineers are for.
That was the meeting content. If it had been a ‘normal’ meeting, I’d be done here. But there was also the format.
This meeting was another one that was broadcast online. At the risk of putting words in their mouth, this was due to the belief people are too much of a threat to allow the public to gather at public meetings. Instead of letting people evaluate the risks individually and act accordingly, attendance was forbidden.
Ironically enough, by my count there were at least 12 people in the room. 5 board members, 1 alternate, Village attorney, 2 other Village staff, three on behalf of the applicant. Which I’m pretty sure exceeds the governor’s decree on gatherings. In all fairness, he’s likely changed that since I last read it.
As alluded too above, the audio quality was rather poor. I couldn’t tell you if it was the masks, the microphone, or something else. Regardless, much of the meeting was barely understandable. I got enough I could follow the general flow, but I know I missed many a detail.
One of those details was about comments and questions being made available somewhere. I got that anything sent into the office will be made part of the public record. And it sounded like they would be made available online. And the public was encouraged to read them, as people were asking the same question repeatedly. Yet I missed the actual location. I would assume the Village’s website, or Facebook page (or both), but who knows.
The platform the Village uses to broadcast meetings has a built in text chat room. Those watching the meeting (I counted a peak of 37) took advantage of this. My sense was they were generally frustrated with the situation. I’m not sure how much of that was the subdivision application, and how much was the meeting format. Personally, I think this became another outlet for frustrations over government overreach involving the flu panic. Or I could be mistaken, wouldn’t be the first (or last) time.
There did not appear to be a time for the public to comment, despite it being a public hearing. In all fairness, I can’t fault this decision. The audio quality was that bad. But it did create the appearance of ignoring the public. Or maybe they asked and no one heard, which is a side effect of poor audio.
Overall, the whole process felt like a mockery of both open meetings and public hearings. Which I found ironic, as I had written up a comment and was looking forward to sharing it. Instead I emailed it to the Village, so you can ask them for it (as it should now be part of the public record).
The gist of my comment was that the rules we are operating under treat people as an inherent threat. Thus meetings are closed, gatherings are canceled, etc. Yet a developer is looking to build more houses, which will increasing the people in the area, and by extension the ‘threat’. If consistently applied, it seems like an obvious denial.
Which it won’t be, approval (as a general concept) should be a foregone conclusion. Details to iron out, yes. But approval to draw lines on a map? How can the Board say no? Hmm, as I think about it, this isn’t the first time I’ve thought this. And been so very wrong.
Even with challenges, I think the Board (and other Village staff) did what they could with what they had to work with. As mentioned above, I like the maps provided. And from the video I got the sense they were doing their best to improve the experience for the public.
I fully believe everyone involved is doing their best, for everyone. It’s just hard at times, even more so when we shoot ourselves in the foot.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the December 7, 2020 meeting (such as it was) of the Honeoye Falls Zoning Board.