TOWN OF MANLIUS – The public will have the opportunity to sound off on the Hoag Lane subdivision during a public hearing with the Manlius Planning Board on Monday, Feb. 22. The meeting will take place over Zoom.
The planning board has debated the controversial 21-home project, proposed near Hoag and Shiraz lanes, for about three years.
In January, the Manlius Planning Board accepted a draft environmental impact statement from the developer, Tom Douglas. The lengthy report was prepared after the planning board determined in August that the project would have a significant environmental impact, requiring the developer to respond to a series of questions about mitigating those impacts. Board members noted that accepting the statement does not imply that they agreed with the developer’s mitigation plans, only that the statement had been fully prepared.
Also in January, Vaughn Lang, the attorney for the developer, filed a lawsuit against Douglas Miller, the Manlius town engineer, alleging that Miller has made a series of false statements causing delays to the project.
“There are so many alternate facts that are in the environment here, that have been said over and over and over again,” attorney Vaughn Lang said. “There comes a point where you have to say ‘enough.’”
Last week, the planning board briefly discussed the upcoming hearing and Planning Board Chairman Joe Lupia said he was considering working with the town board to draft a local law that would prohibit taking down trees on a development site before the necessary permits are received. Over the summer, members of the planning board bristled when they discovered that a number of trees were chopped down on the site before they granted the necessary approvals for site work to begin.
Lang said when the trees were cut down, they were not removed and the roots and stumps were left intact so as not to disturb the ground, which would have been illegal.
Because of the large number of speakers expected, the planning board has requested that those wanting to speak sign up for a five-minute time slot. The registration form is available at townofmanlius.org. The meeting begins at 6:30 p.m.
