Archive: Opinions

A subsidized development across from the ball fields.

What happens if we, as Lansing taxpayers, refuse to subsidize the developer's profits, increased traffic jams/accidents, increased light pollution, increased taxes (very likely), possibly increased crime, the possibility of a dump-and-run developer and other burdens we'll be forced to bear...and we revolt by withholding all or part of our taxes? In other words, when our Town Board refuses to listen, we vote with our wallets and refuse to subsidize their "vision".

You will get a few warning letters, and then your home will be sold at a tax sale and you will be forcibly evicted. If you refuse to leave, the nice man with the gun will assist you.

Reality alert: The "Town Center" is the Village of Lansing. This whole 'vision' of a new town center refuses to die in the minds of our Town Board. Too many land owners and developers have too much to gain, as does the 'affordable' housing crowd.

The first three attempts to establish a town center were to establish a sewer infrastructure to serve the Town Board's vision; all three of these attempts were victoriously crushed. Three times the Town Board tried, and three times Lansing citizens rallied to stop the unimaginably expensive sewer. That didn't stop the Town Board from squandering somewhere between $300,000-$500,000 of our hard-earned taxes to try to defeat the will of the people.

Now, the Town Board is at it again. Never satisfied to let development happen organically, they are trying to force feed another taxpayer subsidized project upon us. Why is it that whenever the Town Board has a great idea for the "Town Center" it is We The People who are forced pay for it? What gives the Town of Lansing the right to rob its citizens at gun point for a feel-good project for those who want 'affordable' housing, and a 'ka-ching' project for those who want to profit from the development? Both groups plan on robbing Lansing taxpayers to make their vision a reality.

Best of all is their traffic plan to dump all of the traffic from this taxpayer subsidized development into a four-way intersection at Woods Edge and Rt. 34. REALLY?

I invite any one of our Town board members to get off their butts and sit at that intersection on a Monday morning...especially in the winter when the salt trucks are thick and heavy. Or when both sides of Woods Edge are packed with vehicles, dogs, children and parents for the entire length of the ball fields during soccer and ball games.

Setting aside the heavy truck and vehicle traffic on Rt. 34, let's take an inventory of Woods Edge Drive. First, the ball fields with cars crowded on both shoulders and kids darting in and out, then Woods Edge retirement community with slow and cautious drivers pulling out, then the Sunset Drive residential development with two entrances to Woods Edge, Ithaca Materials Testing with what looks to be about 75 employees, the residential housing development at Woods Edge and Seacord Lane, the Dollar General, Jump Around Inflatables...and our wise and benevolent Town board members want to approve dumping an entire new development onto Woods Edge Drive where traffic already races down that street to avoid the stop light at Rogues Harbor?

The entire town center vision is never going to die...and I am going to attack it at every opportunity as long as my taxes will be stolen to subsidize it, and idiotic ideas like creating a de facto superhighway down Woods Edge Drive continue to seem 'rational' to our Town Board.

Hugh Bahar
Lansing, NY
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