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Download Comprehensive Plan at www.saranaclakeny.gov

SARANAC LAKE - Several dozen members of the public attended a meeting at the Saranac Lake Adult Center Tuesday evening to read over and discuss the mostly finished Saranac Lake-Harrietstown joint Comprehensive Plan.

"Change happens in Saranac Lake," said village Community Development Director Jeremy Evans, who was a member of the committee that came up with the plan. "It's up to us to decide what we want to do about that. I think, sometimes, we don't notice it, but we want to plan for it."

Evans gave a slide show of buildings in town that have changed over time, such as Hodson Hall at North Country Community College, which used to be Saranac Lake General Hospital, and the Saranac Lake Free Library, which has expanded over the years.

"There is nothing permanent except change," said one of the slides, quoting the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus.

When participants came in, they wrote on slips of paper what planning-related topics are important to them. After Evans' presentation, the participants broke into groups to read over the plan and discuss its impact on and treatment of topics such as shared services, infrastructure improvements, environmental protection and community aesthetics, that were mentioned on these slips.

The committee will take the participants' responses and any other public comments and incorporate them into revising the plan. The plan is about 80 percent finished now, and a complete draft plan will be presented to the town and village boards in a couple of months, committee members said. Each municipality would then hold its own public hearing before adopting the plan.

The plan was written with four themes in mind: economic stability, environmental sustainability, community health and wellness, and sense of community.

Evans said institutions such as NCCC, the Trudeau Institute and American Management Association, which employ large numbers of people, help maintain economic stability.

"I think things looked pretty bleak when a (drug) cure for (tuberculosis) was found," Evans said, but "as a community, we are in some ways quite blessed by the diversity of institutions we have that provide stable employment."

Saranac Lake was a well known cure center for tuberculosis from the late 1800s until after World War II, when a drug cure for tuberculosis became widespread. The Trudeau Sanitorium closed in 1954; the last patient to leave was former New York Giants second baseman Larry Doyle.

One common thread that runs through the plan and ties into all the themes is development with an eye toward preserving and increasing the walkable nature of the area, as well as making it easier to bicycle. Creating more trails for walking and bicycling would also increase recreational opportunities, and recreation was mentioned as a top-three priority of residents in surveys done as the plan was being drafted.

Mixed-use residential-commercial development is also mentioned throughout the plan, as a way to avoid sprawl and to increase walkability by having more people living in commercial areas.

The implementation section of the plan has not yet been written, although committee members have said new land use and subdivision regulations will be part of it.

The town and the village appointed the committee in fall 2006.

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Contact Nathan Brown at 891-2600 ext. 26 or nbrown@adirondackdailyenterprise.com.