Five-Story Apartment Building Explored for Somers Commons
The owner of the Somers Commons shopping center in Baldwin Place is looking to revitalize the longtime retail-only property by bringing in multifamily housing.
Willing Biddle, president and COO of Urstadt Biddle Properties, presented the Somers Planning Board on Jan. 12 with plans to build a five-story, 160-unit apartment building in a 30,000-square-foot space being vacated by Home Goods in early March. Somers Commons is located at the intersection of routes 6 and 118.
Home Goods is relocating about seven miles away to the Cortlandt Town Center on Route 6 in Mohegan Lake to occupy space near Home Depot. The space it is moving into was most recently a Bed Bath & Beyond.
Having reached out to about 100 retailers across the country without success for a possible replacement for Home Goods, Biddle explained that his company, which also owns the Town Centre at Somers and the Heritage 202 Center, both on Route 100 in Somers, was hoping to capitalize on a popular trend in the industry.
“There have been a lot of challenges in the retail world. It’s more and more difficult to find big-box retailers to come into a shopping center,” Biddle said. “We’re looking at potentially a white elephant and we’re scared of that and what it could do to the rest of the center. We’re concerned this store will go dark and we won’t be able to find a replacement for it.”
Plans call for the demolition of the Home Goods building and the construction of a complex with a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom rental apartments. There would be 72 one- and two-bedroom units each and 16 with three bedrooms. Of those units, 24 would be set aside for affordable housing.
The existing Goodwill, Cold Stone Creamery and Penny Lane stores near Home Goods are scheduled to remain. There are currently four other vacancies in the shopping center.
Anup Misra, a consultant for Urstadt Biddle Properties, said the new apartment building, which would include 5,000 square feet of amenities, would help attract baby boomers and millennials to Somers.
“There’s a gap that needs to be filled,” Misra said. “We’re aiming for this to be a top-class development. I think this would be a great thing for the town and a great thing for the shopping center. This is a transition happening all over Westchester. This change is creeping up north.”
Dave Smith, Somers’ consultant planner, agreed mixing housing with retail was “consistent with what is going on in Westchester County.”
“There’s certainly a need for housing in Westchester County of all types,” Smith said. “A lot of synergy can be created with this type of concept.”
However, several Planning Board members strongly balked at the building being five stories, which would require a zoning change from the Town Board. Planning Board member David McNamara said it would be “precedent-setting.”
“While it’s good for you, it’s not necessarily good for us,” board member Nancy Gerbino asserted. “This is a major, major change to our zoning. We are bucolic and how we keep that is by not having five-story buildings.”
“A five-story structure is quite bold for northern Westchester. I understand the concept, but I believe it belongs down county,” added board member Chris Zaberto. “This is a massive project. I don’t see how a five-story complex with 320 parking spaces is a good fit for Somers. I don’t see public opinion in your favor either.”
Planning Board Chairman John Currie said he would be “very comfortable” if the building was three stories, commenting, “I’m not in favor of a five-story building anywhere in this town. I would hate to see even one change the character of the town.”
Biddle, who mentioned his company has been a fixture in Somers since 1993 and paid about $1.14 million in property taxes in 2021, said the easy solution would be to do nothing, but he expressed hope town officials would work with him to craft a mutually acceptable project.
“We want the community to thrive and we’re here to stay,” he said. “What’s good for Somers, is good for us. We need zoning flexibility to help ourselves. We’re not going to build something that’s not going to work.”
Rick has more than 40 years’ experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, running the gamut from politics and crime to sports and human interest. He has been an editor at Examiner Media since 2012. Read more from Rick’s editor-author bio here. Read Rick’s work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/pezzullo_rick-writer/
