Blue Mountain asks to speed up building plans

The Lower Towamensing Township supervisors were asked Tuesday night to consider expediting the land development process for the construction of an addition to an already existing building at Blue Mountain Resort.

Barbara Green, the owner of Blue Mountain Resort, said that a water line break flooded some of the buildings in the Valley Lodge area in late September. Among the areas flooded was the tuning and repair shop.

“The tuning shop took the hit,” Green said. Unfortunately, the resort has already begun advertising on its website about preseason tuning and repairs on ski equipment.

Green said the water damage caused the floor to cave in slightly. She is unsure exactly how the flooding caused the damage, but she knows the tuning shop needs to be relocated. Her engineer has drawn up plans to have a 1,300-square-foot addition built onto an existing building. The damaged structure may need to be torn down.

Usually, the process to build a new structure takes months. The plan has to go before the township’s planning commission, which reviews the plans and makes recommendations. Once the planning commission is satisfied, then the plan goes to the supervisors for final approval.

“I think we should go through the process,” said Jay Mullikin.

But he also said he didn’t want it to slow down the work that needs to be done at Blue Mountain.

Board of Supervisors Chairman Brent Green said in order to go through the process, “it would have to go through land development, which means parking, drainage and stormwater management. It’s not going to be an easy process.”

Barbara Green said she would follow whatever the supervisors wanted, but she needed clarification as to what exactly the next steps would be.

Aside from a 1,300-square-foot addition, “everything else is already existing,” she said. Since the buildings are already there, she asked if it really needs to go through the planning commission.

“The urgency is more of when this accident happened,” she said.

With the ski season just around the corner and repairs and tuning orders coming in soon, Green was concerned about meeting the needs of her customers.

Green told the supervisors that the addition is not an improvement and it is not for use by the public. Only employees use it.

Since the addition is small and not for public use, borough solicitor James Nanovic told the supervisors they could grant a waiver so that work could begin on the project. But he said the supervisors would need to make sure that the motion stipulates and is reflected in the minutes that the waiver is for “a one-time, unique situation.” This is an “emergency circumstance,” and any future work would be on a case-by-case situation, he said. Green said she understood the uniqueness of the situation.

Supervisors Green and Mullikin agreed with Nanovic’s suggestion and approved the waiver. Supervisor Ron Walbert was absent from the meeting.

“It’s a small addition to a current building. It will not affect the parking, drainage and stormwater, which is why we decided it wouldn’t affect land development,” Nanovic said following the meeting.