Sharon Solar Project Public Hearing April 15

SHARON SPRINGS — The Sharon Springs Joint Planning Board has set a public hearing for Wednesday, April 15 on the proposed Sharon Solar Vista project, a five megawatt solar energy facility to be constructed on about 9.5 acres of the Helen Roberts Farm on Slate Hill Road in the Town of Sharon.

The hearing will start at 6:45 p.m. as part of the next SSJPB regular meeting on April 15. Meetings are held in the Library Community Room at 129 Main Street in Sharon Springs. Joint Planning Board members could vote on site plan and special use permit approval for the project on that night after the public hearing, or a vote could wait for a later meeting if all issues have not been worked out to the satisfaction of board members on April 15.

The public hearing was set at the joint planning board's March 18 meeting, where Sharon Solar Vista owner Chad Dickason and other representatives of the company working on the project attended to answer questions and go over aspects of the plan. The project has been discussed at several joint planning board meetings over the last several months.

"This process has taken a long time," Dickason said at the March 18 meeting. Dylan Harris, special counsel for the Town of Sharon, also attended the meeting. He is advising the joint planning board on the matter.

Dickason answered yes when asked by a board member if a complete and detailed landscaping plan would be ready at the April 15 meeting. He added that he is "very much in support of going the PILOT (Payment in Lieu of Taxes) route" in regard to the project but that a PILOT agreement has not been worked out yet.

Dickason has said at several meetings that he and others working on the project have tried to minimize visual and other impacts as much as possible, and that he has worked with neighbors Todd and Patti Countryman on trying to resolve their concerns. One or both of the Countrymans _ who live right across the road from the farm _ have attended all meetings where the project has been discussed.

In other matters from the March 18 meeting, there was a brief discussion of a proposed renovation of the long-closed and vacant Columbia Hotel on South Street in the Village of Sharon Springs. Taylor Bates, who purchased the property about two years ago, wants to remove part of the building and renovate the rest into a structure with two apartments of two bedrooms and four apartments of one bedroom.

Bates, who was accompanied at the March 18 meeting by his attorney on the project Joanne Darcy Crum, explained there would be a lobby area on the first floor, with the apartments on floors two and three. Bates said he wants to recreate the lobby area to look as much like the old hotel's lobby as possible.

"It's something we're willing to take on, something we want to do," Bates told joint planning board members. If the project gets all the required approvals, Bates said he would tackle it in phases and that it would take around 10 years or so for it to be fully completed.

The matter will be discussed at future Sharon Springs Joint Planning Board meetings, and might be discussed by the Schoharie County Planning Commission at its next meeting on April 6.