Last we'd officially heard, there'd be news about Steve Lucente's proposed Varna II (or whatever he'll call it) project in "two to three weeks". That was about six weeks ago. I hadn't seen anything new from Lucente, but apparently he...
This morning's Journal finally notices the Varna development conversations of the last few months. The biggest news in it is that there's a possible date by which we might learn something new about the evolving proposal. Well, not exactly a...
Last night's meeting at the Varna Community Center to discuss Stephen Lucente's plans for development was one of the strangest meetings I've ever attended. I don't think it was just the heat. A few of the highlights, from my definitely...
I mentioned earlier that I really like having public meeting minutes available on the town website. Among those minutes are Planning Board minutes. Much as I like having minutes available, sometimes it's easier to gather pieces about one subject into...
Reporter Nick Babel was at last Monday's meeting about development in Varna. The resulting article gets to a lot of the points raised, though most of the details come out quoted to me, and not to the many people who...
Last night, around 40 residents of Varna (and the Dryden Town Supervisor) gave up a gorgeous evening and came together to discuss what the future of the hamlet might look like. The meeting was preparation for a July 7th meeting...
Here's the text of the mailing sent out about tonight's discussion of a vision for Varna: CHANGE IS COMING READ THIS LETTER & COME TO A MEETING FOR VARNA RESIDENTS AND BUSINESS OWNERS MONDAY JUNE 21 7 P.M THIS IS...
Back in 1999 and 2000, the Varna Community Association was looking ahead to how their hamlet should look, setting concrete goals that described their hopes. As I mentioned earlier, some parts of that plan have only just recently come to...
Last night's public workshop on the amended zoning law was almost as busy as the one held January in Dryden, with some familiar faces but also a lot of new people. Settling in at the Varna zoning meeting. Opponents of...
I've had a few people ask me where exactly these 260 units would go, so I pulled out some aerial photos from April 2005 that show the site. I wasn't so good with the camera that I got the entire...
I was reviewing the old Varna II environmental impact statement, created by Lucente Development for an earlier iteration of this project in 2000. I was a little startled to find, on page 22 of Volume I, this statement: "[Section 803.5...
Ten years ago, Varna residents fought hard against a 170-unit proposal. Last night, Stephen Lucente unveiled a a 260-unit proposal for the same area, apparently indifferent to the work of the project's neighbors and other Town residents that had gone...
Developer Stephen Lucente and his engineer Lawrence Fabbroni came to the Dryden Planning Board to have an initial conversation about their proposal for building a new development on the southern hillside above Varna along Route 366, running behind the existing...