Williamsville Historic Preservation Commission·August 25, 2026
A Mill Wall, Nominated · Four Owners, Three Selling · A Window Nobody Came to Explain · The Liaison Says Goodbye
The Historic Preservation Commission voted Tuesday night to nominate a deteriorating 19th-century stone retaining wall on the east bank of Ellicott Creek as a Village of Williamsville landmark — a step that, the village attorney told members, immediately bars the four private owners whose back yards it holds up from altering it until the Board of Trustees decides whether to designate. A section of the wall gave way within the last two months, three of the four parcels have just sold or are on the market, and one of them, 5630 Main Street, has a redevelopment already pending before the Planning Board. The night's only other item went the other way: a replacement-window certificate of appropriateness for the liquor store at 5511 Main Street was tabled for insufficient information after the applicant did not appear and the submission never said what the window frame is made of. The commission also approved its June 23 minutes with one correction — the line naming the next meeting — and acknowledged that Trustee Steven Meyer is handing off the seat he has held as its Village Board liaison.
The wall has outlived its mill by more than a century. Running along the east bank of Ellicott Creek from the Main Street overpass down to the cascade, the stone retaining wall dates, by the commission's reckoning and that of the village's Local Waterfront Revitalization Program, to the early-to-mid 1800s — built to hold the bank in place beside the Dodge Mill, which stood above it and burned in 1884 in a fire that killed the owner's son. Where the Red Mill the village still knows ground with stones, the Dodge Mill ran rollers, a different technology entirely. The mill is gone. The wall is not, though it is trying.
Within the last two months a section in the middle of it failed outright. “Right now, if you go there,” one member told colleagues, you can “just walk right into the water, because that wall's collapsed there.” The village cannot simply fix it: the wall is not village property. It stands on private parcels, and the LWRP letters that went out years ago were, as members recalled Tuesday, essentially notices to owners that maintaining it was their responsibility.
That is the setup for a nomination made under some pressure. The parcels are moving. One has just sold; a second owner has two of them listed together for a little over $1 million; only the house nearest the cascade appears to be staying put. And 5630 Main Street — the corner parcel in the nomination — is the same address whose redevelopment the Planning Board took up on June 1 and tabled, directing the applicant toward zoning variances. “Especially if there's gonna be construction happening,” a member said, letting the sentence do its own work.
What consumed the hour was not whether the wall matters but where it stops. The application in front of the commission covered four parcels. Members counted roughly ten on the east bank between Main Street and the far end, some of them village-owned — which may explain why only four owners ever got letters. And the wall itself keeps going past the cascade, where it holds back nothing and, in the phrasing several members resisted, becomes “decorative.”
One member pressed the point hardest, reaching for Hadrian's Wall to make it: you do not declare only the convenient stretch important because the rest runs into difficult country. If the wall was laid as one wall, he argued, its integrity is the whole of it. The counter was evidentiary rather than sentimental. The village's preservation consultant[*] examined only the channel stretch, and only that stretch is documented as historic; the LWRP looked at the rest functionally, not historically. “We just don't have enough information to say that the rest of it is historic,” a member conceded. A motion to table the whole thing was floated and quietly let go.
Urgency carried it. With no landmark in place, an owner facing a repair bill could reach for the cheapest fix — members kept circling the image of a flat poured-concrete patch dropped into a stone wall — and nothing in the code would stop him. The motion, read into the record parcel by parcel, nominates the stone wall on the east bank of Ellicott Creek across SBL 69.17-2-19 (5630 Main Street), 69.17-2-18 (16 Mill Street), 69.17-2-17 (20 Mill Street) and 69.17-2-16 (26 Mill Street)[*], on the grounds set out in the filed application. It was seconded and carried on a voice vote. The property owners are to be notified. Approving four parcels tonight, one member noted, “does not preclude us from extending the wall” later.
The most common misconception about a historic preservation commission is that it is a planning board with a taste for old buildings. It is not, and Tuesday put all three of its distinct powers on display in one 56-minute sitting:
Two further distinctions are worth keeping straight. A local landmark is a village designation with real teeth over exterior changes; a National Register listing is a federal honor that imposes almost no restriction on a private owner spending private money. And designation is a brake, not a repair order: it can stop an owner from patching a historic wall badly, but as members said plainly Tuesday, it cannot make him patch it at all. Preservationists have a name for what follows when nobody does — demolition by neglect — and nothing said Tuesday suggested the commission has a tool that answers it.
Here is the part that made Tuesday's vote consequential rather than ceremonial, and it is the opposite of what “nominated for consideration” sounds like. The village attorney's advice to the commission: “If you nominated it today, then they can't pull any permits until the issue is resolved, until the landmark is voted.”
In other words, the nomination itself — not the designation months from now — freezes the wall. From Tuesday night, the four owners may not alter it until the Board of Trustees rules. Routine repair and maintenance are still allowed; alterations are not. With one parcel just sold, two more on the market and a redevelopment pending at the corner, that interim protection was the whole point of moving on four parcels now rather than researching ten and coming back.
The arithmetic mattered too. Members referred repeatedly to only four of the seven commissioners being in the room for this debate, and were told that with that few seated a nomination needs every one of them: “We all have to vote yes or else it won't happen.” A seven-member board needs four affirmative votes whether four show up or seven do. There was no room for a split.
The evening's first item was a replacement window, and it took a quarter of an hour to not decide. The glass at the 5511 Main Liquor Store has been broken since an accident on January 27 — seven months, which one member rounded up while making the point that “they waited eight months. There's no seeming urgency on them.” The building department received the paperwork July 1. Nobody from the property came to Tuesday's meeting.
The commission never reached the merits, because it could not establish what it was looking at. The applicant asserted the replacement is “in kind” — identical to what was there. But the submitted drawing showed a white frame, and members' recollection of the storefront was that the existing frame is silver. The specifications said “clear anodized” in one place and nothing about material in another. “I see the frame and I don't see where it says the finish,” one member said. “That would be my question.”
Whether the commission was entitled to doubt the applicant at all became the argument. “So we say that we don't trust their declaration that it's in kind?” one member asked. “I don't think trust is the right word,” came the answer. “I think just question.” Pressed on what grounds — “Based on what information?” — a member produced the line of the night: “Based on the lack of information.”
The village attorney laid out the options without picking one: the commission could find the work ordinary repair and be done with it, could grant the certificate on the strength of the applicant's representation, or could hold it. He noted the practical cost of guessing wrong. If the commission approves on a claim of in-kind work, the building inspector will not revisit the question, and if the claim proves false, “you can't do anything” beyond referring it back. A member drew the obvious conclusion: “I don't want to decide it after they've done it.”
The motion was to table for insufficient information, with a request that the applicant appear next time. It carried on a voice vote, and the meeting moved on to the wall.
A certificate of appropriateness is required before any exterior alteration, restoration, rehabilitation or reconstruction of landmark property in the village. But Chapter 47 carries a carve-out the attorney read aloud Tuesday: nothing in the chapter prevents “the ordinary maintenance and repair of any exterior architectural feature” where there is no change in design, materials, color or outward appearance.
Which raises the question that hung over the whole item: “You don't need a certificate of appropriateness for an in-kind repair.” So why was one filed? The code lets the code enforcement officer either issue the building permit himself or refer the question to the commission when he is unsure — and nothing in the file showed which of those happened, or whether the owner simply filled out the wrong form. “It's just not clear to me how it got here,” the attorney said.
Settling it required the applicant, and the applicant was not there.
Tuesday was the commission's first meeting since June 23 — the village's posted schedule gives the HPC no July date — and the June session went uncovered here. Its draft minutes, approved Tuesday, dispose of both items this publication left open in May.
61 Stanton Street is finished. The demolition referral for the vacant house, tabled a month on May 27 so the village could pull its permit and assessor history, came back in June with the file assembled. After reviewing materials from both the Village of Williamsville and Town of Amherst building departments, the commission reached a consensus that the property “does not appear to meet the criteria for designation as a local landmark.” No nomination was initiated and no formal motion was required. Property owner Jason Schnelle[*] of 66 Stanton Street, who bought the house at auction and told the commission in May he had watched it sit vacant for eight years, appeared for the June discussion. The item did not return in August.
The Glen Park fence was denied. The application this publication described in May as a fence along the mill flume is styled in the commission's own minutes as the Sweet Jenny's fence, and the feature it would have crossed as the sluiceway. After a site visit, the commission found on June 23 that the sluiceway is a character-defining feature of the Mill property that must remain a visual centerpiece of the site's history; that fencing the public away from it is inappropriate; that the proposal would damage views from Glen Park and diminish the historic relationship between two local landmarks; that it may conflict with a Preservation Covenant and Public Access Easement on the property regarding public visibility; and that the application was in any case incomplete — no survey, no material specifications, no dimensions, no exact location. Vice-Chairperson Catherine Waterman-Kulpa moved to deny; Member Raymond Herman seconded; the vote was 6–0, one member absent. Attorney Grieco advised that while the commission does not enforce the covenant, its terms remain relevant to whether a proposal is appropriate.
13 South Cayuga Road has left the building. The landmark nomination that led the May 27 brief — recommended unanimously over the owners' objection — is no longer the commission's to decide. It went to the Board of Trustees, which opened its public hearing on July 13. It appeared on neither the June nor the August HPC agenda, and nothing said Tuesday touched it. Readers following that fight should watch the trustees, not this commission.
June also carried a loss. Vice-Chair Waterman-Kulpa announced the passing of former commission member Stephen Dyson, and the minutes record the commission's acknowledgment of his years of service to local preservation.
The June 23 minutes were approved with a single correction, and it is a small monument to how a two-month gap happens: the line at the bottom naming the next meeting said July 28, and the commission does not meet in July. It was corrected to reflect Tuesday's date. The vote produced the night's driest exchange when someone at the table asked whether they were allowed to vote on it. “Nope,” came the reply, followed immediately by “just all in favor.”
Business closed with a handoff. Before the motion to adjourn, a member asked whether it had to show in the minutes that the commission has a new Village Board liaison. It did not have to, but it was acknowledged anyway, with thanks to Trustee Steven Meyer for his work in the seat. Meyer asked that his own thanks go in the record too. “It's been fun,” he said. The August agenda still lists him; his successor was not named on the recording. The commission's posted 2026 schedule puts its next meeting on September 22.
The commission votes by voice; no roll-call tallies were taken and no recusals were declared. The clerk's roll recorded six members answering — Bannon, DeLaney, Herman, Waterman-Kulpa, Hannotte and Chairperson Fenster, with Walker not called — but through the landmark debate members referred three separate times to only four commissioners being present, and were advised that all four would have to agree. The recording does not resolve the discrepancy; the commission's official minutes will. Ashley Obstarczyk, the village's community development aide, called the roll.
One correction: the next-meeting date printed at the foot of the June minutes read July 28, 2026, a month in which the commission does not meet; it was corrected to reflect the August 25 meeting date. Moved and seconded; carried on a voice vote with no objection recorded.
No representative of the property appeared. The commission could not determine the frame material or finish from the submission — the drawing shows a white frame where members recall silver, and the specifications say only “clear anodized” without stating material — nor what glass would be used. The applicant asserts the replacement is in kind, which under Chapter 47's ordinary-maintenance-and-repair provision would not require a certificate at all; the file does not show whether the code enforcement officer referred the question or the owner filed on his own initiative. The window has been broken since an accident on January 27; the building department received the application July 1. Members asked that the applicant attend the next meeting.
The motion nominates the stone wall on the east bank of Ellicott Creek, on private property, identified as SBL 69.17-2-19 (5630 Main Street), 69.17-2-18 (16 Mill Street), 69.17-2-17 (20 Mill Street) and 69.17-2-16 (26 Mill Street)[*], for the reasons set out in the nomination application filed with the village. Basis: early-to-mid-1800s construction associated with the Dodge Mill and the milling channel, and the wall's identification in the village's Local Waterfront Revitalization Program as a resource warranting protection. A public hearing follows, after which a recommendation goes to the Board of Trustees, which alone can designate. Effective on nomination, the owners may not alter the wall — routine repair and maintenance remain permitted — until the trustees rule. Owners are to be notified. Members declined to extend the nomination past the cascade for lack of research, noting the west bank is already protected as part of the Glen Park landmark and that the nomination can be amended later.
Moved and seconded after the commission acknowledged Trustee Steven Meyer's service as liaison and his departure from the seat. Carried on a voice vote.
Not listed above: during the wall debate a member said he would move to table the nomination pending research on the rest of the wall. It drew no second and no vote, discussion continued, and the nomination motion followed instead. It is noted here for completeness, not as an action of the commission.
Capture. This brief is built from an automated transcription of the village's meeting recording — 56.3 minutes, faster-whisper “medium,” 924 segments — cross-checked against the posted August 25 agenda and the June 23 draft minutes. The recording carries no speaker labels, so quotations are attributed by role and context (“the village attorney,” “a member”) rather than by name unless the speaker is unambiguous. Roughly ten minutes of the wall discussion transcribe poorly, with heavy overlapping speech; passages there are paraphrased conservatively rather than quoted.
Roll-call anomaly, unresolved. The clerk's roll recorded six members present. The deliberation refers three separate times to four members being in the room, and the attorney's advice about needing every vote only makes sense at four. This brief reports both and resolves neither. The official minutes govern.
Street validation was run, and passed. The Village sits inside the Town of Amherst, so its streets are carried in the Town's street inventory rather than a separate Village list. Checked against it, this transcript yielded two street references — Main Street and Mill Street — and both matched exactly, with nothing flagged ambiguous or unknown. Street names were additionally cross-checked against the posted agenda, which names only Main Street (5511 and 5565) and Ellicott Creek. The Mill Street addresses in the landmark motion — 16, 20 and 26 — appear nowhere in the agenda and are transcribed from audio alone, as are the SBL numbers; they are flagged [*] and should be verified against the commission's minutes and the county tax map before being relied on.
Dates. The village's posted agenda heads this meeting “Wednesday, August 25, 2026.” August 25 fell on a Tuesday, and the commission's posted cadence is the fourth Tuesday of the month; the weekday in the agenda header is an error, not a rescheduling. The date announced at the opening of the recording is garbled in the transcript and carries no weight.
Corrections to earlier coverage. The 61 Stanton Street applicant, given as Jason Schnell in this publication's May 27 brief on the strength of audio alone, is spelled Schnelle in the commission's official June 23 minutes; the minutes govern. The Glen Park feature that brief called a “flume” is termed a sluiceway in the same minutes, and the fence application is docketed there as the Sweet Jenny's fence.
Convention. Commission and staff names are drawn from the village's published roster and its official minutes and are stated normally. Names, addresses and parcel numbers appearing only in audio carry [*] and should be verified before quoting in any formal communication.