Pittsford group planning for town green
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The Forrest Farm on Elm Street in Pittsford. Albert J. Marro / Rutland Herald |
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By Gordon Dritschilo Staff Writer - Published: May 27, 2009
PITTSFORD — A local nonprofit organization plans to give the town a green and wants to know what to put around it.
The Pittsford Community Corporation announced it has a purchase and sale agreement to buy the 14-acre Forrest farm near the corner of Route 7 and Elm Street. PCC President Baird Morgan said Tuesday the next step is a series of meetings on how best to use the property.
"We'd like to see some commercial establishments there, but, in a way, that's putting the cart before the horse," he said. "It's our group taking the lead, putting up the money, but we don't want to do something that flies in the face of what people in town want to do."
Morgan said his organization will bring in a Burlington group to run the meetings as impartial outsiders and that he expects to be able to say more about the timing and format of meetings in the next week. He said there could be focus groups as well as general town meetings.
"We want to be sure some of the perceived town leaders are there," he said. "We want to be sure some of the perceived town critics are there."
The agreement puts a $650,000 price tag on the land. Morgan said the group made a down payment — he would not say how much — and has 30 months to recruit partners to buy subdivisions of the land, financing the rest of the purchase.
Morgan listed small business such as a pharmacy, a doctor's office, an ice cream parlor, a barber shop or an art gallery as appropriate. He also suggested the spot as a location for a new post office and he expected affordable housing to figure into the plans.
"We'll have to do some market analysis," he said. "Whatever goes in here has to fit with community values and desires."
Town Manager John Haverstock said the Select Board would keep its distance from the project for the time being.
"We're simply observing events as they unfold," he said. "We may be cooperating with the group as we learn details of their proposal."
With a proposal for a new post office on Plains Road already in the works, Haverstock said the board wanted to maintain neutrality on that aspect of the project in particular.
Morgan said he founded PCC about 10 years ago with the mission of fulfilling the goals in the town plan. He was on the Planning Commission in the 1990s, and he said that many people then talked about the idea of a village center or village green.
"We hope to build up some community esprit de corps and get Pittsford excited about something," he said.
gordon.dritschilo@rutlandherald.com
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