by Alex Brooks
The Petersburgh Town Board meeting was very short because the Board had to have a lengthy discussion in executive session with their environmental attorney Kevin Young about possible litigation concerning the landfill and other matters.[private] Just who might be suing whom and for what reason is not public knowledge at the moment.
In the short regular meeting, the first matter discussed was the town’s septic system. Apparently there has been an odor recently near the Town Hall. However, no one seemed to know exactly where the septic tank is, or even if there is a septic tank. Town officials will undertake to find it and assess what needs to be done.
Broken Wheel
Supervisor Webster said the Broken Wheel Bridge would be done by the end of the week. Highway Superintendent Rob Cottrell said he needs to abandon 1,000 feet of the old roadway which runs down the bank to the old bridge and back, and adopt 600 feet of the new bridge roadway as a Town Road. A resolution needs to be prepared for a subsequent meeting to do this.
Public Comment
Joe Dunlop asked Cottrell if he is getting washed sand for the winter. Cottrell said he is getting washed sand and mixing it with salt in the shed where it can be kept dry. That mix will be used on all the paved roads, and the big stockpile of sand in the yard is for use on the dirt roads.
Dunlop also asked Cottrell if the Town will be getting the County trucks that have been talked about for years. Cottrell said the Town won’t be buying County trucks. He said he had one of those trucks here, and it “wasn’t worth getting.”
Tom Berry came to the meeting with a collection of clippings from Eastwick Press stories saying that the Town Board had approved doing a Revaluation “four times” between 2010 and the present, and had put money in the budget for it, and for some reason it hadn’t been done. Town Assessor Craig Surprise was not present to explain why it was not done, but Supervisor Webster said he would ask Surprise about it.
In response to a question, Webster said a consent order between Taconic and DEC specifying Taconic’s responsibilities for cleanup and remediation of PFOA is very close to being signed. He said he believed it was just waiting for “executive approval.”
He also said he believes “There is a good chance” that the filtration system on the municipal water supply will be operational by mid-December. The filtration tank which is the heart of the system is supposed to be delivered in late November. Once it arrives, it will be a race to get the system fully installed and a building put up around it before it gets too cold.[/private]