Cairo Town Planning Board advances Blackhead Mountain Lodge Resort without requisite environmental impact statement or adequate safeguards
by Roger Downs, Conservation Director
The Blackhead Mountain Wilderness of the Catskills echoes with an historic importance that is as distinctive as its rooster-comb profile - a prominent landscape feature of the City of Albany’s southern viewshed. Washington Irving and Nathaniel Hawthorne captivated readers with tales of the range’s past inhabitants who occupied this land for thousands of years. Naturalists John Bartram and John Burrows inspired a new nation with the deep ecological connections found within these mountain passes. Frederick Church, Thomas Cole and many other artists of the ‘Hudson River School’ painted this enchanting landscape, defining an American wilderness aesthetic that would lead to greater preservation efforts nation-wide. So when the Cairo Town Planning Board approved a $300 million mega resort development to be constructed on the steep slopes directly beneath Blackhead Mountain’s storied escarpment trail, without any environmental review or consideration for this history, it was difficult for the Sierra Club to stay silent.
As part of the State Environmental Review Act (SEQRA) local planning boards are tasked with having to make a determination of environmental significance when reviewing a project. Through a series of questions posed by an Environmental Assessment Form (EAF) they must find that an action will pose a significant environmental impact (positive declaration) and require an environmental impact statement or that it will have minimal impact (negative declaration) and no further review is necessary. This conclusion must come within 20 days of a submitted application. The Cairo Planning Board improperly took more than a year to make this determination. And in that time the public was subjected to chaotic monthly meetings and a misappropriation of the SEQRA process, where the suppression of key findings, in favor of applicant misinformation, was used to manufacture a false determination of ‘no environmental significance.’
Even though there was overwhelming public opposition and inspiring leadership from the local group ‘Friends of Round Top’ who peppered the planning board with numerous (unanswered) questions about the negative impacts of this massive project, there was an eventual finding that no Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) would be required, despite the project entailing:
- 87 new structures on the property, amounting to over 275,000 sq. ft. of space, over 63 acres of disturbance on steep, highly erodible soils;
- Over 16.5 acres of impervious surfaces, including over 250 parking spaces; deforesting more than 17 acres of trees which will increase the risk of flooding and erosion;
- Over 46,000 gallons of water used and wastewater generated per day, creating potential water shortages and the risk of dry wells for adjoining properties;
- Wastewater discharges into on-site streams and ultimately into the Shingle Kill, making Cairo’s only source of drinking water vulnerable to contamination; and threatening populations of brook trout.
- Directly bordering state parkland under the historic escarpment trail, marring wilderness areas with severe and permanent noise and light pollution, while despoiling the peaceful character and residential appeal of the rural hamlet;
- An additional 1000+ new occupants and staff, (more than doubling the population of Round Top) with up to 1,300 tons of solid waste to be generated per month;
- A substantial increase in construction vehicles, delivery trucks and traffic, which will deteriorate the area’s rural roads.
All these significant impacts require further engineering studies, hydrological reports, seasonal field inventories, modeling, and visual renderings to help avoid or minimize negative outcomes - which is all part of the EIS process. An EIS can also facilitate a robust discussion of project alternatives, mitigations and enforcement standards for noncompliance if some form of the project does move forward.
In the Summer of 2024, the developers of the Blackhead Mountain Lodge resort conducted groundwater tests to determine whether there was enough water on site to support the daily needs of up to 1000 new residents and staff. These invasive tests, alone, contaminated and disrupted the quality and quantity of water to neighboring wells, but the developer’s hydrological report concluded that there was sufficient water to support the outsized project and incidental problems with neighbors could be mitigated. The planning board hired its own hydrologist who concluded that some of the testing procedures employed by the applicant were improper and that there could be significant issues of water scarcity at the site to the potential detriment of adjacent properties. But in making its determination that no environmental review was necessary, the planning board didn’t even mention its own commissioned report and only cited the developer’s findings. Even worse, none of this analysis properly assessed the impact of the facility’s new waste treatment facility, and its 46,000 gallons of effluent discharged a day into the Shingle Kill, a renowned brook trout stream and drinking water source for the town of Cairo. Several planning board members publicly stated that the issue was too complicated for them to sort out and they voted for the ‘Neg Dec’ so that the responsibility would be out of their hands and subject to the expertise of the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) for water withdrawal and discharge permits. Unfortunately, no subsequent environmental review would come from this logic, unless the DEC itself were to be named lead agency and start the SEQRA process anew.
To date, the DEC has not received any permit applications from the project despite a stated intention from the developer to break ground in May 2025. The planning board allegedly has even waived normal site plan requirements in favor of a “less intensive review” which would remove obligations to share detailed architectural plans or certain building layouts with the public, though it appears that there is no public record of the vote to allow such a waiver.
Small family resorts have long been a common land use in the Catskills, but this project, funded by absentee international and Californian investors, represents something so incredibly outsized that will be seen from multiple Catskill and Hudson Valley vantage points. The Sierra Club fears that this project will have an adverse impact on the historic Escarpment Trail, a recreational hiking path through breathtaking wilderness that facilitates thousands of visitors a year, including our own Military Outdoors Rx program that brings veterans into the wilderness to improve the physical, mental, and social well-being of vets transitioning back into civilian life. The planning board did not consider how the architectural elements of this massive development could reflect the sun's glare back upon the Escarpment Trail’s scenic vistas or how potential light pollution may impact the night sky for those camping within 150ft of the trail. For the veterans who use this trail and engage in nature-based restorative activities, what impact will years of percussive nail guns, chainsaws and other construction activity have upon the therapeutic qualities of the Escarpment Trail’s natural ambience? An Environmental Impact Statement would have allowed for an analysis of noise and visual mitigations or construction alternatives to address these issues.
On April 4th, 2025 the Sierra Club, Friends of Round top, and the Theodore Gordon Flyfishers filed an Article 78 challenge in Greene County Supreme Court asking to have the ‘Neg Dec’ rescinded and for the BHML to be subject to a full Environmental Impact Statement under SEQRA so that all the project’s impacts to the escarpment trail, the local ecology and environmental health of the surrounding community can be adequately avoided, minimized and where applicable, mitigated.
We believe the unfortunate approvals in this case are designed to set a precedent for future development in the Catskills, where developers and land profiteers wish to side step environmental scrutiny. If you would like to make a contribution to this suit, please send checks made out to the ‘Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter’ with “Blackhead Mountain Lodge” in the memo line to: Sierra Club Atlantic Chapter, PO Box 38225, Albany, NY 12203.