Date: Fri 25-Sep-1998

Publication: Bee

Author: ANDYG

Quick Words:

P&Z-Homesteads-Pocono

Full Text:

298-Unit "Homesteads" Complex Given P&Z Approval

BY ANDREW GOROSKO

The Planning and Zoning Commission (P&Z) has approved The Homesteads at

Newtown, a 298-unit housing complex planned to provide assisted, congregate,

and independent living facilities for the elderly in Hawleyville.

The action signals municipal approval to build the largest single private

housing complex ever constructed locally. Plans for the project have been

under review by town land use agencies since last January.

At a September 17 session, P&Z members agreed to grant The Homesteads at

Newtown, LLC, a special exception to the zoning regulations provided that: the

emergency access road that will connect the complex to Pocono Road not be used

for construction traffic, that the access road be installed as the last

improvement made before the complex's occupancy, and that the access road be

used for emergency vehicles only.

The P&Z also is requiring the applicant provide proof that the project will be

serviced by a public water supply and public sanitary sewers; that any changes

to the development plan be submitted to the P&Z for review and approval; and

that signs for the complex be submitted for review and approval.

Earlier this month, just as P&Z members were poised to approve the housing

complex, the P&Z opted to have the town engineer review earth moving

computations for the project.

The project involves making 35,000 cubic yards of earthen cuts and doing

71,000 cubic yards of filling, resulting in a net filling of 36,000 cubic

yards. The filling will be done in wetlands to make the site suitable for

construction.

Attorney Bill Denlinger, representing the applicant, has said "My clients'

financing is at risk if they don't start this project this year."

The major stumbling block for The Homesteads at Newtown had been the

objections by some Pocono Road residents to creating an emergency accessway to

the site from Pocono Road.

At an August public hearing on the application, a group of Pocono Road

residents expressed concern that extending an emergency accessway to that road

would open the door to the future use of that accessway as a common way to

enter and exit the housing complex from the narrow, deteriorated Pocono Road.

Those residents have urged that an emergency accessway be extended from

somewhere other than Pocono Road.

Particulars

Dr Morton Silberstein and his wife, Linda, are the owners of The Homesteads at

Newtown, LLC.

The 60-acre complex at 166 Mt Pleasant Road will provide "independent housing"

for the elderly in the form of duplex and fourplex condominiums.

"Congregate housing" will include food service, house cleaning and laundry

service under the terms of a lease/rental agreement.

"Assisted-living" facilities will provide help for people who need aid with

activities of daily life such as eating and dressing.

Housing units will range from 350 to 1,400 square feet in area. The

89,000-square-foot assisted-living building will contain 100 housing units,

including a 16-unit "dementia wing."

Some of the 160 congregate housing units will have carports. The 38

independent living units will have garages.

The first phase of the project, which will contain the assisted-living

facilities, is scheduled to open in 1999.

The site is a former gravel mine. It lies generally to the north, northwest

and northeast of the Newtown Professional Building and Grace Christian

Fellowship, both of which are on Mt Pleasant Road.

The applicants have an option to buy the site from owners John Sedor, Jr;

Lillian S. Emmons; and the Estate of Lillian Hazel Sedor, Lillian S. Emmons,

executrix.

Using the site for an elderly housing complex was among the various uses

recommended for it in a Housatonic Valley Council of Elected Officials report

on the economic development of Hawleyville. The P&Z endorsed that planning

report earlier this year.