Above: John Moffitt of Delaware Operations explains the planned upgrades to the Andes sewage treatment plant at the Andes Town Board Meeting on October 11, 2011.
Engineers described plans for a new $2.5 million Andes sewer upgrade at a tumultuous meeting of the Andes Town Board on Tuesday that also featured dire news of budget cuts, a plan for a temporary ban on fracking in the town, and numerous out-of-order interruptions by audience members.
Lou Dibble and John Moffitt, engineers from Delaware Operations, presented their preliminary plans for replacing the town’s malfunctioning sewage system for the town, which comes with a price tag of $2.5 million.
According to Dibble, the bulk of the cost of the upgrade -- $2.1 to $2.2 million -- will be paid by the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. The town’s portion of the cost will be $300,000 to $500,000. That portion of the cost is expected to be paid fully with grants, according to Marge Merzig, a consultant with Keough Consulting who works with Andes town officials.
“At worst, it will be a minimal increase for the customers," she said. "We expect it to be fully funded with grants."
According to Dibble, construction on the new plant will begin in May 2012.
The new sewage system will use membrane bioreactors to filter wastewater instead of the sand and microbes that the current system uses, John Moffitt explained.
“You’re taking the microbes out, the sand filtration is going,” Moffitt said. “These flat membranes -- there’s 800 of them altogether -- have pumps out of them, basically like a filter.”
The new system allows most of the stages of sewage treatment to take place in one tank, eliminating the need to cycle partially-treated “reject flow” back into the system to be treated again. In the current system, the reject flow has limited the plan’s capacity to treat sewage. In the new system, the lack of reject flow will allow the plant to handle more wastewater than it currently can, Moffitt said.
“There is no reject flow,” he said.
The changes to the plant will not affect its exterior footprint, the engineers said.
“The only difference you're going to see is that the dome will be gone,” Dibble said.
Steep budget cuts
The town of Andes is being forced to make deep budget cuts to meet the budget under the new two-percent property tax cap, Town Supervisor Marty Donnelly said.
“This has been a very miserable, rotten budget because we were forced to go to this two percent cap,” he said. “We've got the brilliance of New York State: a $20,000 increase in health insurance, a $13,000 increase in retirement -- it’s just horrendous.”
Cuts are being made to the salaries of every town staff member that the law allows, Donnelly said.
“Every single person that could be legally required to take a cut in pay did,” he said. “We're trying to do the best we can.”
After the meeting, Sharon Drew, the deputy town clerk, told the Watershed Post that she had just been relieved of her job by her supervisor, Town Clerk Janis Jacques.
There will be a public hearing on a possible town law that would override the two percent tax cap at 12:15pm on November 10 at the Andes Town Hall. A public hearing on the preliminary budget for the town is scheduled for 12:20pm on the same day.
Temporary ban on hydraulic fracturing
The town of Andes should move forward cautiously as it explores banning the controversial practice of hydraulic fracturing, said David Merzig, a municipal attorney who is advising the Andes Town Board on the matter. (David Merzig is Marge Merzig's husband.)
Several towns in New York State that have banned fracking through local zoning ordinances are being sued, Merzig told the board. Because the issue is being “actively litigated,” Merzig said, “a concern I have is that if the town simply passes an anti-heavy-industry zoning law, you’re going to be in the same boat.”
While waiting to see how those lawsuits pan out, Merzig said, Andes should institute a temporary six-month ban on heavy industry -- including fracking -- that can be extended to one year.
“That way, you essentially have a year’s breathing room to see which way it’s going,” Merzig said, “and still have the protection of having a prohibition against fracking.”
There will be a public hearing on Nov. 10 at 12:25pm at the Andes Town Hall about the proposed ban on hydraulic fracturing in Andes. For more from Merzig about town zoning ordinances and fracking, listen to our interview with him on our October 5 edition of the Watershed Post Half-Hour News Hour.
Rumors and accusations
Mike McAdams, the town of Andes Highway Superintendent, was the target of several accusations by Andes residents at the meeting. The first to speak was Bill Wagner, who is running against McAdams for the highway superintendent position in next month’s election.
Wagner, who worked for the Andes Highway Department last fall, said that he had quit abruptly because the truck he was driving had no brakes.
McAdams responded to Wagner by saying that all of his trucks are equipped with brakes. He also addressed the issue his Highway Report, which stated: "I would like to address the rumors going around that I have made employees operate equipment without brakes, which is completely untrue."
Later in the meeting, McAdams was confronted again by local resident Joe Sicinski, who claimed to have heard rumors that McAdams cannot read, and demanded that McAdams read his own report to disprove them. As Sicinski pressed McAdams, Kimberly Tosi, McAdams’ daughter and a candidate for Town Clerk, threatened to punch Sicinski. Town Supervisor Marty Donnelly ended the confrontation by warning that the meeting would be adjourned and postponed if there were further interruptions. (See our full report about this confrontation.)
Below: Andes town supervisor Marty Donnelly reads a letter from municipal attorney David Merzig about a draft fracking ban. Afterwards, Merzig comments on the letter.
