Complaints about range get club’s attention

SAUGERTIES, N.Y. >> Some people who live near the Landowners & Sportsmen Association firing range on Quarry Road say noise from the site has become unbearable.

Neighbors are reviewing their legal options. The association president says he’ll bring the complaints to his board members.

The sound of gunshots on the range — which is on a 130-acre site at 50 Quarry Road in the hamlet of Quarryville — can be heard at about a dozen homes on nearby High Falls Road.

Dennis Lazaroff, who has lived near the range since 2003, says activity there has increased significantly since 2016.

“They were using it for pistols when I moved here. For 10 years ... they were maybe [shooting] twice a week, tops,” he said.

“Around 2015, they started with the ... louder rifles, and then 2016 to 2017, it became unbearable,” Lazaroff said. “When they started with the real loud guns, it [was] every day, at least five, six, seven hours a day.”

Lazaroff said the shooting begins as early as 7:30 a.m. and sometimes foes until sunset.

The association’s website, landownerssportsmenassc.org, says there is rifle and pistol shooting at the range, as well as archery.

Several other nearby residents, including one who shoots at other firing ranges, were contacted about the noise but declined to be identified or quoted, citing fear of retribution from association members.

One neighbor said he is a member of the association and believes the noise issue is being exaggerated.

Complaints about the noise resulted in the association being issued a notice of violation on Nov. 19, 2019, but it was for building construction violations. Association President Matt Gleason said this week that the building matters are being resolved.

Regarding noise, Gleason said neighbors’ complaints are being taken seriously and that association members have been asked to shoot only from noon to dusk Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays.

Gleason said some neighbors have used threatening language in complaining about the noise but Lazaroff has been reasonable.

“I believe the board of directors would be willing to listen if he had ideas,” Gleason said. “We’re even willing to look into it ourselves, [for] insulating ideas. I’m sure there’s some

new technology out there to absorb sound. They do it in indoor ranges, but I’m not sure out it would work outside.”

The association was formed in 1971 and began using the property as a range around 1988, a year before town zoning regulations were adopted. The town has said the association is exempt from zoning regulations as a result.

Still, neighbor Catherine Conley, in a written complaint to the town, said the association violated any initial rights to use the site as a gun range by expanding the

use of the facility.

“It is clear the club has consistently acquired lands and incorporated said lands into the club for its members use,” Conley wrote. “... The club simply acquiring additional lands does not automatically rezone those lands to the club’s underlying use.”

Gleason said the association has about 250 active members. He said that number has been fairly constant since the group began using the Quarry Road site.

“I want to preserve what it was, which was a shooting range,” he said. “I don’t want it to be getting out of hand. I don’t want to be getting more people in the club, I don’t want more shooting there.”