922. Comprehensive harbor management plans. 1. In order to implement a comprehensive harbor management plan the local legislative body of a city, town or village may adopt, amend and enforce local laws or ordinances, not inconsistent with the laws of this state or the United States, to regulate the construction, size and location of wharves, docks, moorings, piers, jetties, platforms, breakwaters or other structures, temporary or permanent, in, on or above waters and the use of surface waters and underwater lands within a city, town or village or bounding a city, town or village to a distance of fifteen hundred feet from the shore. Such local laws or ordinances may provide for the imposition of fees for reasonable expenses incurred by the city, town or village in carrying out this regulatory authority.
2. No 1oca1 1aw or ordinance adopted pursuant to the powers granted by this section shall take effect until it shall have been submitted to and approved in writing by the secretary of state, nor shall such 1oca1 1aw or ordinance affect projects and facilities undertaken or constructed by public authorities for which a statutory exemption has been provided or public authorities formed by compact with another state or any subsidiary thereof formed pursuant to bi-state legislation. The secretary of state shall not approve any local law or ordinance without first consulting with the commissioner of general services and other interested state agencies administering state-owned lands underwater, nor shall the secretary approve any local law or ordinance not in accordance with any comprehensive harbor management plan adopted as part of a local waterfront revitalization program by the local legislative body of the city, town or village and approved by the secretary pursuant to this article.
3. (a) Municipalities on lakes, other than those lakes identified in subdivision four of section nine hundred eleven of this article, may, pursuant to this section, develop cooperative lakewide local waterfront revitalization programs and harbor management plans.
(b) Where no local waterfront revitalization program and harbor management plan exists which has been cooperatively prepared by all of the municipalities which border the shores of such a lake, no local law or ordinance adopted by one such municipality pursuant to a harbor management plan shall be approved without a finding by the secretary of state that the local law or ordinance is consistent as well with the management of the lake by, and interests of, the lake residents and its municipalities as a whole.
(c) Where an organization or entity has been created by statute to provide lakewide planning or regulation, such local laws or ordinances shall be consistent with the plans developed by such organization or entity pursuant to the procedures required in such statute.
4. No provision of this chapter shall be deemed to diminish the authority of any city, town or village pertaining to the regulation of harbors, surface waters and underwater lands granted by any other law, charter, patent or other instrument. Nor shall it be read to authorize local harbor management plans displacing conforming water-dependent businesses in existence on the effective date of this section.
5. Any conveyances of interests pursuant to subdivision seven of section seventy-five of the public lands law and any permits issued pursuant to subdivision one of section 15-0503 of the environmental conservation law shall be consistent, insofar as possible, with approved comprehensive harbor management plans adopted pursuant to this section.
Last modified: February 3, 2019