The Cazenovia Town Board spent more than one hour last week hearing arguments for and against a proposal to create a new water district in and around the Seven Pines neighborhood.
The proposal to run water pipes and village water to a total of 28 properties off East Lake Road north of Lakeside Park has a 60 percent approval from the effected residents. The 40 percent of residents who oppose the project, however, would, if the proposal gets approved by the town board, have to spend the next 30 years helping to pay off the cost of the quarter-million-dollar project they do not even want.
“None of us in this room have any agenda; we’re responding to your request,” said Town Engineer John Dunkle, during his explanation of the proposed project. “This can’t happen without the town board approving it.”
The proposal to create a new water district for houses along a portion of East Lake Road and residents of the Seven Pines neighborhood came about after neighborhood resident Bob Greiner circulated a petition asking his neighbors to support the idea. By getting signatures from more than 50 percent of the effected residents, the proposal went to a public hearing in front of the town board.
“My intent was to bring a safe water supply to Seven Pines, [although] it does come at a cost,” Griener said during the public hearing. “I just thought it made a lot of sense.”
Seven Pines properties currently use well water.
According to Dunkle, in order to bring village water to Seven Pines, the town would have to extend pipes from the end of the current water line (on East Lake Road in front of Lakeside Park), down East Lake Road and then over into Seven Pines. Residents who choose to hook their properties into the water line would have to pay for the hookup from their land to the new pipes in the street, Dunkle said.
In addition to receiving village water, extending water service would mean there would also be fire hydrants placed in the neighborhood and affected houses would then be able to receive fire protection services, he said.
The project would cost a total of $275,000, which the town would bond for over a 30-year period. There would be an $18,000 mortgage cost per year, which all affected residents within the new district would have to pay on a scale based upon the assessment value of their property.
Under town law, residents of the district will not be forced to hook into the new water line of they do not want to, but they still must contribute to the annual bond payments whether they use the water service or not. The median cost to each landowner is estimated to be about $1,000 per year, Dunkle said. That does not include the cost of actually hooking a property into the water line.
During the public hearing, residents in favor of the project called it a “no-brainer” that would benefit their lives and their property values. Opponents felt there was not enough discussion by the town and the residents on the project before it got to the public hearing stage, that it was unfair to make neighbors who do not want or will not use public water to help pay off the project cost, that their well systems work just fine and that payments based on assessment value instead of a basic unit cost for property owners was not right.
After 75 minutes of discussion, the board voted 4-1 to continue the public hearing until its July 13 meeting and to continue accepting public comments during that time. Councilor Tom Driscoll voted no to continuing the public hearing, saying that the board should just follow the established process for creating a new district based on receiving a public request through a petition, rather than “question the process.”
Also at the meeting, the board:
—Approved the expenditure of not more than $16,635 for asbestos removal in the New Woodstock state trooper barracks as part of the project to tear down the building and erect a new building for the troopers in its place. The asbestos work had already been completed, according to Highway Superintendent Tim Hunt. The old barracks were demolished last week by town highway crews.
—Approved the expenditure of not more than $7,660 to purchase a trailer to be used in conjunction with the town lake weed harvester. The trailer would haul the weeds away from the lake instead of the town using one of its dump trucks.
—Heard from Langey that he appeared in county court recently along with attorneys from Owera Vineyards regarding Owera’s lawsuit against the town over its site plan approval to build a new events center. He said the judge granted a group of Owera’s neighbors who had petitioned the court to have a “right to intervene” in the suit, and that all parties will appear for oral arguments in court at 3 p.m. on June 29. The hearing is open to the public.
Jason Emerson is editor of the Cazenovia Republican. He can be reached at [email protected].
