Contact:
Dave Gibson, Executive Director, 518-377-1452, Ext. 301
Dan Plumley, North Country Director, 518-576-4430
or to page with call back number Dan Plumley: 518-574-1080

Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks Announces Opposition to proposed “Adirondack Club and Resort Project”

Project Fundamentally Wrong for Park’s Backcountry, Tupper Lake Community and Region

(Niskayuna and Keene, NY) The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks announced its opposition today to the massive “Adirondack Club and Resort” development proposed in Tupper Lake, which the Association maintains would irreparably harm the natural environment of the region and destroy the unique character of its human communities. The project would, if approved, create a sprawling mega-resort of over 700 single family dwellings, “great camp” lots in the backcountry, multi-unit condominiums, and other development across some 6,400 acres of scenic, largely undeveloped forested land near Tupper Lake. The project’s effects would be felt far beyond the project site, including nearby public Forest Preserve, Tupper Lake, Simon Pond, the Raquette River, and private holdings.

“We recognize and support the Town of Tupper Lake’s interest in seeing the revitalization of the Big Tupper Ski Area,” stated David Gibson, executive director of the 104 -year-old conservation organization. “However, the Association is compelled to oppose the overwhelming scale, scope and intensity of Mr. Foxman’s development scheme. We feel it is not in the best interests of Tupper Lake or the region and consider it a terrible threat to the future well-being of the Adirondack Park and its people. Big development such as proposed in this resort is fundamentally wrong for the Adirondack Park,” he added.

The project will have tremendous negative impact on the woods, waters and wildlife in the region and fragment designated "resource management" lands in a way wholly inconsistent with the Adirondack Park Agency’s statute and its provisions for the protection of such lands,” said Dan Plumley, the Association's North Country Director of Park Protection who resides in Keene, NY.

“Perhaps more than any other design feature, our Board of Trustees found the chopping up and fragmentation of the backcountry lands of this project unacceptable,” he said.

"This represents subdivision in the worst sense,” said Plumley. “We feel that the great camp lots which are spread throughout the backcountry do not conform to the Adirondack Park Agency’s mandate to cluster such development, which would shield the bulk of the unbroken forest from the noise, lights, traffic, and general disruption associated with million-dollar vacation homes.”

According to Mike DiNunzio, an ecologist on the Association’s North Country Team, the roads, utilities, and other infrastructure proposed in connection with the backcountry “great camps” will fragment large blocks of forestland, resulting in loss of wildlife habitat and changes in natural drainage patterns, and it will make on-going forest management much more difficult. “Road construction and use is regarded as one of the most destructive aspects of development,” DiNunzio said. “It slices across the migration routes of reptiles and amphibians, resulting in massive road kills, especially during breeding season. It often leads to soil erosion, water pollution, and promotes the spread of exotic pests and diseases. Roads are like daggers in the heart of the forest. That’s why it is critically important to cluster development and leave the bulk of the forest intact.”

The lands where the great camps are proposed are in a category described in the APA law as "those lands where the need to protect, manage and enhance forest, agricultural, recreational and open space resources is of paramount importance because of overriding natural resources and public considerations."

Plumley went on to say that, “Massive development proposals like Foxman's just don’t fit within the natural and cultural environment of the Adirondack Park. If this resort development goes in, our wildlife, our hunting and fishing opportunities, and a good bit of our quality of life will be gone - plain and simple. And it will never return. This is clearly an attempt to shoehorn an Aspen-like mega-development onto a mountain that’s truly modest in size and which has served as a small, local ski center, beloved by generations of Adirondack families.”

The Association is concerned that the lack of utilities and other infrastructure in the proposed development, coupled with escalating energy demands, make such an “out-of-scale“ design untenable, leaving the town vulnerable to high service costs in the future. The resort could nearly double the developed size of the community and might easily triple the seasonal population during peak summer months and seasonal holidays.

Numerous dwelling units are proposed high on Mount Morris on steep slopes with shallow soils, such as those on the East Ridge section. This type of development can easily lead to pollution of streams and loss of lake water quality, soil erosion, and degradation of the scenic beauty of the area.

The impacts of a possible tripling of the seasonal population on nearby publicly-owned Adirondack Forest Preserve could also exceed the carrying capacity and damage public facilities, trails, waters and shorelines of four nearby Wilderness and two nearby Wild Forest areas.

The Association's staff have met with Town officials to share their concerns, and also have been in contact with part-time and full-time residents, including their own members and multi-generation "Adirondackers" who have grave concerns over the scope, scale and likely impacts of the proposed development.

From a larger perspective, the Association is very concerned about the amount of large-scale housing, resort, and backcountry forestland development projects proposed in the park, including major subdivision and development projects in Jay, Old Forge, and North Creek. The APA is staggering under the demand to review and process the greatest number of development project applications since the boom years of the 1980s.

The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks is a non-profit, member-supported organization founded in 1901 to employ public education, citizen action, public and private partnerships, and strong advocacy to protect, enhance, and sustain the wild character, ecological integrity, and mutual well-being of the natural and human communities of the Adirondack region. The Association's Center for the Forest Preserve in Niskayuna serves as an Adirondack research library and learning center.