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Hudson Valley Flyers ask ZBA to endorse site-plan wording; board resists automatic alignment with FAA MOSAIC
Summary
A Plattekill applicant asked the Zoning Board of Appeals to endorse updated site-plan language aligning with FAA MOSAIC guidance while retaining neighborhood limits; board members said automatic alignment would cede local control and asked for revised wording and legal review of whether a public hearing is required.
Burke Schindler, who identified himself while representing the Hudson Valley Flyers, asked the Plattekill Zoning Board of Appeals to confirm language on a revised site plan so the planning board could adopt updated restrictions for Old Orchard Airport.
Schindler told the board he filed an application after the planning board discussed the matter June 9 and that his goal was to "keep everything exactly the same as we're operating now" while rewriting certain terms to reflect current FAA classifications. "What we're trying to do is get these restrictions with some modifications put back on the map and write it in such a way that as the feds change their regulations every 10, 15 years, we don't have to come back in here and play the alphabet soup with the town because we are a preexisting nonconforming entity," Schindler said.
Board members raised a recurring objection to language that would make the town "automatically" follow MOSAIC. One member warned that giving the applicant scope to follow MOSAIC strictly would "give you an opening to where we only follow Mosaic" and could allow future aircraft types, higher speeds or night-capable operations without local review. "I just don't want to lose complete control to a bureaucratic change and we're stuck eating it," a committee member said, summarizing the board's concern about binding automatic alignment.
Schindler and the board agreed on the airport's neighborhood-oriented operating limits that the applicant wants preserved in paragraph 6 of the site plan: no nighttime operations, sunup-to-sundown hours, no commercial flight schools and no flights before 7 a.m. on Sundays. Schindler emphasized the runway's practical limits—a 3,000-foot grass strip—and insurance and surface constraints he said would limit heavier or faster aircraft.
As a compromise, Schindler offered to remove or reword the MOSAIC-alignment sentence and to insert an explicit date (e.g., a 2025 reference) into the conclusion so the planning board and ZBA preserve current restrictions while updating terminology. "If I take that out of the application, then that gives everything back," he said when describing the proposed revision.
Next steps: Schindler said he could deliver revised language quickly (paper or email) and the ZBA agreed to review the changes at its next meeting. The board said it will consult the town attorney to determine whether the revision requires a public hearing; if required, members discussed scheduling constraints tied to certified-mail notices and newspaper posting deadlines (the ZBA identified July 9 as its next meeting and discussed a possible hearing date later in July). If the ZBA approves revised language, it will send a letter to the planning board documenting the ZBA's agreed-upon stipulations so the planning board can adopt an updated resolution.
Why it matters: Board members said their concern is preserving local land-use control while allowing the airport's operator to remain operationally compliant with FAA airworthiness standards. The exchange centered on whether the town should treat MOSAIC as binding language that supersedes local restrictions or as a reference the airport may "use as a guideline."
