NEW SCOTLAND — A crowd of 75 people packed the planning board meeting Tuesday night for a public hearing on Cynthia Elliott’s application for a special-use permit to run a tree farm and party pavilion on the Brownrigg Road property where she lives.

A local surveyor and former planning board member, Elliott applied in 2015, as Triple S Farm, for a permit to allow her to sell wreaths, boughs, and trees at the farm’s existing pavilion in the winter and, in the off-season, to hold banquets in the facility.

The board is keeping the hearing open for written comments as it awaits word from Albany County but plans to make a decision at its next meeting on March 7.

Townspeople spoke passionately both for and against granting the permit, often referencing larger issues in town. Neighbors near the venue complained about traffic, noise, harm from drunk drivers, and decreased property values.

Many of those supporting Elliott’s plan spoke of the need for both business and open space in New Scotland.

“As a town, we have to make a decision: Are we for big development or do we want small business that will not have an effect on the environment?” asked Elizabeth Stewart, a former planning board member. “Big box — I voted for it,” Stewart said. “It was the law at the time.”

Robert Stapf, a long-time planning board chairman who was replaced as chairman when candidates opposing a big-box development were elected to the town board, spoke for nearly 15 minutes in favor of Elliott’s project.

“She meets all the requirements or exceeds them,” he said. He also said, “We have very little commercial business that creates jobs for our kids.”

In the midst of his speech, responding to criticisms that Elliott’s file did not contain a written interpretation of “restaurant,” applying to her proposal, Stapf asked the town’s building inspector, Jeremy Cramer, “Do you have the original file?”

“Mrs. Elliott’s file is the only file that disappeared out of this building in eight years,” Cramer answered.

Later in the hearing, Elliott said, “That file has been missing since the middle of April...That’s the only file that’s gone missing. Jeremy didn’t lose it.”

After the meeting, Cramer told The Enterprise, “I have extensively looked through the office” in search of the file. Another file was then compiled.

He also explained that he had worked with the planning board’s previous attorney, Jeffrey Baker, to define “restaurant and tavern” according to the town’s zoning law.

“When there’s a gray area, I consult with the lawyer, one of the tools I’m given,” said Cramer.

Elliott’s property is in a residential-agricultural zone in which a long list of uses are permitted, including airports, motels, and clinics as well as “restaurants and taverns.” A restaurant is defined, in part, as a place that prepares meals for consumption on the premises or off, which Cramer and Baker believed fit Elliott’s proposal.

The hearing opened with Elliott’s presentation on how she met environmental requirements, performed a requested sound study, and put in an additional road cut. She said she would host a maximum of 15 events a year from mid-May to mid-October, each with a maximum of 200 guests. All events will end by 11 p.m. to comply with the town’s 2006 noise ordinance, she said.

She has hosted family weddings and celebrations at the pavilion and said the gatherings would be “exclusive,” not “paper plate and paper cup” affairs. With the turnaround on preparing linens, for example, she would not do more than one event a week, she said.

Elliott said the event site on the 55-acre parcel is shielded by trees. “You can’t see it from anywhere unless you’re up there,” she said.

Elliott concluded by listing 25 vendors she said had been hired for her daughter’s wedding, which was attended by 174 guests. Some of them, like those supplying sod or lumber or cement might not apply to other gatherings but other vendors — for music, photography, cake, flowers, limousines, and catering — would.

“If you think small business is about one person, you don’t understand small business,” Elliott concluded.

In support

Public comments began with supporters of the project. Roselyn Robinson read a letter from Tim Stanton about the importance of protecting open space, a frequent thread at the hearing.

Deane Fish, a 27-year resident of Tygert Road, said the business would be “an economic stimulus to others in the local community.” He also spoke of the importance of equity, noting that Indian Ladder Farms on the Altamont-Voorheesville Road, near his home, had recently gotten permission to hold weddings and also has a pub.

Thomas Newell, who moved to New Scotland from Bethlehem a year-and-a-half ago, said that Elliott’s is the kind of business New Scotland wants, preserving open space.

Tamara Wells, Elliott’s nearest neighbor on Brownrigg Road, said she was not disturbed by the pavilion. “It’s beautiful,” she said. “She’s even planting more trees to keep people from seeing one light, like a porch light.”

Tony Turi, who moved to the end of Brownrigg Road in 1993, gave a long history of the neighborhood, saying that, in 2015, he bought vacant land that had been used as a playground for partiers and snowmobilers who vandalized the property and resented it when Turi posted the land.

Turi said that a large number of the people who turned out a year ago to protest Elliott’s proposal were not neighbors but rather snowmobilers and ATV riders; the Helderberg Ridge Runners snowmobile club’s Facebook page announced that they were using the planning board meeting last year as their official club meeting, he said. “The beginning of resistance was because of me shutting down my land,” Turi said.

All of those at Tuesday’s hearing gave local addresses and several neighbors said snowmobilers had nothing to do with their objections.

Turi concluded, “All of us who own our land should be able to use our land as permitted by law so we don’t have to sell parcels.”

In opposition

John Dearstyne said the case was “very important” because it was the first time a definition of “restaurant/tavern” was applied to a residential-agricultural zone. He developed his own checklist for making the decision. “You should not stretch the definition to fit the applicant,” said Dearstyne.

“The building inspector, within his rights, made the determination,” said Charles Voss, planning board chairman.

“Where is the interpretation?” asked Dearstyne. This was explained later in the meeting with the missing file. Also, Elliott’s lawyer noted the interpretation was included in several published legal notices, which Cramer confirmed.

Dearstyne stressed, “My big concern, if this is approved, it will set a precedent to be used on any town road in New Scotland.”

Jim Keegan said it was the town’s obligation to post an interpretation in a timely fashion. He also said Elliott’s proposal was neither a restaurant nor a tavern.  “In my opinion,” he concluded, “based on how this is submitted, it has to be denied.”

Belinda Phillips said her house on Unionville-Feura Bush Road is four doors from Brownrigg Road. She said there is “overwhelming neighborhood opposition” and went over the major concerns outlined in a petition she said was signed by 33 out of 43 households on her road. The concerns included drunk drivers putting people at risk, noise, traffic, safety concerns such as vandalism and robbery, the increased likelihood of more commercial business, and a negative impact on property values.

Thomas McCann went over at great length problems he saw in the sound study. “The applicant, the applicant’s family, and the building inspector participated in the study,” he said. Describing himself as a research analyst, he said, “I’ve looked at a lot of reports. This one stinks. It was skewed..”

Later in the meeting, John DeMis, who conducted the study, said, “The town asked for a ‘simple sound study,’ which I did, using a meter at the proper scale.” With the ambient noise at 45 decibels, he concluded that noise from the Triple S Farm events was “not going to be above the existing ambient noise level.”

Elliott responded by saying she had asked Cramer to witness the tests because he was the town’s code enforcer, and that that was her only role in the sound study.

Closing comments

Valerie Newell of Unionville-Feura Bush Road, said, “We moved here because people were really nice. I’m not seeing that.” She concluded to applause, “Shame on all of you.”

Pat VanAlstyne, describing herself as “one of the closest neighbors,” said she was too nervous to say much, so Voss encouraged her to write her comments since the hearing would remain open.

Karen Moreau noted that Elliott could “run tractors well into the night” but said, “The use she’s proposing...is much less of an impact.”

A large landowner herself, Moreau said she’d like to see her grown children stay in town and asked, “What’s the next generation to do?”

She also said of the planning board process, “It isn’t about how many people sign a petition...it’s not majority rule.”

Marie McMillen of Voorheesville, who for years managed the Altamont Fair, noted that, in Altamont, the way the village dealt with noise was to cut it off at 10 p.m. When containing noise, she said, time limits are the simplest way to enforce.

Ken Wells said he was the third-generation of his family to live on Brownrigg Road and that his children would be the fourth. “I hear the trains in Feura Bush, the garbage trucks, the donkeys,” he said. But noise from Elliott’s pavilion? “Nada,” said Wells.

“I’m a Vietnam veteran,” Wells concluded. “Noises bother me. I returned home to Brownrigg Road because it was quiet. It still is.”

Andrew Sigond, who moved to Unionville-Feura Bush Road a year ago, said when Elliott’s application was discussed at neighborhood meetings there was “no vendetta” against Elliott. He also said the sounds of trains and chainsaws are different than gangster rap at 10:30 p.m.

“I swear on a Bible I can hear music,” he said. “The biggest problem I see is people getting approved and then the enforcement falls through.”

He also said large landowners shouldn’t use selling their land as a threat.

Elliott’s lawyer, Genevieve Trigg with Whiteman Osterman & Hanna, said, “This use is permitted under the code. A restaurant use is allowed.”

The use determination was made in 2015 by the code enforcement officer and has been published in legal notices.

At the March 7 meeting, Voss said, the town-designated engineer will evaluate the sound study and the board’s attorney “will look at the written determination issue.”

Corrected on Feb. 13, 2016: The dateline was corrected to "New Scotland."