Town Board tends to planning referrals, highway garage and Climate Smart support

NORTH EAST — Though the town’s 2021 budget was first and foremost on the Town Board’s mind, its members set their sights on signing agreements and accepting proposals to benefit town residents at its meeting on Thursday, Nov. 12.

The board authorized the list of properties in the Town of North East Water District #1 with unpaid water bills to be sent to Dutchess County for collection in the amounts listed by North East and the village of Millerton.

Next, town Supervisor Chris Kennan signed an inter-municipal agreement with the county to permit the elimination of certain referrals to the Dutchess County Department of Planning & Development. He explained that certain items from the town’s Planning Board need to be referred to the county, including Comprehensive Plan master plans, zoning amendments, re-zonings under proposed local laws and/or other authorizations, site plans and special permits. Additionally, under this inter-municipal agreement, there’s a smaller list of referrals that are eliminated from the referral and review process, such as administrative amendments; zoning amendments regarding fees, procedures, penalties and so forth; special-use permits; etc. Kennan said this was a renewal of a similar inter-municipal agreement dated July 14, 2016; the board authorized Kennan to sign the agreement unanimously.

After delivering a recap of the multi-year joint highway garage project between the town and village and all its moving parts, Kennan said the town has been working with the village’s engineer, Ray Jurkowski, and CPL Engineering on the project’s first two phases and that they talked about Jurkowski doing the work on its third and final phase. In response, Jurkowski submitted to the town a proposal to continue the engineering work on Phase III, which Kennan said the town and village would like to move forward with. One of the reasons is because of the timeline, as constructing facilities like a highway garage are easier to do during the warmer weather. Also, in order to build this structure next year, Kennan said the board needs to be able to go out to bid on construction ideally in February, as that’s when contractors start to fill up their summer schedule.

Before opening the discussion for comment from the board, Kennan acknowledged that they’d just finished the new New York State Department of Transportation-approved entrance way for the garage, so all of the work that needs to be done in anticipation of the highway garage building’s construction is now completed.

“The only thing I would say is with the time factor we’re looking at, I think it’s something that we need to move along with as speedily as possible,” said Councilman George Kaye.

Before asking for a vote, Kennan noted that this agreement won’t be executed until he has an additional meeting with Millerton Mayor Debbie Middlebrook, adding that he’d like her review the preliminary sketch for the building and its accommodations and make sure she’s on board with it. The board unanimously approved the motion.

Kennan then said the Climate Smart Community Task Force, headed by Kathy Chow, has been very active, meeting on a regular monthly basis with good attendance. He explained that the New World Foundation, based in Kingston, was brought to the Task Force’s attention for wanting to support Climate Smart activities throughout the Hudson Valley. In fact, he said the Foundation has offered six communities in the Hudson Valley special technical and financial support in the Climate Smart work they’re doing. 

“This is amazing because it’s an agreement with no strings,” Kennan said, adding he sent the details to the town’s attorney for review. If the town is successful in its application, Kennan said the New World Foundation will give the town $8,000 toward its Climate Smart work in addition to technical support.

Kennan said the foundation identifies a local champion — usually the chair of a municipality’s Climate Smart group — and provides grant funding and programmatic support to local municipalities working on a New York State Climate Smart Community program with the goal of enabling towns to reach their Bronze Certification within six months.

“It’s really jump starting our work, which is already well underway,” Kennan said, “but it certainly will be a help, so not only do I want to see us make an application, I want to apply for this jumping up and down and waving our hands because I really think this would be what we might have dreamed of finding.”

The board OK’d the resolution for Kennan to sign the application for the New World Foundation.