Illegal logging work in Amenia gets a little muddy

AMENIA — Anyone driving down Perrys Corners Road in Amenia over the past two weeks is likely to have noticed the massive logs piled on the side of the road. But according to town officials, the logging on Perrys Corners Road was done illegally, before consulting the town’s Planning Board, and there remains disagreement between the town and the harvesting company as to whether the proper erosion control methods were taken.

Any property owner is free to log their property, explained Planning Board Chairman Bill Flood. But under the town’s zoning, which was updated as part of the new master plan in 2007, any  plans need to be presented to the Planning Board and inspected by the town’s forester, currently Doug Raney, before any project can begin.

The property, owned by The Kildonan School, was being harvested by Mid Hudson Forest Products, based in Pine Plains. The town’s Planning Board wouldn’t have objected to the project, Flood said, but it would have asked for more erosion control.

The foresting company and Kildonan immediately put a halt to operations once contacted by the town.

Ben Powers, Kildonan’s headmaster, explained that the work was being done for a variety of reasons. Among others, Kildonan is looking into building its own campsites to take advantage of the forested property it owns. A private school for children with dyslexia and other learning-based differences, Kildonan engages in a hands-on approach to learning that often involves field trips and physical activity.

The school is also taking the opportunity to address its trail system, which has become overgrown. In clearing some of the woods, the skid roads left behind (the paths created by the large harvesting equipment removing the logs from the site) would serve as a new mountain bike trail.

Powers said the company also explained that selective foresting, which was used during the work, would be a healthy process to pull out larger trees to make room for younger, smaller trees to grow up in their place.

“It’s important to me that the school has the opportunity to open the campus up more for the community, especially since we have all these woods,� Powers explained, saying that he hoped that the mountain bike trail, for example, could be utilized by the public in the future.

Kildonan owns about 350 total acres, including land in both Amenia and North East. The town of North East does not have any zoning regulations in regards to logging.

Brian Arico, who operates Mid Hudson Forest Products, admitted the company’s error in not checking the town’s zoning, but pointed out that only 10 percent of the project was located in the town of Amenia and called any claims that erosion control or any other part of the project could have been handled better “completely erroneous.�

Not addressing the zoning regulations was “inadvertent,� he said, but stressed that the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) was involved in the process both before and after the logging was completed, and that the department had no complaints about the work. Several calls to the DEC were not returned in time for comment on this article, and one person with the department said it wasn’t the DEC’s policy to comment on ongoing projects.

Arico said that while he was perfectly happy to comply with the town’s request to stop work, he insisted that the company begin remediation efforts, which he explained begin post-harvest. Erosion control is not an issue in the woods, but rather on the skid roads, and measures are generally taken to ensure water runoff is properly diverted.

But according to town Supervisor Wayne Euvrard the erosion was “pretty serious.�

“We were all in an uproar, and rightly so,� he said. “Cascade Brook was our biggest concern. Monday and Tuesday [March 29 and 30] the brook was running much muddier than any others around. It ended up going to Lake Amenia and right down toward Wassaic. There was a lot of silt and mud that ran through that.�

Arico maintained that the work was done properly and the runoff was simply the result of the heavy rains early last week. At this point all harvesting work has already been completed.

“Our consultant [Raney] is going to have to walk it, meet with the logger and come up with a remediation plan,� Flood said last week.

Having proper logging procedures in a town’s zoning code is becoming more and more prevalent in Dutchess County, Flood said, and companies should take note and look into any zoning code issues in the future.

“It’s unfortunate that they didn’t check,� he said. “By the time everybody got wind of it the work was pretty much finished.�

Mid Hudson Forest Products is scheduled to meet with the Planning Board at its next meeting to review the town’s logging regulations. The town’s Conservation Advisory Council (CAC) will also be in attendance.

“Our new policy is that just before we start [a project] we call and find out if a town has adopted anything and just try to be as up to date as possible,� said Arico.

“At least from my perspective, it’s critical that whatever is done here is done correctly,� stressed Powers. “We don’t want to damage our property or anyone else’s property. With the catastrophic storm we had, there were a lot of issues with silt. But we’re looking to cooperate to do whatever we can do to make amends with the process.�