Trustees Ponder Driveway Lease for Tavern Owners

The Trustees Law Committee met early Tuesday morning August 31 to review community comments on the proposed lease of the village-owned driveway of the Heathcote Tavern parking lot to building owners Frederick Fish and Stephen Odor.

The developers have leased the restaurant to parties who plan to open an Italian restaurant, Apulia II on the site of the former Tavern. However, without the right to use the driveway, there would be no access to the parking lot, so both the Village and the developers are eager to come to an agreement.

At an August 9th meeting, members of the Heathcote Five Corners Coalition charged the committee with being secretive in their negotiations, but this meeting was more cordial. The Coalition had reviewed the proposed lease and sent comments to the Trustees for their consideration. The Coalition’s goal is to prevent Fish and Oder from developing their property and using the Village's land without coming back to the Village for approval. The Coalition's analysis of the current draft of the lease revealed that the developer would be able to expand the use of the property beyond its current scope.

Peter Gordon, an attorney and member of the Heathcote Five Corner’s Coalition assured the Trustees that the Coalition believes it would be advantageous to have a restaurant on the site and agrees that that the developer has a right to make use of his property. However, he believes that this new lease should not allow Fish and Oder to further develop the property, in a similar manner to what was proposed in 2009.

Gordon felt that there were glaring deficiencies in the proposed lease that would allow the developer to exploit loopholes and use the Village's land to expand the Tavern building or otherwise develop the property. He asserted that the lease needed to be well drafted and tightly written to prevent Fish from proposing one plan now and reinterpreting the text later on.

Larry Bell, another member of the Coalition thanked the Trustees for inviting the group to the meeting and considering their comments. However he felt that they were invited in too late in the process, after the proposed lease had already been sent to Fish and Oder. Echoing concerns from the August 9th meeting he said, “We were invited in at the very end, when it was too late to consider substantive changes to the lease.”

His wife, Janet Bell urged the Board to proceed with great caution and to serve as guardians of the village for now and the future. She told the Trustees that these same developers had added a top floor and a penthouse to a project in New Jersey that violated local height restrictions. Ultimately they had to tear off these top two stories.

Mayor Carolyn Stevens defended the Trustees, telling Larry Bell that the public was notified about all meetings and “did not need a personal invitation” to attend. She said, “to criticize the process is extremely unfair.” In an effort to mediate, Trustee Toder said, “In retrospect, perhaps we could have done more.”

Stevens assured the Coalition that they share a common goal with the Village, which is to keep the property viable so that the developer does not want to tear it down. Despite differences in language she assured the group that the Village and the Coalition were in agreement on the intent of the lease.

The proposed lease requires Fish and Oder to pay the Village $15,000 per year for use of the driveway for an initial term of five years. After 2015, the lease will be automatically renewed for one-year terms until 2025, provided the property is leased to a full service restaurant. The Heathcote Coalition has proposed the addition of wording to the contract that gives the developer use of the driveway, only if the tavern building includes an operational restaurant, cocktail lounge and offices “that is comparable in size to the restaurant, cocktail lounge and office space operated there prior to April 2010. “ This would prevent the developer from building apartments, additional parking and more offices without coming back to the Village for permission.

At the close of the meeting the Trustees thanked the community for their input and agreed to review the Coalition’s proposed changes to the lease.