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Residents urge Ulysses Town Board to slow comprehensive plan; board authorizes $6,500 grant application contract
Summary
At a sometimes tense June 9 meeting, residents urged the Ulysses Town Board to delay votes and a zoning grant application until the comprehensive plan and housing study are finished. Despite public objections, the board authorized a contract with MRB Group not to exceed $6,500 to prepare a smart-growth grant application.
Good evening — the Ulysses Town Board on June 9 faced more than an hour of public comment urging the board to slow the draft comprehensive plan process and to postpone any grant or zoning work until the town completes a housing study and produces a consolidated plan draft for public review.
Several residents — including Sarah Adams of Football Street — criticized the timing and transparency of recent changes to the draft plan. "Why weren't [as many as] 59 resolutions presented prior to closing the public hearing?" Adams asked, urging the board to "delay any voting until a completed draft plan with these changes is incorporated and available to the public." Adams also asked the board to postpone signing any contract with MRB Group to prepare a zoning-code grant until the housing study is complete.
The concerns centered on two linked issues: (1) process and notice for dozens of late plan changes and (2) whether the town should apply this year to the state's Consolidated Funding Application (CFA) for a zoning update. Residents and technical commenters — including Bob Howorth, a former board-of-zoning-appeals chair and environmental scientist — warned that the draft "medium density" designation in parts of the map presumes public water and sewer that do not yet exist and could create legal and practical problems for infrastructure and water quality.
Supervisor (chair) and staff responded that the public hearing on the comp plan was tabled rather than closed and that a town newsletter carried notice of upcoming hearings. Staff also explained the narrow statewide CFA submission window: applications are due July 31 and award notices typically arrive many months later; successful projects often do not begin work for roughly a year. The town budget includes approximately $25,000 set aside to help implement plan-related work, staff said.
After discussion, the board voted to authorize a contract with MRB Group not to exceed $6,500 to prepare an application under the 2026 Smart Growth comprehensive planning program. The motion included a requirement that the town attorney review the contract language to preserve board flexibility. The authorization obligates the town to pay for MRB's work on the application but does not obligate the board to accept any grant award in the future.
Supporters of applying this year said skipping this cycle would delay funding opportunities by at least a year and could slow implementation of parts of the comp plan; opponents argued applying without a finalized plan risks reducing public trust and locking in proposals before full public review.
Next steps: the CFA application (if submitted) would be formally authorized later by a gatekeeper resolution if the board chooses to proceed; the application deadline is July 31. Separately, the public comment period on the comprehensive plan remains open and the board continues to consider map edits and resolutions in upcoming meetings.
What to watch: whether the board pursues a contract extension with the plan consultant to produce a final, consolidated plan before major implementation steps and how the town addresses residents' infrastructure concerns where the draft plan assumes public water or sewer.
