The group is seeking standing to participate in an upcoming adjudication hearing, where it would have a chance to challenge elements of a draft environmental impact statement submitted by the developers.

The Belleayre Resort at Catskill Park, proposed by developer Crossroads Ventures LLC under managing partner Dean Gitter of Mount Tremper, would bring two golf courses and two hotels with a total of 721 rooms to a 1,900-acre site near the Belleayre Mountain Ski Center. The project would straddle the border of the Ulster County town of Shandaken and Delaware County town of Middletown.

Gitter has said the resort would serve as a much-needed source of tax revenue and jobs in the region and would not harm the environment. Opponents contend the resort would destroy the region's rural character and endanger important natural resources, including the New York City watershed and the Esopus Creek.

Tom Alworth, executive director of the Catskill Center for Preservation and Development, said the coalition was formed to share money, experts and other resources for the upcoming hearing in which both sides will be expected to present scientific evidence to back their competing claims.

The approval process for the resort, under the terms of the State Environmental Quality Review Act, is being led by the state Department of Environmental Conservation and will include an "issues conference" in May at which individuals and groups may apply for party status in the process.

A Department of Environmental Conservation administrative law judge will weigh the claims of Crossroads' multimillion-dollar draft environmental impact statement, which shows how adverse environmental impacts of the resort would be eliminated or mitigated, against the arguments of project opponents who claim the developer's study is flawed and biased.

"Now the hyperbole is over," Alworth said. "Whatever we bring to the table must have experts backing it up, and they cost money. No single organization could do this on its own. We knew that none of us would be at the table if we did not join forces financial and otherwise."

In addition to Alworth's group, coalition members include both national environmental groups, like the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Sierra Club and Trout Unlimited, and several local organizations, including Hudson Riverkeeper, the Catskill Heritage Alliance and the Pine Hill Water District Coalition.

Alworth said each group will contribute whatever it can in terms of money, attorneys and experts to the coalition, which is being coordinated by Albany lawyer Marc S. Gertman.

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