Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAbout03-11-1996MINUTES OF TOWN BOARD MEETING MONDAY, MARCH 11, 1996, AT 7:30 P.M. Those present: Teresa M. Ellard L. Daniel J. Donald N. Fran Casu Absent: Gordon C. Robinson, Supervisor Sovocool, Councilman Carey, Councilman Palmer, Councilman llo, Attorney VanBenschoten, Councilman Also present: Liz Brennan, George Senter, John Pachai, Robert Spaulding Supervisor Robinson apologized for being late. She was at another meeting discussing Main Street. Correction to minutes of February 12th meeting. Attorney Casullo was not present. Moved by Mr. Sovocool, seconded by Mr. Palmer, that the minutes of February 12th be approved as corrected. Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. Mr. Palmer, for the record, I would like to compliment the fact that we did get our agenda and our minutes of last months meeting several days in advance of the meeting which made my job an awful lot easier being able to read through them and prepare for the meeting and I commend the Town Clerk for being able to accomplish that. I hope it helped the rest of the Board Members as much as it helped me. I think any information that I can get ahead of time certainly makes it that much easier for me. If there is any correspondence or anything that we can obtain ahead of time and prepare for the meeting, I think it makes it that much smoother. Claim Nos. 21 to 37 of the Highway Fund in the amount of $10,407.76 and Claim Nos. 39 to 67 of the General Fund in the amount of $21,399.87 were presented for audit. Moved by Mr. Palmer, seconded by Mr. Carey, that the bills be approved for payment. Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. Claim Nos. 36 to 41 of the Special Grant Fund (HUD) in the amount of $24,703.22 were presented for audit. Moved by Mr. Palmer, seconded by Mr. Carey, that the bills be approved for payment. Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. LIZ BRENNAN - BOOKKEEPER - Handed out monthly expenditure and revenue sheets to the Board. The snow account is getting low which should be no surprise to anyone. A copy of the Annual Report is available for the Boards review. Have contacted two different business to perform private audit for the Town. LaVigne, Nolis, Beals, CPA's gave a verbal quote of $3100 and will be available after April 15. Dermody, Burke & Brown did not respond. Ciaschi, Dietershagen quoted $3600. Mr. Palmer asked if Ciaschi, Dietershagen offered 1 to negotiate price and also to incorporate the Town Justice Court in the future. No, they weren't contacted. Do you want me to call more? Maybe if they knew we were looking for lower prices, they would consider lowering their price. Liz said we need a single audit for HUD money. We are supposed to have audit completed within 90 days after annual report. Consensus of the Board was to obtain additional quotes and review at the next Board Meeting. Attorney Casullo said that all quotes should be in writing. ROBERT SPAULDING - TOWN OF CAROLINE - Spoke on some innovative things that are happening in the Town of Caroline. One thing is the Web page for the Town of Caroline which they have been working on for approximately six months. The impetus for doing this thing came from his employer, Cornell University. They are using this type technology as a teaching media. In order to be able to help some of the graduate students develop the teaching tools, Mr. Spaulding had to be able to do it so he figured this would be a wonderful project and he could kill two birds with one stone. He worked on the Town of Caroline's Web Page while he was being of use to other people. He handed out copies of what the opening page would look like -- Snapshot of the Town, Businesses, Churches, Community Calendar, Demographics, Government Officials, History in Brief, Local Laws & Ordinances, Organizations, etc. Town Laws, the IRS, Tax Forms, Highway Laws, etc. are all on the Web. Danby has also gone on the Web. Mr. Spaulding has offered his assistance to Groton to go on the Web. John Pachai has also offered his assistance. He has permission for Municipalities to go through the Cornell Local Government Program. Once the Town gets started through Bob, and we have someone to input info, we can have access to the computer. We could start with office hours of our Town Government and work from there. There is no cost at all to municipalities. Cooperative Extension is trying to promote businesses in the area. One of the things that we want to do is to make this information available to the general residency. We try to update at least semi - annually. We have a community calendar that lists upcoming events. GEORGE SENTER - CODE ENFORCEMENT OFFICER - Building permits issued year -to- date: 1995 1 house 2 mobile homes three other 1996 five other Life Safety Inspections will be completed by the end of April. We will be doing junk car inspections in April. We allow people to have one unlicensed vehicle. If more are observed we write them a letter notifying them of a possible violation and 30 days to take care of it. After that, we send a letter of violation giving them 14 days to take care of. If nothing happens then we take them to court. In 1992 we started out with 150 letters and we're down to about 40 some. Don Palmer would like a copy of the Town's Land Use and Development Code. Colleen will see that he gets a copy. LELAND CORNELIUS - HIGHWAY SUPERINTENDENT - Florida Vacation Supervisor Robinson reported that we had let the Boy Scouts use the Highway Garage for their bottle sale and that they had gotten into a little bit of trouble but nothing too damaging but I reported it to the leaders and they 2 were a little bit upset. In early May the Boy Scouts are going to rake our lawn and plant some marigolds in our gardens out here to kind of repay their mischievous. COLLEEN D. PIERSON - TOWN CLERK /TAX COLLECTOR - Town Clerk's monthly report and Tax Collectors report were reviewed by the Board. Clerk received a letter from Stonehedges Country Club advising us that they intend to renew their summer liquor license for the period April thru October of 1996. No objection from Board. ARLAND L. HEFFRON & ALTON I. ALEXANDER, TOWN JUSTICES - Monthly reports were passed around for Board Members to review. DONALD PALMER - COUNCILMAN - I'd like to first thank the Town and the taxpayers for allowing me to go to the Association of Towns Annual Conference in NYC. It was a very worthwhile experience for me being a first time attendee at it. I got a lot of good information out of several of the sessions. There was one for new board members that I found very helpful on the first day. It was a question and answer about a lot of different issues. It seemed to be hitting pretty heavily on the highway superintendents from a lot of different towns and the problems they were having. It was good to hear a lot of different information being shared and a lot of conclusions that were made. There were lawyers in attendance so they were able to give good straight forward answers. I also sat in on the Highway Superintendents sessions which dealt with a lot of issues that I think should concern us about some of the issues the Highway Superintendents face in terms of sexual harassment, working conditions in the work place and all those issues which I'm sure we are covered in some fashion in terms of policies but the point that came back very strongly is that the Municipality is responsible and the Board is responsible. If there are any infractions we need to be aware of them. Even though we may not directly know of any situation if something surfaces we could be held responsible for them. If there are people who walk through the garage and you've got calendars hanging out there and it's offensive to someone, that could become a major issue. It could come back to haunt us. I brought a lot of information back and I'll pass it on to Colleen and Corney and so on and hope there is some good information that they can get from that. There is good information on audits, retirement plans, pension plans, and funding concerns. Discussed authorizing the Tompkins County Intermunicipal Cable Television Commission to negotiate with Time Warner Cable the renewal of the Town's cable franchise, but reserving to the municipality the rights to modify and approve its own final agreement. Our representative on this commission is Ronald Weins. Sometime ago we authorized the State to handle rate increases. Our Franchise with Time Warner expired June 30, 1994. This Commission has recently been reorganized and has been working on a model franchise for all Town to use in negotiating a new Franchise. 3 RESOLUTION NO. 11 - AUTHORIZE TOMPKINS COUNTY INTERMUNICIPAL CABLE COMMISSION TO NEGOTIATE FRANCHISE AGREEMENT WITH TIME WARNER Moved by Mr. Palmer, seconded by Mr. Sovocool Ayes - Sovocool, Palmer, Carey, Robinson WHEREAS, Town of Groton ( "the Municipality ") is provided cable service by Time Warner Cable; and WHEREAS, the Municipality recognized the advantage of cooperation with other municipalities with regard to cable franchise issues; and WHEREAS, the Tompkins County Intermunicipal Cable Television Commission has been formed pursuant to Article 5 -G of the New York General Municipal Law for the purpose of advising municipalities on matters pertaining to cable television franchising and service, and holding public hearings when and where appropriate, all in order to promote the providing of good cable television service at reasonable rates to the residents of the Town of Groton; and WHEREAS, the Municipality is a member of the Tompkins County Intermunicipal Cable Television Commission; NOW THEREFORE, it is: RESOLVED, that the Municipality does hereby authorize the Tompkins County Intermunicipal Cable Television Commission ( "the Commission ") to negotiate with Time Warner Cable the renewal of the Municipality's cable franchise, including conducting such public hearings as the Commission deems appropriate, reserving however to the Municipality the ultimate approval, disapproval or amendment of the franchise agreement so negotiated; and be it FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Commission is hereby authorized to obtain from Time Warner Cable on behalf of the Municipality such information as the Commission deems appropriate, and this Resolution shall be deemed the specific instruction and direction of the Municipality to Time Warner Cable to provide such information as the Commission, as agent of the Municipality, may request. Supervisor Robinson read the following letter: "Dear Teresa, On behalf of the hamlet of McLean, the Bicentennial Committee would like to 4 extend an invitation to you and the Town of Groton Board to attend our 200th year celebration to be held on July 13 and 14, 1996. The hard working group of volunteers from the Towns od Dryden and Groton that make up the committee are finalizing plans for what we believe will be a very successful celebration. The committee has already held several well attended fund - raising events and more are planned. The committee is seeking the political and financial support of the Town of Groton. It is the hope of the committee that the Town Board will pass a resolution to officially recognize the celebration of McLean's 200th year and take action to provide a grant of $2000.00 to help underwrite the cost of an event that will have a beneficial effect on our community. Sincerely, Linda Foote and Shawn Reese, Committee Chair" Supervisor Robinson said that Dryden gave $2,000. We will have to dig a little to come up with the money. I don't know what it is going to be used for. I do know that they are going all out for this. John Pachai said that they must have some kind of game plan indicating where the money will be spent or they wouldn't have any idea how much to ask for. If the Town is possibly in a pinch to come up with the money that they would like, possibly they could provide some service in addition to some funds to offset the expenses. We can table this until next meeting. We can find out what they are doing. Moved by Mr. Sovocool, seconded by Mr. Palmer, to table until next months meeting McLean Bicentennial Committee's request for funding. Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. Discussed Agreement between the Town of Groton and the Village of Groton for rental of Court Room Facilities. The current rental fee is $300 per month or $3600 per year to be paid annually in December. Board asked if this covered our costs. It has been rumored that the Village thinks this is pretty high. Clerk said that Village phone calls for Code Enforcement Officer come through her office. In addition, the Town furnishes for the Justice Court a photocopy machine and paper, computer paper and ribbons, a modem linking court with Albany which is charged against the Town. What we are looking for is to have this charge cover heat and electric costs. Supervisor Robinson said that we go beyond actually this service. We cooperate with the Village but we just don't brag about it. I just want you to know that this is a reasonable request. RESOLUTION NO. 12 - LEASE AGREEMENT BETWEEN TOWN & VILLAGE OF GROTON FOR USE OF TOWN COURTROOM FACILITIES FOR 1996 Moved by Mr. Sovocool, seconded by Mr. Carey Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson RESOLVED, that the Town Board of the Town of Groton does hereby k, authorize the Supervisor to sign Lease Agreement between the Town of Groton and the Village of Groton for use of Courtroom facilities for the year 1996 at the rate of $300.00 per month. Supervisor Robinson would like authorization to sign Youth Services Agreement between Town, Village and Cornell Cooperative Extension of Tompkins County for 1996 Youth Service programs. The Village and Town split cost 50/50. The Town pays the Village. The Village Clerk does administrative billings and payments. RESOLUTION NO. 13 - 1996 YOUTH SERVICES AGREEMENT BETWEEN TOWN, VILLAGE AND COOPERATIVE EXTENSION Moved by Mr. Carey, seconded by Mr. Sovocool Ayes - Sovocool, Carey, Palmer, Robinson. WHEREAS, the Village of Groton in conjunction with the Town of Groton have established and maintain the Groton Youth Commission for the purpose of insuring and development and availability of youth service programs for the youth of the village and town, and WHEREAS, upon recommendation of the Youth Commission, Extension has been selected as the independent contractor to implement the youth service goals and recommendations developed by the Youth Commission, and IT IS THEREFORE RESOLVED, that the Town Board does hereby authorize the Supervisor to sign Youth Service Agreement between Town, Village and Cooperation Extension. A fax was received regarding a "Notice of Posting" as follows: The Tompkins County Department of Public Works (effective February 23, 1996) has installed 15 Tons Weight Limit signs on Peruville Road, CR107 between Rte. 38 and McLean. The weight limit restrictions are imposed because of pavement breakup and will remain in effect until further notice ". Supervisor Robinson said that the salt trucks coming down 34B are turning right on route 38 and go into Freeville and cross bridge and turn left and go over that road and come into McLean the back way and cross McLean Bridge anyway. Supervisor Robinson received an application for an Abbreviated Consolidation Plan for 1996 US Department of Housing Development Block Grant which Karl Heck was here and explained to us a couple of months ago. He has this already to go. All I need to do is sign it and return it so we are sure of getting our grant. We have to reapply formally. Board Members did not understand chart and what it means. Talking about public facility needs and then there is a priority need level. What do the codes stand for -- page three of the packet. Priority need level -- some have N's and others have L's. Water and sewer needs -- this would have to be in the Town -- if districts were formed. This is different than what we had before. Is he going for the $5,440,000? Is he rating these high priority items that should get immediate attention? This n information was not discussed at a prior meeting. Consensus of the Board was that we needed to get Karl Heck down here to explain what this program is. Because of the time limit on the application, the consensus of the Board was to authorize signing of application with the condition that Karl Heck come to a Board Meeting and explain project to the Board. RESOLUTION NO. 14 - APPROVE APPLICATION FOR AN ABBREVIA CONSOLIDATION PLAN FOR 1996 US DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING DEVELOPMENT BLOCK GRANT Moved by Mr. Carey, seconded by Mr. Palmer Ayes - Sovocool, Palmer, Carey, Robinson RESOLVED, that the Town Board does hereby authorize the Supervisor to sign application for an Abbreviated Consolidation Plan for 1996 US Department of Housing Development Block Grant with the condition that Karl Heck attend our next Board Meeting to explain the program. Supervisor Robinson has a meeting tomorrow with the Cooperative Extension on the Community Link. I don't know what it is about but I think George knows what it is about. John Pachai asked the Board if they would make it official that they would develop a Web page for the Town of Groton just so that it is formally approved. RESOLUTION NO. 15 - SUPPORT CONCEPT OF WEB PAGE Moved by Mr. Palmer, seconded by Mr. Carey Ayes - Sovocool, Palmer, Carey, Robinson RESOLVED, that the Town Board does hereby support the concept of Development of a Web Page for the Town of Groton and, FURTHER RESOLVED, that Bob Spaulding be designated as our lead person with John Pachai being designated as the community link. There being no further business, Mr. Sovocool moved to adjourn meeting, seconded by Mr. Carey, at 9:45PM. Unanimous. Colleen D. Pierson Town Clerk 7