Thursday April 25, 2024 
No Good Can Come of This
The Sand Lake Town Board should reject the proposed expansion of the Hoffay/Rifenberg, Olsen, Foley, and Hunt mine. I have many close friends with PhDs in geology of varying expertise. I know all too well that as much as the permit applicants insist that they will preserve the quality of life here, that the environmental impact will be mitigated, and that they do not “plan” to use dynamite for bedrock blasting, the consequences of their operation expansion will be long-lived and pervasive.
Even in the best of cases where organizations sincerely aim to limit the environmental effects of their operations, there are inevitably unintended and unforeseen consequences that follow. In this case, the involved parties have already shown themselves to be unconcerned with laws and regulations as they regularly use Thais Road to transport materials with dump trucks, even though they are not permitted to do so. Allowing the expansion of their operations endangers not just the local environment, but the integrity of this community.
The mine already pays precious little in taxes as compared to adjacent homeowners. If the proposed expansion moves forward, property values on a not insignificant number of houses will subsequently decline, destabilizing the town tax base. The proposed plan then only benefits the applicants and adds no value to the community. I urge the Town Board to reject their request. As part of the town code, board members must “consider the health, safety and welfare of the residents, as well as the aesthetics of all proposed project approvals”.
Justin Hillman, Averill Park