Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutTB Minutes 1990-03-22 TOWN OF ITHACA SPECIAL TOWN BOARD MEE'T'ING March 22 , 1990 At a Special Meeting of the Town Board of the Town of Ithaca , Tompkins County , New York , held at the Town Hall , 126 East Seneca Street , Ithaca , New York , on the 22nd day of March , 1990 , there were : PRESENT : Shirley Raffensperger , Supervisor John Whitcomb , Councilman Patricia Leary , Councilwoman Karl Niklas , Councilman Catherine Valentino , Councilwoman ABSENT : David Klein , Councilman Frank Liguori , Councilman ALSO PRESENT : Richard Ruswick , Town Attorney John Ozolins , Highway Superintendent PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE The Supervisor led the assemblage in the Pledge of Allegiance . SPECIAL LEGISLATION Supervisor Raffensperger stated that Daniel Walker has been recommended by the unanimous vote of the Personnel Committee , however , due to the fact that Mr . Walker did not live in the Town of Ithaca it would be necessary to request special legislation to exempt the residency requirement . RESOLUTION NO . 80 Motion by Councilman Niklas ; seconded by Councilwoman Valentino , RESOLVED , that the Town Board of the Town of Ithaca hereby authorize the Town Supervisor to request that special state legislation be introduced to add the Town of Ithaca to the list of municipalities exempted from the residency requirements for Town Engineers contain in Section 23 of the Town Law . ( Raffensperger , Whitcomb , Niklas and Valentino voting Aye . Nays none ) . APPOINTMENT OF TOWN ENGINEER RESOLUTION NO . 81 Motion by Councilman Niklas ; seconded by Councilman Whitcomb , RESOLVED , that the Town Board of the Town of Ithaca appoints Daniel Walker as interim Town Engineer as of April 9 , 1990 at an annual salary of $44 , 000 . l Town Board Minutes 2 March 22 , 1990 (Raffensperger , Whitccmb , Niklas and Valentino voting Aye . Nays none ) . ESTABLISBN= OF REGULAR SAVINGS ACCOUNTS FOR DEVELOPMENT REVIEW ESCROW Supervisor Raffensperger remarked that there was an additional agenda item , that being the authorization to Tompkins County Trust Company regarding establishment of regular savings accounts for development review escrow . She went on to say that what they intend to do on this is to have regular savings accounts which will be interest bearing set for all those escrow accounts that exceed $ 1 , 000 . All those less will be put in a non-interest bearing account and will not receive interest on the basis that the stun is small enough not to justify the administration of it and that smaller ones usually take a shorter amount of time so that the amount of interest that would accumulate would not be substantial . Councilwoman Valentino asked if this was legal ? Supervisor Raffensperger replied that as far as she knew this was legal . She stated that the Town Attorney had discussed this with the Board earlier . Councilman Whitcomb asked if there would be a separate account for each developer over $ 1 , 000 and one account for all other developers under $ 1 , 0007 Supervisor Raffensperger replied , that is right . Councilman Niklas asked if the minimum dollar amount should be included in the resolution just to make it for the record that it is $ 1 , 000 ,. Attorney :Ruswick replied that his understanding of the resolution was not so much to set up the system for the escrow accounts but to give the bank the authorization to open up the accounts . Councilman Niklas remarked that the resolution says that the payment of interest is justified , he asked to whom? You could read it that the interest could be paid to the Town or the interest could be paid to the account in who ' s name the account is listed . Supervisor Raffensperger suggested the words " to the applicant " be added . Councilworan Valentino asked about double checking the legality of the lesser escrow accounts not being interest bearing . She stated that she thought that in New York State all escrow accounts had to be interest bearing . Attorney Ruswick stated that he did not know , however , all escrow accounts in their office were not interest bearing . Supervisor_ Raffensperger reassured Councilwoman Valentino that she would cheek on the interest question but she felt they already had . She went on to say that as long as it is not in an interest bearing account and we . are not getting interest from their money , we are okay . RESOLUTIO14 N0 , 82 Motion by Supervisor Raffensperger , seconded by Councilman Niklas , Town Board Minutes 3 March 22 , 1990 WHEREAS , the Town of Ithaca has revised the Zoning Ordinance such that escrow deposits will be required for certain development applications to pay for the cost of review , and WHEREAS , the Town of Ithaca finds need to establish separate regular savings accounts for escrow deposits of substantial size such that payment of interest to the applicants is justified , and WHEREAS , the Town of Ithaca will control all such deposited escrow until such time as the various monies are used to reimburse the Town or are refunded to the applicant , NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED , that 1 ) The Tompkins County Trust Company is hereby given general authorization to establish regular savings accounts from time to time upon notice from the Town of Ithaca . Such accounts will be opened by the various employees who carry out the Town ' s accounting functions . 2 ) The title to be used on all such accounts shall be "Town of Ithaca , as escrow agent for (name of applicant) " . 3 ) Each such account will be accompanied by the appropriate bank signature card which will include the account title as stated above , signatures of Town employees authorized to transact such accounts , and the applicant ' s taxpayer identification number , in addition to other information required on the card . 4 ) The Town of Ithaca will obtain signed permission fron applicants to use their taxpayer identification number on such accounts in order to properly report interest income to the U . S . Internal Revenue Service . (Raffensperger , Whitcomb , Niklas and Valentino voting Aye . Nays none ) . CLEAN UP Supervisor Raffensperger stated that when the weather got nice last week and into the beginning of this week we have had approximately 30 calls from Town residents asking us if we are going to have a Spring Clean-up . We can no longer do what we have done in some past years and that is pick up old refrigerators and anything our men can lift , etc . , as the County will not permit us to do this , So what it comes down to is yard waste , leaves and brush . Last year we had a leaf and brush pick up for the Town . This is a very expensive kind of operation and the Highway Superintendent does not feel he has time to do it and she wanted to discuss it with the Town Board briefly as to what kind of guidelines we might employ here as to whether or not it is necessary . Highway Superintendent John Ozolins stated that as far as the clean up of brush , he stated that he had several objections to it . First , is the time involved because you don ' t know what quantity you are going to have out there . Comparing the Spring to the Fall , the Spring is where you really need to start building up your momentum especially the way he had the work plan scheduled in that starting either the first or second of May or at the latest the seventh of May he planned to start paving . The reason for that is that he is using the County paver and we can save $ 1 , 000 a day from actually having to rent the paver . There are certain preparations that have to be done on the roads before paving plus taking care of some of the problems that have come up over the winter . In the Fall or early Winter he has the lions share of that done . Also , Town Board Minutes 4 March 22 , 1990 you never know what the weather is going to be . He went on to say that he has to get the culvert under West Haven Road replaced . Also , he had a sweeper reserved for two weeks to sweep the Town roads and while he had the equipment he planned on cleaning out as many catch basins as possible . There are other culverts that also need replacing if time permits . Councilman Niklas asked what the estimated cost would be , if the Town were to do it ? Highway Superintendent Ozolins replied that last fall it took about a week and a half to two weeks , there were some days on and off . Plus an average of about two hours , crew overtime . At this time the Highway crew rate , per hour , is about $ 130 an hour , that is regular time . Overtime is one and one-half times that . Councilman Niklas remarked that if people want to get rid of biological. stuff they should compost it . Supervisor Raffensperger replied that she had suggested that to somebody last Fall and she did not care to relay the comments made about that suggestion . She wondered if it would be possible to have a kind of compromise and if there are people who feel they have no oilier way to get rid of their brush , etc . , can they bring it to the Highway Barn and can we compost it down there? Highway Superintendent Ozolins replied , the brush is generally not a problem . We can have a brush pile and when it rains they could take care of it so he had no problem with people bring brush . The leaves he had a problem with because the people who bring leaves are going to have to bring them in plastic bags or scene type of bags . It took us two to three days just to cut open bags and dump them out and throw out the plastic bags . We had about three full dump truck loads with the sides full of bags and that took a lot of time to empty that out . It will take a lot of time to empty the bags and this was the only way he could see for people to get their leaves to the Highway Barn . He went on to say that the other concern he had was space . What we mulched up still has to set so he would have to find another area to dump these leaves , it may not be much but again there may be a lot , he did not know and he was running out of space . Councilman Niklas asked the Highway Superintendent if he could think of a compromise . Highway Superintendent Ozolins replied , if we could possibly get dumpsters in the park sites , they could bring their leaves there and dump them into the dumpsters . Supervisor Raffensperger asked , and then what would you do with them? Mr . Ozolins replied , leave them in there as long as possible . Councilwoman Valentino remarked that she could see another problem that we would have with dumpsters in the parks because people would start using them for trash . She asked , is there a place where people can take them now? Highway Superintendent Ozolins replied , you can take the leaves and the brush to the County dump . They have a separate area for composting and it costs nothing . Councilman Niklas questioned the possibility of letting the people know that it would cost them tax dollars and there is a free service at the County landfill . Town Board Minutes 5 March 22 , 1990 Councilman Whitcomb suggested something be put in the Newsletter about the free service available at the County landfill . Supervisor Raffensperger stated that a fall pick up , she felt , was really necessary and perhaps people could store them until Fall . Highway Superintendent Ozolins remarked that they went through almost three dumpsters full of just plastic bags . He felt that biodegradable bags should be used . We should think about how to get the bags to the people , either they could buy them or the Town could sell. them . Councilwoman Leary came in at this time . 1989 YEAR END ADJUSTMENT - PER AUDITORS Assistant Budget Officer Linda Nobles stated that several are related to the over expenditure in Capital Projects . The auditors would prefer that we took the interest earned on any Capital Projects money , put it into Debt Service and then from Debt Service into the Operating Funds and then the Operating Funds had to cover the overage anyway . It ' s just a long way around . RESOLUTION NO . 83 Motion by Councilman Niklas ; seconded by Councilman Whitcomb , RESOLVED , that the Town Board of the Town of Ithaca hereby authorize the following 1989 Year End Adjustments - per the auditors : DEBIT CREDIT WATER .. F350 Water Rents F2140 Metered Water Rec ' ble $ 18 , 449 . 69 Sales $ 18 , 449 . 69 To Adjust Town ' s Records to SCLIWC Rec ' ble Bals , SEWER G360 Sewer Rents G2120 Sewer Rec ' ble $ 21424 . 48 Rents $ 2 , 424948 To Adjust Town ' s Records to SCLIWC Rec ' ble Bals , DEBT SERVICE V391 Due from V2401 Interest Cap . Proj . $ 35 , 192 . 88 income $ 35 , 192988 To Reclassify Money Earned from Borrowing/ Investments to Debt Service to be used to Payoff Debt , CAPITAL PROJECTS H2401 Interest H630 Due to Debt Income $ 35 , 192 . 88 Service $ 35 , 192988 To Reclassify Money Earned from Borrowing/ Investments to Debt Service to be used to Payoff Debt , RESULTING 1990 ADJUSTMENTS SEWER G391 Loan to Water $ 81931998 G202 Cash $ 81931 . 98 Town Board Minutes 6 March 22 , 1990 G9901 . 9 to Cap . Proj . $ 26 , 260 . 90 G202 Cash $ 26 , 260990 WATER F202 Cash F630 Due to $ 8 , 931 . 98 Sewer $ 81931 . 98 F9901 . 9 to F202 Cash Cap . Proj . $ 81931998 $ 81931 . 98 CAPITAL PROJECTS H202 Cash H5032 From $ 35 , 192 . 88 Water & Sewer $ 35 , 192 . 88 (Raffensperger , Whitcomb , Leary , Niklas and Valentino Voting Aye . Nays - none ) . ADJOURNMETIT The meeting was duly adjourned . wn Clerk