To the Editor:

On Tuesday, Oct. 8, the Knox Town Board voted, 3 to 2, to approve the rezoning of a number of parcels near the junction of state routes 156 and 157 from Agricultural and Residential zoning to a Multi-use Recreational District (MRD), where small businesses might be established that could not by law operate in the first two-named types of districts.

Despite the majority vote to approve the MRD, the initiative failed.  How was this possible?

Democracy inaction.

In February, the Albany County Planning Board had voted to disapprove the rezoning plan, citing a number of reasons that echoed those adopted by opponents of any town effort to provide areas where entrepreneurs might be able to grow small businesses.

The “Antis,” as they might be called, have been on guard to prevent any commercial activity other than “home occupation” businesses in Knox since 1974, when the town’s highly-restrictive zoning ordinance went into effect. Because of the Albany County Planning Board vote, the Knox Town Board needed a supermajority of 4 votes to establish the MRD.

The current effort to partially free the town from the grip of its own stifling zoning ordinance goes back to 2013, when a young woman operating a successful towing business in Knox found the business had run afoul of that ordinance.

A citizen effort to find a way to keep the business in Knox became a movement to make the town more open to entrepreneurs such as she. Eventually the towing business was forced out of Knox, but in the next election in 2015 voters chose a new supervisor, a townsman with a sense of optimism and seemingly boundless energy to do good things for Knox.

For two years, he worked to implement reforms and improvements, with limited success because the town board was openly opposed to many of the initiatives upon which he had campaigned and for which he was elected.

In 2017, voters again had their say. They returned him to office and elected two new members to the town board. These new board members have proven themselves to be open-minded, fair, and focused on trying to do what is best for the entire town and for all its citizens.

Now the town has reached a critical point in its history, and the Oct. 8 vote brings the central issue into focus. Before the vote, the supervisor effectively (to my mind at least) refuted each of the objections of the local opposition that had been cited by the Albany County Planning Board in its ruling, objections that already had been refuted numerous times at various public meetings.

More than that, he reported that one business within the proposed MRD wanted to expand its nursery operation to provide bulk materials such as mulch and topsoil, and to hire drivers to deliver the materials, which it cannot now legally do.

He also reported that, when the Berne health-care office closed, there was serious interest to reopen the former Highlands Restaurant as a medical office. Here was clear evidence of the value to the town of rezoning the area. Yet, two board members would not be swayed. And so we are now where we are.

Knox voters will have the responsibility to decide whether they will finish the job they began six years ago or watch as the town slides back into the past. There is much work to be done.  So — who is for going on, and who is for turning back?

Ray Hand

Knox