Housing in the Cupola Building: Hearing Dec. 15

A public hearing is scheduled in New Castle Dec. 15 about modifying the proposed local law in regard to housing in the cupola building on the former Readers Digest property.

The town board is scheduled to meet Tuesday -- but the time has changed. It will begin at 8:30 p.m. instead of 7:45 p.m., and the board members will spend time beforehand in executive session.

Initially, the Town Board introduced a proposed local law that allowed the top two floors of the Cupola Building to be used for affordable housing units, said Supervisor Rob Greenstein in the town e-newsletter.

The revised local law would also allow, as an option, the development of residential units on the lower two floors as well. Making the entire building available for residential use would be consistent with the recommendations of our Planning Board, the Town Planner, and others.

“ Our goal is to adaptively reuse the Cupola Building to create an integrated mix of affordable, workforce and market rate housing in the same beautiful building,” Greenstein said. “The proximity of these residential units to the approved retail stores and restaurants at Chappaqua Crossing would also help create more of the traditional neighborhood design that the Planning Board has encouraged.”

He said additional housing on the bottom two floors of the cupola building would count against the 500,000 square feet limit of occupied commercial space that the Town Board established last year. Therefore, any residential units that are developed on the bottom two floors of the cupola building would replace the existing office space on those floors, so the conversion would not add new density to the site.