Manor OKs laws amid filing error

Bryan Ahrens

Three local laws approved in May by Plandome Manor trustees were passed again on Tuesday after what was termed a filing error required the board to hold to hold public hearings and vote on the proposals a second time. 

Notices of public hearings for local laws outlawing the planting of bamboo on residential properties, enhancing safety at construction sites throughout the village and granting the board the ability to tax utility companies were not published in Plandome Manor’s official newspaper, the Manhasset Press, nullifying their passing on May 20.

“We are going through the public hearings again and the last meeting, the votes are null and void,” Plandome Manor Mayor Barbara Donno said.

The bamboo law would prohibit residents from growing bamboo on their properties and require those already with bamboo at their homes to maintain it, trustees said.

Donno has said the construction law was intended to support residential “properties and property values.”

The construction law requires fencing to be put around work sites to prevent “unauthorized access where people could get hurt [and] injured and, of course, property damage,” Plandome Manor code enforcement officer Robert Rocklein said in describing the legislation last month. 

Rocklein said the law would align the village’s building code with the New York State Uniform Fire Prevention and Building Code, which requires fencing around construction sites and locked windows and doors on unoccupied structures.

“The more regulatory aspects you have to control, the less decisions are made on the spot and [more] uniformity in these things,” he said. “It’s better for the village, it’s better for surrounding neighbors as a whole, and it’s better for anybody who comes and goes from the site in the interim.”

The utility law, trustees have said, had only previously existed at the state level.

The board re-approved the law after the hearing concluded.

Trustees also re-approved the construction law which requires fencing be put around work sites  and windows and doors to be locked in unoccupied structures, and the utility law, after no residents had any input during the two hearings.

In other news: 

• Donno said a $1.5 million grant request for aid for a project to repair the North Plandome Road culvert has been filed to Sen. Jack Martins’ (R-Mineola) office for approval.

“The state has put this out to various municipalities through their senators,” Donno said. “We won’t know whether or not we’re the ones that will be chosen, it was kind of like a first come-first serve.” 

• Trustees also approved the appointment of Joel Levitin to the village Design Review Board with a term running through April 2016. He replaces Laura Hall.

• The next board of trustees is tentatively scheduled for July 15.

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