BETHEL — Concerns over short-term rentals, water quality, development pressure and public engagement dominated discussion Wednesday night as the Town of Bethel presented its draft “Moving Bethel Forward” comprehensive plan during a public hearing at Duggan School.

The draft plan, the town’s first major comprehensive plan update since 2006, was presented by planning consultant Nan Stolzenburg of Community Planning and Environmental Associates, who said she has worked on more than 75 comprehensive plans across New York during a 35-year career.

Stolzenburg described the 309-page document as a long-range policy roadmap intended to guide future zoning, infrastructure, housing and environmental decisions over the next 10 to 15 years.

“This is really a grassroots document,” Stolzenburg said. “I don’t come in with a prescription of what you should be having in your plan. It evolves through what we’ve learned in the community.”

Stolzenburg emphasized that the comprehensive plan itself is not a zoning law, but rather the policy foundation for future land-use regulations and town decision-making.

“It provides the policy and the foundation for land-use laws,” she said. “We don’t just poof regulations out of the air.”

Setting goals

The presentation outlined the extensive public outreach and technical analysis that shaped the draft plan over the past two years. According to Stolzenburg, the process included a public open house attended by 156 people, a town-wide survey that generated 938 responses, eight focus groups, four interviews and roughly two years of advisory committee meetings.

She said the planning effort also included environmental mapping, infrastructure analysis, a build-out study examining how current zoning could shape future growth and an environmental sensitivity analysis identifying areas with overlapping natural-resource constraints.

“We mapped 20 different resources,” Stolzenburg said, including wetlands, watersheds, floodplains, steep slopes, agricultural land and habitat areas.

The plan itself is organized around five major goals: environmental stewardship, economic vitality, housing and workforce retention, community well-being and sustainable development.

Throughout the presentation, Stolzenburg repeatedly stressed that the plan attempts to balance growth with environmental protection and rural character preservation.

“Growth happens in every community,” she said. “This is really a matter of how do we manage that change.”

Water woes

One of the strongest themes of the presentation involved water quality protection, particularly around White Lake and Mountain Lake in Smallwood.

Stolzenburg said public input consistently identified lakes, streams, wetlands and groundwater as some of the community’s highest priorities.

“Water quality protection was from the very beginning one of the top concerns and priorities of the community,” she said.

Among the recommendations discussed were watershed-based planning, expanded septic oversight, shoreline setbacks, conservation subdivision design, stream buffer protections and possible environmental overlay districts tied to sensitive water resources.

The presentation also addressed housing affordability, aging demographics and the town’s seasonal economy. Stolzenburg said Bethel faces challenges attracting and retaining younger residents and workforce households because of rising housing costs and limited housing diversity.

“If we want to have a sustainable and resilient community, we have to have new people moving in,” she said.

Recommendations discussed included smaller housing footprints, mixed-use buildings in hamlets, senior housing opportunities and revisions to multifamily housing standards.

The draft additionally focuses on infrastructure and transportation concerns, including seasonal traffic congestion, roadway safety, pedestrian connectivity and future sewer planning.

Several recommendations discussed Wednesday involved concentrating future development around existing infrastructure and limiting poorly sited development in environmentally sensitive areas.

Residents weigh in

The public comment portion of the hearing quickly focused on short-term rentals, environmental concerns and questions about the planning process itself.

Ph.D. Bruce Johnson, a Smallwood homeowner, lake scientist and member of the Smallwood Civic Association, praised the effort behind the plan but urged the town to take a more aggressive approach toward addressing wastewater impacts and water quality concerns involving Mountain Lake.

Johnson said the lake already experiences algal blooms, cloudy water and unsafe E. coli levels after large rain events.

“We really need to proactively understand these issues, have a plan for mitigation and a plan to properly plan growth in the community,” Johnson said.

Lois Berkowitz, speaking on behalf of the Bethel Roundtable, argued the plan fails to adequately address the impact of short-term rentals on housing availability and neighborhood stability.

“It does not seem feasible, practical or responsible to move forward on issues such as environmental stewardship, economic vitality, community well-being and most importantly housing without directly addressing the impact of short-term rentals,” Berkowitz said.

Berkowitz also questioned whether the public was given enough time to review the lengthy draft before the hearing and said the organization intends to submit additional written comments before the May 27 deadline.

Jonathan Hyman, a longtime Smallwood resident and former president of the Smallwood Civic Association, echoed many of those concerns and called the draft “incomplete” without recommendations involving short-term rental regulation.

“My research suggests there are approximately 275 to 300 short-term rentals in Bethel that we know about,” Hyman said, estimating roughly 170 are in Smallwood.

Hyman urged the town to establish a short-term rental registry, strengthen septic inspection standards and adopt historic preservation and design standards for Smallwood.

“Please provide the leadership and make meaningful recommendations as to whether or not short-term rentals belong as part of Bethel’s future,” he said.

Barbara Lerner also criticized what she described as insufficient public engagement opportunities and questioned the use of 2020 census data following population changes associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There were no visioning sessions, no opportunities to speak freely about where we wanted to be in 10, 20 or 50 years,” Lerner said.

Moving forward

Written comments on the draft plan will continue to be accepted through May 27. Comments can be delivered to Town Hall, emailed to townclerk@townofbethelny.gov, or mailed to Town Clerk, PO Box 300, White Lake, NY 12786.  The committee is expected to review comments during its June meeting before deciding whether to forward a revised draft to the Town Board.

Under state law, the Town Board would then conduct its own public hearing, county referral process and environmental review under the State Environmental Quality Review Act before considering adoption later this year.