If anxiety and proximity to proposed development could be said to rise in direct proportion to each other, Spackenkill Road resident Tom Aguis is a case in point.
“This is destroying my peace of mind and tranquility; it’s unbearable to think about,” he said.
The cause of Aguis’ and several of his neighbors’ angst is the prospect of a 126,000 square-foot church, encompassing a sanctuary seating more than 2,300 people and which could someday include a high school, on a 23.68-acre lot on the corner of Spackenkill and Boardman roads.
The main building would be 33 feet high with a 25-foot steeple and include the sanctuary, school, daycare facilities and church offices.
The Faith Assembly of God Church submitted the site plan in May to the Town of Poughkeepsie Planning Board. A public hearing, which was begun and adjourned until September and an informal meeting between neighborhood residents and church officials have subsequently been held.
The church currently resides in a building west of the lot at 254 Spackenkill Rd. The current church is not serviced by town septic services, something that is available at the proposed location.
According to town officials and residents, the main point of contention is a specification in the site plan to have an ingress and egress point on Spackenkill Road between the horseshoe outlets of Colburn Drive.
“There are a lot of issues. Traffic is a concern. The road was just not meant to hold all that traffic,” said Town Planner Laura Wojtowicz. According to Wojtowicz, the New York State Department of Transportation will be the ultimate arbiter of whether the access road is constructed, as Spackenkill Road is a state route.
Wojtowicz said the town had referred the matter to the NYSDOT and expected there to be a meeting this month between the state, town and church officials.
Road can be dangerous
Residents in the area say the stretch of roadway where the access point is planned is particularly treacherous, coming just before the crest of a hill and the intersection of Spackenkill and Boardman. During the icy winter months, cars are constantly sliding off the road, they said.
“I feel it’s a huge safety issue. Every winter when it snows, we are helping to push stranded cars off the road. My husband and I have a standing joke about putting up a pot of coffee (for stranded motorists),” said Spackenkill Road resident Carolyn Joseph.
The question isn’t whether the church will be built: the lot is zoned as an office- research parcel, a designation that would include a house of worship and a school.
“(The town’s) job isn’t to stop the project, it’s to ensure that it’s not impacting the neighborhood adversely,” said Wojtowicz.
To that end, the planning board, by a 7-0 vote, ruled in June that the church’s State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) Application was incomplete. Among the issues the board asked the church to clarify was to prepare a revised traffic study to include special events and school busing, as well as tree removal, drainage issues and possible future additions.
Under SEQRA, the town could commission further traffic and environmental studies at the applicant’s expense.
One aspect of the plan that town officials would like to see changed in the site plan is parking spaces currently slated to be fronting Spackenkill Road. Officials want them to be moved back behind the proposed building.
“We would like to minimize the visual impact on Spackenkill Road; there was a suggestion that the front of the property be lined with pine trees,” said Planning Board Chairman John Weisman.
As with others, Weisman said traffic is the biggest question about the project. He stressed that the site approval process is only in the initial stages.
“There is a preliminary (environmental impact) declaration and a final declaration. Nothing is ever rubber stamped,” he said.
Following an initial public hearing in June, approximately 25 residents and Councilman Todd Tancredi (R-6th Ward) attended an informal meeting at a church-owned home on Colburn Drive. Tancredi said he agrees with residents that there should not be an entrance to the facility on Spackenkill Road.
“It’s a dangerous stretch of road; it’s on a hill and it gets slippery during the winter,” he said.
Tancredi hopes to meet with DOT officials this month to propose alternatives, including aligning the Boardman/Spackenkill traffic light with an entrance to Colburn that currently sits several hundred feet to the west, widening Boardman to include left and right turning lanes and levels the grade of the western approach to the Boardman/Spackenkill light.
Tancredi said the neighborhood meeting allowed the neighbors to air their concerns to church officials, including Pastor Edward Jones, something that Tancredi did as well.
“I recognize that the church owns the property and has the right to build but I’ve asked the pastor to be sensitive to the concerns of the neighbors and I hope he will be. This is a long-term relationship and it serves everybody best to make sure its done right,” he said.
Too much asphalt
Colburn Drive resident Doreen Tignanelli is concerned about the environmental aspects of having a “sea of asphalt” for a parking lot, as well as safety concerns arising from the increased traffic flow.
“There will be accidents at the top and bottom of that hill,” she said.
Tignanelli and other residents would like to see the planning board issue a positive environmental impact declaration, meaning that the project has one or more significant environmental impacts, thus triggering a draft environmental impact statement be prepared, with alternatives to the current site plan offered up.
“We would like to see the project downsized and an alternate road situation implemented,” she said.
Spackenkill Road homeowners such as Joseph and Aguis, who would ideally prefer to see the land remain open space, would like to see significant changes if the project is to go forward.
Joseph said she would like an increased buffer distance between the construction and the road, as well as the church-funded fencing on both sides of the road to minimize noise and light pollution.
“ I shouldn’t be impositioned,” she said.
Aguis, like Joseph, would like to see the parking spaces in the site plan downsized to around 400 and wants the church to compensate neighbors for any decreased property value arising from the construction project.
“(The church) should be responsible for any loss of equity due to construction,” he said.
Repeated calls to Pastor Jones seeking comment were not returned by press time. The public hearing into the proposed project is set to resume on Sept. 20.