Last minute vote called on Woodbury development

Last minute vote called on Woodbury development

By Chris McKenna
Times Herald-Record
cmckenna@th-record.com

Woodbury – In a last-minute surprise before Election Day, the Town Board has scheduled a climactic vote tonight on the bombshell issue that has consumed town politics for a year.
After months of rancorous debate that spilled from Town Hall into political campaigns, the board will finally vote on a set of laws that would allow the developer Bill Brodsky to build 451 homes on land zoned for 148.
Town Supervisor Sheila Conroy said today the vote was scheduled after the board met on Monday and found only minor changes to make in a 30-page document that ends the project's environmental review.
"We're at the point where it's time to make a decision," Conroy said.
Tonight, the board will vote on that findings statement, then on five proposed laws that would allow the project to move forward to the Planning Board.
The decision to vote tonight caught opponents unawares.
John Burke, who has led the charge against the project and is challenging Conroy for office on Tuesday, accused the board of rushing to meet a "timetable set up by the developer."
"They are following a developer's schedule, and I think that's disgraceful," he said.
Councilwoman Geraldine Gianzero, anticipating criticism of the vote's timing, said it had nothing to do with the upcoming election or Brodsky's schedule
"All the information is in," said Gianzero, who's also up for election Tuesday. "As politically charged as this is, we will not put off the town's business."
Expecting a large turnout, the board has moved its 7:30 p.m. meeting from Town Hall on Route 32 to the senior citizens center nearby on Route 105.

Read more in tomorrow's edition of the Times Herald-Record.