Town Board - Regular Meeting

One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Opening Shelby, do you want to start us off with correspondence? Um, yes. We just received one letter from Kathleen Gerard resigning from the Community Preservation Fund um advisory board effective April 30th, 2026. That was it.

Also received it. Um actually that was it on close. Um one thing is total correspondence sort of um we open up to the public if anyone has any questions on resolutions. Um before we start on the resolutions just double check here. So I had received something from Pam Demeris. Pam, did you want to go through it or would you like me to just go through what you emailed the questions? No, supervisor, it's fine if you go through it and and just give the answers to what I asked. That'll be great. Thank you.

All right. Um, so on one of the resolutions, we are um authorizing and directing to execute an agreement between the town of Shel Island and BBS architecture. And Pam's question for was this undisclosed work put out for bid and yes, it was. We received four proposals. Um and then we the this one that we're selecting BBS architecture met our needs and happened to also meet our budget. Um this agreement is for the facilities master plan and on March 31st um Joe Fenora our town engineer will um give us a presentation and a work session to just go over sort of a summary of what the facilities master plan um will entail, the scope um what we're hoping to accomplish. Um this project is specific to all town um buildings and departments and the projected cost is $58,790. Um the next item was the authoriz authorization to sign a non-binding letter of intent between Shelter Island and Community Development Long Island and Urban Builders Collaborative LLC. And this um was recently um revised letter of intent has been reviewed by the town attorney. Um it wasn't done with the town board in a public forum because it's not um required to be nor should it be because it is a contract that we were negotiating. So it's subject to executive session. Um any further questions can always be directed to um Thomas on that. Um it was drafted by the community housing board's um attorney Miriam Mgrim. And um was is the town board certain there's no imprecise language that can unintentionally make the entire document a binding contract? And um we well we are not lawyers except for Benjamin. Our um attorney did go through it to make sure that we are protected. The next question um is a good one. Um, it's authorizing and directing to execute a license agreement between the

town of Shelter Island and the Shelter Island Historical Society concerning parking. Um, and it should be the Shelter Island Museum. So, thank you for that. We will make that correction as we read through the um resolutions. Um, there was also a question about $7,000 $7,160 budget transfer for 2025 from the super um the town board. No, I guess it's supervisor's ADP account. um and school and travel $69 to town board professional services to cover additional legal fees. And the question was what were these additional legal fees? And in 2025, as people recall, we did not have um a town attorney who was an employee at the start of last year. So, we had to search for a replacement and in the interim, we had a firm um contracted with the firm until a new arrangement could be found. And so, um, with the employee town attorney not covering things, um, we had higher than expected legal fees last year. And the last question was, there's 2025 general claim funds number 2562 through 2594 in the amount of $17,7423 cents that were approved for payment as audited. Um, and what was um, these payments for? Um it the abstract is foilable um at the town clerk's office but 75% of that was for payments to the EMS volunteers um for their travel mileage. the town does not have a um did not have sufficient budget for that, but we did receive um and it's being accepted as a deposit um a grant from the educ um the foundation that supports um EMS for 12,600 I believe or 12,800. And so with those funds, those payments to the um EMS volunteers for using their cars to show up at scenes could be reimbursed for that. And then there's just some other, you know, late bills.

We reconciled Pakosis and noticed a couple missing invoices and then a few late um invoices that just came in towards the end of the year. But those will be the last of um expenditures that can go back um be approved for 2025 because we've closed the window as of this meeting um and everything else will now have to go into 2026. So, thank you for your questions, Pam. Thank you for your responses. I appreciate it. Y um Stephen Jacobs.

Hi, Stephen Jacobs. Um respectfully, I don't think those answers are satisfactory, at least with respect to the uh two resolutions that are buried on page 22 of 29, the agenda. Um the website contains an array of documents The public can see Mr. Soft's application to do business on town property, but it can't see either this agreement, which is obviously important, nor can it see this letter of intent. And the excuse that it's not legally required may hold water in a law court, but respectfully, I don't think it holds water in a court of public. And while you may think that you're advancing and expediting your agenda by operating like this, I don't think that really is in your long-term interest because I think continuing this practice of hiding the ball from the public. A little bit of information at the end of the day breeds public mistrust. and public mistrust, not just for the particular items that you're not being truly meaningfully transparent about, but about everything you're doing. So, I would suggest I would urge that you can change your ways and you can change your ways tonight by deferring a final vote on those two resolutions until the public has had an opportunity to see for themselves what's in there. Thank you. Any other questions on resolutions? Anyone on Zoom?

We can call for discussion when we get to those and see what the board thinks. It starts process.

All right. Um, resolve that the town board of the town of Shelter Island hereby directs that a public hearing be held on April 6, 2026 at 6 p.m. or a soon thereafter prevailing time to hear any and all persons either for or against a local law entitled a local law amending chapters 115 taxation article 6 exemption for volunteer firefighters and ambulance workers. And then I'm going to just direct uh everyone's attention just to the two sections that are being changed. So under A4 um we're changing this from 5 to 2 years. I'm going to read this. The applicant has been certified by the authority having jurisdiction for the incorporated volunteer fire company or fire department as enrolled member of such incorporated volunteer fire company or fire department for at least two years or the applicant has been certified by the authority having jurisdiction for the incorporated voluntary ambulance service as an enrolled member of such incorporated voluntary ambulance service for at least two years. Um and then the next section that's going to change is C2. And this is um basically the unmarried volunteer the unremarried sorry the unremarried spouse of a volunteer firefighter or volunteer ambulance worker killed in the line of duty may continue the above exemption if two such deceased volunteer has been an enrolled member for at least 2 years. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I I coaching carried. Whereas Kyle and Thomas Walsh of 28 Dino Rock Road a petition the town of Shelter Island for permission to install a moing at a location designated as latitude 41.09915 09915 degrees north and longitude 72.3429 degrees west 0-2955. Now therefore be resolved that pursuant to section 90-5 of the code of the town of Shelter Isles, a public hearing will be held at 6 p.m. or as soon thereafter prevailing time on the 6th day of April 2026 in the Shelter Island Town Hall Shelter Island, New York for all interested persons to be heard in favor of or in opposition to the proposed installation. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I I motion carried.

Whereas Steven Rosa Millia, 22 New York Avenue, has petitioned the town of Shelter Island for permission to relocate a moing at a location designated as C 3636 to a location designated as latitude 41.0665° north and longitude 72.36470° west, Earth W6008. Now therefore, be it resolved that pursuant to section 90-5 of the town code of the town of Shelter Island, a public hearing will be held at 6 PM or as soon thereafter prevailing time on the 6th day of April, 2026 in Shelter Island Town Hall, Shelter Island, New York for all interested persons to be heard in favor of or in opposition to the proposed relocation. So move. Second.

All in favor?

Motion carried. Whereas Adam Ranzone, 37A West Morland Drive, has petitioned the town of Shelter Island for permission to relocate a moing a location designated as W3559 to a location designated as latitude 41.0 5670 degrees north and longitude 72.35787 degrees west. birth W2789 formally occupied by John T. Conway. Now therefore be it resolved that pursuant to section 90 90-5 of town code of town shelter island a public hearing will be held at 6:00 p.m. or soon thereafter prevailing time on the 6th day of April 2026 in the Shelter Island town hall Shelter Island New York for all interested persons to be heard in favor of or in opposition to the proposed relocation. So move

second. All in favor? I. Motion carries.

Whereas Steve and Cynthia Rudolph, three sheep pasture Lane, have petitioned the town of Shelter Island for permission to install a mooring at a location designated as latitude 41.08861° north and longitude 72.32301° west, birth number 3719, formerly occupied by Quinn Eddie. Now therefore, be it resolved that pursuant to section 90-5 of the town code of the town of Shelter Island, a public hearing will be held at 6 PM or as soon thereafter prevailing time on the 6th day of April, 2026 and the Shelter Island Town Hall, Shelter Island, New York for all interested persons to be heard in favor of or in opposition to the proposed insulation. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I

I motion carried. Whereas Bridhore LLC pair of John Iker and David Witska has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. And whereas the nature of the business is a ship toshore launch service at Crescent Beach is outlined in the application. And whereas the applicant has submitted that a $350 application fee. And whereas the town board has reviewed the application and determined that the granting of the license is in the best interest of the town of Shelter Island. Now therefore be it resolved that Bridhore LLC is hereby granted a license to operate the business as outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. A a submission of an additional $150 to satisfy the full $500 application fee. B. The lency must provide the town clerk to the town clerk proof of general liability insurance including the town as an additional insured and proof of workers comp workers compensation coverage or proof of exemption from workers compensation. C. The proposed 10x10 tent shall be located on the east end of Crescent Beach and said tent cannot be larger than 10x10. D. Proposed tent shall be removed at the end of each day. E. The location of the lenc's business is subject to review and adjustments by the Shelter Island Police Department and/or the Shelter Island Highway Department. F. The area of the business beach setup cannot be larger than 20 by 20. G. The business operation shall not exceed the period between May 15th and September 30th, 2026. H. The hours of operation cannot exceed 11:00 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. I. There shall be no parking spot guaranteed in connection with this application. J. The lency shall not cone off any empty parking spot at any time. K. The LE is responsible for the daily disposal

of trash created in connection with the operation of the business. L. The disposal of the trash shall be in different receptacles than those provided by the town at the beaches. M. The l e possesses all other necessary federal, state, and county licenses. and the license is subject to the execution of a commercial use license with the town and resolved that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit at its discretion and be it further resolved that the town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and Ridore LLC. So move second. All in favor?

I motion carried. Whereas Bon Spa uh Care of Alexander Roy has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. And whereas the nature of the business is to offer therapeutic massages and physical therapy at Crescent Beach as outlined in the application. Whereas the town board has reviewed the application and determined that the granting of the license is in the best interest of the town of Shelter Islands. Now therefore be resolved that Bonswa is hereby granted a license to operate the business as outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. I'm only going to read the conditions that are different from the ones in the prior application. So, the submission of $500 to satisfy the application fee. The business operation shall not exceed the period between May 15th and September 14th of 2026. Hours of operation cannot exceed 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Area of the business may not be larger than 400 square ft. There shall be no more than two 10x10 tents. Then, the proposed storage locker shall be located within the 400 ft area. Be resolved that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit at its discretion and be it further resolved that the town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and Bon Spa. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I motion carried. Did you have something?

Where is Kira Morcraftoft has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. whereas the nature of the business is to offer 45minute certified instructor-led Matt Pilates classes at Ways Beach as outlined in the application and and I'm going to do as Meg did and only highlight the um the subject following conditions um that aren't that are different submission of $100 to satisfy the application fee. Um they will be subject to certificate of liability insurance and proof of workers comp. It's going to be located at Wade's Beach and shall operate in the location is generally outlined in the application. It will be subject to review by the Police Department and SH Highway Department. The business shall operate between May 23rd and September 5th, 2026. The hours and days of operation cannot exceed 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. on Saturdays and Wednesdays. Um, the area of the business shall not be larger than 20 x 20 ft or 400 square ft. They shall have no parking spot guaranteed. They cannot phone off an empty parking spot. They are responsible for daily disposal of trash in different receptacles. Um the license um possesses all of the other necess lency possesses all other necessary federal, state and county licenses and is subject to the execution of commercial use license with the town. resolved that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit at its discretion and be it further resolved that the town supervisor over is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and Carol Morcraft. So moved

second. All in favor? I motion carried.

Whereas between the fours LLC doing business as the islander has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. Whereas the nature of the business is a food truck at Crescent Beach as outlined in in the application. And whereas the applicant has submitted the $350 application fee. And whereas the town board has reviewed the application, determined that the granting of license the best interest of the town of Shelter Island. Now therefore be it resolved that between the forts LLC doing business as the islander is hereby granted a license to operate the business as outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. Um I'm not sure what's same and what's not. So um the lency provides to the town clerk auto insurance information in which the town is included as additional insured as well as providing proof of general liability insurance and proof of workers compensation coverage and proof of exemption from workers compensation. B. Food truck shall be located east of the gazebo on Crescent Beach in a spot designated by the town of Shelter Island. C. The food truck shall not block said gazebo. D. The location of the license of the business subject to review and adjustment by the Shelter Island Police Department and/or the Shelter Island Highway Department. Excuse me. Uh E. The business operation shall not exceed the period between May 23rd and September 7th, 2026. F. The hours of operation cannot exceed 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. G. There shall be no additional parking spot guaranteed in connection with this application. H. The lency shall not um cone off any empty parking space at any time.

I the license is responsible for daily disposal of trash created in connection with operation of the business. J. Uh the disposal of this trash shall be in different receptacles than those provided by the town at the beaches. K. The lency possesses other necessary federal, state, and county licenses. L. The lency shall adhere to vehicle and traffic law section 1225B. M. Generator shall be under 65 dB from a distance of 25 ft. N. The lency shall obtain an operating permit from the town of Shelter Island building department. O. The license is subject to the execution of a commercial use license with the town and resolve that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit in its at its discretion and be it further resolved that the town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and between the Forks LLC doing business as the island so Second.

All in favor? I I motion carries.

Whereas Memed Sav doing business as Mr. Softy has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. And whereas the nature of the business is an ice cream truck is outlined in the application. And whereas the applicant has submitted the $350,000 $350 application fee. Yeah. Now we Whereas the town board has reviewed the application to determine that the granting of the license is in the best interest of the town of Shelter Island. Now therefore be it resolved that Memed Sever doing business as Mr. Softies is hereby granted a license to operate the business as outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. The lency provides to the town clerk proof of auto insurance and proof of workers compensation coverage or proof of exemption from workers compensation. The lences shall park on the west side of the Wes Beach parking lot. The lences shall park on the north side of the Crescent Beach in the designated area to the east of the gazebo and shall park on the south side of Crescent Beach where parking transitions from perpendicular to parallel parking. The lency shall not block or sell ice cream near or in the crosswalk by Sunset Beach, Hotel Restaurant, and shall not block or stop to sell ice cream between the two areas as designated in condition C. E. The location of the lences business is subject to review and adjustment by the Shelter Island Police Department and the Shelter Island Highway Department. The business operator shall not exceed the period between May 1 and September 20, 2026. The hours of operation cannot exceed 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. The lences shall be permitted to operate the vehicle's musical amplified sound system, loudspeakers only while the vehicle is

in motion. Stopping at any town, beach or on any public roadway, the lences shall discontinue the musical amplified sound system loudspeakers within 30 seconds of the vehicle coming to a stop. There shall be no additional parking spot guaranteed in connection with this application. The lences shall not cone off any empty parking space at any time. The lency is responsible for daily disposal of the trash created in connection with the operation of the business. The disposal of this trash shall be in different receptacles other than those provided by the town at the beaches. The lency possesses all of the necessary federal, state, and county licenses. The lency shall adhere to the vehicle and traffic law section 1225 section B. The lency shall obtain an operating permit from the town of Shelter Island building department. The license is subject to the execution of a commercial use license with the town and resolved that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke the permit at its discretion. And be it further resolved that town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and MeT doing business as Mr. Softy. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I.

Motion carried. Whereas Kayak Shelter Island LLC care of Adam Mills has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. And whereas the nature of the business is to provide kayak and paddle board rentals and guided and self-guided tours primarily along the Coals Harbor Marine Water Trail as outlined in the application. And whereas the applicant submitted a $350 application fee. And whereas the town board has reviewed the application and determined that the granting of the license is in the best interest of the town of Shelter Island. Now therefore be it resolved that Kayak Shelter Island LLC is hereby granted a license to operate the business outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. And I'm just going to read the conditions that are different. Um the business shall be low be the business shall be located at the end of Burns Road as outlined in the application. D. The business operation shall not exceed the period between May 1st and November 30th. E. The hours of operation cannot exceed 9:00 a.m. to sunset. J. The Lency shall remove all equipment daily. K. The Lency acknowledges that storing of equipment on town property is prohibited. Resolve that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit at its discretion. And be it further resolved that the town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and Kayak Shelter Island. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I carried.

Whereas Venture Out Car Matthew Stroberg has filed an application to conduct business on town property for the 2026 summer season. And whereas the nature of the business is to rent paddle boards, kayaks and other water sports equipment, and to hold group tours, creek paddles, lessons, clinics, classes, and paddles as outlined in the application. And whereas the town board has reviewed the application and determined that the granting of a license is in the best interest of the town of Shelter Island. Now, therefore, be it resolved that Venture Out is hereby granted a license to operate the business as outlined in the application subject to the following conditions. A, a submission of the $500 application fee. B. The L E provides to the town clerk proof of workers compensation coverage or proof of an exemption of workers compensation. C. The business shall be contained in a 13.3x 30ft rectangle representing an area of 400 square ft and a 30-foot marking will be established by the Shelter Island Highway Department along the railing to clearly assist and designated the area. D. The location of the lency's business is subject to the review and adjustment by the Shelter Island Police Department andor the Shelter Island Highway Department. E. The proposed tent shall not be larger than 10x 10. F. The proposed storage locker shall be located within the 13.3 ft by 30 ft rectangle of 400 square ft. G. The business operation shall not exceed the period between May 1st and November 30th of 2026. Age. The operation the hours of operation cannot exceed 7 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. I. There shall be no parking spot guaranteed in connection with this application. J. The lency shall not comb off any empty parking spot at any time. K. The lency is responsible for daily disposal of the trash created in connection with the operation of the business. L the disposal of the trash shall be in a different receptacle than those provided by the town at the beaches. M the lency is subject to execution of commercial use license with the town and be resolved that the town of Shelter Island reserves the right to revoke this permit at its discretion. Be it further resolve that the town supervisor or her designate is hereby authorized to sign the commercial use license between the town of Shelter Island and venture out.

So move. Second. All in favor? I. Motion carried.

Whereas the town board previously adopted resolution 486 on December 22nd, 2025, establishing a 2026 hazard mitigation plan review group and designating certain individuals to serve as members. And whereas the town board has determined that the review of the 2026 hazard mitigation plan will be conducted as an internal working group comprised of town officials and staff rather than as an official town committee. Now therefore be it resolved that resolution number 486 adopted on December 22nd, 2025 is hereby revised to clarify that the 2026 hazard mitigation plan review group shall function as an internal working group and not as an official town committee and be it further resolved that the following person/titles shall participate in the internal working group for purposes of reviewing and assisting with the development of the 2026 hazard mitigation plan. Chief Reed, Sergeant Anthony Rando, Supervisor Amber Brock Williams, Councilwoman Elizabeth Hanley, Highway Superintendent Kenneth Lewis, Town Engineer Joseph Anora, Building Department Inspector Reed Can, and Grant Writer Jennifer Maziano, and be it further resolved that except as modified here in resolution 46 as of December 22nd, 2025 shall remain in full force and effect. So moved.

Second discussion. Um the reason for this change is it's not a formal committee um that we don't need to have um uh public meetings and have it you know either meet in this room or hybrid. This the hazard mitigation plan is a roll up your sleeves and get the work done as Liz knows as well and it will be presented to the town board um for review and adoption.

So it's just like we need to get this pulled together. If we were a bigger town and had more staff, we would have people to do this for us instead of town board members and chief of police. Um, so that's the reason for this exchange and therefore we don't have to assign committee clerk to it. So it's an internal working yes because we don't have any for committee clerks. Um, anyway, so I just wanted to clarify that for people. Um, all in favor? I. Motion carried.

Resolved that the town board hereby approves the appointment of Thomas Fields to the Suffach County Working Waterfront Committee. So moved. Second. All in favor? I. I.

Motion carried. Whereas on January 6, 2025, the town board adopted resolution number 63 of 2025 establishing the health and wellness committee to enhance and protect the well-being of all shelter islanders by providing effective mental health support, human services and wellness advocacy and collaboration with as many stakeholders as possible in the community. And where whereas resolution number 63 of 2025 further provided that the committee include the town social worker, a representative from the senior center, and additional appointed members serving 5-year terms with initially staggered expiration dates. And whereas the health and wellness committee and the town board have determined that expanding the committee's membership will allow for broader community participation and further support the committee's mission to enhance and protect the well-being of Shelter Island residents. And whereas the town board wishes to amend resolution number 63 of 2025 to increase the membership of the health and wellness committee. Now therefore, be it resolved that resolution number 63 of 2025 is hereby amended to provide that the health and wellness committee shall consist of a total of 11 members with a town social worker and a representative from the senior center as exeic members. And be it further resolved that members of the health and wellness committee shall continue to serve five-year terms with expiration dates staggered to ensure continuity of membership in the committee on the committee and be it further resolved that except as amended herein all of the provisions of resolution number 63 of 2025 including the committees committee's mission statement and the terms of currently appointed members shall remain in full force and effect. So move

second.

Oh, discussion. Yeah, just a quick discussion. Um, it is very unusual for us to have a committee of 11 members in the town. Um it's not something that I would normally advocate for in most committees, but because of the specific mission of this committee and um the fact that they have so many different goals and objectives, it actually makes sense in this case. So they can break down into smaller groups to work on specific tasks and bring them back to the group so that um we don't just have one person trying to work on certain things. So, we have people who are um very uh involved in physical health and nutritional health and now they're going to be working on um programs. We have people who are very involved in mental health issues. They're going to be working on programs. Um we have another group of people who are working on um community outreach, collecting information and statistics from the community, things like that, and moving programs forward. So, we've enlarged the committee so that they can be more efficient actually in what they're doing. So, that's the reason behind it. I have to say I was so excited that the that the committee wanted to to expand because we all of the applications that we got were so incredible like such talented people and it was really going to be a hardship to try to figure out.

Yeah. Discussion. All in favor? I I carried. All right. Whereas a vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants. Now therefore be it resolved that Natasha Stowe is hereby hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire on January 6th, 2029. So moved. Second. All in favor? I motion carries.

Whereas the vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants. Now therefore be it resolved that Vicky Shields is hereby approved to serve as a member of the Health and Wellness Committee for a term to expire on January 6 of 2030. So moved. Second. All in favor? I motion. Whereas the vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants now therefore be it resolved that Leslie Pasquad is hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire on January 6, 2030. So moved. Second. All in favor? I I Hey, guess what? Whereas a vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee.

And whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants, now therefore be it resolved that Ronnie Saltzman is hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire on January 6, 2031. So moved. Second. All in favor? I. Motion carry. Whereas a vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board as advertised for and interviewed applicants. Now therefore be it resolved that John Morris is hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire on January 6, 2031. So moved. Second. All in favor? I motion carries.

Whereas a vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants. Now therefore be it resolved that Bill Maestro is hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire on January 6, 2032. So moved. Second. All in favor? I motioned. This is the last one. Whereas the vacancy exists on the health and wellness committee and whereas the town board has advertised for and interviewed applicants. Therefore, be it resolved that Emily Nem is hereby appointed to serve as a member of the health and wellness committee for a term to expire January 6, 2032. So moved. Second. All in favor? I. Motion carried.

Resolved that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to execute an agreement between the town of Shelter Island and BBS architecture. So moved. Second. Discussion. Um so the comment was brought up why we are um agreeing you know authorizing this to be executed without um disclo you know further disclosure to the public and so I wanted to turn it over to you Thomas to just discuss a little bit about open meeting law and what's allowed to be done and why it should be done in executive session.

Yeah. So, I mean, a contract like this, the theory is that if you're negotiating with a third party, having you want them to put forth their best offer, and having it available to the public during the negotiation is not the best way to get their best offer. So, the the way this works is that the board is able to negotiate an executive session and then as soon as a decision is made, then it has to be available to the public to review. So tonight we're authorizing the supervisor to sign a resolution. Then it will be the agreement will be available for public to read. Thank you. Um we'll close the discussion and take a vote. All in favor?

I. Motion carried. resolved that the supervisor is hereby authorized to sign a non-binding letter of intent between the town of Shelter Island and the Community Development Long Island and Urban Builders Collaborative LLC. So second discussion I was going to say um yeah so again this um what Thomas spoke of before applies here. Did you have something you wanted to add to that? Um, now it's it's not super clear what this is for. So maybe it's for the Oh, the non-bonding letter of intent.

It's for the um the community housing project that we've all been working on for so long, especially with Hanley. And um it's to build the 10 units on the three lots that the town has provided. And it lets us go to the next step, which is actual contract negotiations. Yes. So the financial feasibility study. So this is like opens the door to all those next things. Moving forward, we'll close discussion. All in favor?

I motion here. Resolve that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to execute a license agreement between the town of Shelter Island and the Shelter Island History Museum concerning the parking for historical society events for history societ historical museum events for the year 2026. So move second. All in favor? I

motion carries resolve that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to expend the sum of $1,637.34 from the 2026 A11.440 440 Justice Court contracts expenditure code to Xerox Xerox Core PO Box 660501 Dallas, Texas for the copier contract base rate charge from February 28th, 2026 to February 27th, 2027. So moved. Second. All in favor?

I motion carried. The resolve of the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to expend the sum of $7,169 from the 2026A 4540428 EMS communications expenditure code to SCM products inc 125 wireless boulevard sweet B hot New York 11 1788 for the 2026 SCM FRS annual maintenance contract so moved

second all in favor. Motion carried. Resolved that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to expend the sum of $3,260 from the 2026 A3120.491 police complex expenditure code to ATC scene LLC PO Box 68 Sartell Minnesota 56377 for the yearly subscription of Crime Fighter Enterprise and all technical support storage and software updates. Second. All in favor?

I motion carries. Resolved that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to issue a refund in the amount of $157 to Denise Fentel from the 2026 820 mooring fee revenue um code for the overpayment of a moing renewal. Some move second. All in favor? I

I motion carried. Whereas the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance has issued a notice of vendor collection credit to the town of Shelter Island for the period ending February 28th, 2026 in the amount of $49.50. Now therefore, be it resolved that the supervisor is hereby authorized and directed to transfer the sum of $49.50 from the trust and agency account to the general account. So move second. All in favor? I. Motion carried.

Whereas the town of Shelter Island has received a donation from the Shelter Island Ambulance Foundation in the amount of $12,800 to be used towards the 2025 EMS mileage siphons. Now therefore, be it resolved that the following 2025 budget modification is hereby approved. a $12,800 increase to the 2025 A2705A ambulance donations revenue account and a $12,800 increase to the 2025 A4540.492 EMS travel meetings expenditure account. So moved. Second. All in favor?

I motion carried. Resolve that the following 2025 budget transfers are hereby approved. $276 from the A1010475 town board drug testing to A1010484 town board officer miscellaneics to cover a shortfall and 705 from A1010475 town board drug testing to A1010495 town board print and advertising to cover extra advertising for lateear replacement hires. $651 from A1010480 Ethics Board Professional Services to A1010497 Town Professional Services to restore an earlier budget transfer for professional fees. 143 from A1010492 Town Board School Travel and Mileage to A1010484 Town Board Office of Missies to cover a shortfall. 245 from A1110410 Justice Court interpreter to A110440 Justice Court contracts to cover extra court coverage, $1,600 from A11049 Justice Court Travel, and 3.90 from A110410 Justice Court Interpreter to A1010497 Town Professional Services to cover an additional legal fees. $111 from A1 1110484 Justice Court Office of Miscellaneous to A1010484 town board office of miscellaneous to cover a shortfall. $44 from A11104844 Justice Court Office and Miscellaneous and $64 from A110499 Justice Court Stenographer and $64 from A110200 Justice Court Equipment to A1010497 Town Board Professional Services to cover additional legal fees and 280 from A1220412 ADP to A1220484 Supervisor Office of Miscellaneous to cover a shortfall $7,160 from A1220 20412 ADP, $69 from A1220492 Supervisor School Travel and Mileage to A1010497

Town Board Professional Services to cover additional legal fees and 171 from A122144 human resources office and miscellaneous to A1330484 tax receiver office and miscellaneous to cover folding machine repair and $2,14 from A312400 police maintenance to A312200 police equipment to cover the final year of the radio system upgrade. So moved. Second. All in favor? I. Motion carries. Resolved that the following 2026 budget transfer is hereby approved. $18,500 from the A5710.499 transfer to waterways fund to A5710.200 waterways equipment to cover the workboat deck repairs. So moved.

Second. All in favor? I.

Motion carries. Resolve that the following funds are hereby encumbered from 2025 to be expended in 2026 with 2025 funds to wit $1,166.92 from the 88510.48 Taylor's Island Cabin repairs account. It's okay. Tell us cabin repair account for the town of Shelder Island Public Works cabin repair work. $289.72 from the A312.2000 police department equipment account for CDW-G $25,498.39 from the A312.2000 2000 police department equipment account for Motorola Solutions. $1,122.38 from the A3120.273 Police Department Firearms and Ammunition Account for AM Char Wholesale Inc. and $1846 from the A3120.484 484 Police Department, Office of Miscellaneous Count for Ciri.

Some moved. Second. All in favor? I I motion carried. Resolved that the 2025 general fund claims numbered 2562 through 2594 in the amount of $17,742 are hereby approved for payment as audited. and the supervisor or any town board member is hereby authorized and directed to sign the approval for payment of sane. So move second. All in favor?

I motion carried. Resolved that the 2026 general fund claims number 261 through421 in the amount of60 $873.77. The 2026 highway fund claims number 32 through 52 in the amount of $52,479.97. the 2026 Community Preservation Fund claims one through two in the amount of $9,795 and the 2026 water quality improvement claim two in the amount of $364 are hereby approved for payment as audited and the supervisor andor any town board member is hereby authorized and directed to sign the approval for the payment of same so moved.

Second. All in favor? Motion carried. All right, we will adjourn the meeting and go into our first public hearing. Um Shelby, if you want to

on the 16th day of March, 2026 at the Shelter Island Town Hall at 6 p.m. or soon thereafter prevailing time on the proposed local law entitled a local law amending chapter 8 code of ethics. The full text of the local law is available in the town clerk's office and online. The summary of which is that the purpose of this local law is to improve the current code of ethics within the town code, protect the interest of the town from unethical activity, and providing its employees with clear guidance in performing their duties. This law will serve to protect against potential town employee and officer misconduct and protect the innocent employee and officer from espersions. I'd like to invite Dr. up to just give us a little history as to why we're amending the code.

Thank you.

State your full name for the record. I'm the chairman of the board of ethics. It's a a five member group of volunteers. Uh Wilson and you are Wilson. Thank you.

I'm I'm a retired journalist and the other members of the group have some experience in ethics in one manner or another. I had a lot of experience in investigating uh people for their ethics when I was an investigative journalist. So um about four years ago e ethics issues were addressed here by people uh asking other people to go outside and uh settle the matter. After that the uh the ethics board was reconstituted in 2022 and and we recommended a ethics code uh to meet the requirements of state law and uh the town board approved that. It was uh it's worked well. We've had about um 20 cases since then, 20 formal cases and other in other cases of informal guidance for people. uh to help them stay on the right side of the state law and the local ethics code. Um we have a couple cases pending right now and we're always always looking for especially um employees or officials who want guidance to stay on the right side of the you know line because it can be gray sometimes. We're we're asked to periodically review the code to suggest improvements and this action would uh have some improvements in some ways. It's it's more or less fine-tuning because the ethics code is uh pretty pretty good. It's worked well. I think I just want to review briefly the major changes that are under consideration. One is to a system of uh this this ethics code relies on disclosure and

recusal of a town official or employee who might have a conflict of interest in an action that they're about to take. this this uh new uh improvement would say dispose to your supervisor and if you're on a board disclose to the board and put it in the minutes. So that's a couple ways to make it a little more official than it was. Uh supposedly in the past they would disclose to the board of ethics but that didn't work. This is a system that can work. This this also uh will clarify some uh exemptions that uh say officials can vote on uh things that benefit all or substantially all of the uh people on shelter island even if it includes themselves or their brother or sister. If if it's an islandwide thing act on it without going a follow of the confident interest standard. Another one that's clarified is employees can receive ordinary holiday or birthday or wedding gifts without running a file of the uh gift bro. Couple more. This would clarify that the board of ex ethics drop complaints that are frivolous or unlikely to lead to anything. And finally, this changes the standard for future employments and that's a subnative change. The uh previous one had certain bans and prohibitions you once a official or employee leaves the town. This one is quite loose now frankly because we decided that after people leave employment it's hard to get uh work here

uh if there's a lot of prohibition on. So this would uh just say that uh someone who leaves uh employment can render services to a new employer but can't appear in front of their uh former office for uh a year. We thought that a small town shouldn't restrict employment too much. Uh this is a judgment call. We we've studied a lot of other ethics codes over the years and we've also said to the town board this is a judgment call and we welcome your judgment on it if you think that should be good but this is our you know unanimous recommendation basically. Um I I really valued a consensus on the ethics board where all five members come to agreement on everything that we we've done on the 20 opinion to date and and on the uh recommendation to approve the code. That's all I have. Thanks for your attention.

Thanks for all your comments. Yeah, thanks for and your board. I mean, thank you for your effort. We really appreciate it. You guys do great work. Thank you. Yeah, I have a really good board. I see there's a couple members here. Yes. Thanks so much. Thank you. Any questions from the board? Any questions? I feel like we spent quite a bit of time reviewing this. Yes. Any questions?

Anyone on Zoom? and we will close this public hearing. Move on to the next one. All in favor? I can go now. You should go next. Hold your No, it's not. It's a combination of things. Yeah. Okay. Got it.

All right. We will go ahead and read the um the public hearing and but we won't start with public comments until Benjamin gets back. Um so shall we? Uh on the 16th day of March 2026 at the Shelter Island Town Hall at 6 PM or as soon thereafter prevailing time on the application of Chad Pike 6 Bluff Avenue to construct a 5tx 30 foot ramp up to a 5'100 ft dock with a 5tx 27 ft L section at Seawward End, 70t splashboard system, one two pile dolphin, three ladders and one bench per plant submitted by Costello Marine dated January 9th, 2024. and stamped New York State DEC approved on January 18th, 2024. And before we get started, I just want to say that we do not have a WMAC report um on this application or you know, it was originally and then um since we have a revised application, it was sent back to WAC. Um it didn't get onto their agenda this um past week. So it will be on their next agenda which is April 13th. So we will not be able to close the public hearing tonight. We can hear the applicant um present. We can hear the public who wishes to chime in but then we will end up adjourning this until our April 27th meeting um which will also give um the public and the applicant the chance to respond to the WMAC memo as well as any additional public comments. I do know someone um who I spoke to this morning who couldn't be here tonight and I told him this. He was happy that he will have an opportunity to speak on the 27th. So I just want to set the expectation as to what's going to happen public hearing. So

from Fritz representing the applicant Chad Ruskin Pike the 12 multiple trust. I'm also here with Kelly Gado and Jack Castella who are in person and I believe there may be some individuals also here on Zoom. I did bring copies of the documents we previously submitted to the board which is a letter from us stated on 2nd 2026 just you have it I think we have March yeah March 2nd 2026 I'll take one tabs one through five Yes,

I have it on my computer, but this will be easier here seeking a dock. The premise located at 6 Bluff Avenue. You've been here several times. It's a lengthy application. I hope we're coming to a close one way or the other. I believe what you have before you and what has been submitted is both the historical, you know, discussion of the chronology that the length of time that we've been before this board as well as the modification to the plans that were previously previously submitted. There was a reopening of the hearing. We appreciate the board uh allowing for. We've also communicated with the Shelter Island Heights community to see if there's anything we could do to address their concerns. Their concerns have been public safety. We have responded to that question in particular. Again, there has been discussion but before this board and with the reopening of the hearing the prior material materials are incorporated by reference. aware. We did just to succinctly state for the board uh introduce the safe and dock which was approved by this board for a dock that was 5 ft by 110 or 100 ft into the waterway which was granted by this board back in 2020. for um let's shut that date was approved by this board 2023 with that application was submitted a hardship letter. We have submitted a similar hardship letter but to end of the day we also have submitted a revised

plan. So we are seeking either the original plan that was submitted or in the alternative the reduction of the plan which brings the length of dock extending from Vi water to 88.5 ft which is where the water depth is at 4T which is compliant with the code as referenced by council and in our letters because we have a DC permit that was issued prior to the revision. of the staff. We are under we're operating under the old prior requirements. We meet all of those requirements and historically this application has been pending before this board since 2023. We have had various public hearings. We have taken in comments from the board. We do meet requirements that have been set forth by the old fire code by fire standards as well as new standards. I'm here tonight also with Rosado to answer questions that you may have regarding is of environmental concerns. I know in terms of have been related to public safety again and I believe we have attested to this and Jack Castello is here and has submitted a letter which are out of letters to review on March 2nd is tab four where there is a discussion as to what are the public what safety concerns that are have been raised by this board. Again, your code does not specifically

speak to that, but again, the applicant is obviously concerned with that issue. He would like to create a public hazard or publications that wouldn't be in the best interest of anyone. Again, what has been cited in Mr. The sub's letter that is tab four those discuss the distance that we are from and west I guess it's southwest of Shel Island Heights property owners association there is significant separation from their swimming area where we are proposing the dock and again as the board is aware and I don't know if the public is as well there are several moing buoys that exist there today So boats are for persons in the area as everyone is aware. The north ferry is also in very close proximity to this location. So there is there's boat activity but it is a significant distance from this concern. Um and as land use and killer auto has submitted we have provided with you and she may she will hand that up. We are about 360 ft from the swimming area. Your neighboring villages of Greenport and Southport have certain dimensional requirements. Uh Greenport requires 200 ft of clearance. Southport is 100. We are well beyond that separation. Again, when this was discussed, and I think this may be better answered by questions to our experts, their statements and their conclusions are that the location of a fixed pier/tock in this location will be a better public safety um addition than the issuer pulling up to a moing as board members may know and members of the public as

well. Again, your code section that we're operating under, as well as the new code section 53-11, requires that there not be an impediment or menace to navigation and that the public shall clearly traverse passage along the shoreline. We have designed this dock to allow free passage for the public. There's no impediment to their passage along the shoreline. That was a consideration rightly stated in its code provisions. We do not violate that requirement. We are not creating a navigational hazard. We have and are set back significantly from area of swimming that has been raised as a concern. And again, I know I've said this before and I hate to sound like a broken record, but I will repeat myself. Um the way this code is written is this is akin to a special permit which if you meet the requirements of the criteria it is tantamount to becoming approved where the conditions that are raised we meet all of them all of the code sections that are required by this board have been met in particular the reduction length of dock that we have produced as an alternative clearly meet all the requirements ments of the code section from the prior as well as the new code section. Alternatively, what was proposed by this by the applicant was a dock of more length which was also approved by this board for the safe and dock. So the choices are very limited. This is an exercise of riparian rights. Again, he discussed this at length. I don't need to belabor the point. it may be more beneficial to if you have questions for either me or our experts. I think that's a good way to exchange this and make it time uh respective and if there are questions from the public

of course we're good to respond to those concerns. if you have questions for me or any of our profession.

I'm doing start off being that person. Um in the Yes, this is the site plan dated 12325 and we've got the distance from mean high water at 88.5 and then the um overall length is 98.5. But then on the next document we've got OA at 98.6. 6 and distance from mean high water at 88.6. So there's a discrepancy in your plans. It's minor, but we can't have plans that don't agree because if this is ultimately approved, we've got conflicting information. So how do we actually issue something that doesn't isn't it? So

no, I appreciate that question. It may be better suited for one of our experts. Jack, you can speak that just I just have to look at it real quick. This is a plan that was originally that there. Yeah, we're you know we're offering to do a reduction. Yeah, but it's just I mean it's we've just got I mean it's minor. It's just that if you're going like if this should get approved, we need it to be Well, we have to go back to waterways anyway. So, okay. I just wanted to point that out from the getgo just because not not publicly just had to be had to be that person.

Professional things when the next one the next one is on April the last second that April 13th. Yeah. April 13th. Okay. Monday. Yes. Yeah. It's on Monday. Yes. Yeah. So we can't we will have to adjourn this ultimately to April 27th. Other questions while I dig out other notes? I do not have any questions to other questions. Any questions? Then we'll open it up to the public.

We'll open up questions. Oh, sure. Good evening and I'm here this speaking on behalf of the shelter and height property owners corporation and I have a letter that we have um written um um that I'd like to read to the Thank you.

So since May of 5th of 2025, this application has been the subject of four hearings and six adjournments. Um so although the hearing for the proposed dock was closed on December 1st, we now find ourselves addressing the matter for the fifth time and facing yet another adjournment. Following the found attorney's determination that the application must be reviewed under the prior dock code. The applicant reduced the original proposed 100T dock to 88.5 measured from the mean high water. This measurement does not include the additional landward access which adds another 3T to the overall structure. From the onset, the Heights has consistently raised concerns regarding the proposal's impact on public safety and navigation. These concerns are not speculative. They were expressed by members of the WMAC during their review of the original application in May of 2025. Since receiving the revised plans, the Heights property and roads committee reviewed the redesign to determine whether additional modifications could mitigate its concerns and allow the heights to support this project. Unfortunately, the committee was unable to identify any design changes that would adequately address the inherent safety risk created by the stop's location. In fact, the shortened dock could worsen the situation as the vessels navigating around the proposed Lshape of dock would operate even closer to the shoreline and swimmers. So for these reasons, the heights

continues to oppose the dove. The heights previously submitted a great deal of corresponding respondence outlining its concerns, all which are part of the administrative record. However, two key points bear particular emphasis. Too close for comfort. The proposed dock would be danger dangerously close to the heights beach beach club swimming area. While the applicant continually references the distance between the swim ropes and the proposed docked sideyard setback, that measure measurement does not reflect reality. Bthers regularly swim up to the beach club property line. The distance between the eastern property line of Six Bluff and Beach Club's western property line is only 96.8 ft, creating an inherent conflict in a heavily used swimming area. The addition of this dock in this location, particularly near three closely clustered existing moorings, would intensify vessel activity and an area already used extensively by swimmers and therefore present a clear and avoidable safety risk. Two, the absence of a principal structure. There is no routine dock application suitable for a checklist review based on solely a dock length and water depth. The parcel is vacant and contains no primary principal structure. Under zoning code 1337 C1, a principal permitted use in the AA district is the one family. Zoning code 1337E1B permits a private dock only as an accessory use for the occupants of property of which there are no occupants

because there's no house. The town has long maintained the policy of denying accessory structures on vacant lots without a primary structure. A private dock is by town code definition an accessory structure. Is the town board aware of any residential docks that were approved for vacant parcels that legally comply with the zoning code? That's a question I ask of you. While the applicant owns one bluff and six bluff and recently purchased a vacant lot on four bluff, all of these properties are not legally tied together by deed covenant or restriction and may be conveyed separately. Chapter 53-2 of the prior dock code authorizes the town board to regulate the size, placement, and use of the docks to optimize the use of town owned underwater lands for the benefit of the public. Also recognizing repairarian rights of upland owners. In this case, the proposed dot raises substantial safety conf concerns, conflicts with multiple provisions of the town code and directly affects the neighboring property owners who are asking the town to give equal consideration for their repair. For these reasons, the heights respectfully urges the board to deny the revised application for the proposed stop at state. Should the hearing again be adjourned, the heights wishes to retain the privilege of speaking again at the continuation of the hearing after receipt of the WMAC recommendations.

Thank you. Anyone else? Anyone on Zoom? Oh, Jack, just have a quick point about that discrepancy. Um, so on one page it's.5, which would be 6 in. And on the other page, it's 6 in, which is equivalent to.5. So, it's the same exact measurement. It's just rigged differently. I was looking at going, how big could this possibly be? So, it's actually right six in, right? Thank you. That might be wrong.

Um, anyone on Zoom? Excuse me.

Did you have something else you want?

I just I just wanted to respond very briefly. I understand this will be continued. So, I don't want to make the point. Jack is here to answer any questions as to the safety issue. We did previously submit this uh document which I think in real time can help the board understand the dimensional issues that are or the what is the reality on the ground or on the water you know showing what exists in the vicinity of the proposed dock. It is an area that is is not actual shoreline. Quite a bit of structures in the water. I just want the board to see that in real time with this type of a discussion. Again, we've just been handed the Shelter Island Heights property owners statements. We will we will respond to that in kind. We can definitely address the issues that are being raised about the accessory structure. Again, that's more of a zoning question than type of an application. Your code does not speak to that specific use, we can definitely address that issue. And if there is a need to conjoin the property or in somehow link them together because the common ownership exists. So, if there's a need for that to be um addressed, I believe the ownership will definitely take that and make sure that's addressed. So, there's no uh precedent set that you wouldn't want to have set. So, I wanted to respond to that question as well. Again, we do appreciate your time. I'm not sure there are many other questions. Let's move back into things like this. And um

just to be clear, the the trust owns both parties. Yes, it's in common ownership with different entities. I can speak to that. Other different entities in terms of LLC's. Yes. But if there is a desire by this board to have them held in common ownership to avoid the issue that is being raised, then I think we're perfectly amendable to that. So I think that's a it's something that we can address to resolve that issue. Not a position will take a hard line. You can definitely correct that issue to address its own questions. Yes. Take that question step further. Um putting them in similar name title is not the same as merging the properties. Well, I wouldn't want to merge them again. I guess we're getting I don't know if they're contiguous.

They're not contiguous. There's some separations. I wasn't prepared to get into the weeds as to that specific question, but we will definitely address that concern so that we're not running a foul of the bill of the town code requirements of accessory use is another primary. So, I think we can navigate that legally. So, I'm not that concerned that issue, but it will be addressed. I just want to speak to like the property ownership real quick because there's a lot of properties on shelf around where the street comes through and I just have to investigate who actually owns the property because if you go between second and third bridge on win a lot of the docks are on the other side of the road. Um that happens a lot on shelfer island and I don't know if all those properties are actually just one part being divided by the property and also if you go on the shore road into dean harbor you have a lot of docks that are actually

potentially on separate parcels because the the town road goes through the property. So I don't know those are actual separate tax numbers or they're not. There are other properties on Shells Royland where I have built docks on properties without primary structure. Well, a lot of those are pre-existing, non-conforming. This one is non-existent.

Well, all I'm saying is I've done docks on properties without a primary and I just don't want to throw anybody under the bus until I like investigate that. But there are a lot of confusing structures in the town that has approved. And also down by the uh if you go down by like the Pidwin area, um Pwin Sunset Beach area, a lot of those docks are all built on several parts with basement. I know Arbor there are houses off the water that have separate properties that have docks on them. So this is a situation that happens very very often on Shelter Island. It's not an odd thing to have without consider that because you know if you drive down win you'll see it on the shore and then the other shore road. Well, I think they changed shore to harbor now.

Harbor.

Yeah, harbor. So the other shore road is now by the sunset beach. But you'll notice that those docks are potentially you know separate easements without a primary structure. Any Other questions?

Okay, then we will adjourn this.

If I could just answer your question. I think, you know, we've been here several times and I appreciate the board's time. I would if there's any direction that the board would suggest. We'd also like to hear that because I I feel like we're presenting the application. We've made amendments. We appreciate any feedback from the board. if not now at some other way because I we've been at this for about a year and again my client appreciates the thoroughess of the review but if there is something that the board is looking for we'd also like to hear that feedback because I feel like this is a one-way conversation which many times it is but if there's something the board is looking for I understand the community's concerns I think I believe we are addressing them in many ways um our issues have been presented by experts and with all due respect to the community I understand their concerns about a dock, a new dock being placed in what would be considered close proximity, but I believe, you know, in some sense, the reality is there is a lot of boat traffic in the area. And if the board has any suggestions, we'd like to have that feedback. And I don't know if we've ever had that. So, I just want to make put that to the board. I'm not suggesting I need that right now, but I believe at least from some level or even from council, if we could hear what the board is concerned about, we would like to address that as much as we can. So, I just want to put that to the board as a request respectfully.

Thank you. Um, I know for myself, the only thing I would like is for our attorney to look into the issue of the dock on a property without a primary structure. That's really the only thing I'd like him to clarify for me. We can communicate and thank you. We'll make a motion to um adjourn this public hearing to October um April. April April 27th. All in favor? I

thank you. Um, on the next public hearing that we're about to open, um, Liz Hanley has to recuse herself. So, if you want to just state why you're refusing yourself from this public hearing. Oh, I am recusing myself from this public, uh, hearing because I serve on the farm committee for Sylvester Manor. And I've also spoken publicly in favor this application. Oh, sorry. Let me share this.

You got it. Okay. All right. So, we'll give a minute for everyone to clear out on this one before we open up the next public hearing. I was told that Ben was going to Is that happening or No. Um, no. He has been disassociated with Sylvester Manor for I guess over two years. I was just going off the information that was given last week.

Put stuff away. Just a second. Hello. Shall we? The 16th day of March, 2026 at the Shelter Island Town Hall at 6:00 p.m. or as soon thereafter prevailing time on the site plan review application of Sylvester Manor Educational Farm, Inc. 80 North Berry Road for interior and exterior renovations to the existing 1737 manor house, including the removal of a 1960 cabana edition at North Elevation, upgrades to mechanical, electrical, plumbing and fire detection suppression systems, a new IIA sanitary system, construction of multiple ADA access points, installation of walkways and landscaping, and the relocation of a generator, diesel fuel tank, heat pump,

condenser unit, and transformer. former we have various memos. Um I'll start off with the CAC one. It's the shortest. Um so CAC wrote a report and at the conservation advisory council meeting held on Tuesday, March 3rd, members reviewed the Sylvester Manor Educational Farm site plan application and issued the following recommendation. One, all the proposed renovations will be required to meet the current code for landscape, natural features, and lighting. And CAC approved the application as submitted. A vote of four to zero. Maybe you've got planning board. Planning board also have the zoning boards, too. Yes. All right. Planning board looked at this. They addressed uh traffic, interior circulation, and parking. for that category. They said Sylvester Manor has three types of existing proposed parking, including dirt and gravel uh perpendicular along driveway edges, dirt and gravel areas connected to driveways, and grassy overflow um parking. Sylvester Manor has indicated that a parking service is hired during large events to direct operations. Sylvester Manor has provided aerial images that give details to parking capacity in different areas of the property as shown in their additional parking information memo dated 12925. Three additional ADA parking spaces are also proposed in the north of Manor House. We base our comments on what we generally understand the parking demands to be using knowledge of recent events held and descriptions supplied by the applicant. But if these events were to grow in size, the current parking plan would be a challenge. Further information on the size and amendment will help clarify. Members of the planning board expressed concerns over parking safety, pedestrians, and traffic coming in and out of the site. Given that there are numerous spaces where

parking could occur on site, site navigation is unclear and varies between events, which was confusing for the assessment purposes. The planning board notes um that having a permanent parking area as well as a well-marked walkways would allow for um improved for perhaps improved and safer site circulation. As it currently stands, the grass parking could create hazards for site navigation on foot. Um landscaping and screening. I'm going to have uh Teresa Mason, I'm going to let her address that because the planning board just agreed with Teresa's recommendations. Um same thing with natural features and environmental concerns. And um for cultural features, the planning board members indicated that areas of archaeological importance and burial ground should be clearly depicted on the site plan to avoid disturbance. Um I did note that they I saw them on the site plan. Maybe they missed them. um public address or sound system. Concerns have been raised about the uh raised to the planning board regarding this provision of the town code. Additional information should be submitted to the record for events that may use amplification of noise. Possible mitigation tactics for noise should also be detailed in the submission. The planning board recommends that for each event that is of larger scale, the applicant should coordinate with town entities and appropriate permits and mitigation tactics. I think this was written before we received our latest submission that showed the directionality of the speakers and such. Um, let's see. Size planning board discussed needing more information regarding the extent of disturbance. Sylvester Manor holds many different events of various sizes and attendance in different locations on the property. We noted that the submission provided um made it very difficult to envision how the property would be used. We strongly recommend that the applicant provide additional specific information

on how each area of property is intended to be utilized. This should include how different areas have been used in the last 10 years as well as how the applicant anticipates the different areas will be used moving forward. Where events and which events are taking place on the property should be clearly delineated on a map. This is of utmost importance for events that will have amplified sound, but also important for events of a larger nature. Furthermore, the public would be served by creating a clear understanding of how any limitation of size will be managed by the town board moving forward. While not specified at the special permit level, the town board may want to set a maximum for current parking and planned noise control as currently configured. The recommendations of the planning board um the planning board views this application as largely incomplete at this time. The town board should carefully consider outstanding items from consultant reviews on engineering and environmental impacts as well as the items below in their review of this site plan application. When additional information should be submitted regarding the nature of outdoor events on the premises, specifically where different events have taken place in the past and where they are anticipated to be held should be indicated on a map. A description of each event should also be provided. Site navigation and parking practices should be reconsidered to improve safety and clear navigation. Three, given the applicant has expressed in testimony its wish to retain flexibility in how its use how it uses the grounds, the site plan should delineate a discrete number of those spaces they might use for various events of expected sizes and with use of speakers rather than the entire grounds, which um while less limiting is too vague for site plan standards. And number four, um, as has been common practice, the applicant should continue to coordinate with the town to receive permits and approvals for large events. Um, and then I also have the ZBA. Mhm. So, and the ZBA um, they had a resolution

and just some of the key findings of that resolution. um on page six after the chart. Essentially, with respect to those uses and activities that the town the board determined above to be within the same general character as an educational institution, the zoning board of appeals has applied the special permit standards enumerated in section 1335 of the town code. um to the facts of this application and determined that the proposal meets said standards for approval. It is noted that with respect to the board's considerations under town code 13335C and E2, there is an expectation that parking and traffic safety and coordination will be more fully addressed during the required site plan review. So, they didn't really address it in the ZBA. The special permit approval is limited solely to those uses that have been specifically identified and approved herein. Accordingly, nothing herein shall be deemed to approve or permit uses that are not identified herein or that have not been engaged in here 24 by the applicant. Further, the applicant uses identified here the approved uses identified herein are limited to the scope of the prior use. So the ZBA is restricting Sylvester Manor to the same volume and intensity of use that they have historically had for the events that they are approving. Um let's see uh the special permit granted herein does not exempt or obiate any such additional requirements or regulations. And then in their um approve impart and deny impart they um their conditions are that there shall be

no construction or installation of new non-aggricultural structures. Two, the special permit and any rights conferred thereby is granted solely till Sylvester Manor and may not be transferred. Three, the property nor any part thereof may not be leased for the purposes of allowing or permitting third parties to engage in uses or activities approved by the special permit granted therein. And number four was where indicated above, approved activities are limited by and shall not occur more frequently than as specified in this determination. So, um, the zoning board set the limits and restrictions on how many events they could have, the type of events they could have, and the intensity of the events like or the number of participants. So, that just may be something you want to clarify further if we need to. Those are the two memos that I have. Okay, we'll turn to Teresa Mason.

Hi, good evening. Theresa Mason on behalf of the town. Um I uh have preliminary advisory report on record dated December 16th and then a supplemental uh advisory report dated revised February 2nd. Um I did get an opportunity to review the submission that was submitted um at the end of uh the first week of March. Unfortunately I was very sick last week so I didn't get an opportunity to write up the findings. Um but based on my review um just some clarifications with respect to the landscaping. Um the document provided by the applicant in most recent um submission indicated that they were proposing to relocate the existing um heritage roses uh on site uh and then heal them in until the construction is complete and then to replant them. Um we just need confirmation and no additional plantings are proposed. If any additional plantings are proposed, they should give us a plant list. um to ensure that there's no invasive species proposed. Um with respect to the mechanical areas, we are still recommending that in addition to the wooden fence that the area be screened with evergreen trees um preferably uh native species like eastern red cedar. This will provide additional screening and additional noise buffering in uh uh to supplement the existing fence. Um our reports did indicate that we had some concerns with respect to grading for the ADA compliant um parking stalls and walkways. There is a 2 to 4 foot elevation change in the area of those structures. Um while the parking and all of the activities are greater than 100 ft from the wetlands, some of that grading may occur within the wetlands. And um we do want to make sure that you know if there's fill that needs to be deposited that it's adequately stabilized. Um and that can be a condition of approval getting that grading plan um especially with respect to the walkways and things of that nature. And we can get that approved

through the town engineer. He can sign off make sure that they're sufficiently stable um that they meet ADA compliant requirements. Um, as part of that and as part of the septic system upgrade, we are going to recommend that you put in uh silt fences during construction to capture any um sediments that might run towards the wetlands because it does slope towards the wetlands in this particular area. And again, that can be a resol, you know, included as a condition of approval. Um, the applicant did provide some drainage plans on their most recent submission. Um, it has been recommended by our office that the drainage be designed to accommodate a 3-in rainfall in light of increased storm intensity and frequency like which is curling right now. Um, and that could be approved subject to the town engineer um uh you know with his approval to confirm that it meets sufficient drainage capacity. And then um I did see uh recently that they submitted an area that shows the areas of uh intended events. Uh some of them are in very close proximity to Butlands. Um I would just recommend that any uh conditional approvals for site plans andor temporary events be conditioned on removal of any um flooring or tents within 48 hours of the end of the event. Um, beyond that, like I said, most of the items are uh items that can be done as conditions of approval prior to issuance of um building permits. Um, but that those are my recommendations at this time.

I do have one question. You said that um you had looked at some information early in March. Um will you be updating your report further then? If you would prefer written comments, I can do so. Otherwise, these comments are on the record and and can can serve as that. But if your if your preference is for written comments, I can work on those this weekend and send them over. Yes, please. Just because we have such a volume of information before us would be helpful. Great. I'll send them over this weekend. Great. Thank you. Um Caitlyn.

Hi. Good evening. Caitlyn Kim, PWer for the town. Uh this firm had prepared two site plan review memos. The first dated October 31st, 2025 and the latest one March 10th, 2026. Um based on the information that the applicant has submitted to date, our original um requests and comments uh have been adequately addressed by the applicant. Um there is one recommendation that we have and that's regarding the um title wetland located to the north of the manor and um the ADA parking. There's been some concerns um or potential for vehicles parking proximate to the wetlands with the three ADA spaces in that existing eastern unpaved parking area. That will serve as a physical barrier to prevent encroachment. Um however, this firm does recommend that the board consider imposing a condition of site plan approval that prohibits parking within the town regulated area. Thank you, Caitlyn.

Thank you.

Okay, that is it for reports that we've received this task. Um, I turn it over to the applicant to do your presentation to and kind of give us the overview of the ask and the application. Hi everybody. Hi. Thank you for having us. Uh I'm Stephen Surl, executive director of Sylvester Manor. And if you will be so kind as just to indulge me tonight on zooming out a little bit. Uh I want to provide you with a brief uh overview, brief and broad overview of Sylvester Matter, our history, the founding of the not for-p profofit and the organization that we are today. today. I think it'll be very helpful for not just this board, which I understand probably already knows quite a bit about us, but for the public in general and just to be on the on the record about that. Uh following me, uh is going to be Julia Brennan, who's our capital projects manager. Uh and she's going to provide a detailed review of our plans for the manor house, kind of note overview of that, uh along with other aspects of our site plan application. Uh Thomas Wolz, our landscape architect, has defined Sylvester Manor's cultural landscape as an index of American history and human occupation. It's a site that represents so many layers of the past and shared experiences. Next slide, please. The history of Sylvester Manor can, I think, best be represented in six different eras. And I just wanted to show this slide here of the first three eras. I know there's a lot of detail here uh but I I think it's really interesting uh and what's most relevant are the dates sort of along the bottom. It also gives a sense of how much has happened at this site and on Shelter Island and the complex history that we are trying to interpret. All of Shelter

Island of course was occupied by the Manhanced people starting thousands of years ago. That's era number one to the left of your screen in the 1650s. All 8,000 acres of Shelter Island were acquired by the Sylvester Family Partnership in order to provision or supply sugarce plantations down in Barbados. All the way to the right of your screen. By the 1730s, the town of Shelter Island was founded and the Manor House was built. Next slide, please. During the 19th and early 20th century, Sylvester Manor went from a colonial homestead to bucolic country estate. That's the first two eras four and five. The manor house and grounds were transformed with the help of people like chemistry professor Evan Horsford who invented baking powder. Famous botonists, scholars, and architects. The last living descendants to live at Sylvester Manor were Andy and Alice Fisk. Alice passed away in 2006. Next slide, please. Over 375 years, the property had gone from the entire island, 8,000 acres, down to 236 acres, all under private ownership. When Mrs. If this passed away, there were a lot of questions about what would happen to this place, whether it would be sold or worse yet, developed. Over a 100 houses could have been built on the site. In 2007, Evan Ospy inherited the property and instead of developing it, he worked with his wife Susan and nephew Bennett Kesnney to start a not forprofit. Ultimately, they decided to give the entire property away to the community. It's a remarkable gift. Next slide. One of the first steps in founding the

nonprofit was a decision to conserve much of the land. Starting in 2010, the organization with the help and in partnership with Piconic Land Trust, the town of Shelter Island, Suffach County, New York State, federal government preserved over half of the 236 acre property in per perpetuity. So over half of the 236 acres have been preserved. The earliest program of the nonprofit is the farm. It was started in 2008 by Bennett and it's modeled off of Quail Hill Farm in Amagancet on the South Fork. Today we have 150 member CSA farm stands, community programming, and a well-known apprentice education program. Conservation and the working community-based farm are central to our mission today, which is to preserve, cultivate, and share historic Sylvester Manor. Next slide, Sylvester Manor is a historic district of national significance on the New York and National Registers of Historic Places. As many of you know, there are numerous historic structures on the site. their barns, farmhouse, windmill, the manor house. And as you all know, we have a lot of work to do, a lot of historic preservation work, a lot of adaptive reuse in the future. When I came on board in 2017, we started with the windmill. Uh that weated the entire exterior of the windmill that was completed in 2018 and 2019. So that was sort of our first historic preservation project. You can guess where I'm going next. Next slide, please. The last time major work was done on the manor house was in 1908. That's over a 100red years ago. As pretty much

everybody in the community knows, this is our next big project, which we actually started studying and working on starting in 2020. A $13 million capital campaign is currently underway. Really has two central goals here. to preserve, well, three, to preserve the entire exterior of the house, to update all of its major systems, and to create our center for history and heritage in the newer 1908 part of the house. We've raised over $8.5 million to date out of the 13 million. And as you all know, we began the permit process for this back in February of 2024 and hope to conclude it as soon as possible so that we can get to work. Julia again will discuss more aspects of this in particular in more detail shortly. Next slide, please. Only 20 years ago, this was a private estate and today we're this public facing nonprofit. We have so much that we want to share with the whole community, so much that we can share and a complex site and history that we need to represent. Examples of programming include our history and heritage work, research, tours, porch talk series with scholars. We also have place-based educational programming. This is at the heart of nearly everything that we do. We work with everybody from ages 2 up to 99. Uh it includes our summer youth program, field trips, curriculum building for local schools. Uh and we have cultural programming. is one of the best ways to understand and experience the multi-layered history and cultural landscape. We have Shakespeare at the manor, sculpture at Sylvester Manor, we have concerts and numerous other programs. Last slide, please.

I just wanted to share with you all a snapshot of the impact that I think we have had over the years on the community. This is mostly representative of 2025 and now this year, not just on the community, but also on the local economy. We employ nearly 80 people, 15 of which are year round employees. We host hundreds of children annually. We have a robust farm to food pantry program and compost program, and we are a significant contributor to the local economy. With that said, we're still a young nonprofit and we have a lot of work to do, especially on our infrastructure, but every day we really do try to benefit the community both programmatically and economically. Thank you for your time. I look forward to hearing your questions and Julia is now going to presentation. Hello Brandon and I represent Sister Manor as capital subjects manager. I just want to go really quickly through this presentation right there. When when I tell people that I work at Sylvester Manor, first they ask, well, what do you do? What what what goes on at Sylvester Manor? And I think that Stephen has amply presented the the full range of what we do without getting uh too deeply into the weeds. Um for anybody who's interested in learning more, you can always go to our website manner.org. And then almost always the second question is when are you going to paint the house so you can move on? We know um that that ultimately is the goal that that coat of beautiful yellow paint that's going to go onto the house.

But there's a lot of work which is represented in this image in blue that has to happen before we can do that. On the right side of this screen is a list of just many but only a few of the experts who have been helping us in this process. As Stephen said, we've been studying this house for many years. We've done deep dives into all of the different um systems, the physical house itself. We have a technical report that is, you know, stacks up into two giant boxes of paper. Um we are largely guided by architectural preservation studio. Um and Douglas Emmelio is on the call if anybody on the board has questions relating to any of the architecture is our resident historic pres. Um, one of the things that we look at when we're coming to you is what does it say? What does it say that we have to do? And this talks about um the process wanting to be simple simple review. I will tell you, we understand there's not a lot that's simple about this one. Um, of the 14 standards of review for site plan review, we understand that we probably hit almost all of them, if not all of them. Um, so there's nothing simple about this. Um, the work that we're doing and the amount of detail that we've provided is is challenging enough. So we hope that there aren't any other regulatory issues that we haven't already sort of investigated. If there are, of course, we will uh take on and give you whatever information you need.

Yeah. Um and then we also want just to say we appreciate everybody that we've been interacting with whether um the town staff um who have been wonderful um over the course of two years since this application process began. They've been able to answer all of our questions. They facilitated all of our work. Um and then there's an enormous team of people at Sylvester Manor. You all know who you are. Um everybody has contributed including people who have worked at this so long. Um, now they're retired and uh we just wanted to make sure that bang them all. Slide please. So in this house because it is as Stephen mentioned a nationally significant resource in our historic district the national and state register of historic places. We can't just say let's just do whatever we want. We are held to um certain standards and those are established by the secretary of the interior and they govern different levels of preservation work that you're doing. Some of the work that we're doing in the house is at one level. Some of the work that we're doing in the house is at different levels. Um and we're going to tell you a little bit about that. Um while this is site plan review, I wanted just to make sure that people have a chance to understand what it is that we're actually dealing with the house. Um the first decision that we made again after a lot of study was to divide the house as Stephen mentioned into our center for history and heritage and then to largely leave the front part of the house intact and to continue its uses which are largely museum type uses. That's important not just for different types of uses, but because it it has to do with the codes that are involved in the building codes that are involved in those that apply to those two different uses. We will be having um the same

programs that we've had previously, guided tours and whatnot. Um, and then at the back of the house, which is a more modern part of the house, we're going to have offices and we're going to have accommodations for visiting scholars um, and artists in residence. And the reason that we need to do that is because under a grant from the Melon Foundation, we were able to drill down on developing um, our understanding of the collections that Sylvester Manor has. It's not just a place with a big yellow house. It comes with a tremendous amount of information that's associated with it. And this is information that has value to scholars. Not only here, we've made connections um with through higher learning partnerships to institutions around the world. um being able to bring people to this location in order to make study of Sylvester Manor improve our understanding of it, improve our knowledge of the region's earliest development, its earliest settlement and the settlement that happened before that, the new settlement that happened before that is going to be incredibly valuable not just to Sylvester Manor but also to the entire community. Um so to create scholar residence locations um within the house was a very important priority for us. I just want to show you this is a a drawing of the roof. These are all part of our APS packet that you have had since we first applied. Um, red means remove, and that gives you an idea of how extensive um, some of the ravages of time and age have been on the house for removing a lot of things from the house. But that doesn't necessarily mean

that they're going to be brought up, you know, made to look new because of the standards that we're held to. Um, we are going to prioritize repair wherever we can. And when we do have to replace these, we're going to replace them in a way that is very similar down to the texture and the color and the type of materials and even the way the materials are handled. If you could just give me the next slide. Our goal there is to improve the functionality without taking away from the historic significance. Um, on the north facade here, is there a way you can get the black bar off of there or is that just on our screens? No, that's um it's on our screen, not on the Zoom.

Yeah. Um so here at this is sort of the back of the house, the north of the house. And one of the things you can see in this illustration is how it has been added to. So the front of the house is that large there's two large chimneys that taller and then the back of the house is the chimneys that look lower down. Those are additions that came out of the house. The one on the right came out in the starting in the early 1700s. They had to add a summer kitchen. Um then they had to add a more formal uh summer kitchen and then they had to add servants bedrooms. Um in 1908 they balanced out the back of the house by just copying the one side was copied with the other. Um they added a cabana in the 1960s that's mentioned in what Shelby read earlier. We are removing that cabana. it was to service a swimming pool. The swimming pool is gone, so we're going to take the cabana away. Um, we are adding, as was mentioned, uh, ramps so that people will be able to get into the house. We're making sure that the entryways are necessarily level with those ramps. Um, and we'll be doing here in blue a lot of um, new work. Red is removable, blue is new work. We're going to be repointing the brick. We're going to be replacing shingles. We're going to be replacing clabers. We're going to be making repairs wherever we can to the wooden portions of the house. Um, we can go to the next one. This is the west facade on this side. Those of you who know the house now, there are some on the first floor there's a set of um Anderson windows, the big bay window. When you walk in and look out, there's a giant bay window. We are actually going to be um restoring the original fenestration, the way that that looked to the outside. It was a debate that we had. We went back to it. Should we do this? Shouldn't we do this? Should we do this? Should we do this? Again, we were guided by preservation

experts and we decided that it was the appropriate thing to do that if we were going to be digging this deeply into the house that we should really bring it back um so that it was a coherent um vision of what it sort of had been. That's also why we're adding back, hard to make it out here, these lovely decorative railings. That's not a porch like a deck up there. It's just a decorative railing. Um those things can be notoriously difficult to maintain. Um and they did not last very long after they were they are no longer present, but we're going to restore them. We actually found the original pencil drawings for them from the architectural firm. Henry Bacon was the architect who designed the 1908 improvements to the house. He's best known for designing the Lincoln Memorial. And James L. Greenleaf was the landscape architect who designed the front gates. We'll have more about the front gates in a little bit. Um he worked with Lincoln on the Lincoln Memorial and did the landscape from there and they came to Shelter Island to work here. Move again. So this is the photograph that we started with the big yellow house. This shows the extent of the work that's going to be of the renewal work that we'll be doing. All of these windows, every window in the house is going to be removed. Just mention that because I've heard in the wind people say, "I hear you're taking all the windows out of the house. We're replacing them with modern windows." We're not. We're taking all of the windows out of the house, all the doors, all the shutters, and they're all going to go off to a workshop of preservation experts who will restore and repair what can be restored, repaired, and replicate what can't. So, we will end up with windows that align with the design, the

original intent of the house. They won't have those aluminum three-part storm screen things that went on in the 1940s or 50s. Um, and wherever possible, we're going to retain the Ripley Glass, um, the old Ripley Glass in the front of the house, which is the historic area of the house. We have a lot more capacity to do that because that part has never been air conditioned, and we have no intention to air condition it. We'd like for it to have somewhat better heat than it has now. Um, but it doesn't need to be air conditioned. Um, in the rear of the house, we might have to work on the, you know, layered glass so that we can help for that air conditioning system, uh, to be a little bit more efficient than it would be otherwise. Um, you know, to the next here, you can see there's a long ramp that connects um, so that people can come in through the music room, which is on the east side, into our our main large space. and then go from there across the porch into the front door. So all the entire first floor is all connected um via these KDA access rooms. Go to the next one systems and I bring these things up. All of those images, you have them in the architectural added, but just to say all of these things have knock on effects in the landscape. And one of the main ones that has the largest knock on effect in the landscape are our systems. So, we're switching from a fossil fuel hot water source, I mean, uh, heating source, and we're we're going to go with heat pumps, electric heat pumps. This requires components that can live outdoors. Um, at one point we thought, well, we'll just put them up on the roof and then nobody will have to look them. Um, but that required too large an area on the

roof to be interfered with. Even though we might have been able to do it, it was too much of a challenge. We drew a circle around the property. That's the radius how far you can take this um conduit that needs to connect to the outdoor components. The entire front of the house is off limits. That's all culturally very sensitive land. Um, and we ended up fortunately in a space behind the house that had been um, previously disturbed. And this was the location of our carriage house. I'll show you an image of the mechanical pad, the proposed mechanical pad later. There was a carriage house that burned down I think in the 1980s. Um, and our archaeologists have always asked us when you're looking to put something into the landscape, try to do it where there's been areas of previous disturbance rather than setting out fresh to dig ground that hasn't been disturbed that could actually have an impact on some of the archaeological and cultural resources that may be buried there. Of course, any work we do that involves ground disturbance, we have a very close relationship with the Fisk Center for Archaeological Research. They've been doing studies at Sylvester Manor since the 1990s. Um, and they come to us and have field schools over and over and over again. And, uh, they are just a phone call away. If we need them to come and look at something, they can be there for us. I just wanted to point out that we also are trying to um, retain humming fixtures wherever we can. We're going to have the same number of fixtures that we have now when we when we rejigger things and we reconfigure them. Um, but this is just an example. The bathtub and the sink both come from different bathrooms. Um, one of them has been in the house since 1908. The other one looks like it's from about the 1930s. Um, we have a sink in one of the bathrooms. It might be the first sink that ever got stolen in Shelter Island. That one we're going to preserve, too, although I'm not sure where we can put it. It's very hard to get parts

out.

Shocking. Thank you. Um the basement right now there isn't an accessible space inside of our basement. Um we are going to be changing that. We're putting a restroom, an accessible restroom. We're having a three stop elevator in the building. We're going to have um a kitchen that our staff will be able to use, that our guests will be able to use. All located down in the basement. And if you just flip to the next side slide, you can see here the previous slide, it just pointed where the arrows were. All the areas in blue will now be handicapped accessible. So that's a huge improvement and we're really pleased that we were able to make people feel be welcome um in a space that previously was not accessible to

one quick question. Yeah, sure.

What's happening to the current paint kitchen space on the first floor? Oh, I'll get to that in just a minute. That's the That's the current kitchen. We are moving kitchen facilities down to a space that used to be a pantry and it's if you're in the current kitchen, there's a staircase that goes down to the basement that's just at the bottom of that staircase about the same size. Uh this gives you a view of the cabana. When we talk about the cabana, one of the uses of the cabana cabana is that it had a half bath in it. This was very useful when we were having outdoor events and we needed a bathroom sort of close to the area for people who are working there um for people who were when we had archaeology teams come through they needed a bathroom. Um it no longer is functional and what we're doing it's right outside the back door. We're swapping it for one that's just inside the back door and that is in a location because of the way it's configured. We'll be able to open those doors and make that available to people um during the day. It's a familysized bathroom. We'll have a changing table in there. It's a terrific improvement and we're really pleased that we found a way to fit it in. Next, please. Um up on the first floor, we have a masonry structure inside the house. It runs from the basement through the second floor, and it is was designed as a vault. She was put in in 1908 when the house was owned by Cornelia Horseford. The family had um gotten to a point about the generation before her where they realized they had all of these things that had historical value. They were very preservation-minded. They didn't really throw very much away. And the house was full of these fantastic documents and records that go all the way back to the 1650s when the Sylvester family first arrived. Lived in a different house on the property, but but

arrived. Um, and so they added a vault and in order to make it fireproof, the standard then was it had to be completely encased in masonry. And so it was it has steel shutters on the outside and on the inside of a window. There's a window sandwiched in between that's probably window that's in the best shape of any of Sylvester Manor because it's been sandwiched between these steel shutters. Since we have this masonry structure, it was really the most sensible place to put in the elevator shaft. Um, we will no longer have the vault, but we'll we'll figure that out. Right now, we uh are have the generosity of the Shelter Island History Museum. Um they're allowing us to use their old bio vault for our most precious materials. Um and we just recently moved them over there. Um this is the abaness now of that space if you will. This is this makes that previous space completely accessible um not only for visitors but also for our own staff, for vendors um for people who may pop in and work for a day with us. We now have this welcoming space. On the second floor, we've taken um three bedrooms and are going to convert them. There used to be three baths on the hallway. We're going to convert this to three bedrooms each with its own bathroom and one of them will be an ADA compliant suite because the elevator people will be able to access the second floor. Um that will be really helpful as well uh for other purposes to have an elevator running through the building. Go to the next one. And then up here in the attic, we have uh one last very special um program that I just wanted to highlight. We're going to be removing the floorboards. That's that area in red. This is going to allow us to take out the old insulation um

which is no longer serving its intended function. Um, if you have ever been up in the attic, um, you'll remember, and if not, I'll try to describe them for you. These beautiful long floorboards that are, some of them are this wide, this thick. Um, they have wide cracks between them and we know that people inhabited that attic. We have carvings on the wall, ship graffiti of two. Montake boys who were indentured to the gardener family when they lived in the manor house and they carved ships like the ones that they had no doubt seen all over um the island and in neighboring communities. Um the older brother left before his indenture was up and was never heard from again. And the younger brother stayed on even after his indenture. He stayed on at Sylvester Manor um and was actually buried in our Afroindigenous burial ground. I was very pleased. Meg, thank you for pointing out um our burial grounds are sacred spaces for for burial people's remains are interred and they're also really important to us. We have the Quaker cemetery which is still used as the location of the Quaker meeting. There are people who still gather there in good weather um for their weekly worship. And our Afroindigenous Burial Ground has been the subject of intensive study. One of the things that we had concerns about is we weren't sure what our boundaries and we've been able to confirm that through study with the Fisk Center. They've come multiple times back to Sylvester Matter to determine that the boundaries that have been on our survey for many years are in fact the boundaries of that aerial ground. So I hope that that resolves any

concerns that people have about us knowing where these are. Um I think that's it. That's it. Um, so what I wanted to do if you have questions, we've done a lot of submissions, you have our original submission was a packet that we put together for the building inspector to review. When you know you have a big project like this, you put together a package and he gives the building inspector and then he immediately sends him to a zoning board and then the zoning board sends you to the town board. Um, what we were not really clear on when we came out of the zoning board with our special permit was that this review, our site plan review, would actually we would be asked to cover things that are sort of related to our special use rather than just strictly the knock-on effects of the things in the house. And so if it seems like we've been scrambling to try to provide you with information, it's because we did not real we didn't make that connection and we should have and didn't. And so we've kind of been playing catch-up and we may have missed some things. And I I'm sure in your questions we'll find out what those are. If we have, our goal is to get to yes. Our goal is to not do anything that would adversely impact the environment, the historic resources of Sylvester Manor in any way. One thing I would ask if you could pull it up, Shelby, is since um the planning board gave its response, we actually had um some remarks back and if we could just quickly look at that one.

Sorry. Was it a large program? Yes. Yes. So, we had um we had been asked by the by the planning board to provide the locations of the events that were allowed under our special permit from the zoning board. And we tried to put everything on one map which as it turned out did not give sufficient information for that purpose. And instead we went we went back after we heard from them not satisfied with that approach. We went back and showed where in the landscape these different events occur have occurred in the past and I can just pull up. Great. But it was an effort to add on added a little bit more detail. And we realize this came in on the 13th and there was a little bit of a back and forth between us and the planning board. If you could just scroll down here. So what we did after receiving the response um it said we were being too vague is we broke out the different areas of the property where we have typically have events. So the lawn on the manor in front of manor house between manor house and gardener creek is an area where we have had uh creek side concerts. It's a place where we've had Shakespeare

table and farm to table which these these programs they're large enough. We always go to the town for an outdoor assembly per conversation proactively to make sure that if there's any permitting that's required um that we receive those permits and sometimes the answer is they're not necessary. Um, our Shakespeare performances are usually done sort of in the round on the grass. There's no amplification. It's done in daylight. They're over early. Um, it's a very familyfriendly kind of layout. We we sort of string rope so people don't go where the actors expect to walk. Uh, just to indicate sort of seating areas, but everybody brings their own chairs. They bring their own blankets. Um, and the same thing for concerts. People bring their own chairs, they bring their own blankets. Sometimes we get the stage from um Suffach County Department of Parks, the show I think it's called. There's only so many places you can put that vehicle. It comes on the back of a of a trough and gets set up. So, it has to be in a location where the truck driver feels comfortable being able to pull it in and then come back and retrieve it and pull it back out again. Our property, although it's very large, it's also largely wooded. We only have certain number of areas that are suitable for outdoor events that have a kind of either level for an event where people want to sit at tables and chairs or event that requires people sit at tables and chairs or the kind of sort of gently sloped thing where somebody sitting on a blanket can have good sight lines for a Shakespeare performance or good sight lines for um a musical concert and also to leave space in front of where the band is playing so people can dance. People like to get up and dance at these things and we don't want them doing that on hillsides. And there really aren't that many places in

Sylvester Manor where we can do that while also reserving level spaces for people to park their cars on the on the grass. We just scroll through a little bit to the next image. Here is the um circle in front of the manor house. You can see the direction of the arrows. Typically, we would set up not even the show mobile, but just a small platform um for whoever has come to perform. This tends to be somewhat smaller audience event. Had Jean Casey and the Lone Sharks there last summer for a concert that benefited the Shelter Island Fire Department. Um and it was great fun. The fire trucks parked right in the driveway. Um all the kids got to pop on the fire trucks. It really lovely event. Go to the next one.

This is an area that's to the west of our driveway sort of before you get to the banner house. There's a sort of a natural bowl that occurs in there. And we've had concerts there where we've managed to put the stage up. People come with their blankets. They sit and they listen. There's no permanent infrastructure for any of these things. We have generators that are provided to for amplification. There's no lighting necessarily when we do farm to table. Of course, we light the venue. It's one time a year. Um, and we do get the necessary permits to do that. We have limited amplification at many of our events. Almost always powered by the generator. Some of them, I think Jean Casey was powered by a battery last time when he came. You can move to the next image. This is the we call them the rooms in our historic gardens. We've had events in this this area generally, you know, rather than dry out each little tiny garden room. Um Harland came there. We had them sprites.

Yes. Um, so there's some overlap and uh crisscross between us and some of the other organizations on the island. Um, and we can offer a space for them to come and have uh performances related to the work that they're doing. Um, we had the prom here previously in one of these rooms which was a lovely event. Go to the next one. And then this is generally last year's setup for farmtotable. So over on the left, that's the area. It's not just one big tent. It's a group of tents. There's the dining tent that people sit under for dinner. It has a DJ and a dance floor. Plus, it has all of the um catering tents and the sort of supply backup support tents tent that you see over on the right. That over on the right, that's where we have a reception area when people first arrive. We have cocktails, we have things like that. And then in between that circle lawn again becomes kind of a lounge area, sort of an open air lounge area. We do bring in special trailer for rather than the regular portaotties that we otherwise would use. We bring in special restroom trailers. People are dressed up for this event and we want to gussy up our game on the portaotti side as well. Um, we have lighting because this is an event that does go past dark. That's not to say that we don't anticipate always keeping our events before dark. It just is an acknowledgement. We don't have any um infrastructure for outdoor lighting at this time. As Stephen said, we're a very young organization. We inherited a house that is a private residence that we are working now to convert to these public purposes. And there's quite a bit of work um to do around that. We have to make sure all of our assets are stabilized. We have a lot of historic

buildings around the property and we're sort of chipping away at these big jobs with the man house being this is our windmill field area and some livestock in there. Um we have events around the windmill. We've had fundraisers for the windmill at the windmill. We have a windmill lighting every year. Um I think that the shortest fundraiser on Shelter Island is the library's turkey plunge because it's so cold you have to jump in the water. Um but this might be the second shortest one because it's usually really cold. You know, the hot chocolate itself even can be cold. Um but people come and hip hip hooray. The lights go on the windmill and it's really a lot of fun. We do have grassy overflow parking here at the farm stand. We have a gravel and dirt parking area. This is the way we have done things traditionally at Sylvester Man. We have You can swirl it. Thank you, Shelby.

I've designated on all of these using the Suffach GIS how long the area is. Typically 10 ft wide for parked cars. Uh if it's 70 ft long, you can get 10 cars in there. If it's 15 feet long, you can get five cars in there. We can put cars not on both sides the full length of this area, but about a length and a half. Um so we can get a good number of cars in there on grassy overflow for an event that is in and out. Um and it's not that we're using these parking lots over and over and over again. We also use some of our mode grassy areas for livestock grazing. We use them for programs. Our summer youth program um has spreads out over the property. We don't allow people to park anywhere they want to park, especially in cases where there's children around. We have an orderly way of bringing cars in and out during those programs and while they're in session. Um, and while some places can be used for parking, we designate that that's the designated parking area. So, if you were to come into an event like Shakespeare, there would be a person waving you in for park on the line. It's not just people driving in the park and they are told this is the designated parking area. So, if that wasn't made clear in our submissions, I apologize for that. Um, sometimes we have parkers who stay the whole night and help provide um, exiting service, but for most of our events, it's just to help people know this is where you're supposed to park. Um, I think that's good. If you want to go to one of the areas that may cause some confusion is our track. So, we submitted a couple of documents to you and um

Amber and I had talked about this. We have a we have a grant. We're operating under a grant to redesign our primary entryway that's going to take us a while to get through a separate regulatory process because that primary entry is on the state roadway. The New York State Department of Transportation is the is the controlling authority there. We got a grant. We applied for it a long time ago. It took a while for us to get it. It took even longer to get through all the paperwork um in order to actually get the money rolling because it's New York State Authority. And as soon as we were able, we began working again with Nelson Bulls on a redesign. What we're trying to do is widen the opening so that two cars can pass at a time. We submitted the plans for information so that people can see we recognize this is an issue but we can't link it to this project because it's its own separate project and it has more than one entryway is involved. So, if we were to just peel out the entryway, that's where, no pun intended, for the um front main gate, we could be accused of segmentation. We have a project that's in front of the DOT, and yet we're only doing site plan review on one part of it, and we don't want to do that. We want to keep the project as one whole so that it can go through its own regulatory process as one whole. And since it is with the DOT, we have no idea if action and what that time. So, we hope that the information that we've provided to you with that with our um improvements that we're uh making for our interior circulation will help alleviate some of the concerns that people have about traffic as it comes in

and out um of the gates there. We'll do everything we can to talk to the people who are driving the children to the program to make sure that they understand the challenge and that this is a sort of a sore point for um folks in the community. And I will ask just for a little bit of community participation, there is a very um very like only on Shelter Island habit that people have gotten into, which is if you're going south on 114 and you're coming up on the IG and you plan to go straight, you turn on your left blinker, right? It it it has effects on us because there are people who will be coming up that same roadway and turn on their left linker who are about to stop.

So what we would ask maybe the town and we can get the sign or something um with a nice motto on it to help uh a public service campaign um that people should only turn the blinker on when if they're actually turning if they're actually turning left. Yeah. We also I'm one of the ones who turn on the paper to go straight. We also proposed initially we proposed initially that there possibly possibly this is something that the town may want to take on with the DOT. I don't know. Um that at the very least there'll be a crosswalk installed

at the stop sign at Manwearing with stars opening now in that site. There there's a lot of traffic going around there. um more than there used to be. Um and it would be nice to have one designated crosswalk there. We will be separating pedestrians from cars at our entry under our plans and we'll have a pathway that goes alongside the driveway until they're well into the property. Um because we understand that that's a consideration, too. You don't want people having to cut through that narrow gate with cars going in both directions. So, am I hearing this right? Now that we know that the gates have some sort of architectural significance, which I'm not sure we knew before,

they're going to remain.

No. So, we have reached out as we are required to do to the New York um state historic preservation office, which is part of the New York parks department. And we asked them to take a look at the redesign because we were concerned about that. We're like these gates were designed by this um permanent architect of his day and the word that we got back is they have no objection to it at this time. Um we have with our team at Nelson Wolves and our engineer to Bennett um tried to take us back to an older set of gates. So we're not giving up on the history of Sylvester Manor. We designed a set of gates that or an entry way. It won't actually have gates that move. Um an entryway that is um reflective of an older period. And on top of that, one of the other entryways that's covered by this project is at the Quaker corner and they have the very same design as the gates at the primary entry. And they were also designed by James Greenley. So we are preserving these gates at the Quaker corner so that we can make some more sort of modernizations uh at the area that's the sticky.

Got it. Were there any other major areas? I don't want to belabor any of this. You have all this incredible documentation in front of you. Were there any other questions that you had for us? Not at the moment. Yeah, I think you Yeah, I think you touched on Okay. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate it. Um, and if possible, I have an opportunity to come back if there's any comments for you to follow. Thank you so much. Thank you. Questions from the table. I'll open it up to the public. Okay. And we know Mr. Gay had his name on the list first.

I did. Hi there, Mike Gainer 8 Cobitz Lane. I'm a direct neighbor of uh Sylvester Man Educational Farm. We share a lot line together as you guys all know. Can I please share my screen? Did you submit it to um the town ahead of this meeting? I did not because only when we receive things ahead of time just so we can vet them to make sure that there's nothing. Okay, no problem. I can I can uh for the next we're going to have a continuation of this. So, if you want to submit it ahead of time, then it can be reviewed for propriety and make sure there's nothing.

Great. No problem. We'll uh we'll do that that way the next time I'll be here. Um so, just as you say, I don't want to be that person. Um when I was, as you know, I got here at 4:00. Eager Bieber wanted to make certain I got first on the list. And when I was walking, this is an open to meetings question. Uh when I was walking into the building, uh Stephen Sill was walking out. You didn't have a conversation with Stephen Si about this application today, did you? No, I didn't even see him. Okay, great. Perfect. I just It's just an open meeting. It's a real issue with people.

Oh, okay. Yeah, I was not a big deal. I didn't want like I said, I don't want to be that person, but those those open meeting rules are there for a reason. And if we're going to have a public hearing, I just wanted to make sure that whatever we're going to discuss that everybody gets to discuss it. Um, I of course have a very different agenda than what you just heard right here. Um, I'm in the technology industry as I think some of you might know and uh PowerPoint presentations like that, we call them vaporware in uh the tech world. Uh, you can put put anything on a PowerPoint presentation and make it look and and say whatever you want it to say. Uh, when you look at the facts, the history of what's taken place at Sylvester Manor Educational Farm. um and uh relative to what is uh some of the concerns are of the community going forward and how the government here I'm actually speaking to my community here. I'm not necessarily speaking to my government. I'm going to speak to the character of this organization and I'm going to speak to the character of this board because it's a real problem how this application has been handled. This conversation was supposed to happen 16 years ago, right? So, when you ask people like the Pikes that were just here to go build a dock, uh when you ask uh the library, when you ask the Pearlman Center, when you ask uh uh the Prinwin, anybody who has to go through the permanent process knows one unilateral thing about it. It sucks. But everybody has to do it except for these folks. They have violated the law up one side and down the other and they've done it with the assistant of our of our government. I'm going to document each and every one of you on this town board has exhibited extreme bias towards them and I've documented it. Okay? And so we're going to talk through that history and I'm going to make an argument that you are unfit to be hearing this site

plan review. None of you every single one of you has unclean hands. Al, Ben, you, Amber, and um, each of you. In 2009, these folks pick up a single family residence and they illegally convert it into a uh, concert and event venue. They were never cited from that moment on. The minute they took that single family residence and they turned it into an event venue, which is exactly what it is. It is an event venue. That's all they do there is they have events. The moment they did that, they violated the town code. You're required to get a special permit. You guys all know that. Jim Dhy, Jerry Girth, Jerry Siller, you Amber, all of your administrations and all of the respective board members have not just looked the other way. You've been complicit in allowing them to operate without a special getting a special permit. It's a very expensive and it's a very painful process. They knew what they needed to do. These are super super smart people. Super smart people. And they're highly compensated. Steven Zero makes $140,000 a year working part-time for a not for-p profofit corporation. That's public information. It's filed with the New York Attorney General's office. Okay. Because they're a not for-profit corporation.

Let's just make sure we keep things to site plan review. I'm keeping them to site plan review, Amber. And it's the question of of what your uh credibility is inside of this site. People are very concerned about it, right? We're expecting that we are going to get a fair hearing on this. The history, your personal uh performance inside of this community relative to this applicant has showed tremendous bias. Each and every person here intense rain. That's rain. Yes. Not the ceiling coming down. It's raining down.

It might down. It might start raining in here. That's what the facility master plan is for.

In February of 2024, I uncovered that these folks were operating illegally inside of the town. And I confronted every single person who was here right now was on was at that meeting. Ben was here, Al was here, Matt was here, you were here, Amber, and I confronted you on it. You acted like it was new information. There's two permutations of that answer. either a there's a 230 plus acre uh notfor-profit organization that's having events uh uh not 6 miles away from where you're sitting and you guys don't know about it or you did know about it. The first scenario is actually the scarier one that you folks are in office and that was going on and you didn't know about that. That's how you acted when I confronted you about this. You said that predated my administration here and all of these other ridiculous things that you said when in fact everybody here knew that they were operating illegally. And you know what you did once I did tell you that and confronted you that on the record? Nothing. They were not cited at all. They continue to operate illegally. If there were any other business inside of inside of this community and it was operating illegally like let's say I don't know for example Rams Head In what happened to Rams Head In right they got put through the ringer. Do you know that business almost got put out of business by the time you guys got done with her? Andrea Carter burned through a half million dollars in legal fees and got and was literally caught up in the jaws of government for years. That's what happens to other businesses around here. Tim Eaton over on Cartwright over there has been drawn in and out of court over this stuff. Meanwhile, these guys do whatever it is they want to do and you guys allow them to do it. It is biased. They have been treated with bias for 16 years and it's well documented.

This thing is a forprofit event venue masquerading as a notfor-profit organization. that little vapor wear show that they just put on. They are in the business of of collecting public monies and private donations. That's it. They have not done anything over there. If I were allowed to share my screen, I'd show a picture of what that place looks like. It's falling down. They stole $30,000 from my wife. Sylvester Manor organization did. They told me that they were going to take my money. They showed me a big fancy document just like that. They said they were going to take my money and they were going to go clean up that place. Go take a look at it. It's not just unpainted. It's strewn with garbage from one end of the property to the other. The place is a dump. You all know I am also a real estate developer. This ridiculous uh fantastic thing that they're describing that they're going to fix up that property that all they have to do they're they're at $8 million out. All they have to do is get to 13. Do you know what? $13 million will buy you on that property. Nothing. It's never going to happen. They're going to wave that out in front of more donors and they're going to exploit more people and they're going to get more money out of them. $13 million. With $30 million, you couldn't put a dent inside of that place. It's never going to happen. This would have been in 2019. I just moved here. I get approached by Sarah Gordon, my next door neighbor across the street who was in charge of fundraising over there and Steven Sero. They show a document in front of me and they and they tell me that if I make a contribution to this thing, it is absolutely made clear to me that the town is completely aware of this that they're going to be doing this entire event venue. And again, I'll bring that

document here in the next time and we'll go take a look at it. It's an inch thick. And they show it to me and they get and they and they get my wife and I to give them $30,000 to go clean up the building. It never happens. This thing is a fraud. It is a tax and charitable donation scam. I can't show any of my pictures, so I'm going to have to show them the next time. New York State public hearings law matter of Edy versus town board in the town of North Green Bush. This is where we get to your folks and why I believe you need to all recuse yourself from this meeting based on your history inside of this thing. A board member's prior public statements, prior votes, or prior conduct demonstrating a fixed viewpoint on a particular applicant or application constitutes a disqualifying bias that was written into the New York State Open Meetings Law in 2006. Okay. Now, we're going to walk through your history. In December of 2019, one week before Christmas, under the cloak of darkness, uh uh a piece of legislation is passed by the town board. You vote on that, Al, and you vote on it, Amber. You've got a business that's illegally operating in a double A zone, an event venue, right? You guys come together and sign off on a piece of legislation that purchases a a a conservation easement off of that. Anybody who's ever driven down 114, uh, just as soon as you get past the the IGA, when you're heading towards the North Ferry, look to your right and you're going to see a scrubby patch of of woods there. You guys put a a fictitious line around 16 acres inside of there and said that piece of land had to be protected. And you gave them $2,55,000 to to to protect a piece of land from

development that they couldn't protect. It was not physically possible. It's an unsubdivided piece of land and the only people who could possibly build on it is them themselves. So is that what we do now in the town? We pay people $2 million not to develop their own land. You guys voted on that. An illegal business. You gave them $2,55,000 of our money to do to not do something that they were never going to do. Nor could they. We didn't get the land. It was a it was a conservation eman. It was unsubdivided property. You just got them to give you a promise. It was the most expensive promise that anyone's ever transacted in. $2 million55,000 to uh not build on a piece of land that they had no intention or no possibility of ever doing that. That is an example of bias by both you and Al. You guys both need to recuse yourself from this hearing process. That is well documented. You told an illegal business that they could have $2,55,000 of our money. You shouldn't have done that. You're exhibiting bias toward them. Recruit recruits yourself from this special permit application. That uh that $2,55,000 transaction, Ben Diet's name is on it. He signed it. He got the wire transfer. He was president of Sylvester Manor Educational Farm when the wire went through. Jerry Siller signed off on that. uh uh uh Katherine Gerard who just put in her uh who just put in her resignation who currently sits on her community preservation fund board. She also sits on Sylvester Manor's board and she orchestrated that entire transaction. Her Gordon Gooding, Ben, everybody was involved inside. I'm sorry.

Nothing. Sorry. Glad you find it funny, Ben. Keep going.

Yeah. I plan on it in 2020. Sylvester Manor Educational Farm has an illegal mega film film back there with Beyonce and Disney funding. One year prior to that film being filmed, HBO came to this community and offered us $50,000 for to to film one night in in in uh on uh uh Shelterite one night and we kicked him out and ran them off of the island because it was going to be disturbing. They knew what they were doing. These are really really smart people. So they they obiscated that. They didn't tell anybody and they secretly filmed a megapilm. That's what it's defined as inside of the town code. What happened to them? Nothing. They were not cited for that. Nothing happened to them whatsoever. Made it all over the newspaper all throughout the United States. It was in page six. It was in page Vogue. We look like idiots. That cost us money. Could have got a lot of money for the community for that. and nothing happened to them. Bias. You were sitting on the board. You've been in office here for over a decade now, Amber. You've taken no enforcement action, not once. Whether you were a board member or as a supervisor, after I uncovered that they're operating illegally in a double A zone and you refuse to sight them, I come to you and I say they are now they're going through the special permit process now. cats out of the bag. We all know that now they have to go through the special permit process. They shouldn't be having events there. If it were any other business, they wouldn't be allowed to continue to operate. And I said, and so they were coming to you for a noise permit, right, for their for their uh charitable event that they have every year supposedly their fancy party that they have over there for that sells at 650 bucks a ticket. And if you're lucky enough, maybe you can get a couple of those tickets for free.

I confront you on that. And you you and you and you both tell them that they can't have live music at that event, right? Because they were because they were uh uh uh uh they were going through the special permit process and they were operating illegally. What did they do, Amber? They had music at the event. You're going to miss my best picture all together. This is the best one right here with Ben Diet dancing on the dance floor. So he recuses himself. Love those moves.

Yeah. He recuses himself from the hearing and then goes to the a town board member recuses himself from the hearing because he used to be president of their organization. Then he goes to the event where they're playing the live music and he's doing a Danny Tero right in front of where they have somebody a DJ spinning the music and it's up I'm glad you find it funny because I was up until 11 p.m. listening to that gets better. So they don't get cited for you. You tell them they can't have music. They go ahead and have music anyhow. They don't get cited for that. Not two months later, they have an illegal concert. They sell tickets on event for God's sakes. Sold out show. 400 people wind up going to that concert. The Zidote concert. two months after you and and and what happens when they have that illegal concept? Are they cited? No. Bias. Everybody on this board needs to recuse themselves from looking at this application. You folks are unfit. You have a long history of bias against this applicant. After the noise violation, after the legal concert, I come back the next year. This has been going on for years of my life now with you people. Years of my life. They come back the next year again. Ben recuses himself from the conversation and you guys go on to say, "You know what? Not only can you have your your your big fancy party, but yeah, this year, even though you violated all the rules last year, and the code is very clear about these assembly permits, if you violate the rules one year, you're not supposed to

even be available to get another permit for at least 3 years. It's written into the code. Either way, they break the rules twice the year before in 2024. 2025, they come back, you give them everything. You say you can have music at your uh at your farm tot party. You can have all of your concerts, all of it. You operate with extreme bias when it comes to this app. And Amber and you, Magg, and you, Al in September of 2025, the zoning board is charged with finally hearing this uh uh special uh uh permit application. And the charge that they are given uh by Tim Hill, who's a super super smart attorney by the way. Uh Tim Hill charges them with finding a nexus, right? A a intersection between a an educational institution, which what's which is what they're supposed to be, uh Sylvester Manor Educational Farm, right? A nexus between all of the activities they have going on there, and the and educational institution. And somehow somehow Phil Dioro, Lynn Collian, and the rest of them somehow think that having concerts out there at Sylvester Manor Educational Department, there is some nexus between that and an educational institution. I have no idea how they got there, but now it's in our law, right? It was written, it was approved. They were told that they can have two concerts a year inside of that property. Two concerts a year. That's it. that the language is about that thin. It doesn't say anything about them. Right now, what I know about these guys, they're not particularly smart and they're not particularly honest and they're not particularly well organized. Going forward, what happens when the smart uh uh uh articulate, wellorganized

people get in charge of that place? It's a 230 acre property that now has a piece of legislation with Sylvester Manor's name on it that says that they can have two concert events there every year with about two sentences describing what it is. The smart, wellorganized people are going to be like, "Holy cow, this is awesome. How many people can we stuff into this property and have multi,000 person concerts?" I described this to you last week. This is a real problem. We're not talking about some faroff land where uh uh freaking Taylor Swift has an event or something like that. Talking about the Shinik Indian uh uh reservation, which is the only place that runs more wild than that place over there right now. Shinikok Indian reser reservation a couple years ago got it inside of their head that their land was a great place to have an outdoor concert venue. It's operating completely illegal. There's nothing anybody can do about it. Town of Southampton can't touch it. It's being controlled by the by by the uh Department of the Interior. That's it. It started off as a couple hundred person concert like they have out there. And last year it clocked in at over 10,000 people showed up and nobody could do anything about it. This year they expect it's going to be over 20,000 people. So when the smart wellorganized people get their hands on this thing might not be a year from now or two or three but it could be in five easily when you guys are all out of office when I make sure of that when you guys are all out of office and the smart wellorganized people get their hands on that place and they're going to say go sue me. What are you going to do then? Are you going to is this what we're supposed to expect? Then you guys are going to enforce all the laws here that you haven't enforced against them in 16 years. So now they're going to go forward. You've made a big point out of this, Meg. One of the reasons you didn't want to enforce the site plan on Jerry Silver is you're like, "We can't enforce that stuff. That's a landscaping

property. What are you going to do when these guys start doing that? Nobody showed up. I called the cops. Nobody goes over there. They have concerts. We're going to call the zoning police on them when they start when that 300 person concert turns into 500. You're going to be there with a clicker when they walk in the front door and count them off. That's never going to happen. That's fantasy. Planning board reviews this thing last week and it sounds like please watch the video. Is the video version of this thing? Anybody? I encourage you. It's the most watched uh uh planning board uh video of all times by about 300%. We're up to about 169 people viewed it right now. Okay, go read go watch it. It starts at the 2-hour mark. You got to make it all the way. You have to suffer through uh all the conversations about wetlands. It starts at the 2-hour mark and uh uh I think the guy's name is Steve Davyy who's who's definitely one of the smartest guys on this island. Steve's good and you know what he describes their application as garbage. That's what the planning board thinks of this thing. These are my recommendations to my community, not to you guys. Amber, Meg, Al, and Ben all need to recruit us recruit themselves as the law requires based on your history of biased treatment of the matter. That's what the state law says. I've just given you all the facts to show that you've shown incredible bias towards this applicant. You've not taken any enforcement action against them in 16 years. You need to recuse yourself from this application process. planning board should take and trust me that what I would like to do is I'd like to re revoke their fairy passes, but I know I know I'm not going to be able to

get away with it. These are all reasonable things that could happen. Planning board takes the lead on all this. Uh uh this is I just like one of the most fantastic parts about this thing. Half of the planning board had to recuse themsel more than half. What am I saying? more than half of the planning board had to recuse themselves from this thing because everybody is connected to this hot mess over here. Planning board should take this uh take charge of this thing and they should be responsible for this application. Start this whole process over the way it should have been done. This is what happened when you get caught doing stuff you're not supposed to be doing. You don't get rewarded, you get reprimanded. Make them start this process completely over. make them go to the zoning board, file an amendment to that application, and take concerts off of that property. On their own public statements, they have said they don't make any money at concerts. Well, they don't make any money at concerts, and they're a charitable organization. Why are we having concerts? What's the point? Because they plan on making money at concerts eventually if they're not already. So, have them go back to the zoning board and remove concerts if they're not gerine. It's one of the biggest issues. It's one of the things that the planning department completely focused on. It's all about the noise. Start this whole process over. Do it correctly. Take a holistic approach with both planning and zoning working together. Emphasis on being a making a permanent commitment from the manor for its future, which is a common theme that comes out of everybody's mouth. Came out of you watch the zoning meeting on this thing from September when they discussed it. You watch the you watch the planning board meeting from last week. They do not want to commit to anything going forward in the future. Oh, we'll just figure it out later because we're such good stewards of this property. That's why it's falling down because we have such good character that we have illegal concerts all the time. Let's just go figure it out in the future. You folks

need to recuse yourself. Thank you. Mike Dos, Mike Collins. Thank you.

Anyone else who would like to speak? I expected to be, you know, first of all, my name is Michael Shading. I'm a resident and a property owner. You know, I live here, but my family members have purchased houses here, has purchased a house here. We really value the lifestyle that we have on the island. Um I feel it's a little threatened by the level of economic development and some of the challenges that the community faces um with regard to um being a cohesive community and being a vibrant community. And it's interesting. I had no contact with this group, but I came up with this the same categories of impact that Sylvester Manor has on the community. Um, and that category is those categories are that it has a favorable impact upon the economy of the island and it has a favorable impact on um the vibrance of our community. Um but many of our pe residents here are summer people. Um what makes uh it possible for young f young professional families to be here on the island all summer long is that the Sylvester Manor runs community runs activities um that provide um or um provide camps um and you know for a young family that's that's very important to have activities Um

so that mom and dad can uh work remotely. Um and I to me that's it's important that um my family is is around me and I think it's also important that after going through a long desolate winter um that there is community activities here. There are events um that uh make the place um what it is. You know, we are um I think like it or not a a summer destination and the kinds of activities that the manner provides for cultural activities, they're community activities. Um when it comes to economics, it's not just the jobs that the the manner provides. It's it's it's it's more than that. Um, you know, it's the old expression and that maybe doesn't mean that much to some people. It's the the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker. What that means is that each business entity has an impact on other business entities and the the activities that the manner provides in terms of all the things that they do generates uh sort of business activities for the island at at large. and uh each adds to the success of each ind individual to our restaurants and to our service businesses. And you know, let's face it, the discussion right now is why are businesses failing on the island and we're losing critical services. Well, we just we need more content here and Sylvester Manor as well as many of our our well I'll say well-mannered uh institutions like Sylvester Manor and I was happy to see I thought it was a beneficial thing to see that um Pearlman Foundation chose to be here

year round. These these institutions are what keeps our fragile economy going and makes those 13 weeks that businesses function here a a year round success. Um so I ask I'm sorry I'm the only person standing here before you. I I wish the room was packed with other citizens. And I think the fact that it's not packed with people, people don't come when when they're happy with something. They come when they have something to complain about. I I thought I was going to be one of many uh here that, you know, would have something to say. Um but I'm unfortunately alone. I reach out to other people to take their civic responsibility. If they value what Sylvester Matter does for the community, I ask that they come and and speak out because I I know that these things turn on community um action and community sentiments. Um again, the impact thing is very important in in zoning and in planning. Um you have to look at the positives. What when I say the positives, if something is has negative impacts, you balance it. And of course, a concert periodically has negative impacts to a close by neighbor, but you balance it against the good that it that it provides for the community economics and for this notion of how people feel and function as a as a group. And I again say that this is an an establishment that has done well for us. And the fact that we have overlapping uh board members and over overlapping committee members just speaks to the fact, you know, there's no sinister plan there. It speaks to the fact that we're

common community that has common values and of course people will sit on both communities. I'm think that the comments that were made by the planning board are comments that were made by the thoughtful group and I applaud this town board for having stood up recently, a very thoughtful, thorough, professional um planning board. Um I I wish that going forward with this that there's a process to make the comments that they made more actionable and more specific. And I say that because I'm also a taxpayer here and like a third of the community, we are fixed income uh individuals and I I know I don't know but I suspect that we face the potential of litigation and I just encourage you to sort of dot your eyes and cross your tees um to put us in the best possible position with regard to the tax implications of of people that will attack this in in the future. Um because it's the citizens at large of the community that bear the the brunt of that. So I would ask that you do what you do um as carefully as you possibly can so that the uh you're in we're in the best shape moving forward after you make your decision. And thank you for your time.

Thank you. Thank you, Michael. Bob Jeffy, I see that you have your um hand raised.

Uh thank you. Thank you, Amber. Uh I tried to start my video. Okay. Anyhow, I would like to uh and thank you for recognizing me. I would like to uh echo the comments of the prior speaker. I think Sylvester Manor is a wonderful institution. It brings so many uh wonderful things to the uh to Shelter Island. Uh I think Stephen and Julia uh covered all of those things and and I would have to reinforce everything that's been said and I also think that you've been careful as a board trying to weigh all of the interests of all the different people, but this is a very very special institution in terms of what it's providing this community. And I think it would be a major mistake not to continue to try to provide as much support as possible. Many many uh communities would just die to have something with the incredible culture history. I mean this stretches back and it covers everything of America's history here as we're talking about our 250 years. We go back 400 years. So I just uh I'm going to be very efficient and get right to the point. Uh I am overwhelmingly in favor of what they are proposing.

Thank you.

Is there anyone else in the Zoom audience who would like to speak?

Pam.

Yes. Good evening everyone. I I'd just like to reiterate what the planning board memo has said that the application is largely incomplete at this time and I think that you need to review exactly what they have submitted to you in their memo about what they are finding is incomplete. Uh what should be reviewed again perhaps it should go back to them one more time for review. And then the other issue that I have with this project is it's not really clear if the ZBA gave special permits for all for uh both parcels 5.10 and 5.3. I'm not really sure it's clear the ZBA gave approval of changing a barn into an accessory structure as an A3 occupancy which would then be an event hall. I'm not clear on that. Um, and I'm also not clear on the secret designation of this as a type two action that apparently the ZBA had designated. And the town board has not discussed how they feel about this action. But in town code, anything that involves more than 20 parking spaces becomes a type one action. So I don't know how you want to try to address that. Uh, they have admitted that they have over 60 employees at this establishment. So where are they parking on a regular basis? And I think that we really need to get back on the details of actually what site plan review is about which is traffic, parking, lighting, natural features, etc. and go over that criteria and see in fact if they have met those uh recommendations and and taken it to a full site plan review as required by the town. So, I don't I I don't know if you intend on uh sending this back to the planning board with the information they provided tonight or or or will we convene this public hearing and get some more information and then continue next month?

Yeah, we're going to adjourn because there's a lot of information. Some we only just got on Friday. So we will need to adjourn so that we can the town board can continue to sift through everything and um look at everything and come you know ask the applicant more questions part of that too. Thank you very much. That's that's perfectly reasonable. Thank you very much.

And just Pam so you know there were documents that we received after the planning board memo that addressed what the planning board was asking for. So, we did get more detailed um documents showing exactly sort of where the events take place, which is what the planning board was asking for in their memo. So, we did receive additional information to address some of the planning board's concerns. Yes. Thank you, Meg. I did see those documents. Okay.

Is there anyone else on Zoom who would like to speak? I'm presuming Bob, Jeffy, you still have your hand raised from the first time, so I'm not good. Thank you. All right. Uh, any final comments from anyone in the audience here?

Yeah, just again, Julie Brennan, um, Sylvester Manor, just to follow up. Um, we hope that we will be hearing from you about any additional information that you need, any gaps in information that we can fill. This project is the sum of like any project, but thousands and thousands of tiny little decisions and every time you make a change over here can have a knock-on effect over there. And so, if there's places that we haven't covered to your satisfaction, let us know. Like I said, we want to get to guess about this. Um, and we don't want to do anything that would adversely impact um that location that we have devoted our lives to, our our work lives to. Um, and that we have great affection for anyway and many people in the community have expressed that. Um, I just wanted to invite you to send us any information, give us any feedback. Um, are you waiting for additional reports from on different areas of site review? I I just wanted to know what to expect.

Teresa Mason is going to update her report this um weekend and then um you know, as me said, you know, we're going to look at the planning board memo again just to double check and see like what came in subsequent to see if it's answered questions. Um look at what you gave us. Um, I want to, you know, go back through each of the review standards myself and be like, okay, like where is this? What are we doing? You know, it's like I've had all of this stuff like all over the place and I've got it all numbered now thanks to Federica at the back. So, it just needs more time to like just synthesize everything. Any specific questions and any other additional information you need, we are happy to scramble around and try to get it to you. I just wanted to end Michael Chhat has said it really well but the National Park Service is one of the people one of the organizations that kind of regulates us. We have to run all of our plans by the National Park Service. We have to run them by the state historic preservation office. We have to run a lot of stuff by Suffach County. We have a lot of people. We have to run a lot of stuff by this work that we're doing is focused on a tax lot and not on these places that have conservation easements or we'd also have to run by all of the people those conservation. But the advisory council on historic preservation um has this to say about preservation. They say preservation stimulates community revitalization, heritage, tourism, job creation, improves quality of life, greater shared knowledge about our past and strengthened regional identity and local pride. We think that the thing about how do we fit under the comprehensive plan, how do we fit under the goals of the town has for itself, that that's our answer to that. that by preserving this property, we're fulfilling this idea of injecting some new life into this portion of the community in a

responsible way and with the plan that is thoroughly thought through and actually achievable and not some pie in the sky idea um but something that we can actually accomplish. Thank you. Thank you. Um I just want to take a moment for the town board to just pull up my schedule on what we've got um like what we have scheduled for public hearings. Find it quickly to see what we have on our plates for the April 4th meetings if six. Oh, you've got the list in front of you.

April 6th. What is it? Um, April 6th, I think is the next is the next town board meeting. I don't just pull up and rattle off just to sort of get a sense of six more tax resolution six you said. Yes.

Okay. I'm sensitive to your needs to wanting to keep this moving forward because you've got these growths pending. It's actually 9:14. I thought it might be later. Oh, we're doing better than I expected today. Usually I underestimate the time.

Um, all right. Let's What do you guys say? We'll put it on for April 6. Yes. So, make a motion to adjourn to April 6. Second. All in favor? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. We will enter the regular meeting. Is there anyone from the public who wanted to just make any other general comments? All right. Um, I'll entertain a motion to close the meeting. Second. All in favor? I. Thank you, everybody.