HomeMy WebLinkAboutCB Minutes 2015-12-03 Town of Ithaca Conservation Board (CB)
December 3, 2015, 5:30 p.m.
Final Minutes
Members present: James Hamilton - Vice Chairperson, Eva Hoffmann, Jon Meigs, M. Elizabeth
Sanders and Ellie Stewart— Chairperson.
Staff: Michael Smith, Senior Planner.
Guests: Mara Alper and Lima Hossain, from Ithaca College, Will Van Dyke, who is a possible
new CB member, a student from Ithaca College, and a high school student.
1. Persons to be heard: None
2. Members' Concerns: It was noted that we did not have a quorum for the meeting.
3. Chairperson and Coordinator Reports:
Chairperson: None.
Coordinator, Mike Smith: Mike reported on Planning Board (PB) reviews.
a. The Amabel project got a State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR), but questions
remained about storm water management, so no final approval was given.
b. The Crown Castle cell tower provided additional information about its application and it will
be on the PB agenda for Jan 5, 2016. There are no detailed changes, but the tower will be 5
feet higher. Balloons set up to show the height of the tower could not be seen, because trees
around the site are high enough to hide it. James suggested that hemlocks instead of cedars be
used for plantings around the tower. He reported that Mark Whitmore at Cornell would like to
see that happen to be able to test predators of Hemlock Wooly Adelgids.
c. Mike reported that the tree inventory project has now received a final grant contract so the
work can be started. Two local firms will be doing it. An arborist will identify all the trees
along Town roads. The other firm will record the numbers of different trees and check on
their health in parks and preserves. There will be a lot of GPS information and a public
presentation of the results will follow.
d. There will be a public presentation of the Route 96B pedestrian corridor study (from the City
line to King Road) at 6:30 PM on Tuesday Dec. 8, 2015.
e. The Codes and Ordinances Committee (COC) is working on a new solar law for the Town. It
will be expanded from the existing law, having more categories with different standards.
4. Approval of minutes from November 5, 2015: There were no minutes available.
5. Presentation of findings on three tiered pricing for the Bolton Point water system: Lima
Hossain from Ithaca College presented information from her study (see the attached document
provided by Ms. Hossain and shown at the meeting). She found that the Town has an incentive to
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change its rate structure for water consumption. It now uses a two tier system, but the CB has
suggested a three tier one. Ms. Hossain looked at the Town of Ithaca, the Town and Village of
Lansing and the Village of Cayuga Heights for her study. Ithaca College is the largest water user
in the Town of Ithaca.
She talked about price elasticity, meaning how would demand change if prices do. (See the
attachment for detailed information.) She found that Bolton Point can increase its revenue if it
changes prices. A 4% increase in price can lead to a 10% increase in revenue.
Ms. Hossain only looked at residential use of water. She asked: how could one affect commercial
users? What is the real cost compared to the rates charged? Real estate or census web sites could
provide information about household size, consumption etc. She suggested arranging a meeting
with town of Ithaca officials before having a meeting with all those of the Bolton Point system as
a whole. Jon suggested it would be useful to project information into the future assuming that the
population would grow. Ms. Hossain will be away from February to May 2016.
6. Continue discussion of deer management efforts in the Town and County: Disappointment
was expressed that the White Paper about deer management, which we prepared for the Town
Board (TB) at that board's request quite a while ago, has not led to any action. Mike S. suggested
that the CB might have some more useful informal discussions and interactions with the TB at one
of its monthly Study Sessions, rather than by sending another resolution (draft resolution attached)
about deer management to the TB. The sessions involve discussions with various town officials
and would allow CB members to be more engaged with different members of the TB and its
committees.
A suggestion was made that the CB follow up on the White Paper by sending a brief letter with
that document and Cornell information about deer attached and request a meeting at a Study
Session to present them and other information we have accumulated over the years. We agreed to
look at when and how to do that at our January meeting. Jon volunteered to write such a letter.
A question came up about what happens to dead deer. It was mentioned that now it has been
discovered that ticks and deer carry other diseases than Lyme disease.
7. Discuss goats as an environmentally friendly weed and invasive species control: There was a
brief discussion on this topic. We agreed to continue it at another meeting.
8. Regular Reports and Updates:
Environmental Review Committee (Ellie): No report.
Scenic Resources Committee (Eva): No report.
Communications Committee (Elizabeth): There was a discussion on the usefulness of the Town's
newsletter as a vehicle for information from the CB. Until a couple of years ago hard copies of
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the newsletter were sent out by mail twice a year to all Town households. It was then changed to
be delivered electronically, with some who requested it continuing to get it by regular mail. We
were astonished to learn that currently only less than 200 households get this newsletter (180 get it
electronically), compared to about 3,000 before the change in delivery system. The newsletter is
available at the Town's Web site, but it's unclear how many households read it there.
Tompkins Counter (Vladimir): No report.
Six Mile Creek Volunteer Monitoring Pro_gram (James): James reported that a synoptic water
sampling for chemical and bacterial analysis was done by the group in 13 places yesterday. Three
of the 4 Benthic Macroinvertebrate (BMI) samples taken last summer have been analyzed and
showed little to no "impact"; some of the impact may be due to a drought in the watershed. One
site in Slaterville Springs has interesting invertebrates, but they have not been analyzed yet. The
signs are that Six Mile Creek is a really healthy creek. Fall Creek has more organic matter. They
have two new volunteers and their BMI specialist, Adrianna Hirtler, is back. She hosts a BMI
identifying session, "Thursday Night at the Lab," from 4:30 to 7:30 weekly at CSI's Langmuir lab.
City of Ithaca Natural Areas Commission (Jon): The park area at Ithaca Falls is being redone with
the addition of paths to and from it. A single sidewalk will be built to be accessible according to
the Americans with Disabilities Act(ADA) with an appropriate railing. There is a
recommendation to search for a nicer looking rail option than the standard highway guard rail
type.
Cornell Plantations Natural Areas Academy (James): James reported that the Cornell University
Plantations officials are trying to re-brand themselves. Enough people object to the name's
implications of slavery and other issues. The program's volunteers have been weeding the north
shore of Beebe Lake to get rid of invasive buckthorn, honeysuckle, privet, multiflora rose,
Japanese, and Norway Maple . They use glyphosate in approved ways.
9. Other Business: No scheduled business was done since we didn't have a quorum.
Mike updated the board on changes that will occur at the beginning of 2016. Supervisor Herb
Engman retires at the end of December and Bill Goodman will be the new Supervisor. There will
be a new TB member, Pam Bleiwas.
10. Review 2015 Work Goals/Discuss January A eg nda
11. Adjournment: The meeting was adjourned at 7:34 PM.
Respectfully submitted by Eva Hoffmann
Attachment: LimaH_Poster.pdf
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+ 1W Price Elasticity of Demand for Water in the Town of Ithaca
IT' H,ACA Lima Hossain ., Mathematics - Economics, 2017
COLLEGE Stephen Younger,, Scholar in Residence,, Economics
Summer 2015
This project was supported in part by the Summer Scholars Program , School of Humanities and Sciences, Ithaca College
Abstract Fixed- Effects Regression : The estimators indicate that water is an inelastic
The Town of Ithaca Water Conservation Board expressed interest commodity for all of the municipalities including
in changing the current waterprice s stem to encoura e water `�� � �� ���` � ,��I� d, � rr��rai� + � �� � time -�- ethe Town of Ithaca . For the town of Ithacag g Y g
conservation efforts of the town without compromising the � � demand is responsive to the price, which is
revenue of the local water plant, Bolton Point. By taking seasonal Alternative Regression : beneficial for water conservation efforts but
changes, price changes and change of water usage into account I inelastic, which is beneficial for the revenue of
analyze how price changes would affect water usage and Bolton I nqt,p 80 + g, Inp + mu n�� + � f� �► quartet , -� �!� #k * yeark + e Bolton Point.
Point's revenue. The method used to calculate this is through a COnCIU51On
fixed effect regression on a panel of five municipalities over 28 Results The results of this study coincide with similar
quarters in which the municipalities have changed their prices at The following table shows the price elasticity estimations with studies indicating that a price increase will lower
different times and by different amounts. This estimate indicates adjustments to the regression equation described in the methods demand and but also raise revenue which is
that water is an inelastic commodity for the Town of Ithaca . For section . The last two regression models include corrections for auto- beneficial for Bolton Point. The next steps of this
the town of Ithaca, demand is responsive to the price, which is correlation and outliers that may skew the data . study would be to acquire individual household
beneficial for water conservation efforts but inelastic, which is demographics such as income and consumption
beneficial for the revenue of Bolton Point. Varaable (1) (2) �3� �a�
In(price) -0.565 4.539 -0s23 -0s03 to observe how individual demand shifts with
Literature Review and Methods 4uarter u std error 0.223 a ag iza �� 0.172 price changes. This would then be used to
In order to compare theprice elasticit estimate of water demand z -o.o13 -a.o13 -o.o27 determine a three-tier price system that the
p y 3 0,116 0.116 0.1M Water Conservation Board for the Town of Ithaca
in similar studies, I have taken a close look at the Epsey, Epsey and a o. o.� o.o�g
Shaw meta-analysis ( 1997) . This meta-analysis is the foundation Years/ aeg ss is interested in . In order to do so Bolton Point has
2009 0,1043 0.041, 0,024,
to agree to provide the information described and
that many studies have taken into account when studying price zoo o.o�s o.o�b o.o5s
implications on water demand . Zoll 0,173 0.169 0,1a0, Willing to change their current price system .
2012 0.191 0.168 0.167
2013 0.199 0.189 0182
60 SR Range: A.03 to -2.23 2014 0187 o.iso 0.169 Acknowledgements
S.R. Median_ -01.38
tjSa LR Range: .o.,0to _3.33 Constant 15.511 1,5.988 15.557 15.590 Special thanks to Mara Alper for initiating my
GR Medi*n• -o.esa First Order Autocorrelation Coeffecient 0.049
40 R-Square 0.049 0,056 0.056 0.072 curiosity in this project; Stephen Younger for
1 1 30 Model descriptions. Notes: 1/ Lefit•aut values of dummy variables are 'Town of' Lansing, quarter i, and 2008.
guiding me through the research process, The
.� 20, r
(1) Includes flixedeffects for municipality and time perod Summer Scholars Program for giving me the
yoo. : (2) Includes fixed effects for municipality and quarterly and yea�iydumm�ies opportunity to conduct the study; Lastly, Bolton
Q � (3) Includes correction for within-municipality aut�orre�ation
11 o- ...........
0t , .4021.5 4) 26m .0so 4► si ,a .075 .076 to -Lao ».o (4) Inlcudescorrection for within-municipalityautlie�s Point for providing the data needed to conduct
'Esdm*ftd Prke ElasOcity the study.
Mike Smith
From: James Hamilton <jameswaldo@twc.com>
Sent: Wednesday, November 18, 2015 11:01 AM
To: Vladimir Micic; Mike Smith; Ellie Stewart; E HoffmannContact; Carrie Simon; Mildred
Elizabeth Sanders;J MeigsContact; Mike Roberts
Subject: draft deer management resolution
Dear CB colleagues,
I've reached the point in this draft resolution where I've reached saturation and am no longer sure how to
improve it. As the CB is an advisory board, I'm not including specifics on how the resolution should direct the
Town Board's implementation of the action we suggest. Maybe we should mention the DEC's Deer Depredation
Permits, as an essential ingredient for effective land management?
Anyway,please read this with care and consider possible revisions. I hope we can vote on an approved final
draft at our next meeting.
Yours,
James
the draft resolution:
Whereas there can be no doubt that the unsustainable overpopulation of white-
tailed deer is an environmental crisis desperately in need of responsible attention,
and
Whereas the public health has been seriously harmed by Lyme disease, which is
clearly caused by a serious infestation of deer-ticks harbored by too many deer in
our neighborhood, and
Whereas deer-car collisions and the damage caused to landscape plants and
agricultural crops, however severe, is a minor nuisance compared to the destruction
of natural areas, where habitat loss caused by deer overbrowsing is resulting in a
trophic cascade: with the extinction of native flora and fauna and the proliferation of
invasive species everywhere around us, leaving depauperate lands where the deer
themselves suffer from insufficient native browse and run the risk of priors disease
among many other problems, and
Whereas responsible attempts to lower deer population in adjacent municipalities of
Cayuga Heights, Lansing, Trumansburg (please see attached "Activities on
approved Properties" from the Village of Trumansburg Deer Management Program
for 2015-16"), and in the Natural Areas and on the campus of Cornell University,
prove that reducing the size of deer herds is not only feasible, but requires area-
wide cooperation and "smart" (ie, not recreational or sport) hunting, lest deer
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management in one area result in herds seeking refuge in adjacent unmanaged
lands, and
Whereas the Conservation Board of the Town of Ithaca has repeatedly resolved
that the Town should do something to reduce our deer herds, including a white
paper providing scientific documentation of the necessity to do so (please see
August 7, 2014 memo to Supervisor Engman and Town Board members referring to
this "Deer in Ithaca: an updated review of science, and a call for action"), for more
than ten years "without any perceptible change in policy," we now most urgently
RESOLVE that the Town of Ithaca must, as soon as possible, engage in a
concerted, responsible, and coordinated effort to join in the efforts of adjacent
landowners and natural areas managers to kill deer not for sport, but in an
intelligent and effective method demanded by a responsible land ethic, to reduce
deer population wherever and however possible.
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