It looks like an opinion poll on the fate of St. Paul's is taking shape. According to Dennis Donnelly, Eastern Property Owners' Association (EPOA) president and chair of the Joint Conference Committee, the poll's wording has not yet been agreed upon but the East and Estates POAs do plan on conducting a poll. Donnelly further noted that the Central and West sections were "not interested."

"As of tonight there has been no agreement as to the wording of any of the questions to be asked in the poll other than at the moment the East and Estates plan on running a poll," Donnelly said. "Central was not interested in a three-question poll, nor was the West. At the moment we are negotiating language for questions on a three-question poll."

If and when wording is agreed upon, any resident of the village would be able to express their opinion in the poll, even though they don't reside in the East or Estates sections.

Pat Di Mattia, Central POA president, reiterated her association's position. "For the record and for everyone here, as I've said repeatedly, the CPOA believes this should be a yes/no vote only on AvalonBay," she said.

The CPOA believes that if the four POAs are not collectively doing this and doing it with agreement on what the polling issues are, there is a legitimacy issue about the poll.

"If it doesn't represent the four of us and we are not all in agreement on what the polling questions are, there's a real question as to whether it's valid or not and in my mind it's not valid," Di Mattia continued.

Further, the CPOA believes it's a yes/no vote. "In my mind, the critical issue, the only critical issue at stake here for all of you to make is AvalonBay. We've invested an enormous amount of money on this decision about designating them as the possible developer for St. Paul's. This is a huge, huge issue and ... any decision that you make should reflect the voice of the residents. If the Oct. 2 meeting didn't get the message across to all of you that this should be a yes/no vote about AvalonBay ... A two- or three-question poll leads to ambiguity. It's going to lead to inconclusive results..."

On the village's website, there is a link in which residents can voice their opinions as to what they want for the Main Building at St. Paul's. Trustee Tom Lamberti, chair of the Mayor's Committee on St. Paul's, noted that he did tabulate the responses thus far but will have more accurate numbers at the next board of trustees meeting.

He did estimate though that two responses are clearly in favor of the AvalonBay proposal, approximately 70 to 75 responses oppose it and a "handful" of responses favor other options. " I will break it down column by column," he said. "You'll get a report from me at the next meeting."

Paul Muscarella, the Western Property Owners' Association's president, did not comment. The opinion poll is intended to take place Dec. 2.