BEDFORD, N.Y. — Bedford lawmakers will renew consideration next week of how to deal with large RVs parked on town streets after their initial approach was criticized as both overly broad and decidedly uncharitable.
The critiques arrived via email and at a public hearing last week as it emerged that the town’s effort to restrict parking of the big rigs was inspired by a lone RV that’s taken up residence on Edgemont Road in Katonah for almost half a year.
Residents had demanded town action, prompting discussions all this month of a proposed town code amendment treating recreational vehicles like commercial and industrial trucks, which require town permits. But at least two Edgemont Road neighbors, addressing the Jan. 20 hearing, called instead for compassion for “one struggling individual.”
Supervisor Ellen Calves acknowledged the need for more-specific language, calling the law’s first draft “a little clunky, the way we’ve put it together.”
“Definitely,” she told last week’s sparsely attended town hall meeting, “we want to hear from everyone this evening, and we can take comments via email during the week and then we can hear from people again at the next meeting to really land on something that works. . . “
The Town Board continued a hearing on the draft law for next Tuesday, Feb. 3.
At last week’s meeting, the board heard from five speakers, including the two urging kindness “instead of passing a law to get rid of [the RV and its lone occupant].” The vehicle’s driver, identified publicly only in non-specific, no-gender terms, is a woman who arrived from out of town, it was learned. Why she chose narrow, tree-lined Edgemont Road is not known.
But Rev. Rev. Martin McGeachy, pastor of the Katonah Presbyterian Church and an Edgemont Road resident, opposed the code amendment, telling last week’s hearing that “it appears to me to be a solution to a problem that is about one individual.”
“I happen to know that the individual is trying to not be unhoused and has gotten a job and is seeking a different path,” he said. “This doesn’t seem the kind and caring way to solve this problem.”
McGeachy urged residents to join with him in talking “about other solutions to help this individual instead of passing a law to get rid of them, which doesn’t seem to me to be the most caring thing to do.”
Another Edgemont Road neighbor, Marga Spiller, agreed and had at least one suggestion: Katonah’s “big commuter lot” near Route 35, where “there’s ample space. It has never been full after Covid.”
She asked whether the town could “just give this person a temporary permit to park this big vehicle in a corner there?”
Spiller gave a thumbs-up to Edgemont Road’s new sewer hookups but noted the presence of “big vehicles there for half a year” as crews completed the installation.
“The history of this changing of the town law,” she continued, “really is about one struggling individual in a hopefully temporary [but] really bad situation—with one big vehicle.”
But another Edgemont Road resident, Gary McKendry, expressed what appears to be the neighborhood’s prevailing view of the interloping RV: “Local people are pretty worn down by it.”
McKendry said he thinks “the last thing . . . anyone wants to be is unkind. I think people in this town are very kind; people move to this town because of community spirit. Everyone lives close together: narrow roads, houses on small lots, and people get along.”
But he warned that if the town allows just “anyone to park in the streets at any time, you’re going to be swamped. . . . That one vehicle is a sign of what can happen—and people don’t want to be swamped. It’s blocking access; it’s blocking parking.”
A Bedford resident, Gerardo Mendez, weighed in online about the law more generally, especially in the longer term. As written, he said, it lacks specificity and needs a better RV definition.
“There seems to be some controversy around it,” Mendez said of the amendment. “But if you’re going to actually do something like this, I think the legislation needs a lot more specificity to avoid abuse, not just at the moment but 10, 15, 20 years from now, when the initial intent no longer exists.”
Sally Corbett-Turco, executive director of Katonah’s Stepping Stones, home of Alcoholics Anonymous founder Bill Wilson and his wife, also spoke. She said the proposed amendment would have little impact at the historic site, where visitors rarely arrive in RVs. Short-term, not overnight, parking permits would be preferred.
Calves, for her part, said the town has tried to provide help and offered parking alternatives to ease the Edgemont Road situation. “Not all of the options have been accepted or desired by this person,” she said, making clear that if the RV’s occupant “doesn’t take some of the help that’s been offered, we can’t let this go on forever.”
COMMITTEE POSTS
The Town Board continued making appointments to Bedford’s permitting, advisory and regulatory panels. All appointments were effective Jan. 20.
Meredith Black of Katonah, a lawyer specializing in land-use matters and 12-year member of the Zoning Board of Appeals, has been reappointed to serve another five years. The board hears petitioners’ requests to vary or modify the strict letter of zoning law regulations or provisions.
Mary Hernstadt’s status on the Conservation Board has been upgraded to full membership with a two-year appointment. The board has nine full members plus associate members.
Gerard Virga and Kyle-Beth Hilfer have been appointed to five-year terms on the Ethics Board, succeeding George Almasi and Amal Shady.
Shawn Carmody, a six-year veteran of the Bedford Village Historic District Review Commission, has been reappointed for three more years. A longtime resident and chief of the Bedford Village Fire Department, he and fellow board members are charged with maintaining the district’s character as well as regulating new construction or alterations to existing structures.
Bruce Yablon, a longtime member of the Town Housing Committee and an advocate for affordable housing, has been reappointed to a three-year term. The committee administers fair and affordable housing.
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