Town Board - Regular Meeting

Welcome everyone to our town of southeast town board meeting for June 4th. If we could rise for 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.

Okay, just to remind everybody of the emergency exits, there's two in the back of the room and there's one over here in case of an emergency. I'd ask everybody to put their electronic devices on silent. And with that, I'll ask the town clerk to give us roll call.

Councilman Cypress? Here. Councilman Larca?

Here.

Councilwoman Lewis? Here. Councilman Mazzotta?

Here.

Supervisor Castellano?

Present. Thank you. First item on our agenda tonight is a public hearing. We have a continuation from the May 21st public hearing for 301 Milk Town Road.

Before we get started, I'm going to recuse myself. This property is 600 feet from my house. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Peter Scott. I'm here to represent the applicant tonight. Good evening. So we're here for 288, and basically the 288 is to supplement frontage requirements. Our lot is somewhat unusual. We have a lot of frontage, but we can't get to it because there's wetlands which run along the edge of Middletown Road. So accordingly, we did a bulk table analysis on the project. We could have had five lots on the site of 46 acres total, but we decided to go with four lots. And we arranged them with a common driveway servicing three lots. And that requires a 288. And then we need to add another lot at the bottom lower portion of the property, which utilizes frontage on the Milltown Road. In this manner, we have a single penetration through wetland control area to enter onto the property. And once we're in the middle of the property, it's beautiful rolling lands with pretty flat terrain filled with barberry and multifloral rose and red maples. So basically, it used to be a farm operation. And accordingly, it's sedimented with walls in a grid pattern, as you can see on the plan. And I heard from the last meeting there were some questions about stone walls. I'm also entering into it right now. We designed the project to minimize any encroachments on stone walls. But because there's so many of these in this grid pattern, we have a couple penetrations right entrance to lot number three. We have another penetration where a lot number two is accessed with a driveway. And it's only because of the fact that the farmers made closed boxes on the property in a very rectilinear, and we had to penetrate them. And we minimized them to the maximum possible. If we do penetrate a wall, we would repair the perimeters or edges of that penetration itself. But again, there's so many walls and they're so diverse across the property that for the limited number of penetrations we have, for the development of such a large parcel, I think we could more than adequately address the issue with the design. A couple things just for status wise. We just got the approval from the historical, Southeast Conservation Historical for our penetration through the 50 foot buffer. We have that permit. We have a permit from the Putnam County Department of Highways. They've approved the locations of our driveways for sight distance. What's pending is we need to finish a approval of a 288, then we have to go back to the planning board and get our pulmonary subdivision approval, and then we can get the final health department permits and the PCDOH permits. The plans have been reviewed extensively by Bruce Barber, the web consultant, and they've also been approved by Hahn Engineering to basically for conformance with stormwater management and basic construction. And I believe we're here to answer any questions. And I'll let it go to the audience.

OK. Thank you.

Peter, if you could just turn the map towards the public here in case anybody wants to take a look.

OK. With that, if anybody from the public would like to come up and ask questions or speak on this. Yes. If you could just state your name

You've got to come up to the podium, please. You had talked before about the buffer. between well our property which is on the west side and the lady who was here last time on the east side and I wondered about that buffer and how big it is and does it mean that that property that part of your property will not be touched or you're going to plant there take stuff down

So to compromise with various concerns of neighbors, we came up with a comprehensive plan of three students on the project. And the first- And Peter, you might want to step up to the mic.

She couldn't hear you. And the camera too, so. Yeah. Sure.

So this map depicts the common driveway, and there's two buffers being proposed, one on the northern portion of the property within lot number one, and it's depicted in this light green enhancement here. There's also a buffer required per the Historic Conservation Commission for our penetration from the roadway. And what they consist of is mixed species of evergreens. And we're planting them within the trees that are there now. And that's this part of the project. And for you, we have a special. And so... Along your property line, we have an approximately 50-foot wide buffer. And again, we have mixed species of evergreens within that as well. And the trees that are there remain, and we're going to strategically locate these enhancements between trees that we've located using drones. So we know we've accurately located the trees, and we have specifically placed these evergreens within this area. And they're not to be touched. And we have an agreement has been drafted by our attorneys, which provide protection for for these plantings for future homeowners to have included in their deed. so basically they're going to be there there's a maintenance requirement for those it's all been it will be recorded when this is approved uh and it'll be for perpetuity so uh and one last thing is during the planting process uh there it'll be inspected by the town for a period i think it's three years on this project

And where is the house on that? The house before?

Yes.

I see four there, but I don't know where the next one is.

The house is right here. Okay, so it's quite close to the opera.

Well, this is a pretty big lot. It's very large in size. That house is over 100 foot off the property line. We have a zoning requirement. We're an R160. We're required to have a 100 foot minimum setback. And in all cases, we've proposed our house sites beyond 100 foot setback. So 100 foot's about two times the length of this room. Yes, we've submitted and discussed the project with the New York City DEP and they had us move the house a little bit farther onto the property to fit larger basins on our property line to collect stormwater runoff. So we had to adjust things to meet requirements of that one particular agency. But on this particular lot number four, we've moved the septic area away from the property line and we've taken away any disturbance within the buffer. We've moved the septic system as approved by the health department to the opposite side of the lot. And that was an agreement we reached with you in the past to maintain integrity of the existing trees.

Okay.

Okay.

And that septic area . In other words, every tree in that area has to be cut in order to accommodate the septic, and that's gonna be on the other side of the property, away from your place.

Is that for just the one house?

It's for one house. Unfortunately, septic systems have a primary system and a reserve system, so you're actually building an area suitable for two septic systems. if one fails, we have a space. So in most cases, initially we would clear that area and just make it satisfactory for if we had to put a reserve septic at that point in time. It's about 6,000, 7,000 square feet.

Okay. Any other, anybody else would like to speak or have other questions about 301 Milltown Road?

Can you go up to the mic? What's the proposed timing on this?

That's all I know.

Well, I wish I knew.

It's been years. When did I buy this? I bought this from the town. Is it 2021? What is it now? It's five years and we haven't even done anything.

Yeah, so we have a whole list of submissions and approvals in place on the project. But again, we have to work in a linear manner. planning board approval, then we have to go to town board approval, then we have to go back to planning board approval. In the meantime, we've distributed everything to all the other agencies, so we think within the next six months at most, we would be finalized. We have final plat maps that are prepared, but we can't go to the health department, so we're kind of waiting. We're trying to get all of this out of the way if we could.

What's the timeline on the health department when you get to that point?

They're pretty fast. I mean, our PERC tests were more than acceptable. They were very good. Everything's been witnessed, tested a million times, and DEP's been there as well. So literally, it's just a matter of getting the right paperwork in order to submit to them. I don't anticipate any problems whatsoever. Okay. You have another question?

One other question. With the buffer in there, between the house number four, I guess it's called, and us, there will be trees. Yes. They're certainly along the pasture side, but...

Yeah, our arrangement, our agreement is we keep all the existing trees there, and you've got substantial trees along that area. A couple trees fell down recently in a storm, but basically we're gonna augment the trees that are there. And the problem with the existing trees are is the canopy is like 60 feet tall. That's why we're putting the pines in. Because while we have big trees remaining, you can see right through this array of trunks. So that's why we're putting in the evergreens, which will reach heights between 15 and 20 feet. And that would give you a solid buffer year round. Because we can't rely on telephone poles to big tall trees to give you any buffer.

Okay. Anyone else with a question? Okay. I'll make a motion to close the public hearing with a five-day written comment period to the town clerk. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay, our second public hearing tonight is a proposed local law regulating commercial filming. I will make a motion to open the public hearing. Do I have a second?

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Would anybody like to come up and ask questions about this proposed local law that we have for commercial filming? Just to give you a brief version of it, as stated previously, we did have an individual that came forward and was requesting to film a commercial or a movie, actually, on a local property. And we're one of the few towns that don't have any regulations on that. So we figured we'd take a look at it and come up with a local law that would be fair for everybody, including the neighbors. Doesn't seem to be that controversial or anything, but we have to go through the motions, so if anybody would like to ask a question or anything to that nature.

Okay.

I'll make a I'll make a motion to close that public hearing with a five-day written comment period to the town clerk. Do I have a second?

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Aye. Okay. We'll move on to the work session of tonight's meeting. Item number one is discussion about Maple Road. So with that, I will open it up for discussion.

And any- Yeah, I'll- Would you like to start? I'll go over a few things. I wasn't at the last meeting. I was on a work trip, but I've been on the board the longest, so I think I'm familiar with most of the history here. And I'll just go through a few things. I watched the last meeting and go through a few things that we've done and some of the findings that we've found since then. um there are copies of memos so we have a memo from han engineering which isn't okay yeah so they're in the back if you don't have them there's a memo from han engineering and from akrf they were included in the backup for tonight's meeting and we also put them on that maple road page that we created and sent an alert out so if you don't have a copy they're in the back So we'll go through a few of the things that we've reviewed. This is not a public hearing. We have a few other items on the agenda that we'll want to get through. And if anyone from Maple Road wants to make any comment, you're more than welcome to just stay through that and you can make comment at the end during public comment period. All right, so since the last meeting, we met with our town engineer who's here, Han Engineering, our town planner. We reached out to the health department, and I had spoken to our grant writer. So the memos go through most of that. In no particular order, I'll go through some of these things. We looked at alternative routes. There's two options there, Kelly Road and Peter Road. We and I didn't realize this but Kelly Road. There's a major stream crossing between enough and Kelly Road. And that would require a culvert and the you know, similar wetland mitigations and it would also require cooperation Carmel apparently this was done. some time ago, 10 years ago or more. And Carmel sued us to be lead agency and what? 20 years ago. 20 years ago. And it's in the conversation, it's very unlikely we'd be able to accomplish that. And if we could, the cost could be similar to what we had to do at Cobb Road, which was over a million dollars that we just did last year. We looked at Peter Road. There is a emergency easement between 100 Enoch and 99 Enoch. That easement can only be used for emergency purposes. If we wanted to take that and pave it, those property owners would have to sell us that land, or we could try and take it through eminent domain. But I don't know that that's a realistic solution, and I don't know if those people are here, but I don't know that they'd be willing to sell their land to us. The next thing that we brought up was silica. We are certainly not experts on silica, but we did reach out to our town planner, and they wrote us a memo. It was written by Aaron Stoltz, who is a CHI, Certified Industrial Hygienist, and Senior Technical Director of Environmental Health and Safety Compliance at AKRF. So I'm not going to go into that, but there's two pages here, which I think answer the question of the health and safety issues that were raised with silica being used on that road. uh silica being present in that road in the in the dust um some of the improvements so since the last meeting i think you all know that there's we've made some investments and improvements there's been some fiber mesh that we've put down after meeting with han a few weeks ago i took a ride with the highway superintendent on all the dirt roads over there and he showed me where the mesh was and also he's been using a new aggregate on Maple Road and I believe he's going to continue using that and the other dirt roads there but the Maple Road portion was significantly smoother significantly less dust than if you went towards. the spillway and uh it was very clear when we drove those roads so i understand mike that you're going to be using that new aggregate on all those roads going forward um and it and it uh it should get better also in the memo from akrf they made a few recommendations for uh some maintenance that we can do there and some mitigation and that include like spraying down the road and it's up to Mike. He does have the equipment to do that and I think that will be part of the maintenance going forward regardless of what happens on all the dirt roads. This is the biggest one that we found out. There were some preliminary meetings last year with the DEP, I believe, and there was conversations about phasing the project so that We could avoid certain water treatment mitigation practices that the DEP would require us to do. I believe that there is then another meeting with the DEC, and both these agencies have to approve a project like this. Their feedback was that under no circumstances could this project be phased. It has to be done and reviewed as a singular project, which means that it would trigger all of the full blown water mitigation and treatment. And because of the land constraints there, you have the right of way and you have the reservoir, it becomes much more expensive to treat that water. Methods that need to be used and from the what the memo says I'm not an expert those those Methods are way more expensive so Because it cannot be phased the cost estimates that we had ballooned to 2.2 to 2.7 million and it doesn't include the engineering cost which would probably be I don't know fifty to a hundred thousand dollars and a Bond which we have to bond a bond on 2.5 million would cost 3.25 million. And it's 43% of our annual tax levy. So every dollar that the 9,000 parcels in this town pay, 43% of that would go to paving this half mile of road. Then we also looked at seeing if we can get grants. Mr. Marini, you had sent an email about the DOT safety program and funding. We reached out to our grant writer, talked to him about that. Unfortunately, what we found out was that it only applies to clear and this is their their explanation clear safety issues crash history risk of serious injury high traffic areas high speed and it does not cover full paving projects mostly geared towards signage shoulder edge work intersection improvements and is focused on protecting the environment which you know this this project doesn't really qualify for So those are the findings. I don't know. I think I've covered everything, Will and Jim. If I got anything wrong, let me know. But I don't know if anyone else has any other comments.

I think you covered it pretty well.

Okay. Yeah, thank you. Just to bring everybody up to speed, certainly we tried very hard to take a deep dive into every single possibility on how we can improve this. And I took a ride on the road last week with the highway superintendent. road is in the best shape i've seen the road for 20 years i know you guys travel it every day it's in the best shape that i've ever seen it in you know granted i don't drive there every day and i understand your concerns but we are doing the best we can without you know overburdening the uh the tax budget that we have um i i thought we'd have another exit route but clearly we've explored all those options and there is not So it's a half a mile that you would like to see paid, but it's a considerable amount of money, and it would be a big tax burden on the entire town. Anyone else have any comments or questions?

No, sir. Thanks.

The only thing I would add, Joe, been an extensive amount of research over the past year. I think we've brought our professionals in. I think we've certainly listened for the past year and spent quite a bit of time on it. So I think we've done our due diligence and made our best efforts.

okay i will uh move on to the next item on our agenda for discussion that is a 63 trail view the certiorari settlement that we have in front of us so um we have a tax cert case um right here in our town we have uh our We got word back from our attorneys, we have a fair settlement agreement that's in front of us. It seems to be the right thing to do to follow their guidance on this. Does anybody have any questions or comments on this one?

No. That's fine. Okay.

Thank you, we're moving on to item number three. This is the Putnam County IDA pilot agreement for APAP land management on Route 22, tax map 35-2-6. I know we have the IDA here, if you can give us an overview on this potential pilot agreement.

Good evening. My name is Bill Nolk. I'm the chairman of the Pendleton County Industrial Development Agency. And I have my executive director here, Paul Hernandez. And we're here just asking as a courtesy for approval of the board for the pilot proposal for actually two properties. There's the APOP and your next one will be also for the Kinsley Group or was it 20 Fields Lane project. And this is, I don't want to be careful how I say this, but you know the law gives the IDA, you know, ability to provide these property tax exemptions, but in practical purposes, it's very smart for us to say, hi folks, we would like to do this in your town. And that's why what we're offering, and again, I keep telling people, this is the Putnam County IDA, the IDAs do not give away money. What we're doing is giving abatements that allow a project to get settled and move ahead. But you're immediately getting more money for your tax property. And we start with a 50% abatement. on the sales tax or property tax on the improvements of the property. So you're getting full value of the property plus 50% of the new assessed value of the improvements. And then over a 10 year period, it goes up to full 100%. And so we would like to ask your approval for these projects to go forward with that understanding.

Okay. Anybody have any questions on that?

I have a couple.

Yes, please do. Bill, your opening statement, and I've kind of heard that before. So to be blunt, what are you saying? Regardless of how we vote, you guys have to say?

And I'm not talking about these projects particularly. The reason we do it this way, and it's the Putnam County IDA's policy, is to ask for the approval of the individual towns doing this. In other jurisdictions, they had gone and said, well, yeah, we could do it, so we'll do it. And then, because this is America, they were sued, and they spent more money trying to answer their legal cases than they would have ever gotten for doing the project. So it just makes sense to, number one, we do due diligence before to make sure that the projects are proper and appropriate. And then we ask that you guys agree with us.

But in the end, it's just our opinion. Fair?

Yeah, your concurrence.

Bill, I mean, these projects seem a little small for IDA. I was hoping maybe you could give a brief summary of the cost-benefit analysis on these. I mean, I know there's a ton of detail in here, but maybe just for everybody, if you have some high-level things you could share.

Paul, that's her specialty there.

Sure. So for APAP land management, they're asking for sales tax abatement and the pilot. And so for... Normally we look at projects at five million and under, but we did a cost benefit analysis based on their construction costs, et cetera, and looked at the value to both local and state in terms of job creation, which is very important for the IDA. We look at will jobs, will good jobs be created, and will they be lasting jobs? And with APAP in particular, they were actually looking to move out of New York State to put their headquarters in Connecticut. And they had done a lot of research on that, and it was almost cheaper per se to purchase a building rather than build a new one and stay here. So that was also something else that the IDA considered. We wanna keep not only the jobs and the tax base here in New York State as an IDA, but in putnam county and in the town of southeast um you know where they're currently located um in patterson uh now they'll be in the town of southeast with their big buildings so that's kind of why we looked at this particular job for for this reason and um and i think you saw in the cost benefit analysis um the benefits far outweigh the costs in the long term with job creation future employment etc you know millions and millions of dollars over a 10-year period So for us, that was a good thing.

Yeah, thanks Paula. So could you add any detail, and I forget the numbers, but I think APAC might have been like 15 million and the other one was like 70 million or something in local benefit. Those seem like very large numbers. Can you kind of elaborate on what goes into that number?

Sure, and these cost benefit analysis are, we key in certain numbers and these other numbers come out. we're kind of going on the jobs created either by the construction, and it's all cumulative over the year. So if your payroll is four million this year, five million next year, so it's all cumulative over the 10-year period, so that's why those numbers seem so high, but there's still benefits to our local area.

I noticed one is asking for mortgage tax and one isn't. So do applicants generally just like, why wouldn't you ask for everything and why would you guys give or not give that specific one? Because that one sometimes is a lot of money for us.

Sure, yeah, absolutely.

It depends on whether or not in the particular case that we were looking at, they already owned the property, so they didn't have to purchase it. So the property was owned. But again, the assessment as far as the property tax valuation goes again with the original property and then the improvements to the property.

Okay. You were talking about bringing jobs. How many people would you add to the payroll in this project? Not counting construction because you were speaking of long term.

Yeah, APAP I believe, what did they say? Nine or 10 new jobs, forgive me here.

These are new jobs, but also remember that they're keeping- So you have- Some odd jobs that- From Patterson. Yeah. Right, but we're talking about adding- Maintaining the job stations here, and then bringing some new opportunities for increased employment.

Yeah, they had stated that they'll be creating nine jobs, and what the IDA does every year is we actually have a lot of compliance that we have to do with New York State, and part of it is following up and ensuring that that is actually in fact happening, or we do a clawback.

That's good to know. Alex, do you have a question? Yeah, I do.

Just reading on the APAP one, it looks like on the spreadsheet you prepared, currently, if nothing was done on this property, vacant land, we're just collecting $4,500 a year, it looks like. And then if the project is developed, the taxable amount or the taxes that could be collected on a full assessment looks like 74,000 a year. And then the reduction, the pilot request is 32,000 a year. So the idea is the net benefit is the 30, is that balance that we are improved by or bettered by. So in a cumulative fashion, instead of collecting $50,000 on vacant land taxes, we potentially could be collecting $550,000 on an improved, but we are giving up the benefit of maybe $218,000 of full taxation if we didn't give into the pocket. Correct. Am I reading that right?

You are. But in the business world, that gives them an opportunity to get themselves settled and moving forward in all the... things that come along with moving around. I'm sure you folks are all, you know, when you move to a new place, it looks very nice and stuff, you turn around and, whoops, I need another one of these, I need another one of those. So that's the kind of things that we build into that allowance.

And we also encourage them to also use local labor where possible. We're very strict. We have a worker's policy.

Well, it's a workforce policy, actually. Very, very strict. Well, it's not very stringent. It's very... express it. And it says, listen, our goal is to hire Putnam employees, and if you can't do it with Putnam employees, lower Westchester employees, and then in New York State. And we understand that, you know, we're right next door to Connecticut and stuff like that. But, you know, we try and get you to do, we have waivers so that we can understand and work around that. But for instance, one of the people that you just talked about was the project over 101 Pugsley Road is now the lesser evil property. And they have told us that, number one, they brought over, I believe, 40 employees. They're now up to something like 90. And many of those are New York State residents. So I mean, the process works.

But you're already an established business, correct? So you're already running, so you're simply moving locations completely?

You're talking about APAP? Yes, they're an established business. They have their headquarters in Paterson and they have another location in Paterson as well. But they've outgrown them both. They'll give up their rented location, they'll keep their location they own currently on Route 311, but that'll be used for not their main operations.

So I think my point is that you wouldn't need the same time period to adjust to a new location as a new business would. Correct. So that period that a pilot offers is really a little different than what you have up on Pugsley. Different apples and oranges, but I see your point.

Yeah, a pilot is generally 10 years is kind of the minimum. There are many ideas that give 25 or even longer. We don't do that. It's our policy. We do 10 year max.

I've got a couple questions. What were they? The town is going to be giving up the smallest concession in this, right? I think we all agree on that. We don't benefit from sales tax. We have the lowest tax rate. The county has a higher tax rate. The school has a much higher tax rate. Yet we're kind of always pressured, it seems like, to vote first. And personally, I wouldn't or don't feel comfortable voting until I understand how the larger taxing authorities would feel about this. Although, it wasn't very clear how you answered, Eric. I don't think it matters if I'm understanding this correctly. But I do think that, I don't know why it's always on us. If you're playing whoever's got the most chips, peels the cards.

and we've got because you guys come up first in the schedules okay the letters went out to all three taxing agencies at the same time and we're working through the school district and through the putnam county legislature to do you know the full process and it's just hi guys thank you you're first okay yeah there's no there's no rhyme or reason for that at all

yeah maybe it just felt that way but in in a recent pilot we eric and i think were the only ones here at the time and and we did feel pressure to vote before the other agencies so we'll note that um for kinsley's they're already in southeast right and so they're just moving down the street building a new building um

and you know ace indigo was a recipient of a of a pilot and i think that it was well deserved i mean they brought so many jobs here it's beautiful up there i do definitely see the roi there um i just uh you know These projects are getting smaller. We've had dozens of projects in similar size in nature in my tenure on the board and on the planning board that have not applied for pilots. I mean, like Restaurant Depot, for an example. I mean, they came out of nowhere.

They can't. We have a mandate. We cannot give pilots to retail. Retail. It can be maximum 30% retail.

That's good to know, but there's still, I think, a lot of other projects that probably could have applied for this. It just seems unfair to them, and these are getting smaller.

Can I add to that? Yeah. A lot of people don't know we exist. We're not really out there to be like, you know, here's for you, here's for you. So we're a quiet agency. We don't promote ourselves, but we do try to inform town boards, et cetera, and that's actually something on the, kind of on the, our agenda is to actually kind of do a tour of all of the town boards in Putnam County. Just to remind them. To remind them, yeah, exactly, to remind the town boards that we do exist and that we are out there. we don't, like I said, we don't promote ourselves.

Yeah, I guess this is, and I don't mean to be a pain, although sometimes I am, I don't want this pilot program to be used as like a coupon, right? Like, oh hey, I'm gonna buy this anyway, but let me get it cheaper. Like Asyndico, I think that really drew a great business here. It's starting to make me a little bit uncomfortable how we're approving pilots, and I do want them to be used for their intended purpose.

But anyway, those are- Just be aware that in some cases, businesses don't come to us because we do require certain you know, adherence to our workforce policies. And, you know, there are, you know, processes that we go through that we look into their businesses more than they perhaps want us to. And so, and they may be in a bigger rush than they're willing to go through the process. So, and there's reasons why other, you know, businesses, especially in some cases, smaller ones, are, you know, less interested in an IDA project.

Okay. Understood. Have you guys ever done a clawback is it? We haven't done it in our in my ten years here in this since I've been chairman so for the logistics project they they received a pilot You know one of those buildings has been empty. I'm lesser evils great business. I've been out there We're lucky to have them. I think they're you know, really good. I And it's great they're creating jobs. But for the other building or that project in total, if they don't hit their number of jobs, there'll be a clawback.

And if there is, does that money go back to the- Yes, there's a three-year period that they're given to the nature of their lease up was such that they were given a three-year period to get to, I believe it's 70% leased up, at which point we would be clawing back. But they are, they're not, they've been paying full boat on, their property taxes so far, and then the pilots will kick in this coming March, or excuse me, this coming September. The school tax will be their first, and they're paying for that, so.

If there's a clawback, does that go back to the taxing entities as a pilot payment?

It goes back to the state, and I think they do, they spend that to where it belongs.

Okay, Lori, did you have any thoughts on this? I don't want to put you on the spot or, no? You don't have to.

Lori Bell, assessor. I'm with all the rest of you on this. In my almost 30 years of working here, and me and my office administering the pilot agreements once they've been approved by the various taxing jurisdictions, be it county, town, or school. They've always been larger projects, manufacturing, industrial, yes, generating jobs and revenue but again it was to entice new institutions to come into town and the larger projects like think Mount Eber Road South all of those big buildings back in there past UCP those were all pilots when those were built Powers Fasteners was a pilot when it was built I mean think like major big buildings and those were the pilots um we've had as you know several similar sized relatively new construction mostly long fields lane there's other ones going up on zimmer and in other locations in town and um i personally don't see how they qualify for what the general intention was And I also believe that there is a possibility that if a town or county or school district doesn't agree to a pilot for a project that the other taxing municipalities can agree. I don't think it's an all or nothing, not from what I've seen. I could be wrong, you guys can correct me if I'm wrong. So to your point, Eric, that if we're not comfortable as the town making the first decision, traditionally it has been us first, and everybody goes, okay, well, whatever they said. I agree that the school district gets the bigger chunk, and maybe this time around with these smaller projects, they should be the ones to decide whether or not they want to participate, and then we can decide independently.

And the county, yeah.

Yeah. That's my two cents.

Thanks, Lori. Thank you. What's the next step, or how does this process work going forward?

Well, if you guys give us the approval, then we're looking next to, the next one would be, the school district their series comes up and then the uh the county would be uh able to sign i think after july 8th is when they that's when their official legislative meeting is so at that point that would go forward from there you have a date for the school do you have a date for the school

we've been anxiously waiting to see if we're on their july or june 9th meeting and if not they have another one i think on the 26th i'm sure there's someone in the audience that could maybe help

So, but, you know, that's the timeline then. And, you know, that's the question there. We're just trying to move these things as expeditiously as we can. Okay.

I'd like to just add to Lori's comment. We appreciate that and we agree, you know, These are very case by case. And the reason why we looked at APAP and our board, believe me, there's a lot of back and forth with our board. The reason why APAP was to keep them here, and the reason for Kinsley, which we can talk about next, was also because they're a Connecticut-based company that was looking to go back to Connecticut and pull out of New York.

so that you know there's rhyme and reason to why we we agreed to these okay with that let's open up uh that as well that's on number four on our agenda uh the putnam county ida pilot agreement for kinsley development at 20 fields lane tax map 7-2-25.2 if you i think you've covered basically yeah i thought we were doing both no no no but i just want to make sure that we discuss both if you have anything to add about kinsley

Yeah, absolutely. So Kinsley is looking for a sales tax abatement, mortgage tax abatement, as well as a pilot. Their project's a little bit bigger, it's over $5 million, and they currently have a building on Guinea Road which they have outgrown. They want to move to Fields Lane. They have not yet purchased the property. They're in the midst of it. Once they purchase the property, they want to put a building there that will be both offices and kind of a distribution warehouse.

And increase employment.

And increase employment, yes. So they did want to increase their employment. I believe it was by seven employees. Those employees are much higher paid employees as well. We thought that was a nice deal that these are good jobs, these are good paying jobs. Not that APAPs weren't, but these ones are higher paying jobs, a little less, a little higher paying.

How many employees do they currently have?

They currently have, I believe, I'm sorry, I don't know the number and I don't want to guess. Okay.

Any questions or comments on Kingsley? Yeah. Yeah, mine were covered. That's cool. Thank you. Yeah, I do want to point out that you did have a public hearing here last month, and I believe there was no objections whatsoever to both projects. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, thank you for coming out tonight. Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Who wants to speak? Lori. Lori.

This question is for these guys. I know that APAP is fully approved by the planning board. Kinsley, I'm not sure if they are or not. And if they are, I think they're in contract. Are there plans for both of these projects to move forward if they don't get approval for the IDA, for the pilot?

I believe in both cases. They would, could, if not, and we have to, you know, one of the things that an IDA is supposed to do, the famous phrase is, but for, we should do this, but for, you know, the benefits that are given from the IDA. Well, one of the things, but for, if we didn't give them the benefits, then we'd be looking at companies going back to Connecticut. And so we have a competition in interest that we have to look into also.

Go ahead, Lori.

APAP's fully approved. As far as I know, they pulled permits, I think, already. They're ready to move forward. I don't think they would have gotten this far if it was, well, I need the IDA pilot in order to be able to financially float this project. And I have to imagine Kinsley's probably somewhere.

Back in March, we gave them what we call an inducement resolution, where we agreed that the IDA thought, based on the information we had at that time and the beginning of our investigation, that they were a worthwhile project. And that was we said, yes, we think we're going to go through. It's not a final approval, but that wasn't given until February. May 27th, so it's recently that we've given them actually authorization. And the authorization is contingent, you know, for, well, if you give them the sales tax and the mortgage tax payment, and the pilot is contingent upon approval of the boards because that's our policy that we want that approval.

If the town didn't approve the pilot, what happens with the mortgage tax since the town's a recipient of the mortgage tax?

Then they would still get that if they went into it, if they built the property. Because there's actually, there's a mortgage, recording to us recording tax well there's a mortgage lease and then there's a pilot uh lease and so there's two different functions in there okay they're separated down there yeah i'm not saying how i'm going to vote but it just it makes me nervous it just seems like we're setting a lower precedent we again uh a new restaurant depot i didn't realize it wasn't retail but we've

I mean, we've had so many projects, I think we're like 95% of our commercial space is developed. People want to be here. And it just seems like it's starting to get a little unfair, and I don't want to open the floodgates for other ones. But I'll look through these again and see.

And it's a fair concern. I mean, the bottom line is with the IDA, we cover all of Putnam County, but like 95% of the development is happening right here in the town of Southeast. So that's why you're seeing the bulk of it. If you want to convince Putnam Lake or Cold Spring- They need the pilots. They need the pilots. We don't need the pilots. But yeah, so unfortunately, it's also a game of numbers that just more development is happening here.

Yeah, understood.

Again, remember, you're not losing money, you're just not getting quite the stats.

Fair enough. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for coming out. Okay, moving on to the regular meeting portion, I'll make a motion to go into the regular meeting. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. okay item number one on our regular meeting is a resolution for 63 trail view certiorari settlement that we have in front of us and previously discussed so i will make a motion be resolved that the town board of the town of southeast does hereby accept the recommendation of its professional advisors and authorizes the town attorney to execute a stipulation of settlement consent judgment and or order on consent In accordance with the recommendations for the following, Petitioner Derry, 73 Trail View, tax ID map is 67.15-1-5. Can I just pause you? Yes. Just one says 63, one says 73. What's correct, Mallory?

73. 73. Okay. So it is 73 Trail View.

Index number on the state Supreme Court action is 501408 slash 2025. So with that, be it resolved that the town attorney is hereby authorized and directed to execute stipulations, consent orders, and other documents necessary to reflect the foregoing settlement. I'll make the motion. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Thank you. Moving on to new business. Does any member of the town board have any new business to bring forward? I don't. No, sir. Okay. On to recognition of public for public comment. If anybody would like to speak on any item, please come forward.

Hi, gang. Jamie Callanan. You guys are lucky, because I am super calm today.

So a couple of things. I was not expecting to talk about the pilot. I'm sorry that they left. 95% of the projects are in Southeast. That's actually because we have 684, 84, 22, Route 6, all these things. They're not ideal projects. The way that I look at it often is that southeast and all of our villages and towns within that is often the dumping ground of Putnam County. And we do not get lovely projects. That Pugsley thing is not an ideal situation for us. especially on the most crowded artery across our across our town with schools all of those things so i i think that when you think about pilots and i'm not necessarily saying these little guys or anything like that i don't really have a point of view on that but as someone that was not a fan of the logistics project that has seen what has occurred with very little occupancy on route 312 to date and how that project went through in terms of the road that curve and all of that stuff I think we have to do a better job of really sussing out what are the right projects for our town and that includes being able to hold them accountable because I believe and again I'm dusting off my memory bank here but when we were going through Lincoln logistics there was in that proposal that all of these jobs were going to be from area workers

It was about, I think you're right, I think it was three to four, four to 500 jobs, and that was my comment about the callback.

Yep, and I believe that company is actually based in New Jersey.

Lesser Evil is based- Not Lesser Evil.

Lincoln Logistics. So when they did all the construction jobs, we're supposed to be hiring people from our area. And I believe that company was from New Jersey. There was never an audit. There was never any back like, let's go back and ensure that you're doing this. So we're literally approving jobs. The school district did lose millions of dollars in funding from the Lincoln Logistics Project. And we didn't get the jobs that was promised. So there's a lot of items that have to be considered. And I would actually raise the bar to the IDA and be able to say, we want documentation of what those types of jobs. I don't know who the woman was, but she literally said this other one, the second larger one, they're going to be good jobs. Not that the others weren't. Yeah, the others aren't. Doing warehouse work is not going to be a high paying job so that our community folks are being able to say, I'm able to find a fulfilling career. The other thing is being able to track what is the salary rates, are they getting health benefits and so forth. bringing new business, I actually am a proponent of the Asyndico because the marketplace is a great place. All of those jobs, they support our community in all of these areas that you literally see them donating. So you have to use that type of judgment. So I did just randomly want to bring up that. um the other thing um i'm unfortunately there's a lot of interesting meetings happening next week about garden street i know that has nothing to do with you guys and also our subject i know i have a lot of rage about you don't want to rage bait me right now but the other one is lincoln logistics I and about opening it up 24 hour operations that was a specific clause in that deal that was written and people were like no no we're fine and that's because now they come back and they're going to say it's a business blocker the reason that we don't have it all completely done they're going to utilize that Turning that open and opening it to 24 hours would be a poor decision that, again, takes all of the cruddy jobs that land on the town of Southeast that we get from the rest of Putnam County that's like, look, we're bringing all this business, and it's all not ideal jobs, companies that are landing in here. You guys have to be able to fight back on that.

And just real quick, so the public knows that they've made that application in front of the planning board, not our board. It may make it to our board, but that's not something we're considering at this time.

You can let me know how I can influence the planning board, but I will be on a business trip all next week. I will not influence anybody.

How I can, how I can.

And then the last thing about Reservoir Road, Joe, you really have to stop saying it looks great. Right now.

Reservoir Road?

Maple Road. Right now it looks great because it's the dry season unless you're walking on the road and you get caught in a dust storm. So these are my things and this is what I don't feel was answered. I didn't read the document and I don't have my reading glasses on that I could zoom in and make it large print on this. But Reservoir Road is actually in great shape. So there was a porous. Maple. No. Reservoir. There was a porous material put down. And then was that paved after that porous material was put down? No. Okay. Thank you. I travel three dirt roads every day that I commute. I'm not saying don't be on a dirt road. It is in fact Maple that is actually a normally horrible dirt road. And so what I'm saying is like, we're not considering other options. It's not that the whole folks that are for it are saying pave, pave, pave. We want a resolution for that strip, which Eric said before is a half mile. and for the people that have to drive that every day because if you're coming out of enoch you are literally have choice bad or choice worse and the one that we're asking that get paved is actually the work the worst of the two options in how it goes so what porous solutions are out there that are available because reservoir road if you drive that i understand that my cat might have different opinion in terms of stuff but it literally is about improving that road and that in that and that road was is actually improved when you drive on that porous area it's actually a really nice stretch of road that you're able to do the other thing is is that we don't we don't we're not tracking the costs so every time we come back and have a conversation about the cost we are never talking about the maintenance costs the maintenance costs going down to how much do we how many how many additional employees do we have let me pause we did look at that we have four ish miles of uh unpaved roads um if we pave that portion maple road tomorrow

We still need a crew out there, trucks out there, material out there for the rest of the road. So we spoke to Mike and said, hey, how much would we save? And it's negligible. Everyone's out there.

But no one's tracking the actual costs. So the cost, and I said this last meeting, so wear and tear, gas, health care benefits. Wait, wait, wait. There's no extra employees for this road.

For half a mile of dirt road?

it they are out there on the regular doing that road so that but if they're out there they're doing the whole room they're doing the whole road but this still is so one is my opinion is that that side of the road actually has greater wear and tear and more potholes than the other side of the road but number two is you just reduced what they have to do on a regular basis including the dirt including the rocks into including the gas including the wear and tear on the trucks including all of that and so you actually might be able to say one employee gets to retire and we no longer have to do half of it to that point right there it we we've looked at that and it's quite clear that if we did pave that road it's not like we're gonna

Eliminate two positions in the highway department. It's not going to happen.

But you've never tracked the full dollar amount.

What we did, we talked to the highway superintendent. And we said, how much will we save if this goes on? Is there meaningful cost savings here? We don't have all these employees.

But then I would ask you guys to share that with the Maple Road folks that you guys have been in communication with. Share that analysis, because what I'm saying is that I don't think that analysis accurately depicts all of the costs. So when I have to do my P&L at work, I have to factor in all of these things. What is your travel going to be? What is your health care going to be? What is it? All of those things.

In our P&L, this is like taking a printer out of your office. That's how negligible it is.

It is not. The amount of money that is spent on that road on an annual basis is ridiculous. I don't see anybody else on the roads that I travel on a daily basis that I'm seeing on that road. Think of 312th. how often 312, that is the main artery of our road. I don't see road trucks like I see. That's a state road. Oh, okay. Pick another road. Peaceable Hill. You don't see... That's a county road.

Brewster Hill? County road. Or North Brewster is a county road.

They spent a year on, almost a year on Brewster Hill. Which was a waste of money because they did it twice. So that's the other thing. So the other thing is I just don't believe there's been an accurate... response to to the group about alternates to paving what can we do on porous what can we do on the other considerations i know you guys have done something about going you know several inches down i asked you to mark it's still just 24 inches I would like you to mark the road where that happened so that we can see as residents that are driving that road on the daily, where did it occur? Because we're going to be the ones that are actually going to be saying, you know what? This section is much nicer during the rains. This section is much nicer during the heave.

There are maps, I think it was shared in the last presentation, that showed the areas where the improvements were done. And let me just say this.

Mark it on the road. So when we drive it, we're like, I just hit point A.

Well, let me just say this. I'm going to say it out loud. I would love to pave the road. We've talked. I've talked to other people in the neighborhood.

You campaigned on my driveway, and you called him while he was campaigning. We thought we could pave it.

Trust me, I would pave it tomorrow. I cannot and will not, I'm just going to put this to bed, I'm not going to spend or approve $3.25 million to pave a half mile road. I'm not asking that. I want it to be improved. No one's up here trying to say, how can we not pave this? We've said, what can we do to make it better? We've looked at the alternatives. I mean, if there's something else that we can do to that road.

How much does it cost to do the non-porous that was done on reservoir?

The non-porous?

The porous one that was done on reservoir. How much does it cost for that 500?

It's not, I don't know, and it's not 300 feet within the reservoir. We have looked at this half mile.

So we've been told that by the department, whatever. What? That we've been told by the water department that we cannot use what was used on reservoir on maple. What?

Yes.

We've been told. We have official documentation that says we cannot do that.

We've said, what can we do to this road?

No offense, but I'm not asking New York State anything. Tell me what I can do. What I'm saying is have we submitted a proposal that says we have used this on another area. We want to use this porous solution on this stretch. Can we do that?

Jamie, we've explored all of the options.

Then what I want is an email that says, where does that say that? How is this option a porous?

Bring a porous option.

We'll run it by the DEC. Jamie, I think yours. You guys told me. you guys told me when during multiple conversations that what was done on reservoir road it was millings i think and that's the poorest option no it's not for this road you have to read the it's all in the report that's so we cannot use millings on maple because correct well no and it's because it's within 300 feet of the reservoir So we cannot use it because the department of whatever, New York State Department of DEP said we cannot use millings on that road. That's what I want that document says. It says it in that. No, no, I want the document from the DEP. So is that in that document?

It's from our engineers who meet with the DEP.

Yeah, they don't give them a document.

And we've had problems with millings.

Not as much problems as we have as residents on Maple Road with our cars. Jamie, I have to say something.

We all purchased our homes on this road. I live there too. I've had four children learn to drive on that road. We all purchased that road knowing that it was unpaved. It didn't pose a problem when we purchased. We knew what we were getting into. The road is well cared for. Since that work that Mike did in that long stretch, you can actually see the difference. You can feel the difference, and it was better this winter. We had one bad spot. They did that work over the soft spot, and it has been much, much better. It's like, as far as dirt roads go, it's been a pretty smooth drive.

I disagree with you. And even though you buy a house, that doesn't necessarily mean you fully comprehend all the challenges that you're going to encounter on that.

Here's my position. I think we've exhausted the research on this.

If there's some other alternative, I mean, we have- I just want documentation that DEP has been consulted. And if he wants to write a letter and certify from a notary that he has consulted and the DEP said you are not permitted to do millings on this and we know what the cost of that would have been, then that would be perfect. Because the thing is that you might have exhausted, but oftentimes it doesn't necessarily feel like we are hearing all of the exhausted things. So you might have taken that journey.

i can't i can't think i've we've both been involved in this town forever i can't think of one thing that's been more transparent or communicative than this but we will get you i think we've spent more time on this road than we have in almost any other project in the last two years

We have other things that are happening in the town of Southeast. And a half a mile of Maple Road has cost money for engineering. We have spent so much time on this. So much time.

And you know what? That's part of the racket.

That's part of the racket. And we've exhausted at this point all options.

So all I'm asking for is the documentation that is going to be able to clearly articulate that every single option that people have brought forth has been examined and we have been told directly by the DEP that you are not permitted to do that. Because there's a thousand other things that people will say.

And read the engineering report.

Yeah, read the memo and the engineering reports that have already been uploaded. I did not get it previously. I'm going to get that, and then I will read it, and I will ask additional questions. But the one thing I do think is the cost savings, I also want that emailed to that community, because the cost savings, does it do wear and tear? When you think of the IRS on your car, gas mileage, wear and tear, all those things, I get 54 cents a mile.

So we should put that burden of the wear and tear on your car on the-

not my wear and tear in the car the wear and tear of the town of southeast equipment all of the costs associated with constantly having to do because you might say there's 90 miles of road in the town of southeast there's only four roads that are as brutal as maple that are actually taking up probably a quarter of your resources so that's a legitimate point

You know what would help the wear and tear of that road? People driving the speed limit. We had a speed detector on that road. Over 40% of the cars were well above 30 miles an hour. Put speed bumps. Many of them, you can't do speed bumps. Many of them reaching in the 50s. I don't care. That is wear and tear on that road. That causes potholes. It's not the speed.

Yes, it is, Jamie. So the reason why I don't care is because every town in Brewster has speeders and has slow drivers.

There's only one town in Brewster.

Oh, no, there's three.

It's a village.

No, there's three if you say we go to Brewster. Our post office is outside, our school is outside. The bottom line is that every road, you're going to have speeders. Regardless of the condition of that road, you're going to have that. You get behind someone, they drive 10 miles. You get behind someone, they drive 35 miles, they drive 40 miles. All of those things are factors on every single road. It's not just ours. And therefore, we can't say you're only allowed to do this because it's our road and we live there. I'm sorry that the people are going first.

Jamie, I think there's two things that you would like. Millings and some sort of documentation on maintenance costs of that portion of the road.

Yes. And the millings is a full response of how the DPP responded.

We will look into both those things.

Awesome. Thank you.

Michael DeCrow, 15 Deer Court. I'll be short. One question, the material we're talking about you're putting down is item four aggregate, correct?

Yes.

Okay. Have any of you people read what item four aggregate dust can cause? Have you looked on your iPhones to look at that? Yes, we did. Yes. And did you read it? Yes, and we brought it. Because it says, and I'm quoting, and it's not wrong. It says, can possesses severe health risks primarily due to the crystalline silica. And that can result, and I'll be brief here, in potentially fatal disease. Now you glossed over that in your presentation today. You glossed over it. You spent about 10 seconds on it.

Excuse me, with all due respect, This is one of the biggest things that we looked into. There's a two-page memo here. It's very technical. I am not versed in silica, but it does go into it. We had an expert look at it, and there is an answer here. It's in the back. I can't comment more, but please don't insinuate that we did not care or look into it. It came from whom? It came from, as I said, AKRF, Erin Stoltz, who is a certified industrial hygienist, and she is the senior technical director of environmental health and safety compliance for AKRF. That's not good enough.

I'm sorry. That's not good enough. You're missing the real serious issue. It's discussed in the national press.

Michael, the health risks for silica also, which is explained in the AKRF, are for people who work in areas where they are pulling up the silica all the time. Workers in an environment that are cutting rocks.

That's not what I'm reading here. Your workers, when they're working on that road, should be wearing masks. They really should. Because if any of them comes down with that and they read about this, again, you could be subject to a lawsuit. I would encourage you to read the memo. You people are not cognizant of that. I've said my point.

Thank you, Michael.

I don't want to belabor Maple Road that much more. I'm sorry, guys. But I'm Mike Principe. I live at 35 Maple Road. I've been there, lived there for the last two decades. And first thing, I'd like to commend the highway department. Believe me, I see the trucks go by my house almost at least weekly, and they've done a great job, you know, maintaining that road. But 10 years ago, I actually wrote a letter to Tony Hay. And I presented it to the board and asked that it be put in the Maple Road file. And then another 10 years went by, and there uh more questions about maple road uh so i submitted the letter to the putnam county times and they they put it in as an op-ed i send it again to the town board so i won't belabor you with the details of the letter but i did do some research on just some of the the issues with the original EIS for the project on Enoch Crosby and the DEIS and the FEIS for that subdivision did not recommend paving any section of Maple Road. as a means of mitigating hazardous traffic conditions uh it issued in this was in 1989 actually it noted that one of the significant impacts associated with the project was increased automobile traffic in the project area and it increased traffic volumes was one of the unavoidable adverse impacts that needed to be mitigated The proposed mitigation measure for the increased traffic flow generated by the proposed development included upgrading Enoch Crosby Road to a 20-foot wide paved road and the construction of a T-intersection with a stop sign at the intersection of Enoch Crosby Road and Maple Road. A connection to Peter Road was also recommended for emergency use only. connection to peter in summary the dis stated the following based upon the analysis contained in the traffic report the proposed 49 unit subdivision will have minimal traffic impacts on the adjoining roadway network overall level of service and operating condition at key locations will remain the same with or without the proposed development improvements to enoch crosby road improve access, service to existing homes, serve future residents of Southeast Acres. Other traffic safety improvements will include a stop sign at Houston, Maple, Brewster Roads, and at Enoch, Crosby Road, and Maple Road. In addition to the response to a number of comments concerning improvements being made to Maple Road, the DEI stated that there were no plans to improve Maple Road. Overall, the DEIS and FEIS found that there was no reason, safety concerns, increased traffic volumes or otherwise to warrant paving Maple Road as a result of the construction of Southeast Acres subdivisions, which I think goes to your point. in that when these houses were built, people knew they were buying houses that had this connection to Maple Road. I've read Han Engineering's MMO, that you guys just had posted, as well as AKRF's hygienist report. And I concur. I think they're very thorough and they hit all the issues. And I think the board's on the right track in terms of fiscal responsibility. There's no way that the increased use of highway department staff is anywhere near what the cost would 35 million cost would be to pay this road. So I risk my case.

Thanks, Mike.

Thank you.

You're gonna beat her, Charlie? You're gonna be shorter than that.

Rochambeau.

Charles Hazaready, 62 Enoch Crosby Road. I've been living there for 30 years. It is true that in years past, especially in the springtime melt, the road was pretty bad. It was difficult. But the improvements that have been done with the different surface, the road has never been better. I'm not saying it's like a perfect paved road, but it's a gorgeous road and a nice place to take a walk along the reservoir. And it has really never, never been better. And I really appreciate what you've done.

Thank you, Charlie. You ride your bike on that road too.

Yeah.

Yeah.

hi lynn good evening everyone i know we all want to go home i'll try to really breathe did jamie leave because i was going to agree with her on something oh no um i want to thank you because um i've been through three iterations and i know wendy has two of improving maple and this i think you've done the best job of putting you know answering the questions that need to be answered so i really want to thank you for that it's been very helpful and i think If Wendy remembers the past, it was even more contentious.

I was sitting in a different position back then.

The first time I met Wendy was at a Maple Road meeting. I just wanted to talk really briefly about the pilot programs because Jamie said a lot that I agree with. By the way, if anyone is interested, Lincoln Logistics is on the planning board this coming Monday at 7 o'clock, and it's here, as far as their increased hours. But the pilot program, my concern is setting precedent, as is yours, and you raised some really good questions that I think are really, really important. I also think it would be nice if, at the planning board level, we knew that that's what was going to happen, that people were going to go for a pilot program. Because we hear over and over, I mean, from residents who don't want this development or that development. And we hear, oh, they're going to pay a ton of taxes, it's going to help everybody, and then this is kind of a betrayal to me of what was promised to residents. So I think, I know, I guess you can't vote no, or I guess you, well, you can. You can't just do it anyhow. That's my understanding. It wasn't clear.

We wouldn't answer, but I think that's the way it works.

But I think it might send a really good message. I'm not telling you how to vote, obviously. If I could, I would. But I think sending a clear message of we're really concerned about what's going to happen. There are a lot of projects in front of us now, some that aren't retail that could come in and ask for the same. And that is my concern, so I would hate to, I think they could be a lot more transparent in the process. And I don't want to set precedents on this. And yes, when they say it's better than if it lies vacant, I don't believe really that a lot of these companies will move to Connecticut. I just don't buy it either. So thank you for your time, I really appreciate it.

Thanks, Len.

Thank you.

Scott Seaman, Times Southeast. Tonight I'm here from the Brewster Board of Education, and we will not be making any comment on pilots. But you will be voting first.

Yes.

Our agenda comes out tomorrow. I'll be as surprised as the next person. First, we'd just like to come and thank the community for their support of our budget. We do appreciate the thoughtfulness that was reviewed and the acceptance of the budget and the three trustees who are returning their positions. Graduation is in a very short period of time. So if anybody knows graduates or any of these young men and women, they've been through a lot. So let's help them out, let's cheer them out, let's support what's going out. And if you have any kids, I'm sure the next three weeks is going to be living hell with everything you have to go through. So we appreciate that. Highlights, Cafetorium is all enclosed and well underway. The sports structure is, we put the roof on, all the structures are up. And you can really, if you haven't been by the schools recently, you can really see it coming to fruition. That's most of the information that's going on. I would just like to remind people, with this busy life, we are leaving this weekend. Right now the Brewster Elks Carnival is going on. Saturday, also the county is doing the Year 250 Colonial Fair over there in Carmel. It's an all day event with recreationists, a lot of colonial fair, a lot of information going on. And then the Relay for Life is kicking off for this section of Putnam on Saturday from 3 to 9 o'clock at night. So if you have anybody, just keep them in remembrance or show up. They're always looking for more support. And as always, we thank the town for your support. And as we pointed out last week, the electric bus mandate has been pushed off five years. And we'll continue to raise questions about that and we might come back as we get closer. Because nothing, while the five years have changed the initial thing that's happening next year, every other step we have to do, we still have to do. We have to prepare, we have to possibly put in infrastructure because it takes years to develop. So none of that has been put aside by pushing off the core construction. And I think we can all agree that's where we want to be. It is the best thing for our students and our community. But it's the timing, the expense, the infrastructure, the unreliability power grid, there's so many things. And people have stayed here way too long tonight, I don't want to hold them any longer. But as always, thank you, and if there's anything we can do, please let us know.

Hey Scott, is graduation on the turf?

Yes.

Are they gonna limit tickets or?

I believe they're limiting tickets.

Yeah, can I sneak in around a tray maybe?

Well, I'm sure if you carry a tray or something, but there's always overflow in the pack center.

All right, thanks Scott.

If you wanna run for the board, I can get you a great position on the stage. No, thank you. Thanks Scott. Thank you.

Good evening, everybody. Captain Corinne Pitt on behalf of Sheriff Brian Hess. Just to let you all know, I am hearing the community's concerns regarding speed on Maple Road. And I'll request that our traffic safety unit be out there on Maple Road, especially during commuting hours. And just so the community knows that that 30 mile per hour speed limit is in place also, obviously, for residents that reside there.

um don't tell them yeah yeah i can tell you where where to park all right so they'll be out there um also that that four-way stop sign is also a hot spot i don't know i don't know you know if you guys have the capacity to um also take a peek there coming off of houston straight through is a it's almost like the stop sign doesn't exist there's a t-bone there you know every few months i would say but it's pretty bad okay okay we'll be right in the same area thank you thank you thank you who said that and i don't want to be selfish but i was t-boned there in december yeah it's it's a wreck literally it's a wreck okay anyone else would like to comment

Okay, with that, recognition of the town board, town board comment? Any town board member want to speak?

No. Just to follow up on Scott's, we've got the fireworks on July 5th, and we doubled the amount of fireworks that are in the show in recognition for the 250. So there's going to be over 1,500 shells, there's usually around 700, so it should be a good show to come out.

check it out we've also had some conversations with Brewster schools so if any of the students want to come and sing the national anthem or anything else you know please continue the conversation I know it's a busy time of year for all the school but we're open to suggestions love to have the kids involved

oh uh let me just say that we doubled it with private funds the town does not pay yes we have a non-profit that we raise money and the fireworks are fully funded by that non-profit and the donations that they've received check out our facebook page And thank you to the Sheriff's Department who's going to be helping us out with all the traffic control. Thanks.

Thanks very much.

We do have shred day this Saturday, so hopefully if anybody has any documents they want shredded, go to the highway department between 9 and 12. I would say come early because if the shred truck is full, they're going to leave. Anybody else? No, sir. Okay, I'll make a motion to adjourn. Do I have a second? Second. All in favor? Aye. Aye.

Thank you.