Follow Up on the News

Troubles At Onteora

Alan Rosa, Executive Director of the CWC, Nate Hendricks, civil engineer for the CWC and George Lamont of Lamont Engineering provided a comprehensive update and workshop on the sewer project and Peter Manning, regional planner for the CCCD sought the town’s participation in the Route 28 regional planning collaborative whose immediate task is to apply for $500,000 in grants available through the NYSDEC for capital improvements to be made within the 6 designated towns along the Rt. 28 corridor. Manning said that, “The grants are relatively large by historic norms and are concentrated in a relatively small geographic area and reflect a part of the Belleayre Catskill Resort agreement recently reached between NYS and the developer of the proposed resort.”
The large box full of voluminous sewage plant design and permit documents dropped at newcomer councilman Pete Freidel’s desk by George Lamont of Lamont Engineering made a resounding thud and well illuminated the complexity and process of building a sewage plant, drawing a hearty laugh from the crowd. Lamont’s comprehensive update covered the latest status details of the completed sewage collection system plans, nearly completed processing facility plans, permitting status and easement procurement, as well as the usual myriad of small issues and details worked out on the spot by the town board as the project advances towards a projected summer commencement.
The $17 million plant will be paid for by the CWC with funds provided them by NYC as mandated by the recently revised US EPA Filtration Avoidance Determination which allows for the use of the unfiltered Catskill watershed supply by NYC residents for 10 years as long as certain measures are taken to avoid watershed pollution.
The Operations and Maintenance budget of the proposed facility will largely be paid for by those located within the proposed sewer district, including the Boiceville campus of Onteora Central School District, whose own septic system has failed repeatedly and whose effluent will comprise the majority of the plant’s usage. A small portion of the O and M budget will be subsidized by NYC.
According to Lamont, commercial users in the new district have been fitted with meters to determine the actual demand, which he said has confirmed his original conservative projections. One business was found to have substantial leaks which will be repaired soon. Lamont provided color renderings of the plant, which resembles a rural barn.
A 13’ high pad will be constructed to elevate the plant above the 100 year flood plain as per NYS building code and insurance regulations. The resulting basement will allow for transfer of dried solids to the shipping containers via gravity, eliminating a mechanical conveyor. The building is 24 feet tall without the cupolas and it will be partially visible over the former Trail Nursery building from Rt. 28.
With the design process drawing to a close, construction bids are expected to go out by early summer, pending approval by NYCDEP, NYSDEC and the NYS Dept. of Health, with actual construction to start soon thereafter. A related storm water project is to be paid for by a separate program which includes an endowment made to the Town of Olive by NYC for maintenance of the turbidity settlement swales which ultimately discharge into the Esopus Creek. The Town is required to sell the excess 2 or so acres surplus to the operation which also contains the former Trail Nursery building.
Lamont encouraged the board to obtain flood insurance promptly to allow the sewer plant O & M budget to be completed. NYC will provide a partial subsidy for the amet. Easements for 16 of 47 sewage pipe laterals have been obtained, with most of the remainder nearing completion. All easements must be procured prior to the bids being let. He said “as we advance the updates will increase in frequency. The town will have to amend bids as needed and proceed.”
Lamont added that “the plant will not smell or be offensive” and said that “the board has visited the Prattsville and Hobart plant and are therefore familiar with the lack of odor. SEQRA is done and ready to submit to planning board.” Supervisor Liefeld asked where the boundary would be between the plant and the residue parcel to be sold. The board deliberated and drew the tentative boundary line. Councilman Bruce LaMonda worked out some thorny boundary, right of way and abandoned property issues with Lamont in an effort to avoid future liabilities. Lamont said he was pleased with the progress made.
Manning presented his plan to create a regional collaborative partnership of the six designated Rt. 28 corridor towns that are specified in the recently signed Belleayre Resort agreement and sought two members from Olive to join the newly forming regional planning group which will immediately help administer the $500,000 in grants earmarked for Rt. 28 corridor improvements and, perhaps more importantly, become part of what is likely to become the future seat of central Catskill planning, which he said would provide a strong united voice to collectively and more powerfully communicate with the state. Robert Selkowitz of Shokan suggested that a portion of the grant be used to stripe RT. 28 with reflective paint to help reduce the frequent accidents that will likely increase with the Belleayre Catskill Resort project. Supervisor Liefeld said he would contact the DOT and request the reflective striping in any case.
Selkowitz also suggested reviving Councilwoman Chase’ idea to create a picnic area along Rt. 28 that would also have a kiosk or some means to hold local brochures. He would like to see cars slow down, stop and leave some dollars. He said that “some people drive through here for years on their way to Belleayre and never stop. The picnic area with brochures will encourage them to stop and explore the local area.”
Selkowitz and Councilwoman Chase were both appointed to the new CCCD committee that will generate the grant proposal(s). Contact either with your RT. 28 corridor grant ideas.
Olive assessor William Cook brought a resolution from the UC Assessors Association that asks the County Legislature to apply for a $50,000 state grant to study the feasibility of consolidating all local assessors offices into a countywide office. The assessors association believes that the study will show that the idea is not viable or cost effective.
He said that “ the governor is trying to take away the right to assess from any town with less than 10,000 parcels, meaning almost all of upstate NY. They want to take away home rule.”
He described how the assessor function is integral to the smooth operation of other departments of the town such as zoning, building and planning.
The Town Board deliberated and found that keeping the assessor function local is desirable and approved the resolution unanimously.

In recent months the Governor, the Catskill Watershed Corporation, and the City have all been involved in attempting to establish criteria that would be used for future valuation of all city-owned reservoirs. Whether such criteria will be in place in advance of the issue’s next court date remains unclear.
A trial date has been set by Judge O’Conner in Ulster County Supreme Court for April 7. Two pretrial conferences between the Judge and DEP and town officials are also set for March.
Announcement of the City’s financial commitment to the Schoharie project has raised more than a few eyebrows in Olive, according to Supervisor Berndt Leifeld.
“Here you have the Ashokan, which the city values at $123 million, and which our professional, out-of-state appraisers say should be valued at $650 million,” Leifeld said. “Nobody’s arguing about whether they’re going to spend $583 million to fix a dam on a reservoir that’s probably a third the Ashokan’s size. But it does make you wonder how they came up with that valuation for us…”

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City Playing Nicey-Nice?

What happened… and is happening?
According to Leifeld, much of it is unknowable. But the dismissal, he added, seemed to be the direct result of the school district’s decision to join the town in its legal defense as an Intervenor. That’s because Acting State Supreme Court Justice Gerald W. Connelly said that he dismissed the City’s suit when it was pointed out to him that they had failed to properly serve notice to the Superintendent of the District and not its Clerk.
A previous ruling on the same case, by the late Supreme Court Justice Vincent Bradley, had similarly thrown out the City’s case after discovering that New York had hired an assessor not licensed to practice in the state. At that time, Bradley had added that he would likely rule, in the future, in New York’s favor were the Town of Olive not to implement a long-awaited revaluation. Which they then did, also taking off their backs a requirement for the Large Parcel law whose placement on Olive taxpayers resulted in a series of protest votes that shifted control of the school district to a more Olive-friendly, and ultimately tax-savvy board of trustees.
A number of years before, Olive and Onteora did lose one of the City’s appeals, forcing local taxpayers to pick up a hefty back tax bill… a scenario no one wants to repeat.
“This Intervenor thing came up and mostly the school pushed the issue,” said Leifeld of the legal moves that resulted in the recent dismissal, which the City could still appeal… although he hasn’t seen such indication of yet. “Our attorneys agreed that if you do it, we would sanction it. But had they not been Intervenors, I don’t think you would have seen this.”
Onteora became an Intervenor as a means of gaining a seat at the table for the legal proceedings that had previously been solely between Olive and the City, with monetary aid from a since-depleted $3 million fund set up at the CWC (with City money) just for the purpose of fighting City appeals of local assessments. Onteora argued, at Olive’s request, that since it would be liable for much of the asked-for tax burden the City was trying to get shifted, it should have a say in the matter.
Connelly’s decision now grants such status, as requested, to Onteora. Olive has also been asking other towns in the school district, and with reservoir lands, to join their ongoing lawsuits.
The City’s senior legal counsel in its Law Department, Tax and Bankruptcy Litigation office, Joseph Kropening, has since released a statement that he and his people “are currently reviewing the decision and deciding and determining the city’s next legal steps.”
Those would normally have included the current assessment appeal against Olive’s revaluated assessment of the reservoir for 2005-2006 and 2006-2007, with a third appeal for the completing fiscal year expected, wherein New York is claiming a value of $150 million for the Ashokan versus Olive’s claim for $600 million and the state Office of Real Property Service’s estimate of $340 million.
According to Leifeld, an April 5 date has long been set to discuss the case, with City lawyers, in Connelly’s offices. But now, he said, “The other side seems to be trying to make nicey-nice.”
What has been odd of late, the supervisor added, was that for the first time in memory, New York City was still negotiating, seeming to be open to not only settling their current lawsuit, but also “talking with us on a lot of levels about other issues, including the speed limits along Route 28A. Am I a little skeptical? Yeah…”
Could the City’s actions be a continuing response to Onteora’s having gotten into the act, or maybe even a reaction to the worsening economic climate?
Or could the City’s shift in terms of the newer appeals be tied to shifts in its approach to flood mitigation and other newer issues on its plate, as well as its own increasing investment in such things as the re-opened Waste Channel through the Ashokan Field Campus, local land buys, and the recent difficulties it faced getting a ten year extension on its federal filtration avoidance determination?
“This week will be the third or fourth times we’ve sat down with them,” was all Leifeld would reply to the conjecture in the air, beyond wishing that any coming solution be long-term, and not just based on a continuing stream of individual appeals.. “It’s better than not talking to us… Better we should all bite the bullet and come up with something. Even if the numbers are still the hard thing.”
“I hope this will help us begin to work together for at least a portion of time,” said Onteora Superintendent Dr. Leslie Ford, echoing Leifeld’s statement.
Prompting the supervisor, later, to again state his case for getting other towns in the school district, and across the watershed, to join it in its fight to end New York’s continuing legal threats against it and other reservoir towns in the Catskills. And even suggest that Onteora give it some money for legal costs instead of just moral support, and its own lawyers.
At least, for now, we all saved a little, even if only in would-be future fines. For the moment.

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A Comprensive Scoping

According to most involved parties in the process, from state officials and the developers to environmental organizations that signed on to Spitzer’s AIP and those still fighting it, the resulting document, at 157 pages, is comprehensive and groundbreaking… in most ways.
It also seems that the process of creating the Scope, as the blueprint for ensuring Draft Environmental Impact statements and Unit Management Plans from the developers and state is termed, resulted in some key changes to the project being proposed made during the “scoping process” that included two nights of public hearings and hundreds of written comments.
In particular, the state’s ski area expansion plans have shrunk somewhat, drawing some concern from long-term Belleayre enthusiasts and resort supporters… as well as opponents who were looking forward to the added ski trails on the mountain.
“The scope was significantly broadened with a number of things changing as it reached its final form,” said state DEC Region Three Director Willie Janeway of the document prepared by staff in Albany. “It now include a number of issues not there before, such as a whole new focus on climate change issues, new alternatives, including scenarios with or without the developers’ proposed spa, and the ski trail changes.”
Janeway added that most of those changes came in response to comments heard at the December hearings or received during the written comment period that ended in early January.
Higher up, the state’s Deputy Secretary for the Environment, Judith Enck – who served as the chief negotiator for what would become the current AIP that the scope seeks to address – said in a recent interview that she was particularly proud of the climate change criteria for the private and public components of the Scope, a national first for such things, as far as she knew.
On a private level, the month since the document’s release have been marked by continuing spin from those for and against the Resort proposal.
Opponents of the proposal were joined by the Adirondack Mountain Club and other organizations decrying the size of the resort, while those in favor cried foul about cuts to the ski area expansion and set up a lobbying trip to Albany for March 27… which they said would likely be the first of many such activities.
The document itself is split into three basic sections involving the state’s plans, the developer’s Belleayre Resort proposal, and a discussion of ways to assess the potential cumulative impacts of both. Last time around, before the resort project ended up in adjudication, with appeals, the gap between scoping and final acceptance of a complete DEIS took well over a year. And although the new work on the part of Crossroads Ventures, the resort developers, has been termed a “Supplemental” EIS that can arguably build upon past submissions, the state’s part of the process, which will include its Unit Management Plans for its long-awaited expansion, could take conceivably longer.
The new document even goes so far as to address those critics who spoke out and wrote letters suggesting that the DEC’s review of its own project could be construed as a conflict of interest.
“The Agreement does not change the Department’s legal obligations to create an environmental record in support of its own and other agencies’ permitting decisions, as well as its own facility development or land acquisition decisions,” the new Scope reads. “ Within the SEQR process, the Agreement represents the project proposal and the project sponsor’s preferred alternative. The Department staff is under no obligation to accept that alternative, in whole or in part, but must evaluate potential impacts of that alternative as part of the Department’s environmental review under SEQR.”
Among subjects set to be studied in the pending documents will be the potential effects of diverting waters from the Ashokan to the Delaware River basin via snowmaking, including that water’s potential flood impact; possible traffic impacts on intersections and stretches of road as far away as the Kingston Thruway exchange, including accident trends; possible visual impacts throughout the central Catskills, including all wilderness high peak areas;
Climate change studies will work with recent reports that envisioned winter snowfall changes over the coming 50 years, study means of shrinking the combined project’s carbon footprint, and look into both the viability of ski areas in the SoutheasternU.S. and possible impacts on other privately owned ski areas in the Catskills and New York State.
“Anticipated cumulative impacts of the modified private development plan in relation to the expansion of the Ski Center include, but are not limited to: water quality, water supply, aesthetics, noise, transportation, and community character<’ the Scope notes at one point, although it also goes out of its way to note that matters of strict community character and economic competition concern are not in the purview of state environmental review laws.
“When the present Supplemental Environmental Review Study is completed, in conformity with the new scoping document, the Belleayre Resort will have proven to be the most closely examined private development in the history of New York State,” wrote the project’s private developers in a February 28 press release. “Crossroads Ventures, Inc. is confident that we will be able to mitigate all the issues raised and develop a resort that is in the vanguard of environmental responsibility while giving a lasting boost to the regional economy of the Catskills.”
A March 4 press release put out by the seven environmental organizations that signed onto the AIP last September, meanwhile, praised the scope for having included a section on cumulative impacts of both developments, something they fought for during the previous review process, unsuccessfully, and expressed “general satisfaction with the detail and thoroughness of the final scope, and with the comprehensiveness of the upcoming review that the scope foreshadows.”
They also applauded the State’s decision to drop the proposed Belleayre East trails, a matter that had Joe Kelly, head of the recently renamed Coalition To Save Belleayre and a member of the new pro-resort Patterns for Progress group based in nearby Margaretville, fuming when he found out about it.
Deeper into the signers’ press release came a statement that could be seen as a step back, though.
“The environmental groups’ support of the AIP must not be misconstrued as overall support for the proposed project. Signing the AIP does not commit us to supporting every aspect of the current proposal in full – in the AIP we agreed that the lower impact alternative is preferable to that originally proposed,” the statement read. “We continue to share ongoing community concerns about specific issues – including viewshed impacts, stormwater controls, community character, and the number of ridgeline units – and will continue to closely monitor and actively participate in the ongoing environmental review of the revised project contemplated in the AIP.”
Janeway, for his part, described the process’ next steps, getting the SEIS, DEIS and UMP ready, as “a lot of work for a lot of people. “We will be thorough.”
For more on the scope, including an online copy of the actual document, visit http://www.dec.ny.gov/press/42345.html and follow the links…

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A Jar Of Olives...
A Better Idea
Thoughts About The Coming Tax Rebates

“Duh!” This notification was labor intensive and costly in postage. Couldn’t they have simplified the process? It’s tax time, and the government is going to send us checks later, after they have checked our tax returns. My better idea is this. Why couldn’t our government save millions, yes millions, by incorporating the two on a simple addendum to the 1040 tax form? If a taxpayer qualified for a rebate, the amount of credit toward money owed could be deducted. If a refund were due, the amount would be added to the refund check. That way all that “Postage and Handling” could be reduced to a single process. It would be a one-way communication for most and a two-way refund for some.
To a coupon clipping, comparison-shopping personality like mine, I abhor waste and needless steps. I use those unattractive, energy-saving swirly bulbs. I recycle and compost. I bundle my errands to save gas. I carpool when I can. Clearance and discount are two of my favorite words. To watch the government waste money and amass huge national debts annoys me when I am following Henry David Thoreau’s advice to “Keep your accounts on a thumb nail.”
While I am pontificating, here are some of my other good ideas:
1. Let’s buy gas from those companies that are not connected to the Middle East and to price gouging oil companies. Check out the email that is circulating listing those, like Hess and Sunoco, which are western hemisphere supplied.
2. Let’s keep driving our old cars until the carmakers produce an energy efficient car at an affordable price.
3. Bring your bags back to the supermarket and your hangers back to the cleaners.
4. Attend local events. They are usually reasonable or free. Last weekend I was entertained by local stories at the Town of Olive Historical Society’s get-together. Next weekend on Saturday, March 29, you can enjoy an art exhibit at the Reservoir Methodist Church, Route 28 in Shokan from 3 to 5. The bonus is that events like this also come with “goodies.”
5. Shop locally. By the time you add the gas cost, you probably will save time and money. It also keeps the local merchants in the black.
Speaking of saving time and money, what is going on with the Democratic Primaries? Do the math…millions wasted and too much time and energy spent on more of the same rhetoric. Eventually one or both candidates will self-destruct. How about a sudden death, two out of three, ROCK/PAPER/SCISSORS to see if it should be Obama or Clinton for President? I would like to see the loser of this contest sign on as Vice President, and, frankly, I don’t care which one. Together they will be the “dream team” or “nightmare” depending which side of the aisle you are on. Finally, I would like to see things like the Certiorari Lawsuit settled through negotiation and mediation. In fact, let’s take that to the next step. I’d like to see the Iraq/Afghanistan/Iran/ Korea thing settled like two women would settle it. As heads of state they would make a date for lunch to discuss and settle the matter. One woman would make the pre-negotiation phone call to see what to wear. Burka or little black dress? Pearls are always safe, neutral and understated. Secondly, the other one would make one more pre-negotiation phone call to ask, “What can I bring?” At the summit meeting, the two women would find common ground—grandchildren, their dogs, the price of Coach handbags. Then they would use diplomacy, compromise and consensus to resolve the issue before the biggest decision presents itself. Shall we have dessert? They will then hug, promise to call and say, “Let’s do this again real soon.” They won’t. Issue resolved.

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