Draft of White Plains Comprehensive Plan Update is Seriously Flawed
Opinion Advocates for ideas and draws conclusions based on the author/producer’s interpretation of facts and data.
Dear Members of the Common Council,
The White Plains One draft update to the Comprehensive Plan is a radical departure from the goals and objectives outlined in the 1997 plan. That plan emphasized the importance of protecting the city’s neighborhoods. It specifically highlighted the importance of preservation of the low-density outlying residential neighborhoods. It recognized that White Plains is a geographically small area and that the delicate balance between downtown and the outlying low-density neighborhoods be preserved.
The draft plan turns this policy on its head. It is not an update but essentially a completely new document. The new plan is less a policy statement than an advocacy manifesto. One glaring example is the recommendation that the Burke Rehabilitation Hospital property be rezoned to permit greater density, including alternative uses. This despite the property being located within the R-12.5 single-family residential zone in Gedney Farms by special permit.
This is one of many unbridled challenges made in this document to existing land use in the city. It highlights the consistent lack of sensitivity to existing zoning, historic conditions and land use policies formulated over many years.
When I spoke at the Feb. 5 public hearing, I offered the key reasons why this Draft has failed. Chief among them being the manner in which it was initially set up, which seems to have deliberately limited real citizen participation. A fundamental element in successful comprehensive planning always includes direct citizen involvement in the process as was the case in the 1997 effort.
Numerous citizen committees were formed undertaking analysis of key issues such as housing and open space. Supporting these committees were surveys, hearings and workshops, which included the general public to voice their input. A meaningful Comprehensive Plan update must be the composite vision of the residents as to what they want the future of their community to be, not of consultants or city employees.
The overwhelming negative resident reaction to the draft plan confirms its failure. Eleven neighborhood associations signed a joint letter stating “substantial opposition” to many elements of the draft. Significantly, no neighborhood association has supported the draft document.
Hundreds of residents flooded the corridors of City Hall on Mar. 3 to vigorously oppose the draft plan. Social media is also ablaze with opposition. Clearly, Planning Commissioner Gomez and the consultants failed in identifying the goals and objectives of the vast majority of residents. Indeed, Mr. Gomez spent much of the two hearings trying to explain away what the draft said.
Lastly, the plan’s endorsement by a small, pre-selected committee that met a few times hardly gives credibility to the draft.
Does the Common Council believe that such a plan would ever see the light of day in our neighboring communities of Scarsdale, Harrison or Mamaroneck? The answer is clearly no because these officials recognize that their main job is to protect the quality, character and environment of existing neighborhoods and not adversely impact property values.
It seems to me that the Common Council has an important choice: Join Mayor Roach and Commissioner Gomez and adopt a very flawed plan or recognize the overwhelming negative comments of the vast number of citizens and neighborhood associations who took the time to appear at the public hearings or who have communicated directly urging rejection of the draft plan.
John E. Sheehan
White Plains
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