To the Editor:

I am writing to let more residents know about the proposed chip-sealing/paving of Hillsdale’s local dirt roads, altering the rural and scenic beauty of our town. According to the Highway Department, over the past ten years, twenty miles of Hillsdale’s dirt roads have been chip-sealed/paved (most notably Harlemville Rd, Wolf Rd and Herrington Rd), leaving only twenty miles of unpaved roads in our rural town. The Highway Department has proposed to chip-seal/pave two of the most iconic dirt roads remaining – Texas Hill Rd and Apple Tree Lane, which border Pym Farm and Honey Dog Farm, respectively.

While chip-sealing/paving may seem like an upgrade to some, the overwhelming majority of residents on Texas Hill Rd and Apple Tree Lane, as well as many other members of our community, are strongly opposed to it given the permanent change to the rural character of Hillsdale and the serious concerns to the environment, quality of life, and safety. 

Dear Supervisor Dvorchak, Members of the Town Board, and Highway Superintendent Briggs,

I am likely one of the only voices you will hear from who grew up on one of the dirt roads in question. I know you have received environmental and issue-based letters from our community, and I share these same concerns and am in complete opposition to the proposed chip/seal treatment of our beloved dirt roads. 

Dear Town Supervisor Mike Dvorchak:

Proposed paving of Texas Hill Road and Apple Tree Lane

We are writing to strongly oppose the proposed plans to apply “chip and seal” to Texas Hill Road and Apple Tree Lane, due to be discussed at the Hillsdale town meeting on 11 February.

Dear Highway Superintendent Briggs, Supervisor Dvorchak and Members of the Town Board: We are writing to express our strong opposition to possible plans for new paving of dirt or gravel roads in the Town of Hillsdale. 

To Supervisor Mike Dvorchak and Town Board Members:

With all due respect to the town board and the road and highway department. I will write as a citizen, as a businessman, as a steward of the land, as a farmer, and as a family man. All of my comments will encompass the above. To suddenly be informed of an impending plan to stone and oil the  roads of Texas Hill and Appletree Lane is an unexpected blow to my farm, my business and my family.

I have spent a quarter century and great effort, both financially and with sweat equity to maintain and express the beauty of the Knapp Hollow Valley that Apple Tree Lane bisects. I have spent years fighting illegal, poachers, cleaning up residual trash thrown from cars and maintaining the land and the valley and the stream with the utmost attention to organic standards, cleanliness and beauty. The idea of having that bisection of the valley, be paved and stoned and oiled with petroleum products is nothing but an aggressive affront to everything that my farm and staff has done for a quarter century in this hamlet of Hillsdale. I will not stand for it, and I will oppose it unceasingly. I will not let this be pushed through by some back room colloquy of people who have never lifted a shovel of dirt in that land to plant something and harvest it. In short order, I find the idea and the dispensation of the idea, violent and brutal, and not rooted in the health of the community.