New Castle Residents to Receive Survey on Town-Owned Land
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New Castle officials will be sending a land planning survey to residents in the coming weeks to help gauge public sentiment about potential future uses of town-owned land near Town Hall and the Chappaqua train station.
The survey, the next step in the process following public engagement sessions last May, is being formulated with questions based on feedback from those public forums.
It is scheduled to be sent to residents by early October with a completed report to the town by the end of the calendar year. It will be conducted by the Marist Institute for Public Opinion.
Last week, Barbara Carvalho, director of the Marist Poll, and Mike Conte, its director of client services, reviewed the likely topics that the poll will focus on with the Town Board and the possible wording of some of the questions.
Conte said the objectives for the survey are to learn if residents want the town-owned land that includes some of the parking lots at the train station and the area around Town Hall to be developed, and if so, how they want the land to be developed and how that development would be funded.
Questions under consideration will be related to housing, types of commercial development, recreational facilities, green space and parking and pedestrian use. There are also a series of demographic questions.
“We have a draft already set, so we really just need your feedback, but we’re working on a deadline where we really want to have the final report to you by the end of the year,” Conte told the board.
He said the survey will be mailed to each one of the 6,086 addresses in New Castle, but that mailing will also include a link to take the same survey online.
A postcard mailing will also be sent to all residences sometime after that to encourage residents to participate.
Carvalho said the key to a strong survey is to make sure the questions are clearly understandable and can’t be misinterpreted. Town officials also wanted to guard against it being too long, so residents don’t lose interest in completing the questionnaire.
“I just don’t want people to take this survey and say to themselves ‘This is too much detail, I don’t have time for this,’” said town Director of Planning Sabrina Charney Hull. “I think we want to get a broad sense of what people care about. Do they care about affordable housing? If they say yes, I think getting into the weeds might make some people tune out.”
Supervisor Victoria Tipp said she’s hopeful it will center on major themes and enable the town to get a clear sense of what the respondents would like to see. Ultimately, the goal is to make the town as appealing as possible.
“We want to engage residents and people to come into town and spend time in town,” Tipp said. “We want to make the town more walkable. These are the things that people have said to us…and people care a lot about recreation.”
Conte said he was hopeful that the board could provide their comments on the draft questions and topics by last Friday so that the final survey could be greenlighted by the end of this week.
The town had scheduled a walking tour for interested residents last spring of the 23 acres of municipal land being considered for potential development followed by the two public engagement sessions.
Martin has more than 30 years experience covering local news in Westchester and Putnam counties, including a frequent focus on zoning and planning issues. He has been editor-in-chief of The Examiner since its inception in 2007. Read more from Martin’s editor-author bio here. Read Martin’s archived work here: https://www.theexaminernews.com/author/martin-wilbur2007/
