A waiver is not a favor.
Zena Homes cannot be built without Eastwoods Drive. Eastwoods Drive is a private gravel road in the Town of Woodstock that currently serves five houses. To reach the proposed subdivision in the Town of Ulster, it would have to be widened and extended into a dead-end road running roughly a mile and three quarters through wetlands and the Zena Woods Critical Environmental Area.
The Woodstock Planning Board has to approve that road. To approve it as designed, the Board has to set aside its own code, repeatedly. We have counted thirteen separate standards at issue.
A waiver is a request, not an entitlement. The Planning Board has the legal authority to say no to any of them, and to all of them.
Every item below cites the specific code section. The developers' own submissions are on our Resources page under Waivers, and Woodstock's codes are there as well. Read them yourself; we would rather you checked us than took our word for it.
Writing a letter? Pick one waiver, write about that one, and name the code section. Jump to the list of what to write about ↓
Which one is yours?
Write about the thing you already care about. Here is where it lands:
- Waiting on an ambulance or a fire truck → Waiver 2, Waiver 7, Waiver 9
- Getting out in a wildfire or a storm → Waiver 2, Waiver 3, Waiver 10
- Wetlands and water → Waiver 6, Waiver 4
- Walking or biking the road, dust → Waiver 4
- Construction trucks and heavy equipment → Waiver 4, Waiver 5
- Who pays when the homeowners association fails → Waiver 5, Waiver 8
- Woodstock carrying the cost of an Ulster project → Waiver 8, Waiver 11
- What the two towns did and didn't review → Waiver 11, Waiver 12, Waiver 13
Waivers from the Town of Woodstock Code
These are requests the Woodstock Planning Board can grant or deny outright. A letter about one of these has the most direct effect.
1. The blanket request
Town of Woodstock Code § 202-32
A road serving eleven or more lots must be built to major road standards. Rather than address each standard one at a time, the developers asked the Planning Board to waive the Section 202-32 road design standards as a whole: fifteen pages of code.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32 in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
2. Dead-end road length
§ 202-32.D(1)
The maximum length for a dead-end road is 2,000 feet. The proposed road is more than 7,000 feet, ending in a cul-de-sac deep in the woods. Dead-end limits exist so emergency responders can reach you and so you can get out.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32.D(1) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
3. Two means of access
§ 202-32.C
Subdivisions of twenty or more lots must have at least two connections to existing roads. This proposal has one way in and one way out for thirty lots. If that road is blocked by a fallen tree, a fire, a storm, or an accident, there is no second route.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32.C in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
4. Road width and shoulders
§ 202-32.G(4)
Major roads require 28 feet in total: a 20-foot surface plus 4-foot shoulders on each side. The proposal is roughly 20 feet of gravel with no compliant shoulders. Along the wetland there is no room for a shoulder at all. Shoulders are what let vehicles pass, give responders room to work, and keep people walking the road out of traffic. Widening a gravel road for construction traffic also means dust, at volumes the current road has never carried.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32.G(4) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
5. Subbase
§ 202-32.G(19)
Major roads require a 12-inch crushed stone subbase. None is proposed. The subbase is what lets a road carry a fire truck or a concrete truck without rutting or washing out. A road built below standard costs more to maintain, and the homeowners association proposed to maintain it does not exist yet.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32.G(19) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
6. Paving
§ 202-32.G(20)
Roads serving more than eleven lots must be paved. Woodstock's own environmental consultant warned that paving Eastwoods Drive would damage the wetlands alongside it. The developers' answer is to skip the paving and ask for a waiver, which leaves the Board choosing between road safety and the wetland.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-32.G(20) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
7. Adequate emergency access
§ 202-11(E)
Subdivision roads must provide adequate access for fire, police, and emergency medical services. Reviewing the developers' own documents for the Planning Board, consulting engineer Stephan A. Maffia, P.E., called the proposal "unacceptably excessive roadway lengths with regard to safety," warning that a blockage could delay fire, police, and EMS response. He measured the access road at more than 7,000 feet.
Writing about this one? Name § 202-11(E) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
8. The access road must be suitably improved
NYS Town Law § 280-a; Town of Woodstock Code § 202-29A.(5)
Building permits cannot be issued until the road providing access is suitably improved, and Woodstock requires private access roads to meet public road design standards. The developers have asked to waive nearly every standard that defines what "suitably improved" means. If every standard is waived, what is left of the word?
Writing about this one? Name NYS Town Law § 280-a and Woodstock Code § 202-29A.(5) in your letter, then tell us you've taken it.
State standards Woodstock cannot waive
The Woodstock Planning Board has no authority to set these aside. Only the New York State Department of State can grant a variance from the Uniform Code. If you write about these, ask the Board to require a formal determination from the state before approving anything.
9. Long dead-end fire apparatus access roads
NYS Fire Code Appendix D, Table D103.4
Dead-end fire apparatus access roads longer than 750 feet trigger additional design requirements. This one is more than 7,000 feet, from Zena Highwoods Road to the farthest lot.
Writing about this one? Ask the Board to require a formal determination from the New York State Department of State before approving anything, then tell us you've taken it.
10. Two fire apparatus access roads
NYS Fire Code Appendix D § D107.1
Developments of thirty or more dwelling units generally require two approved fire apparatus access roads. This proposal has thirty lots and one road.
Writing about this one? Ask the Board to require a formal determination from the New York State Department of State before approving anything, then tell us you've taken it.
Questions about the review itself
These are not waiver requests. They are concerns that the review has been incomplete. They belong in the record, but they are a different kind of ask.
11. Cross-municipal coordination
SEQRA; General Municipal Law §§ 239-l–239-n
The subdivision is in Ulster. The road, and every burden it creates, is in Woodstock.
Writing about this one? Ask the Board to say on the record what coordination with Ulster actually happened, and tell us you've taken it.
12. Easement disclosure
SEQRA EAF Part 1, Question 16
Easements affecting Eastwoods Drive appear not to have been accurately disclosed in the project record.
Writing about this one? Ask the Board to require an accurate easement disclosure before it acts, and tell us you've taken it.
13. Segmentation
SEQRA, 6 NYCRR § 617
The houses cannot exist without the road, and the road has no purpose without the houses. Reviewed separately, no single body has looked at the whole project.
Writing about this one? Ask the Board to put the concern on the record before it acts, and tell us you've taken it.
Claim your waiver
Nearly three hundred letters have gone to the two towns since the start of 2025. What the Board has not seen is thirteen letters, each one taking a single standard and asking a specific question about it.
Tell us which one you're taking so we can make sure none of the thirteen is left out.
Still unclaimed:
All thirteen are still unclaimed. Be the first.
Then follow the letter-writing guide and remember to BCC szd@stopzena.org.