Minutes
City of
October 31, 2005
The
City of
The
Mayor asked for a moment of Silence for Rosa Parks.
Those
in attendance were as follows:
Mayor
Clara Lou Gould
Council
Members: Deanna Leake
Eleanor
Thompson
Lee Kyriacou
Fred Antalek
Mike Fasano
Traffic Committee: Tony Furco
David Miller
Rob Riley
Traffic Pattern near
Chairman, Tony Furco: As you know
Ronbout has plagued us for quite some time as to how to control traffic. The school permits the students to exit out
the school back door and that’s where they are picked up. Regardless of who comes to pick up the kids,
there is a traffic jam. We tried several
different scenarios. How buses go
in. How cars go in. Nothing seems to work. Our biggest problem is in the afternoon. In the morning, the parents drop their kids
off then they leave. We tried utilizing
the parking lot, using school personnel, directing the parents where to
park. It just doesn’t work. We also tried to utilize the Police
Department but that is an unfair expectation for them because if they get a
call they have to leave.
What we came up with is making the street a one-way street. We can re direct the cars to
The one way all the way up to the school makes a lot of sense. One suggestion is to make one way coming in
and on Wilkes, making it two ways. That
is also the way the buses come.
The Traffic Committee’s
recommendation will be put in place temporarily to see if it works. If it works, we can do it permanently. A recommendation is also made to close the
road from 7:00 a.m. to :2:30 p.m.
Authorize the road to be closed
from
Tony Furco: What to do with the light. It is broken and cannot be fixed. It would cost close to $100,000.00 to
repair. Do you want to spend that much
on the light or do you want to leave it the way it is now? There are 700 – 9000 cars per week if you use
Mayor Clara Lou Gould: We can try it for a couple of months and see
if it works.
Consensus on a four way
stop: four people in favor of four way
stop. City Attorney Pisanelli will do a
resolution in time for the Council Meeting on November 7, 2005.
Budget Discussions
Department of Public Works – Rob Riley
went over his budget for 2006.
Council
Rob Riley: That is because it is a bigger building
Mayor Clara Lou Gould: Have we ever looked into solar heat?
Council Member Braun: We will look into that. If we get a grant we can look into Solar
because it is pretty expensive. The
panels are expensive. The architect will
look into this.
Council
Member Thompson: When you say community
activities, what are you talking about?
Rob
Riley: When they come in they put the
heat up and don’t try to conserve.
Council
Member Thompson: We should charge fees
when the public uses public buildings. I
do care about the citizens but I feel that you either pay the increase in
taxes, or pay some fees the same as you charge for the public using the
grounds.
Council
Member Fasano: Can we lock the
thermostat at a set temperature?
City
Administrator, Joseph Braun: With the
cost of energy, something has to be done.
We can get a thermostat that we can program.
Rob
Riley: Let me continue. With the heat and gas, we are paid up until
October 23rd. I can get some
money out of the line items that I haven’t touched. I think we will have to go into GF money
Council
Member Thompson: I have a question about
snow: Is this enough?
Rob
Riley: We have enough for three storms
through the end of December. If we do
not have any storms, the money carries over.
City
Administrator, Joseph Braun: We use a
five-year average to come up with this figure.
Council
Member Thompson: On streetlights, do we
change the bulbs and all that stuff?
Rob Riley: This is for all the
lights for the city of
Rob Riley left at this point.
Historic Overlay: I
Factory: The
Mayor: I checked with David Stolman to see what his
position was in adding to the historic overlays - the factory space between
Council
Member Kyriacou: I am not sure you are
right about the tax benefit for being in the historic overlay. I do not get any benefits on my
property: The only way I would get
anything is to be in the register. Just
because you are in the overlay doesn’t mean you are on the register. I think we should investigate this. I would like to ask for a recommendation from
the Master Plan group of the areas that they think are relevant.
Mayor
Clara Lou Gould: I think that we should
do this one step at a time and not all at once.
Council
Member Kyriacou: I would like someone in
the city do a survey to determine what is in the overlay. My request is very simple. Let someone in the city do a review Let’s get the whole package. It would be nice to know what is in the
overlay rather than one at a time.
This
discussion ended at 8:20 p.m. because of the time spent on this item and so the
workshop could continue on to the next item.
Proposed Local Law
Second
A sentence will be added to the law stating that extra receptacles are available at an additional cost.
A
Public Hearing will be set a for Nov 7, 2005.
Special Use Permit
Special Use Permit: Senior Housing
Facility – Property Owner:
This is not the Meadow Ridge II program.
Beacon Community Foundation: came to us about the water. They were going to speak to the
assessor. They said they would get back
to us and they haven’t. This item should
be tabled
City Attorney, Gerard Pisanelli: I will talk to their assessor and see if they
can get an answer. We haven’t heard from
them
City Administrator, Joseph Braun: Can the Council through the Special Use
Permit process say,
”Either we do it our way or no way?”
Council Member Thompson:
By law, a not for profit is exempt from paying taxes. We cannot hold payment in lieu of taxes over
their head. I am sure it can be done
because it’s done all the time.
Question Mark for the agenda: Public Hearing for Nov 7
Special
Use Permit
Accessory
Apartment –
Put on the
agenda to set public hearing for November 7, 2005
Special
Use Permit
Artist
Live / Work Space –
Put on the
agenda to set public for November 7, 2005
Use of Barracks Property
need for parkland swap.
Council
City Administrator, Joseph
Braun: I talked to the person who
represents state parks. Once you get
federal money for parkland, you can’t use it for other things. You have to go through a process to convert
this back to where this parcel will no longer be parkland.
Mayor: I checked with Mr. Saland’s Office. If you already have the land and it was
written into the legislation, and it is not used, it goes back to being
parkland.
Consensus Vote: All voted yes except Lee because he would
like to see a proposal.
Mayor got a letter from the
DEC and they would site it as a special property
Does anyone want to do
Hiddenbrooke? The County is a matching thing but that is due the end of
January.
Single Room
Occupancies
Main Street Single Room Occupancies – See Memo dated 10/12/05 from T. Dexter to J. Braun
Mayor Clara Lou Gould: Tim made a
suggestion that we phase those out.
Council
Member Kyriacou: There are three of them
involved. One of them was above what was
once the Beacon Tavern and now is Mary Ryan.
This is the one that has a loitering problem. The other two don’t. I don’t want to eliminate them if we don’t
have to.
The
one in question are a problem and have a loitering problem. If we can take care of the loitering problem,
everything will be ok.
Council
Member Fasano: I spoke to the police and
they said that they couldn’t walk up to people who are loitering and violate
their civil rights.
Council
Member Fasano: Eliminating single room
occupancy can hurt us down the road with our Bed and Breakfasts.
Discussion
ended.
Inter-municipal
Agreement
Inter-municipal Agreement
for the Creation of a Regulated MS4 Coordination Committee. See attached documentation from David Kubek
of D.C. Soil & Water Conservation District.
City Administrator, Joseph
Braun: I think we should do this because
it is a good thing.
Everyone
agrees to place this on the agenda.
Denning’s Avenue
Landfill
Evaluation of Bids – See
attached Correspondence dated 9/30/05 from J. Dennis to J. Braun. It was discovered about seven years ago that
we hadn’t closed all the landfill because a part of the old landfill was on MTA
property. About a year ago we got the
property and now are in a position to close the piece that wasn’t closed in the
early 90’s. We got authorization for
$5,000.000.00 in 1992 for this project.
Everyone agreed to place
this item on the agenda for November 7 2005
The
Request
to Amend The New York State’s Sex Offender Registration Act To Prohibit Level 2
And Level 3 Sex Offenders From Living Within Close Proximity To Schools,
Playgrounds, Parks,
See Additional Information J. Pisanelli forwarded 10/4/05
Sex Offender Registration Act – Criminal Law Handbook.
See New York Times Article dated 10/03/05 Exiling Sex
Offenders From Town.
Council Member Fasano acquired the following
information: Level 1 and Level 2 have to
report once a year. Level 3 has to
report immediately upon leaving incarceration.
The scary thing is that the Level 1 or Level 2 could have been a Level 3
offence but was pleaded down. They can
be just as severe as Level 3.
Mayor Clara Lou Gould:
We have been asked to convey our concerns to the state.
We tabled this because we did not know what a Level 1,2, or
3 are.
Consensus: To do a resolution to
recommend that the state amend. All said
yes.
This
will be brought off the table and placed on the agenda.
Firefighters
Firefighters - Tax Exemptions
Council Member
Thompson: We gave a service award in
lieu of this. We found that a lot of
people would not benefit from this because they are not homeowners.
Mayor Clara Lou Gould:
The service
awards are in place so they do not have to be renewed.
Building Moratorium
City Attorney
Pisanelli: The attorney that we hired to
do rezoning said that in his opinion it is not appropriate to do a moratorium
at this time.
Council Member
Kyriacou: When we talked about this it
was for a limited moratorium on the side of the mountain.
Budget
Mayor Clara Lou Gould: Council Member Kyriacou requested that we
change Law that says budget goes through as presented if no changes made by
December no official passing necessary.
If we cannot agree on a
budget, we can fall back on last years budget.
City
Administrator, Joseph Braun: Last years
budget – there were contracts in place – The end product is either we pass it
or go back to last year. Services will
be cut 5%. If we have ideas that can
save money, let’s do it.
Council
Member Kyriacou: If we don’t vote on it,
9.25% goes in right now. Any work that
we do to reduce it and we don’t agree, it goes back to 9.25%. This is not what we want. For some reason if the work does not get
done, I don’t want to see 9.25%.
City
Administrator, Joseph Braun : I think
that we should inquire of the city attorney today for his opinion.
City
Administrator, Joseph Braun I think that
particular issue should be dissolved.
There should be every opportunity to determine a budget.
Mayor: We can vote on what we already discussed.
Eleanor Thompson left the workshop at this point: 9:09 p.m.
Mobile Data
Terminals
See Memo dated 10/26/05
from J. Braun along with Purchase Order.
Needs Council Approval.
City Administrator, Joseph
Braun: I received a purchase requisition
from the Police Dept. for a large amount of computer equipment. It was not for Mobile Data Terminals I know
we got a grant for Mobile Data Terminals but I wanted to see something from the
state saying that they will reimburse us for equipment if it is other than the
Mobile Data Terminals. I spoke to a lady
at the state and she said that it would be ok.
Someone from the state has signed off.
They have to spend the money by a certain date. I felt that if the money was not spent for
what it was supposed to be used for, the council should approve it in the event
they come back and say that the person who approved this is no longer is
working there and we have to give the grant money back.
The Mayor took a consensus
vote and everyone voted “Yes”.
Announcements
Budget Discussions:
Recreation and Fire Departments – November 14th
Police Department
– November 28th
City Administrator, Joseph Braun: You have all received a copy of the letter
from An Meter. As I related to you in
the past years, we needed to get this process done in timely fashion. Then the Department of Justice Report came
out and with their report and that report contains recommendations that they
have made regarding policies and procedures.
I believe that the only way this is going to get done in a timely
fashion is if we had this company come in and do it. At the end of the day it will give us
accreditation and satisfy the DOJ Dept.
We have to be certain that we have enough money to provide the training.
Council
City Administrator, Joseph Braun: I did not pursue that because the argument
was that there was not enough money so I said that we are going to make certain
that we have enough money to accomplish what the DOJ requested. If you institute the new procedures, you have
to train for those procedures.
This will go into effect as soon as we pass the
appropriation and approve it. I
recommend that we do a resolution to sign the authorization to go forward. I will be on top of this because it is
critical.
This item will be placed on the agenda.
Human Relations
Commission: Fonda Muhammad as
Chairperson of the Human Relations Commission effective immediately
There
are still four vacancies on the Human Relations Commission.
OTHER
BUSINESS/
UPDATES:
Wind power Status on
legality? (Also solar? City Buildings – DPW?)
Parking Lots Status of
Parking Lots by Library, North Chestnut and Eliza Streets
City Administrator, Joseph
Braun: This was contingent upon the
Library budget, which did not pass. I
did get an email from the appraiser today and he will have it to me later this
week. I should have the information for
our next workshop.
Cameras Status of
Water Bills: What I would recommend for
large water bills. We knew this would
happen. We have done it for years where
we would go in and find that the outside reading device slowed down which is
why I recommended the outside radio reading which would resolve the problem
once and for all. We will go back and
read every meter to be sure it is correct.
Council Member Leake: I know we discussed this before. Over a period of time you were not charged
what you were supposed to be charged such as my water bill, which just came
in. Why is it my fault that I was not
charged when I was supposed to be charged?
Council Member Fasano: I want it on the record that being that the
City’s equipment was not working properly, the burden should not be placed on
the resident.
Mayor: The
rest of the city should not pay for this water if the recipient of the charge
used it.
City Administrator, Joseph Braun: If you do not pay for the water that you use,
someone else will have to pay for it.
Council Agenda
Monday, November 7, 2005
6 Public Hearings
Another one added tonight depending what City
Attorney’s research finds.
Resolutions:
Hiddenbrooke – David Stolman will be here.
The intermunicipal Agreement
Sex Offenders Registration Act
Authorize the signing of contract with Van Meter
Water bills
Appointments / Ratifications
Zoning Board -
Reappointment – Claudia Haug - Three Year Term – Term to Expire 12/31/09
Recreation
Commission – Reappointment – Terry
Martin – Three Year Term to Expire 12/31/09
Human Relations
Commission:
Reappointments: Two Year Term – Term to Expire 12/31/07
1. Malcom W. Attaway
2. Soma Grupta
3. Keith Milkove
4. Janie Doris Moore
5. Fonda Muhammad
6. Dorothy Paulin
7. Dolores B. Patterson
Mase Hook and Ladder – Effective 08/02/05
Spencer
Moroney – Active Status, John Porcoro – Exempt Status
Harbor Management
Advisory Announcement: Ian MacDougall, City of
Human Relations Vacancies: – Four Vacancies
Personnel
Issues
Submitted
by Lucy M. Cullinan – November 5, 2005