“According to Town records provided to the Trustees, the deck was never permitted. The Town Code states that no work can be done on a non-permitted structure.”

When was the deck built? When was the Town Code revised to state “that no work can be done on a non-permitted structure”? What exceptions are provided for and what is the penalty status of existing non-permitted structures?

If a structure was built prior to applicable “Town Code” and then an application for a permit is made, what version of “Town Code” is applicable to the permit application? What is the penalty status of the presently “non-permitted” structure?

Does the town maintain a detailed record of “Town Code” provision applicability vs date? Or is the “current” configuration of “Town Code” the only version that is maintained?

It has been stated that current position of the Town is that existing permits do not transfer with a transfer of property ownership and that a transfer to the new owner requires application for transfer, including (re)inspection and (re)evaluation. I have been advised that this “seems to run counter to general rule which provides that variances and permits affecting the land run with the land, not the person owning the land”. Please advise the details of any {new} policy regarding permit and variance durability.

Please remember that the Town Board, not the Trustees, adapt and/or consider amendments to the Town Code. The Trustees must use the Town Code when making decisions.

Dave

Dave Bergen
Town Trustee

Let me start off by saying that I have grown up on Peconic Bay, learned to sail at Old Cove Yacht Club and currently keep a boat in New Suffolk. My college degree was in biology with an academic emphasis in marine biology, to include some graduate level coursework in fisheries biology. I have sailed our bays for many years, so I do consider myself very well aware of our waters from both a users perspective and an environmental perspective. By the way, the President recently signed the new clean water act which does NOT include the need for all recreational boaters to obtain a Federal permit for their grey water discharge system or their holding tank systems. But I digress. While I might not like very loud and fast boats, I do not find boats in general to be annoying. Technology has made excellent strides with addressing the level of pollution which results from boat engines. Add to this the new Federal law which addresses the requirement of holding tanks plus the Town’s purchase of two pump out boats and a local law which requires all marinas who are upgrading their facilities to include pump out stations, leads me to disagree with the statement that all boaters are polluters.

I believe that I have made my stance on some of these issues clear already. The town has now invited the opinion of several experts from the State who have all stated that “science” should not be used as a reason to ban docks in the bays. I feel that the Town Board should come up with a dock test similar to the one which the Trustees currently use in our consideration of applications for docks in the creeks, for docks in the bays, then leave it to the Trustees to grant or deny permits based upon these criteria. The zoning of the bays does have merit when taking into consideration all the different types of marine uses. I believe that a policy can be developed which can take into consideration the needs of the environment, the need for public access, what we would like our shorelines to look like and the rights of private property owners. Common sense should allow for this to happen. At the most recent dock meeting, a comment was made that as there are about 1000 lots on the water in our bays which do not have docks, there is the potential right now for 1000 additional docks being approved for the bays. The reality is that I do not see any local Board allowing this to happen.

I had worked with Steve Resler on dredging issues over the past several years. Steve is currently retired, so my understanding is that his current opinions are his own, not those of the Department of State. I hold him in high regard and find his input important. Saying that, I strongly disagreed with some of his comments made at the meetings. Government should not simply take a huge, lenghty comprehensive document such as the LWRP and use it to say no to everything. The information contained in the LWRP is very valuable when it comes to planning, and should be used as part of the consideration of permit requests. But I do not agree that the Town should use it to simply say no to almost everything, ignoring opportunites for mitigation. Property owners do have rights which should not be ignored.

I am pleased that the Town Board is including input from the Trustees as they continue to develop policy. This is very important as it will be the Trustees, unless the Courts or the Town Board determines otherwise, who will be using the policies to approve or disapprove permit applications. The input from Southold VOICE and every Southold citizen is also important. The value of yours and other’s input has already been demonstrated as what was first stated was the need for a total ban of residential docks has been amended as the group is now considering areas where docks might be OK. Thank you for requesting our input. As always, I remain available to discuss these or other matters with your members.

Dave Bergen
Southold Trustee

Sincerely,
Jill Doherty

Bob Ghosio Jr. wrote, responding to the questions John Kramer presented at the last worksession:

“While I’ve said in the past that I would like to see zoning used as an effective tool for planning the future of our community, it needs to be done in a responsible manner. The community doesn’t want homes impacting Great Pond? Fine. But zone it properly so that someone buying the property in that zone does NOT have a reasonable expectation to be able to build there. Do not zone it residential then fight when the property owner wants to build. That’s backwards in my opinion.”

This is a refreshingly candid and reasoned statement. However, I would note that past [and current] practice of Southold Town boards to engage in “ratcheting” [some would call it blackmail!] in an effort to extract, from applicants, agreement to carry out often unrelated actions as “the price” for application approval, make planning, on the part of the residents of Southold, difficult if not impossible. Want house changes approved? Agree to tear down a 30 year old waterfront deck! Want a 40 year old dock retroactively “approved” so that you can make repairs “legal”? Agree to tear up a 40 year old fence! Want a small storage shed approved? Agree to backfit gutters, downspouts and dry wells to your 25 year old residence! Etcetera, etcetera and so forth.

Realistic planning, on the part of Southold residents and potential future residents is being made impossible by the efforts of board members to “retrofit virginity”. It is impossible to plan, today, for the adverse impact, say ten years in the future, of board member efforts to retrofit not yet existing regulations upon projects to be completed this year. One can never have “a reasonable expectation”, relative to the impact upon existing structures and presently anticipated projects, of arbitrary future enforcement of regulations that do not yet exist.

The town needs to stop “retro” tradeoff ratcheting and concentrate on future looking fair and enlightened enforcement of presently existing regulations relative to current projects.

Dan Christianson

I’m on vacation in CT but didn’t want to wait much longer before responding to the questions John gave us at the last work session. I will try to keep my response brief.

I attended the NOAA workshop at Peconic Landing which was organized by the Southold Conservation Advisory Council and the DOS meeting with Steve Resler concerning Southold’s LWRP. I was not able to attend the DOS meeting on docks on the bay.

As for the NOAA presentation on visual and aesthetic impacts of small docks goes, I found the presentation to be less biased than I expected. I felt the seminar addressed issues in a fair and balanced manner, even going so far as to show science that indicates that perhaps use of CCA on docks is not as bad as once thought. Coincidentally, while I think this is good news, I am not apt to change my stance against CCA since there are viable alternatives that have zero leachates that can damage the environment. I am interested to learn more about the formulas NOAA has developed to quantify aesthetic impacts of docks since I always believed (and still believe) aesthetics to be a subjective criterion. The worries concerning “build out” are legitimate but I believe, as NOAA was bold enough to acknowledge, that this is a very political subject. Part of Southold’s challenge is going to be setting the parameters to define when “build out” will occur and how we will address it as it approaches. Interesting to note was the negative comments about this seminar from both the group favoring docks and the group against docks. For me, this is evidence of the balanced nature of the report.

The comments Steve Resler of DOS made at the meeting I attended seemed to be deliberately polarizing. I can’t even venture a guess as to why. Though characterized as “sitting around the table like the cat who ate the fish out of the fish bowl”, I thought I was pretty vocal in expressing that I was not happy with Resler’s “us against them” approach to decision making. I said to Mr. Resler that I prefer a government that helps the citizen by telling them, as Scott Russell has said, what they CAN do…… not what they CANNOT do. Mr. Resler’s response was an emphatic “NO, government is about telling people what they cannot do and the courts will back you up on that.” Not only is this very off-putting, it’s also dangerous.

I was also pretty vocal about my dislike of the LWRP in its current format. At this meeting were quite a few people, both elected and civil servants, who are supposed to administer the town’s LWRP and no one seems to agree on how it should be done. Resler’s approach is to follow the LWRP to the letter and not even accept an application if the LWRP wouldn’t find it consistent with policy. This of course would mean we would accept only a few applications per year, since the LWRP finds most applications to be inconsistent. None of the officials in the room, with the exception of maybe one, seemed to be comfortable with this approach since it leaves no room for mitigation. I think that by and large, most people, elected or otherwise, are not altogether comfortable with the governmental taking of personal property rights, either directly or through legislation. Admittedly, there are some who are in town positions, who believe it better to preserve open space and animal habitat no matter what the cost to individual rights, but I do not perceive this to be the majority.

I do not agree with the assertion that property rights are not an important consideration to policy, but it’s also not the only consideration. When protecting the rights of one property owner can have a deleterious effect on another property owner (including property owned by the community as a whole, a.k.a. the common lands or public trust), that’s when a board such as the ZBA or Trustees needs to be involved in the process. The question of whether to allow docks on the bay and where to allow them is important because the more docks there are, the more they infringe on public domain. At some point, the community needs to decide on a policy prior to so-called “build out.” Otherwise, we will reach build out and then have to make a knee jerk decision to end building docks altogether rather than a have planned approach. I advocate a planned approach. While the Trustees should perhaps be part of the process, ultimately it is the Town Board who will set the legislation for this planned approach. Personally, I welcome that and look forward to having a policy that the community is happy with, to help us make decisions. Hopefully, the policy will be a bit more user friendly than the current LWRP.

While I’ve said in the past that I would like to see zoning used as an effective tool for planning the future of our community, it needs to be done in a responsible manner. The community doesn’t want homes impacting Great Pond? Fine, but zone it properly so that someone buying the property in that zone does NOT have a reasonable expectation to be able to build there. Do not zone it residential then fight when the property owner wants to build. That’s backwards in my opinion.

Same goes for “passive” recreational uses on the bay. All in all, areas of passive use might be nice, but don’t create those zones at the risk of losing the active uses. And if we are to create them, then create them now, so that water front property owners and buyers both know what can be expected in their zone now and in the future. The bay is big enough for areas of both active and passive use. And it’s the active uses that drive our economy. It would be dangerous and stupid to try to eliminate them. But if having areas of passive use can enhance the habitat that drives the active use, I would not be against zoning that area “passive”. This could even include an area of natural view shed. Just like those who come here to enjoy the vistas afforded us by our farmlands, there are those who come here to enjoy our natural shorelines. Those people keep boats in our marinas, eat at our restaurants and sleep in our hotels. There is a justification for protecting that view shed, just not at every turn and in every inlet or bay. Active uses must be protected as well.

And just for the record, I do not find boats to be annoying nor polluting if operated and maintained properly. Some boaters can be pretty annoying though. . . .

And finally, as for an attempt to neuter the Trustees role, there are those who would like to see the Trustees role lessened to a great degree. This is evidenced by a lawsuit currently filed that challenges the very existence of the Trustees. I do not believe, however, that this is the mission of the Town Board as a whole, nor of the group working on crafting dock regulations.

I hope this helps you understand my thoughts on these issues. Thank you for taking the time to attend our meetings and ask questions.

Sincerely,

Bob Ghosio Jr.
Southold Town Trustee

If existing structures become “nonconforming preexisting structures” zoning laws make the elimination of these structures the zoning goal.

I and other SoutholdVOICE volunteers will be watching and reporting as this legislation begins to take shape.