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Both ZBA Chair And Yeshiva Counsel Say Yeshiva’s Rights Trump Provisions Of Zoning Code And Concerns Of Neighbors
Residents of Church Road and neighboring streets in the Village of Airmont, including some members of the religious Orthodox community turned out last month at a Village Zoning Board of Appeals meeting to vociferously oppose a plan for a large yeshiva on a residential site. However, some residents from the Jewish orthodox community who send their children to the yeshiva’s school in Spring Valley, spoke in favor of the proposal.
The packed room meeting pitted distressed neighbors who told Zoning Board members that the proposed girls yeshiva would bring unmanageable traffic, noise, and change the character of the mostly residential road of single-family houses. The application spurred an uncharacteristically contentious environment, though at least one board member described the application for the variances as a “monumental request,” because they fall well beyond the scope of what the code allows.
“Stephan Petranker, who lives next door to the lot for the proposed yeshiva, said “this is not what I moved out of the city for.” He said he objected to the clear-cutting of the wooded acreage, depicting the project as an “overdevelopment whose footprint was bigger than the shoe it is supposed to go into.”
Many parents of would-be students at the yeshiva’s school who live in Airmont plead with the board to grant the variances, saying their daughters need a closer school to attend. They said their daughters travel daily to yeshivas in Spring Valley, commuting an hour each way.
Darkei Emunah Bnos Binah hopes to construct a yeshiva at 51 Church Road for 375 pre-K through twelfth grade students in a 47,000-square foot, two-story building with an indoor swimming pool in the basement. The applicant needs a raft of variances for lot coverage, floor area ratio, and parking reduction from the Village of Airmont Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) before it returns to the Planning Board for final site plan approval.
Residents opposing the plan say the lot coverage is more than three times the size permitted in the zoning code, and would make a mockery of the Village’s open space goals.
But Ira Emmanuel, counsel for the yeshiva, told the board “special treatment” must be given to religious and educational institutions and that the ZBA had to weigh the application for variances with its “thumb on the scale” in favor of the yeshiva.
Under Airmont’s zoning code, schools of general or religious instruction without accessory housing are permitted in the R-35 residential zone by special permit. Under the village code, an 80,000 square foot lot is the minimum required for a school in the R-35 zone.
The near-vacant site 2.29-acre site (there’s one small house) sits at the southeast corner of Church and Smith Hill Roads.
The clash over the building of yeshivas is widespread in Rockland County, and particularly in the Town of Ramapo. However, this is the first application of this scope in the Village of Airmont’s residential areas.
Church Road resident Teresa O’Leary described the project as “an oversized facility on an inappropriately small lot” and said there was no plan to reduce “auditory intrusions” into the neighbors’ properties. She raised concerns about the street not being wide enough to accommodate school buses that will be forced to breach the oncoming traffic lane to exit the property.
Neighbors both secular and religious opposed the application fearing for the safety of their children with school buses using undersized roads on sidewalk-less streets.
Opposition to the application did not divide between religious and secular lines. Among the 30 speakers who addressed the zoning board were religious residents who feared for their quiet single-family neighborhood, asking the board to deny the raft of variances.
Several residents pooled funds to hire Clifford Davis, a White Plains lawyer, to argue on their behalf.
Davis pointed out that the zoning code only allows for lot coverage of 19,241 square feet. The yeshiva’s request for lot coverage of almost 52,000 square feet amounts to a 170 percent increase in allowable development coverage. The yeshiva is also seeking a parking reduction of 73 percent of the required amount, from 186 required spaces down to 50, saying its staff doesn’t drive, its students will arrive by bus, and that any events at the school would be limited to one grade at a time.
Emmanuel said Village zoning code was “out-of-date,” and that it made no distinction on lot coverage where schools were concerned, applying the same standards to schools as applied to single family houses. Emmanuel also argued that parking requirements made no sense – basing them on the size of the building rather than the number of students. He said without the parking variance, the school would have to clear cut and pave about 95 percent of the wooded lot.
While the Zoning Board must generally abide by the Village code even if it is outdated or doesn’t fit neatly into specific situations, it can issue area variances as relief from the code’s requirements. Changes to the zoning code itself, or to its use and bulk tables, are a function of the Village Board.
Opponents of the plan argued that once variances of this scale and scope were granted, multiple yeshivas would be free to situate on undersized lots, relying on the precedent of the variances.
Though some zoning board members seemed tentative about the application, the board’s chairperson Monroe Zafir said the board was bound by court decisions that say “the public benefits of religious and educational organizations outweigh the harm to the neighbors,” and that considerations of traffic, changes to the character of the their neighborhood and devaluation of their homes took a back seat to the needs of the religious and educational institution.
The ZBA initially closed the public hearing; and it seemed poised to rule. But the board stopped short after a suggestion was raised for the board to take a site visit to the location. Additionally, another board member suggested the applicant reconsider its plans and scale back the project to pre-K through six grade with a smaller building. Based on these queries, the board re-opened the public meeting.
The Airmont Planning Board referred the application to the ZBA in June to consider the requested variances after making a negative declaration under SEQRA (State Environmental Quality Review Act). The negative declaration was a finding under state law that the project would not have a significant environmental impact and that no formal environmental review was required.
Access to the school will be provided via a double-looped driveway system with two one-way access points on Church Road. The first loop provides access to a bus drop-off/pick-up area. The second loop, which goes behind the proposed building, provides access to all 50 parking spaces.
The application indicated that the school will have a footprint of 15,593 square feet and a total gross floor area of 46,779 square feet. An indoor swimming pool is planned for the basement of the yeshiva. A play area is proposed at the rear of the building. To accommodate a more level play area, two retaining walls, each with four-foot-tall fences, will be installed along Smith Hill Road and the eastern lot line. A chain link fence as high as 11-1/2 feet (at its highest point) will separate the property from its residential neighbors.
No dormitory is proposed, and students will be transported to and from the school daily, according to the applicant.
Bnos Binah needs several area variances, including a front yard variance from 50 feet to 12.3 feet; development coverage from an allowance of 20 percent to 54 percent; Floor Area Ratio from .4 to .46; parking spaces from 186 down to 50; and fence height from 3.5 feet allowed to 11.5 feet proposed. Development coverage refers to the percentage of lot which can be developed. Floor area ratio refers to the amount of square footage that can be build compared to the size of the lot.
The public hearing is set to continue on September 11, at 8:00pm at Airmont Village Hall.
