Clear Lake, which is right off of Genesee Road near Jennings Road, is owned by the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. It’s currently in a $4.8-million project on the dam.

North Collins Town Supervisor John Tobia asked Senator Patrick Gallivan for assistance in getting the land. Sen. Gallivan, who Tobia thanked for his help, gathered the group that included the state Parks Recreation & Historic Preservation and DOCCS to speak about the possible land transfer.

During the trek around the area, Tobia was amazed that the land had beautiful scenery and undeveloped land. In North Collins, many residents own campers, Tobia said, and there’s nowhere to go in the township.

“A lot of the people in our town go somewhere else in the summer,” Tobia said. “It’s an abandoned town. A lot of people go away camping. Why not stay right here? If you go up there, it looks like the Adirondacks. … You have no idea you’re in North Collins. The benefit is that you don’t have to go so far for those people who love to camp. It’s breath taking.”

Tobia saw potential in the massive land and lake area. The first goal is attaining the land, which there was no promise of handing it over, but a possibility of that occurring.

“If we get that, a goal is to possibility make it into a seasonal campground,” Tobia said. “… It’s 540 acres of the most beautiful land you’ve ever seen in your life. You have 75 acres of a reservoir or 50 acres. It’s 25-feet deep in the middle. We can do kayaking, we can do sailing, we can do rowing, all non-motorized boats out there.”

Tobia is speaking with an engineering group out of Syracuse to see the cost expectations over the next 50 years and the associated expenses that may come with the land. After that, the town board will look into the grants that are out there with its grant writer.

Though the supervisor is looking into the possible future, the entire project may be halted at step one: getting the land.

“It’s not definite,” Tobia said. “(They may) sell it to use, one or the other. They know we are interested in it. I think they are ready to hand it over.”

If it comes to fruition and the town is given the land, Tobia wants to create a committee that will guide the local voice. The supervisor believes the land can aspire to be a hub that includes equestrian trails, a restaurant and lodging, snowshoeing, hiking and multiple uses for the lake and ice in the winter.

“This opens up the door to many, many things,” Tobia said.

However, Tobia understands his voice is only one resident out of the entire town.

“We would have to put a committee together about the development of Clear Lake. It’s not Clear Lake according to John (Tobia), it’s going to be Clear Lake according to the citizens of North Collins because ultimately, they would be paying for it,” he said.

The earliest the town can receive the land is 2019. If the town could retrieve the land at no or a low cost, it has low overhead costs to maintain and a committee gets the public input as to what would be best, the town can utilize a lake in a landlocked town.

“Now listen, this isn’t Hilton Head (Island in South Carolina) and this isn’t Cape Cod, it isn’t the Jersey shore, but it’s every bit as pretty as anywhere in Pennsylvania or anywhere else people go,” Tobia said. “It’s beautiful here.”