Committees - Regular Meeting

Okay, good evening everybody. This is the order for the August 4th CAC meeting and the first thing we're going to do is review the minutes and see how we stand on that. Everybody get a chance to look at them? Yep, absolutely. Any comments online? Okay. Everybody happy? Everybody's happy.

Yes, right. Fine. Bye.

6-0. Okay. Mm-hmm. Good. That's an easy one to do. The mission statement, still working on it. I have a hard time because with my, I guess, comprehensive plan has something to do with it. But we should look it over carefully and come with some suggestions if we have to revise it. I don't know what to re-focus on it. It's pretty good the way it is, I think. But it's always something we can clarify or add to it if we want to take another look at it. And we don't look at it often enough. I say that about all the code items. You know, we should be looking at the code not every 25 years of the copyright issue, maximum five years or something like that. But it's hard to do. I fit it in the schedules. Yes, Liz. Hi. Good evening. We just got started, Liz. We approved the minister meeting. And we're getting into just talking about the mission statement that we have to work on that a little bit more and make some changes now. Actually, you know, conservation to me is a lot different than it would be to the younger people. I mean, growing up, the first time I was on shelf, I was in 1969. There's a big difference then, you know, what we would like to conserve. keep going is important, and we have to get our mission straight. It's a lot to conserve here. You know, there's a lot going on. There's, you know, affordable housing, adding housing, ADUs and stuff that affects our water quality and sea rise is affecting the perimeter. Actually, I think the island is getting swallowed due to sea rise and the population is increasing.

affordable housing is one aspect of housing that has a significant, potentially, I don't know what impact, extraordinary impact affordable housing has on water quality. A 12,000 square foot house has a measurable impact on water quality. And if I line those up wherever I have an empty spot, I think that's That's sort of the bigger exposure to me than a few affordable housing units so that people who work here can live here. You know,

unless we're building a city, I think you're absolutely right. Yeah. Don't you agree?

Yeah. But like the house across from me is, I guess, 10,000 square foot. It's a large house. He's never been there. He has a cistern. Is it about the one that he renovated? Yeah. Well, no, the one they took down the days... Oh, Bill's house. Yeah, Bill. There's a few down there. Yeah. And he has a cistern in there and everything, so he's actually adding water to it, conserving water, and he doesn't have the land. It depends on the type of people. I'm afraid if he moves, what will happen to the house? You know, it's a huge house, has a boat house, swimming pool, beautiful site on the water and everything, bulk headed.

Yeah, and there are other houses that are constantly rented. Oh, yeah. And there is, I'm pretty sure they haven't heard about aquifer and how that works and might not work if one does the wrong shower habits. I don't know. And to me, it seems that we are kind of ignoring the elephant in the room. And that's a lot of the big stuff that has been going on. The little houses on the island haven't challenged the aquifer. We started challenging the aquifer when we took out more water than we did in the past. We have oaks that need a lot of water right now. I understand that. But 10,000 square foot rented out, people taking shower, and that challenges too. Well, yeah, that's another portion. And people who were running their sprinklers, although we told them until the cows come home, please don't do that during the day, they still do. And it's laudable that Nordstrom, they all have their, it's all professionally managed, but we're not too concerned about that. But there's a lot that is not professionally managed, and it's just there for profit. And profit is never, profit and conservation, this is like a word.

That's true. I mean, I have, by me and houses across the street, they're rented out for the summer. And people come in there and they have like five or six cars and people and they're paying $1,000 a night, they're not going to conserve. And they don't even know what water they're drinking, you know, if they're drinking in the ice machine or anything like that. But it's something that as a town, I hope we can check the laws and see what we can do with that. It's a tough situation because you want to get people, young people in for the volunteers and stuff like committees like we have.

But the people renting the houses, they don't care. A lot of these, you know, the super big houses, they don't rent out. They're just trophy houses. You know, they really don't. Nobody uses them. The maid spends more time in it than anybody. It's true. I mean, that's the reality of it, you know. But, you know, it's the little mid-range ones, you know, like the... You know, the 23,000 square foot hours to get, they get used a lot. Yeah.

Those are the ones that yeah, and really, you know, I want to say that you talk about affordable housing. There is none. On shelter, I don't know the cost of the house, all of the that people to build are not required to be affordable housing. All right. It can be rented at market rate. So. The biggest issue I think we have, or the, um. The waterfront properties that build the. accessory dwellings and like that. But again, they're not occupied to a large extent. The fact that they built them, the potential was there.

Somebody might take them over.

Who knows?

But the original builders, I don't think they...

I can't see somebody spending $10 million on a house and then letting people rent it out to people, though. You know what I'm saying?

That kind of thing's not going to happen. It's overflow. The use is minimal. They're not there 12 months out of the year. The accessories are definitely not there 12 months out of the year. I think that's sort of like people think that's a big problem, but overall scheme of things. I think it's really the Airbnbs that are flipping people and the people don't know and they don't understand and they don't have any

In the big houses, it's the irrigation that's the problem because it's, you know, everything just gets fluffed out and it's got to be green. Green lawns. Yeah. Green everything. That's where the water's going there. It's very impressive. Big ones, you know.

My neighbor says she uses half a water view. Half a water view is on the side of a truck.

once or twice a week you know and that's what yeah anybody that's got a sister it's at least twice a week right pretty much yeah that's a plan story yeah it's not inexpensive now that's you know it's a couple thousand or two if they want to do that if you want to water your stuff that's the best way to do it yeah it's the right way to do it and that's just the other people that that could be like when it's raining and the sprinkles are running you're like really There was a new build over here on South Midway. And it was raining and free sprinklers going. And we're like, please use your sprinkler between, you know, the hours over.

Gotta grab my grass. Yeah, well, that's a major problem, some enforcement of everything. I don't think we have the manpower to enforce it. Like dark skies. You know, nobody's around here at night, you know, for the town to go around and look at us, but that's a big problem with the environment. Not so much people, you know, but the environment. Animals, the little animals that run around get spooked by jaguars. Well, we keep working on it. I go to a lot of meetings like the Water Advisory Committee and see what they're doing. That's a great committee. They do a tremendous job. How did that go with the thing they had last week? The Know Your Water Weekend? Yeah. I didn't see anybody. I went around. I didn't see anybody at the table, but I guess it's okay. I'll ask Sean at the next meeting how he did, you know. We were one of your volunteers. I couldn't do it, so. I have a hard time keeping my property up, digging around and stuff like that. I think they did pretty good. They had stands around, so. Anybody go to see any of it?

I wondered if you, yeah.

The table at IGA.

Yeah, it's at the IGA.

IGA one, yeah.

I saw them in other locations in the morning. They got different comments back. People were, you know, somebody had gotten a notice from the Southern County Health Department about getting a water test for free. because someone next to them had high PFAS.

Right.

And so they were like, what is this? Is this real? I was like, yes. And they're going to do like the $1,200 test. So if they're going to give it to you for free, take advantage of it. Oh, yeah. And then just people, you know, a little bit interested in like, oh, okay, what do I have to do to test my water? So some people took the pamphlets to sign up for it.

I think I said it the last time, but the school did a great job with me on that. chlorine tested, very on the spot with what I have tested once a year. They got the same level, just about, so parts per million and stuff. It was very good at the school. And I hope the school, I think they sounded like they enjoyed it there as part of the course, you know, so, you know, the kids go to school and work here, their parents here, so it was very good. So I'll check, I'll go to the Water Advisory Committee usually go to that one so it's a very good committee i think it's very active okay now that was item four item five we skipped over item four which is the nature preserve reports update now we had complaints about what uh the town highway department did at Shell Beach. Roundup Haven was down there. So I talked to Ken and he said, well, you know, that's the weakest area of that area going out there. But he put that. He's not going any further. That's it. And I walked out there. It's really, I didn't see it too objectionable to us. Of course, it's not like it used to be, just sand and stuff. Right. There is, you know, and he's, I would say, probably one-third of all our roads are within 100 feet of wetlands. Yeah. All the town landings and everything like that. So it's nothing unusual. That is even less obnoxious than, you know, the paving down to the town landing site. Right. And you look, what does Silver Beach say?

Well, my first question is still, why didn't this show up before it happened? If I look at the wetlands code, I might not be looking at it correctly. I'm not a US lawyer, but why wasn't there, based on my reading, this requires a permit. It's a structure in the wetlands. If it's not a structure, then I wonder, then it's dumping. That's not allowed either. No, dumping is not. So why are we so docile about, oh, yeah. And it's like, what is it? We're supposed to take care of wetlands and we're sitting here and we're not even making noise that someone dumps a load of leftovers from another road job. on that beautiful preserved stretch, created a structure or whatever it is that is in parts not permeable. It creates runoff. It has already a ton of potholes and it's going to continue this way. And by the end of next winter, the flood stuff is going to be everywhere except for on that road. And all that without asking the town board, without asking Silver Beach, without asking for a permit because it's wetlands work.

Well, most of them, well, is that okay? I talked to Ken about that. Like I said, one-third of the roads are within 100 feet of wetlands.

If a homeowner were to blacktop their driveway, the near shore they need to supply an engineer design and where the runoff is going to go and they need to get a permit and a permit right so i think at the minimum the town engineer should look at it and see if maybe there's some after the fact maybe dry wells that should be put in Because, yeah, I mean, if you did it and you were in the same circumstance, you'd be in big trouble. Yeah. I don't even know if the DEC would be involved or not, but, yeah, like you say, I mean, to just... Well, the DEC would be within 300 feet.

They'd get involved. So they'd be involved. So they decided it wasn't a good idea to do any more of that?

Well, no, we don't know. They had the material left over from the soda.

I know what stuff is. I'm just saying that they decided that they're not going to do that anymore. Go out to Shell Beach and put that stuff there.

Oh, yeah. No more on Shell Beach. He's gone that far. And that's all he was going to do because that was the most vulnerable area of the road out there where he put it. I don't know. why it's the most vulnerable.

I just know it's the most vulnerable with all the stone riprap. Because every time there's a nor'easter or hurricane or whatever, it tries to break through because that's where, if you look at the old maps, there used to be an island, Oak Island. So nature wants that to be open, which it should be open. There's no reason for them to continue to close it off. Before the conservation...

Concrete highway doesn't prevent nature from opening that up. Nature removes the stuff underneath and then the highway collapses. Now, this is even less than a concrete highway. This is already gone after what we have.

Again, they put all the stone riprap in there. Yeah. To prevent. Yeah. Okay. It had been cut through at some point. Yeah. And back in the early 1920s or whatever, that was... was an island so we filled we keep filling it and spending money and making it a whole road that's what they used to dredge it for yeah but again there's got to be some maybe army corps permits or these oh yeah to continue to do that because when you go out to a real point if you want to continue to and spoil or whatever, even do a real point. You need permits for all that stuff. You just can't just pile stuff in. They used to just dump concrete, this concrete block and all kinds of stuff at real point that they used to just dump in because nobody cared. Now it's a different world.

Back when we used to work on the road at Meshamic, we had to use either crushed natural stone or our bluestone blend or whatever. Out there, so it probably should be the same sort of a, you know, it's a lot more expensive, but I mean, that should be probably more like what they should be doing. Since it is a nature preserve, it's the same same thing with shell beach road. You know, it's the same thing. It's. You know, basically, so, I mean, they should probably just put that kind of the other kind of material that doesn't doesn't wash or get into the water and, you know.

So are we making that a recommendation from this committee?

Yeah, I think we should make a recommendation to the town to, you know, talk to Ken about it. Because Ken has to deal with the DOT and everybody, you know, with the quality of the road and stuff like that.

The DOT doesn't have a, you know, they're not involved in that road. That's a private town park road, right? DOT would be state or county. Beach, where does that end up then? I guess the town owns it. I don't think Silver Beach owns it. I think the town owns it.

Basically, the only thing they ever did out there is once a year would just regrade it before summer. And that was it. And it was always potholes. And everybody kind of wanted it like that, so nobody went 90 miles an hour out there.

It was rutted. It wasn't potholes. Now it has potholes. Now it looks like a

Right, right. The best idea would probably be to just put it back the way it naturally is and leave it and just do the once a year grading before summer and that's it.

That's a really good recommendation from this committee.

Yeah, just re-grade the dirt that's there and don't add anything that's going to... Yeah, he said he wasn't going to do anything.

And if they're going to do something like that, they're going to have a plan.

You know, as long as there's a berm all the way along that road, none of that stuff will wash out of there. It'll just stay there. It's pretty much level, you know. It doesn't really all run from one end all the way down to the other. It just kind of stays there and goes to the sides, hits the sand, and goes into the ground. But, you know, as long as there's a berm, you know, a foot or so high or two feet high.

Yeah, we're due for a hurricane, right? We're way overdue for a hurricane.

Oh, yeah, no, this is the year.

It's almost like the other day with the rain.

It just kept coming.

I mean, not only... on the beach and in the water.

Like I said, the old dirt road with a berm, a high berm on the side, it just stayed on that road. It didn't wash out. You don't want it to really wash over. And if you have big puddles there for a day and then they dry up, who cares? It's better off leaving it like that than it is trying to make it special. Yeah, it's not a paved road. Just go back to dirt and be done with it. And even that's further improvement. Right. Even that stuff they put down, they could just take their grader and drop the teeth and just mix that in with the dirt and just regrade it with what's there. There isn't that much. A few hundred yards.

They could have dropped that on the dirt easement by Goat Hill. Right. The other place. That's where they should have used it. Yeah. That's a terrible road.

We'll just even bring it up to the dump and sell it to people to patch the driveway with or whatever.

It doesn't have to be gotten rid of instantly.

Should be a plan. Yeah, that's like on Goode Hill. I asked Ken, I said, why did we pave up by the town, by the house there? Is it off by the driving range? No. The handicap accessible thing he put in is great, you know, to get up onto the porch. So he had to pay that with tar because that's, again, wetland. Well, it's an aquifer underneath, a central aquifer for the heights and stuff like that. Yeah, but it's public water.

But still, that's, we're talking about waterfront wetlands and the highest point on the island. Yeah. By the driving range, they put some of that stuff down. They did a lot of the T-axis and stuff, too. It was really good. I mean, it's very helpful.

But even that area, if they put more of it down and then rolled it, that stuff just gets just like asphalt. But it's not... hard to describe it it sets up just like as well but it doesn't break up and crack because it's already broken up and cracked it just stays the way you put it down as long as you roll it in it's like gravel black yeah it's like yeah it's really it's actually better than asphalt this stuff cracks it's already oh yeah because it's it's You know, it's only a little bit. But I'm saying up there where they did that. Like if you go down to Cliff Clark's, where his barn is. Oh, yeah. We put that stuff around the whole place. And he loves it. Because once it sets up and it's hard, you don't ever have to regrade it because there's nothing that happens to it, you know. And he was going to pave around the whole thing. But five years later, it all breaks up and falls apart. This stuff. It's already broken up. So, you know, it works certain applications. It works really great. But, like, by the driving range, if they put more of that down and just made a project out of it, did it right. That would be really nice and that would stay forever.

Were you able to capture the wording on that?

Yeah. Okay. Because I also have to tie in Howard gives me his specific notes. Okay. Tie them all together. Okay.

I just want to be sure. Okay. Thanks. Appreciate it. We'll edit it.

Are we allowed to ask the town board liaisons a question? Of course. Sure. Why is you created a lot of unhappy campers in certainly in Silver Beach? uh or candid and the reaction or the missing of any official reaction afterwards why is is is the town board concerned that the highway superintendent doesn't ask for permits and exit upon himself well-intentioned i give him that the idea that it's he saves money by not having to export it from the island or have to dump it someplace else, which has permit issues. All that given, nevertheless, at first and second glance, it's a pretty ill-advised project. That happened without consulting anybody.

He is individual, you know, separately elected and it falls within his jurisdiction. My understanding is that they were not required to get permits and that the materials that they used were allowable materials. So it's, it is definitely within his department. It is not a town board matter.

And who signs off the budget?

The town board does, but we don't, once someone has their budget in place, they get to operate within that budget. If they need to make a modification, then they do need to, if they need to increase something or move money between things, then they do have to come to the town board for approval for those types of things.

So if someone were to create a road that is in some sort of slush fund or that would be a budget item?

that would be a line item on Ken's yeah I mean he has you know he has labor you know yes you know assigned to the highway department so he gets to utilize that in the fashion that he you know so but it's not it's the town board doesn't get to the level of detail that I'm creating a road to extend Oak Tree Lane

That's sort of not a specific project that would be in the budget as a project. That's sort of something.

It wasn't. My understanding is they used existing materials from someplace else, so there was no cost for those materials.

But the labor and the equipment, it's all town equipment, so that's cost.

Yeah, but I mean, he chose to maintain the road with those materials instead of going out and dealing with the sand. the men would have been used in some fashion. Okay. So it is, you know, this is definitely a Ken, like throwing him under the bus.

No, no, I don't want to throw anybody under the bus. I'm concerned that we are a relatively little town and a highway superintendent can ignore laws as he pleases. And Ken is a charming guy.

I don't believe he ignored any laws.

So who says who?

It says he and the town engineer.

Well, he violated it, so he obviously would not promote that he violated it.

Do you have that? Just because we are in a public meeting, do you have proof that he violated that?

No, I'm looking at 129.

It's a very serious allegation, so I just want to make sure.

I'm looking at 129, the wetlands code. Who else has looked at that code? If you read that code, it requires a wetland permit. and we don't have a wetland permit. Does anyone look at that? Or are we just okay with it? If we are, that's fine. I know I'm not gonna be able to change the world. I'm just concerned as a citizen.

I don't think he will do that again, but because of the uproar that he created, but it was within his jurisdiction. And the town does not necessarily have follow its own rules we generally do on projects say you must follow the rules but I'm like we're making ourselves go through site plan review um so like whether or not I we would have to look at whether or not he violated the weapons but I have not looked at it it was so done it was a fate of complete by the time we heard about it

I don't want to amplify it here, but that in itself is an interesting statement.

I mean, I agree with what Ken did. I mean, he knows highways. If it was lighting, I don't know, electrical engineering, I could tell you what was wrong with the lighting, but the paving and stuff, that's the part on transportation has to be built to that standard. And we have the wetlands, which controls another part. And he did the best he could for that area.

Based on what? On his experience. If we have a wetlands code, and the wetlands code requires application for a permit, and the permit wasn't requested, the best of what? If any one of them does, then we have a legal problem. Well, someone is going to, if it's big enough, someone's going to come after us.

Well, I mean, like I said, one-third of the roads are within 100 foot of a wavelength on Shelter Island. You can go down any town landing and it's there. And it gets repaved and it's resurfaced as required. Because it's there. We surfaced a stair. This was not... Well, we have a bulkhead at the end of Shelby Street, which we said should be repaired. Stuff like that. All right. I think... You know, I would suggest you put it in writing.

We're putting it in writing. And I guess we take it to the voting booth. That's probably the most effective way of doing it if we're not looking for legal solutions. then political solutions might be the only way to go.

We have a committee working on the wetlands, which we've taken everybody's notes. We spent two and a half hours the last week.

But that's a different issue. It's wetlands. This is based on current wetland code that has nothing to do with the revision of the code. But I don't want to derail the meeting. I think what I've heard I find very interesting. Love to sit there.

Anybody else?

No, I don't think so.

Yeah. It's kind of like the same thing when people call me up and they want me to dump a load of screen sand down on the beach. You just kind of don't do that. Yeah. You know, unless you want to draw a fire. So it's the same kind of thing that happened with the Silver Beach thing and probably not going to happen again. It'll happen. That'll be it.

At the time, it seemed appropriate, you know, and stuff like that, too. Yeah, you're up that section of the land before it breaks through again. The dredging's there, and they didn't want to lose that.

Anyway.

All right.

Well, go back to a dirt road and be done with it. That's the best thing. Yeah.

I guess so.

And it is what it is.

It's what it is, yeah. And you can't drive on it. You can't drive on it.

Yeah, well, just, you know.

Like you have storms like we had with the rain.

Yeah.

I mean, that was terrible, that rain. All right, well, the rest of the Nature Preserve updates we had. And basically the same as what we went through on 2024. but we submit it again now. So I was suggesting that we get a line item from the Highway Department to donate funding for those areas like Wade's Beach, you know, the breakthrough with the sand coming onto the paving there. Sachem's Woods is a problem because all the businesses around it are going over the property lines and spilling into the Sachem's Woods, which is originally for the aquifer. But the town has to take care of that, too. I mean, it's another one.

What's the island in property on the Sachem's Woods thing?

The island in property, S-E-N property. the restaurant there.

Oh, the Islander. Okay.

All right. Okay. Yeah.

All right. Okay.

Yeah.

Got it. But they're not the big one. It's... Marcello has a pipeline going in there. I don't know what that's from. And then there's... Up on the other roadway there, there's... all the stuff is just coming over into the woods, you know, outside. And I don't, you know, the workers do that. I don't know how often the owners take a look at it, but we bring that to their attention anyway. But this shouldn't be over the property lines. Take a look at that. What else did we have on the property? Garcia is That's, we don't have the boundaries marked and I think in a way that's good because nobody knows where it is and there's a plan what that is for, you know, what to do there. But the survey hasn't been marked out and I think we should just leave it that way. Wade's Beach is just at the parking lot over, Bushes they have by the parking lot get trampled by people walking, taking shortcuts to the beach instead of going around it. So then when you have a storm, the sand just comes in to the parking lot, unfortunately. Dickerson Park has been there for a long time. That old garage is falling down. The problem with that one is that asbestos shingles on it. It's a costly item to remove. I talked to Ken on that and I said, you know, maybe we should have a line item for these properties so that we can get them cleared out. Because it's falling down now. Bushes are growing through the roof. It's ugly. Hopefully nobody gets hurt there. But if it breaks onto the ground, again, it's affecting our aquifer in that area. And that's been on for several years. So I'll get to that. The invasive brush around the pond, you know, that's just an item. You're not going to clear that out. I mean, we have beautiful pictures of what that pond was at one time, you know. Gorgeous place. And the neighbor properties going out to Dickinson Road there, it's not really clearly marked, so people tend to just squeeze in over the property line. So we should take a careful look at that. again these are items that should be addressed at the budget item as a budget for them so okay would that come from like the two percent committee or to that since it's i guess it could be contributed you know because they have money for maintenance on things so yeah but that's what there's separate properties that they have They should use it because we're not going to be able to buy many more properties on Shelter Island. So you're going to get a lot of money from sales that they could use.

That should be like one big parkland budget, I would think. Yeah, maybe. Something to consider. Make it easier on the taxpayers, that's for sure.

Yeah. I should go to the Nature Preserve because they've been working... You know, that committee wants to do certain things they like to do, like they want to build from Otis Lane now. The neighborhood wants to build like a bridge across so you don't have to go out and come back in on Otis Lane to use that property. But then you build a bridge, the account insurance is a response. Who's building a bridge?

Who would build a bridge there?

That's well, it's just it sounds like a big bridge. It's not a big bridge. This is about it. 30 foot opening in the water. That's all the build across at that.

Sounds like a bad idea.

Sounds like a really bad. I thought these were supposed to be reverse on serving. What's there?

They can't walk around anymore. That's part of the problem.

It's gorgeous as is.

People want to put exercise things into different preserves. You know, say when you walk through the preserve, you lift weights and stuff like that. I know a violin in Nassau County. That's what they do. And then you have to have insurance for that. Let's not be an asshole.

I know, right.

Keep it simple.

You know, there's a difference between recreation and preservation, though. The idea of preservation is really to think about preserving what is, not necessarily having everything be so people-centric. You know, there's places for that. I know what you're talking about. I think it's a great idea. You can do that in some park that we have not every preservation spot that's those are supposed to be natural yeah you know what i'm saying it just really is yeah we're not thinking at all what i wondered is i did try to go look at some of these properties there are so many of them um and i was extremely impressed by the amount that we actually have it's phenomenal uh you know i hope our Our master plan will really highlight What we have on this island, because it's so incredibly impressive, but I guess I wondered, you know, I encountered 1, it didn't have a name. Some have placards and names. Some don't. And there was 1, I think it's Nostrand Parkway and West neck. It looks like a cleared area. You know, I'm talking about, and it has, and it seems to show a plan like there and a group. Nelson Pope and or his or something. Yes. Okay. So they did a plan and then you can see that it's phased in now. I don't know if it's happening, but what I wonder it is, I didn't know if that place has a name. I wonder, do we always do a use plan and it maps back to the mission statement? Because I think there is some. reference to our having responsibilities for the development of plans. I don't know if it's an ongoing use plan, if we oversee it, that I'm not sure of, but I just wondered, do we consistently, does anybody know when the land is either purchased or donated, is there always a plan, a preservation plan that's developed? a stewardship plan. So everybody always has that. So one posted, the others did not. Okay. And then, so are we...

I think Tim Patel kind of took that one over himself and is trying to have a fight against Mugwort. Yeah. I don't know if anybody could defeat Mugwort.

Is that why it's being wrote to? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Ah, okay.

The only way you can really kill Mugwort is just to keep mowing it and it finally gives up.

Okay, I think that's exactly what they do, but I think they're tilling it and then plowing it.

Yeah, yeah.

Is that the plan?

Because, well, I don't know.

Okay, yeah.

It's an ongoing fight. Yeah, oh, I see. You either turn it into a field, or you give up it's like mugwort is impossible okay but I see yeah just keep mowing it that's the only way you can fight you can fight it because it has rhizomes that kill everything else around it but once you it doesn't have any leaves it can't really continue on so you just mow it down and that's it then it dies but otherwise if you let it grow this high it's going to take over everything take over everything yeah yeah

Tim is down there looking at it all the time.

He has somebody plowing it. Even the farmer guys that are doing it, they're like, yeah, it's not going to work. They're trying to do the fight.

A lot of things are that way. The preservation group there, when they purchase the land, they will always give a stewardship plan for it. We usually get to review it. And certain stewards, I'm the steward for Otis Lane right now. You know, they're supposed to be selected. They've been, you know, they switched chairmen, so it gets a little bit behind for a while, but they'll catch up, go ahead with the job. But that's all in the plans and they allocate money every year to maintain that property.

Okay. In accordance with the stewardship.

Yeah.

Yes. Okay. I mean, I'm just asking again for conservation and preservation that if you have, if someone donates land, because they want it to be open space, then it would seem to me that having a plan and then that we have some moral or legal responsibility to adhere to that plan. So, you know, I think a lot of it is really designed for wildlife. Yeah. And I know we have trails through many of them and that's fine. I mean, at one trail through Is fine, but I wouldn't want to be changing that dramatically or having too much of that because that and I also wondered, are they planting anything at all? You know, is there clover or. You know, some kind of crop cover or, you know, in other words, is anything being done to improve upon this from a natural point of view for wildlife?

It would be on the stewardship.

Okay, that's what it would come with. I mean, I get to talk to Tim and see what his final plan is on the whole thing.

Okay, there's that when I just happened to encounter that when I tried to look a lot of them, that was the only one that had a visible plan. It had no name for what it is, but it had a plan. So, I guess I was just, I thought all of them were amazing. I was just surprised that there wasn't consistency of signage. or a plan. I encountered one that had lovely brochures, but again, they don't all have that, but the brochures are great. So yeah, I just kind of wondered, is that the preservation group that's kind of responsible for that? Do they go around and take a look at this? Are we supposed to be doing something?

I just wondered. Well, that's what this open space is. You have that She gave you that, and you can see which property it is, and then you look it up on there.

No, no, I can find it. I guess I was just talking about the inconsistency of the... Yeah, a lot of great things are happening. So I too am now trying to be critical. I was trying to understand and wonder if we have... Or improve it. Or improve it, exactly.

Because I think it is... Well, I would suggest to go to a meeting and talk to the chairman.

Sure, no, I'd be happy to do that. Is the chairman of that, do you know? It is. Oh, sure. I know him. Yeah. Yeah.

He's chairman now.

Okay. Yeah. Great. No, I'll give him a call. Yeah.

Yeah. I will go to the meeting. Yeah, I will. They're very open about everything.

Yeah. No, no, I just, yeah.

Okay. Okay. Got those items. Okay now there's a green expo coming up August 22nd and we need somebody to land that little booth that we put up there.

What are the hours of?

I think it's 10 to 2. I'm not sure but something like that because it goes through lunch.

Yeah it does to me too yeah.

Yeah it is 10 to 2.

I don't think it's as long as the entire part of it.

Right, no.

Yeah, that's what I was just saying.

Yeah. It seems right to me too. So are we going to be back here, or are we going to leave here by the school?

By the school. By the school. Okay. I think I was, you know, did that last year.

Yeah. The sampling.

Yeah.

And hopefully the fire department will have a nice lunch. You can go over there and have a nice lunch. It's nothing official yet.

Yeah.

But, you know, If you could give me, you know, before the 22nd, like the end of the month or what hours, you know, her tent is big. I get over and set it up. She's usually pulling all those tents together, you know. Right. She's there reading.

I'll do 10 to 11. How's that? That's great.

I'll do 11 to 12. 12 to 1, I guess. I thought we had two people. We can have two. But we may end up with that.

We can have more.

Yeah, remembering that, you know.

Yeah, we try to have two to keep us, you know.

Yeah.

sitting there and it's nice to have somebody to talk to and somebody and a lot of people come by and and they might know one of the people I don't know the other so it's easy to them yeah yeah right I'd be glad to be one of the people I think I was last year yeah yeah and then you meet the other committees next to you you know and talk to them so it's really It's a nice day, hopefully the weather.

Yeah, no, it is. It's very nice.

So we got 10 to 11, 11 to 12. Anybody from 12 to 1?

What did you put me down for? I'll do 12 to 1 if you want to tweak it.

Yeah, I think that's what you said too. So let's, yeah, we'll put you down for 12 to 1. That's great. Thanks.

I'm working. You're working. Yeah. Yeah.

And what's the date on that?

Yeah, it's on a Saturday, right?

It's a Saturday, yeah.

Yeah, it is. We got to get those IAs in before we... Yeah, well, talk to the county. Yeah, I know.

It's terrible. More money to get than what I hide.

Okay, yeah. And I'll be around because I help set it up and then stay for a while and stuff like that. So you work and you spend some time up there? I think I'm out of town. Oh, okay. So if you're out of town, you can't spend the time there. And Dan, I haven't heard from, you know, Dan. Unfortunately, he's the kind of person we like at these meetings. He's got a lot on his hands right now. He's got two kids now and it's hard. It's very hard. I understand that. And now I have a tree planted by the Friends of Trees in front of my property that's blocking the stop sign on your corner. He's trying to get somebody to cut it down. Dan might be one of the ones to be taken care of by Friends of Trees instead of the town taking it. And Tim Patel, you know, he's very... Bill Benson So they just planted? William Peters Yeah. Well, not just now, a couple of years ago, and it's growing out and blocks the stop sign. Nobody stops at the stop sign anyway, but... Bill Benson You guys don't have any shoulders down there, right? William Peters No. Bill Benson Everything's right to the road. William Peters Right to the road. But the town owns that 12 and a half feet from there to the road. That's not our property. That's an easement. Most places. Most places. Some of it varies. Depends on where the center line is.

It depends if there was a big rock. All kinds of stuff.

Can I ask a question about one of these? I forgot. Josephson's Head, I believe, is the name of it. It's on South Cartwright. Do you know what I'm talking about?

Almost like Harlingen Road. Yeah, yes. Yes.

I mean, that's the most phenomenal place. I just wondered what was... It had been a tennis court. It's obviously been fallen to disrepair, but the setting is spectacular. You know what I'm talking about. Oh, my gosh. Is there a plan for that?

I think the best use of that place would be another town dock. Well, you've got a house, too.

working on the what to do with the house and if it's historic and stewardship and so i know that i know that to be and that they're working on that it's like okay yeah it's that's complicated because what do you do with all that stuff so because there's actually water there but they also uh they got the property right next to the town dock that's given to the town they could put another town dock there as well right

so there's plenty of room in front of Andy's infrastructure in front of Andy's yeah right right they donated that plot there where the kayak racks and stuff all right they could throw the dock in that spot too but there's water in front of that that new property yeah it's good water and it's protected you don't have to really worry about any kind of storm problems it'd be a great place for a town talk is it what is it like 100 people in there 100 people on the list something like that I don't know

it's huge really people have been waiting some people die before they get on the list yeah but that would be that would be a great use for it you know yeah it's it's it's a beautiful piece of property there it's really gorgeous and it's tranquil i don't know what a town dock would do to it but you know i get the practicality of it but through the boats and leaves you gotta see the boats though and right now it's so lovely it is and everything you know i don't think that

town engineer I know has been down there looking at the building. The garage is in better shape to try to keep the garage, I think. Oh, then the building, the house itself?

That's expensive, too. That's expensive. What are you going to do with it? You're going to have to upgrade it. You're going to have to spend millions of dollars to fix it and make it a municipal. You know, Howard, the town can take those down.

They've got the tractor trailer.

The town guys can knock that thing down in a day. Yeah, it's not a big deal. Then you've got pristine property.

And maybe make the tennis court work or whatever, but you know, you can leave that's what I was thinking. It's a tense tennis court fence.

Yes, the fence is there, but it does look like the surface is all broken.

I mean, if you got rid of the tennis court, you could make like a community garden in the fence. That was 1 of the thoughts, you know, so you can get in and put top. So. And then that would be a spot that everybody could... That's a nice idea. The thing with a community garden that's kind of neat is that if people get together, they actually have fun with that. It's more of a recreation thing. They sit there and watch the tomatoes grow.

And they talk together.

They work together. And it's kind of neat. And if they already got a fence, the department could take out the tennis court, leave the fence, or whatever you got to do. Just keep the deer out and then people could go in. Yeah. Really? Because I know Dr. Ryan, he had a little garden for his friends. And it was always, you know, I would say probably a dozen people there every weekend fooling around in the garden.

Yeah.

You know, and you give people a place to do that.

Lovely idea. They would like it.

And that was all farmland anyway. So that's good soil. It's like mishawmy.

People go up there and weed and everything like that.

But you know, you just give people some things like that and who knows, it might take off. You know, you might be able to do, you know, five or six community gardens in different places, you know. And you could.

Really could. Really could. That's a great idea.

see what happens on it you've come up with a lot tonight haven't you yeah we're keeping you town doc that's that we really need yeah i don't think there'd be that much opposition about it you know it could be self-funded yeah i mean just the fact that just so many people are looking for a place you know keep a boat you know you're you're charging enough money to help

No, seriously, for a slip. I mean, it used to be like ridiculous amount of money. Now it's, you know, you could have, if you had 30 or 40 slips there, that would pay for a solid. Right. Yeah. Keep and maintenance. Yeah. So, I mean, it would cost the town very minimal. Initially, you'd have to lay the money out, but I think you... God.

So cool. I mean, infrastructure. I mean, I know this, the 2% money is, some of it is for recreation, right? Or is it only for preserve?

That's what I wonder, can you do? And acquisition and stewardship.

Right.

And there is like a historic component too, but we've never had anything historic with other towns.

Yeah. And the artist building that's out completely, right?

That was a nice idea.

Well, yeah, but they don't have the money is next Monday. So you can, you can.

Is that right? Yeah, because it would be a perfect setting for that.

Yeah. I mean, that's literally that committee is working on.

Right.

Yes.

I think it's 8 o'clock in the morning, right?

It's already.

And, you know, they took a bunch of suggestions, you know, and everybody came to it. But the artists were, one group that wanted it and another group, pollution and stuff like that from the paints and the waste of that, they didn't want to have that there. It shouldn't be either.

Yeah. Well, tell them it's going to become a town dock if they don't and see what they have to say. They might need a town dock, another town dock.

They don't need one.

They're at Jamie Coogan's now, right? Yeah, they got a spot. They're all set. They're on Bridge Street.

Oh, is that right?

Yeah, they set up there, which probably isn't a bad idea, you know.

Oh, is this that you're talking about?

That's on Bridge Street. Yeah. That's what you're doing.

Jamie Cogan's restaurant. Oh, Jamie Cogan's restaurant. Oh, okay. All right.

But the one that's just for sale. So, right. I want a Bridge Street. I have no idea. I've never. Yeah. There's classes.

Yeah. They have classes and talks. Yeah.

Right. And any classes that. Yeah, there's a couple. That's good.

It is good. Yeah. Very nice. Yeah. OK, well, thank you.

OK, what else we have that so? The Green Expo. We got people to cover. So we'll see people the more the merrier. Doesn't matter. We can get more chairs. Yeah. Or you can. One of the nice thing is you have a person and the other person go walk around. Look at the arts and crafts. That's very right. No, that's spend a couple hours there.

usually pretty interesting okay old business I don't know if we have any except that we had on the uh shell beach that was old business that we took care of just one update I sent an email to the town attorney to just look at whether or not the work that was down now down there would have required a weapons permit oh okay there are certain things as I was going through the code it was like if it's public facilities no permits required If it's maintenance, no permits required. So I'd like to have legalized, take a look at it. Yeah.

But you never know, you know, before it was spending on the wetlands or revision and the amount of time and everything before it's ready to go to the public. And I'm sure when it goes to the public, there'll be plenty of comments.

Yes.

Thanks, Ann. We're working on see what happens. Okay, that's great. Appreciate that. That's good. No wetlands applications, huh? I think people are noticing sea rise. Maybe I don't want to build here. Nothing slows anybody down.

Yeah, I don't think so either. I agree. I don't care.

I'll be, you know, waterfront pretty soon.

I can't wait to be waterfront.

Yeah. Oh, I could. It's a mess when there's a storm, like I tell you. Watch your basement there. Get the pumps going and see what's going on. All the stuff in your basement's got to be up on blocks. You know, people in fact, I hate to say Nassau County, but they used to put those plastic bags around the burners when the hurricanes came into Freeport. would raise the bag up over the burner and shut the burner down so it wouldn't get full of water. All sorts of innovative ideas, you know. It's innovative. Okay. Any new business we might want to discuss coming up?

Oh, four posters. Are they coming back? Oh, I've said that. Oh, that's like a good thing. I guess we gave all ours to North Haven or sold them to them, and they're working great. Go figure. Now we've got to get more.

They went and knocked on every single door in North Haven to get people to sign up. So we may have somebody who's willing to do that.

We can do that. Yeah. Well, they work.

Nothing else works. And now, apparently, all the rabbits are going to kill us. The rabbits is to a little remia now, because the ticks bite the rabbit and then the tick bites you and then you get this some radical disease.

Oh, really?

I heard that they had 3 or 4 confirmed cases in Suffolk County now. Really? And they're saying.

And it's, it's bad, it's not going to wait till, you know, they they've got. 50 or 60 different diseases before we have those.

The flesh-eating bacteria. Well, that's from the water.

If you ever look at a deer, like even the little fawns, I got a whole collection of them down in my pit, and I can get pretty close to them, and their heads are covered with ticks, the little guys. So the four posters really work. It was such a stupid thing to stop doing it. I know the DEC, but they're ridiculous anyway.

It's like chronic wasting disease. They're trying to avoid that. So we get deers conglomerate into this area. We've never had that here. It's upstate.

Yeah, it's not. They have one book and everything comes out of the one book and nobody can think between the lines. I go through it all the time with my mining stuff. But that actually worked. In fact, what was it? The county that did the test originally? It was a long time ago. Was it the 90s when they set up It was Stony Brook. Somebody did the original thing. And it worked so good that, you know, the town just went right along with whatever they had set up. And it was fine. I mean, we had any ticks around for a long time. So they're still doing it in North Haven? Well, they just set up this year, right? And it's working great.

We still have a deer and tick committee, so. Yeah. Yeah. Very good fun.

Yeah, but the trouble is the DEC said you can't do anything. It's like COVID, you know, you either make it or you don't. I mean, that's how they are with the ticks, you know.

But if they're doing it here, we're a mile away.

You need to have neighbors sign up.

Well, there's something about, you know, it's 750 feet or something, right? Which is a ridiculous amount of space. So you have one guy that says, no, I don't want it. But that's like ridiculous. Who came up with that number? I mean, that's 750 feet. It's like... That's like from here to the firehouse. You're never going to find a neighbor that's nice within 750 feet of you. It's a tick-borne disease thing. They got a new one. They moved to Kansas, and now in Bourbon, Kansas, they got their own new disease from the people that came from Plum Island and went to Kansas. oh really oh yeah yeah yeah they don't call it lime they call it no it's bourbon disease because it came from bourbon kansas so and you got to find a double they have nothing to do with it you know because the government you know i don't know why that double washed corn you know for to put a deer i think double washed corn yeah that they put for the feeders for the poor poster yeah yeah yeah What's wrong with that? I don't know why. Cow corn. Harvey's grown a bunch of cow corn. Deer don't care. We've got to get that going again because that really worked. I agree. You know, and sooner or later, we're going to get something that's really bad that you can't do anything about. And, you know, like germ warfare ticks is the reason that they all go for that because you can't stop a tick. You could stop everything else, you know, but you can't stop a tick. Yeah.

So, I don't know. It'd be a rough one, you know, with the hunters and everything like that.

With what? The four posers?

Yeah. Yeah. Meat from the deer and everything. I did it before. Yeah, I know.

I know.

And Kulu was full.

Yeah.

I go down there every week.

Yeah. I don't know. But, you know, you can't have everybody.

That's pretty nasty. A lot of people have that.

Oh, my wife's got that really bad.

A lot of people, my neighborhood, whatever.

And these are all new ones. These are all after the four posters that we got. Yeah. The Alpha Gal, none of that was around when the four posts. It's been, what, at least 15 years or so that the four posters haven't been around?

Yeah.

Something like that. Yeah. Yeah.

looks like tularemia is treatable with antibiotics they know what they're looking for apparently a month to figure it out does it really okay they don't see it it's not a very common disease right it really has to be on the ball to figure it out okay you get the initial looks like lyme and babesiosis and ehrlichiosis exactly vomiting it's the whole gamut of the symptomatic problems yes but there are specific blood tests they have to do to figure out what it is. And by that time you already had it two or three weeks and now you're being more debilitated by it.

The worst thing is people that come here from Europe, And get some sort of Lyme type of thing and then go back there and have no idea what it is. I know. I know. That's a really bad thing.

It is. Exactly. Yeah.

Our doctors here are on the ball. They're on, you know, they understand what's going on.

Yeah, no, they know. They see it.

But you get into England and, you know, I've been here for the weekend and they go back to wherever they go.

They have no idea. Yeah, you're absolutely right.

And that's a real problem because they've been, you know, doctors are like...

neurological disease you know it's sort of they put them in you know yeah it's a while because i had the disease and you know they took the doctors and e-l-i-h like a week they throw something out of us they they don't have to figure it out at that time i don't know now they didn't have permanent staff at eo ih they was kind of stony brook and went for a while and stuff like that so oh wow

If you got something and nobody knows what it is, so Dr. Cycling had it for $12. And guess what? It either works or it doesn't.

It's one of the antibiotics they use. So that's useful.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Dr. Keltz.

And Cipro. So that's good.

Yeah.

So you would naturally get that anyway. Okay, we'll be all right. There's only 4 3 suspected cases in Suffolk County this year. So it's in the 1, 2, and it's been creepy again.

If they don't know what it is, there's probably 500 more. Could they have a diagnosis? Yes.

Yeah. But if they give you docs a cycle. I mean, it's 104 antibiotics, so it'd be your daily vital.

You just can't go out in the sun.

You can't go to the beach. You can't go to the woods. You can't go to the beach. Let's get the four boats back. What did that cost the town a year? Did you ever figure that out? Now it would be a lot more, but... And look, yeah. Because I know the Ryan kid did it, and Nicky Ryan did it, and I think he was the only one. And that was like his job for the highway department, just doing those four posters. Yeah, setting them up.

But I'd go in the woods, I'd see station's wood and stuff, you'd see squirrels in there, chipmunks. It's helping all of them. Right. Yeah, it really is. It's not just, you know, everybody's like, oh, kill all the deer. It's like, it's not just deer. Birds get it. Ticks go on everything. I get it. My dogs get it.

Yeah, well, the birds, they say that the, you know, who knows what's the truth, but they say that the lone star came up from birds from out west and down south, you know, which is a possibility. Yeah. You know.

They migrate.

Yeah.

They get on a bird, they take a flight. It's like nuke takes from China now. Of course there are. Yeah.

Yeah, well, of course.

You might see a storm comes over. Yeah, from China.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anything else? That's it. Let's get the four posters back. Four posters. We fixed everything. Let's go on.

Community garden. Let's paint the entire place.

And dirt road on South Beach. Solved it all.

Good ideas. Just paint the entire island. No. Dirt. No ticks. No ticks.

Okay, I'm going to adjourn. Yes.