Me - Allen Carstensen, and Laura
John and Martha Ullberg
Alan Vogel
Robert Brown
Geoffrey Hart
Tom Ferritti - Police Cheif
Jason Fuller - Fire
Ed Hetherington - Building Inspector
Bruce Vann - DPW, Water, and Sewer
Jamie Saine - our new Trumansburg Free Press Reporter
You will see a link to an mp3 file of the meeting below. If you click on the link, you can listen from within your browser, but there is usually a way to move this mp3 file to your desktop. In Firefox, you wait for the whole file to move to the browser, (a minute or two) then you go - File - Save Page As..... and you can put it anywhere you want. The advantage is that you can then listen with other programs (Real Player, Itunes etc.) which allow you to adjust equalizer settings and they give you a time counter. With the time counter and my notes below, you can jump to the part that interests you. You can also put the file on an Ipod, and listen while taking a walk, or driving or doing the dishes! When you're done with the dishes, pull the plug and watch the dirty water going down the drain, as you listen to our democracy going down the drain. Great fun!
Here's the AUDIO LINK
Before the meeting started I passed out printed versions of a piece written by Norman Hummel who was on the Task Force that unanimously reccomended that the Village should decide by referendum whether or not to begin billing for ambulance services. You can read it at the Trumansburg Free Press Blog http://flakes1.wordpress.com/ Mr. Hummel is an active paramedic in the Trumansburg ambulance corps.
0 hrs. 0 min. 0 sec. - call to order, then the first public comment period were I inform the trustees of the latest news that logically would inspire them to pass the resolution to encourage Congress to look into impeachment of Bush and Cheney. You can get the text at trumansburgimpeachment.blogspot.com.
0-03-08 -- Jason Fulton (fire chief) claims that there are a couple of factual errors in my Free Press editorial published last Wednesday 6/13. I stated that “Chris Thomas’s Task Force Report claims that we could collect $252,000 per year with his privatization scheme. That works out to about $25 per year for each of us.” Jason claims that is my first error, because actually there are 3500 households (not 10,000) in the fire district. I didn’t say there were 10,000 households, however. I said “$25 per year for each of us” in other words I’m talking per capita, not per household. I don’t have an exact figure for the population of the fire district, but it is undeniably much closer to 10,000 than 3,500 and 10,000 makes the math easier. If my math was way off, (which it’s not) and it cost twice as much to continue to support our ambulance with my taxes, it would not change my arguments.
Next, Jason claims that I was incorrect when I wrote “Also, a significant portion of the ambulance budget is offset by donations and these would likely stop, when donors saw that bills were being sent.” Jason objects because I don’t understand how these donations are handled. I don’t really care how they are handled, they offset taxes. Perhaps he doesn’t understand which donations I was talking about. When someone, or a family member, is helped by the Ambulance/EMS Service, they often feel a sense of gratitude that compels them to make a donation, because they realize that the service exists thanks to the generosity of the volunteers and the taxpayers of the Fire District. This will change radically if we enter into a relationship with multibillion dollar private for profit health insurance companies. This will reduce donations to the department, thus increasing our taxes.
I greatly respect and appreciate Jason’s service to our community. He volunteers a great deal of his time on our behalf. I wish he understood where I was coming from.
0-05-00 - Department Heads
Ed Hetherington
Tom Ferritti
Bruce Vann
interesting discussion of how to find the lost water main crossing a property at the intersection of Waterburg and Curry Roads. There is an application for a new water service. A pipe runs through the property but they can't find it. (Water witch failed to find it - no really) Bruce found an outfit that offers to attempt to find these things with ground penetrating radar equipment but it costs $1200 a day - no guarantees. Any volunteer witches?
0-53-29 - Tammy Morse informs us,
6/18 - 7pm Elementary School auditorium Ambulance Billing Public Hearing
6/19 - 7pm Elementary School auditorium Byrne Dairy Site Plan Hearing
6/23 - 7pm Village Hall another Byrne Dairy Hearing (zoning interpretation)
0-59-05 Tammy McMillen financial stuff, including moving $2119 that was for street trees into the Main Street Project Fund. This sparked a conversation that included the fact that Bill Chaisson has written a grant proposal for some funds for street trees, that if we get it could do a lot more for us than the $2119. Thanks Bill!
1-19-10 Mayor's report - Marty talked about the progress toward DOT rules that should soon reduce large truck traffic on Rts 89 and 96.
1-23-04 Commissioners, first Chris Thomas on Fire/EMS, and MSP lights should be here within a month. He spoke about the format of Wednesdays EMS hearing. The format seems to be a bit up in the air still, but they agreed that residents of the district should get 3 minutes to make comments and/or ask questions. Marty mentioned that perhaps the volunteers should have more time. This gets shot down. Chris says they are just residents of a fire district in terms of a public hearing. What if we did a straw poll at the end. Ask for a show of hands for in favor of billing, opposed to billing, and then undecided. Tammy says we can't do this. Why not? We are still arguing over how many were in favor of impeachment last September 24th. Chris said he asked NYCOM six different ways to allow a referendum. I wish I could have been on that call. It doesn't make sense. I understand why they would want to discourage frequent referendums on day to day matters, but this is potentially a life and death issue. To add to the irony, they would require a referendum before instituting Thomas's Length of Service Award Program (retirement fund - LOSAP) which is decidedly not life and death. Weird.
2-03-24 - discussion of correspondence - I mentioned that I had sent an email to the board asking what happens to the solids, after they are separated out at our waste water treatment plant - and hadn't gotten an answer. John Hrubos told me that it is put in a dumpster and taken away by Yaws Environmental Lab. So I called them today and learned that it is spread on a farmer's field in Romulus. John said that it used to go up to Seneca Meadows but this is cheaper. Personally, I'd prefer to pay the extra to have it taken to Seneca Meadows. John said it's excellent fertilizer. Yes. It's high in nitrogen and other beneficial nutrients as long as you don't mind the heavy metals, and pharmaceuticals and other toxins. There's a group of concerned citizens near Mecklenburg that have organized to fight the dumping of this crap on fields around them. http://carrcny.org/ Sometimes it gets spread on the fields before a heavy rain and then it gets washed into Trumansburg Creek. Lovely.
2-07-00 John talks about water infrastructure work. Coating a tank on 89, replacing some pumps, and some water main on 96.
2-10-11 request for closing Cayuga St. on 6/28 from Prospect to King for a block party - approved
2-12-32 John talks about a drainage problem on Lake St. that is going to have to be repaired for big bucks eventually.
2-16-00 Farmers Market Agreement
2-23-14 Telephone Building Update. Sounds encouraging. We are moving closer to purchasing the old building for use as a Community Center - thanks to the work of John Vogel, John Ullberg, and Don Schlather.
2-54-12 Zoning Moratorium extension on Auble property which expires on 7/31 They are going to try to extend for another 6 months - to give time to complete zoning ordinance update
We got 2 $1900 celebration grants for the Winter Festival and the Main St Dance - 9/6
The County will be helping us soon with the zoning ordinance update. Mayor and a couple of trustees will be meeting with Ed Marks soon.
3-02-40 Paying Bills
3-08-06 Public Comment period 2. I ask Chris Thomas to clarify the numbers that Jason based his objections to my Free Press article on. He agreed that I wasn't far off when basing my math on 10,000 residents of the Fire District. Tammy Morse said there are about 3500 Tax Parcels in the District - not people.
adjourn
Jamie Saine - our new Trumansburg Free Press Reporter
You will see a link to an mp3 file of the meeting below. If you click on the link, you can listen from within your browser, but there is usually a way to move this mp3 file to your desktop. In Firefox, you wait for the whole file to move to the browser, (a minute or two) then you go - File - Save Page As..... and you can put it anywhere you want. The advantage is that you can then listen with other programs (Real Player, Itunes etc.) which allow you to adjust equalizer settings and they give you a time counter. With the time counter and my notes below, you can jump to the part that interests you. You can also put the file on an Ipod, and listen while taking a walk, or driving or doing the dishes! When you're done with the dishes, pull the plug and watch the dirty water going down the drain, as you listen to our democracy going down the drain. Great fun!
Here's the AUDIO LINK
Before the meeting started I passed out printed versions of a piece written by Norman Hummel who was on the Task Force that unanimously reccomended that the Village should decide by referendum whether or not to begin billing for ambulance services. You can read it at the Trumansburg Free Press Blog http://flakes1.wordpress.com/ Mr. Hummel is an active paramedic in the Trumansburg ambulance corps.
0 hrs. 0 min. 0 sec. - call to order, then the first public comment period were I inform the trustees of the latest news that logically would inspire them to pass the resolution to encourage Congress to look into impeachment of Bush and Cheney. You can get the text at trumansburgimpeachment.blogspot.com.
0-03-08 -- Jason Fulton (fire chief) claims that there are a couple of factual errors in my Free Press editorial published last Wednesday 6/13. I stated that “Chris Thomas’s Task Force Report claims that we could collect $252,000 per year with his privatization scheme. That works out to about $25 per year for each of us.” Jason claims that is my first error, because actually there are 3500 households (not 10,000) in the fire district. I didn’t say there were 10,000 households, however. I said “$25 per year for each of us” in other words I’m talking per capita, not per household. I don’t have an exact figure for the population of the fire district, but it is undeniably much closer to 10,000 than 3,500 and 10,000 makes the math easier. If my math was way off, (which it’s not) and it cost twice as much to continue to support our ambulance with my taxes, it would not change my arguments.
Next, Jason claims that I was incorrect when I wrote “Also, a significant portion of the ambulance budget is offset by donations and these would likely stop, when donors saw that bills were being sent.” Jason objects because I don’t understand how these donations are handled. I don’t really care how they are handled, they offset taxes. Perhaps he doesn’t understand which donations I was talking about. When someone, or a family member, is helped by the Ambulance/EMS Service, they often feel a sense of gratitude that compels them to make a donation, because they realize that the service exists thanks to the generosity of the volunteers and the taxpayers of the Fire District. This will change radically if we enter into a relationship with multibillion dollar private for profit health insurance companies. This will reduce donations to the department, thus increasing our taxes.
I greatly respect and appreciate Jason’s service to our community. He volunteers a great deal of his time on our behalf. I wish he understood where I was coming from.
0-05-00 - Department Heads
Ed Hetherington
Tom Ferritti
Bruce Vann
interesting discussion of how to find the lost water main crossing a property at the intersection of Waterburg and Curry Roads. There is an application for a new water service. A pipe runs through the property but they can't find it. (Water witch failed to find it - no really) Bruce found an outfit that offers to attempt to find these things with ground penetrating radar equipment but it costs $1200 a day - no guarantees. Any volunteer witches?
0-53-29 - Tammy Morse informs us,
6/18 - 7pm Elementary School auditorium Ambulance Billing Public Hearing
6/19 - 7pm Elementary School auditorium Byrne Dairy Site Plan Hearing
6/23 - 7pm Village Hall another Byrne Dairy Hearing (zoning interpretation)
0-59-05 Tammy McMillen financial stuff, including moving $2119 that was for street trees into the Main Street Project Fund. This sparked a conversation that included the fact that Bill Chaisson has written a grant proposal for some funds for street trees, that if we get it could do a lot more for us than the $2119. Thanks Bill!
1-19-10 Mayor's report - Marty talked about the progress toward DOT rules that should soon reduce large truck traffic on Rts 89 and 96.
1-23-04 Commissioners, first Chris Thomas on Fire/EMS, and MSP lights should be here within a month. He spoke about the format of Wednesdays EMS hearing. The format seems to be a bit up in the air still, but they agreed that residents of the district should get 3 minutes to make comments and/or ask questions. Marty mentioned that perhaps the volunteers should have more time. This gets shot down. Chris says they are just residents of a fire district in terms of a public hearing. What if we did a straw poll at the end. Ask for a show of hands for in favor of billing, opposed to billing, and then undecided. Tammy says we can't do this. Why not? We are still arguing over how many were in favor of impeachment last September 24th. Chris said he asked NYCOM six different ways to allow a referendum. I wish I could have been on that call. It doesn't make sense. I understand why they would want to discourage frequent referendums on day to day matters, but this is potentially a life and death issue. To add to the irony, they would require a referendum before instituting Thomas's Length of Service Award Program (retirement fund - LOSAP) which is decidedly not life and death. Weird.
2-03-24 - discussion of correspondence - I mentioned that I had sent an email to the board asking what happens to the solids, after they are separated out at our waste water treatment plant - and hadn't gotten an answer. John Hrubos told me that it is put in a dumpster and taken away by Yaws Environmental Lab. So I called them today and learned that it is spread on a farmer's field in Romulus. John said that it used to go up to Seneca Meadows but this is cheaper. Personally, I'd prefer to pay the extra to have it taken to Seneca Meadows. John said it's excellent fertilizer. Yes. It's high in nitrogen and other beneficial nutrients as long as you don't mind the heavy metals, and pharmaceuticals and other toxins. There's a group of concerned citizens near Mecklenburg that have organized to fight the dumping of this crap on fields around them. http://carrcny.org/ Sometimes it gets spread on the fields before a heavy rain and then it gets washed into Trumansburg Creek. Lovely.
2-07-00 John talks about water infrastructure work. Coating a tank on 89, replacing some pumps, and some water main on 96.
2-10-11 request for closing Cayuga St. on 6/28 from Prospect to King for a block party - approved
2-12-32 John talks about a drainage problem on Lake St. that is going to have to be repaired for big bucks eventually.
2-16-00 Farmers Market Agreement
2-23-14 Telephone Building Update. Sounds encouraging. We are moving closer to purchasing the old building for use as a Community Center - thanks to the work of John Vogel, John Ullberg, and Don Schlather.
2-54-12 Zoning Moratorium extension on Auble property which expires on 7/31 They are going to try to extend for another 6 months - to give time to complete zoning ordinance update
We got 2 $1900 celebration grants for the Winter Festival and the Main St Dance - 9/6
The County will be helping us soon with the zoning ordinance update. Mayor and a couple of trustees will be meeting with Ed Marks soon.
3-02-40 Paying Bills
3-08-06 Public Comment period 2. I ask Chris Thomas to clarify the numbers that Jason based his objections to my Free Press article on. He agreed that I wasn't far off when basing my math on 10,000 residents of the Fire District. Tammy Morse said there are about 3500 Tax Parcels in the District - not people.
adjourn
