by Alex Brooks
At its August 15 meeting, the Petersburgh Town Board unanimously passed a resolution to retain Kevin Young of the firm Young Sommer LLC to represent the Town in matters pertaining to the PFOA crisis.[private]
Updated Codes On March 9 of this year, the New York State Fire Prevention and Building Code Council completed major updates to the Uniform Fire Prevention and Building Code and the State Energy Conservation Code. This code incorporates by reference 2015 International codes for residential building, existing buildings, fire, plumbing, mechanical, property maintenance and energy conservation.
The Town Board adopted this updated code with a resolution passed unanimously. There was no discussion of what changes or new requirements this updated code may bring.
Speed Limits The Board passed a resolution to lower speed limits on Hewitt Road, Armsby Road, Lewis Hollow Road, and Hill Hollow Road. This resolution will be sent to the County, which will add its comments and recommendations and send it on to the State Department of Transportation, which will make a decision about what the new speed limits will be.
Water District Water District Superintendent Ben Krahforst recapped the story of the water leak that happened August 5. A major leak in the valve pit on Moses Road caused the water level in the tank to drop, making it necessary to turn on Well #2, which raised the PFOA level in the water. That leak was fixed on Monday August 8, and since then Well #5 has been able to supply all the water for the District’s needs. Krahforst said the level of water in the tank is rising one foot a day using only Well #5. The level of PFOA in the Water was tested since the leak was fixed at 71 parts per trillion (ppt), and is presumably still dropping, since the water from Well #5 has consistently tested at less than 40 ppt.
Landfill Update Ben Krahforst said he and Dennis Smith and Berlin Supervisor Jaeger met with James Quinn from DEC to walk the landfill site and discuss how the investigation will go, and Supervisor Webster had some discussions with Regional DEC Director Keith Goertz, but there was not much new information. The landfill has been declared a “P-site,” which means it is a potential Superfund site and makes some state funds available for investigation of the site.
PVMCC Custodian At the recommendation of the PVMCC Board of Directors, the Petersburgh Town Board passed resolutions to discontinue the services of the current PVMCC custodian, and instead hire Louise Harrison as the PVMCC Custodian. Also at the request of the PVMCC Board, the weekly pay for the custodian was raised from $50 per week to $60 per week, and PVMCC agreed to pay for the additional cost.
New Phones The Board received a proposal for a new phone system for the Town Hall from Jackie Berry of CIT Associates, based in Bennington. There was a quote for just a phone system for $4,273 and a quote for phone and internet for $6,143. Both quotes said they were based on use of the existing wiring and did not include removal of old equipment. Dave Miller said he thought the wiring needs to be replaced. Berry guessed that rewiring with all new wire might add about $2,500 to the cost, but this was just a guess and could not be relied on. The Board thanked her for the information and said they would need a firm figure for what the whole project would cost so they could put it in the budget for next year.
Youth to Youth Several of the girls from the Youth To Youth Program came to talk about the work that their group does. The group has put in over 400 volunteer hours in the past year and has put on various events to demonstrate that kids can have fun without drugs or alcohol. Their work has had a measurable impact in reducing the level of drug and alcohol usage in the Berlin School District. They thanked the Board for paying the cost of sending two kids to the Annual Youth To Youth Conference this summer, and asked for the same support for next summer, which would be $850. Tom Berry, who contributed $100 to this summer’s contribution, said he would increase his contribution to $250 for next summer, and Zeegie Krahforst said he would contribute the rest.
Public Comment Tammy Dunlop asked when the debris from the old shirt factory will be cleaned up. Dave Miller said he had assurances that it would be done “before winter,” but he had nothing more specific than that. Tom Berry asked when the Town is going to do a Property Revaluation. Supervisor Webster said that matter has been under discussion recently, but he had no answer yet. He said he hopes to have an update on the Reval schedule by next month’s meeting.
Town Clerk Deidra Michaels said she is working on gathering information about the town landfill for the upcoming investigation, and she is working on ADA mediation issues. She said the Town did not get the grant for records management from the New York State Archives for which they applied, but they will submit the application again next year.
Supervisor Webster said Sam’s Club offered to donate 910 cases of bottled water. He said the Town does not have the facilities to receive and store that much water, so he asked Taconic to receive, store and distribute it. He said Taconic is in the process of taking over the bottled water distribution completely. He also said Taconic will provide a container for recycling of the water bottles and cardboard from water distribution.
Town Clerk Deidra Michaels said two applications have been received for the Highway Department job recently advertised.
The Board went into Executive Session at the end of the meeting and discussed personnel matters and threatened litigation.
In other matters the Board:
• Chose material for signs to be put up at various places along the Little Hoosic River for swimming and fishing advisory about PFOA in the water.
• Appointed Jeff Knight to the Economic Development Committee.
• Scheduled a workshop for Tuesday August 30 at 7 pm on Building Department issues. [/private]