Lenox Conservation Commission Orders Peer Review of Proposed 75-Room Hotel Near Barnes Brook

LENOX — June 3, 2026 — Lenox Conservation Commission orders peer review of proposed 75-room Housatonic Street hotel. The commission voted unanimously at its June 3 meeting to require an independent technical review of a notice of intent filed by Garden Management Incorporated for a four-story, 75-room hotel at 165 Housatonic Street, where Barnes Brook — a cold-water fishery — runs within roughly 10 feet of existing motel buildings. Civil engineer Glenn Seider of Forest State Land Services told the commission the new building would be no closer than 75 feet from the stream bank and would produce a net cut of 77 cubic yards in the floodplain, with an 80-percent total suspended solids removal system handling site runoff. Abutters raised concerns about the brook's history of overflowing its banks "by meters and meters" during major storm events and the condition of a downstream culvert beneath Housatonic Street. The commission cited plan-narrative inconsistencies, missing erosion-control details, and late-arriving written comments from a reviewer as reasons to seek outside expertise, invoking its authority under Massachusetts General Law Chapter 44, Section 53G — which places the cost of the review on the applicant. The hearing was continued to June 17 at 7 p.m.; a Planning Board public hearing on the same project is set for June 22.