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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2014-11-03 Joint SessionJOINT WORK SESSION MCLEAN FIRE DISTRICT BOARD OF FIRE COMMISSIONERS TOWN OF GROTON TOWN BOARD TOWN OF GROTON PLANNING BOARD TOMPKI NS COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF PLANNING MONDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2014 AT 7:30 PM AT THE MCLEAN FIRE HALL, MCLEAN, NEW YORK Those Present: McLean Fire District Board of Fire Commissioners: Chairman, Adelbert Carr; Vice Chairman, Mike Totman, Kristina Robinson, Ron Beck, Ron Space; Treasurer, Bob Walpole; Secretary, Steve Foote; Attorney, Liam Murphy From the Town of Groton: Supervisor, Glenn Morey; Councilpersons Ellard Sovocool, Richard Gamel, Sheldon Clark, and Kelly Smith; Planning Board Chair, Ed Neuhauser; Planning Board Members, Lisa Maloney -Hahn, Barbara Clark, and Monica Carey; Attorney, Dan Ellis; Town Clerk, April Scheffler From Tompkins County Planning: Ed Marx and Scott Doyle Also Present: Mike Lane, Brian Robison, Lee Shurtleff, Alton Knapp & Son, Brian Klumpp, Chad Shurtleff, Steve Gobel, over 50 members of the public and Fire Department Adelbert Carr - Made introductions and turned the meeting over to Mike Totman, who gave a history of the Fire Department which included projected pictures. Originally formed June 9, 1947, one charter member remains in the McLean Fire Department. The members voted to borrow $1,500 to build a fire station on this site and it is still part of the current building. Eventually, they bought the property on each side of the station, added an extension on the back around 1970, and then built an addition in 1971, which is the part of the building where this meeting was taking place. Mr. Totman - Showed a calendar of events to describe the almost daily use of the building by both the Fire Department and the community. They also provide a place for the community flag pole, which was placed there by the Beautification Committee, as well as the welcome to McLean sign. In the mid 80's it became clear that their trucks were extremely crowded as they were parking tandem, one behind the other. Without a lot of funding or land, they put on an addition facing School Street with two large doors for trucks. At the time they hoped to get 10 to 15 years out of this fix while they figured out something else to do. After that, they bought property to the north and volunteers added fill to this area as it was quite low. In 2004, they bought the "Bell property", which was also very low, and extended down to the creek. This is the land that the new addition would be built on. Joint Work Session Page 2 of 17 November 3, 2014 Mr. Totman listed some of issues with the current building which included, trucks being parked very tightly together with very little room between them; 10 foot high doors creating very low clearance; floor drains that have been filled in but floors that are still sloped for drains leaving no place for water to go. Original fill was concrete, rebar, etc. from Cornell. Then when the County did the road and curbs, Suit Kote wanted to use the area as a staging area and offered to fill it in level if they could use it all summer. That is about where it is today. Almost everything done to this point has not been a cost to the District but has been done by donation and fundraising. Kristina Robinson - Explained that about 10 years ago everyone got together and talked about the amount of repairs being done on the building and formed a building committee to look at things. Options explored were tearing down and rebuilding in the same spot to moving to a different property. We had a professional engineer survey the building and found it structurally sound. Eventually it was decided that staying here was the best answer from a fundraising standpoint, a community standpoint, and a financially responsible standpoint. At that point we started to look at options and what was needed for an addition to the building. With the floor problems in the truck bay it was thought that it would be better to reutilize that space and build a new and larger truck bay. In 2009 we presented a request to the public for a capital fund for a building subject to a mandatory referendum. Some of the money from this fund was used for insulation in the existing building, but the need for a new roof has been put on hold pending the plans for expansion. The present door height creates a problem of needing to special order trucks that are also more expensive. Mutual aid companies are not able to pull their trucks into the bay as they will not fit. Not only are the floor drains a problem, but the floor itself has heaved and cracked. We also need more space to train and for records retention. After much planning and many meetings with the community, we came up with a plan that we could fund without raising taxes. In June we applied to the Groton Planning Board for the addition. Part of the process was that we looked at the fact that the existing building sits in a floodplain. We hired Knapp Associates as consultants, put together a plan for an addition, applied to the Planning Board and then ran into some mitigation issues and that's where we are tonight. Alton Knapp, III, introduced himself and his father, Alton Knapp, Jr. We specialize in floodplain management and have been in business about 20 years. Prior to that my father worked in the floodplain management section of DEC. We were asked by the Fire Department to come up with a solution for their floodplain issues. The location is in an Unnumbered A Zone on the flood map, meaning it is a gray shaded area on a very poor developed map that says it's flood -prone. They were made in the early 70's with very little data in terms of topography, mapping, and road names as an initial attempt to develop some sort of idea of areas that were flood -prone so they could avoid giving out insurance claims and just giving away money after disasters. So, we looked at the map and said there are no water surface elevations associated with that particular area. One of our specialties is to develop a base flood elevation for that so we will know what actual flooding conditions are on the property. We came up with a base flood elevation that is 1121, which is about the elevation of the existing grade next to the existing building. In order to put the expansion in, a process would be to place fill and remove that portion of land from the actual floodplain and then they would be able to build the building without having to worry about insurance. This is done with an application to FEMA and they will acknowledge that our calculations a correct and that area can now be removed. We have done a lot of these over the years and have Joint Work Session Page 3 of 17 November 3, 2014 never had an issue with them coming back, so we are very confident in our ability to determine whether these calculations are accurate or not. In 1981 there was a flood here and a smaller one in 2006 and neither one of them flooded the Fire Department, so our calculations show that the base flood elevation should be a few feet lower than the actual building. This correlates real life scenarios with the methodology used to develop the base flood elevation. Kristina Robinson - With or without the building addition, we desire to remove as much of the existing property as we can from the floodplain zone because it's un -numbered. We don't want to worry about flood insurance in the future with regulations that are changing. We are trying to save some money by doing the land and the building all in one shot. In June, we made the application for site plan approval and were told that the local zoning for the Town of Groton does not require anything for the fill itself but that the addition needed site plan approval. So, in the application we included the information about what we were doing with the floodplain. We were given preliminary approval in June, which included a letter from the DEC and the Army Corp of Engineers stating that they didn't have any jurisdiction. The Health Department also said they didn't have any jurisdiction. Under State Law it had to be submitted to the County Planning Department for comment. They provided a letter back to the Planning Board recommending denial and suggested moving the fire station to a different location because of it being in a floodplain. Our plan was to take it out of the floodplain so we were a little confused by that. We tried to get some more information from the County and the Town and be able to move through the process and figure out how to mitigate this. Our consultants tried to contact the County and get some additional information from them. In the end, after a couple of months we chose to withdraw our application without any bias so we could back up and say what are we missing here, we don't understand. Mike Lane - Asked if he could be shown where the floodway is on the map that was projected on the screen. Alton Knapp, III - Explained that a floodplain is an area inundated by a 100 -year event. That is the outermost extent at which the flood will go based on elevation. A floodway is if you were to condense the floodplain as much as you could until you get a one foot rise in surface elevation, that would technically be determined as the floodway. That is only on floodplains that have been studied by FEMA. There is no floodway in an Un- numbered A Zone because there is no analysis done. He pointed out the floodplain on the map as going all the way to the street. I think since they've started doing the remapping for the State, there is a reason why they invested all this money nationwide, they know that those maps are desperately inaccurate. So, that's why they have started the remapping process. Dave Norte - Asked if some of the inaccuracy was because they were put together by private insurance companies to mitigate their costs? Alton Knapp, III - No, they were put together by the Federal Government and the way they were developed were they took USGS contour shape quad maps with 20 foot interval contours and literally took a magic marker and said this looks reasonable. It was for any watershed over one square mile. Sometimes they got a little bit smaller, but in general they took any stream on the map with a greater than one square mile watershed. Mr. Norte - What would you say the percent of accuracy would be? Joint Work Session Page 4 of 17 November 3, 2014 Alton Knapp, III - Factual inaccuracy, it's hard to say, but based on my experience they are very inaccurate just because the data that they had to work with was very preliminary. Member of Public - Asked if the proposal will take the entire property out of the flood zone or just where the addition is going to be? Alton Knapp, III - Our proposal was for the building itself plus an additional area for recreation. I know the Fire Department wanted to maintain a level area behind the building to be used for events. The area to be removed would be a described portion based on the top of fill, in general this line (he showed an area on the map), which does tie into the 1 121 contour and so that contour does go all the way out. This area would remain a flood prone area and this area here, obviously (pointing to areas on map). Member of Public - Just getting the building and new addition out of it, that will cancel out any flood insurance they have to have? Alton Knapp, III - Yes. Alton Knapp, Jr. - A couple things to make note of is that one of the other advantages of taking the structure and the proposed addition and a described portion out of the floodplain, as it stands right now public buildings that are in the floodplain are required by FEMA to be insured and many are not. The problem is that if you have a flood and you put in a claim, it often reduces the amount of the disaster assistance by that which you should have received through your flood insurance. When you take a portion of a property out, including the building, you do two things. You've removed a mandated insurance relative to any mortgages, loans or whatever you might have against the building, but you also put that building into what is called an X Zone where what insurance is still available is very affordable. It's called a preferred risk policy. So, that's another advantage to elevating the addition such that the whole building could be taken out of the floodplain. Alton Knapp, III - The Fire Department wanted to address some of the comments that were provided by the Department of Planning for Tompkins County. That letter is up here. Under FEMA's hazard mitigation planning process they go through and do a countywide hazard mitigation plan. Every county has that and they are required to update and make changes to them on a 5 -year basis. In order to qualify for disaster assistance and relief after disasters, they have to adopt these plans, otherwise they can't get any money. So, this refers to an update of 2013 and in there, it includes "actions that understand potential impacts to critical facilities," obviously a fire department is a critical facility, "and services operations under different climate change scenarios and to develop regulations to prohibit future building in flood -prone areas as well as create incentives to encourage property owners to protect and improve streams and buffers." That is what is stated in their hazard mitigation plan that they have adopted. I'm a huge proponent for hazard mitigation planning because without it no improvements can be made and millions of dollars go out the door to disaster funding on an annual basis. So, they are critical items that need to be there. For this particular property, it is a critical property. It should not be in the floodplain and can be shown that it isn't in the floodplain by elevation. Our plan to add fill, and remove additional portions of the property, on top of fill that has already been placed there, doesn't seem like a far-fetched idea to be allowed. We're putting, on average, one to two feet. Two feet in a very minimal area and one foot in the majority of the pack on top of four to five feet that were put there in order to repair the bridge. So, if Joint Work Session Page 5 of 17 November 3, 2014 they had already put that fill there when they originally placed it, we wouldn't have this issue. Alton Knapp, Jr. - Under the State's facility regulations which are part of the Environmental Conservation Law, part 502, you get into the requirements and they do recognize critical facilities as needing special attention, but one of the requirements is that they must be protected. They're not prohibited, but they do need to be protected to the 1 % or 100 -year flood. Again, that's what we're doing here. That's how we make this compliant with State regulations. I don't know whether there's any State money involved in this project or not, but we look at all of the regulations to make sure that what is proposed will be compliant. And that's also compliant with the Town's regulations. A woman from the public asked if there was any chance that the zoning could be rezoned for the flood zone. Alton Knapp, III - Are you talking building zoning or flood zone? As part of the remapping that they are doing nationwide, they are going in and looking at flood conditions on a countywide basis. Typically they will make those re -study determinations based on population and/or previous flooding conditions. Now, the fact that it did flood in 2006 probably wouldn't put it on the radar for the State and FEMA to spend money, typically because the cost/benefit ratio is not there. Their benefit of spending $100,000.00 - $200,,000.00 to show that 4 houses are not in it really wouldn't be there. So, I don't think that this one would get picked up during that remapping process. The simple fact of the Fire Department putting money out there to do that analysis, to show what real life conditions should be, they've already taken that step in the right direction to know what it should be. Mike Totman - I'd like to hear from the County or Town Planning Board because that's really where the issue came up. We can make our case all day long, but we don't want to move from here. We can't afford to. I guess the question I would have is if there was no requirement for a building permit to put the fill in, and we had established that, the problem that we had here at the board meeting, we put this out to bid to do that. It was awarded and we actually had the work to be completed by August 31. The problem became that once we were not clear that we were going to get site plan approval, that portion of it is about $30,,000.00,, well why would we spend that if you're not sure you're going to be able to build on it? It put us in a spot. We could have done it and had it all done. (It was not noticed that the tape ended and needed to be turned over to continue recording. The following section is transcribed from notes, not the tape.) Alton Knapp, Jr - Explained that once the letter of approval was received from FEMA, the Town of Groton would need to amend its local law and its flood maps. He said that if it is approved and removed from the floodplain, it is removed from the need of approval to build there. Dave Norte - Said that he felt that the Groton Board's power was being abdicated to the County. It appeared that the Fire Department had all of it's "i's" dotted and "t's" crossed. That is looked like they had done a really good job. Now an unelected, arbitrary group from the County has said no. Mike Lane, County Legislator - Explained that Tompkins County has no land use planning authority, but is bound by law to look at some things. The County does not have veto authority. That authority remains with the Town Planning Board. Under Town Joint Work Session Page 6 of 17 November 3, 2014 Law Article 239 review, the Town Planning Board must forward it to the County for their review and opinion. If that opinion is to deny the project, it can still be passed by the Town Planning Board by a super majority vote. David Norte - Responded that at the same time he sees the County going around trying to get the towns to abdicate their power. He is all for planning but the overall theme seems to indicate that he has lost all of his representation. The Fire Department has worked on this for years and now it sounds like it is dead in the water. Kristina Robinson - Said that she did not understand why it was a problem when it had been clearly stated that their intention was to take the property out of the floodplain. Mike Totman - Asked Ed Marx, from County Planning, if it would make a difference to the response from the County Planning Department if the property was taken out of the floodplain. Ed Marx - Said that the response had been two -fold. First was that critical facilities should not be placed in the floodplain. Secondly, if you put in fill, you move water someplace else and cause a problem somewhere else. Consultation would need to take place with the County Highway Engineer to see what it would affect. Alton Knapp, III - When the bridge was changed, there was 4 foot or more fill placed in the floodplain with no study being done to show what the effects would be. Our study shows what 1 or 2 foot on top of that will do. (Transcribing from tape again from this point on.) Alton Knapp, III - Bringing it up higher is a calculated safety factor. We can put that fill in our model and it won't even show up. The fill that's already there, will show up. So, in terms of having concerns about velocity on the existing bridge, that probably should have done when you put it in. We've done it now and we have an end result. Ed Marx - Well I think that would have to be reviewed by our County Highway Engineers for them to see if they agree with that. Jack Miller - If the County Highway ......?....take care of the dead trees and brambles like they did 50 years ago, there wouldn't be any discussions on all this. Just walk the creek bed and see the number of dead trees that have accumulated over the years. It must impact hugely the bridge abutment down here. Nothing is done about that because magically, the trout are more important than I as a citizen. Ron Beck - We were shocked when we got this negative declaration from the County directed to the Planning Board. We've done our work. We hired the best consultant we could find and they came up with this plan and it all looks good to us. Then we find out that the County says, well, the Mitigation Plan doesn't allow it. Well, we're out of the flood zone. That's a moot point. We're taking the building out of the flood zone. So, now they well, this addition of 1 or 2 feet of fill is going to affect the bridge they just put in. They already put 4 feet of fill in there. They asked nobody. How is another few inches in the small area that we are going to fill affect that bridge when our engineer has told us as plainly as he can that this is not going to affect anything? The other thing they say is we should move to another location. That is going to destroy the heart of this Fire Department community if we move it out of town. What will it do to the cost? We'd have to get rid of this building, something's got to happen to this building, sold, destroyed, torn down, whatever. That's going to cost something. The Town of Groton taxpayers are going to have a big effect on that. So will the Town of Dryden, but it's the Town of Groton who's making this difficult for us. So, it's the Town of Groton's Joint Work Session Page 7 of 17 November 3, 2014 Board's decision if we're forced to do something else you can damn well bet we're not going to be able to keep this tax rate where it's been for the last 8 or 10 years. It seems to me that this is an effort by a community that's saying, well, this is something that might occur, we don't have any proof of it, but it might, so to protect the good of the whole people they're going to say you can't do it. There's too many things going on like that already, a lot of things. The next thing we found out, if we accept a negative vote from the Planning Board and take it to the next step to fight it, then we have to pay the cost of all the attorneys on both sides and another engineering study. Now, what the hell's the sense of that? This is an unelected board that's appointed and they have the power to put us in that position. It doesn't make any sense. It's time for common sense to prevail, I think, and make this happen. We've already let the contract to put the fill in and in prudence we've put it off because who wants to spend $30,000 because some municipality or some agency says we can't build our building? But we don't know what it's going to cost us to renegotiate that contract. I think there's got to be some give here someplace, and I think we've done everything we can. We are just not in the position to take the recommendation of the County to move to a different location. That's just not going to work. Woman in audience - You should see the trees that my husband took out of that creek. The other day he worked and worked and worked. Her Husband - That's the small creek. The big creek is right full of trees up through there. They don't care a thing about that. That stops the water from flowing all the way down stream ....... you go up the stream here and it's all full of trees and everything. That's what makes things flooded, right there. The trees in the big creek, it floods up, and then it comes down across, right down the road because there's no place .... talk about flooded! You should be concerned about cleaning out the creek and that would avoid a lot of flooding right there. Christine Walpole - What are the thoughts of the Town Board? Supervisor Morey - Our thoughts are basically keeping the safety of the McLean Fire District and all the people who live within it. That's number one. I was under the impression that the McLean Fire Department withdrew their application, so we're waiting for another engineering study that somebody needed. As far as 19M concerned, we do have to do our homework, we look at it all together with our council to find out what the avenues are, but speaking only for myself, this is the only solution we have and we're at a catch -twenty-two and we have to do something. Kristina Robinson - At no time were we ever told that the County Highway Superintendent or Highway Engineer needed to review this because we would have provided it. We asked repeatedly, what do we need to do, who do we need to give information to, and that was never relayed to us. So, if that was all we needed to do, we would have done it. Mike Totman - I'll address the withdrawal of the application. We withdrew the application because it was very unclear whether it was going to get a positive vote, and before it could be turned down we withdrew, quite frankly, with the intention of doing this (meeting). We had no other plans of any study. We're studied to death. I did.....for the public because I had numerous calls on this lady who did the article. No, we're not buying additional fire apparatus; she had that in there. I can't remember all she had in there... Joint Work Session Page 8 of 17 November 3, 2014 Kristina Robinson - It was riddled with inaccuracies, we'll just say that. The purpose of the withdrawal was to not be forced to an Article 78, by getting a no vote. We've been transparent from day one on what we are trying to do. We've never had anybody speak up and say, hey, there might be a problem with that. The Town has known about it. The County placed the first four foot plus of fill out there on their own. They did that. We didn't do that. We kind of wanted to come together and say, okay, what do we do now because we don't know what to do short of hiring an attorney to do things for us and that's going to become very expensive for the taxpayers. So, we're hoping that the Town Board can provide a solution that will work that is going to avoid some of those legal costs. Councilperson Gamel - From the first time I heard this, I thought this was a no-brainer. This is a done deal. You put the fill in and it's done. Until, and I don't remember where this came from, that the Town may be responsible for the County bridge if something were to happen. That's where the brakes when on for me because I think this should happen, but if that puts the money back on the Town if something happens to the County bridge, and we might be responsible for the bridge being taken out or for property down stream or upstream. If something happens because of the fill put in, that's where the brakes went on for me, and I said, okay, we've got to make sure that this isn't going to come back on our shoulders if this fill is put in and next spring there is a huge flood and everybody is suing the Town of Groton because your house was damaged because we let them put 2 feet of fill in. That's my only hold-up. If that goes away, it's a yes vote for me immediately. Alton Knapp, Jr. - Floodplain management lies with the municipality. Participation in the National Flood Insurance Program was granted to the Town based upon regulations adopted and hopefully enforced by the municipality. Unfortunately what we've run into for, and I can say for forty years, is that most municipal code enforcement officers, floodplain administrators, do not know what's required for development proposed in the floodplain. The municipality also probably doesn't realize, and the County probably doesn't either, that when you have a County action, bridge, culvert, and it's in the community's floodplain, the community is required to issue a permit and review that action, and if you feel it is beyond your capability to review that, you require the individual or the County agency coming for the permit to provide you with the engineering necessary to provide a sound decision. You get the engineering; you look through it; everything looks good; if you wish, you can hire your own engineer to review that; that's up to the community. When you get done, you approve it. The project goes in. You're protected because you reviewed the project; you had your engineer review their engineer's work; everybody's in agreement. So, you've done due diligence. So, there is really little responsibility on the part of the Town for that particular project. However, when you have a project like a bridge or a culvert or whatever, even stockpiling fill in the floodplain, can have an adverse impact and if that is something that the Town did not approve, yes, you could be held liable for it. If you allow enough of those things and FEMA gets wind of it, they could come in and say you're not enforcing your regulations, you're out of the program, and nobody can buy flood insurance. That's the last thing that you want. Most municipalities don't fully understand their responsibilities. How many of you that are on the Town Board have actually read the flood regulations that the Town adopted, cover to cover? You need to. You need to understand what your responsibilities are. We've been in private business for 20 years, we know what litigation could be. We spent 4 1/2 years on one project. Joint Work Session Page 9 of 17 November 3, 2014 Councilperson Gamel - So, when the bridge went in there, if we didn't approve the County's plan to put the fill in there, does that come back on us? Alton Knapp, Jr. - It could. What should have happened, there should have been an analysis to establish a flood elevation based on natural conditions at that time. That probably wasn't done. I can't say it wasn't because I haven't seen anything that said it was or wasn't. Now we've got fill in there. The best we can do is go in and look at it and say here's the elevation now at current conditions. Alton Knapp, III - And that's what the County is asking the Fire Department to do, something that they should have done when they put the bridge in. So, it seems like that's a little unfair. But it is a municipal responsibility. You guys own your local law. You need to enforce it. Like my Dad said, often times those things, when counties do projects, they think they're exempt. School districts are exactly the same way, they don't think, but they are within the Town, so they have to go by those local laws. That is something you can ask the County to do, provide an analysis for that bridge, show there's no impact. Then we can compare that to the analysis that we have. Is the fill going to be an issue, yes, no, maybe? I say no. So, that's several things that you can do. Alton Knapp, Jr. - Sometimes when you get a bridge like that, that's being done by a county, the State Department of Transportation will do the analysis for you. I don't know if that was the case when this one went in or not, but if it was, it should be available. Ron Space - Was that bridge approved by the Town? Supervisor Morey - No. Ed, was that study done? Ed Marx - I don't have any analysis on it, to be honest with you. I heard earlier that fill that was put in there came from Martha Vann (?) at Cornell. The County didn't do that. Several Fire Department people say no. Ed Marx - Okay, I'm not familiar with the County putting fill in there. Kristina Robinson - The County placed a majority of the fill on that side lot as part of their project for the bridge. Ed Marx - Was it the County or was it the contractor made a side deal with somebody else? I don't know. Kristina Robinson - The contractor on behalf of the County. Ed Marx- Well, I don't know if it was done on behalf of the County. Kristina Robinson - Their contractors. Supervisor Morey - Can you find out for us, Ed? Ed Marx - We can find out..... Mike Totman - I can tell you who to call. The majority of the fill on top of that old building out there, we thought it was great, they came along and said we're going to fill this in because we want to stage out here for the summer. We have pictures of it. That was Suit Kote. They were your 2006 contractor. Then when they did the bridge, they did it again. The County paving came and said, hey, they used your site. We're going to do the same thing and when we're done, whatever we've got left, we're Joint Work Session Page 10 of 17 November 3, 2014 going to smooth off and leave you graded. They probably added, most of it was Suit Kote, but it was probably 3-5 inches left that they graded around from the County paving job. Ron Beck - Can you tell me why the County has not responded to our engineer's letter of August 4th asking for information on this exact question? Ed Marx - We provided the report we got from your engineers to our County Highway folks. The last we've gotten back from them was that that wouldn't be sufficient to evaluate the displacement of water from the fill, not in and of itself. So, we're kind of at the point, I don't know the answer to this at this point. Ron Beck - We've asked for it and we have heard absolutely nothing from your department? Ed Marx - Well, we've made some contacts.... Kristina Robinson - But the letter specifically asked for you to provide certain engineering studies to our consultants, and those have not been provided either. Ron Beck - So, it's a bureaucratic mess, right? Ed Marx - Well, I wouldn't put it that way. We will try to find out, whatever more we can from our Highway Department in terms of any other studies that were done at the time. The information I've heard tonight, this is the first time I've ever heard about the fill being placed in that area at the time those jobs were done. We'll go back and see what we can find out about that. I don't know, I still don't know if that was at County direction, or a side deal made by the contractor. They had fill to get rid of and they may not have even talked to the County about it. Kristina Robinson - The August 4th letter has the fill information in it, so for you to say you didn't get this, it was addressed to you. Ed Marx - What I'm saying is I don't know... Kristina Robinson - But you just said it was the first time you've heard about it. It was in the letter sent months ago. If we'd gotten a response or had any feedback, we might have been able to work with that, but instead we're getting stonewalled. So, from where I'm sitting, we're the one group who has tried to follow the rules; be transparent with the community and all the other boards; follow the floodplain elevation laws; follow the DEC regulations; ask the Town for permits because that's what the floodplain stuff required. We're the only taxing authority that seems to be transparent in doing it, and then we get stonewalled. So, somebody can explain to this group of taxpayers how any of that is right and how we're going to fix it. Mike Totman - We've been jumping through all the hoops and gave them everything that they wanted. We have all that. To be perfectly honest with you when the Town's Planning Board asked us for the Army Corp of Engineers, we kind of said, huh? And when she called the Army Corp of Engineers they said why are you calling us? Some of this was way beyond. Kristina Robinson - And with all due respect, we can provide you with the engineering report and you can tell me that you would vote yes, but based on your zoning ordinance we need site plan from your Planning Board and they're not an elected board. So, that's not giving any guarantees to not spend taxpayers' money on getting this done some other way. Joint Work Session Page 1 1 of 17 November 3, 2014 David Norte - I'd like to know from you guys and from the Town, I've heard some things from the (County) Planning Commission, they don't want it. They don't want it. They've already said they don't want any fill up and down the stream because they feel it's going to flood. A little back history, the Planning Commission had at the same time, a Comprehensive Plan, and it all ties into this same thing. If you read the Comprehensive Plan, the majority of the opinions they are forming on for the Comprehensive Plan for the County are from high school kids. 913 answered their survey, a large majority of which were high school government class. Ed Marx - Not true. Not a majority. David Norte - It says in your Plan you gave to me, a large majority of our government outreach program. So, my question is, I feel we're going to try to push forward, if we're not dealing with something that's realistic as a County, what are we going to do? There's a bigger picture than just a flood for McLean residents. I'm paying taxes. What am I paying taxes for? I have representatives, what do they do for us? Should I just let them all go if they have no real power anymore, if the County's going to decide everything? That's the elephant in the room, not just the floodplain; it's who has the authority. They've already arbitrarily said they just don't want any fill up and down the river. What are you going to do about that? How are you going to hide that? That's the elephant in the room. Christine Walpole - I'd also like that clarified for me, because I couldn't hear Mr. Lane. I think you said that regardless with what the County suggests, our Planning Board of the Town could override that? Ed Marx - That's correct. Our decisions often get over-ridden. Christine Walpole - So, I would like to know what the (Town) Planning Board, what your thoughts are, educational -wise, what homework you've done to deny it. I haven't listened to much of what has come out of the commissioners' meetings. I'm kind of stymied here. I don't understand what your thoughts are and why it is "no". What expertise are you using to decide that? Mike Totman - Or, going on that, where are you on that? Ed Neuhauser - If you want to resubmit it, resubmit it and we'll continue our discussion with you. Mike Totman - We've discussed it three months now, going on four. Ed Neuhauser - Okay. It still needs to be resubmitted. (Several people talking at once.) We have Planning Board meetings to discuss these things. I want to make one other thing clear, the Planning Board will only consider the new building. The Planning Board has nothing at all to do with any existing facilities. Mike Totman - But the new building is the whole project. Ed Neuhauser - That's what we have to review. Kristina Robinson - So, the Town Board, maybe one of the right answers is that you suggest that the District move forward with the fill and the floodplain because there is no permit needed for that, and then we re -apply after the FEMA stuff is complete and we are no longer in the floodplain, if that seems reasonable. Supervisor Morey - It does. Joint Work Session Page 12 of 17 November 3, 2014 Someone asked if that was a contingency of the County review, the floodplain itself. Kristina replied that no, the Town Planning Board had referred to the County for review under Town Law because they are located on a County road. She hoped that if it were no longer in the floodplain then for the County that would mitigate that part of their comment on the project. Someone asked Mr. Marx that if it was submitted to FEMA and taken out of the floodplain, if it would solve the issue for the County. Mr. Marx replied that without looking at anything concrete he could not give an answer on that. Mike Totman - Because if we can get it out of the floodplain and solve all of these problems. We were not in real assurance that if we did that, that we wouldn't still have a problem. That's kind of why we're having this meeting. We could do that, we had that contract all awarded, ready to do that. If that's done and we have FEMA withdraw it, where is the Town Board on that? Bob Walpole said that it would take some time to do that and asked how long it would take the Town to pass a local law to officially recognize the map revision. There was some talk about that by several people. It would require a public hearing and would probably take at least 60 days. Dan Ellis - You would still need to do a site plan. Kristina Robinson - We would still need to do a site plan but at that point the site plan would be strictly for an addition to a building that is no longer in the floodplain. If that would take the County's comments out, if the Town Board is suggesting, that maybe that would be an okay way to go, then we can move forward and mitigate the floodplain stuff that we've got going on our existing property. Then we'll regroup and do our submittal to the Planning Board after we've taken care of that in a different faze. Ed Neuhauser - Okay, but all of it has to come to the Planning Board, and the Planning Board is obliged to give it back to the County to review again because you are revising the plan. Kristina Robinson - No, we withdrew our plan. Ed Neuhauser - Okay, so whatever you submit back to us, whatever minor modifications you have made..... Kristina Robinson - It's going to be a new plan. Ed Neuhauser -.....we will submit it, we have to submit it back to the County. Kristina Robinson - Yes, and it will go back to the County, but at that point it won't be in the floodplain, so the County can make their comments. But the majority of their comments were based on the floodplain and that will no longer be an issue because we won't be in it any more. (Several people talking at once.) Ron Beck - So, do we take that risk that we're going to get approval with this mess that we've gone through? Do we take that risk that we're going to meet approval and go ahead with our plans? We ought to have some more assurance than what we've had so far. So that's where we set, the six of us who are making this decision. Someone asked how many people from the Town Board or Town of Groton make the decisions that affect this community. How many people were there from the Town Joint Work Session Page 13 of 17 November 3, 2014 Board and Planning Board? All of the Town Board was present and four of the seven - member Planning Board were present. So, he said, that's the majority, and they were talking about the super -majority. I feel for you guys from the Town Council because you got caught between the rock and a hard place, but then again, that's why you do what you do. I understand the cautions about liability. As the pastor of the local church, we deal with liabilities and what you can do all the time. However, also knowing that if you are prudent and don't do anything negligent, therefore you look at all of the surveys and make a decision based on your info, you are no longer negligent or can't be held liable of negligence. Plus, it doesn't make sense to me for the Town to look at it from the standpoint that we want to avoid a potential liability lawsuit by inviting a lawsuit. That makes no sense to me in government. And if there is any liability, not one of you is going to pull out your personal checkbook and cover it, we're going to pay for it, all of us. Councilperson Gamel - All of us, including me, because I live in the Town as well. I'm trying to look out for everybody. Same speaker - I understand your position and I appreciate it. However, to avoid a possible, one in a million lawsuit because the lawsuit goes out again by inviting the indefinite lawsuit doesn't make sense. Councilperson Gamel - It never was, in my opinion, no we're not going to do this because there might be a lawsuit down the road, it was more of I want to put the brakes on right now until we find out, to make sure that we're not going to be in that situation. Because if it was going to be a situation where, we're going to put two feet of fill in here and next spring I've got five houses up -stream that are filing lawsuits against the Town, that's all for me. I just want to make sure that's clear because that covers everybody, you, me, everybody in the room who pays taxes. We don't want that to happen. Nobody wants that to happen. I'm sure the Fire Department, the last thing they would want here is to have five house up -stream or down -stream file lawsuits because of something they did. Someone asked Mr. Gamel if something he heard tonight had changed his mind about taking the brakes off and moving ahead. Councilperson Gamel - You don't have to change my mind. If that's out of the floodplain and if that takes us off the chopping block, absolutely for me, but I can only speak for myself. Ron Beck - Well, you are the one who made the comment. If anyone else would like to comment. Has the issue been addressed, either the Town Board or the Planning Board, to your satisfaction, with what you've heard tonight, has it been addressed? Councilperson Gamel - Well, I'd like to hear from our lawyer, if FEMA says you're no longer in the floodplain, and that puts the Planning Board in a place where they no longer have to worry about that, yes, absolutely. Supervisor Morey - Let me assure everybody that the major concern that we have for the safety of the people within the Fire District of McLean. We will look into this. I think the Board is confused because there's been a lot of different stories going around. Now we do understand it and we'll make sure that the Planning Board has all of their questions answered before their next meeting. We're going to talk to our legal council. I guess there are two ways of doing this, either submitting your application as is, or to change the law that we have right now. We have to look and see which one is most advantageous for everybody. Once we do something for one specific area of the Joint Work Session Page 14 of 17 November 3, 2014 Town we always get slammed because it affects everybody in the Town just not the one place. So, we have to be very cautious about what we can do and how we can do this properly and legally. We will get together next month, or the Planning Board this month. I think we should move forward and make sure that it's all right. I assure you that your concern is our concern too. Lee Shurtleff - I think you've got two pieces that need to happen. One is that the County Highway Engineering needs to take the information that was submitted. The letter from the Planning Department came on July 18th and the letter from Knapp was on August 4th, so there's subsequent information that needs to be picked up and reviewed and verified. That's the first step. Second step is if you can take that information and there's an agreement that based on current conditions that there are no problems and it doesn't appear that you've got a threat down -stream, take it to FEMA and get your letter. Then take it to the Town Board and get it out of the floodplain. Looking out here, and what's been done, I don't see any major problems. As far as critical infrastructure goes, yes the fire station is a part of that, but they're building truck bays, storage areas, off to the south. What's critical is this room that we're in right now. That's what makes it a critical facility. You're enhancing that by moving the trucks out of here. I think you've got the space to move forward. From what I hear you've got information, you've got a path to follow. The Town Board has some options. I think that, we talked about the County Mitigation Plan, I think it gives us some reason to go back and look at what we can do throughout this watershed, some mitigation strategies. I think there's some things that can be done, in light of all of this, to look at some retention further up the creek that may also alleviate some of the problems. But I think you've got a path to go forward and I think what I'm hearing from the Town is a willingness to move forward and work with you on it. There may be a couple missing pieces, but you've got engineers to work with subsequent to the County Planning Board decision. Move forward. Everyone seems to be in agreement here that it's the right thing to do. Supervisor Morey - I'd really like to make a request to Ed Marx to get the answers to the August letter and give me a copy as well as the board of the McLean Fire Department. Kristina Robinson - From somebody who has spent a lot of time working on the other side of this, we certainly appreciate what you guys are looking at. And, yes, it is your job to make sure you have an engineering study. That's why we hired a consultant to do this. It wasn't just us trying to put together numbers; we wanted a professional who does this day in and day out. If there is flooding, we're the ones who are going to be there. So, obviously, we don't want to do anything that's going to contribute to the stream flooding and making things any worse than they are. We're trying to be financially responsible for our taxpayers. Mike Totman - We've done everything we can to keep the tax rate down. It hasn't increased in at least five years and maybe better than that. The building addition that we are doing will have no increase on the tax rate. We've already collected that. Bob Walpole - We've put $25,,000 a year aside and we have $126,000 in the building fund as well as.....(?).... Mike Totman - And besides that, we are debt free. We think we've been pretty good stewards with the money of the taxpayers. The problem is, if we don't do this deal, there's going to be drastic increases. There's no question, there's no place in our budget...... you' re talking about buying land, infrastructure, parking, fundraising, the whole bit. We're at the point we have to be here... Joint Work Session Page 15 of 17 November 3, 2014 Alton Knapp, III - I have one question for the Town Board. I wondered if you could clarify one statement that you made in your previous comment, where you wanted to go back and review the entire project and that there was some proposed laws for the Town that you needed to consider. Do you know what those proposed laws are? Supervisor Morey - Not right now. Alton Knapp, III - You don't know what they are? Okay. Someone said that everyone is concerned about the fill, but why wasn't anyone concerned about the two trestles across the creek that are nothing but dams? Several people were talking about that and someone said there were actually three trestles. Someone else said that they thought these had reverted to the original landowners. Alton Kapp, Jr. - We have a case right now where at one time there was a private railroad trestle for a village that went across the stream. When it was no longer a public easement it went back to the landowner. During some high water and some beaver problems some of the wing walls failed and they needed to be fixed. There was no agency that would claim responsibility. So, what happened was that because it started to fail, the landowner had to take remediation action to stabilize that structure, and she paid $50,000 to do that, and it's not a permanent fix. The permanent fix is $100,000. This is a real problem when you get into these things that are turned back to a private landowner. Someone said they thought the creek itself belongs to the State. Alton Knapp, Jr. - I don't know, they were saying it was on private property. Mike Totman - I think it's about the same thing that you're talking about, that it went back to the landowner because the railroad is no longer here. Someone said they were a little confused, a few years ago the County redid the bridge but the State put in the fill? Kristina Robinson - The County contactor put in the fill in order to do the County bridge. The person asked if the State approved it. Kristina Robinson - We don't think anybody approved it. They just raised it four to six feet. The person asked, and nobody cared about that? If we don't do anything now and something happens, then nobody cares, but yet you're doing the right thing and you're going to have to prove it? I don't understand. Alton Knapp, Jr. - Well, that's all part of the non -enforcement. I look at it like this, and I've seen so much of it in forty years, but I can say this without reservation, what happened in the past is in the past. If fill that was put in wasn't analyzed to see if there was an encroachment problem, it's there now, we can't go back and do it now. What we want to do now is take the existing conditions, the fill is there, compare it, include the fill that's proposed, see what we have for a flood elevation and see if there's an impact. You can always have a flood greater than the one percent chance of the hundred year. Look at Binghamton; look at Lourde's Hospital. We were involved in the wall that went around Lourde's Hospital the first time. So, you had levies in the City of Binghamton, because I worked with flood control for a number of years, to protect the City. They didn't work; they over -topped. So, no matter how much protection you take, it can always be exceeded. What you try to do is take a nationally accepted Joint Work Session Page 16 of 17 November 3, 2014 standard and apply that because the flood program never prohibited development in the floodplain. They said you can develop as long as you can meet the standards. This was tested way back in the early 70's in a case in Texas.... First tape ended at this point. Second tape started with someone from the Fire Department speaking..... Member of Fire Department - ..... the Groton Planning Board, and it's been stated that they're going to do their due diligence and defer to the County for their recommendation again. So, when I was reading the County recommendation letter, a few things popped out at me. The major issue was that we were going to build in a floodplain and we had already clearly stated that we were going to prove that we were going to mitigate the floodplain; we were going to take that out of the question. So, toward the bottom of that recommendation, it was noted then that in addition to that, their concern was that taking the building out of the floodplain would impact the bridge. So, one thing that was unclear to me in that aspect was the recommendation was made by the County that by taking us out of the floodplain would affect the bridge, but then I believe our representative from the County said that they would need to have a highway engineer look at our engineering study to determine that. So, was that recommendation made by the County without the engineer looking at it from the highway? Ed Marx - After talking to them, they say that study you provided isn't sufficient to determine what the effects of the offsite.....? .... that's what they said to us. Member of Fire Department - Okay, that's fair. So, my question now is, we're going to reapply; the Planning Board is going to do their due diligence and defer to County, which should be done; and the County's recommendation is going to be based on what our engineers have provided. From what I just heard, the highway engineers looked at our engineering study and already determined that there wasn't sufficient information there, so when this goes through the process again, is that where we're going to be in another month or two months? Ed Marx - I can't say for sure where you'll be. I think we'll make every effort to bring you people together and find out what information is missing, if something is missing and whether it can be provided so we can clarify any uncertainties that we have. And like I said before, it comes to us and it's already out of the floodplain, then there's not much we can ........ (Several people talking all at once.) Member of Fire Department - ......and experts have related to me that the information they provided, from their end, they're saying it's more than sufficient, but the information that you're getting on your end from your engineers is that there's not enough information. So, what I would like to know is if the County could talk to the engineers and say what kind of information can we take to McLean and say your engineers need to provide us this, so that we can look at it and say, based on what they're supposed to do and we agree......... relay what information you need from them. Several people kept talking. Mr. Marx said they are concerned with the safety of the stream. The Member of the Fire Department said that none of them wants to cause harm to anyone else and that is why they have gone to such lengths and are confident that they are not going to be displacing any more water. He feels that the Fire Joint Work Session Page 17 of 17 November 3, 2014 Department has provided all the information that they know how, but at the other end the County is saying they don't have all the information. Fire Chief Carr - Said that he would now like to close the meeting. He thanked everyone for coming. Meeting was closed at 9:20 pm. Respectfully Submitted by April L. Scheffler, RMC Groton Town Clerk