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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2021-06-08TOWN OF GROTON - MINUTES OF TOWN BOARD MEETING TUESDAY, JUNE 8, 2021 AT 7:30 PNI THE TOWN HALL, 101 CONGER BOULEVARD Town Officer.~ Present: Donald T. Scheffler, Supervisor Richard Camel, Councilperson Crystal Young, Councilperson Brian Klumpp, Councilperson April L. Scheffler, Town Clerk Charles Rankin, Bookkeeper Francis Casullo, Attorney Town Offcen- Absent: .Also Present: Sheldon C. Clark, Councilperson Ben Nelson Michael Perkins, Highway Supt Ellard Keister XV. Rick Fritz, Code Official Robin Cargian Jahn Dorman, Town Justice Mitch Quint Supervisor Scheffler - Before we start, I have a letter from PERMA that reads, " Congratulations! In the Inst completed calendar year, you had no workers* compensation claims. Please find enclosed a cel-tificate ofachieyement.'* I'd like to personally thank all our employees, the Highway Department, the Clerks Office, the Court, and Cade Office. It*s amazing and everybody is dedicated to safety and doing a great job. Thank you very much. MOVED by Councilperson Gamel, seconded by Councilperson Klumpp, to approve the minutes of the N9av 11, -10-11 Town Board N9eetin(I as presented. :fives - Young, Klumpp, Camel, Scheffler RESOLUTION 921-037 - APPROVE PAYMENT OF INVOICES MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Young WHEREAS, vouchers for :abstract ##6 for the Year 1-01-1, numbered 23i - 1-84 were reviewed and audited by the Town Board, be it RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby approves said vouchers for the accounts and in the total amounts as follows: trip hind TMaffir Jy 13 (;1:NFR-\l IIt:r\-.ti 11aWF Ti»VIt WSAI4 .1-I.rc1.r:`I'I.h�1yl'11c Tatal- 0 .dyes - Young, Klumpp, Gomel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Torun Board Minutes Page 2 Jame 8, 2021 Monthly Reports: Charles Rankin, Bookkeeper - Submitted monthly reports for the Board's review and requested a budget transfer. RESOLUTION #21-038 - 2021 BUDGET ADJUSTMENT MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Young RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby approves the following 2021 Budget Adjustment: General Fund, Town Wide: From: Contingency, A1990.4 ....................$50.00 To: Buildings, Alarm System, A1620.41 ..... 50.00 Ayes - Young, Mumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed W. Rick Fritz, Code/Fire Enforcement Officer — Was not present but had submitted monthly reports for the Board's review. Michael Perkins, Highway Superintendent - Was not present but had submitted monthly reports for the Board's review. April L. Scheffler, RMC, Town Clerk/Tax Collector - Submitted monthly reports for the Board's review and had nothing else to report. Francis Casullo, Attorney for the Town - Had nothing to report. John J. Norman, Town Justice - Were not present. Councilperson Crystal Young as Representative to Joint Youth Program — Summer sports are underway and doing well. Jennifer is doing a great job and making sure things are running smoothly. Ben Nelson, Fire Chief - Several things going on. We're still working on hiring a daytime ambulance driver. Some applications are in for that and we're working with the Village on filling that position, I'm hoping very soon. The rest of the membership has stepped up very admirably and I can't commend their efforts enough; they've done an awesome job. I have a paramedic that's going to be going out with back surgery, so other paramedics are stepping up and the volunteers are stepping up. It's been huge over there. Our new ambulance has arrived. We're working on switching over from the old one to the new one. The radio guys were there for 8 hours today. Then we have to license and register it and get hold of the State Department of Health so they can inspect it. I submitted a fireworks permit with the office for our fireworks on July 2nd Everything should be good to go on that and then I'll send the permit to the fireworks company. It's July 2"d at dark, and it is a Friday night. I believe Jen is coordinating something with the concert series too. There is not a rain date for this. I just came from a meeting where we were setting up for our Junior Firefighting Camp. We have 70 kids signed up for our 3 -day camp July 12, 13 and 14. If you're interested, stop on down. There's going to be lots of water, everyone's going to get wet, and everyone loves it. We shortened it up but are looking to pack a lot of good things into 3 days. Torun Board Minutes Page 3 Jame 8, 2021 Lastly, we will be doing something for Olde Home Days. Other than that, we are still looking for a tanker, but not trying to rush anything. Councilperson Klumpp - Any movement on the fire station? Charles Rankin - We did have a concept where we were looking at Fire Department in one building and then another of having the fire station and the clerk and the police on sort of a campus. That came back with the cost being approximately the same. Ben Nelson - So, not much happening. RESOLUTION #21-039 - WAIVE FEE FOR FIRE DEPARTMENT FIREWORKS PERMIT MOVED by Councilperson Gamel, seconded by Councilperson Klumpp RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby waives the fee for the fireworks permit for the Groton Fire Department's fireworks on July 2, 2021. Ayes - Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Mitch Quine, CS Energy - (Gave handouts to the Board.) You may remember me from when I was here in October. At that time, we were in very early stages of development for a project that will be located in a combination of the Town Lansing and the Town of Groton, called the Yellow Barn Solar Project. At that time, we were planning to bid into the NYSERDA annual certification for the year 2020. But as you remember, there was a lot of uncertainty in 2020, so we elected to hold back on the bid process that year and work out a few things that were important for the project's success. In the meantime, we've been continuing our development efforts. We've been working with landowners in Lansing and Groton to pursue lease and option agreements. We are about 75% of the way through that process and feel very confident that we will be wrapping that up this summer. With that, the next NYSERDA RFP is open this year and we are planning to bid into that in August. There have also been a number of changes at the State level. Last year we discussed that for projects this size we thought there would be local involvement. In March the State finalized their regulations for projects over 25 megawatts, which this project will be, and so we now have some clear guidance on what they're looking for and what that process is going to look like. So, our plan is to work, over the coming months, hiring environmental consultants to study our project area. We'll be working with towns to discuss concerns, set -backs, landscaping, all of the things we need to do to gain support of the project. Our hope is to submit our application to the State permitting process next year after we've had time to take care of some of those issues and put together a detailed design. The purpose of my being here tonight is to just re-engage and present a little bit of our timeline and our plan and we're hoping that we can cooperate with the Town as best we can. I know that there are a lot of mixed feelings about the State process and the fact that the application goes through the State office, but our intent is to work as closely with both towns throughout the process and make sure we are developing something that's going to be acceptable and beneficial to everybody in both towns. With that, I did give you a couple of handouts. One is just a quick thing talking about the company and some specifics of this project including what we expect for acreage and timeline. The second handout is a very, very rough map showing kind of the bounds of the lands that we are currently investigating. Obviously, that map covers a lot of land and I want to be clear that not all of that is going to be involved. We're targeting primarily a mix of farmland and forestland. Where we're targeting farmland, we're Torun Board Minutes Page 4 Jame 8, 2021 trying to target marginal or less productive farmland and most important, we are targeting land that is going to be visible to the fewest number of people as possible. So, where you see that map, there's going to be multiple small arrays spread throughout in ways that are going to be effectively sited. Not all of the details are laid out at this point. Councilperson Gamel asked what the total acreage was of the green area shown on the map. Mr. Quine - That green area is 5000 acres. Councilperson Gamel - So you're looking at 1/5 of this land to be covered with solar arrays? Mr. Quine - Just about. Councilperson Gamel - And you're taking trees down to do this, the wooded areas? Mr. Quine - Yes, so we find that trying to balance the impacts to ag land and impacts to forest lands is going to be more beneficial. There will be some tree clearing. Councilperson Gamel - Can I just ask, say for example, there are hundreds, probably thousands of buildings in the area that have roofs, every one of them. What is the downside? Is it just too costly to put them on a roof as opposed to taking up good farmland and woodland? Mr. Quine - So, the bottom line is yes. Building on rooftops in order to, this project participates in the wholesale market, so we're competing with natural gas generators, we're competing with a lot of big, bulky generators. The cost to build on rooftops is just prohibitive for that type of thing. It's a different type of project. If you had something like a high power purchase agreement with some of the building owners or some of the residences, a rooftop system could be feasible for that kind of situation, but for these types of systems where you sell on the wholesale market, the large scale, ground mounted, is the only really viable...?.. Supervisor Scheffler - This green on the map, is this what you've already leased? Mr. Quine - The land that we have signed up is about 75% of what we think we need and is within that green area and there is also some that we're negotiating for in that area. Councilperson Gamel - So if they're leasing 1,000 acres for solar arrays in there, they've got 750 acres of it already leased. Supervisor Scheffler - So this isn't specific to where it actually is? Mr. Quine - No, it's more general. We were hoping to just show you the general area. Councilperson Klumpp - How are property taxes calculated? Mr. Quine - As part of the regulations that were passed as part of the (State) budget, they will be calculated on the discounted cashflow method. The Office of Tax and Finance should be releasing a model at some point and that will create a model for assessment of these projects. And our hope, because this is a long-term project with long-term fixed revenues, we would hope to pursue a PILOT agreement, some sort of reasonable tax payment in a fixed manner. So, the assessment would be based on that State model or something similar to it. Councilperson Gamel asked how the assessment on a solar farm would compare to the assessment on a house and Mr. Quine was unable to answer that question, saying there was a lot of discrepancy across the State on how solar arrays are being assessed. Councilperson Klumpp asked why there is such a discrepancy. Mr. Quine said that other states that have had solar for longer, have established the discounted cashflow method or income capitalization method, more commonly. But in New York, some assessors are using those methods, others are using construction cost methods, and other methods. Torun Board Minutes Page 5 Jame 8, 2021 Supervisor Scheffler - Isn't sort of rude or insulting to people who have been here forever, that they don't have anything to say about their assessment or taxes and they're living on a broken income, and you get a deal with the State where you have a fixed assessment? They are gambling and you aren't. People have brought this up to me, so that's why I'm asking. Mr. Quine - I think there are a lot for industries and commercial business in which the State has guidance for how to assess those and make the assessment reasonable. I recognize that there is a desire, and I think a reasonable desire, for home -rule around the assessment of these projects, and I think as part of that, it could be taken in an insulting way. Part of what we try to do as developers, in recognition of that, is to negotiate a host community agreement, because the Town is the community that is having the impact from it. So, we try to work with the Town to negotiate a host community agreement so that regardless with whatever the assessment comes in as or whatever the PILOT agreement comes in at, there's a host community agreement placed with the Town so that they are covered for their portion. We can negotiate that. We have a lot of flexibility in the host community agreement; whether that's a long-term payment to the Town; whether it's a payment that goes into a fund; whatever we want to do. There is also a small bill credit that gets applied for the first 10 years of the project for any residents. It's not huge but maybe ten to thirty bucks a year. I really appreciate your time. We'll plan to be here more often going forward as this plan develops. We are definitely eager, as we start to get a clearer sense of what this may look like, we're eager to get early feedback on that to make sure that we're not submitting something... (cannot hear him on the tape recording)... the earlier we can discuss, we have much more flexibility to compromise, and shift things, and move things. That's our goal. We're looking at probably a full year from now for submitting an application, but we want to get as much local feedback as we can. That's our goal. Councilperson Gamel - My early feedback is to move this green line all the way over to Lansing and keep it over there. That's my early feedback. Mr. Quine - I appreciate that. Discussion took place on where the town line actually was on the map that Mr. Quine had provided. Far more of the general area is in Groton. 60% to 80% will be in Groton depending on who opts into a lease and who doesn't. 1,000 acres of land will be impacted within the 5,000 acres shown on the map. Councilperson Gamel - My personal opinion: they're unsightly. I look at your brochure and it makes me sick to my stomach to see crop land and wooded land disrupted for these hideous solar panels. I'm sorry, that's the profession you've chosen, and I'm sure you would have a few choice words about my as well. But it breaks my heart to see this in our town. When I see things like "actively managing view shed" you're trying to keep it from as many, hide it from as much residential as you can, but I live in the country because that's where I want to live. I don't want to be in a residential area. So, by putting it out there to get it away from the masses, it's not okay with me. I think this is premature that you guys are doing this before ..... if it's about saving the earth and being green and energy efficient, then the extra cost of putting it on every Walmart in the country, or every Lowes or every whatever, shouldn't be an issue. You're getting tax breaks for this to begin with, take it somewhere where we're not going to see it; put it up on top of those roofs; save the farmland; save the forest. I think it's kind of hypocritical that we're taking down forestland and farmland to save the earth. Councilperson Young - Yes, to put up metal. What is between those panels? Mr. Quine - So, they'll be planted with local grasses and... Councilperson Young - I heard there are toxins in between the glass in the panels Torun Board Minutes Page 6 Jame 8, 2021 Mr. Quine - They are silicon panels. There's a lot of old data out there about cadmium panels. These are very safe. Obviously, it's an electrical system, so you don't want to break it up and bury it. But they're rigorously tested, there's no chance of leaching. In order to test these, they crush them up and put them in an acid bath. They're perfectly safe. You may have heard something about cadmium..... Attorney Casullo - The State's made the rules. Yellow Barn has to follow them and so do we. The Town doesn't have much say. I think what we need to do, whether we personally like or not, it's something that we're going to have to deal with and go from there. I understand some of the positions of the Board members, however, we didn't make the rules, but we have to abide by the rules. Councilperson Klumpp - So we have to follow the rules. Maybe 15% of the Town is going to be affected by this project and we have nothing to say about it? Attorney Casullo - You're going to have some say. They're going to have to talk about a host agreement. I'm assuming you're going to have some kind of bond for if these things ever have to be taken down. The State has made some decisions. Councilperson Klumpp - I think a good analogy might be the vote on the school budget where we can vote yes or no on the school budget, but if the residents of the school district vote it down, there's still a significant budget there. We get to vote on a small part of something that's very big. I get the feeling that we're not going to have much say in this other than we get an extra $3.00 on a $10,000.00 deal. Attorney Casullo - There's going to be some room for the Town to have some say, however, at the end of the day, whether I like it, Crystal likes it, Rick likes it, whoever, the State has made some guidelines that we have to follow. I will help you along with that. Councilperson Klumpp - Are there a number of towns that are in the same boat we are, that aren't very happy about it? Attorney Casullo - I'll tell you, I won't name the town, but there was a meeting a few weeks ago in which their lawyer said, look solar is coming, the State has spoken, to some degree, you've got to... Councilperson Klumpp - Yes, but the portion of the State that spoke is downstate. And like Rick said, it would be nice if downstate, who wants all these solar farms, would put those arrays on their buildings down there. Attorney Casullo - I'm not trying to argue with you. Councilperson Klumpp - No, I'm not arguing with you, I just want it said. Attorney Casullo - I understand the frustration, but I'm here sometimes to give you the good news and also the news that you don't like. We're going to have to address it. There are issues that the Town will have a say in: bonds and the host agreement. I would hope that Yellow Barn would work with the Town to make it as esthetically pleasing as possible; take into consideration all different issues. But from the looks of it, it's going to be a 70/30 split with what is in the Town. Councilperson Klumpp - There must be some serious environmental impacts. Crystal mentioned wildlife. There's also wetlands there. There are a number of things this is going to impact and I think there is avenue for us to push back. Attorney Casullo - What's your understanding on the SEQR review? Mr. Quine - So, the ORES review will supersede the SEQR review. With that said, all of reviews and some others that we would normally be doing in preparation of a SEQR application, we will Torun Board Minutes Page 7 Jame 8, 2021 also be doing and we will have the DEC involved at the same rate or more so than for SEQR. Ag and Markets is involved and SHPO is involved... Councilperson Klumpp - I saw the solar array over towards Walmart, on Stupke Road. They didn't have to do any stormwater management plan on that. The people who were in here before with an application said that they're not disturbing the soil, just pounding in stakes. I looked at that site and they didn't have any silt fence up in that entire 10 -acre piece, or more, there was no erosion control or sediment pond or anything. They just went in there and did it. I can't believe the DEC ... if that had been a land developer putting in 25 homes, that project would have been stopped on day one. It seems like if they say we want solar arrays, then here we go. Mr. Quine - I can't speak to that project, but I can tell you that we actually anticipate having to provide a SWIFT (?) and we'll be installing everywhere that's necessary, all the things that are required. Every solar site that I work on, we've silt fence up, we've got hay bales, we've got silt sock ....... I'll say, I do think the industry has changed so much, so fast, especially in New York. As projects are getting bigger, bigger, bigger, I think there has been potentially some disagreements on how things should apply to certain things versus others. I don't think you're wrong, but our project will hold up from our end. Supervisor Scheffler - I know we spoke on the phone about the Town permit and you say you're not going to get a Town permit. What that does, it would tell us exactly where this is going to be, not 1/5th of this big circle. I look at this and believe it or not, I live right there. I know these property owners and a lot of them say there's no flipping way there is ever going to be a solar farm on my farm. So, I know this isn't all going to be solar farm. If I knew where it was going to be and where it isn't going to be, that would go a long way to mitigate how people feel about it. So far, we don't know where this is going; what road it's going to be on; maybe it's totally hidden for all I know. If you filled out our permit, I know you don't have to, but you still could. If you did that and we had the maps and knew where the properties were where it is going, that would go a long way to answer questions or bring up questions. Mr. Quine - Like I said, I know it's not much and there's not a lot you can base off of this. So, I'm not sure, off the top of my head, what the Town's permit process is, but we'd be happy to entertain that kind of process where we fill out all the application materials that are needed for the Town and have a more detailed layout. We're still working on that and it's not ready to go yet. But if that is the way that we feel the Town would be more comfortable in looking at this and providing feedback on it, I'm trying to be as flexible as we can. We do recognize this. Obviously, I get my directives from higher up, but part of my job is to try to make this as smooth as possible. If we can find avenues to make you happy, we're happy to work with the local agency. The Board thanked Mr. Quine for coming. Councilperson Young asked where his company was located and he said that the headquarters were in New Jersey. RESOLUTION #21-040 - SET PAY RATE FOR NEW HIGHWAY EMPLOYEE MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Gamel WHEREAS, Tyler Murray has been hired for the position of Laborer in the Highway Department, be it RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby sets the rate of pay at $17.00 per hour. Ayes - Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Torun Board Minutes Page 8 Jame 8, 2021 Supervisor Scheffler said that there were grants available for salt sheds and asked for a consensus from the Board that we should explore possible grants, which the Board agreed to. Supervisor Scheffler said that the Court Office was considering replacing a color printer/copier/fax machine and wanted to know what the Board thought of leasing a replacement. The Board discussed it briefly but did not come to any conclusions. Prii,ilege of the Floor: Ellard Keister - Mike didn't make it in, but I'll give you a little update on what's going on in the Highway Department. We did start our paving project today. We got our first road done out of two. Our smaller one did run over, but I feel it was improperly quoted. It was going to be just a once-over and the whole road needed a shim and a top -coat. So, I changed that before we even started the paving job because we're not going to just do a mediocre job on a road. We're going to make sure they're done right the first time. That did go about 100 tons over. Roughly, from what I figured out on the tickets, Suit-Kote kind of had a mess with their tickets today, but we're on top of our stuff around here, so we keep good track of it anyways. We're going to be starting Sovocool Hill Road tomorrow morning, first thing. Luckily, last week we were able to get a grinder in because we needed to grind out the Village portion so we didn't run all the water into the residential houses at the foot of the hill. The happened last week and we're on track to start that pavement tomorrow. That hill will be closed down for the next day or two. I usually contact the bus garage before all of it happens. So, everything is on track right now. I did want to bring up one other thing that just happened. I haven't seen the paperwork because I haven't seen Ben since 6 o'clock until now, but he got the paperwork and we talked about that truck we are redoing, the one we bought the new box for. I mentioned before about not just coming inhere with a wire wheel and a grinder but putting a little more into it right now and get it done right. So, we have a quote to get it sandblasted and painted, not with Rust-Oleum, but a nice, treated paint that should last on this truck for a while. The quote altogether is $3,000.00 for both the sandblasting and the paint. We do think it's well worth it for the longevity of that truck. We're not trying to make this truck last just 2 more years, but a lot longer than that. I asked last week for a tentative date and we're looking at the end of June before we can get the truck in, but this needs to get done before Ben can get further along in the process. (The Board agreed that this sounded logical.) Other than that, everything is going on track like it should. We've got a great operation. The new employee has been here two days and I can already tell it's going to be an excellent fit. He's a great working individual; good knowledge of machinery and equipment; and I think it's going to be a very nice transition. Two weeks ago, I sat through a phone conference with the County, some other municipalities, and the State. The State, believe it or not, is looking for advice on how to plow snow, because must be their engineers who can tell you how to plow snow but have never done it, are getting confused with the salt output. They are trying to cut back on their salt output and we are going to see that trickle down in the future to us. It's starting right now in the Adirondacks, because they have all rock up there so the soil is not taking in any salt, there is no filtration, and it's all going right into the lakes. I believe it's specifically Lake George and there's a huge impact with salt running in there. So, they're looking at ways to conserve. We had a nice round -table discussion for a little over an hour and forty minutes long. It was very informational for everybody. I asked for some information on what other people did. They're looking to do that more often. Believe it or not, they take from us smaller people who actually do plow snow and we do it with a logical budget, and take some of our ideas that they've never heard of before. So, this working with the County and the State and everybody else is going smoothly and we're looking forward to that in the future, because like I said, this is going to trickle down to us. We will have to pay attention to that with the salt shed too. This run-off is a big deal. Our big leg up is that we can do all self -containment for our run-off and I think that's what we should do with our salt shed. We Torun Board Minutes Page 9 Jame 8, 2021 do have a major waterway here and we need to keep the salt out of it and not going to Owasco Lake, and then on the other side we deal with the Cayuga Lake watershed. Discussion took place about possible grants to build the salt shed. Mr. Keister said that he had changed the plans a little from the original plan and had received a quote for Baker Miller as well as an estimate for concrete. However, prices are escalating at this time. Announcements: Planning Board Meeting, June 17 at 7:30 pm Zoning Board of Appeals Meeting, June 16, at 7:00 pm Fireworks, July 2 at dark There being no further business, Councilperson Gamel moved to adjourn, seconded by Councilperson Young, at 8:29 pm. Unanimous. April L. Scheffler, RMC Town Clerk