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HomeMy WebLinkAbout6-14-2022TOWN OF GROTON –- MINUTES OF TOWN BOARD MEETING TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2022 AT 7:30 PM Town Officers Present: Town Officers Absent: Also Present: Donald F. Scheffler, Supervisor W. Rick Fritz, Code Official Lee Shurtleff, Legislator Richard Gamel, Councilperson Paul Lang, Town Justice Charles Rankin Brian Klumpp Councilperson Randy Jackson, Town Justice Eric Deforrest, Fire Chief Crystal Young, Councilperson Mack Rankin, Dept. Highway Kevin Conlon, Cortland Standard Sheldon C. Clark, Councilperson Mitch Quine, CS Energy Robin Cargian, Town Clerk Sage Ezell, CS Energy Ellard Keister, Highway Supt. Carl Scheffler Francis Casullo, Attorney Janet Scheffler Julie Graham, Bookkeeper Monica Carey, Planning Board Dan Carey, AG Advisory Comm. The meeting opened at 7:30pm MOVED by Councilperson Gamel, seconded by Councilperson Klumpp, to approve the minutes of the May 10, 2022 Town Board Meeting as submitted. Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler, Motion Passed Charles Rankin & Julie Graham, Bookkeeper – Chuck thanked the board for employing him for the past 11 years and for the experience working with Town Government. The budget adjustment in the General fund is a routine adjustment. The adjustment in the DB fund is done every year as the CHIPs money is brought in but the DA fund adjustment is necessary to create an appropriation account for the salt shed expenses. The board thanked Chuck for his years of service. RESOLUTION #22-043‐ ‐ BUDGET ADJUSTMENT General fund Contingent A1990.4 $200 To- Celebrations Fund A7550.4 $200 MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Gamel Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler, Motion Passed RESOLUTION #22-044‐ ‐ BUDGET ADJUSTMENT Highway Town wide: Appropriation Fund Balance DA911 $22,000 CR. Snow Removal Salt shed DA5142.2 $22,0000 MOVED by Councilperson Young, seconded by Councilperson Clark Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler, Motion Passed RESOLUTION #22-045‐ ‐ BUDGET ADJUSTMENT Highway Part Town: Increase revenues DB3501 $148,749.00 Increase Chips Expenditures DB5112.2 $148,749.00 Town Board Minutes Page 2 June 14, 2022 MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Gamel Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler, Motion Passed RESOLUTION #22-046‐ ‐ APPROVE PAYMENT OF INVOICES WHEREAS, vouchers for Abstract #6 for the Year 2022, numbered 234-286 were reviewed and and audited by the Town Board, be it RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby approves said vouchers with the Total amounts as follows: A GENERAL FUND 25,224.74 B GENERAL FUND PART TOWN 10,080.12 DA HIGHWAY FUND 23,864.92 DB HIGHWAY FUND PART TOWN 64,042.59 SL2- PERUVILLE LIGHTING DISTRICT 81.90 SLl- MCLEAN LIGHTING DISTRICT 145.23 Total 123,439.50 MOVED by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Klumpp Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler, Nays - Resolution Passed Monthly Reports W. Rick Fritz, Code/Fire Enforcement Officer – Submitted a report. Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent –The weather has cooperated, and we have been very busy. The oil and stone project on Sovocool Hill is complete. Despite my best efforts to direct them otherwise, some areas were over sprayed. This situation was not created by our department, and I was able to remain within budget due to Suit Kote providing an extra 1500 gallons of oil to cover the error. Paving is done as well, this also required reworking the project a bit in order to remain within budget. We have started the prep work for the Stevens Rd. culvert. I passed out copies of the application for the road work permit that is pretty close to what other townships in the area are doing. We have had a good example of this in the past couple of weeks with some poles being put in right next to the right of way. The same time you were texting me Brian, was the same time I was meeting with the Jim who is the foreman to move quite a few of them. Some were directly blocking our stop sign. This application will help us in the future to avoid these conflicts. We were fortunate to have caught this when we did because there were planning on hanging wires the next day. The fee of $75 is based off an average of other towns in the area. If you have comments or would like to approve the application and fee, I will move forward with it as it appears it is needed. Councilperson Gamel, Just curious, did they happen to say or do you know what happened with the idea of underground wires? Is it too costly to do instead of placing poles? Town Board Minutes Page 3 June 14, 2022 Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent – I don’t know the answer to that but I certainly like the idea. Trees don’t take them down, you can plow snow wherever you need and not have to avoid any. The problems with these on Davis Rd. is they are right in a very tight wind spot besides being too close to the road and blocking our stop signs. I measured some that turned out to be just shy of 16’ from the center line. Their foreman and I plan to go over where the engineers have put stakes. No one has ever worked with us before on this and it is a great example of why this is needed. I have talked with other highway superintendents working with Time Warner that created a $50,000 repair bill to a brand new oil and stone road that they tracked up. I would be more than happy to get Fran a copy to review before you decide. The mowing tractor should be coming in about two weeks. The new trailer is working out wonderful and we have sold the old one. MOTION #22-047‐ ‐ APPROVE HIGHWAY ROAD WORK PERMIT APPLICATION MOVED by Councilperson Gamel, seconded by Councilperson Klumpp to proceed with the Town of Groton road work application and fee set at $75 subject to the review of the security deposit amount from the Attorney for the Town. Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Robin Cargian RMC, Town Clerk & Tax Collector – You have my report which has the longer version, but the short version is I updated the website. I attended Tax Collector’s Conference where we were updated on the exemptions that are headed to the Governor’s desk to sign. One example is the Volunteer Fireman and Ambulance worker’s exemption will be available across the state and that rate is capped at 10%. These will require an opt in or opt out by the board. I also found out the State is issuing checks based on your annual income from 2020 and is a percentage of your star exemption from the 2021 school year. This was passed and is happening now if your income was under $250,000. Something that passed in 2020, was put off by covid, then applied this year. If you are seriously delinquent on your taxes you will lose your star exemption. If that happened and you are able to pay, then you will have to reapply to the State which will then be a credit. Councilperson Young as Representative to Joint Youth Program- Chris Dempsey met with us and gave information to what insurances we would need to manage the programs and comply. Jennifer will draft a letter and packet for the coaches, which will detail the expectations. They will meet again at the end of June to bring in the coaches. Eric DeForrest, Groton Fire Chief ‐ We are at 381 ambulance calls and 94 fire calls. Last month we participated with the school in the DWI/DUI mock crash which is a great program to reach out to the kids and seemed successful as to implications of driving while impaired. We had great member turn out, at least 13 members took the day off of work to help. We will be going up to the elementary school on the 17th for the field days and spray the kids down with water. Fireworks are on for Friday July 1st, at the elementary school with the rain date of July 8th. We have 7 kids signed up for Kids Camp so far on July 11- 13th. Last year the Honor Society Students helped us out in corralling the kids so we have reached out to them this year as well. We have a couple new members that have started their training and have signed up for classes. The next project will be Olde Home Days Planning. Town Board Minutes Page 4 June 14, 2022 Discussion and action on Salt Shed: Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent - We had previously agreed after we had the plans for the shed from the engineer, the highway department would build the concrete floor and walls for another company to bid on constructing the remainder, basically a pole barn construction on top of those walls. From my understanding there is a new concern that we would be liable should the work be inconsistent with drawings and who will review that work. We have not talked to anyone about concrete prices from a contractor and would assume they would get it from the same place we would anyway. How is the board feeling, would you like us to continue as planned or should we be seeking a bid for the whole project? Councilperson Gamel,- Did we ever get a quote on the whole thing or was it always planned that the highway department would handle the site work and concrete? Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- No. It has always been planned we would handle the floor and concrete walls. The attorney will need to write up the bid packet with the floor and walls or not. It doesn’t make any difference to me as we have plenty of road work that we can do. Councilperson Gamel- Do we need to get bids? Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- It will cost over the policy limit of $20,000. Likely the same contractor would like to bid on the whole project as we would not be able to compare the bids legally if it is for half the project. The contractor may subcontract that portion out but that would be included in the whole package. Councilperson Gamel,- Can you do a double bid and separate it into two parts? Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- Is that something that is legal to do? Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – When I was asked to draw the bid specs I was under the assumption that the highway department was going to do the earth work and the concrete. When you do an invitation to bid there must something called a scope of work. This is where you will need some technical help. Whatever the earth work is being done by the highway, then the concrete work, which is also being done by the highway department, that will stay out of the scope of work to the bidders. However, if that work is going to be done by the highway department first, someone is going to have to make sure the earth work and concrete work is done to engineered specifications. Also included in the scope of work will need to be a technical description of the building in the narrative. Mr. Elwyn also brought up, who will be responsible for the latches and how it is secured. The successful bidder will not be responsible for the building of or the installation of the brackets and will need to be stated in the bid. Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- We will be building the brackets. They will just be building a pole barn off of those. Which was always understood. Councilperson Gamel,- Would the engineer who did the drawings, run the scope of the work? Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- We have all the specification for the concrete right now. The engineer suggested having a company come in and inspect the rebar before you pour. We have also gone over the fabrication of the brackets with him, feasibly building them better and will have them galvanize Town Board Minutes Page 5 June 14, 2022 dipped. Regardless of whether someone else does the concrete work or we do it, someone else will use the brackets we have built. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – What I am saying is all of that scope of the work will need to be included in the bid packet so the successful bidder is not responsible for the earth work, not responsible for the brackets, not responsible for the concrete work. A description of that needs to be included. Councilperson Gamel,- Could the Engineer provide you with the technical language you need? Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- I am trying to get bids from concrete companies right now, to help finish that aspect of the walls and get some vibration onto the floor to make sure there is no honeycomb. I am confident we are going to be fine with that. If you decide to get prices on the whole project, I am fine with that as well Councilperson Gamel,- I agree and would like to see a company come in just to make sure there isn’t any honeycomb because that does set us back. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – I also suggest a pre bid conference like we did for the roof, we need somebody here with some knowledge to be able to answer questions, so they know what they are responsible for. If that is what is happening, I am sure there are contractors who can do what you are saying we just need to be able to include verbally what they are expected to do and what we don’t expect them to do. I think the verbiage would be best coming from someone who has more technical knowledge. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – It would be great to make sure everyone is getting the same information. Ellard Keister, Highway Superintendent- I have been in contact back and forth with the engineer on the design of those and that is why we are ahead with buying the steel. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – So, the consensus is to go ahead with this then? Various statements of approval from the board to go full speed ahead. Yellow Barn Solar: Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – I have two maps for you, one with a broad outline and one zoomed in with more details of panel placement and property lines. The last time we spoke was just before we submitted the request to NYSERDA, they just made their announcement a few weeks ago that we were successful, so we are full speed ahead with the public engagement process. In terms of updates, there are no additional parcels to the area you were shown before. The acreage of areas we are expected to use is just about 800 acres based upon webinars we have been seeing we attempted to shrink our footprint. In turns of ballpark numbers, we are still talking about 1000 acres project total Groton and Lansing. The split between Groton and Lansing, 200 Acres of fence line in Lansing and 600 acres in Groton. Based on previous discussion we had with you, in terms of using forest versus open field, and scrub area we have pulled away from forested areas to include less than 100 acres. We had a consultant look at the wetland areas which lined up with the forested areas and have avoided those. There still may be some tweaks in the lines that are provided as some information has not come in from the same consultant. Town Board Minutes Page 6 June 14, 2022 Now that we have received the award from NYSERDA we want to enter into the permitting process which includes all of the public engagement with the towns and residents. Someone printed out the multi-page overview of the ORES (Office of Renewable Energy Siting) process for hand outs which talks about the coordination meeting and requirements for that. We are hopeful we can get that meeting within the next few weeks or sometime this month to stay on track. Right now, we are looking at getting our application in right around the end of the year which gives us sufficient amount of time to get feedback from boards, planning boards and the public to try and tweak the project as best we can regarding setbacks etcetera. We wanted to be here to address any questions you may have on this or the ORES process that we can answer. Councilperson Klumpp -How many landowners within the Town of Groton have you signed with? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – I think it is 10. Councilperson Klumpp - How long does the State approval process take? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – From the time that we submit the application, from there they have a 60 day window to determine if the application is complete and I believe it is a year from there is what we expect. Supervisor Scheffler – Will you set up the public meetings or are we going to have to set them up, what will be the process? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – We would be happy to set them up ourselves, we would love the cooperation from the Town Board for getting the message out. As there are two towns involved, we thought it would be best to host them ourselves and invite people from both towns, so we are not having to send people from Groton to the Lansing Town Hall and Lansing people to the Groton Town Hall. We will probably rent a space locally and host those. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – What I have suggested to Don Scheffler, yesterday I had a discussion with the Lansing Town attorney and we both agreed that it is probably the time now for both Supervisors to meet with the Supervisor from Lansing to discuss some parameters and how they want to do it. I think that will be within the next week or two where they meet to get together on some things. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – It would be great to make sure everyone is getting the same information. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – I think that is the key to make sure we are getting as much information out to the public as possible. Councilperson Clark – How do you answer the question as to what happens to these panels once they have reached the end of their life span, what is it 20 years? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - 20-30 years is the standard expectation, right now we are fully expecting there is a panel recycling industry that is getting started up in the United States and growing. I know of at least one company in New York, in the Binghamton area that is doing battery and solar recycling. Our expectation will be when these modules get pulled from the system that they will be going to some recycling plant like that. Town Board Minutes Page 7 June 14, 2022 Councilperson Gamel – That is 20 -30 years down the road, and if you remember when everything went to recycling, we were told everything will get recycled. Now every commercial on TV tells us only 9% of the plastic gets recycled even if it goes to the recycling plant. So, what is going to really happened 20 – 30 years from now? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - I think the difference is for the solar modules, there are some plastic in them, but they are made up of pretty marketable materials. I can’t speak to what the market of copper, silver and silicon will be in 20 years but the intent and understanding and goal will be to recycle those materials back into the economy. Councilperson Clark – Will you replace them? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - No, as far as we are concerned this is a project with a specific useful life 25 or 30 years. Councilperson Gamel – What is your lease time with the landowners? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - We can go out to a maximum of 40 years. Councilperson Gamel – So it is a 20-year lease with the option of extending it? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - Yes. Councilperson Clark – What will you do with the brackets, wiring, poles when you are done? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – It all gets pulled out either by a contractor hired by the system who owns it at that time, or a contractor that is hired by the towns using the money that has been set aside for that project. Councilperson Gamel – Who establishes that decommissioning contract? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – We post the security, and the decommissioning plan fund is reviewed and agreed upon by the ORES process. Councilperson Gamel – Do we have any control on that contract? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – You will absolutely have the opportunity to review and provide comments and ideally… Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – I think what they are asking Mitch is, would they have the final say? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – No. The State would have the final say on the decommissioning plan approval which is the case with most of the ORES process. The ORES process comes with a lot of hang ups, our goal is to try and work closely with the towns to work through those hang ups as much as possible before the ORES has to weigh in on anything. We have negotiated decommissioning agreements with towns before on smaller projects, outside of the ORES process and have been successful with that. We Town Board Minutes Page 8 June 14, 2022 typically will hire an engineer to review our estimate and the town will hire an engineer to review that estimate. Or they do their own and we will discuss and make sure concerns are handled. Councilperson Gamel – My concern, right now, it costs twice as much to build a house as it did five years ago. It is very difficult to put a dollar amount on something that far in the future. I would rather have something that says, at the end of this process, this stuff is going to go away. I don’t care about a dollar figure, I don’t care how much it’s going to cost you or another owner at that point, I just want to make sure that it is in there that whatever has to happen, is going to happen. Is that something you do? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – Absolutely, the way the bond and the way the decommissioning plans will all be written at the end of the project life, the reason for the bond is if at the end of the project life, if the owner has gone bankrupt or defaulted or not available for whatever reason that bond is held there by a much more financially stable company. The last case scenario. Councilperson Gamel – Put yourself in our position. I don’t think that last case scenario is that much of a last case scenario. 20 years from now, if I am the company that owns it and I think it’s going to cost twice as much as it did, I wash my hands of it and that puts it back on us. The onus is on us to come up with money to finish off the decommissioning process, yes with the funds that were put in that contract, but we have come up with the funds beyond that. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar- The way we traditionally deal with that is we place it in the permit annually with the bond that the estimate needs to refresh every so often whether it be every two or three years or five years. An engineer has to redo the estimate or else the bond is invalid. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – Correct me if I am wrong, with the bond, isn’t there a certain period of time that the bond has to be reviewed to make sure it is keeping up with the marketplace? Councilperson Gamel- Who takes care of that bond if they sell it a year from now, is the new owner responsible for keeping up with that bond? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar- The bond would be in the name of the project company. If the project changes hands that bond is still tied to whoever is owning the project. Now in the event, say at the five year mark, that bond needs to be refreshed and whoever that company is at the time, refuses to refresh it, that would be a violation of the permit and therefore the bond would be five years out of date at that point in terms of the number but the bond at that point, could be used to decommission the project if the project was in violation of the permit. It would never be twenty years out of date it would only be at most whatever number was agreed upon. Fran Casullo, Attorney for the Town – I think there are a lot of issues that need to be addressed and understood. The public needs to have direct knowledge to understand this. As this project will be joint, in Lansing and Groton, the time has come to where we need to speak with Lansing to find out if we are on the same page. Supervisor Scheffler – I agree it would be in everyone’s best interest to meet. Are there any more questions? Councilperson Gamel- Based on the size of your grid how many New York homes annually will this system power? Town Board Minutes Page 9 June 14, 2022 Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar- We are estimating right now, a little over 32,000. Supervisor Scheffler – So, three quarters of Tomkins County homes. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – It is certainly a significant impact, significant project with its positive sides which that energy is one of them but we are trying to take seriously the impacts of the other side of that as well. Councilperson Klumpp - How many solar projects of this size, or even half of this size have been constructed south of Rockland County? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – No projects of this size have been constructed in New York. Councilperson Klumpp – Even half this size? Or even a third of this size. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – The largest single project that has been constructed to date is an eighth of this size. A 20MW utility scale in Washington county. Councilperson Gamel -Your company or any company? I thought one of the maps you sent us had this fifth on the list? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar -That may have been projects approved by NYSERDA not yet constructed. There are some other projects that are amalgamation of a few smaller projects that are a little bit larger. One in Jefferson County that is…. Councilperson Gamel – I thought there were some up near Buffalo that were a couple of 320 – 350mw. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – Those are all under development still, not yet constructed. As far as I know the first projects that are similar in size, above a hundred megawatts will be going under construction sometime later this year or early next year. This program that NYSERDA does projects through, has only started in 2017 and the permitting process, interconnection process takes quite a long time. The bigger the project, the longer it takes. Councilperson Klumpp – Are you familiar with what projects are in the works? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – At a high level, I don’t know everyone off the top of my head, but I try to keep up with…. Councilperson Klumpp - How many large-scale projects are in the works for Long Island, Rockland County, South of Rockland County? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – Of this scale? None. Land Availability is… Councilperson Klumpp - So for most of the State Level legislatures that are promoting this level of green energy, they are not from districts that have these solar arrays going in? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – That would probably be true. I don’t know the numbers but yes. That is a complicated issue because obviously those downstate counties are using a lot of the electricity these Town Board Minutes Page 10 June 14, 2022 projects are creating but by the same token, they were also using a lot of the electricity that the natural gas plants or hydro were creating that are were also located upstate. Councilperson Klumpp - I am not asking you to defend it I was just making a very valid point. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – I don’t disagree with you. I think there are unfortunate realities of making these projects viable that make it easier to build them upstate than downstate. Councilperson Gamel – Are there any future plans to start thinking about, as I have said before, there are Lowes, Home Depot in every town across the state and doing rooftop solar instead of taking farmland or forested land? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – Rooftop solar is a really important piece of the mix of the State’s goals of trying to get to 70% by 2030. In terms of the dollar per dollar efficiency and trying to get the green energy on the grid, that this is the most efficient for rate payers of New York. Rooftop solar is more expensive than ground mount solar. Councilperson Gamel – I believe in the words of your company, it’s really not about cost as much as it is about the environment right? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - I don’t think I follow you. Councilperson Gamel - It’s about getting green energy, not about the cost of it. If it costs a little more to put it on a rooftop, rather than take forest land or farmland, isn’t the point to have green energy as opposed to fossil fuels? Isn’t that your whole goal? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – It is certainly one of my goals. Councilperson Gamel – It’s really not about the consumer then, it’s about the company putting it in. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - I do not set the incentives that NYSERDA does. There are states that have much stronger incentives for parking lot solar and rooftop solar. There are a lot of those incentives in place for smaller scale solar in New York. The goals that the State has set and the amount of generation that is needed can’t be accomplished through those means alone. These utility scale projects are part of the mix that needs to happen in order to make the switch. I think that’s the impetus behind it. I don’t mean to belittle it at all….. Councilperson Gamel – We have some agriculture utilitarian’s here in the audience that I know are here for that very reason because they hate to see good crop land or good forest land taken for clean energy. It is kind of an oxymoron to clear cut forest to put in green energy. It makes no sense to me at all and that is why I would push for rooftop. NY City has lots of rooftops. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – If I were making changes at the state level, I would try to do the same. We all have our rolls to play. While utility scale projects like this are impactful and while they do obviously create all of these impacts that we are discussing tonight, they are still the best bang for your buck in getting this power onto the grid. Town Board Minutes Page 11 June 14, 2022 Councilperson Young – You also said there would be an opportunity for community agreements to be able to negotiate and assist the community with things that they may need. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - Absolutely, over the course of the projects lifetime, we would expect a minimum of 15 to 20 million dollars of payments of the combination of property taxes and agreements between the County, School district and Towns. In terms of that money, some of that is already allocated hopefully to the pilots itself, that portion that can be allocated to the community host agreements for specific projects that the town has in mind. In one instance we worked with a town to provide them funds and our construction labor and equipment to erect a park within the town. There is a lot of flexibility to work with the town on those items. Councilperson Klumpp - What is the black hatched area on the map? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - That would be areas that the landowner did not wish us to build upon. They wanted to keep for future wood lot or was better for their tenant farmer. Councilperson Klumpp – Is there a stormwater plan? Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar - We don’t have that yet, that will be part of the ORES application submission. The town will have the opportunity to review that prior to the submission but we don’t have that yet. Mitch Quine, Yellow Barn Solar – We will look out for the coordination from Don or Fran after you have had the opportunity to speak with Lansing and look forward to the next steps. If it’s ok I will leave a sign up sheet for a newsletter for people who would like to do that. RESOLUTION #22-048‐ STANDARD WORK DAY AND REPORTING RESOLUTION FOR THE TOWN CLERK AND HIGHWAY SUPERINTENDENT WHEREAS, The Town Board of the Town of Groton has audited the record of activities for the Highway Superintendent and Town Clerk and, WHEREAS, it is the finding of the Town Board that both positions meet the retirement standards of a 8 hour workday, Be hereby RESOLVED, the Town Board of the Town of Groton declares that the Highway Superintendent and Town Clerk positions qualify as 8 hour per workday for the purposes of New York State Retirement. Motion by Supervisor Scheffler, seconded by Councilperson Gamel, Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Town Board Minutes Page 12 June 14, 2022 Title Standard Work Day Name Social Security # NYSLRS ID: X if Tier 1 Current Term Begins & Ends Record of Activities Result X If Record Not Submitted Elected Officials Town Clerk 8 Robin Cargian 9624 9624 1/1/2022 12/31/2025 21.66 Highway Superintendent 8 Ellard Keister 9624 9624 1/1/2022 – 12/31/2025 27.71 Cintas Contract: Supervisor Scheffler – The matt/rug cleaning contract is up and we have been offered a contract for 60 months. While the price has gone down, I did not want to sign this without board approval as we have previously had bad experiences doing that. Councilperson Klumpp – Didn’t we decide we would do just one-year contracts? I’m all for doing just one year. Councilperson Gamel – Tell them we want one year at a time and we want that price. Councilperson Young - You can ask but by next year, the price will be different. MOTION #22-049‐ ‐APPROVE SUPERVISOR TO SIGN CINTAS CONTRACT IF NEGOTIATED TO A ONE YEAR EXPIRATION. MOVED by Councilperson Gamel, seconded by Councilperson Clark, to approve the Supervisor sign the Cintas contract for rug cleaning contract subject to negotiating it to a one-year contract. Ayes - Clark, Young, Klumpp, Gamel, Scheffler Nays - Resolution Passed Privilege of the Floor: No one wished to speak. Announcements: • Zoning Board of Appeals Meeting, Wednesday, June 15, 2022 at 7:00 pm • Planning Board Meeting, Thursday, June 16, 2022 at 7:30 pm • Primary Day is June 28, 2022 • Special Elections August 23, 2022 to fill a vacant Congressional Seat • Fire Camp is July 11-13th. • Fireworks are July 1st and the rain date is July 8th. There being no further business, Councilperson Gamel moved to adjourn, seconded by Councilperson Clark, at 8:45 pm. Unanimous. Robin Cargian, RMC Town Clerk/Tax Collector