Times Herald article on baseball house.....

[FriendsofAN44]

Olean planners not sure if student housing allowed in city


By JOHN T. EBERTH, The Times Herald 05/25/2005

OLEAN — City Planning Board members are trying to determine if student housing is permitted within city limits under Olean’s Zoning Code.
A group of St. Bonaventure University baseball players would like to move into an abandoned nursing home at the end of South 26th Street. A father of one of the players is planning to buy the building and renovate it for the team. The street’s residents are opposing the plan.
The issue wasn’t on Monday night’s Planning Board agenda but reporters asked board members after their regular meeting about the status of the South 26th Street project.
Planning Board Chairman Thomas Barnes said multiple-resident homes like apartment buildings and nursing homes are allowed on South 26th Street but it’s not clear that student housing falls into the same category.
“We’re not sure it’s a permitted use,” Mr. Barnes said.
Community Development Coordinator Mary George said the application filed with the city to use the former Valley View nursing home as a home for college students states that the intended use of the building is “student housing.”<br>Real estate developer Elmer Grap of Maryland proposed the project. Mr. Grap said members of the baseball team want to get out of campus dorms to find a quieter place to study and strategize for games. In a telephone interview last week with The Times Herald he assured the community that the college athletes will make good neighbors if given a chance. Mr. Grap did not attend Monday’s meeting. He’s expected to present his plans for the building at a June 6 Planning Board meeting. The meeting starts at 7 p.m. in the Common Council Chambers of the Municipal Building. Mr. Grap said about 10 baseball players would move into the old nursing home building at the end of South 26th Street.
Mr. Barnes said if the board determines the project is allowed under the Zoning Code, it must still clear several reviews before students could move onto South 26th Street.
“The project also has to pass the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) and community character is an element of that,” he said.
All projects considered by the Planning Board have to pass a SEQRA review to determine what the project’s impact on the surrounding environment, including people living nearby, will be.
“If it changes the community’s character then the issue becomes how significant is that change,” Mr. Barnes added.
Mr. Barnes said the Planning Board must also determine if student housing in residential neighborhoods is consistent with the goals of the Olean Comprehensive Development Plan.
South 26th Street residents say they’re worried the students will create a rowdy atmosphere on their street. They say their worried about late-night parties and cars racing up and down the street as students rush to classes.
South 26th is a dead-end street with about 20 residents. It remains a quiet corner of Olean despite an increase in retail development nearby during the last 10 years.

[FriendsofAN44]

There is also an editorial by Chuck Pollock in today's paper, but it isn't available online yet - hopefully tomorrow.

It's entitled: 'Another PR nightmare for St. Bona'

[B02]

I can't believe people are making a big deal about this. It just seems like such a little deal that some baseball parent wants to move his kid and friends into his house. People of Olean need to relax and realize they are living in a college town which for the most part are good kidsI wish the OTH did more work on covering SBU recruiting than trivial matters like baseball players looking to live off-campus.

[FriendsofAN44]

Here is the Chuck Pollock editorial:

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It hasn’t been the best of springs for St. Bonaventure athletics.
At various times in this space there have been recounted the two alcohol-related arrests of Tyler Relph and the plagiarism incident of men’s basketball teammate Paul Williams. Then there were women’s head basketball coach Jim Crowley and assistant Scott Young being put on administrative leave due to a harassment charge filed by a female employee.
Now St. Bonaventure is in the crosshairs again ... and this time it’s totally innocent.
No matter, though, when the current controversy plays out, it will be Bona that ends up with another public relations fiasco through no fault of its own.

THE PLAN to convert a former nursing home on South 26th Street into housing for a group of St. Bonaventure baseball players has “bad idea” spray-painted all over it.
Unfortunately, the university is powerless to prevent the nightmare.
Private individuals can do as they please, so long as they don’t break the law, and Bona has no say in where its students choose to live.
Still, I’ll make you a bet that not a single SBU administrator, faculty member or coach is in favor of the plan ... though you’ll never hear it on the record.
Indeed, it’s likely someone from the university tried to convince Elmer Grap, the player’s father considering buying and converting the property, that this is a disaster waiting to happen.

IF YOU’VE read the TH over the past several weeks, you already know what the 20 families residing on the quiet, dead-end street, think of the plan.
Even Grap, who lives safely removed in Maryland, admitted, “I understand their feelings ... If it were my house or my neighborhood, I might be a little upset and might try to oppose it too.”<br>Predictably, the first face-to-face meeting between a baseball player and a 26th Street resident didn’t go well.
The player reportedly told the woman to “F off” in front of his parents.
Clearly the resident wasn’t there with a pie welcoming them to the street. She admitted approaching them to emphasize the neighborhood was opposed to the project.
That doesn’t excuse the player’s disrespectful language — especially in front of his mother — but the exchange between the resident and the three visitors was at least somewhat confrontational.
And that’s the way it will always be unless the Olean Planning Board can find a reason Grap’s scheme violates some zoning ordinance.

YEAH..yeah...yeah, they’re “good kids.”<br>So was I and my housemates while living off-campus in a fraternity house on a residential street in Ithaca.
Trouble is, with “good kids” the emphasis is always on the adjective when it sometimes should be on the noun.
We weren’t the scourges of the neighborhood, but we were also never as quiet as we could of been nor as considerate neighbors as we should have been.
We were kids ... no different than Bona’s baseball players.

IN A PHONE interview with the TH, Grap was quoted as saying, “(The players are) just looking for a quiet place where they can study and strategize on games together.”<br>Cue my Ed McMahon guffaw: “Ho ... Ho ... Ho.”<br>Kids are kids.
And sooner, more likely than later — given the residents’ vehement opposition — if the baseball players take up residence on South 26th Street, the confrontations and complaints to police will quickly follow.
If you doubt it, check with those frustrated folks in Allegany who are unfortunate enough to live near off-campus housing.
Unfortunately for St. Bonaventure, if only by association, the university’s identification with its students doesn’t end on campus ... as stories in the TH repeatedly point out.
(Chuck Pollock is sports editor of The Times Herald.)

[B02]

Maybe that's why Brian Moritz writes for my hometown paper (Binghamton) now so that way he doesen't have to write about squabbles between neighbors. By the way Brian is doing a nice job covering Bing. Univ men's b-ball and Binghamton Mets AA baseball. I have a hard time seeing that there will be a big party at that house with it being so far from Allegany. People go to house parties then walk to the bars, that would not happen at that house. Notice how in that article we conviently didn't hear what the neighbor said to the baseball player to incite him. People who know Coach Sudbrook, do you really think that he will allow his players to cause problems? His punishment will be much worse than what the police can do.

[Ladderman]

I guess I agree with Pollock's assessment of the situation, in terms of it being a PR loser for the university. But I am surprised he used 'could of' instead of 'could have,' a mistake I saw frequently when I taught 7th grade English in summer school.

[MIKE MACALUSO]

cant wait for harrington from the buff news to get the bit in his teeth !!! nice choice of words by pollock"...find a reason why grap's scheme violates..."

i can remember when a select group of brown indian athletes rented the cash household off the five mile road in allegany..a certain red mustang convertible was always full of neighbors sweet corn and genny cream..some things never change !

[Wolfpackfan]

If I was looking at houses and a stranger came up to me and told me that I wasn't welcome in their neighborhood, I don't how I would react either. This player is being judged by one side of the story.