Silo Ridge plan so big, protections are needed

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Many residents have the impression Silo Ridge is giving Amenia a wastewater treatment plant. They are not. Their document states if they build the project, they will consider adding additional capacity to the wastewater treatment plant in lieu of providing workforce housing or a fee in lieu of. The town will have the associated costs of creating an infrastructure to tie into the waste treatment facility, which will cost millions of dollars. Translation: Silo Ridge is giving the town nothing.

Imagine the residents’ anger if the project is never built, and we end up with a blighted landscape. It is happening to similar projects around the country — it could happen here.

Some members of the Planning Board and residents of the community do not have the technical expertise to understand the long-term ramifications of this project. I do. I know about turf grass maintenance, associated agricultural chemical uses, and their toxic effects on humans and the environment.

We have repeatedly requested a CADD 3-D "walkthrough" for this project. The applicant has spent a tremendous amount of money in developing concepts and changing them, but will not provide the three-dimensional element, which can be projected and rendered from a two-dimensional design set.

A "scale model" did not accurately depict land form profile elevations, nor did it include tree line and other landscape elements, thereby providing an inaccurate projection of the entire project.

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In recent years there has been a trend toward converting golf courses to other land uses. If a course is more than two or three decades old, there is a possibility residues of highly toxic and very persistent pesticides remain. The residues may be sufficiently high to be of concern if the soils are eroded into nearby waterways during the construction phase or if children play on greens converted to residential lawns.

Soil testing can determine if there is cause for concern. Visit the Web site www.ceds.org. See what they have to say about golf courses and their effect on aquatic environments, particularly chemical residue loading in soils.

When golf courses accounted for more than 50 percent of the watershed land use, then a moderate to severe level of stream quality degradation was found. Such a waterway would be unfit for most human uses.

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Monitoring should begin one year prior to construction and continue throughout the construction phase and the first five years the course is used. Ground and surface water should be analyzed quarterly for ammonia, nitrate, phosphorus and pesticides. Biological sampling should be performed. Fish tissues should be examined for chemical bio-accumulate. Groundwater monitoring should be established to detect effects upon existing wells and wetlands. Base-flow and water temperature should be monitored in any streams in the vicinity of the course.

Monitoring should not be considered a substitute for measures that design impacts out of a golf course. Please note: CEDS has found that a disturbing number of commitments made during the permitting process to monitor golf courses are ignored once the course is completed.

Since the golf course existed prior to 1990, soils on greens, tees and fairways should be analyzed for organochlorine and metallic pesticide residues. If residues are present, mitigation measures should be taken to minimize movement to ground or surface waters.