Retain school land, just don’t develop it

PHOTOGRAPHER: Letters to the Editor

Regarding the upcoming Dec. 5 vote to have Clifton Park purchase 34 acres from Shenendehowa, it seems that taxpayers already own the parcel, having paid for it with school tax dollars.

To now have another public entity, the town of Clifton Park, purchase the land from the school is having taxpayers pay for the same land again. I know that we are dealing with two different entities, but they are both public entities funded by tax dollars. If school taxes come out of my right pocket, county sales taxes, fees and surcharges come out of my left pocket, the money is all from me, the taxpayer.

The most common-sense outcome that could be made came from the original school board decision to sell the land for over $2 million to a private enterprise that would gift back more than half of the land for public use, while having Shop-Rite pay a sizable annual school tax into the future. This was the win, win, win. Why “open-space” people were not satisfied is still a mystery.

If advocates of “open space” are so numerous, could they not convince the school to keep the land as is for the good of the environment? When the time comes to buy land for an additional school, do so with school taxes. Every taxpayer participating in the school district would then be paying for the new land purchase and Clifton Park would not have put in an extra $1.1 million. This seems a fairer alternative.

Maybe Clifton Park does not need a new open space park in the middle of a commercial district now. Why not leave that issue for another day? Taxpayers appreciate public officials being fiscally conservative, not spending unnecessarily.

Christine DeMaria

Clifton Park