NEW SCOTLAND — Republicans were distressed by a last-minute campaign letter sent to New Scotland residents by the Democrats. They called it "a blatant distortion of facts" while the winning Democratic candidate responded that the letter was accurate and informative.

The letter centered on a planning board decision last week to not re-zone an area in the northeast part of town slated for dense development.

The mailed letter is dated Nov. 2, the day after the planning board meeting. It was signed by all three Democratic candidates: Elizabeth Stewart, running for supervisor, and Margaret Neri and Wayne LaChapelle, running for town board. Only Neri was elected.

By the time that residents received the letter on Friday or Saturday, there wasn’t enough time to send out a response, said Supervisor Ed Clark, who won his reelection bid on the Republican line.

About 170 residents petitioned the town board in October asking for two-acre zoning on land where a development of 286 upscale homes on 267 acres is planned. The town board sent the petitioners’ request to the planning board which recommended, by unanimous vote, the area should not be rezoned. (The meeting was covered in a Nov. 3 Enterprise article.)
"I do not think it was an above-board campaign tactic," Clark said.

Councilman-elect Douglas LaGrange said he saw it as a direct attack against him since it names him solely as a planning-board member.
The letter starts off, "This week, the town planning board, which includes Doug LaGrange and other members hand-picked by Ed Clark, voted unanimously against changing the zoning in the Tall Timbers area to a more restrictive two-acre zoning."
The letter goes on to say that the Democratic candidates find the density proposed for Kensington Woods to be "unacceptable," and, as town officials, they will scale it down.

The letter suggests that the candidates disagree with the planning board’s decision, and also suggest that the planning board’s recommendation to not re-zone will prevent the control of the size of the proposed development.
But the main message in the letter is one of planning. The candidates pledge to work with developers and the planning board to build in "harmony with the character of New Scotland."
"I felt totally misrepresented," Clark said. He also said that the letter indicates that the Democratic candidates support a rezone, when that’s not the case.
"It’s a Johnny-come-lately to the issue," Clark said. It was obviously sent to sway the voters and pander to the 170 petitioners, Clark said.
Clark said it was not correct to identify him as the person who "hand- picked" the people on the planning board; the real opponents to the rezone are planning board members who have been on the board since before his administration, Clark said.

Also, in recent years, many of the appointments to the planning board have been made with split party votes, with the Democrats’ choice winning out.

It wasn’t fair to point out LaGrange in the letter when there are six other planning board members who agreed with the recommendation, both LaGrange and Clark said.
"I took it a little personally because I thought I had a great relationship with Bob Stapf...I didn’t think he was so political," LaGrange said of the board’s chairman. But, now, LaGrange said, looking back on last week’s planning board meeting, "There was a little more exuberance on his [Stapf] and Louis Neri’s part," to force a vote from the planning board before the election.

Louis Neri is the husband of board member elect Margaret Neri, he works as the attorney for the planning and zoning board. (See Related Story). Stapf had endorsed Neri for town board.
"I wonder what their motives were," LaGrange said. While he hopes that it was innocent, he said, "I have my doubts." LaGrange said that he has no solid proof that Stapf and Louis Neri where in cahoots, but it does raise the question in his mind, he said. Forcing a vote and then taking the opportunity to send out a misleading letter that says "Douglas LaGrange is for high density," when that’s not the case at all, LaGrange said.

Stapf could not be reached for comment this week, because he is vacation in California for the rest of the month.

Neri gave his legal opinion on procedure at the board’s request last week. He said that the planning board did not have to hold a public hearing on the matter and that the petition request was forwarded to the planning board simply for a recommendation. The public hearings will be held at the town board level, he advised.
"I don’t know where Doug is coming from...I don’t know how he could possibly come to that conclusion," Louis Neri told The Enterprise yesterday. The board opened it up to discussion and planning board member Robert Smith, a Republican, moved the board to vote on it, Neri said. He added that he is shocked by LaGrange’s accusation.

At the Nov. 1 planning board meeting, The Enterprise observed the board members were in favor of making a recommendation right away; no one requested that the board wait on the vote, and there was no disagreement among the board members on the opinion that this area of town should not be re-zoned.

The only planning board member who didn’t speak individually and explain his position was LaGrange, although he did vote in favor of the recommendation to not change the zoning.

Additionally, while Stapf is regularly a vocal and dominating chairman, he attempted to solicit numerous times from the other board members their views on the matter, more so than usual.

Planning board member Robert Smith was just as, if not more, vocally adamant about not changing the zoning. He along with Stapf were planning board members in 1994, when a comprehensive plan for the town was drafted.
LaGrange had the ability to make a motion to table the vote or to amend it, Neri said. He said it sounds like LaGrange is now trying to make up excuses, but, "He won — so what’s his problem"" Neri asked, an excuse for why Gleason didn’t win" "It makes no sense," Neri said.
Neri called back a few minutes later to add, why was it so important to LaGrange to not vote before the election. "Did he have something to hide"" Neri asked.

LaGrange said the discussion of a zoning recommendation was the last thing on the agenda at the Nov. 1 planning board meeting and board members received just one sheet of the many pages of petition, with a dozen or so names on it. LaGrange said he didn’t have enough information to support warranting a zone change so he had to vote with the board.

Margaret Neri said that one of the reasons the Democrats wanted to send out the letter about the planning-board decision is because that Nov. 1 meeting had been poorly attended, with the petitioners not being present, and the Democratic candidates wanted to let New Scotlanders know what had happened.

None of the Democratic candidates had been in attendance at the meeting either.

The letter just describes the action of the board, Mrs. Neri said.

Neri said another reason she wanted to send the letter is because LaGrange has been going around expressing a different mind-set than what he voted on, Neri said.

Clark said that the letter misrepresented his position on the whole thing. He disapproves of the way the planning board handled the situation: Discussing the re-zone hadn’t been placed on the agenda until the day of the meeting Clark said; the planning board didn’t tell the town board it would be on the agenda; and none of the 170 petitions were informed the discussion was going to happen.

The planning board members should not have made a recommendation without any input from the petition sponsors, Clark said.
"Their approach was totally contradictory to good public policy," Clark said. Sponsors should always have the opportunity to represent their side, he said.

While Clark and LaGrange criticized the Democrats for pulling LaGrange’s name out of the board and pinpointing him in their letter, the Republican candidates wrote a response letter, which they handed out door-to-door, since there was not enough time to mail them before Election Day. In their letter, the Republicans single out planning board Chairman Stapf.
"Don’t be fooled," their letter reads in bold, "The most ardent opponent of the rezoning proposal has been the Democratic appointed chairman of the planning board Bob Staph (sic)."
"Again, no one I’ve appointed," Clark said.
"They are talking out both sides of their mouth," Clark said on Wednesday; on one hand, you have the chairman saying no rezoning and then in a flyer sent out by Neri, Stapf is publicly endorsing her.
"She’s taking his endorsement, but refuting his position," Clark said.
"It’s a complete smoke screen of policy" that contradicts itself, Clark said.
"That is an unfair characterization," Neri responded. She said that she and Stapf have never talked about the Kensington Woods proposal. He is a qualified person, who "endorses me based on my qualification," Neri said.
The Democratic candidates sent the letters because they wanted to tell voters what had happened at the planning board meeting, Neri reiterated. "There was nothing derogatory in the letter," Neri said.

She said that she just wants to see the process move forward, and get to the bottom of how everyone in the community feels about Kensington Woods and re-zoning. She said, for the people that feel short-changed, a compromise needs to be made, and the letter was saying the same thing: compromising and working together, Neri said.

Neri said that she wants to start out on a positive note with her fellow board members.
The rest of the Republicans response letter highlights ways that the Republican candidates "actively pursued" strengthening the town planning documents to prevent urban sprawl. It lists appointing a professional planner to the planning board, creating and supporting the Residents’ Planning Advisory Committee, and moving the petition to rezone into deliberation quickly.

The letter concludes with a promise from the Republicans, when they win, to update the comprehensive plan.
Tuesday night, despite their loss, Clark said he’s still going to pursue updating the comprehensive plan, "I don’t know where the Democrats will be," Clark said, but their letter "seemed to indicate an accord with the need to review zoning...I would hope they continue to support that view."