Many Pine Grove Lakes homeowners are curious about a proposed plan to build a new house at the top of the Hillside Road mountaintop, just below the community water tower.

The Thursday, August 20, Sloatsburg Zoning Board of Appeals public hearing is both a continuance for the PGL zoning variance requests as well a hearing for other village zoning requests.

The PGL hearing in particular has generated interest because of the nature of the HOA community, which began as an area for hunting camps years ago but evolved into Sloatsburg’s sole HOA neighborhood. PGL also has any number of undeveloped property parcels set amid rocky outcrops and sensitive wetlands.

A Thursday Sloatsburg Zoning Board of Appeals Public Hearing continues to review the zoning variances requested by a property owner for a lot at Council Crest Road and Woodland Avenue. The proposed size for the single-family home is too large for the lot, given the rock outcroppings and extensive sloping on the parcel. The ZBA meets Thursday, August 20, at 7:30pm at the Village Hall.

Thursday’s ZBA hearing involves one of those rocky outcrop properties off of Council Crest at Woodlands Avenue. The owner has requested a series of zoning variances for a proposed roughly 3000 square foot two-story single-family. The build out of the property would entail extending Woodland Avenue, installing utilities and retaining walls.

The heart of the matter involves a proposed structure too large the lot size. Sloatsburg’s building code includes a formula for properties with rocky out cropping and land that slopes greater than 20% — which reduces the area of land that can be built on in order to retain green space and set back that conforms to the Village code and community standards.

The current property owner would add value to the small empty lot with variances that allow for construction of the proposed development footprint — the property owner could then sell the ready-to-build lot to a developer who would then be restricted to building the exact approved footprint.

The larger the approved house or development, the more appealing the property to a developer, the thinking goes. Any additional or future change of use variances for such a property would start a whole separate ZBA.

With PGL’s various undeveloped land lot sizes, the ZBA must consider neighborhood and community standards in approving any building variances that don’t meet the Village Master Plan codes.

The Sloatsburg Zoning Board of Appeals meets Thursday, August 20, at 7:30pm at the Village Hall. The Public Hearing is open to the public as well as public testimony related to agenda items.