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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1994-11-01 - TB 0/ 11 TOWN OF ULYSSES REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING November 1 , 1994 P resent : Supervisor Doug Austic ; Councilpeople Catherine Stover , Tom Reitz , Ben Curtis ; Highway Superintendent James Meeker ; Town Clerk Marsha Georgia . Mr . Austic called the Regular Board Meeting of the Town of U lysses to order at 7 : 30PM and led those in attendance in the P ledge of Allegiance to the Flag, of the United States of America . Approval of Minutes Mr . Reitz commented on the Regular Board Meeting of October 11 , • page 2 . . . Linda Beins should be Linda Buettner . Mrs . Georgia said that had already been corrected . Mrs . Stover indicated on page 3 . . . meeting date should be October 13 not the 10th . Also on page 1 . . . Fire Dept . report . . . purchase of truck from Ovid . . . question that . Mr . Curtis said they have a letter saying that Ovid will purchase the truck . Mr . Reitz said on the October 13th meeting . . . Youth discussed . . . should be that the Intermunicipal committee agreed , not County . Also clarify . . . Ithaca City Youth P rograms . H earing no further comments Mr . Reitz moved , seconded by Mrs . Stover approval of the minutes of the Regular Board meeting of 10 / 11 / 94 and Special Budget meeting of 10 / 13 / 94 . Unanimously approved . Claims Mr . Reitz moved , seconded by Mrs . Stover approval of Claims # 321 - 351 in the amount of $ 10 , 363 . 93 . Mr . Curtis questioned Claim # 332 ; all documentation wasn ' t ge attached except motel bill . Would suggest payment upon receipt of documentation . Mr . Austic will ask for receipts before d isbursing check . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Approved . Report : Fire Department Absent Report : Rep . Peter Meskill Absent Reports Town Clerk Marsha Georgia reported total fees for October A $ 3 , 114 . 25 of which $ 1 , 267 . 25 was turned over to the Supervisor . In the process of purging and sorting files for the Grant . Marriage records have been taken to be microfilmed . Getting q uotes on printer / readers . Highway Superintendent James Meeker said they are preparing trucks , mowing back roadsides , cut brush , built pad for salt shed . . . should be done in a couple of days . Paved Agard and Boyd Hill Roads . Still have some shoulders to do and pave the salt Town of Ulysses 2 Regular Town Board Meeting November 1 , 1994 shed . B oard Members Mr . Reitz stated he had a document from Peter D emjanec , who has brought to my attention that the NYS Council of the Arts has a grant to help on the design phase of a project for additions to buildings , and the like . Application deadline is March 1 . Mrs . Georgia said that Peter has offered to write another SARA Grant for the Town Clerk ' s office also . Mr . Reitz said it is certainly something to look into ; know we need to think about it , but should I ask Peter to get the application form or have him come to a meeting and discuss this . Mrs . G eorgia suggested that the Building Committee have a meeting . Mr . Austic said this is worth looking into . . . do you want a • commitment now ? Mr . Reitz said let me talk to him first . Mrs . Stover said the Master Plan is working tonight to , assemble the questionnaires for mailing . Approximately. 170'0 . Mr . Austic said that does not include organizations like churches , etc . ? Mrs . Stover said correct . Mr . Austic asked if it includes every o ther individual tax payer parcel ? Mrs . Stover said Yes , whether they are a resident or out of state , as long as they own property in the Town or Village . They will be mailed out on the 7th of N ovember . Mr . Curtis said that everyone received their packet from the Intermunicipal Cable Commission . . . need for individual municipalities to adopt the by - laws . Moving along pretty well ; h ad a couple of good speakers ; starting to learn a little about it . Have Ithaca City Franchise Contract in front of us now will g o through it and compare with outlying municipalities . Don ' t know if some areas can be applied to our municipality . . . will borrow some legal expertise . Surprised that we only have 564 cable subscribers in the Town of Ulysses . Village has 580 . Mr . 4 Austic asked if Mr . Curtis needs a resolution . Mr . Curtis said yes , the by - laws are a contract between the municipality and . . . Mr . Austic asked , Now ? Mr . Curtis said no , can do it at the next meeting . Further discussion took place . S upervisor ' s Report Financial report was distributed . Everything is in good shape e xcept Planning . Will wait and deal with this later . OLD BUSINESS W ater - Mr . Austic said he has received an estimate from Hunt Engineering . Also the engineering study that the Village of Trumansburg has said we can do . Don ' t think we want to spend $ 5500 . 00 . Mrs . Stover asked if this study is on the Village w ater system? Mr . Austic said yes , they would look at the ✓ illage system and determine if they have enough water to give to us and sewer capacity to give to us and then determine the best w ay to get there . . . a rough idea of cost of installing the line . B asically will need this study for a petition to form a water d istrict or for the grant work . Went to everyone involved today . . . Tim McGuire , Jim Seafuse , Bill Auble . . . told them that the Town is not willing to spend $ 5500 . on a gamble . They all agreed that they will get together in the next couple of days , see how much they each want to put in and come up with the $ 5500 . to do the study . Once they come up with the money then we will hire these guys to do the study . That ' s the way I feel . Told McGuire , Seafuse , etc . that if they have an engineering firm they w ould rather go with , fine . Mr . Curtis said this only is the study and estimate of putting it in . . . Mr . Austic said it does the rough plans to put this in . Mr . Curtis said they would have to come back with drawings . . . can they g ive us an idea of what that would cost ? Mr . Austic said if we Town of Ulysses 3 Regular Town Board Meeting N ovember 1 , 1994 g et to that point they will , yes . Mr . Reitz said perhaps you should back up and discuss what happened at the Village meeting . Mr . Austic said that ' s why I don ' t want to spend the $ 5500 . Mr . Reitz said perhaps the rest of the Board should be aware of w hat ' s happening . Mr . Austic said I went to the Village Board Meeting and talked on and on whether we could have permission to h ire an engineer . They had all this stuff that we could only hire Hunt and this other guy . . . I said no , don ' t think that ' s right . . . we don ' t need your permission to hire one anyway , so think you should at least give us permission to hire who we want and if you ( Village ) want to say we can use Hunt and their reports that they already have , fine . The Village finally passed a resolution that was satisfactory but wasn ' t needed . I left because I was getting a little angry . . . after that they got into • some joint planning effort between the Village and the Town . I d idn ' t want to get into this and lose $ 5500 . , does anyone have a problem with that ? Mr . Reitz said based on what you said ; the Village would not give us a commitment for water . Mrs . Stover asked if the people are aware of this and Mr . Austic said he told them it could be a w aste of money . Mr . Curtis asked what the Village wants . Mr . Austic said he doesn ' t know . Mr . Curtis asked what . this joint planning study is about . Mr . Austic said they ( Village ) want to have a say in what would be developed on either - end - of where we are going . Mr . Reitz said they want an agreement between the ✓ illage Planning Board , the Town Planning Board , the Town Master Plan . . . an agreement on what will happen on the periphery of the ✓ illage . What development is going to happen before they would free up the water for us . Mr . Austic said that ' s great . . . we need a reciprocal agreement ; we also have control of what happens in the Village . Mr . Curtis said he could see some of the reasoning behind this . Mr . Austic said that it ' s a separate municipality ; it would be kind of hard to do . Mr . Curtis suggested sitting down with the Village and talking this through and see what we can come up with . Mr . Reitz said he w ould like to see copies of the resolutions the Village passed . Mr . Curtis reiterated his desire to meet with the Village , would like to think that we could sit down and talk ; Mr . Austic said he thought the same thing . Further discussion ensued. Mr . Curtis w as encouraged to speak to Mr . Griswold . Mr . Austic- said that he is meeting on Friday at 8 : 00am with folks from Bolton Point . Will check with the Village to see when they w ould like to meet . . . will suggest November 17th . N EW BUSINESS Mr . Austic said that he has been re - thinking the sales tax issue and suggests that the entire amount not be taken . No one at the County level can answer questions I have ; however , the law says w e can take part of the sales tax ; so am suggesting that we ✓ escind the first resolution stating we would take all of the sales tax ; then ' we ask the County to allow us • to . have one - third ® of the amount ; that amount takes care of all the DB and B expenses , ' which are Town outside the Village . The County keeps the remaining two - thirds and apply it to the County tax outside the Village . So then we have one tax rate Townwide for the A and DA fund . That is the only way to get best advantage - to the Town ✓ esidents outside the Village . If we take this $ 130 , 000 . ( roughly one - third , out of the $ 400 , 000 . ; means we are going to leave $ 270 , 000 . down there to ✓ educe the tax to the outside Village people ) , our Town tax will be somewhere around $ 1 . 65 per thousand . That makes the Village and Town the same ; plus the fire . Dave Squires is saying they don ' t know what the sales tax is going to be but assuming it ' s a14. Town of Ulysses 4 Regular Town Board Meeting November 1 , 1994 the same as last year , or more . . . so last year our tax rate with the County was $ 2 . 26 . . . if you took this $ 130 , 000 . out and gave it to us , their tax rate would be somewhere around $ 3 . 30 plus whatever they are going to come up with . It ' s going to be around 5 % - 6 % plus the $ 3 . 20 - $ 3 . 30 . So Ben , if you figure it out on a hundred thousand dollar house , it ' s roughly the same as last year . The problem before is , you could come up with about a $ . 65 tax in the Town , that ' s it . Figure the County taxes and local taxes and it ' s more . . . they can ' t explain it , so you tell me . Further discussion ensued . Mr . Austic said that he also discovered that State Revenue Sharing as applied to the A and DA Funds ; that misappropriation of funds . The Village gets their own share of revenue sharing which is a share of ours . . . therefore • there should be no State Revenue Funding in the A and DA Funds . S o the per capita income comes out of A and DA and goes all to B and DB . Mrs . Stover moved , seconded by Mr . Reitz the following resolution : WHEREAS the Town of Ulysses has on September 13 , 1994 , passed a motion electing to accept directly all sales tax proceeds attributed to the Town of Ulysses collected by Tompkins County , and WHEREAS the Town of Ulysses upon further investigation has further decided that it is in the best interest of Town residents to directly accept only a part of the sales tax proceeds to be applied to any town purpose , B E IT RESOLVED that the town board of the Town of Ulysses rescinds the motion passed on September 13 , 1994 . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Adopted . Mr . Austic moved , seconded by Mrs . Stover t e following resolution : W HEREAS , the Tompkins County Comptrolle has agreed to `Cek1, ccept $ 5 , 469 . 89 as full payme t for the 1992 and 993 election expenses as follo s ; $ 3 , 217 . 14 for „Al 1 92 direct expense and $ 2 , 252 . 7 for 1993 direct ex ,ense . WHEREAS , the ompkins County Comptroller wi 1 furnish a & . state ent of full payment for 1992 nd 1993 (�, E lecti n Expenses . p e n s . ,V B E IT RESOLVED , C\1at the Town Board of the Tow of Ulysses agrees t remove a sum of $ 5 , 469 . 89 fr m encumbers moneys for election expenses of 1992 and 1993 a d use the remaining encumbers funds for general town purposes . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Adopted . B udget ■ c21lS Town of Ulysses - 5 Regular Town Board Meeting N ovember 1 , 1994 Mr . Austic said changes in the Preliminary Budget to the Adopted B udget : A Fund : Appropriations 1220 . 01 reduce from $ 12 , 733 . 00 to $ 12 , 223 . 00 1220 . 04 increase from $ 500 . 00 to $ 1000 . 00 1410 . 01 change from $ 38 , 469 . 00 to $ 38 , 649 . 00 Under Youth . . . summer employment figure is correct . Youth Programs figure should be increased : • 7310 . 04 increase from $ 13 , 706 . 00 to $ 24 , 657 . 00 Total of A Fund increases from $ 300 , 788 . 00 to $ 311 , 927 . 00 A Fund : Revenue Property taxes A1001 : $ 207 , 463 . 00 In Lieu of Taxes A1081 : reduce to $ 0 S ales Tax A1120 originally $ 148 , 814 . 00 reduced to $ 0 . TC Youth A2350 originally $ 8 , 350 . 00 increased to $ 17 , 054 . 00 State Revenue Sharing A3001 originally $ 16 , 343 . 00 reduce to $ 0 . Total General Fund Revenue $ 311 , 927 . 00 B Fund : Appropriations N o changes B Fund : Revenue Sales tax B1120 $ 22 , 221 . 00 increase to $ 26 , 834 . 00 N YS per capita B3001 $ 2 , 530 . 00 increase to $ 7 , 836 . 00 Total General OV Fund $ 43 , 120 . 00 DA Fund : Appropriations N o changes DA Fund : Revenue P roperty tax DA1001 will be $ 143 , 273 . 00 S ales tax DA1120 $ 124 , 198 is reduced to $ 0 . Appropriated Fund Bal . going to $ 25 , 000 . 00 Total Highway Fund revenue $ 252 , 810 . 00 D B Fund : Appropriations N o changes ® DB Fund : Revenue S ales Tax DB1120 increases from $ 81 , 435 . 00 to $ 98 , 891 . 00 NYS per capita DB3001 increases from $ 8 , 930 . 00 to $ 19 , 967 . 00 Total Revenue / DB Fund $ 162 , 008 . 00 '• Fire Protection and Water Fund remains the same . Mr . Austic asked if anyone else had changes . Turns out to be a 3 . 8 % increase in total appropriations ; 3 . 8 % is $ 25 , 118 . 00 of the total budget . Take the $ 25 , 000 . unexpended fund balance and apply it , alp Town of Ulysses 6 Regular Town Board Meeting N ovember 1 , 1994 essentially you are taking off that $ 25 , 000 . , not to say that it isn ' t a 3 . 8 % increase in expenses , but you are covering it with the unappropriated fund balance , so you don ' t have to raise the tax rate to get it . S hould have a tax rate of $ 1 . 6811 Townwide . Last year the ✓ illage was $ 1 . 475 and Town was $ 2 . 307 . Further discussion ensued regarding why the Village rate was up . D iscussion took place regarding the division of Justice salaries ; Mrs . Stover didn ' t want to continue losing ground in the two justice rates of pay . Mr . Curtis felt that the 80 / 20 split was a good way , starting in direction of correcting it . Further discussion began regarding tax rate , balances , etc . Mr . • Reitz indicated that 65 % of the total budget is in highways . Mr . Austic said he doesn ' t want to do anything to hinder roads , but to continually budget $ 50 , 000 . to $ 100 , 000 . more increases the budget . Hearing no further discussion Mr . Austic entertained a motion , moved by Mr . Curtis , seconded by Mrs . Stover to approve the budget with the understanding that we will look at using unexpended balances to reduce future budgets . Mr . Curtis said can ' t we do something with the unexpended balances . Mr . Austic said it would be like the $ 25 , 000 . I put in . . . just put more in so it reduces down the amount you have to raise from tax on the other end . If you want to say that , go ahead . Put it in the A or DA Fund . Decided to change DA Appropriated Fund Balance from $ 25 , 000 . to $ 40 , 000 . Taxes DA1001 is then $ 143 , 273 . 00 and makes Total Highway Fund revenue $ 252 , 810 . 00 . I Mr . Austic entertained a motion , moved by Mr . Curtis , seconded by Mrs . Stover to approve the amendments to the preliminary budget . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Adopted . Mr . Reitz moved that the Preliminary Budget be adopted , seconded by Mrs . Stover . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Adopted . E lderly Exemption Mr . Austic said that he has a memo to increase the Elderly E xemptions , would like to hold it off until 1995 . Was last done 3 / 26 / 94 . State changes it every year . Mr . Austic suggested looking at it next September . O ther Mr . Austic said he has an agreement with Mr . Squires regarding the Election expense . Mr . Austic moved , seconded by Mr . Reitz the following resolution : ai / Town of Ulysses 7 Regular Town Board Meeting November 1 , 1994 WHEREAS : the Tompkins County Comptroller has agreed to accept $ 5469 . 89 as full payment for 1992 and 1993 Election Expenses as follows : $ 3217 . 14 for 1992 and $ 2252 . 75 for 1993 and furnish the Town of Ulysses a statement of accepting this as full payment for 1992 and 1993 Election Expenses ; BE IT RESOLVED : that the Town of Ulysses Town Board agrees to remove the sum of $ 5469 . 89 from incumbered monies for Election Expenses and use the remaining incumbered fund balance for general Town purposes . Mr . Austic explained that in 1992 $ 17 , 000 . was incumbered and in ® 1993 $ 13 , 000 . was incumbered but you used $ 6 , 000 . for the chipper , so there should be around $ 20 , 000 . still there . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Aye Adopted . Mr . Curtis commended Mr . Austic on the work he did on this issue . Holtkamp Mr . Austic said Bill Holtkamp came in today and requested removing the PUD . Asked that he submit the request in writing . Octopus Project Mr . Reitz mentioned that the Ithaca City Common Council are to take a vote tomorrow on the Octopus design and construction . Mr . Reitz moved , seconded by Mrs . Stover the following : RESOLVED : that the Town Board of the Town of Ulysses urges the City of Ithaca Common Council to approve the design of the Route 96 Octopus Project as presented , without any major modifications . Short discussion . Mr . Austic asked for a vote . Mr . Austic Aye Mr . Reitz Aye Mrs . Stover Aye Mr . Curtis Nay Adopted . Correspondence Mr . Austic reviewed correspondence received . Mrs . Stover mentioned turkeys for employees . Was decided to give a turkey to part - time folks also and discussed size of turkeys . ® Mr . Reitz suggested a gift certificate . Mr . Curtis said the turkeys are a nice tradition . Also suggested giving one to the Planning , ZBA , boards . Discussion followed . Mrs . Stover and Mr . Reitz will check out prices and inform Board . Hearing no further business Mrs . Stover moved , seconded by Mr . Reitz to adjourn the meeting . Unanimously approved the meeting adjourned at 10 : 40pm . Respectfully submitted , Marsha L . Georgia