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Home My WebLink About11-04-1999 BUDG2000 MINUTES HEARING UPON PRELIMINARY BUDGET FOR THE YEAR 2000 AND FIRE DEPARTMENT HEARING THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 1999 AT 7:30 P.M. Those present: Teresa M. Robinson, Supervisor Ellard L. Sovocool, Councilman Daniel J. Carey, Councilman Donald N. Palmer, Councilman Donald F. Scheffler, Councilman Also present: Dewey Dawson, Glen Morey, Liz Brennan, Tyke Randall, Peg Palmer, Joe Graham, Chris Dempsey, Tom Walpole, Sheldon Clark, Lauren Bishop for the Ithaca Journal. Publication of the Legal Notice for the Hearing was published in the Moravia Republican Register on October 27, 1999. Supervisor Robinson opened the Hearing at 7:30 P.M. SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- Welcome. I have one change to make before we get started. If you look on the first page, under A1110.2, under Justice, Equipment, it's $1000. We are going to move it into the Contingency Fund, which is A1990.4 which makes this $6000 instead of $5000. It doesn't change any overall figures, but it changes the ones there. The reason being, we have a chance to apply for some equipment from a grant and if it's in the budget, they aren't allowed to apply. Since it isn't in the budget now, we put it in the Contingency Fund in case you don't get it, because it doesn't mean you're going to get it just because you apply. It will be there if we need it. Does anyone have any questions on the totals. If not, any question on individual items? DEWEY DAWSON- The only question I have is in regards to that $1000 that you moved to Contingency. If we don't get the grant, that would still be able to be gotten out for that purpose later on? SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- That's what I explained to you. Pg.2 - Year 2000 Budget Hearing - November 4, 1999 LAUREN BISHOP- What was the reason that the $1000 was moved? SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- Because you can not have it in the budget if you apply for a grant. LAUREN BISHOP- What was the grant? SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- It was for equipment for the judicial department. It's just a minor thing, but I'd like to have them apply. You need money, so you find some way to get it. I think you all understand everything, or if you don't, I can go over the figures. (Supervisor Robinson pointed out sections of the General and Highway Funds). If you live in the Town you will be paying 7.662 and in the Village, 4.916 (per thousand). The only thing different than that is that we will be getting our sales tax money, and the sales tax money will reduce our Tompkins County taxes, and that doesn't apply in the Village. That is an increase over last year of 5.83%. Do you have any questions? GLEN MOREY Asked Supervisor Robinson about the youth program. (Could not hear conversation on tape, neither used microphone. Clerk Pierson informed Supervisor Robinson that no one could hear). SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- We had our Youth Commission last night and Glen asked me about what we had for the youth. On page six we have a Contractual of $8500. This is for the Joint Youth Program. We put $8000 in there for the Youth Coordinator. Then on page one of Part Town, we have the $9000 for the Pool and $1132 for the Summer Program. These are what we cooperate... give the money towards the Pool for the Town's participation in the Youth Program in the Pool. Anybody else have any questions? One of the reasons that our Highway is up is because gas is up right now and also salt. And the alarm system, I forgot that. That's something that we..... I wish you wouldn't put that in the paper though. I don't want them to know we haven't got one. PEG PALMER- They already know that, Teresa. SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- Well, if it wasn't for the one we had, they would have been here all night. November 4, 1999 - Year 2000 Budget Hearing - Pg.3 PEG PALMER- Somebody knew it. Of course when the fire alarm went off, they didn't know that it didn't go any further than this room. SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- Well, we had a partial one and we've still got it and I don't want...... Other than that...... (Not using microphone.) LAUREN BISHOP- Where is the alarm system in this? SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- Page three, under contractual, A1620.41. If you'd like to ask the Board anything, feel free to. Fire When there were no other questions, Supervisor Robinson moved on to the Department Hearing at 7:45 P.M. and asked Chris Dempsey to speak. CHRIS DEMPSEY- Good evening. Never to be short-winded, I thought I'd come and give you a short spiel of what we're up to and why our little increase that we're running into on the Fire Department side. As always, it seems to be one of our main expenses that seems to be increasing constantly is the EMS side of our operation. We handed out, at least to the Board, we hand out to you new Board Members, a budget of what we've given in the past and some of the reasons why we have increases, and what we're running into that is causing us some headaches. One of the things that we're extremely proud of is that we still don't charge for any ambulance calls which is very expensive in Dryden and down in Four Town, which is the Moravia - Locke area, where they've been charging for ambulance calls. We don't charge for any of that. We've been trying to do a lot of our training in-house at our department. This has caused a lot of extra expense. To do a proper job of in-house training they require us to have the proper mannequins, slide projector we purchased this year, several items just to do a quality job and make sure that our people are up to snuff. I think that if people were fairly aware of the ambulance as a progress in Groton, you used to see a lot of Bangs and other outfits coming into Town to give us a hand, well you very rarely ever see that in Town now. I think the ambulance crew we have now does an excellent job of taking care of what we have so we don't run into that. We are running into an increase in New York State regulations. The training costs have increased and we don't get back from the State what we used to. They're cutting us at every angle. But I believe there's a great commitment at the department to stay so we don't have to charge, and I don't see that as a foreseeable thing. The hospital that does supply us with some of our materials, but it doesn't reimburse us for d-fib pads or......or stuff like that, so we have to take that out of our budget. Some of the concerns I have is looking down the road at the Department, really from a fire side, it's becoming very difficult, and I think all departments run into this, as far as keeping people trained to premium level. Obviously, we all know, we don't have fires like we used to. Pg.4 - Year 2000 Budget Hearing - November 4, 1999 I think we had one this year. We just don't have them. Because of that, the interest isn't there. The interest isn't there, it's hard to keep the training there. Why train if nothing burns? So, there's no interest, so it's hard to get our numbers up to burn stuff. We did burn three houses, I think, this year, and that helps to have some interest. But pretty soon everybody's living in a house. We had one guy say well, if you burn down this house that I don't want, and I put up my new house, you guys are so excited to burn down the old one, what happens when I move into the new one? You going to burn that down? So, there are some concerns with that, and I do think that down the road we're going to probably get them to hire more people than we do. I think that is a cost that Groton's going to run into. Also, our department, our building, which wishfully would be satisfactory, we are running into more and more OSHA, is going to come down on us one of these days and just gonna walk in and say this isn't going to work. We're trying to plan for it. We're trying to get ready for it, but at some point in time they're going to walk in and say you haven't met this requirement, this requirement, this requirement and we're going to be like, you know.... So, we're going to go at this point as long as we can, but we are trying to plan for it, we are trying to get ready for at some point in time having to get ready for a different station. At some point in time the station we have will not work, and there's nothing we can do about it. Do you have any questions for me on anything that I've briefly gone over? You never ask any questions. You just wish I'd sit down and shut up. I can do that too. As always we've appreciated the support of the Town Board the past year and we hope for it in the future. SUPERVISOR ROBINSON AND BOARD MEMBERS- Thank you. Thank you very much. SUPERVISOR ROBINSON- I'm sure you understand what the lights are, McLean and Peruville lights.....areas where lights are provided for the people who live in that area....light district. (Not using microphone). Any questions? There being no further questions, it was moved by Councilman Carey, seconded by Councilman Sovocool, to close the Hearing at 7:55 P.M. Ayes - Sovocool, Scheffler, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. Colleen D. Pierson Town Clerk