GREENFIELD — The Conservation Commission voted to continue a public hearing on Noble Home LLC’s plans to build 22 condominiums divided into multi-family homes on Stone Farm Lane until Sept. 9, when members hope to have a better understanding of the proposed development’s impact on wildlife.
The commission continued the hearing Tuesday evening from its initial date of July 23, when members asked the applicant for a more thorough review of the project’s stormwater drainage system. For the Sept. 9 meeting, the commission requested that the applicant return with a third-party review of the development’s impact on wildlife.
“Now, the water is coming down from Sunrise [Avenue] right into the vernal pool, untreated,” Bucky Sparkle, a civil engineer hired by Noble Home LLC for the project, explained at Tuesday’s meeting. “Stormwater management systems are absolutely supposed to discharge downstream and we are discharging a fraction of what we need to for this project.”
Valley Community Land Trust, a regional nonprofit that purchases and leases land for conservation and affordable housing, bought the land on Stone Farm Lane for roughly $995,000 last summer before leasing portions to Noble Home LLC, an architectural design firm from Shelburne Falls, and the Valley Housing Co-op for development.
As a small portion of the proposed development’s parking area and utilities will fall into a wetlands buffer zone, under both state law and the local ordinance, the application requires the Conservation Commission’s approval.
In an effort to reduce the level of disturbance the gravel parking lot would bring to the riverfront area, commission members discussed removing, or relocating, one of the development’s proposed 16 parking spots from the river-facing side of the property.
Noble Home owner Noah Grunberg responded that he would be willing to remove one or two parking spaces to improve the project.
“We actually have quite a number of more spaces than required according to the zoning bylaws, especially for the two duplexes,” Grunberg said. “We’re certainly able to get rid of one, if not two, spaces. … I don’t think there’s a problem reducing parking spaces if that is amenable to the board.”
Since neighbors of the proposed project raised concerns about its potential impact on wildlife at the July meeting, commission member Emily Boss said she wished to receive a more detailed report from the applicant about plans to minimize wildlife devastation while the buildings are constructed. Boss suggested that the commission continue the hearing until Sept. 9, requesting that the applicant return with a wildlife impact report in accordance with Massachusetts Association of Conservation Commissions standards.
“The areas that we’re looking over are really small in terms of square footage, but the overall project is bigger than that. One of the strongest pieces of feedback that I heard last time was to make sure that the impact on wildlife will be minimized,” Boss said. “We might consider asking for the applicant to use a contractor that we have requested so that it’s an independent source of information, or at least one that we decided on, that fits these standards.”
