Schermerhorn Moreau plan: 296 apartments in 37 buildings

By Ben Westcott & Cathy DeDe

Developer Rich Schermerhorn seeks to build a mixed-use project with 296 apartments in 37 two-story, eight-unit buildings on just under 33 acres at 1345 Route 9 in the Town of Moreau.

It’s on a narrow property stretching from just east of the Saratoga Olive Oil Company on Route 9 to the Northway.

The plan includes a commercial pad “for future development,” said the application. About a third of the property closest to Route 9, not included in the proposed apartment complex, will also be considered “for future development,” consistent with allowed zoning uses.

The property is within Moreau’s new Sewer District. “All units will be connected to the municipal sanitary sewer being constructed,” said the application.

Mr. Schermerhorn proposes a new Town Road from Route 9 to about the middle of the property, connecting to a circular private drive through the complex, with about 520 parking spaces in front of the buildings on both sides.

A zoning amendment is required to create the Planned United Development on property now zoned C-1, General Commercial.
“This isn’t going to hurt me if you say no,” Mr. Schermerhorn told the Aug. 19 Moreau Planning Board meeting. “I’ve got other places I could go. But I enjoy it here. And I’m telling you, we need growth.”

He said, “I do see the hardship of what’s going on in the town of Moreau right now. If we want commercial in our hometown, the only way we’re going to get it is we need more people. We can have more housing subdivisions, but the challenge with housing right now is people can’t afford houses and can’t get mortgages. Rentals are a solution, and it’s shelter that’s working.

“If we want to get the commercial here, the retail stores, you have to have a base of people here,” Mr. Schermerhorn said. “Every commercial retailer, commercial realtor, and representatives from these stores that you talk to say there’s a lot of traffic but there’s not enough people that live in the town of Moreau.”

Planning Board Chairman John Arnold retorted, “I’ve spoken to five or six of these retailers to try to encourage them to come, and not one of them has said the problem is you don’t have enough people in your town.

“Every one of them has said traffic in getting on and off Exit 17 is an issue. And every one of them has said the price of properties on Route 9 do not reflect the value of those properties to them.”

“So what’s the answer, should we let it sit vacant?” Mr. Schermerhorn responded. “Office buildings don’t work anymore. Office is done. It’s over in our lifetime. You’ll never see it. There’s vacant offices everywhere. Medical buildings are going vacant everywhere. They’re all consolidating on the campus of the hospital. You’ve got two choices: housing or apartments to build our community.”

He said, “If I could build residential homes that I knew I could sell to middle America and a tick below, I would be doing that, and so would so many other developers. But the challenge that we all face is you can’t build affordable houses.

“Honestly, I don’t even consider $300,000 affordable, because if you have to have a 20% down payment to build an affordable house, that’s a lot of money. So apartments have been on the rise.”

“All my apartments are full,” Mr. Schermerhorn said. “It’s not because I’m a nice guy. It’s because they’re reasonably priced, they’re maintained, and they’re managed.”

Mr. Arnold suggested public sentiment would be against Mr. Schermerhorn’s plans. “I talk to people in the community, and as a whole 90% of them say no more apartments,” he said. “And the second thing they say is no more traffic on Route 9.”

Mr. Schermerhorn responded, “You know what that is? That’s selfishness. I started out in an apartment. A lot of us started in apartments. Apartments are not bad people. It’s our moms, our dads, our aunts, our uncles, our friends. People don’t all want houses. Not all people can afford a house.”

Mr. Arnold responded, “I don’t think it’s bigotism. I don’t think it’s an insult. In fact, most of the people that have told me that live in apartments. It’s not that. It’s the fact that we have a lot of traffic on Route 9.”

Later in the meeting, Mr. Schermerhorn told the board, “You’re lucky you even got me to consider, because across the street we have Casella Waste Management with 100 acres of garbage trucks. I should probably have my head examined for even thinking about this, but I still know I can sell it because I’ll make the development beautiful.

“I’m picking an area that’s not that desirable, and I’m willing to invest my money,” he said. “My proposal is to hopefully develop this, and then there’s some really big acreage next door where hopefully we can attract some more people. We have to tart somewhere.”

He argued his development would help local school systems raise enrollment.

“I don’t know any school system where the enrollments are going up,” he said. “They’re either staying flat or going down. If you look at Hudson Falls right now, they don’t even have a varsity football team. So bringing children is not a bad thing for our school systems.”

The project is to appear before the planning board again next month. Mr. Schermerhorn seems eager to get rolling.

“We can all have visions, but how long can we sit and wait and stand by and go back and plan?” he asked the board. “I build whole communities while everyone’s talking about it.”

Copyright © 2024 Lone Oak Publishing Co., Inc. All Rights Reserved