French American School of New York representatives say they are being unfairly targeted by a zoning measure being studied by White Plains that would cap development on golf courses to 5 percent of the property.
The White Plains Common Council on May 14 extended a city-wide moratorium on open-space developments ”“ which has been in effect for more than a year ”“ through Sept. 17 while consultants working for the city continue to study the potential implications of the controversial amendment.
If approved, the amendment to the city”™s comprehensive plan would require 300-foot buffers between buildings on specified open-space properties and neighboring homes, in addition to capping development on such properties at 5 percent of the parcel.
The most recent extension of the open-space moratorium, which was set to expire May 17, represents the latest challenge facing FASNY, which in January 2011 acquired the former Ridgeway Country Club for $11 million, where it plans to consolidate its pre-kindergarten through 12th grade programs.
FASNY submitted its draft environmental impact statement to the council May 21, and had scheduled a public meeting open to city residents for June 9. There, school officials hoped to share their plans for a $60 million, 45-acre campus and an adjoining 84-acre public conservancy.
More than 35,000 invitations to the meeting were mailed out, FASNY said.
At the meeting, school officials and consultants working on the project planned to present the current design plans, including several measures aimed at eliminating traffic backflows at a cost of $1 million to the school.
Mischa Zabotin, chairman of the FASNY board of trustees, said the school would take legal action to ensure it doesn”™t become the victim of the proposed zoning amendment, which he said was initially floated just weeks after FASNY officials closed on the acquisition of the 129-acre country club.
“In zoning, you zone areas, not owners,” Zabotin said. “So this moratorium, which was proposed after we bought the property and constructed in such a way as to make our plan unfeasible, would not, I think, hold (against) a legal challenge.”
Zabotin added that the moratorium “doesn”™t look like it was done for any other reason than to make it difficult for us to go through with our plan.”
White Plains Mayor Thomas Roach vehemently denied that any parties were being targeted by the moratorium or the proposed zoning changes.
“This is a big city, and the study that we”™re doing on the land use, on vast areas of land, is not directed at anyone,” Roach said. “You can”™t always make everyone happy but at the end of the day you have to do your due diligence ”¦ and that”™s the way I view it.”
In the meantime, FASNY and the Common Council are moving forward in the approvals process.
Despite disagreeing over the legal merits of the proposed zoning amendment, Zabotin said the Common Council has acted in a “judicial manner” in working with the school to ensure that any environmental concerns are properly addressed.
“The (FASNY) technical team is talking to the city all the time and presumably answering questions that have been asked by the Common Council through the agencies,” he said. “So I think there”™s been a pretty robust dialogue going on there to make sure this plan is as tight and complete as it could be.”
The next step in the process is for the council to review the school”™s draft EIS to ensure it is complete and in line with the scope the council adopted late last fall. The document will then be returned to FASNY for school representatives to answer any lingering questions, and a public hearing on the draft EIS could be held as early as September.
