Protect the Adirondacks and the Sierra Club contend that the permits for the Adirondack Club and Resort in Tupper Lake have expired and the developer must begin the lengthy application process all over again.
In January, the Adirondack Park Agency approved the permits with conditions. Among them, the developers were told to conduct a wildlife survey.
John Caffry, the attorney for the two environmental groups, asserts in a letter to the APA that under the APA Act, permits expire if the conditions are not met after six months. He says the deadline passed on July 31.
“If the Project Sponsor wishes to proceed with the Project, it will have to begin the application process again,” Caffry wrote.
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The original application process took more than seven years.
APA spokesman Keith McKeever denied today that the permits have expired. “The ACR Project Order specifies a 10 year time period for the project sponsor to complete all requirements necessary to obtain permits and convey the first authorized lot,” he said in an e-mail.
Protect the Adirondacks and the Sierra Club are suing the APA in an effort to nullify approval of the resort. The groups contend that the development would, among other things, violate regulations intended to protect tracts classified as Resource Management, the strictest of the agency’s six zoning categories for private lands.
The lawsuit has angered residents in Tupper Lake who see the resort as an economic boon for the community.
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Preserve Associates plans to build a 719-unit resort on 6,200 acres of forestland near the Big Tupper Ski Area. The development will include so-called Great Camps, single-family homes, town houses, a sixty-room hotel, a restaurant, shops, a health spa, and a marina. Preserve Associates also intends to expand and renovate the ski area. The Great Camp estates would subdivide a large tract of timberlands classified as Resource Management.
Click here to read the news release of Protect the Adirondacks and Caffry’s letter to the APA.
This new resort is going to be TOO BIG.
Single family homes, town houses, shops (read: malls), a 60 room hotel, restaurants, expanding the ski area. C’mon. This isn’t an Adirondack experience. Lake George has all but the ski area and look what happened there.
And worse; The Great Camp estates would carve up a large tract of timberlands classified as Resource Management.
What happened to the “Forever Wild” mantra?
Don’t do it. The standard will be set and it will happen in other areas as well.
Janet, Forever Wild applies to Publicly help land in the park not private land. Also, “carve up” is just a term that some like to use to make it sound worse than it is. I think it worked in this case. The land in those areas (if ever developed, which is a big if) will probably not look much different than it did being managed as timberland. In fact it will probably look better aesthetically and environmentally.
Paul, point taken. I changed “carve up” to the more neutral “subdivide.”
Phil I also think that it would be fair to say that the subdivision goes beyond what you can do without including some other conditions to get a permit. But the isn’t an easy way to say that!
It’s never been tried.
Even though it’s outside the village it’s just hard to imagine such an upity in such a “Blue Collar” portion of the dacks.