Holy Cross

The long-abandoned former Holy Cross campus is going on the auction block.

Steve Kutner, director of marketing for AuctionAmericaRealty.com, on Monday said the company has been hired to sell the 112-acre parcel at auction “regardless of the price.”

“This will be an ‘absolute auction’ which means there is no minimum (price),” said Kutner. The property will be sold to the highest bidder.”

READ MORE ON THE RHINEBECK COMMUNITY FORUM

Update provided by John Lyons:

At the Town Board workshop meeting this January 29th, the Board reversed its December 15, 2008 decision and voted 5-0 in favor of abandoning the idea of a special 200 unit senior housing zone for the Holy Cross School (HCS) property. They opted to revert to virtually the same zoning that is presently in place for that property (5 acre zoning plus the possibility of the floating senior housing zone subject to special use permit conditions). Board Member Ellen Silverstein took the lead in stepping out first and endorsing that the Board reverse its position. All the other Board members followed fairly quickly. The Board received applause from those in attendance both after the vote and at the conclusion of the meeting.
 
The Rhinecliff Hamlet extension still lives. At the meeting, Dod Crane advocated dropping it from the plan. After discussion, the Board decided to retain the possibility, at least for the purposes of including it in the environmental review, with the understanding that they have the option to drop it out at a later juncture. 

In an effort to shed light on the controversial Town meeting that took place on December 15th we have extracted two clips of video from the meeting.

Rhinebeck Town Board Comp-Plan and zoning workshop12/15/08 Holy Cross video clip:

Rhinebeck Town Board Comp-Plan and zoning workshop 12/15/08 Rhinecliff extension video clip:

Please leave your comments below:

During this holiday season the Town Board voted 5-0 to amend the Comp Plan to allow 200+ units of senior housing at the former Holy Cross site.

The addition of 200+ units of allowable density is a substantial change to the original DGEIS document. Proceeding to an EIS at this point would be a mistake, and unlawful.

We urge all residents of the Town to sign this petition to create a supplemental DGEIS document. It is imperative that there be new public hearings to review this significant change.