At a specially convened Oct. 8 meeting, the Liverpool Village Board authorized Mayor Gary White to sign two intermunicipal agreements with Onondaga County and a letter of understanding with the Onondaga Earth Corps, a group recommended by the Department of Water Environment Protection in support of the county’s Save the Rain campaign.
In all, the county reimbursement grants amount to more than $245,000.
The first intermunicipal agreement, a Village Sewer Infrastructure Grant arranged via the county Department of Water Environment Protection, will pay for up to $120,000 of sanitary sewer repairs and upgrades here.
The second agreement confirms a contract between the village and the Onondaga County of Transportation which will provide $40,000 for improvements at Johnson Park, including the planned construction of a retractable roof or awning for the amphitheater stage.
The agreement with Onondaga Earth Corps is part of an $87,000 grant from the county’s the Department of Water Environment Protection for pipe lining and tree planting in the village.
The Earth Corps, which primarily employs inner-city youth from Syracuse, will plant 25 new trees in the village, a service worth $6,200. The corps’ contract guarantees a 95 percent survival rate for the new trees which will be planted this fall.
“I want to publicly thank Fourth District County Legislator Judy Tassone who joins us here today,” Mayor Gary White said at the noon meeting. “Through her diligence and hard work, the village has been able to access significantly more dollars from the county. All of this funding is because of Judy.”
“I fought for you guys,” Tassone told the trustees. “And I will continue to do that. We’re not done yet.”
Summer concert-goers will certainly appreciate the village’s plan to cover the stage at Johnson Park. This year four of 24 summer concerts booked at the park by the Liverpool is The Place Committee were rained out. In 2014, rain prevented eight concerts from taking place, washing away a full one-third of the popular summer series.
The village board’s newest trustee, Christina Fadden Fitch, has been meeting with the Liverpool Is The Place Committee chaired by Colleen Gunnip to brainstorm park improvements.
Now that the funding has been approved, Fadden Fitch said that, after a design is finalized, construction of a stage roof could start as early as next spring.
