Commentary From Susan Siegel:FACTS About the Winery_blog_2-14-2012

The FACTS About the Winery
By Susan Siegel
Reading Bruce Apar’s February 9th blog post about the Winery sent me back to my files to reconstruct what really happened with the Winery and why it has taken Tom DeChiaro as long as it has to get Town approvals for his project.
There’s PR, and then there are the facts – facts that were sorely missing in Mr. Apar’s posting.
So here they are. The facts speak for themselves.
While the history of the Old Stone Church goes back many years, this posting will only address the most recent issues that I was involved in during my term in office. The facts cover the period from 2009 when Mr. DeChiaro filed applications for both a rezoning and a special use permit to the present. The facts are all detailed in minutes and correspondence that are part of the public record.
The facts fall into three distinct categories:
 Approval of the Winery parking plan
 Issuance of the building permit
 Legal issues surrounding the use of the building

Parking Plan
In September and October of 2009, Mr. DeChiaro submitted two different applications for the same property: one to the Town Board to rezone the property to permit a commercial use, and a second to the Zoning Board of Appeals for a special permit to allow a restaurant in a dwelling built before 1930.
Both the Town Board and the Zoning Board began processing the applications within a month of receiving the submissions, and, following long established procedures, both applications were referred to the Planning Board.
At its December 14, 2009 meeting, the Planning Board advised Mr. DeChiaro that in order to review the applications he would have to submit the following basic documents: a survey of the property, a parking plan, an updated delineation of the site’s wetlands, and a traffic analysis. The need for these documents was repeated to Mr. DeChiaro, his project manager and his attorneys in both letters and at meetings on several occasions.
The required documents were finally submitted to the Planning Board in November 2010, 11 months after they had been requested. Once the required documents were submitted, it took the Planning Board three months to review and approve the parking plan for the special use permit. (Sometime in 2010, Mr. DeChiaro decided not to pursue his rezoning application.)
Building Permit
It took the Winery team seven months, from February 2011 when it received Planning Board approval for the parking plan, to September 2011 to provide the Building Department with the necessary construction plans and other documents required by the New York State Building Code.
Once the building permit was issued in September, it wasn’t until mid-January 2012, after Mr. DeChiaro had applied to the Town Board for a temporary certificate of occupancy, that many of the interior requirements of the building permit were addressed.
Also, as of January 2012, work had not commenced on the improvements to the parking lot that Mr. DeChiaro had agreed to in February 2011, and which were required by the terms of the Planning Board’s approval. And, at the recent February 4th Town Board meeting, Mr. DeChiaro stated publicly, for the first time, his intention to ask the Planning Board to approve a different parking plan, the one that he had initially discussed with the board as far back as January 2010.
Legal issues
It’s a generally accepted fact that Mr. DeChiaro has openly conducted a commercial business on the site since at least 2009, despite the fact that the building did not have the required certificate of occupancy.
In July 2009, the Town sought a preliminary injunction to prevent Mr. DeChiaro from holding public functions at the Winery on the grounds that the building did not have the required certificate of occupancy, and that Mr. DeChiaro was conducting a business in a residential zone. Acting on the Town’s motion, a Supreme Court justice issued a temporary restraining order prohibiting any commercial function for more than 25 people. In January 2010, Mr. DeChiaro declared himself a candidate for the Republican nomination for the 19th Congressional District, and the next month a second Supreme Court justice ruled that in order to project his rights to free speech and assembly, Mr. DeChiaro could hold non-commercial political fund raising functions at the Winery, limited to 100 persons, but not commercial functions.
In June 2010, in an effort to end the past contentiousness, I proposed – and the Town Board approved – offering Mr. DeChiaro a “time out” from ongoing legal actions so he could focus on submitting the documents needed to get his approvals. I hoped that such a truce would, in addition saving both sides considerable legal fees, enable the Winery to finally receive a CO to open legally.
With the court’s approval, in October 2010, the Town and Mr. DeChiaro agreed to a Stipulation of Settlement. Both sides agreed to discontinue their legal actions against each other and Mr. DeChiaro agreed to submit all the required documents to the Planning Board within 45 days.
Meanwhile, based on the Supreme Court’s February “free speech” ruling, the Winery continued to be open for business without a legal CO. But to prove that the premises weren’t always being used for a political fund raising function every time its doors were open, the Town would have had to hire an undercover detective, an expense the Town Board ultimately decided it did not want to pass on to the taxpayers. Then, in the summer of 2011, Mr. DeChiaro became a candidate for political office a second time, this time for Town Councilman.
Those are the facts.
Regrettably, the facts show that Mr. DeChiaro’s “history” has been to avoid following proper procedures and then blame the Town for the delay in approving his application. But the record is clear that had he submitted the required documents back in December 2009 that he eventually submitted in November 2010, he could have had a legal – and permanent – CO more than a year ago. And that would have been a win-win for all concerned: Mr. DeChiaro could have grown his business earlier, the taxpayers of Yorktown would have saved in excess of $150,000 in legal bills, and Yorktown residents would have had an attractive, safe Winery in which to spend their leisure hours.
Instead, the Winery will continue to operate on a temporary CO for who knows how long and the construction of an approved and safe parking lot will remain on hold.

Bazzo 02/14/12