HomeMy WebLinkAbout20250274 Crescent Ave & Jefferson St Site Plan Extension NarrativeLIBERTY AFFORDABLE HOUSING INC.
NARRATIVE
APPLICATION FOR EXTENSION OF SITE PLAN
The Liberty at Saratoga project is a proposed multi -family residential workforce housing project with 212
units (tax map parcel 179-5-8). The property contains +/- 30 acres located at the corner of Jefferson Street
and Crescent Avenue, adjacent to the Saratoga Casino and Raceway. The property will be accessed on
Bunny Lake Drive.
On December 14, 2023, the Planning Board unanimously granted site plan review for this project. The
decision reflecting the conditions pertaining to the project was executed by the Chair on January 8, 2024.
Following the granting of all municipal approvals, the project was able to proceed and submit the
application to the State for support and funding.
The project is presently progressing through the NYS Housing Finance Agency (HFA) and NYS Homes and
Community Renewal (HCR) pipelines to obtain necessary review and approvals for the funding and
financing. The funding and application process had to wait until the city's municipal approvals were
obtained prior to submitting the initial application; and unfortunately, funding for affordable housing projects
is competitive, slow and involves a cue of projects awaiting review. Overall, the 18 months allowed by the
site plan approval was an insufficient period of time for NYS HFA/HCR to even begin to review the project's
financing details.
At present, the Liberty at Saratoga project is progressing through the HFA/HCR pipeline with construction
financing targeted for 2026. The process is affected by regulatory approvals, competitive funding sources,
ever -changing market conditions and interest rate fluctuations. The largest hurdles include securing
financing, obtaining final environmental approvals and meeting the MWBE/labor requirements. We
anticipate having additional information related to the funding at the time we present to the Planning Board.
With the pending application, Liberty seeks an extension of the approvals for the date when the original
mylars would need to be signed (presently set to expire on July 8, 2025). Typically, those would result in a
new date of January 8, 2027. However, given that the date for expiration of the Zoning Map and
Comprehensive Map amendments expire that year, we would request the revised deadlines be extended to
line up with the December 31, 2027 map amendments, and will be requesting similar extensions of time
from the ZBA so that all city approvals have the same outside expiration dates.