Loggers receive permit after the deed is done

AMENIA — A selective timber harvest on property owned by The Kildonan School has been granted a logging permit by the town’s Planning Board, despite the fact that logging has already been completed.

The Planning Board approved the permit last month after consulting with Doug Raney, the town’s forestry consultant. But the bulk of the on-site work was completed in March.

The company hired by Kildonan, Pine Plains’ Mid Hudson Forest Products, said it was unaware that Amenia had a logging ordinance in its zoning code. About 10 percent of the 100 to 120 acres that was harvested is located in the town of Amenia; the rest is in the town of North East, which does not have similar zoning regulations.

Mid Hudson acknowledged it was an oversight on its part not to check the town’s zoning before beginning work. But once the town discovered the work was going on, there was concern from local officials that the logging was harming the property.

To further complicate matters, there was a serious storm the day before the town discovered the logging work, and the National Weather Service had issued a flood warning for the area.

Josh Kowan, a forester working for Mid Hudson, stressed that the silt dirtying Cascade Brook (which runs through the harvested property) for a short period after the heavy rains was “a function of the storm and not from any logging.�

He also reiterated that two officials from the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation  (DEC) offices visited the site that day and concluded that the harvesting was done properly.

Since then Mid Hudson went before Amenia’s Planning Board to clear up the issue. The board asked the applicant to go through the permit application process anyway, even though the majority of work was already completed. At previous Planning Board meetings, board Chairman Bill Flood agreed that the town and the logging company “got off on the wrong foot,� but that Mid Hudson had been cooperative and easy to work with since.

During an on-site visit Aug. 6, Kowan said the company has still not received official confirmation that a permit has been granted.

Flood, reached later by phone, said that the permit process was approved by both Raney and the board and that it wasn’t the board’s policy to provide a physical copy of the approval. The company’s escrow account balance has been returned to the applicant, Flood continued, and with the town’s forester in agreement, the matter is closed.

The selective harvesting work provides The Kildonan School, a private school whose main campus is just north of the harvesting project off Perry Corners Road,  increased access to its forested property. School Headmaster Ben Powers said the skid roads created by the harvesting equipment were serving as a new mountain biking trail for the school, and the selective harvesting would give the land increased biodiversity.

“We’ve been using it all summer with camp,� he said, referring to Camp Dunnabeck, Kildonan’s summer school program. “This is the first summer that we’ve done on-site camping. We used to have to bus all the kids off campus. But definitely there’s been mountain biking and horseback riding up there as well and we’re really happy with the end product.�

The harvesting also provided the opportunity for Kildonan to engage its students academically, and Powers said Kowan was great about giving tours through the site.

“The kids and the teachers loved it,� he said. “Josh was able to explain to them the process of selective harvesting and what exactly they were doing out there.�

There are still large piles of logs and brush collected on the side of Perrys Corners Road, but Kowan said that the trees will be chopped up for eventual sale as firewood and the brush will be put through a wood chipper and brought to the marketplace.

“In three to five years, you would not know we were in a wood lot,� Kowan said standing in front of a large section where work had taken place. “We’ve reclaimed the site to be an excellent showpiece and I’ve taken other landowners here to see the work we’ve done.�