New PDR properties, Bellvale Water District

to get town hearings Warwick-Nine farms have applied recently for the town's Purchase of Development Rights program. The Town board will hold a public hearing next Thursday, Sept. 9, at 7 p.m. to get the public's input. Seven of the farms are located in the Warwick Valley Central School District n the Brady Farm, William and Barbara Brown farm, Wisner and Gladys Buckbee farm, Mary Lewis farm, Raynor farm, Donald and Linda Weiss farm, and Della Wright farm. Two other properties, Thomas Miller farm and Dexter Orchard, are in the Florida Union Free School District. A town-wide referendum in 2000 gave the town the go-ahead to purchase the development rights to properties in an effort to maintain open space. Voters approved $9.5 million of town funds to buy open space. The Greenwood Lake/Tuxedo School District, which has no farmland, is to get 24 percent, Florida is slated for 14 percent and Warwick gets the remaining 62 percent. The town has already purchased a ball field and a marina in Greenwood Lake. The marina opened in July as a new town beach. The state and federal governments also have Purchase of Development Rights funding, which have already been used to keep farms green in Warwick. Following the PDR public hearing, the town will hear from the public regarding the expansion of the Bellvale Water District. Currently, there are 25 users in this little district, created over 30 years ago when Bellvale Boulevard was built. Now in front of the Planning Board are two applications to build a total of 60 homes on Route 17A near Bellvale Boulevard. BCM and the Gables are those new developments and the developers would like to tap into the Bellvale Water District. In return, the district would receive two new wells. "These two wells would provide an ample supply of water with no dissolved uranium," said Supervisor Michael Sweeton. Bringing in the new wells would alleviate the higher dissolved uranium levels found in the existing wells. The town looked into a filtration system but it was very costly, Sweeton said. Both of the new wells are on the BCM site. The water will be pumped to storage on the Gable site, where it would be blended with the existing district wells. "The result for the existing district will be essentially a replacement of a 40-year-old system with quality water and previously nonexistent storage capacity with the cost shared among 55 plus new homes," said Sweeton. "This is a win-win for everybody." Sweeton said he has met with residents of the district and most are in agreement with this plan. Adding the new homes to the district would lower the cost for each of the homeowners in the district for the district improvements, which includes a new water holding tank with twice the capacity of the current one. The plan was to refurbish the existing holding tank next year and build a new one the following year. But that changed. Now the plan is to build the new holding tank in 2005 and refurbish the old one in 2006. "I pledged to the residents of the Bellvale Water District to keep the capital cost to them at or below $300 per household over the life of the bond, which is 25-30 years," Sweeton added. "We will not abandon their existing wells. I will stick to that pledge.