(1) Town Board - Regular Meeting

Good evening folks. I'd like to welcome you to the Red Hook Town Board meeting of Tuesday, September 9th, 2025. Would you kindly join me in the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you all very much.

It is another wonderful day here in Red Hook. We've been uniquely blessed with some good weather and so I uh thank you all for being indoors during this night. Um for the folks at home, if you'd be kind enough to pan to the screen so we can show them what's on tonight's agenda. This is the first meeting of the month, which means we'll start out with the supervisor's report. It's a snapshot of the financial condition of uh the municipality at a given moment. We'll have the clerk's report as well. A few announcements, reminders mostly tonight. Um we'll take public comments for 15 minutes. Um then we move into a presentation uh from Eli Dooker, professor at Bard College uh on the Hudson Valley Air Quality Coalition. And then we'll move our next item will be an RFP for the um customer acquisition and subscriber management firm. As you know, we are building our second uh community solar project on the Cookingham property. Uh we have awarded the contract for construction and this is an RFP for the firm to manage the program itself. Uh we'll be talking again about uh Camp Rising Sun, the CPF application, and discussing possibly uh passing it on to that advisory board for uh their review and a presentation by Winnick Land Trust to them. We are going to continue to do something we've been doing for years now, which is trying to gain control over uh the speeds on our town roads. We have been working diligently with uh surrounding

municipalities, counties um to try to effectuate uh change up in Albany. As you know, New York is a home rule state except when it comes to things like determining speed limits. What we need to do is have engineering studies uh conducted. And so that's what we're looking at tonight's a townwide study and uh a task order from one of our firms to do just that. Uh continued uh conversation and updates on the composting agreement. Uh as you know our recycling center, we accept food compost and it's doing quite well and we'd like to explore expanding the number of bins uh that we uh accept. We also have a resolution to establish a date for a public hearing regarding water rates and charges for the water district. Number one, this is our annual increase. Uh the water board uh would like us to look at the usual 5% increase. There's been a series of those uh over the last few years. The caveat being that they think they are close to renovating the water storage tank which is going to be a fairly large capital expense and so there will be additional increases uh likely in 2026. Um we are going to have a brief probably discussion about um the intermunicipal grant program through EFC. Last year, we applied for um a couple of million dollars towards uh the $6.5 million sewer extension uh project through the traditional neighborhood district. Uh the application period for this year uh it ends this week and so we'd like to go

ahead and bless uh resubmitting the application. That's 40% of the total project costs that we could uh receive up to. Um the last thing is updates on procurement policy. We haven't updated the dollar figures in many years and with inflation we find ourselves spending a lot of time uh seeking out uh quotes for very small amounts of money. And so we'd like to update not only the amounts but perhaps look at a green purchasing policy as well. and then one or two items for a reorganization. So, with that being said, we'll jump into uh just a few announcements. Just a reminder, tomorrow, Congressman Ryan Spar's van uh will be up at uh Tivoli Free Library up uh in Tiboly Village Hall 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. This is to assist constituents with some of the federal programs uh to understand more about how they work and to direct them to uh the particular offices to apply for those programs. uh hard scrabble the villages annual uh musical event uh is coming up September 20th. I want to remind you also this Saturday is uh the household hazardous waste and electronics recycling event. As you know we have our own e-waste event here at the town, but we don't do hazardous waste. Um, this is down at the fairgrounds, 8:00 a.m. to 12:30. It's uh pre-registration necessary and a $10 prepayment fee as well. Here are the items that they will accept. And I'll keep that up there for a moment so you can take a look at that.

We get a lot of calls about where to bring certain items, household items that can't be disposed of in the hall or trash or here at our recycling center. And this is about as close as this event has come to the town of Red Hook. So, uh, if you are looking to dispose of some of these items, I would suggest you take advantage of it if you can't. Um, one of my particular favorite events, uh, Tivoli Street Painting Festival is coming up in a couple of Saturdays, uh, September 27th at 10:00 a.m. And you can register, pre-register for some of the squares. And how it works, if you're not familiar, uh, we go out there, I'm one of those folks. Early in the morning, we paint squares. Um, and then folks come and do sidewalk uh chalk and you get to see some great artists at work. Uh, also a couple of reminders. Uh, the Elundorf historic Red Hook has their open house uh, the Saturday. I have not mentioned September 20th. And uh Winnicki will have a ribbon cutting also this Saturday for the new trail um the blue trail over uh on the salt and they invite anybody who wants to work on invasive uh vines to uh come along as well. Okay, that's all I have for announcements. Anybody else want anything to share?

Well, sure. I could say so. I'm the uh chair of the comprehensive plan committee that is in its early stages and going well and um we'll be uh becoming more public this fall. So, we will be at Hearts Scravel Day uh collecting ideas and our first public workshop will be in October and I think soon to be announced.

Very good. Thank you very much, Julio. Um we'll dive right in on the supervisor's report. Again, this is for a moment in time. We do this each month uh to update the public on the finances of uh the municipality and we'll be my office will be presenting the budget tenative budget next month uh early next month for 2026. Um we started the month of August with an opening balance of 10,217,000 had receipts of nearly 351,000 dispersements of 53,000 with a balance of 10,65,000. You have in your packets uh the budget adjustments as suggested uh by our bookkeeper uh for the month of August and your monthly variance reports. I'll make a note that we are starting to see some improvements the second uh six months of the mortgage tax year which is an off uh season thing from April through September. Um it's our hope that with interest rates perhaps finally uh moderating a little bit, we'll see a little bit more mortgage tax revenue. Sales tax um is coming in. We just received a quarterly early in August. Um about flattish for last from this year to last year. Uh we'll see how that uh how that progresses during the year. You know, a lot of sales tax has to do with car sales. So, we'll see how that

industry does um in the next few months. Okay. Um any questions about the supervisor's report? Okay, hearing none. Would somebody like to make a motion to accept it? So moved. Second. Thank you. All in favor? I. Thank you very much. Deanna, may I kindly ask you uh to give your clerk's report?

Okay. The clerk's report for the dates August 1st through August 31st, 2025. Um, we had 191 walk-in window service. We did 178 notaries and the deputy alone did 106 phone calls. I did not record mine. Um, total lo Oh, I forgot to print out my thing. Okay, so um, total local shares remitted to the supervisor $7,749.73. Amount paid to New York State Agriculture and Markets for the Spay Neuter Program, $29. The amount paid to the New York State Department of Health for marriage licenses, $225. Amount paid to New York State Environmental Conservation for hunting and fishing licenses, $1,976. The total state, local, county, and local revenues, $9,888.90. And I have um abstract. I hereby certify that vouchers numbered 33806 to 33852 processed in the month of August 2025 are an accurate reporting of the abstracts approved for payment by the town board in the August in the amount in the month of August 2025. Yes.

Thanks. Is there a motion to accept the clerk's report? Thank you, Bill. Second. Thank you, Julia. All in favor? I I Very good. Okay. Um, we can take 15 minutes of public comments. Is there somebody who'd like to make some public comments tonight?

If you'd be kind enough to state your name for for the record, please.

Roland Page 4827 Route 92G Red Oak New York. 56 years here. I have researched some of the daily carrots reports that you have participated in and I'm going to quote some here now. I am determined to do the very best for this community. I feel like I my role is to help assist the bringing of consensus. you come up with something that is com a compromise for the community. Mr. Supervisor, when Bart College offered land to the town, the deal fell through. Was that because your best efforts to compromise for consensus or was it your way of the highway attitude? Don't expect an answer. You failed to put the necessary effort into compromise with Bart College to acquire 20 acres. Then you focused turned to the Red Hook Boat Club with 2.37 acres. Doesn't sound rational to me. You failed to consider the possible growth of the support from residents in the community from the Pope community and others others for the Red Hook Poke Club. Mr. Supervisor, you take credit for bringing diligent or being diligent for keep the town taxes low. Being a resident of 56 years and learning a little bit about taxes, I offer the more accurate picture. Over the years of your administration,

the growth of the new tax taxable property and the increase in existing property value together with grants has resulted in a fairly steady tax town. But you jump out and take great credit for all of this in your skill and wisdom, which I think is limited. The talent has a grant writer in the budget, a grant administrator. Correction, they should be responsible for completing the environmental assessments that are currently incomplete, erroneous, and/or failing in your failing in your filing. Excuse me. Anybody's interested, I'm going to give copies of the May 28th environmental assessment report that I provided. I'd like to take the opportunity to get copies now. I leave these here for a making two trucks. Thank you.

This demonstrates exactly I'm not just blowing whistles about your lousy work. Well, thank you. Um, next up, Lisa, if you'd be kind enough to say your name for the record, please.

Lisa Fero, town of Red Hook. A key and crucial attribute of autocratic regimes is that they permit neither disscent nor contradiction. The notion of truth does not matter. In fact, myth and fantasy as well as unpredictability and inconsistency become powerful political tools. So begins an article recently written by Bard College President Leon Boxstein and how appropo to what we are witnessing. You've ignored prevailing public sentiment, the 87 Berrytown residents that wrote of their concerns and asking for additional information, the determination of the waterfront advisory committee, and the multiple emails from Jeremiah Sheen to the supervisor between May and August to discuss the town law 220. So, you permit neither dissent nor contradiction. Suddenly, the supervisor has begun responding to public comments, but on his terms in response to the outrage over the over 108,000 spent through June, he stated the lawsuit was brought by the boat club against the town. Now, he knows that entire amount is not due to the lawsuit challenging the flawed legislation that all five board members approved. Less than 1% of the $24,000 in invoices spent on planning during that period was related to legal action and the majority of the almost 55,000 page paid to Hodgson Ross through May 31st was related to initiating the eminent domain action and preparing for the public hearing. But the notion of truth does not matter. Robert stated one way to keep the cost down is not to have us need to engage our attorneys. In other words, do as we say and don't question us. Blame the victim. I guarantee that if the property you owned, maintained, improved, and which carried over seven decades of history was subject to eminent domain on the heels of targeted zoning legislation, you'd fight it, too. But your message is to stand down and let us roll right over you. The best way to not engage the attorneys is to abandon the unpopular action that the

majority of the residents have told you is not needed. and your gratuitous and unprofessional statement regarding unrelated lawsuits in another county was simply meant to smear an individual and infer non-existent actions here in Red Hook. It was a myth. Jacob, you've chosen to stake your professional and personal reputations on this overreach manufactured by the supervisor. We ask you to please re-examine your position and give the same consideration and concern to the property owners that you do to the students that seek your assistance in protecting their rights. You all have equal standing on this board. No one wields greater greater power than another. Yet, we only hear from the supervisor. Any one of you can introduce a resolution, engage the public, respond to a comment, or host a real town hall meeting where there is actual give and take. But please do so without the rehearsed self- congratulatory pronouncements and half-truths. That would be a welcome and refreshing change.

Thank you, Lisa. Next up, Roxan, if you'd be kind enough to state your name for the record.

Roxan Roxan Fiser, Barry Town, New York. Tonight, I address the supervisor's news flash, a reposting on his site three months later of the flawed public meeting of May 16th and its PowerPoint presentation on the proposed waterfront at the Red Hook Boat Club site. While pressed on in sorry while presented as an informative resource, the posting dangerously omits critical facts, misleading the public as much as any outright falsehood. The presentation claims the Red Hook Boat Club property is quote ideal location for a public park, citing existing facilities and Hudson River access. It asserts alignment with the LWRP despite insignificant inconsistencies later cited by the planning board. It suggests no environmental impact or expansion of use with no construction needed despite contrary evidence, including necessary ADA compliance. No link given to written comments in the town record or acknowledgement of 916 speakers who voiced strong resistance to the eminent domain acquisition of the site. The supervisor ignores Judge Rose's August 15, 2025 ruling which overturned major claims of local law number one of 2025. It explicitly stated the zoning law exceeded the town's authority and that public parks are not permitted in the waterfront zoning district. The town has 30 days to appeal this ruling. Yet, this critical deadline and its implications were excluded from the supervisor's news

flash presentation. These omissions distort the public's understanding of the project's feasibility and legality. By selectively framing the narrative, the supervisor undermines transparency and dismisses the community's voice. I urge the town board to correct this misinformation, fully disclose Judge Rose's ruling, and acknowledge the public opposition in all future communications. to continue quoting Leon Botstein, president of Bard College, from his September 4th article, quote, "Autocracies thrive on lies, particularly those that easily lend themselves to elaboration as officially sanctioned myths, which then are used to define norms and laws." Supervisor McKon, you have perpetuated the myth of a public private partnership dialogue by insisting on acquisition as the starting point for closing genuine collaboration or alternative approaches. Councilman Tester, as a Bard employee, you have hopefully read this article and must champion your president's call for truth and transparency. Let us reject lies, omissions, and myth, embracing truth and open dialogue in Red Hook's decisionmaking. Thank you.

Thank you, Alex. Okay, next up, we have time for Nancy, for you, and for one more. My mine's pretty short. Okay.

My name is Nancy Rogers, and my house at 7659 North Broadway is sandwiched between Cookingham East and West. My focus is on the west side. Mr. McKeen, you stated that you visited the Red Hill Folk Club on Memorial Day and there was no one there. I can say the same for most days in the entire Labor Day weekend on the Cookie Camp Trail. I can confirm that 99% of the time there were less than 10 people walking on that trail since it is visible out my kitchen window, my family room window, as well as my deck. Yet your need and want was to build this walkway and fencing using taxpayers money without an opportunity to vote on the property use and expenditure. And I'm unsure why expensive fencing was required if their trails were already well delineated. What was once a working farm with beautiful apple blossoms and majestic corn fields is now a field of weeds and soon those trails will surround um solar panels. How will they be secured and maintained? There is a walking track around the ball field at the recreck park and sidewalks throughout the village and to the wreck park, but none up north Broadway beyond Park Avenue. Currently, the only parking for the Cookingham Trail is on Park Avenue, which impedes the sight lines for traffic on that heavily traveled street. There would be no sidewalks. How many of you town board members have taken a walk on the farm trail? Since it is literally in my backyard, I can walk through the tall weeds, hop the fence, be on the trail. I have walked the trail only twice. I much prefer walking through the streets of Renault, window shopping at our stores, and having a cup of coffee at Mighty Donuts. Pedestrians have to walk along busy Route 9 on a narrow shoulder to reach the trail entrance. Safety seems to has taken a backseat to building fences and bridges. Since the trails fall within the village boundaries, why were the parking and safety concerns not addressed jointly by the village and the town? So much for

paying village taxes. The village and the town do not seem to be communicating on issues that impact both. I suggest the town board be building truth and trust with its village and town residents. Now, are you asking for the public's input on bridge designs, but none of the sketches contain estimated costs? This is important information for the public to know and consider. Please update the materials on the town website so residents can make informed decisions and find out and not find out the price tag after the fact, which seems to be a theme with the town board. And here's a couple Whoops. of pictures of the field. Thank you.

Thank you, Nancy. Okay. We have time for one more speaker. Public comment.

Okay. We want to thank you all for taking time to speak tonight. Um I'll take a couple minutes to try to quickly answer a couple of those questions that were opposed. And if anybody else would like to chime in as well, um I want to first say uh to sort of the the crux of this situation, I want to remind the public um that we started out making the request and was told that we could have a sit down to discuss a public private partnership with the boat club on This property, this property, I should add, was uh recommended by the LWRP working group uh several years ago. The update to the LWRP is up at DOS for final approval where they, not us, the town board, they recommended uh that we um endeavor a public private partnership with this particular property. And I've had boat club members and even a boat club director confirm that this is in fact a property to be doing this. If you are familiar with the boat launches up and down the Hudson River as I am, as our consultant was, and I want to remind the public, our planning consultant is the individual who uh put together the Hudson River Access Plan uh for New York State uh DEEC. He's quite and is a voter. He's quite familiar with all the properties up and down the river. And I would encourage you to go see there's some wonderful waterfront parks. Um Kokaki has an amazing and much larger park than than this will be. Um but there are some great places. But when you look at

places that are essentially boat launches, you'll see that this property compares very favorably with those types of places. um it has um elements to it that are much better than for example the the two properties up in in Germantown. Um as as far as the notion of starting at eminent domain, anything could be further from the truth. We have been insisting on having meetings um with the Bo Club to discuss a public private partnership for it seems like 6 months maybe maybe more. I'm going to do something rather unusual which is I'm going to read from attorney communications. It's not something we typically do um but it's something that I feel uh would be necessary in this case. Hopefully um you were okay with that. There's an email from our attorney back in May 2nd saying, "Bill, you had previously indicated to me that absent evidence that there was support from the the whole board as opposed to just the supervisor for moving forward with a park project that there was no reason to meet. As you can see by their unanimous vote, there is such support for moving forward. Therefore, can we set up a meeting in the next few days to discuss alternatives to eminent domain? Can we meet in the next few days to discuss alternatives to eminent domain? Please let me know. William Hurst, attorney for the boat club, there will be no meeting. So this notion being put forth that the

boat club is being subjected to eminent domain first without outreach. We've been outreaching for months and asking to have a meeting to discuss public private partnership and I will say we did have one meeting in the six months. That is not how we can put together a public private partnership and the demands that have been put upon us before we have meetings to come up with plans without having information on how a plan would work. The reason we were able to on rather short notice put together a really good plan with Bart College and local land trusts for that property which by the way was a lot more than 20 acres is because we met early often we listened and we learned about what each other was looking for in a public private partnership and it worked. Now, the reason that the project hasn't moved forward with the Bart College property was explained to us by the BART CFO at one of three neighborhood gatherings that I had raged for in Barry Town to keep them updated. And it had more to do with their change of plans for that property, bringing over Simon's Rock and needing to focus. And if you've seen what they've done over there on that property, they have gone full boore to try and get ready for those students and to focus on that and and their efforts. Whether that project will ever take place, I don't know. But I will tell you that it has nothing to do with the consensus of this board. And I will say

that this board has worked fabulously well to protect that property. The hamlet of Barry Town. They met early and often and came to some decisive decision making that I think everybody agrees was to the benefit of the community. The same is true for the Cookingham property, which when we are finished with the solar project, we will then put up for sale like we did on the east side for farming purposes. And Nancy, you will see a farmer there again, but not until we are finished with that aspect of the project. As far as the trails and the parking, it's not just fencing we did. We had to stabilize a lot of those farm paths. They were not suitable for trails. There is no need for additional parking. Once this bridge is constructed, people can park in either one of the recreational parking lots in addition to Park Avenue. There has never, to my knowledge, been uh a moment where there was insufficient parking for people to access through Abrams Park, which is where they are supposed to access the Cookingham trails. Um there were not 916 speakers as once again misinformation coming uh out to the public. There were 76 speakers at the public hearing. There were a few hundred people there. Many of them because they received a letter from my office inviting them to learn about the project and also because boat club members reached out to their friends and family to come as well to advocate on their behalf.

We have taken time to reach out to those who have not engaged uh in this particular project and this issue to try and gauge community sentiment one by one to get a better handle of how people uh feel about the project. And admittedly there is a difference of opinion and there are people who are supportive and people who are not supportive. As I mentioned earlier, in 2007, the same was true of the Community Preservation Act initiative, which was required to go to public referendum, which barely passed, but which has made a substantial difference in our community and provided the funding in order to put together that deal for Cookingham, for Barry Town, for all of the farms up and down West Curly Corner. ers, just to name a few. So, with that being said, I'm sure that I didn't uh answer all of your questions as far as the lawsuit and Judge Rose's decision. The court essentially said uh that the two actions were in in proximity uh chronologically and perhaps should have been considered uh together, but one action has nothing to do with the other action. And so as far as an appeal, this board after going into attorney of client did come to a determination um and we did authorize uh our firm to both reargue and to appeal that decision. Okay. Uh that's enough out of me. Let's get on to the agenda. And I hope I've at least answered some of your questions as

best as I can. Anybody else? Uh before we get on anybody. Okay, we have Professor Duker here. And the nice thing about having Professor Duker here is whenever we see him, we're always talking about water quality and protecting the water. Today we're talking about air and air quality, something near and dear to our hearts. So, let me see if I can jump over to your slides. I'll be your slide person. Do you want to put it into slideshow mode?

Oh, you're assuming I know how to do that. Um, click the reload button the in the middle like top middle reload. Professor punishment for sending it to me at the last minute. All right. So, um,

beautiful. Uh, so my name is Eli Deer. I'm a a professor at Bard College. Um, BR's on the I'm about to talk about air. So I thought um we could as a community maybe really quickly just take a deep breath. Inhale. Exhale. Okay. So now I'm going to tell you a little bit about the air that you just breathe. All right. So, um, as, uh, as Robert said, uh, I'm here to talk a little bit about the air quality work that we've been doing with the community. Um, when I say the community, I mean the entire Hudson Valley at this point. Uh, we are doing a lot of work with students, faculty, staff, and community leaders throughout the Hudson Valley um, who are interested in in finding out what our air quality is like and how to preserve it. Um, and uh, I think it's interesting that in this area um, you would have known me first as a water quality person, but in the in the Hudson Valley in general, if you ask someone what the water is like, they probably will know. But if you ask someone what the air is like, until recently, most of us did not know. And so this is a story um that I'm going to share with you a little bit about how community um observations and leadership around um taking care of air and water really can put the Hudson Valley and us in particular in this area um really ahead of the game in terms of understanding air quality as wildfire smoke starts really challenging our capacity to breathe um and as our uh beautiful views you remember these kind of views everybody. They I haven't seen them very much recently, right? So, trying to get back to these kind of beautiful views and and ways to really enjoy where we

live. Um, so what we do is we put together air quality data with informed community members. That's us. We're all community. We all just breathe the same air. And I'll tell you right now, we all just breathe each other's air. That's happening. Um, so we're an informed community here and we're working towards cleaner air. Next slide. You're assuming I know how to I'm assuming a lot.

Okay. So, the ways that we do that um so one of the things um that's important to note is that this community, Red Hook and Kingston are kind of the first communities to get involved in looking at air quality. Uh Kingston was the first to ask Bard College through the community sciences lab to put an air quality sensor on the rooftop of the community building there, the Andy Murphy Neighborhood Center in 2020. and uh Red Hook uh Red Hook Library actually was the very first library to join the Hudson Valley Library air quality uh uh network which was started by a bar student uh back in 2021 I believe that now has uh almost we're getting towards 30 libraries now but Red Hook was the first okay and it's really important to know this because it has made a huge difference and it has actually um um really inspired the rest of the Hudson how to um start putting up air quality sensors and understanding more about the air. So on the left you'll see uh the very first community air quality report that was put together by a group called the Hudson Valley Air Quality Coalition or HVAC which cracks us all up. Um, so HVAC uh took all the data that we have gotten on the rooftop of the Andy Murphy building about air quality in Kingston for the last 5 years and put it together into um a a really amazing uh community- centered report that lets the community know not just the kinds of air, the kind of air that we're breathing, but also how to stay safe and also how to understand the effects of wildfire smoke and other um other types of air quality. the um issues on their health. You add that to creating the capacity for community to actually see the data. So, how many of you check your phones

for air quality these days? Right. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Um how many folks know where those data are coming from on your phone?

All right. So the the unfortunate reality is that for most of the areas across the United States, if you're looking at your weather app to see the air quality, um you are not necessarily seeing the air quality where you are. You're seeing air quality of the closest sensor and those sensors are usually far away. So do the next slide. Um so the center for environmental sciences and humanities, we work on water and air clearly. Um our job at at Bard um and in the community is to be a part of the community to take the um the resources that we have in the academic realm and bringing that to uh the communities that we live in and the communities we're a part of um to try to deal with local issues, right? And so we're trying to address wicked environmental problems like we need to breathe. How do we do that? Like these are really tough environmental problems these days. Um and so so if we are trying to do that bridging, we basically have had to uh respond to community requests for understanding air quality and water quality where they live, not somewhere far away, not not relying on on data from Albany, not relying on data from New York City, but knowing actually what's happening right where we are. What are we drinking? What are we breathing? And so on the right you'll see the map there. It the red dots show uh clusters of of air quality sensors that we have up now and also places where we do water quality work. The big blue symbols there are our regional air quality systems and those are systems that are on the rooftops. So Andy Murphy building was the first the one that's circled in yellow in Kingston. We now have one on um the library at bar. We have another rooftop sensor um at Mop St. Mary's College in Newberg. And our

last sensor is in Kipsy on the Adrian's Memorial Library. Those are giving us an idea of regional air quality. It's on a roof. What you might notice is that not everybody lives on the roof though. We need not just rooftop uh air quality sensing, but we also need ground level. And that's what the the Red Hook Library sensor and all the sensors in all the libraries across the Hudson Valley are providing. So if you could do the next slide. So what we're trying to do is actually really cutting edge. Um it's not really um but it's just now being noticed by um by scientists and just now being noticed by the rest of the academic um realm that actually communities, those of us who live and breathe where we are are actually the best stewards of our own water and air and that we actually can be very good at observing change and figuring out what to do with those changes. So this is from nature talking about how citizen science can help to solve the global freshwater crisis. We've been doing work here in this community. Community leaders of Red Hook and Bard have been working together for over 50 years doing this stuff. So this is it's cutting edge, but it's really we we've always known always known this. So if you could go to the next slide. Same thing is true about about thinking about environmental regulations and really working together as a community um to figure out how is it that we want to be healthy? How do we want to make sure we have clean uh air and clean water?

Um not bad. Not bad. Not bad. All right. So in this uh so in and the other part though that really is cutting edge is that we are set up because we've been doing this work for so long. We are actually set up to deal with the fact that on the on the federal level we're getting we're seeing uh historic deregulation around water and air quality um for uh for the nation. And if we are in in this very localized way able to do our own monitoring, do our own um stewardship over water and air. We're in a much better place and we are which is good. This is all good news. So,

so as I said, we've been doing this kind of work together um since 1975. Um, and it's really we're really benefiting from it now. So, if you go to the next slide, the the um the air quality network that we put together with community leaders with Red Hook leading the way, with Kingston leading the way, is called the Hudson Valley Community Air Network. We went live with it over the summer. And over the summer, we toured up and down the Hudson Valley talking to communities and community leaders about ways to be able to provide you with your own data so that you're not just looking at your weather app to find out if it's safe to go outside. You're actually looking at an app that will tell you what it really is outside. Not a guess, not a prediction about what what's outside, but actually what is what you're breathing outside. And so, um, we're we see this as a really good way to start helping us as communities figure out how to be safe as our air changes. Next slide. Um, so we just to be sure everyone knows, and I think probably everyone's on the same page, the reason why we care about air quality is that it is the fluid. It is a fluid just like water. It is a fluid and it is the fluid that we interact with most out of all the fluids out there most intimately. We breathe it in, we breathe it out, we breathe it in, we breathe it out. We change it by breathing out. We are trusting it by breathing it in. Okay, so that's number one. That's why we should. The next reason is that over 8.1 million people die from air pollution each year. the next and air pollution is well known as the second most common cause of death and it's second only to heart disease and here's the problem heart disease is exacerbated by bad air quality so I think we are just now starting to come to the understanding of just how important good

air is but the problem is we don't have local monitors this is also a breaking news uh piece of literature that was just published by um by the sciences, but that's something that we've always known in this community. And so that's why in 2020, Kingston reached out and said, "Hey, if we're going to be making all these decisions that are around, how do we keep our community safe? How do we become a climate smart community? How do we do that if we don't even know what it was like to begin with? How do we know what we're saying we're doing is even working?" Um so then they asked us to figure that out. So then that's why we put up the air quality sensor. So if you want to hit it a couple times, actually another time. Uh so we came up with this. This is a figure that shows you um the concentration of air pollution over time. Um and this is from the rooftop of the Andy Murphy building in Kingston. Okay. It takes five years to actually be able to say anything about air quality. Lesson number one was when we put it up in n in uh we put it up in January of 2020. Um and we I had no idea what weird air quality year that would be because co came in and you can see right here the huge impact co us staying home, us not driving, us not doing things as normal greatly reduced the air pollution um in Kingston and it's very obvious. And then over time, um, there's a lot to say here, but one of the things that's really important to note is that while we don't necessarily always exceed what is considered the EPA limit for air pollution on a daily basis, we are often exceeding the World Health Organization's understanding of what is healthy on a daily basis. And this is Kingston, New York on the you can see

fourth of July here. So, it's obvious that this is not necessarily the fault of Canada. It's not necessarily the fault of California. We actually have this powerful influence on our own local um air quality and we can change it um and make decisions that are good about it. One of the things to note, so you have these uh yellow uh little haze uh haze here. Um those denote when um there were wildfires, wildfire smoke coming into our region. And you'll see that every time we do have an increase in particulate matter and air pollution. So it is affecting you know uh wildfire smoke that is coming from other places is affecting us. But the thing about air quality is that it's additive. So if you start here with your own pollution that you're putting out as a community and then an air pollution event comes in a wildfire event comes in something like this. If you add this to this, it actually is not such a bad air quality day. So, it's really important to note that we can make decisions even though we've got pollution coming at us from other places. We can make decisions as a community to reduce what we put out to be able to make those days not as harmful to us. Does that make sense? This is very exciting for us um to be able to tell Kingston about it, but also this is what is in the future for Red Hook and other other areas because as as long as we're able to get the air quality data and take a look at it, we can actually have conversations with each other. What are we going to decide in terms of what's allowed in our air? What are we going to do? Are we gonna on a on a day that we know the wildfire or smoke is the highest, are we actually gonna have our Fourth of July big fireworks thing, or can we have it the next day or something like that? You know, there there are tiny but very important decisions we can make. Okay, next slide. Um, and I'm almost done.

Promise. So, the Hudson Valley Community Air Network basically pulls together the four rooftop sensors that I told you about, uh, Bard, Kingston, Pipsy, and Newberg. and then it combines it with 20 different street level library air quality sensors. So those libraries are all across the Hudson Valley. Um we are now being joined by the Ramipole library system. So that that number will go up to 3035. Um we have 12 neighborhood street level air quality sensors across the Hudson Valley and they're just folks that are interested in providing data that for their neighbors that is near where they live. So, one of the things that we have done is work to put all of these sensors up on a platform called the Just Air Just Air platform. You can get there by typing in justair.app in your phone or you can use this uh use this little scannable thing. And basically what it does is it gives you access real time access to the data that are being generated by those rooftop sensors. Not only that, but those sensors will text you when air quality is going bad. So, you can tell you can tell the the app which sensors you would like to hear from and you will get proactive texts letting you know, alerting you so you can keep yourself and your family safe. What we're trying to do is increase the number of um sensors that are on this platform. And what I was hoping um to put forward is that the that that the town of Red Hook sponsor a couple of these sensors. Um right now the Red Hook Library sensor, it's it's running, it's it's uh publicly accessible through the Purple Air network, but we'd really like to get it on this platform so that folks can proactively be alerted to that. And then the other suggestion I was going to

make is that the um town hall itself have its own air quality sensor. There are some sensors that now um are made that turn different colors based on what the air quality is. And so you could literally be driving by the town hall and be like, "Oh, the it's green. Air is great." Or, "Oh, it's red. Where are my kids?" You know? Um so that those are a couple things that I was hoping to suggest to you that could be something possibly the town could do. Um if you go to the next slide. Um, and it'd be really great then to be able to add Red Hook to uh the number of sensors that are going up. Right now, we've got a contract coming online with Oolster County. They are jumping in and they're filling in the blank spots in Oolster County. Uh, they're putting up I think 20 sensors um and then we'll be putting it up on the um on the Just Air app. And I think it would be great though if Red Hook got in there first. It hasn't happened yet. So if Red Hook was our first library, um it would be really great if Red Hook would be our first ground level sensor on the on the network. All right, next slide. I think this is the last slide. And this is really just about what you can individually do. Anyone can have one of these sensors. We can help you manage it. We can help you install it. Um also, you can there are monthly meetings with the Hudson Valley Air Quality Coalition. It's always a great place to learn what's going on across the Hudson Valley in terms of air quality, what people are concerned about, what issues are popping up, and how folks are using the data that they're seeing online. Um, also the biggest thing that we can do, and I'm going to run after I say this, is stop burning wood. It's really sad. It is really sad. It is really sad. We live in the Hudson Valley. People love to burn their wood. But the problem is wood smoke is actually worse than coal or oil

or gas.

So if you can't imagine taking coal and burning it in your backyard or in your house, you definitely do not want to be wearing wood. It's sad. I love s'mores so much. But as a scientist, the the uh the data are devastatingly obvious. So, as a as a valley, we do have some big decisions to make around how we're going to use the clean air that we have. Um, but one of those is if you can stand it, stop or greatly decrease burning wood because it really makes a huge difference here in the valley. Um and then the last part is is figuring out um how to participate further and um if you have the chance funding all sorts of scientific um um efforts including helping other communities in Duchess County or in your neighborhood or in the state wherever helping communities be able to have these kinds of sensors and have access to data um because it's really powerful. Anyway, I think that's it. I'm sorry it's very long, but uh [Applause]

is everybody still breathing? It is safe. I promise you. One quick question. Let's assume everybody took every recommendation that you gave. How much would those recommendations improve our quality of life and life expectancy? If a average man lives till 75 and a woman till 81, would making all of these changes increase life expectancy of some sort?

Yes, there is. If you would love if you would like to work with me to be able to calculate those kind like the answer to that question, I think it's doable, but I have no idea. I think um given what we saw with the um the map of air quality over time, it's clear that we can make a devastatingly huge difference if we all as a community make different decisions. I mean that that COVID uh slump there is like is amazing. Um, so we can absolutely make a huge difference. And also the there are neighborhoods in I don't know if it happens here, but I know in Kingston there are neighborhoods where there's just one person who has a chimney and likes to have wood fires and that person is actually um affecting its entire neighborhood.

Um, and it and it happens really frequently. And so if that person stopped, I don't know how to quantify the years of life that other people question. Sure. Like if you do get a sensor and is it say you do want to burn wood, say you do want once a once a year, like will you be like pinged as like that one in the neighborhood that's like look at you?

I mean I'm I all I'm going to say all I'm going to say is that the the wood burning thing has taken me years to come to an okay place to be able to not cry while I'm sing. So it it is painful but I have I have seen it can cause damage immediately. So you are making a decision and it's like a cigarette. So it's secondhand smoke right? So you decide how much secondhand smoke do you want to gift other people. I I raised my hand.

Uh subject I study because we uh as a community ban outdoor wood boilers. If you're familiar with them, they are structures that look like maybe a doghouse size. They're about yay tall. You burn. They're incomplete burns. And so what happens is the smoke actually drifts at a very low level and doesn't rise because of the lack of heat of the fire. And so we banned these gosh almost two decades ago. Um, and you'll find that states, I think it's Oregon,

uh, banned uh, wood stoves, uh, for this reason, their air quality was so poor. Um, wood smoke is 12 times, I learned this, uh, professor, 12 times as carcinogenic as cigarettes. Yep. 12 times. And so you think just the volume difference between, and I used to smoke as a young man, I'm embarrassed to say, but um, so Uh listen to your professor. He's he's right on the money there. It is something we romance here to sit around a fire and I think it's wonderful. But um it it does create cellular damage. Um we have how many water test sites here in this town?

Okay. So if you want to talk water, I'm ready for that. No, no, no. I'm just saying you're asking for a couple of air spots. We have right now we have 12 13 sites. So yeah. No. So if we were to have a couple in the town and the reason I bring that up is because you suggested both town hall and the and the live to say um both of which are on a state highway. And here's the other thing. Yeah.

If and I'm sorry that uh Nancy has left us because she lives on a state highway. the health outcomes. Just to understand how important air air pollution is, um studies show that if you live on a main road, Albany, right here, is the longest road in New York State. It goes from Manhattan all the way up to Albany.

Um it's a state highway. And so if you live on main roads, your health outcomes are greatly diminished than if you live on a more rural uh road or further away. And this is one of the challenges we have in the town of Red Hookup is we have three state highways. Two of them meet right here at the center of the village. So we have those uh fine particullet that we're dealing with,

which is why we as a community have been leading with the transition to electric vehicles. Um we have some uh in fact our we one of the first to get one for our building and zoning. We uh piloted the first in the state um electric landscaping. So we had a whole demonstration project where we went out to all the neighborhoods, invited people in the neighborhoods to get their lawn mower for free, right, Julia? And so they got a chance to experience what that's like because single cycle engines are one of the worst for air quality. Now, you don't use it as much as your car perhaps, but um what they emit is is really terrible. Um, I would love it if we could host I mean I think the idea of having one on town hall is a great idea because people do look to see what's being hosted um at town hall. I wonder would it be duplicative to have one at the library and town hall since they're right up the road?

It would be it would definitely be informative to watch the differences the difference between the two. Yeah. What about having some other a little bit more remote locations like would we have one on what park? There's a good example. Um or or those trails that um you know something like that county has been putting them on running trails actually so that people can get a sense of what they're breathing when they run. So that's not a bad idea. They're um the limitation uh is electricity um and Wi-Fi. So those are the those are the limitations. They're not I mean you can get past those some money but

so W Park would work because we have public Wi-Fi there and we have and flag poles have become the the norm the exciting place for folks to be putting these um at libraries. It's worked really well. So okay good. You can tell I'm excited about this topic. yourself home. I'm sorry. We're moving on. Good. Now I have to jump back to the We need help with that agenda. No, I think I may have this as the original one I had. There it is.

Um, okay. Second, community solar. That's the other thing we're doing to try to limit emissions obviously. Um, and to save people money. Um, I think I failed to mention somebody spoke about taxes going up and they had a piece of paper or whatever. Um, we we tell folks if you'd like to see what's actually happening with your taxes, the tax collector can print out for you a tax bill from 2015 and a tax bill from 2025 and you can see how we've been saving you money over the last decade. Um, we need a company to manage the customers, aka the town residents. So, we have an RFP. The way this project works, for those of you who are sitting in the audience, this is now the second one that we have. Um, this this community solar project, it is about a third the size of the first one that we did. It will accommodate up to 100 households worth of electricity. uh people will subscribe to the program. Um all of the energy will go into the grid. One of the things people uh don't necessarily realize immediately with solar, they hear about how it's uh temperamental um better in the summer, worse in the winter or the rainy seasons. But solar really helps out the stability of the grid. If you think of the grid being like the veins in your body, you have bigger ones that flow better and you have thinner ones that don't flow so well. Properly placed with the proper equipment um solar helps the stability of the grid. So right now we have a resolution uh to

go out and to solicit bids from firms that manage our customers to acquire them which shouldn't be too hard because the first one was a very successful project and to manage um the billing and the list with the utility which is Central Hudson in our case. Um folks, did you have any questions about either the timeline? Um I highlighted or the attorney did a couple things to um just to note that um the bid will be expressed in uh cents per kilowatt hour. We're giving them a certain amount of time to post questions. Um what's different now is how this gets placed on the bill. Um, and obviously for the folks at home, the people in the audience, what's different now, at least temporarily, unfortunately, is with the inflation reduction act, we are able to build this and own this from day one. We were not able to do that until the inflation reduction act was uh passed uh in Congress. Um, but we will get a direct rebate from the federal government. the spring after we file a form of completion of this project. So, we will get federal support and state support for the project. Any questions about the number of days um they will uh have about 60 days we're telling them I highlighted in the yellow to get up to 100% of subscription rain. We want to get it all subscribed by December. When we flip the switch, we

can start building out for January production. Seems all pretty straightforward. Okay, I think Christine is ready. Anyone else have any questions? No. No. Okay. Could you let us know what resolution number we're up to, please? 60. 60.

Dated September 9th, authorizing issuance of a request for a proposal for Cookingham Silver Community Distributed Generation aka CDG subscriber services for a 749.1 kilowatt DC system. And who would like to move that? So moved. We both second. All right. Very good. Thank you very much. Uh, next item on the agenda is All in favor?

Sometimes we move along a little too quickly. We forget they sometimes.

Okay. Um, what do we have here? So there is a camp that's been in operation for 70 some odd maybe more almost 100 years camp rising sun in the southern border of the town. We had a presentation from Winnicki Landress at our last meeting. Um I asked them to update the map showing uh the trail loop coming back here for those of you on the screen. Thank you for panning to the screen. Um the entrance will be off of Oral Mills Road. This is the camp infrastructure here. This is a state water protection quality project. So we are accomplishing several things at the same time. We're going to have more walking trails here. Um the camp will be using these trails during a portion of the summer and uh there will be a parking area here, ADA accessible parking area here. And so the idea is that we are we want to keep this thing moving. Um they'll get the appraisal updated. They're required through the state program to have an update to the appraisal uh within 90 days of the closing. Um, so we'll have the exact numbers for the project, but we're using for now um an up to $390,000 figure for the town's portion of it for both the public access and the conservation easement associated with it. And so what I would ask you tonight is if you would consider um uh supporting sending this to the community preservation advisory uh board for their um advice and um recommendation and that will create an opportunity uh to meet with Winnick and have a presentation to them. And then assuming that they more favorable, it would come

back to the board. It comes back to us either way. Um, generally they have always recommended, but um they're just uh an advisory board. We can still take action. I can't imagine we wouldn't want to support this project, but you know, crazier things have happened in 2025, right? Um this is a wonderful trail project to joining um what was the Hudson Valley sheep company uh this beautiful farm here. Okay. Um any questions? I think just a motion to uh send it to the committee.

Yep. uh to approve uh sending it to the community preservation advisory board to review the project and uh proposed funding not to exceed $390,000 and who Christine Kaine would like to make that sound. How did I know you would like to do that? It gets on my part. Is there a second on that? Second. Okay, thank you very much, Bill. Uh, all in favor I

I thank you very much. Wine, this is, you know, Eli, you brought this up. I I always marvel every time I go across the river and I see these trails and paths and they're directly next to the throughway and I think to myself, my god, I don't think they should be running next to it because they're inhaling all that stuff. But that's a lot of times where the paths are pre, right? You you can only work with what you have. That's why some of these other trails, Cookingham's a good example, gives you far enough off that and the air quality should be better. Um, okay, moving right along. I like the application with the AF review. Next up, engineering study. I think you you heard me uh update you as to what we're trying to accomplish here. Um which is

just there. One more

do a townwide study. The uh New York State DO approves all uh speed reduction requests. We've had success um with some of our residential subdivisions. We've had success working with the state and the Empire State Trail to lower the speed limits on River Road. River Road, let's see, we have some Park College students. Park College is on River Road. So, the extent of River Road down to the bridge approach um was part of an Empire State Trail project. We um approved some traffic calming measures, speed tables, speed hubs um which enabled a reduction uh in the speed limit on River Road. Uh 9G, we were able to get a reduction in the speed limit. um on 9G as part of uh a response to an upper route 9G corridor study. There was a very tragic uh accident where a drunk driver uh killed two bar students as you may or may not know. Um just north of the uh entrance to Tiboli on Route 9G and 78. Um and it has just as of this week actually been instituted finally a full stop light um in in both directions there on 9G and uh County Route 78 were which was part of the recommendations many recommendations issued from the study. Um in local government uh speeding is probably the number one issue. uh we get phone calls for here

and so there's um enforcement that's critical um but certainly lowering the speed limits to a realistic level or to a safe level is what's necessary. For some reason the state thinks that they need to control uh the speeds on uh local roads. We don't understand why because it's really not affecting uh commerce. Um this is a task orderer. We have a firm that we have uh hired years ago for just this type of work. They have particular expertise in transportation and traffic safety issues. And so um we were hoping that DOT we had heard that they were looking at possibly uh changing their guidelines to give us perhaps some more authority. didn't come to pass and we're now on year three of patiently waiting. Um, I think we're we're we're ready, aren't we, folks, to have uh this uh study done so that we can get uh the proper speed limits on our roads.

It's also important to note that at one time, probably 40 years ago, the speed limit for the town was 30. Was 30 and they raised it. And I don't know that it was done in bad faith because at that time we didn't have as much traffic and the population. But now with ways and Google maps and Apple Maps and everything else, many of the roads uh have become cutthroughs and passthroughs for traffic to avoid traffic in the village. And um some of these roads I mean I saw a tractor trailer stuck at an intersection uh couldn't go forward, couldn't go backwards. And when I asked him, he was was right on the corner of Crestwood and fell under Mark walking my dog.

He said, "Oh, Google Maps took me this way uh off of 199." So, I think it would be good to get the speed limit for the town reverted back to 30 so that all of these electronic systems that guide people would know uh not to guide them to certain these roads because they use algorithms to determine how quickly we'll get you from one place to the next. And um if you're not from here, and many people come off the taconic trying to come to Bard, uh they cut, it's true, they cut through various roads and um some of the roads are really windy. Um and as someone who lives on one of those windy roads, I can say that it's hard to even maintain the speed that is the limit. So it would be it would be better for everybody if we could somehow at least get it back to

Well, let's see what the study produces. It may say that certain roads need to go down even further than that. the 25 to come up with recommendations. So what's the we get a report out of this study and then what is the process from there? What does that enable? I mean up until now we've been doing neighborhood by neighborhood studies, right? Does this take the place of that and it would then be all we need to go to the state or is there additional process?

No. So this is this will produce the information that is a requirement for the state. Now we we went back and forth years ago about this. Do we absolutely have to do this? No, we don't have to do the engineering study. Will we have success if we don't do this study? No, we will not. Um so uh by supplying this data and what they will do is that they will go around the town and they will lay down the tubes and they will study the um prevailing speed the 85th percentile and the 50th percentile as well and they will uh compile all that data and produce a report for the state the state DOT which is backed up unfortunately will take a look at this and then hopefully give us the approval So, we're going to need to do this in order to accomplish what our constituents want from us on this issue. And

so, the report that we expect to get will identify and it says something about nine locations plus 12, you know, pre-existing sets of data. Uh they will have sort of a summary of recommendations of changes. That's right. Throughout the whole town like they expect it to be relatively comprehensive. they will cuz not every road um should have the same speed limit.

Um you know you have connector roads, you have um rural roads, you have you know geometric design um challenges, sharp curves, you know those types of situations. So they'll analyze the road for its characteristics and its usage and obviously the data and then they'll make a recommendation um for speed limits in the town. But they will have a recommendation for a townwide level. So hopefully that will be something other than 35 and Bill is correct. In 1985 the town council at that time recommended to raise from 30 to 30,000 uh the speed limit

and they mentioned a to kickoff meeting. Are they intending to coordinate with the highway department on this? They will do with my office and and with the highway department. Yeah, they'll invite both. Yeah. So, I do I do see something in the task order that needs to be addressed though. Okay. Uh notwithstanding the fact that the town does not have its own police department. It's a village police department. The New York State Police and the Justice County Sheriff's Office also respond and keep their own records for crashes. And the way our 911 system works, sometimes it's one, the other, all three. And the Village Police Department is not a three shift police department. And so if there's a crash at 4:00 in the morning,

Yeah. Um it may be the state police. So, in order to get the crash data, they're going to have to go to three sources, not just one. Yeah. Well, fine. But we should add that. Yeah. But it needs to be in the task Okay. Bill, you want to make that change and we'll uh we'll send it over to Manning.

Okay. Did Did we have a resolution prepared for this or no? We're just going to do this by motion. Okay. Task order number 10, Brighton Manning. In accordance with the agreement, exhibit B, scope of services. I want to move this one because this has been something with the addition of project with as as modified as modified by the deputy supervisor Hamill. I so move. I'll second it. All in favor?

I. Anything else you want to add? No. Okay. Slow it down. Slow it down, people. Okay. Uh, food scraps. One of the things that we've been doing for years is we've been accepting uh food scraps at our recycling center um and many other things. Um and so it's going well. The thinking is we want to go from six bins to eight bins. And I think Bill, you reported just recently that it was full and they had to turn away a couple people,

two centers. Um, so Ozone was going to transfer over um this business to the main employee that's been doing it. Turns out um not ready yet for that. Um we thought you needed to be a licensed hauler. That was the case with the county. It's no longer the case with the county. They no longer want to regulate us, which is good. I think it kind of makes sense. Although Um I'm sure everybody wants to make sure that uh these materials are being processed properly and effectively. Um at the moment Ozone is going to continue um the contract that we have and then maybe in 2026 we can look at the transfer of business.

So is willing to do this? zone is willing to keep keep the contract, but I would like to entertain um increasing it from six to eight cuz I think the dollar figure, right, Jacob, was something nominal, right? Yeah, it was not a significant increase for $80 or something for two

a month for 2x pickups. Um, for the folks at home, if you want to join the terribly named art scrapers, scrappers or whatever they came up with, um, you'll get a bin. You bring it to the recycling center. Later on in the year, there will be compost delivered there that you can take back to your farm. Okay. Uh would we do a motion to increase the level of services to eight bins and modify the service agreement

based on the pricing that was quoted at the last based upon the pricing that was quoted at the last meeting. Who would like to make that motion? So moved. Thank you. Is there a second? Second, Julia. Give it to Julie. Just barely. Just barely. Okay. Julia, thank you very much. And as I said to you before, this is no longer applicable. You don't need to be a licensed hauler. Okay. Um setting the public hearing on details. All in favor? I

thank you. Trying to move it along. I apologize. Um, okay. Establishing a date for a public hearing regarding water rates and charges for water district. Number one, we have some of the lowest rates. We being the water district. I think the comproller reported that $1,100 a year for water was about the average for a user. in New York. I think the water district is what half of that. I was going to say just a touch above half.

That's the good news. The bad news is now comes a capital project and they've set aside some money. So that's all good, but but not enough to do the whole project. So this is the annual 5% that they've been asking for for the last several years. They'll be back in 2026, early 2026, figuring out what they need to do in order to pay for that um water storage tank, which will involve uh Bart College as well. um because it is the backup to the college and uh often times um the college will need to go offline for one reason or another and the town is in the position to uh provide water um which of course Jonathan as you know means what we asked to contribute to that capital project you're probably happy to hear about that

what's you left your checkbook at home. Uh not that the college hasn't been spending a lot of money to do a lot of projects, but alas, um fair is there.

Um okay. So, uh our public hearing, our next meeting is the 24th. I I think we need to do that because then the quarterly goes out for the October one. They have the newsletter. they can let people know we have 487 households who are on a water district. Uh for the folks who are here studying local government, um this is what's called a special benefit assessment district. Only the people who live in the area that's serviced by central water pay for the costs associated with it. Um the rest who live out in the boon docks as we like to refer to don't. Um okay. So it's to schedule for the 24th at 7:35. Let's say shall we? Um and this is resolution 61.

Yes.

It's an increase. water on you. You move it. I will I will have to move it. Okay. Very good. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Jacob. Any further discussion? If not, all in favor? I I thank you very much. And just so the public knows, tomorrow night at 7 o'clock, the water board will be meeting to discuss those next steps regarding important discussions also helpful if you're suffering from insomnia insomnia um but actually a really talented board I mean

incredibly talented I I feel like there's a max [Music] thanks for coming I I hope you're excited enough to someday take over for us to go. Thank you. Thanks very much. Okay. Uh we're on the resolution number 62 approving amended count of record purchasing of procurement policy. So before we go ahead [Music] Oh yeah. Well, that's a quick one. That's boring.

That's a quick one. As I stated earlier, uh the deadline is Friday. Um it's just a resubmission and this year you can get up to 40% of your total project costs which is $6,576,000. [Music] 40% would be um $2,600. Let's do it. Let's do it. We need to do it. Important things to fund. Don't want to spend any more money on these losses. We just need a motion. Motion. Who wants to make it? Moved. I'll second. Further discussion.

All in favor? I I much. Okay. Um purchasing. So, um updated draft of the limits. You know, we were going out and getting three quotes for everything that we buy that was over $2,000. I mean, you can't buy anything for one of our trucks for, right? I mean, we were sp we're spending too much time on these things. Um, so that's been updated the amount. Um, so Jacob, I printed out on the green purchasing community. Can I please back up for a minute? Um, I was just wondering the um changing from 2,000 to 5,000. That's correct.

Is that like a controller recommendation or where did we come up with that $5,000? It's a fairly common amount that's uh utilized, but it's something that really takes into account inflation. We've had this threshold now for a gazillion years. No, I just was wondering if we wanted to go to 7500 given inflation. Does the state controller have a recommendation? The state controller does have um the I wouldn't call them recommendations, right, Chris? What would you call them? I know you're there somewhere.

Well, they absolutely have recommendations for process. They I do not believe they have recommendations for specific numbers below the threshold, but they require you as the board to determine uh what those thresholds should be and to follow them, right? I mean, I'm fine to go to 7500 if you want to make that modification. I mean, it's just often times, I mean, you get a mower. So now we got to go out and get three cloaks on a mower. And the difference between going to get that same mower at this location. What's that? And those mowers are expensive,

right? You can't get a mower. You can't get a mower for $5,000. So I'm pristine. You know, you convinced me in record time. I don't know how many of those feel. Does that affect the other ranges? Because if we do 7500, that's 75 those up. Oh, it's proportional.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, we can make things simple. We can we can just get rid of this section. Uh we can go up to if you wanted to. Now, I I don't want to jump over your number, but if you wanted to go and get rid of this section uh over 5,000 to 999, if you want to go up to 999 at the discretion department head and within budgetary limits, um then we can go right to 10 10 to 1999. Yeah. Because budgetary limits have to come back to us any have to come to us anyway, right? So

I mean I think there's some value in encouraging department heads to shop around a little bit once you get into that range. I mean I don't certainly I don't think you need a formal RFP process but just encourage when you say that which which range are you 5 to99 or 75 like I don't I don't have a strong opinion about that but I think that keeping this category number two has some value. Okay. Where do you want to keep it? You want to keep it at 10 to 15? I'm going to get in a fight with Christine.

Okay. I'm I'm fine with going up to 999 and then just picking up that section and then and then um you know going to turns out Christine is um I mean I just think there's so written like this category three 10 to 1999 written RFP quotes or former bids like that feels like it's substantially more formal to me and I think that having an intermediate option that encourages a little extra

well that's not yeah again that also at the discretion of the department heads or town supervisor at least three vendors self shall be solicited so quotes I mean it's no it's reasonable to give quotes from 10 to 20 I mean I think that's reasonable written RFPs boy I tell you you know what you spend especially when you need to engage an engineer right they have RFP for you or or other consultants it really adds to the cost which defeats the purpose of So it is the was the only change from 2 to 5. No. And then everything else was proportional.

Yeah, it was proportions. Yeah. And we had 10,000 uh over Yeah, we had over 20,000 uh formal public bids, but no, we had a 10,000 threshold changed there. So Christine, you're just proposing basically to sort of collapse category 2 and category 3 in the section sort of. Yeah, I'm okay with that. Well, that's two yeses. What do you guys think? Seems like it's easier to administer. Make a little faster when you want. Oh god. Yeah. you know, when we have a separate price.

Well, when you get up into those prices, I mean, you're looking at things in the highway department. You're looking at things from the recreation department. I mean, you know, it's not office supplies and, you know, that kind of thing. So, you know, you need them when you need them and you know, it's within u budgetary limits. Yeah. Anyway, so,

well, I think even that, you know, this is a good example. So, we were thinking, do we need to go and get quotes now from the food waste haulers because we're going from 6 to 8. Do we need to go out and get another, you know, get these quotes and all of that? And it's like, well, this is this is ridiculous. This is like $80 more a month to get 33% more capacity. Think about the people on the other end of that, right? They're going through the effort to put in those RFPs for something tiny. Exactly. So, are we voting on this tonight? Do we need to actually word smith it or are we going to Well, I mean, you know, well, a couple things.

First of all, let's let's deal with the numbers right now if we could. How how how are we laying? I'm sorry. I'm with Christine on this. That's fine cuz I end up spending a lot of time on this. I appreciate that. It's just not always time well spent quite frankly. Understood. Well, how much should How much when we replaced that big flat screen TV? How much did that cost? Uh, no, that wasn't that much. That was No, this that was on sale. The TV is You picked the one thing that hasn't gone up a lot in the last 20 years since we've had this stretch. Oh, it is. It's probably like $500. It was I think it was

well I know for instance John had written in one of his reports wanted to get a piece of equipment thing right they it was slightly cheaper somewhere else but who didn't service wouldn't pick it up and deliver for service because they were so far away so I just think that if we go up then it provides flexibility for those kinds of things. So what would you propose like starting at zero you've got a category that's up to something at the discretion of the department head right? So yeah, up to 99999 would be okay. Then we would have over 10,000 over 10,000 to 1999 is written RFB. Okay.

And over 20 is formal public unless people want to move those up. No, you don't no 20 20 needs to stay state. But but I think the language within budgetary limits I mean I think that's sort of the controlling uh internal control because you know every department has a certain budget right and if they think they need they're going to need more money and we have to do an adjustment it's going to come to us anyway right so I I think that you know provides some comfort I agree with that

Christine's very good um uh as modified now Uh more modifications from that side of the Yeah. desk.

Yeah. So um I sent an email to everybody um with information about the green purchasing community program through green New York. Um comes through the office of general services I believe. Um so on the state level there is this program that includes a couple of things. Um, one of them is maintaining standards for green products. Um, sort of a catalog that you can search um, to see things that are competitive with products we might be purchasing as municipality. Um, they say that it's simple to administer green purchasing program. I know that I first started this in a CAC meeting earlier this year and plan to bring it up whenever we talked about the procurement policy. So, now's the time to do that. Um in that meeting um the support from that group is something that would be good for having more environmentally conscious purchasing from the municipality. Um part of this program includes cost effectiveness. So things that are um within a certain percentage of non-green options. Um if you look at the catalog we put it up in the meeting. It's like pretty easily to search for paper. supplies like they have a lot of things the municipalities would be looking to purchase.

Um so I think it would be pretty straightforward in that sense. It's not a decision that we have to evaluate all these products on our own. It comes from this thing that's been vetted by the state. Um in addition to being more sustainable, it also gives us points for our climate smart community reertification. Um, I know there's interest in doing the things that we can to, you know, be successful in that endeavor, but I think it's also the principle of it is a good thing to be doing, be buying more environmentally conscious products where they're available and they're not an extreme cost premium above what we be purchasing otherwise. So, it's straightforward. There's language here that I think we've seen um

where this goes into the policy, how it fits into into the policy. Um so um I don't know if there's any thoughts and I I know Bill you had a question about reaching out to other municipalities for you know was there experiences there. So I went on the website to see what the instance were doing this and it seems like there's a range right so there's counties there's towns there's villages city of Kingston is one town of Newalt is another Olster county um and there's a few smaller municipalities like hast things on Hudson um it's not an extremely long list but there are a number of counties and cities and towns that are doing this so what that says to me without actually reaching out to them is that it works on these different levels it's like fairly straightforward for them to administer but we could reach out to

the only the only reason I ask is that you know the larger the municipality the larger their staff and the number of people to administer a program and having you know spent 25 years in the federal government and four in a very senior position in the state I do know that sometimes it's good to these pronouncements come but then there's people actually physically have to do it and um and sometimes it's easier and sometimes it's not totally and I think Um I wouldn't want to tie our hands on something until we get some input on what are the administrative burdens if there are any u in when you finished with with respect to administering this program. Um

it's not it's not a burden it's it's an option. And so what this allows you allows you to go up to 10% higher on something that is better for the environment or more sustainable. And I actually found it easier. It's a little bit like going on the state's website like a state contract. So, for example, I linked on and I didn't realize there are break pads listed there. There's a lot there's a lot of stuff, right? There's a lot of stuff and I'm like, well, this is great.

There are things that have already been prevetted for us that we know have an environmental benefit that are within the guide guide rails. I don't think it's a burn. I think it's an assist. quite frankly and it's consistent with our ethos which is we want to buy things that are good for the envirment and they're also not auditing this too right so it's something that we say we're going to do and we uphold ourselves rather than them coming and saying oh you didn't do this or you didn't do that policy so if we find something that's 4% more expensive but better for the environment we could choose that yeah I just wanted you know there are mechanics involved and what's for the people.

We have basically one person who does. Well, I know, but I actually liked it. I thought it was going to make my life easier cuz you just clicked on. I was like, "Wow, there's a whole category called brake pads." So, I want to send that stuff or maybe you would want to send it over to the Yeah, I think I think if we do this, it would be a really good thing. Just make sure everybody who's making those purchasing decisions knows exactly this is available and it's something that we can do al together to do more.

Which brings me to Go ahead. Well, no. I'm just going to ask like I think that because it it is so voluntary. I mean, conceptually, Bill, I agree with you. I would really kind of like to get some testimonials of how this has worked in other communities, whether on one end of the spectrum it has been sort of burdensome and bureaucratic or on the other end of the spectrum, it doesn't make a lot of difference because people who are doing the purchasing aren't fully on board and really like making any changes to their behavior. Um,

and so I guess then my question is if we go forward with it, how do we um roll it out in a way that gets enthusiastic clients from everybody who's doing the purchasing? Everybody from, you know, our bookkeeper to our rec department to our highway, you know, there's there's really quite a lot of people probably who are making some degree of purchases. Yeah. I find myself in the rare position of correcting you, which I almost never have. I wouldn't use the term compliance because it is optional. I think you want to have you want to have participation, but if we're setting the policy, they're complying with our policy with the program so much as complying with what we're saying. Right. But can I Robert, can I just add something here?

Yeah.

Looked at this a little bit. So, two things. Number one, this only applies when you're talking about your ser your your purchases below 20,000. section. I just want to make sure everybody understands it, thousands, but it's not going to apply to those, you know, probably more complex purchases. Second, um there you would have to have some kind of process because it is not optional in the sense that it says where the municipality is procuring um then the municipality shall follow the green procurement spec to the maximum extent practical where the cost is reasonably competitive. So when they're picking items, they should check each time to see if there is a,

you know, green alternative. And so it's not necessarily honorous, but it is a process that needs to be incorporated. It was pretty easy. I linked right on. It's like link. It's actually easier than going on OS and seeing what's on the state contract, which I've been doing things for a very long time. I have habits. Well, and what if like hypothetically, I mean, and I'm philosophically I'm very much in support of this, right? But like what if hypothetically, you know, you've got the paper towels that we normally order and then there's some other recommended paper towels and we purchase them and it turns out that they're lousy for some reason they shred or people don't like them. Then do we have to like what then what happens? Then we order them again.

Okay. So, but but then what with Chris like what box do you have to check to explain why you're no longer doing that? Well, in the case of I believe that you have um even though the best value, you know, the the the statutory best value process for the is for the over 20s,

in your 104 adopted policy language, I believe that you already have language in there that talks about um in your quote section should look reflect a process that will generate the best value at the lowest cost. And I think if you're going to adopt a green purchasing procedure, you're going to incorporate, you know, taking into account, you know, reviewing, you're gonna you're going to be looking at and incorporating that language if the um you know, green purchases is, you know, better or as good, you know, at a at a price that's at least, you know, 10%, you know, 10% premium or not more than a 10% premium, then you would make that purchase. But you still have to evaluate the value.

Right. So if it's a crummy product, you're gonna determine that it isn't comparable. Right. Yeah. It's gonna have to meet some minimum standards. But are we going to require You're going to pardon me? Are we going to require our purchasing agent to write some kind of soul source or some kind of justification that they chose? I mean, this is where I'm going with respect. Oh, no. I don't think No, it's not like it each purchase you have to, you know, detail why you didn't go green with with something. That's not This is really like a policy statement. Quite frankly, it's just not it's not an auditable thing coming out of the controller's office.

Oh, it could just add um a box, you know, to the form that says, did you compare this, you know, is this a green product? Yes. No. If not, did you review it? Yes. Right. And I think that if this becomes something that feels like a burden, we could always remove it from our policy in the future. I don't think we're locked into it long term if it's something that feels genuinely bad for everybody. But I think that as a principle, it's a very good approach. And I think that I would expect it to be minimally burdensome.

Yeah. I mean, I'm totally willing as somebody who's spent more time on this procurement than IS engage in trying to find environmentally friendly options available. I found this very easy to go on there. Um, I was really curious on some of the things that were listed there. and no brake pads made that much of a difference, but um it could be a learning experience also for for us as well. Anyway, so what do we think? What do we think? So, do we need to do

I would I would incorporate this language into the modifications you suggested, but only if there's consensus to do so. if you all want to hold off. Julia, if you want to go go get some coal or some wood and

um No, I think I'm fine. I mean, I feel a little I would be more confident if I had a little more information. We had talked to a couple of other municipalities and the folks who do purchasing for us and if Chris showed her cards a little more about how much burden she thinks this might or might not add to implement fully. But, uh, You could convince me that we should go ahead and move forward and and and you know do it by trial and error and see what happens. went like if we went to the town of Hastings and Hudson or one other they could also give us a go by and save us a lot of work in writing our own you know they you know why reinvent

well no how it's incorporated into their procurement policy that and I guess my point is if we adopt it tonight then we call them and say hey got any tips for us on how you implement this how about subject two. Why don't we just make a few more calls and vote on our next meeting? Is there urgency to the Yeah, that's why I'm Okay, we're going to put we're going to do a modified whoever wants to use this database or going to be making purchases in the next few modify the draft with the model language.

We're going to modify the draft with the model language. I'll call over to Julie Noble, not Mayor Steve Noble, cuz Julie will tell me how it's going over there. Although, well, I'm sure she's responsible for a lot of procurement. Um, okay. I think I think doing that also means that the public will see the changes incorporated before we adopt the policy and stuff. That's good. Yeah. Thank you.

Okay. Uh, makes sense. And public dollars Um, reor a couple recommendations for the ethics board. We had a couple people move. Got some recommendations. Uh, Jacob, you went to the FX board.

Yes. So, we have um we've had materials from two individuals who've expressed interest in joining the ethics board um for a little bit and uh Brenda Elsie, who's the chair of the ethics board, met with both of them to interview them and gauge their qualifications and interest in joining. Um the first of them, Laura Roberts, attended a meeting of the ethics board a few months ago um to express interest and just sort of get a sense for what it would be like. Um has a recommendation from Brenda. We have our materials here. Um in addition, uh Kevin Kavanaaugh also um expressed interest similar high recommendation from Brenda. Um so I don't know if there's any discussion to be had on this, but otherwise I would um move to point them to the ethics board. I don't have the reorg list in front of me to know what the term end years are. Um, but after reviewing their materials, I I think they're well qualified for these positions on the ethics board. Um, I would support them.

If you want to hang on one second, I can look up u Diana's latest at least the latest one we have that I have. If you want to wait one second, I will do that. All right. Thanks, Chris. Thanks, Chris. because it's important to, you know, point them into the right seats. So, we have Gail Cale, you want to talk about something else for a second? I can I'll give it to you in just a minute. Bridgewashing and Dex. Bridgewashing and Dex.

Yeah. So, let's talk about the Bridgewalking and Dex. So, uh LWRP referral uh to the planning board. uh the planning board chair took a look at this communication from DOT and came to the conclusion that this is really dimminimous. This is routine maintenance. This is not something the planning board needs to review. It's how do you clean the bridge? It's over 9G. Um because 9G is the um in many cases the eastern border of the LWRP uh zone. So, um just to report that out that we received this communication um from DOS and Department of Transportation, Bridgewashing and Deck Sealing, various municipalities up and down Columbia, Duchess Putnham, Westchester, Rockland Orange, and Austin County. All right. Um,

I have information when you're ready. We are ready for you, Chris. Thank you. Okay. So, according to this is as of February, but I'm assuming it hasn't changed. Not that commission. Did you appoint anybody else this year? I don't recall. Yes, we we reappointed Susan. Yes. The chair, right? No, Susan Simon. Susan Simon. Oh, okay. She's not on this list. Oh, god. Okay. Um, so we need to understand which one you would have appointed her to because there was a vacancy um that expired in 2024. That would have been the one. Deian is going. That would have been the one.

Okay. And then you had so you've so you've got Brenda who's whose term ends in 2025, S whose term ends in 2026. And then you would have Susan whose term ends you know that's the one I don't know 2029. Um if it's the 20 24 then it's going to be 2029 right? Yeah. Um and then the 27 and 28 are the vacant month the other two vacant ones 27 and 28 that you would select from. Yeah. Yeah. So Susan 28 20 29 that makes sense. Um and then seven and eight. Uh do we have a preference of who would get 27 and who would get 28?

I don't think I don't think at least for me I don't think there's a strong preference. I thought that uh Kevin's IRB experience was a good credential to meet it. Brett is something that I think would be a good fit for following sort of the expectations of this role. Um not to say I don't expect Laura, but I'd do the 2028 for him and then 2027 for Laura. That would be my first instinct. But um if others think differently, that's fine as well. No, that makes sense. I think Deanna was looking for the most recent one. I think that's what she stepped out to do. So maybe whenever she gets back, we can I can make a motion unless the information changes. Okay.

Um Okay. And how many does that does that fill them all? That should fill the ethics board. Yes. Jacob, do you know if we there's been some interest in the housing committee recently? I don't know where we stand with that. I don't think we're ready to appoint. I think we had one person who reached out to express doing it and I needed to get back to her about Okay. sort of getting the formal Well, yeah. And we're still because they're they are working with the rotating chair right now. It's a little unclear what the procedure would be for bringing them up to the Yeah. I mean, I think that Oh, thank you. Um I think if the committee is largely in consensus, then we could just both bring it forward.

Yeah. Yeah, I mean I think that what I want to do is just get sort of like a more formal letter of interest then we can maybe do maybe I'll get back to her and we can do it the next meeting for me to do that usually somebody got appointed and wasn't interested in point someone who's been reached out expressing she emailed expressing interest but we follow material yeah yeah I think we're both probably on that um so this has 2024 2027 as vacant 2025, 2026, 2029. So, I'm assuming one of these just didn't get I assume the 2024 didn't get updated at one point because one there were um two people that never took took the oath

and or one one person didn't take their oath and the other moved out away. Yes. So, that those are the years that never got nothing happened with with those two. But they'll fill in the gaps be 25 26 28 29. Yeah. Okay. Great. So, that's 25. Yes. Um, so yes, Chris, one thing I just want to make sure that you're you're remembering that you have a proision, which you should verify for these appointments. You make additional appointments that no more than three members may be enrolled in the same political party. We did. And no member shall hold office in a political party. So, you just want to make sure that you are complying with those provisions, please.

Yeah. Um, two of the three current members are unaffiliated. So that's one thing that I know doesn't create a competition for political party and I don't think we have any reason to expect that either of these people are holding a position within the political party. Okay. Um so are you making a motion to reappoint Susan Simon to the ethics board? She's already on it. We did that earlier this year. So, I'd make a motion to appoint Kevin Kavanaaugh to a seat on the ethics board for a term ending 2028. And um wait, I'm sorry. Who? Kevin.

Kevin to 28. Okay, got it. Sorry. Yeah, sorry. And then Laura Roberts for a term ending 2027. Laura Roberts 2027. I need a letter of interest for I'll send it forward. I'll second the motion. Very good. Uh any further discussion? My discussion is thank you uh Laura and Kevin stepping up. And participating that was my discussion. Uh let's vote. All in favor? I.

Uh folks, that concludes uh our agenda items for this evening. I would like to thank you all. Uh once again, stay healthy. It was 42 degrees this morning. Enjoy the beautiful weather while it's still here. At this time, I'd like to entertain a motion we go into returning client session. Is there a second? Second. All in favor? I I Good night. Thank you very much. Thank you very much for coming. Have a wonderful evening.