A massive Amazon warehouse plan that was previously denied in the Orange County town of Wawayanda is back - and so is the controversy surrounding it.

The proposal calls for a 3.2-million-square-foot distribution center on roughly 100 acres near McBride Road, Hoops Road and Route 6, just outside of Middletown. If built, it would be one of the largest warehouse projects in New York state.

The project was denied by the town’s zoning board earlier this year over a height variance but was later approved by the town’s planning board, allowing it to move forward — a decision residents and state officials say is highly unusual.

Nearby resident Alicia Albertson says the town ignored community concerns.

“The town is going ahead with their own agenda,” Albertson said. “If the zoning board said no, it should be no.”

Albertson says the project is too large for the area and raises major safety concerns.

“It’s dangerous with the thousands of trucks we’ll have and the 6,000 lithium batteries that will be in the building,” she said. “Wawayanda is a beautiful town. It's not what we moved here for, and it’s a shame they want to encourage this kind of building.”

The Amazon plan comes as nearly a dozen other warehouse and distribution projects are being proposed or considered across Wawayanda, something many residents fear will forever change the town’s rural character.

State Sen. James Skoufis, who represents the area, says Amazon effectively found a way around the town’s original denial.

“Somehow, someway the applicant, Amazon, basically did a work-around here,” said Skoufis. “I’ve never seen a planning board be able to do that.”

Skoufis says the project also received an $80 million tax break from the Orange County Industrial Development Agency, the county board that provides business incentives.

“This is a multitrillion-dollar company headed by the second-richest man in the world asking us to subsidize their tax bill,” said Skoufis.

Documents obtained by News 12 show Amazon would still pay about $48 million in property taxes over the 15-year PILOT agreement, but the deal cuts those payments nearly in half.

Skoufis says the agency violated the intent of its own rules, which require tax breaks to go to companies offering substantial community and wage benefits.

“Amazon’s own data shows most of these jobs will pay around $37,000 a year,” said Skoufis. “So, in addition to taxpayers footing their bill, we’re also footing the bill for their employees when they apply for SNAP and Medicaid because these are poverty-wage jobs.”

Bill Fioravanti, CEO of the Orange County IDA, disagrees, telling News 12 the project represents a major private investment and long-term benefit for the region.

"Sen. Skoufis is opposed to these types of tax incentives of this caliber. This is a huge project for the town of Wawayanda. A huge boon in terms of brand-new tax revenue — even with IDA incentives," Fioravanti said. "It's important for people to know the site where it's to be built is an active mining operation. If you go there now, you'll see dirty, dusty trucks going in and out of that site all day. It's not like a preserved land site. It's ideal for this."

Town officials have also defended the project, saying online claims about it are misleading. They say the site has been an industrial mine for years, not farmland, and that the facility will replace a low-value, high-impact use with a modern warehouse that adds stability and tax growth.

The controversy has also renewed scrutiny of the Orange County IDA’s oversight.

The agency has operated under the watch of a state-appointed independent monitor since 2023, after a series of corruption and mismanagement scandals involving its former leadership. The monitor was installed at the request of Sen. Skoufis and has the power to veto IDA decisions that violate state law or agency policy.

Skoufis says that monitor is now reviewing the Amazon tax-break deal and could block it in the coming days.

“It underscores what we have here in Orange County, corporate welfare at the highest order, and county officials turning a blind eye,” he said.

News 12 has reached out to Amazon, the Town of Wawayanda, and the Orange County Legislature, which appoints IDA members, for comment.