Residents object to changes of revised dock code: Lengthy meeting at Town Hall on issue

Following the second public hearing on changes to the Town Code regarding docks, it appears if any changes are to be made, it will take time to review and see if it’s going to pass muster with the public.

It was anticipated the Town Board at Tuesday’s work session would begin discussion of what they heard Monday night, but with Councilmen Albert Dickson and Benjamin Dyett unable to attend the Monday session, they needed time to watch the recorded session and gather their thoughts.

Tuesday’s was the final session of 2024 since the Dec. 30 Town Board meeting has been canceled.

That means it would be some time in January before any discussion of the dock code changes could happen.

Bayman Bert Waife challenged the Town Board during the discussion, raising a question of why so much time was being spent on the dock code while there has been no perceptible action on the issues of potable water and septics in the Center.

“Who’s going to lead the Town for the next few years” and resolve those issues? he asked.

Supervisor Amber Brach-Williams was ready for him on that challenge. She said a meeting is slated in January with Town Engineer Joe Finora presenting information on the need to deal with a mandate to provide potable water to Center public buildings.

There’s money awarded through the federal Environmental Protection Agency earmarked for a central septic system to serve municipal and other public buildings in the Center.

The Town is exploring whether that money can be used to cure the potable water situation that has been handled through temporary measures on the local level.

Details on what systems are to be used could begin to come into focus in January, the supervisor said.

At the same time, she said having only a four-member Town Board through all but the last week was partly the reason for not being able to tackle all issues she would have liked to see started in the first year of her administration.

Returning to the dock code, the Town Board heard from a parade of speakers. What most speakers requested was scrapping the revised code and maintaining the existing code with a few tweaks to clarify language and to grandfather in existing docks or those in the pipeline that were stopped by a moratorium, and allow anyone with a dock that’s damaged to replace it in kind.

The revised code would put a dock owner through the entire process with its attendant fees and time spent filing a long application. What’s more, if they got an exemption on the original dock that allowed for any change to what the code allows, they would not get that exemption on the replacement dock.

Former councilman Peter Reich, a long-time liaison from the Town Board to the Waterways Management Advisory Council, charged the WMAC and Town Board were guilty of overreach, spending time trying to solve problems that don’t exist. To the argument that shorelines were unsafe to allow docks, he said, “unsafe is very arbitrary.”

The process of gaining approval for a dock, Mr. Reich said, can cost between $10,000 to $15,000, and doesn’t include the fee for actual construction. Requiring expensive environmental review when the State Department of Environmental Conservation has already certified that part of the application is an unnecessary duplication, Mr. Reich said.

Al Loreto, with 17 years on the WMAC, called the latest draft a document that needs a rewrite. He said the Town Board is “anti-dock,” adding, “I think we have other problems in Town that require more attention.”

Former WMAC chairman John Needham denounced additional bureaucracy that comes at a significant expense to those who wish to gain dock permits. He also said he doesn’t have a lot of faith in environmental consultants.

Mike Anglin, who was a longtime member of the WMAC and operated a marina, raised many of the same issues about the time and cost of gaining a permit. Numerous residents complained riparian rights — the right of residents to have access to the water — were being compromised. They complained about governmental interference and what they viewed as unnecessary restrictions.

Only one speaker defended dock code changes — Bill Geraghty, chairman of the Waterways Management Advisory Council — who led the effort to rewrite the code.

Toward the end of the 2 1/2 hour hearing, he defended the changes recommended, saying they were developed because of the number of dock applications “coming at us.”

There been an increase in the number of applications each year — eight in 2019, but 18 in 2023. In addition, in 2019, six of the eight applicants sought variances from the code; in 2023, 13 of the 18 applicants were seeking waivers from the code, “proving the code was not sufficient,” Mr. Geraghty said.

People were trying to build docks in locations that didn’t make sense, he added. Many provisions of the existing code are vague, making it difficult to enforce rulings; what’s needed is specific language, he said.