West Monroe town master plan committee meeting,
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Town Master Plan Committee
The West Monroe town board has formed a town master plan committee (TMPC) to review the town master plan and develop recommendations for updates and changes.
The town master plan committee has established a meeting schedule. The committee meets at the West Monroe Town Hall, 46 County Route 11, West Monroe, New York. Each meeting will start at 6:30 pm on the dates below and will normally be 2 hours long. Part of the meeting will be a 15 minute public questions and answer period at the end. The only exception to this will be the two public meetings, public hearing and final report to the Town Board. They will have their own formal agenda as part of the process.
The next meeting of the town master plan committee will be Tuesday, August 5 at the West Monroe Town Hall, 46 County Route 11, West Monroe, New York.
A complete schedule of meetings, with a printable version of the schedule, can be found on the Schedule page. (Schedule updated Tuesday, July 28.)
Documents associated with the master plan update can be found on the Documents page.
News
The third draft of the final report of the master plan update committee has been posted to the Documents page.
"Why Prepare a Comprehensive Plan" has been posted to the Documents page.
The Master Plan Committee has established an e-mail address, masterplan@townofwestmonroe-ny.us. Please use this e-mail address for any questions, comments or suggestions you have regarding the master plan and the master plan update process. Any e-mail received may be posted to the Master Plan update web site, may be edited for length or content, and may be included in other documents. Please keep comments civil, and we look forward to your e-mail as a vital part of the master plan update process.
Report #9 (below) has been posted to the Documents page.
Keeping You, the Residents Informed
West Monroe Master Plan Committee Update -- by Doug Fuegel
Sewers, a Key Ingredient of a Successful Master Plan - Where, Why and Who Pays
Cross over the bridge, I-81 Bridge that is at New York Route 49 and what do we see? Well I guess it all depends upon which way you are traveling, if you are heading west the first thing you see is a couple very busy fast food restaurants, the Golden Arches and across the way home to the big burger. Go a bit further and you see a super Wal-Mart, a busy convenience store, bowling ally, a couple busy banks, drug store, liquor store, health center and the list goes on. If you take a fast right off I-81 at exit 32 you encounter a couple convenience stores that sell fuel, a restaurant, a beauty shop, propane dealer and an auto repair shop and oh yes an off track betting parlor. Is there a tremendous difference in the tax base from one side of the bridge to the other, and are there differences in the tremendous amount of services offered? You bet there is. Sure we West Monroe residents can cross the bridge and benefit from these businesses with little trouble but who is reaping the benefits because of their location? How many of you reading this knows that I-81 is the boundary line between the Town of West Monroe and the Town of Hastings? One major difference from one side of this bridge to the other is to the west in the Town of Hastings there are municipal sewers and water, to the east of the bridge in West Monroe there is water but no sewers. Life offers no guarantees and would sewers east of I-81 into our town be the silver bullet, who knows; but the fact remains the commercial businesses in the Town of Hastings within eye sight of West Monroe are light years ahead of us in terms of tax base and services says a lot. Would Wal-Mart be where they are without sewers, of course not?
The West Monroe Master Plan Committee learned early on from our hired professional planner James Kent that residential only cannot sustain the services required by the community; that is a national accepted fact concerning real property and community planning. Of the more than 50 plus items the committee listed as desirable for the town plan four critical items jump out as key and foremost for success; zoning, infrastructure, hamlet and Oneida Lake access. Concerning infrastructure the committee deliberated long and hard that in order to attract big box commercial to our town, sewers were a must; the logical location for a sewer district to accomplish that goal was the New York Route 49 corridor starting from the town line at I-81 and extending eastward to approximately County Route 11. Discussion also entered into the possibility of extending the sewer district a bit north and south on County Route 37 at the Route 49 intersection. The final decision concerning the overall scope of the sewer project will be finalized by the town board and the landowners involved along the proposed route through public meetings and public hearings.
One item should be very clear to all West Monroe residents concerning cost and who pays. Although all residents will ultimately benefit by having commercial businesses establish throughout the corridor in reduced traveling to obtain services and goods, and increased tax base for the town it will be the landowners along the sewer route that will bear the cost burden. In this regard the town will make every effort to obtain state and federal grant funds to ease the burden.
As a very long time resident of West Monroe we have come to expect to drive great distances to places as the Carousal Mall or Great Northern Mall for many of our needs but it really does not have to be that way. First every purchase we make at these outlining places only adds to the sales tax collected by our southern neighbor, Onondaga County, it is our loss and secondly the north shore of Oneida Lake does have the population to support commercial big box growth. Even with sewers growth probably will not happen much in the next five years or more but with a sewer district we have a better than even chance of attracting new businesses and an ever increasing tax base.
As always our goal is to keep you the West Monroe residents informed; my next column will hopefully give you a much better understanding of our "commercial land use" within the town; where is it and what is it. And as always we urge residents to attend our meetings; the complete schedule is listed on our web site at www.townofwestmonroe-ny.us
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