An $8 million increase in the estimated cost of a new upgrade to the town’s wastewater treatment facilities was approved by the Town Board at last week’s meeting.
The cost of the project has spiked about 80% since the board first approved the plan two years ago. It was then estimated by consulting engineers H2M to carry a $10.5 million price tag. But when bids came in this year, the cost spiked to an estimated $18.65 million, according to H2M Senior Vice President Chris Weiss. The increased costs were largely the result of COVID supply chain issues, Weiss told the Town Board at a June 4 public hearing. There were also some design changes, such as an increase in the size of the storage building, H2M wastewater engineer Nick Bono said.
The upgrade involves converting the facility’s existing sludge handling process to a Class A biosolids project. The current sludge handling process results in the production of a “sludge cake” that costs the town more than $500,000 per year to haul off and dispose at a landfill in Pennsylvania. Class A, or exceptional quality, biosolids meet the federal Environmental Protection Agency’s standards for land application and surface disposal, according to an engineering report prepared for the town by H2M in April 2021.
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The new system will save the town an estimated $25 million in operational costs over 30 years, mostly in reduced disposal costs due to the reduction in volume and weight of the biosolids that would need to be disposed of, according to an analysis prepared by H2M and presented to the Town Board by Bono at the May 15 work session. There is also the possibility that the town will be able to give the material away, avoiding some or even most, disposal costs.
Annual debt service on a $17 million no-interest, 20-year loan from the N.Y. State Environmental Services Corporation would be about $844,000, according to the H2M analysis.
The town has prepared plans and specs and the initial design of the project and is “ready to embark on the construction phase of this project” but needs to “match the proposed bond amount that was initially established way back in 2021 to the current project costs that match the actual construction bids that we have received just recently,” Weiss said.
The cost of the project would be financed by up to $18.65 million, which will be paid off by assessments on all properties within the service area.
The Town Board last week unanimously approved an amended public interest order and amended bond resolution for the project to authorize the increased borrowing. The board in 2022 had approved a public interest order and bond resolution for the lesser ($10.5 million) amount.
The board’s actions at the June 4 meeting came after a public hearing that drew no public comments. At the conclusion of the hearing, Supervisor Tim Hubbard announced that the hearing record would be kept open for 10 days until June 14.
In response to a reporter’s inquiry about how the Town Board could act on the resolutions that were the subject of the public hearing when the supervisor held the record open for written comment for another 10 days, Town Attorney Erik Howard said the votes themselves, taken after the supervisor’s announcement of the 10-day comment period, essentially closed the hearing and terminated the comment period.
“While at the hearing the Supervisor did, as he typically does, comment to keep the record to leave open for public comment, the Town Board did subsequently vote unanimously to adopt the bond authorization and public interest order,” Howard wrote in a June 10 email.
“The public hearing was properly noticed and opportunity to be heard was sufficiently afforded,” he wrote.
“The legislative action is the vote and thus the bond authorization and public interest order were approved and adopted and public hearing closed constructively by operation of the legislative act,” Howard wrote.
The bond resolution adopted last week states that it amends a bond resolution adopted on April 19, 2022. However, the previous bond resolution, number 2022-385, was actually adopted on May 18, 2022 according to the town clerk’s records and meeting minutes. Despite the actual date of its adoption being May 18, 2022, resolution 2022-385 incorrectly stated that it was adopted on April 19, 2022.
An error in the June 4 bond resolution, which in several places recited the incorrect (April 19, 2022) date of adoption for the resolution it amended, “does not materially affect the purpose or intent of the action,” Howard said in an email late Tuesday afternoon.
The incorrect reference to an April 19, 2022 adoption date in last week’s bond resolution amending the 2022 resolution was merely “scrivener’s error,” Howard said, “and can and should be corrected after the fact.”
The Town Board on June 4 also approved a resolution authorizing the Community Development Agency to apply for grant funding and/or a low-interest loan from the New York State Environmental Facilities Corporation Water Infrastructure Improvement Program.
Editor’s note: This article has been amended to reflect subsequent comments from Town Attorney Erik Howard and to clarify earlier reporting regarding the incorrect date contained in resolutions adopted by the Town Board on May 18, 2022 and June 4, 2024.
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