Press Alt + R to read the document text or Alt + P to download or print.
This document contains no pages.
2004-03-15 MTG13
409
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING MTG. #13
March 15, 2004 RES. 157-177
7:00 p.m. BOH. 5-6
TOWN BOARD MEMBERS PRESENT
SUPERVISOR DANIEL STEC
COUNCILMAN ROBER BOOR
COUNCILMAN THEODORE TURNER
COUNCILMAN JOHN STROUGH
COUNCILMAN TIM BREWER
TOWN OFFICIALS
Town Counsel Mark Schachner
Director of Community Development Chris Round
Water/Wastwater Supt. Ralph VanDusen
Sr. Planner Marilyn Ryba
Assistant Director of Parks and Rec. Steve Lovering
Director of Technology Bob Keenan
PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE LED BY SUPERVISOR DANIEL STEC
RESOLUTION CALL FOR QUEENSBURY BOARD OF HEALTH
RESOLUTION NO. 157. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer WHO MOVED FOR ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
RESOLVED
, that the Town Board of the Town of Queensbury hereby moves into the
Queensbury Board of Health.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
AYES: Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES: None
ABSENT: None
QUEENSBURY BOARD OF HEALTH
RESOLUTION SETTING PUBLIC HEARING ON SEWAGE
DISPOSAL
VARIANCE APPLICATION OF STEVE AND DEBBY SEABOYER
RESOLUTION NO.: 5. 2004 BOH
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
410
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board serves as the Town’s Local Board of
Health and is authorized by Town Code Chapter 136 to issue variances from the Town’s
On-Site Sewage Disposal Ordinance, and
WHEREAS, Steve and Debby Seaboyer have applied to the Local Board of Health
for a variance from Chapter 136 to install a sewage disposal system 82.35’ from Lake
George instead of the required 100’ setback on property located at 83 Rockhurst Road,
Queensbury,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Local Board of Health for the Town of Queensbury will hold
th
a public hearing on April 5, 2004 at 7:00 p.m. at the Queensbury Activities Center, 742
Bay Road, Queensbury, to consider Steve and Debby Seaboyer sewage disposal variance
application concerning property located at 83 Rockhurst Road, Queensbury (Tax Map No.:
227.13-2-36) and at that time all interested persons will be heard, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Local Board of Health authorizes and directs the Queensbury
Town Clerk to publish the Notice of Public Hearing presented at this meeting and send a
copy of the Notice to neighbors located within 500 feet of Mr. and Mrs. Seaboyer’s property
as required by law.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
RESOLUTION ADJOURING QUEENSBURY BOARD OF HEALTH
RESOLUTION NO. 6.2004 BOH
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner WHO MOVED FOR ITS
ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
RESOLVED,
that the Queensbury Board of Health hereby adjourns its meeting.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
411
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
AYES: Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES: None
ABSENT: None
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING
2.1 PUBLIC HEARING –Application For Community Development Block
Grant Funds Through New York State Small Cities Program
NOTICE SHOWN
Senior Planner Marilyn Ryba-Good evening, Ladies and Gentlemen and the Audience as
well. Tonight is the first of two public hearings scheduled for an application for
Community Development Block Grants funds through the New York State Small Cities
nd
Program. The second public hearing is scheduled for March 22. next Monday evening.
The first one we are required to by the State Community, by the State Small Cities
program to discuss the over all needs and priorities that we see in the community here as
well as explain what is involved on the State level with these funds. How much total
funding is available, the type of grants that we could apply for, who is eligible for the
program and then the eligible activities. So, I will go through that first and then secondly
I would like to discuss a little bit about what we are thinking and then hopefully get some
takers from the audience who will also give us some ideas. On the general level there is
fifty two million dollars available through the small cities program this year. These for
non entitlement communities that means that we compete with usually about three
hundred other municipalities in the State for this funding less, fewer than one hundred are
funded each year. So, it is a competitive type of program. This is in contrast to
entitlement communities of which Glens Falls is one so the City of Glens Falls
automatically gets money through the Community Development Block Grant Program,
Queensbury does not. About sixty percent of that money is for housing, public facilities,
micro enterprise type programs, thirty five percent is for economic development
programs and then five percent is used for technical assistance. We did receive some
funding last year to put together an affordable housing strategy so that is very useful for
us because since it is something that the State Community of, excuse me, State small
cities program funded we get to point to that and say we have completed our study and
our evaluation of the community and you funded this remember, so please fund us now
in the future now that we have all of this identified. The types of grants that are available
are single purpose grants we can apply for a maximum of one hundred thousand dollars
which we intend to do. There is a maximum of six hundred thousand dollars if there is a
joint application or for counties. The money can be used for housing, public facilities,
economic development as I discussed earlier. Comprehensive applications can be for a
combination of those activities. Eligibility, there are three broad national objectives,
funds can be used for projects of at least fifty one percent of the beneficiaries are
households that incomes eighty percent below the median income for the area. I do have
copies available of what those latest income eligibility requirements are and they are at
the front table and I think I attached those in your packages as well. Funds can be used
for projects which address slums or blighted conditions and funds can also be used to
address problems where there is an immediate threat to health and safety. Over all
community program must allocate seventy percent of its money to persons to benefit
persons of low or moderate income. So, typically that is what we have done in the past,
we have only received one of these grants in the past that was in 2001 and we are just
about completed with that program. What else can I tell you here, under housing eligibly
activities include housing rehabilitation, new construction, direct home ownership
assistance, in terms of counseling and home maintenance and that type of thing. Private
water, wastewater system assistance, public facilities for things such as wastewater
collection and treatment, floor control, storm water drainage but not for buildings for the
general conduct of government. So, for example we could not build a new town office
with any of these funds. Micro enterprise, that is to address businesses employing five or
fewer people and then the comprehensive projects which could be a combination of those
412
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
things. So, that is the type of, or those or the types of activities that would be eligible for
funding. What we are looking to do based on the affordable housing strategy is continue
the home improvement program. We did identify that people who live in West Glens
Falls and South Queensbury have the lowest income in the community based on 2000
census data so they would meet the eligibility of having incomes of less than 80% of the
median for the Glens Falls Metropolitan Statistical Area. We did a couple of weeks ago
put in an advertisement in the paper asking people, from those two areas to complete
surveys. We have had a tremendous response, we have had almost one hundred inquiries
based on that advertisement. In addition to the names of people that I have collected
though out the past couple of years who have been looking for some kind of assistance
but have not been able to fit into our current target area, which is very small. We did
have a visit from the Deputy Director of the Small Cities Program a couple of weeks ago
and I think he was very pleased. We showed him what we did do so that looks very
favorable for us as well. I think that is about all I have, I do have some additional
surveys here if anybody is interested. I do have an outline of what was discussed and then
as I said the next public hearing we can get into some of the more specific items,
regarding the application that we would like to have and have the Board agree to a
resolution to forward it onto the Small Cities Program. The applications are due April
thnd
5 , we intend to have ours completed April 2. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you. Town Board Members any questions for Marilyn? All right
I will open the public hearing. Any members of the public that would like to speak on
the Community Development Block Grant Fund Application as Marilyn is briefing?
Anybody? I did not think there would be any. Anything from Town Board Members on
nd
it. Our next public hearing, the second of the two public hearings will be on the 22
which is next Monday night at a workshop meeting so we will have a workshop meeting
then you would be looking for us to take action next Monday? I told you it would make
him nervous.
Councilman Brewer-I am not nervous at all.
Supervisor Stec- You are not happy.
Sr. Planner Marilyn Ryba-It is an advertised public hearing, so
Supervisor Stec-I do not have a problem with it.
Sr. Planner Marilyn Ryba- You could forward a resolution tonight unless Town Counsel
states otherwise, that is a possibility.
Supervisor Stec-I would rather not. I would rather not do that tonight I would rather have
the second public hearing and take action.
Sr. Planner Marilyn Ryba-All the resolution will do is authorize putting forth a grant
application for assistance, it doesn’t specify the content.
Supervisor Stec-I am sure we will entertain it and we have done it before, I know we
normally try to avoid taking formal action on resolutions at our workshops but we have
done it before, it is allowed it is certainly legal but as a general practice we don’t. Some
board members are more concerned about that than others and with reason. I would just
add that I would like to thank Marilyn and Chris and the Planning Department Staff for
their effort that you all put in, not only on this particular application that you are working
on but also the one that we received a few years ago that we are wrapping up funding.
Saturday, Councilman Brewer and I were out touring the Town on a couple of other
related matters and we did get a chance to talk to one person who is a beneficiary of the
current program. I can tell you it is being very well received in the community both from
a practical sense and also from how we are using these funds and how we are managing
the grant that we have been awarded. I am hopeful that we are going to be competitive
for our next, our next application but as you pointed out, it certainly isn’t a sure thing.
Sr. Planner Marilyn Ryba-Regarding our current status we have less than fifty thousand
dollars left which will be expended or committed within the next two weeks, so it is
413
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
st
about finished up, we have until July 1 to complete it so we are well within the time
frame.
Supervisor Stec-All right thank you Marilyn. If there is no other comment we can move
to our next public hearing. Marilyn do I leave the public hearing open or do I close it and
we have to have two right?
Town Counsel Schachner-There is another public hearing.
Supervisor Stec-So, I will close the public hearing for now in anticipation of another
public hearing a week from tonight on the same matter.
2.2 PUBLIC HEARING – Bill Bunting’s Performance Custom Trailers,
Inc.’s Request To Shift Operations From the Town of Queensbury To The
Warrensburg Industrial Park Located in The Warren County Empire Zone
NOTICE SHOWN
Supervisor Stec-Is Mr. Bunting or anyone here to speak on behalf of this application? I
am not sure that it is necessarily required but, is anyone here representing this
application, probably not. All right, this is an application, we have actually two of these
tonight, we talked about them a little bit two weeks ago when we set the public hearing
for tonight. This is concerning, each of these concerns a Queensbury business that is
going to relocate outside of Queensbury to another part of Warren County that is also,
they are also applying for the Empire Zone. In order to be eligible for the Empire Zone
while moving within the same County, Queensbury has to essentially release them from
the Town in order to leave the Town and get the Empire Zone within the County. This
first one is regarding Custom Trailers which is on Lockhart Mountain Road would be
leaving there to expand operations to Warrensburg. With that said, I will open the public
hearing and if there is anyone that would like to comment on this zone in the audience on
this particular move out of Queensbury to Warrensburg for Bill Buntings Custom Trailers
Inc. please come forward. Anybody? Any comments from staff, Chris or Mark? Did I
hit the nail on the head with those?
Town Counsel Schachner-That is what is required, that is a perfect ..
Supervisor Stec-Any comments or questions from the Town Board Members?
No comment.
Supervisor Stec-We have talked about this before and while we are sad to see a business
leave Queensbury it happens to be under good circumstances so hopefully it will be good
for the individual business and good for the County. With that I will close the Public
Hearing. Entertain a motion.
RESOLUTION APPROVING BILL BUNTING’S PERFORMANCE
CUSTOM TRAILERS, INC.’S REQUEST TO SHIFT OPERATIONS
FROM TOWN OF QUEENSBURY TO WARRENSBURG
INDUSTRIAL PARK LOCATED IN WARREN COUNTY EMPIRE
ZONE
RESOLUTION NO.: 158. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
414
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS,Bill Bunting’s Performance Custom Trailers, Inc., (Bunting) has
manufactured trailers in the Town of Queensbury, and
WHEREAS, Bunting currently has four (4) full-time employees, and
WHEREAS, restrictions at Bunting’s current Town of Queensbury site prevent
expansion and job creation due to the size and scope of its building, its proximity to a
residential neighborhood and its need for a retail operation, and
WHEREAS, Bunting has decided to relocate from its site on Lockhart Mountain
Road to the Warrensburg Industrial Park as Bunting could not find a preferred space to
conduct its business within the Town of Queensbury, and
§
WHEREAS, in accordance with New York State General Municipal Law 959
(a)(iii), Bunting must secure the approval of the Town of Queensbury in order to relocate
to the Warrensburg Industrial Park located in the Warren County Empire Zone, and
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board duly conducted a public hearing and
th
heard all interested persons on March 15, 2004 concerning Bunting’s proposed
relocation,
NOW, THEREFORE BE IT
§
RESOLVED, in accordance with New York State General Municipal Law 959
(a)(iii), the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves the proposal by Bill Bunting’s
Performance Custom Trailers, Inc., to shift its operations from Lockhart Mountain Road
to the Warrensburg Industrial Park located in the Warren County Empire Zone, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board authorizes and directs the Town Supervisor to
sign any documentation and take any action necessary to effectuate the terms of this
Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
415
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
Discussion held after vote: Councilman Boor-In the case of the Bunting’s he is leaving a
non conforming use and there was some question at the last time we discussed this as to
how long that, does that use stay with the property the non conforming aspect of it or is
there time frame? Town Counsel Schachner-Yes to both. Yes the property has been
utilized as a non conforming use that stays with the property but there is termination 18
months …
2.3 PUBLIC HEARING –TV-8’s Request To Shift Operations From The
Town of Queensbury To The City Of Glens Falls Located In The Warren
County Empire Zone
NOTICE SHOWN
Supervisor Stec-Is anyone from TV-8 here Mike Collins I know is one of the partners
down there at TV-8. Operations staff is present tonight. Again, this is a similar
resolution to the one before it. TV-8 on Quaker Road is going to, is requesting to leave
Queensbury go to Glens Falls in the downtown area not too far from JE Sawyers and the
Civic Center. They have got issues where the move would certainly help their, the
strength of their transmission so it would improve their operations. They too are
expanding and while the Town would miss them certainly it would be good for the area
and good for the business. With that I will open the public hearing. Is there anyone that
would like to comment about the Town releasing TV-8 from Queensbury to go and move
its operations down to Glens Falls. Nobody? Anything from staff? Anything from
Town Board Members? Ok. Again, so we certainly wish them well and success, it
sounds like things are going well for them which is why they are growing and leaving.
So, hopefully we will be able to bring somebody in, in their place and I am sure we will
be able to do that. With that, I will close the public hearing and call for the vote, that is
right, entertain a motion.
RESOLUTION APPROVING TV-8’S REQUEST TO SHIFT
OPERATIONS FROM TOWN OF QUEENSBURY TO CITY OF
GLENS FALLS LOCATED IN WARREN COUNTY EMPIRE ZONE
RESOLUTION NO.: 159. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHEREAS,TV-8 is an FCC-licensed, low power, Class A commercial television
station located within the Town of Queensbury and serving Warren, Washington and
Northern Saratoga Counties, and
WHEREAS, TV-8 currently has four (4) full-time employees, and
416
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, TV-8 has decided to relocate from its site on Quaker Road to the
City of Glens Falls in order to: 1) be closer to the main downtown transmitter and Civic
Center in order to improve its signal; 2) facilitate live, downtown programming; 3)
improve its visibility; and 4) produce more local programs and improve current ones,
thereby increasing employment, and
WHEREAS, TV-8 could not find a comparable space to conduct its business
within the Town of Queensbury, and
§
WHEREAS, in accordance with New York State General Municipal Law 959
(a)(iii), TV-8 must secure the approval of the Town of Queensbury in order to relocate to
the City of Glens Falls located in the Warren County Empire Zone, and
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board duly conducted a public hearing and
th
heard all interested persons on March 15, 2004 concerning the Company’s proposed
relocation,
NOW, THEREFORE BE IT
§
RESOLVED, in accordance with New York State General Municipal Law 959
(a)(iii), the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves the proposal by TV-8 to shift its
operations from Quaker Road, Queensbury to the City of Glens Falls located in the
Warren County Empire Zone, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board authorizes and directs the Town Supervisor to
sign any documentation and take any action necessary to effectuate the terms of this
Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
2.4 PUBLIC HEARING - Bay Ridge Volunteer Fire Company, Inc.’s
Proposal To Purchase American LaFrance Custom Eagle Tanker
Truck
417
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
NOTICE SHOWN
Supervisor Stec-I know that somebody is here to speak on behalf of this public hearing,
Chief Mellon, I see you are bring you heavy artillery, Mr. Paul Pontiff Esquire.
Unknown-They do not need heavy artillery. They do very well on their own.
Supervisor Stec-I am sure I speak for the five us we can agree with that. Good evening
Gentlemen.
Attorney Paul Pontiff-I will introduce myself I am Paul Pontiff I am here representing
Bay Ridge with respect to their application. I know most of the members here except I
have not met everybody formally. Escentially I think the newspaper article this morning
said pretty much everything that needed to be said. It indicated that the new tanker
would cost $356,000 dollars, and that it was an intent by the Fire Company to replace a
1985 truck which is by the way standard geared and I do not know how many of you
realize this but there are a lot of people that do not know how to operate a standard gear
vehicle. This one is even more complex because of the way the thing is geared. So, it is
helpful if you have an automatic. But, in addition to that the truck is a 1985 vehicle and
certainly it is time to be replaced. The new truck would cost three fifty six as I indicated
the fire company would take two hundred and twenty five thousand from it’s restricted
vehicle account and apply that against the new vehicle. They would sell the old truck we
do not at this point, I do not have any idea what it would go for but maybe Chip does and
he could give us some insight into that. The balance then would be financed through a
lease purchase arrangement. That is the guts of what we are talking about.
Supervisor Stec-Chief Mellon, anything you would like to add before we open the public
hearing?
Chief Mellon-Paul highlighted most of the information about the truck, it is a 1985 it
does have a manual transmission with a two speed rear axle which does make it very
difficult to drive. At this point we have approximately twenty five percent of our
members that can actually drive the truck because it is a manual transmission. The new
truck would provide several of the features that this one doesn’t, the major factor being
that it is an automatic transmission. It also would have an auxiliary braking systems a
Jacobs Engine Brake, which provides extra braking power and due to the amount of
water that is being carried on it the size of the apparatus it is definitely a safety
consideration. It will conform to the modern NFPA regulations for fire apparatus, which
is the National Fire Protection Association and also the standard on water supplies it will
conform to that as well. Anybody that doesn’t know basically our district is composed of
about twenty five percent hydranted and about seventy five percent of the district has no
hydrants, so we are dependent of this to bring the water supply with us. I do not know
how much you want me to get in if you want me to get into all the specifics or I can
answer questions later on or whatever works for you.
Supervisor Stec-I know the Town Board covered some of the specs with you I do not
know. I do not think we necessarily need to hear you go through all the specs of the truck
again. I think you could do a fair introduction of what we are talking about tonight.
Unless you have anything else to add I would at this point probably move onto the public
hearing and let you answer questions as they come up that might not be a bad idea if you
want to stay near the front row and jot down what the questions might be and we will
have you come back after we get some. With that I will open the public hearing, again
we are talking about an engine tanker for Bay Ridge Volunteer Fire Company replacing a
1985 tanker. I believe that most of the Town Board has been up to see the existing tanker
and we have had a workshop with Bay Ridge on this and I am sure that we have had
individual conversations between board members and leadership of the fire department.
With that is there anyone in the public that would like to come up comment for or
against, questions, answers. Yes, Sir, Mr. Ryan. How are you doing Mr. Ryan?
Mr. George Ryan-Very Good. I am George Ryan, I would just like to support the truck
and the fire department. If you guys take a look on the northern part of our town the
houses are getting bigger there is more and more houses and this tanker is just not going
418
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
to be for this little part of the town. If there is a fire these guys are willing, they are
waiting for it, I mean we are lucky to have a fire department like we have. These guys
are there waiting. The truck is my no means a piece of junk truck and we say oh well lets
sell it, maybe we could give it to one of the local communities next to us and if there is a
fire they could fill it and bring it to us. Maybe we could help somebody else with the old
one. I think that it is very important that they get the new tanker and we go on with the
future. The Town is growing and we could really use it. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you Sir. Anyone else like to speak on the tanker, public
hearing? Anybody? I wonder what everybody is here for? All right anybody, the
public hearing on the tanker?
Unknown-Could you answer a question, how many miles are on the tanker?
Supervisor Stec-It would be better if you come to the microphone and I know that you are
going to say it is the hours not the miles but I will let you, if you would just for the
purpose of the record, your name and address for the record.
Mr. Brian Granger-Brian Granger, 63 Wincoma Lane, Queensbury.
Supervisor Stec-I did not get a chance to return your call today, I have been, a Granger
called me, it was a different Granger, sorry.
Mr. Granger-I was just curious how many miles or hours are on the one we are replacing
and also I realize all of the fire departments got new buildings now I would kind of like to
see the list of equipment that everybody has got and look at this in a little more in depth.
Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Yes, Sir. If you want to field them as they come I don’t think we are
going to have very many.
Chief Mellon-The existing tanker has 11,000 miles on it and approximately 1300 hours,
engine hours on it.
Supervisor Stec-I know we have been through this before and not to make your case for
you but it is the last four years we have talked about fire apparatus I understand that it is
not necessarily miles as it is hours and certainly just twenty years of any sort of wear to
heavy apparatus. But, your point is well taken too Mr. Granger. Any other public
comments, questions or input on this proposed purchase? Board Members, discussion by
the Town Board, maybe Paul and Chip if you want to come back up we will go through
any questions. I know we had some questions when we talked about this in a workshop
and also privately off line between different Board Members had some of the same
questions. Board Member questions?
Councilman Boor-I don’t really have any questions, I know Tim had just left when I
arrived and John Strough was there at the same time and we actually got a tour of all the
equipment up there and obviously we were specifically concerned with the truck that is
being replaced and the one that is replacing it. It is a worth while investment and that is
what it is, it is an investment, it is an investment in safety. The old truck is that, yes it
looks like it is in great shape but in no way comparable to what the new truck is. We are
in a rural community and if we could get some money for the old one that is great, but I
was very pleased with all the explanations I received for any of the questions that I had. I
will support it.
Supervisor Stec-Ted, do you have any questions?
Councilman Turner-No. I will just echo Roger’s comments, I did go look at it and it is
true it is twenty years old and now is the time to get rid of it replace it with a newer truck
because you are not going to get anything for it if you keep it much longer. So, that is
where I am.
Supervisor Stec-John?
419
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Strough-Just a couple of questions. First of all I appreciate the tour of the
fire house I was impressed at how well organized and neat and ready to go it was. I feel
better with people like you behind the wheel so to speak. I appreciate you volunteer
service. I got a couple of questions and now when you sell the current tanker, where will
that funding go?
Chief Mellon-Those funds will they typically go back to the restricted vehicle fund unless
the Town Board has other requests for it. It is part of the lease purchase agreement that is
pretty much cut and dry how we are going to pay for it but it is something certainly if you
would like us to look into reducing the total cost that would probably be applied toward
the lease purchase. But, other than that we plan on putting it back into restricted vehicle
fund.
Councilman Strough-Is there an regular routine?
Councilman Brewer-It is in the resolution. It says it will be back into the restricted fund
or will reduce the amount of debt if traded in.
Supervisor Stec-But, Chief Mellon was correct we do have flexibility we could put it
where ever we want but I thought it was in the resolution, normally we put it in the
vehicle fund.
Councilman Strough-We could put it back it into…
Supervisor Stec-I suppose probably so.
Councilman Brewer-I would prefer to put it back
Supervisor Stec-On the loan.
Councilman Brewer-on the debt.
Supervisor Stec-We could probably do that. Is that it?
Councilman Strough-The only other thing I have was, are there going to be any
additional costs to equip it. I mean, the price that we have here does that include the light
bars and …
Councilman Brewer-lettering?
Chief Mellon-Yes, that basically includes the vehicle when it drives it, it has the drop
tanks on it, the lettering the striping, the lighting all the emergency warning systems all
that is included in the price of the what you have there three fifty six nine ten.
Councilman Strough-Then you are probably using the hoses and all the equipment from
the old one and this new one has even more storage capacity and that is one of the
benefits of it, isn’t it?
Chief Mellon-Actually it has less storage capacity. We have, there are two large storage
compartments on each side and a small storage compartment for like hydrant fittings and
things like that in the rear of the truck. So, most of the equipment from the existing
tanker will go on this but there is some more that we are going to have to look into that
will come out of our regular annual equipment budget for those types of fire fighting
equipment.
Councilman Strough-This new one sits six, either firemen coming or if somebody needed
a place for a safe haven so to speak or a warm spot it could supply a victim with that area.
Chief Mellon-For rehabilitation purposes for firefighters it will be climate controlled or
you are right if a civilian or some other person needs to have a place to get out of the
elements it can provide that service as well.
420
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Strough-After looking at the whole thing I have gotten all kinds of phone
calls for, against, for, against, you know I looked at this and got the tour and I have given
it a hard look, and it looks like you know you were trading it for a 1985 vehicle too that
you know, I support this proposal but it did lead me to some thoughts that I am going to
share with you at the Town Board moment later on, in reference to vehicles. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Tim?
Councilman Brewer-When I was there we talked about and prior to me being there, there
was conversation about getting rid of two vehicles and replacing two of them with this
the Hahn Pumper and if that is correct is what I am saying what I am saying. I asked you
about the ISO rating what will happen if we did happen to get rid of two of them and just
keep this one, or if we could equip this one to maintain the same rating. Maybe you
could just explain that and let us know whether it will change or won’t change. Whether
it is beneficial to keep both or sell one or sell two.
Chief Mellon-As far as that question is concerned, ISO Insurance Service office they
review different fire district, fire companies for the type of service that they provide and
are given a rating. The rating is comprised of several factors, man power, dispatching,
water supply, pumping capacity, amount of equipment carried and so forth. Basically
after the review was completed due to the different factors in our district it is required
that we have three engines available in our fire district. An engine is something that
makes the criteria according to the NFPA 1901 standard for pumper fire apparatus. This
new truck that we are going to be buying is actually considered a water supply apparatus
because it is primarily a tanker, it happens to have a water pump on it that can be used to
pump the water off if we have to. Due to the fact that there is a certain amount of
equipment that is required to be carried, i.e. air packs, ladders, hose, pipe poles, different
type of equipment, the size of this truck limits the capacity to carry all the required
equipment because it is primarily a tanker, the large part of the body is water tanks. The
water tank on board we also have two portable drop tanks, portable ponds there are
different terminologies that is how we dump the water off the tanker into these ponds and
it is ultimately supplied to another pumper that puts the water on the fire. We are limited
for the amount of equipment storage to do that fact we cannot count this as a pumper per
se. In using that engine or a third engine. Can a third engine if it is not available in our
fire district will this effect insurance rates in the fire protection classification. I spoke to
Tim Henry in ISO and his answer, basically we are considered 4-9 classification in our
area. It is a split classification four has to do with the areas in the hydrant district nine is
the rural area that has no water. Basically our rating would revert back to a five instead
of a four. As far as insurance rates they do not directly determine how much the
insurance rates are but his answer was it depends on each insurance company how much
the insurance rates would increase. Different insurance companies use different rating
schemes. Some would basically remain the same, some our increase slightly some would
increase dramatically. That is the best information he could provide me for that. I asked
him if this tanker because it has a pump on it, if it could be considered a third engine and
due to the fact that it does not make all the NFPA required equipment it would not be.
Additionally ISO has actually stricter guidelines then NFPA for the equipment to be
carried on a vehicle. With that in mind I took the 1988 Hahn and the 85 tanker compared
the equipment from both vehicles to see if we could put equipment from the pumper on
the tanker. Basically I came up with a list of fifty nine pieces of equipment that are on
the engine, forty nine pieces of equipment that are on the tanker. There is physically no
way that we can carry the equipment from both trucks on to the tanker. Due to the fact
also we have no other way to carry the equipment we do not have a full size rescue per
se, unlike the other four departments in the Town, that they have that, that is great that
they do. But, unfortunately we do not have that luxury to have another place to carry our
equipment. So, in part I hope that answers your questions as far as where we are going to
carry the equipment.
Councilman Brewer-All right, one last question. The four, nine, is the four the best it can
get or the worst it can get and is the nine?
421
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Chief Mellon-The lower the number the better the rating. So, the four is, it is very good
a large part of that has to do with the
Councilman Brewer-So, then my question would be, why wouldn’t the rating get better if
we are adding another piece of equipment.
Chief Mellon-Because you are asking about
Councilman Boor-Eliminating two.
Supervisor Stec-You are talking about eliminating two trucks?
Councilman Brewer-No, no I am saying on the other hand if we were to, we are going to
keep the Hahn, now we are buying a bigger, better truck, and I am not saying we should
or shouldn’t I am just asking the question. Why couldn’t that help us get our rating to a
better point?
Chief Mellon-If I understand to get a better rating there is a lot more, it has more to do
than the type of apparatus. It has to do with training requirements a lot of it has to do
with career vs. volunteer departments. You really if I understand it correctly you do not
get a better rating than a four until you go to a paid service.
Councilman Brewer-We do not want to do there.
Supervisor Stec-That is my understanding as well, is that the four, nine and I think this is
important to note, because we are always talking.
Councilman Brewer-Is probably the best you can get.
Supervisor Stec-Four, nine is the best rating ISO rating that we can get without having a
career service, which I agree we want to avoid because the cost is of that, well I mean I
do not think the Town wants to make that investment.
Councilman Brewer-No, I am not saying that I am for or against that I am just saying
when we buy these things we have to be aware of what our ratings is and why it is what it
is so when the public calls us and says why are you spending three hundred and fifty
thousand dollars on a truck, this is the reason.
Chief Mellon-That is correct a large part that we have the four, nine rating also has to do
with the excellent water supply for the areas that are provided by hydrants in the Town.
Many areas, many not in Queensbury but in other areas the hydrant flows could vary
from one hydrant to another. In Queensbury we are very fortunate that the hydrants that
we have they all flow about the same and they are maximum flow rates so that is
something that probably Ralph VanDusen should be commended on for the service that
they provide.
Supervisor Stec-I think you are right and I think since he is here I think we will commend
the Water Department. I asked the question not to get off on too much of a tangent but
talking about the towns water supply for fire fighting, back about a year or so ago there
was some newspaper articles concerning hydrants, working, not working you know
impacting firefighting outside the municipality, adjacent to the Town. At the time I asked
Ralph VanDusen how good are our hydrants? I will put him on the stop, but it goes to
what you are saying Chip, he pointed out that we have about a thousand fire hydrants in
the town and they all get checked every year. Every single one of them gets checked and
actually I think he said that Vance Plante is the guy that does most of the hydrants and he
said that he is as certain as he could be that they all work all the time. They get checked
every year and you know a little maintenance. I think that that is important for our public
to know and I think its appropriate time in the discussion to commend the Water
Department, Ralph and Bruce and the entire Water Department for keeping up with the
hydrants the way they do. Sorry to interrupt. Tim?
Councilman Brewer-I am all set, thank you Chip.
422
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-It sounds like everybody has been to look at the tanker 420, I know that
Tim and I were up there at the same time not too long ago and I stayed to get the tour of
the truck and he didn’t but you got back there at a later date. You know I think it is
important to note that to my memory the four years that I have been on the Town Board
and running, that this is the first time that we have had a proposed vehicle replacement
come to us with the exception of South Queensbury’s Brush truck that actually hit twenty
years. It is not to say that we are making the argument that they should be twenty years
because I also understand that NFPA is now recommending fifteen years as a guideline
instead of twenty. Most large apparatus like this, this is the fist one that I have seen hit
the twenty year mark. You do, you start to getting into the debate well do you hang onto
it for three more years, drive it into the ground or do you take the little bit of money that
you can get for it and run? I do think and I have talked with the leadership of the five
departments together, they have all heard this, and we have a lot of members of Bay
Ridge here and I am sure several people will watch this on TV so I will take a minute to
just say that moving forward later this year when we have a contact that will expire at the
end of the year and rather than waiting until November and trying to scurry and throw
together a contract in the middle of everything else that we usually have going on at the
end of the year. I have been trying to get us all and I think we are a little bit ahead of the
curve in some of the discussion that we are thinking now in February and March about
issues that are going to be coming up for the next contract and things that we do not have
to wait for contract time to implement. A comprehensive look at all of the towns
apparatus I think going forward, each, as part of their contracts each of the five fire
companies submits a five year plan for their apparatus and the Town gets that and we
keep that and that is great, but I think that what we would be better served by we being
the public is a comprehensive look where we integrated all five of those plans together
and have a discussion together so that we are not necessarily duplicating. I have been
likening it a lot to the rec center. Everyone is concerned well gee you know you have got
all these schools doing their own thing you have got Doug Miller doing his thing, you
have got the Forum now and you have got the Y and is this going to compete? Is the rec
center going to compete with these. The answer that we are hoping that we are going to
get is well no they are complement. The only way we will know that is if we do sit down
and talk with the Y and talk with the different school districts and find out what is in the
hopper for you what are you seeing for numbers and demand. And so, that you find out
that if you need a pool and basketball court that somebody builds a pool and somebody
builds a basketball court and you do not have the Y and the Town building two pools.
So, I think that kind of thinking is called for when we talk about apparatus you know that
I think we are one town tax rate, one town so we have an interest in making sure that the
Town fire system is all that it can be and so I think integrating that and going forward
into the future is going to be important and I know that I shared that with the fire
departments and hopefully there is some agreement there. I know you start talking about
change or doing something that we haven’t done before and people get a little nervous.
But, I think that you know certainly if we have got, say there is twenty large piece of
apparatus out there you know, maybe when you do a comprehensive look at it maybe the
number comes in at nineteen or eighteen and before you know it you are saving three or
four hundred thousand dollar purchase. I think going forward in the future that will be
important, I think that is going to take some faith and some cooperation between the town
and the five fire departments, but I think we can get there. So, I do think that as we move
forward we need to organize that. On its own merits looking at the truck that you have
and looking at and talking to not only members of Bay Ridge but members of other
companies and other people that I know have expertise. While there is, there is always
some criticism and you have got at some point decide do we have enough or do we have
too much, that I think that on its own merits you have got a twenty year old truck and we
are either going to get another two years out of it or maybe we won’t. But, is it worth the
hassle to try to get another year or two out of it, I do not think so. Anything else from the
Town Board? All right I will close the public hearing and entertain a motion.
RESOLUTION APPROVING BAY RIDGE VOLUNTEER FIRE
COMPANY, INC.’S PROPOSAL TO PURCHASE AMERICAN
423
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
LAFRANCE CUSTOM EAGLE TANKER TRUCK AND
AUTHORIZING INCURRENCE OF DEBT FOR SUCH PURCHASE
RESOLUTION NO.: 160. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHO MOVED FOR ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHEREAS, the Town of Queensbury and the Bay Ridge Volunteer Fire
Company, Inc. (Fire Company) have entered into an Agreement for fire protection
services, which Agreement sets forth a number of terms and conditions including a
condition that the Fire Company will not purchase or enter into any binding contract to
purchase any piece of apparatus, equipment, vehicles, real property, or make any
improvements that would require the Fire Company to acquire a loan or mortgage or use
money placed in a “vehicles fund” without prior approval of the Queensbury Town
Board, and
WHEREAS, the Fire Company has advised the Town Board that it wishes to
purchase an American LaFrance Custom Eagle Tanker Truck (Tanker) for a sum not to
exceed $356,910, such purchase already included in the scheduled Fire Company’s five (5)
year capital plan that forecasts future capital needs and expenditures, including anticipated
vehicles, equipment, tools, other apparatus, facilities or improvements to facilities to be used
for firematic purposes, and
WHEREAS, the Fire Company plans on paying for the Tanker by using $225,000 in
funds from its Restricted Vehicle Fund and entering into a four (4) year tax-exempt lease-
purchase agreement with Evergreen Bank/Bank North for $131,910, and
th
WHEREAS, on March 15, 2004, the Town Board held a public hearing
concerning the Fire Company’s proposed purchase and debt incurrence and heard all
interested persons, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board feels that this new vehicle will provide additional
safety protection for the Town, and
WHEREAS, the Town wishes to adopt a Resolution authorizing the purchase of
the Tanker Truck and incurrence of debt by the Fire Company,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
424
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves of the Bay Ridge
Volunteer Fire Company, Inc.’s proposal to purchase an American LaFrance Custom
Eagle Tanker Truck for a sum not to exceed $356,910, such purchase already included in
the scheduled Fire Company’s five (5) year capital plan that forecasts future capital needs
and expenditures, including anticipated vehicles, equipment, tools, other apparatus, facilities
or improvements to facilities to be used for firematic purposes, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes the Fire
Company to use $225,000 in funds from its Restricted Vehicle Fund
toward the purchase, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further approves of the incurrence of $131,910
in debt by the Bay Ridge Volunteer Fire Company, Inc. for such purchase with the
understanding that the Town Board is relying upon the Fire Company’s assurances that
the Tanker Truck is serviceable and suitable for its long-term intended use,
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that a retired tanker truck will be sold or traded at fair market value
and the proceeds will be deposited to the Restricted Vehicle Fund if sold, or will reduce
the amount of debt if traded in, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town of Queensbury does not guarantee the debt with
Evergreen Bank/Bank North on behalf of the Fire Company nor does the Town Board
create or intend to create any assumption on the part of the Town of Queensbury of any
obligation or liability for the financing, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor and/or Town Budget Officer to take any action necessary to effectuate all
terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner
425
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote: Councilman Brewer-Can we amend it so that the sales price of
the apparatus that we are getting rid of be applied to the purchase price? Councilman Boor-
Do we want to do that, we certainly can but do you want to think about it we do not need to
do it right now. Councilman Brewer-Why wouldn’t you want to do that? Councilman
Boor-Because I don’t think we have thought it out. Supervisor Stec-I do not think we have
to do that tonight. Councilman Boor-It certainly leaves the option open I am not opposed to
it I just do not know why we would put it in the resolution. Councilman Brewer-Are you
guys plan on buying something in the year or two? Chief Mellon-no Councilman Brewer-
Why would you want to just put money in the bank? Councilman Boor-I could not answer
that question that is why I do not really want to change the resolution. Supervisor Stec-This
can go into the vehicle fund and then we could turn around and pay down the debt. Chief
Mellon-We can get back to you at the time the truck is sold.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you and all the volunteer fire companies and rescue squads for your
service and your volunteer and your significant hours we appreciate it.
5.0 PUBLIC HEARING - Proposed Local Law, To Replace Chapter 119
Entitled “Outdoor Furnaces” With A New Local law Prohibiting The Use
Of Outdoor Furnaces In the Town of Queensbury
NOTICE SHOWN
Supervisor Stec-We have a six month moratorium started not too long ago, prohibiting the
addition of any new outdoor furnaces until the Town Board had a chance to research,
deliberate and decide what if anything we wanted to do to address the issue. We did have
late last year, we did have some people come and bring a video tape of some outdoor
furnace activity over on Glen Lake that got our attention. I think anyone that saw that it
certainly raised eyebrows. Since that time we instituted this moratorium to consider it. The
Town Board has had at least one workshop on this subject to deliberate it and we I can
assure the public that we have wrestled with each other and beat each other up over it. The
original draft had a fair amount of, with the Town Board directed the attorneys to draft up
some local law that would severely limit the use of the allowance of these in the Town. The
Town Board discussed it and at one point the recommendation was made that the
restrictions that we were proposing to have were so restrictive that really what in effect we
were talking about was a ban. So, we did at that point say fine, write the local law to ban
them, which is where we are today. We have got along with the banning there are several
other things that need to be addressed. The idea of grand fathering to grand father to not
grand father how long to if we didn’t grand father how long would we allow them to
continue to use if we ban them. So, that is what is before us tonight. I can tell you that since
we set the public hearing for tonight there has been continuing debate between the Town
Board and continued input from the public as to the merits and draw backs from taking this
action. We have tried to educate ourselves a little bit. I have talked with a member of
DEC’s air quality this morning on the phone for about a half an hour up in Warrensburg and
picked their brain. But, what we have before us is a proposed local law that would ban
outdoor furnaces within the town. So, that is the next public hearing, did I miss any key
items? Yes Mr. Schachner.
th
Town Counsel Schachner-The moratorium was adopted on December 15 2003 for a six
month period.
Supervisor Stec-I thought it was right at the end of the year. We still have a moratorium in
th
effect regardless of what happens tonight. The moratorium is in effect until June 15 unless
we adopted a local law tonight. With that I recognize some people in the audience that I
have talked to about the issue and so I would open the public hearing to anyone that would
like to come on either side of the issue to ban or not ban, yes Sir. For the public hearing for
426
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
the purpose of the record if you could just state your name and address for the record and we
can entertain your comments and hopefully do the right thing.
Mr. Kevin Ireland-My name is Kevin Ireland I live in Harris Street in Queensbury, New
York I do have a prepared comment, it should only take me a few minutes to read it.
Hopefully my voice will hold up. In regard to the matter of the proposed banning of the use
of outdoor wood furnaces in the Town of Queensbury I would like to point out a few things
that may or may not effect the out come of your final decision. First off I would like to
point out that I have an outdoor wood furnace in use at my home and also I am a local dealer
of outdoor wood furnaces here in Queensbury. To satisfy any possible critics that I may
have I would like to point out that residents of the Town of Queensbury are not my primary
customers. If Queensbury were to in fact ban the use of outdoor wood furnaces it would
not drastically effect my business. Granted I do have a vested interest in the outcome of this
matter but I am also concerned about the rights of Americans Citizens being taken away
from them little by little. As far as I am concerned there are a number of benefits to be had
for someone to install an outdoor wood furnace at their home, not just in comparison to a
wood stove in general, but to all heating sources combined. We live in the Adirondacks
where wood is both plentiful and relatively inexpensive thus to heat with wood can be
considerably cheaper than heating with most any other fuel. Having the unit outside the
structure being heated virtually eliminates the risk of fire and carbon monoxide poisoning as
compared with having a wood stove inside the home. The heat from the outdoor unit is
piped into the structure by means of underground piping and the heat is evenly distributed
throughout the home as opposed to just one room that a wood stove might be in . A
homeowner no longer has to contend with the wood, smoke, insects and ash being brought
into their home thus making them cleaner to operate than a conventional woodstove.
Heating with wood in this way gives homeowners more control over their heating costs and
it also gives them freedom of choice because they are no longer forced to purchase from the
local utility or propane/fuel oil distributor. If you do not allow your constituents the option
to decide whether or not to, an outdoor wood furnace is right for them, then realize that once
again it would appear that government is taking away Americans Freedoms bit by bit. I
would like to point out that wood is a renewal energy source and that petroleum based fuels
are not. Also that Americans have been burning wood for over two hundred years and
mankind in general has been doing so for thousands of years. Wood smoke is wood smoke
is wood smoke whether it is created by an outdoor wood furnace or your neighbors indoor
woodstove. They both do the same thing to a greater or lesser degree. You might say that
an outdoor wood furnace is essentially a very large wood stove just like comparing a
compact car with an SUV. They both an get the job done but the SUV is the preferred
vehicle because it does it better. If you decide to ban the use of outdoor wood furnaces in
the entire Town of Queensbury how can you then justify denying one person the right to
install a safe inexpensive and comfortable means of heating for his home and then turn
around and allow that same persons neighbor to install a wood stove in theirs? To ban or
not to ban that is the question. Instead of making a blanket prohibition of the use of outdoor
wood furnaces in the entire Town of Queensbury I suggest you consider the recent cigarette
smoke ban by the Federal Government. Some places may be appropriate and others not.
Maybe neighborhood approval is the answer, that is when a constituent applies for a
variance. Maybe regulating what materials are burned in them and seeing to it that they are
installed correctly according to manufacturers instructions. The requirement to extend the
chimney height of some installations may resolve the smoke issue in areas where complaints
from neighbors might become prevalent. However, if the weather out side is stagnant and
causes the smoke to linger at ground level it would do so no matter where the smoke came
from wood stove or wood furnace. I have also heard it suggested that the time of year that
they could be operated could be regulated but I do not think that is the best solution either as
there are some installations with no neighbors whatsoever and also that the regulations
would not apply equally to woodstoves use. I happen to live in an area where many of my
neighbors have in the past or are presently heating with wood and we have no disputes with
one another. I personally do not believe that the use of an outdoor wood furnace is
necessarily appropriate for all neighborhoods though. If I happen to live in Bedford Close,
Courthouse Estates, or anyone of the newer developments in the Town where the property
acreage is small then I probably would not opt for an outdoor wood furnace because of
esthetic reasons but then again if I could afford to live in a development like that then this
whole thing would not be an issue for me and I would be paying the local utility without a
second thought. In conclusion and above all else I believe that common sense and respect
427
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
for the safety and well being of others should prevail and be the deciding factor as to
whether or not an outdoor wood furnace is appropriate for any particular neighborhood.
Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you Sir.
Mr. Gary Springer- Gary Springer, 80 Central Avenue, Queensbury You guys should have
copies of these, I put them in Tim’s mailbox. I would just like to say a couple of things that
these woodstoves, mine anyway.
Councilman Boor-Could you give the page?
Mr. Springer-Yes, second page. They are endorsed by the US Forestry Service and the
Union of Concerned Scientists. On page 5 there is a fuel cost comparison and that was one
of the big things for me was that and the other big thing that he mentioned was it is outside
it is not in my house. I had a woodstove I did not like it. Then there is a lot of other stuff in
here but the biggest thing that I want to go to was in the back page the last page. It states in
there, you know, the fuel that you should use what you should burn and what you should not
burn in them. There are stipulations and stuff in here and there are specs on where they
should be in height and stuff and I would just like you people to look over this before you
make a decision. Ok. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Yes, Sir. Anyone else, Yes, Sir.
Mr. Rodney Tollefson-Rodney Tollefson, I am with Central Boiler. I have a handout. I
appreciate the chance to be here, again I am Rodney Tollefson I am Vice President at
Central Boiler. I have been with Central Boiler since 1990. I have traveled from northern
Minnesota to be with you today and I appreciate your, the opportunity to speak. I am going
to read this and if there are any questions you would like to ask me afterwards that is fine,
but sometimes I forget things and I don’t say enough if I don’t read it, so I am going to read
the prepared statement I have. I would like to present some facts about outdoor wood
furnaces and clear up some misconceptions. First let me take a moment to tell you a little bit
about Central Boiler. We are one of the larger manufacturers of outdoor furnaces and we
probably manufactured a significant percentage of the outdoor furnaces sold in New York
State. We provide heat efficiency, low emission furnaces as a responsible alternative means
to heating homes. We are very committed to R&D, we have an on site testing lab, we are
currently testing emissions and efficiency and we have been doing so for two years. We
have some very good technologies that we see coming that can do a lot for increasing
efficiency and emission control in the near future, very near term future. Many other
manufacturers also are taking the initiative as we speak. They are testing emissions and
seeking improvements for better performance. We actually have a manufacturers an out
door wood furnace manufacturer caucus and we have addressed these issues in the past year
very earnestly. New York dealerships provide dedicated sales and technical support and can
be a big help in many installations where there might be an issue. Central … has been at the
forefront of educational efforts and working together with government to troubleshoot
issues. If something comes up we try to get together with them. Next I would like to
address air quality concerns. Outdoor furnaces do not pose a threat to the environment any
different than other indoor stoves. Heating with wood reduces SO2 and NOX as compared
with fossil fuels. I know that is a very big issue in New York and all the eastern states the
SO2 and NOX and wood is a very low emission rate of that almost non existent. Heating
with wood also produces no net increase of carbon dioxide, fossil fuels do. The natural the
renewal resource is, it produces absolutely no increase in carbon dioxide. When compared
to emissions from indoor woodstoves, particulate emission are the same as indoor
woodstoves. Outdoor wood furnaces have eliminated many health problems for thousands
of homeowners. Many people have had asthma and other respiratory problems completely
eliminated when they removed their indoor wood stoves and replaced them with an outdoor
wood furnace. I for one have a wife that has asthma problems and we had to get rid of our
indoor wood stove we could not use it and we can heat with wood because of an outdoor
furnace. Central Boiler was directly involved with EPA by providing one of the outdoor
wood furnaces and other heating equipment used in the emission testing project that
428
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
evaluated outdoor wood furnaces. This EPA testing was conducted from June of 1995
through October, 1995. The results are published in a February 1998 report identified as
EPA-600/R-98-017. The project summary published on this states compared to a wide
range of residential heating options, these furnaces emissions were of the same order as
other stick wood burning appliances. If you look at the last page I have included a copy it is
a portion of that test and it talks about, I put an arrow on the grams per kilogram of dry fuel,
that is the emission rate on outdoor wood furnace, that was one of our furnaces tested at that
time. A project in 1998 and 99 in Portland, Oregon the arrows indicating there, they are the
same, the 10.8 and the 9.23 the grams per kilogram are the same on an EPA certified phase
2 stove. For the amount of wood they burn they produce the same amount of emissions. If
you put two wood stoves in and burn the same amount as you would in one indoor it
produces the same amount of emissions is what that is saying. Now, I would like to address
why we are here today, the complaints and neighborhood disputes. It is a serious issue.
Burning of illegal trash. For years, Central Boiler and other manufacturers have clearly
instructed, in the written installation manuals that chimneys are to be extended to a height
above the roofs of surrounding buildings if installed in areas of higher populations. These
instruction manuals also clearly state, burn wood only. In our review of the small number of
complaints about outdoor wood furnaces each indicate that the furnaces involved did not
have the proper installation chimneys initially installed to proper heights in the beginning.
That is every one of the complaints that we have ever been able to locate, everyone of them
has not had the chimney extended to start with. So that is at the route of the problem. In
researching other complains we have found in researching all of these we found that
approximately fifty of the complaints started long before there was an outdoor furnace
involved. Half of the complaints were disputing neighbors over issues like pets, dogs,
swimming pools, stereos or vehicles, loud vehicles. In each case where there are nuisance
laws in place to take care of that somebody is forced to turn their stereos down, they are
forced to tie up their pets or they are forced not to drive vehicles in whatever on lawns or
replace mufflers or whatever they did not ban the stereos or the pets or the vehicles they
controlled them by the nuisance laws they currently had in place. I think that is our solution.
So, the solution is working together for a responsible operation and installation of the
product. Central Boiler and other manufacturers independently and through industry
associations with HPBA are committed to the responsible burning. We worked together as
a caucus to form, to apply responsible wood burning to out door furnaces focusing on efforts
to publicize the best burn practices. Are you all aware of that best burn practices here? He
had that in his last guy that got up here. The second is if there are a few issues we want to
help trouble shoot any issues that are out there and we would like to work together with the
government if there is any thing. We already have an on going relationship with the
Department in New York Environmental Conservation. We are working together with them
getting them some information. So, we encourage a dialog to work with you. Is there any
questions any of you have?
Supervisor Stec-Any questions?
Councilman Brewer-How did you find out about this meeting?
Mr. Tollefson-I found out from a dealer of ours that had informed us that there was going to
be a hearing.
Councilman Strough-You are recommending that the stack height be higher then the roofs
of the adjacent houses?
Mr. Tollefson-If it is in very close, if homes are very close together then yes, if not, if they
are further apart that chart in there shows you that you can we expect that the further
distance you are the stack can go down somewhat.
Councilman Boor-In your study what distances do you consider appropriate when you say if
they are close together, what do you consider close together?
Mr. Tollefson-That chart talks about if you look
429
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Boor-I saw the 150’ but I they are talking about the ability of the plumbing I
believe to be most efficient. I am talking about the smoke, in other words what do you
consider close proximity of buildings?
Mr. Tollefson-The best practices chart that you have right there.
Councilman Boor-Right here I see this and that is what I am looking at and that has to do to
me they are talking about the efficiency. I am seeing this as efficiency.
Mr. Tollefson-They are talking about the stack height as related to the distance to a home
that is not serviced by the unit. So, if you are fifty feet or a hundred or two hundred feet the
stack, the closer you are the taller the stack has to be.
Councilman Boor-I guess I have a problem when it says if located more than a hundred feet
but not more than a hundred and fifty feet, in other words why, wouldn’t more be better?
Mr. Tollefson-Well it is in between they are trying to cover.
Councilman Boor-I know but wouldn’t more be better if you wanted to have a buffer for
smoke why would you limit it at a hundred and fifty feet wouldn’t three or five hundred feet
be better for the down wind recipient of the smoke?
Mr. Tollefson-Yes you can always go higher?
Councilman Boor-I know I guess I am not trying to be argumentative but I just do not know
why you put a limit of a hundred and fifty feet I mean it seems like more is better in this
instance.
Mr. Tollefson-Yea, if you are installing one if you are talking about a neighbor being in a
close proximity if there is really an issue of smoke whether you are a hundred feet or you are
ten feet you need to get the smoke high enough so it becomes no issue. We put a chart in
there to be a guideline to start with.
Councilman Strough-All right lets get back to my thought, I never got the chance to
complete. So, if the adjacent house was say twenty five feet and it is within fifty feet then
the smoke stack should be at least twenty five feet high.
Mr. Tollefson-To the roof line.
Councilman Strough-To the roof line.
Councilman Brewer-Plus two feet.
Mr. Tollefson-Plus two feet
Councilman Strough-So, twenty seven foot.
Councilman Brewer-If the house is twenty five foot
Councilman Strough-If the house if twenty five.
Councilman Boor-If the eve, it is a two story house.
Councilman Strough-How do you support a stack of twenty five feet high?
Mr. Tollefson-It is very easy there are many people that have just put a beam or a pole in the
ground and support it from that five feet away from the stack. It is very easy to do.
Councilman Strough-So you would have an xo structure of some sort a pole with guide
wires even?
430
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Mr. Tollefson-Some people have had them near a building and they run a brace from a
building or if you are close, relatively close to a building or you can put a support you can
guide wire it but what ever means it needs to be if it is going up two or three extensions it
can support itself on the furnace without any, if you are going twenty five feet it needs to be
supported in an adequate manner.
Councilman Strough-Ok. Now from an esthetic point of view that kind of arrangement is
not for everywhere and I think you would agree.
Mr. Tollefson-I would certainly not want it put something that was not esthetically pleasing.
Councilman Strough-The other question that I have is on sparks, I have read some literature
here and at times because you can really load these up, they can get roaring and people have
admitted that there is a potential for sparks and this might again be related to improper stack
heights or the fact that they do not have spark arrestors but is there a potential to public
safety of arrant sparks?
Mr. Tollefson-Our owners manual suggests that all installations use the spark arrestor at
least if they are in an area of high fire risk, but we recommend it on all. Spark arrestors are
available.
Councilman Strough-It is only a recommendation it does not come with the unit itself?
Mr. Tollefson-That is correct.
Councilman Strough-You have to pay extra for that?
Mr. Tollefson-It is thirty five bucks or fifty five bucks or something like that. A regular
home fireplace would have the same spark issue and fire issue because you can have a
chimney fire in one of those and you have flames shooting out of them similar.
Councilman Strough-The only other, the last time and I have this just that the EPA test and
from what I have read those emissions standards are best on, are based on the best case
scenario. That is not often the case with an individual home users, or it may or may not be.
Mr. Tollefson-This report and I brought it along just to for illustration purposes the report
that was done in 1995, it was actually written in 1998 the testing was done in 95’ it actually
there were two different rates. It was a fifteen thousand and thirty thousand and a thirty
thousand BTU rate constant out put rate is similar to a seven gallon little better than seven
gallons per day of oil. So, a normal residential home would very easily, many of them
anyway would be heated by that so that is a fairly real use where if you take an indoor wood
stove the hang tag ratings that they put on them are what you depicted. They have a
weighted average and they burn them in a lab and they do them, they rate them two point
nine when in reality in the home use you see what they put out and this testing was more of
a real in home use because it was a thirty thousand BTU and a fifteen thousand steady draw.
So, it wasn’t a better rating because it was done in a laboratory. Any other questions?
Supervisor Stec-I thank you for traveling all the way from Minnesota and thank you for
bring your weather with you tomorrow.
Mr. Tollesfson-We do not have this down there. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Anyone else? Outdoor furnaces, Yes, Sir in the back.
Mr. Bob Dean-Hello, my name is Bob Dean, Big Boom Road, Queensbury. I have a
Classic Boiler but I have never met this man, maybe he could have given me a better deal.
Anyways, I have over eight thousand dollars in my system, I do not burn anything but wood
and I do not have any problems with my neighbors. I have neighbors that burn coal, I have
neighbors that have wood stoves none of them are close to me at all. I burn wood. I do not
see what the problem is. Last I knew I have to pay taxes for garbage to be burnt, and we are
not getting rid of the garbage plant. I also think we have an incinerator, I mean a
crematorium in town don’t we, I do not understand how you can say here somebody has got
431
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
eight to ten thousand dollars in something you cannot have it. How can you tell me how to
heat my home if I am not doing it illegal. That is all I have got to say.
Supervisor Stec-Yes, in the back.
Ms. Kathleen Sweet-Kathleen Sweet, South Western Avenue but we also have property on
Mallory Avenue and that is where the Central Boiler is located.
Mr. Keith Sweet-I just wanted to, well Kevin pretty much covered everything I guess, there
he did a good job on that. Like I said we have a wood boiler, we have the support of our
neighbors. No body around us has a problem with it. We burn just wood we have a lot of
cost in it about seven or eight thousand dollars. The energy costs is with the cost of energy
and everything these days it is going through the roof. What else, we are responsible, we
only burn wood and make sure it doesn’t get carried away or anything like that. I do not
agree with the ban. I have got a lot of money invested in it.
Mrs. Sweet-The way we are heating we are doing a lot of hot, like we have radiant heat
floors so we are using the water that comes from that for that so our heating system the heart
of our heating system at this point is the wood furnace. We don’t burn it after, we burn it
basically from October to possibly the first of April, clean it out, we take very good care of
it, it is a substantial part of our heating system and we are heating three times the size of the
house that we are living in now and our power bill this month was fifty dollars in our other
house it is a hundred and seventy. So, it is a substantial savings and I really do not want to
see us have to go back to fossil fuels if we do not have to.
Councilman Strough-How close are you to your neighbors?
Mrs. Sweet-We have a good size piece of property we are probably a hundred to two
hundred feet.
Mr. Sweet-A hundred fifty feet probably.
Mrs. Sweet-From our neighbors around, we have gone to every single one of them and
talked to them and not any of them have a problem with it.
Councilman Strough-How high is your stack?
Mr. Sweet-About twenty feet. It is two section so it is twenty feet.
Councilman Strough-And you support it with a pole?
Mr. Sweet-With two sections you do not have to support it at all, it is free standing.
Supervisor Stec-I would say, just for the benefit of the Board that the Sweet’s outdoor
furnace and the Ireland’s outdoor furnace, Tim and I went and visited them, I do not think
you were expecting us I think that Kevin Ireland was and he had it set up so we got there
when it was the appropriate time where he could take it through a cycle so we could see
what was going on with his unit. But, there’s two you could stand at one and throw a stone
and just about hit the other one and I went to one of your neighbors that was in between the
two of you and knocked on her door and I asked her about it and she backed up with both
you and Mr. Ireland that she did not have a problem at all. I saw what you were burning and
we talked a lot about that. I thought it was, it struck me enough that I felt I should note it to
the Board that here is two you could throw a stone from one and hit the other one and you
are in a pretty tight neighborhood. I also want to say that I was impressed with both set up
as far as showing us how it works inside the home and you know both arrangements were
pretty impressive to see how that it is tied in because I had not seen it before. I wanted to
thank you publicly for spending some time with us over the weekend. I thought it was
remarkable to note that you had two that were that close together and I went to a neighbor in
the middle and asked what they thought and they backed up what everyone was telling us.
Mr. Sweet-Thank you for your time.
432
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Ms. Dawn Hlavaty Starratt
Mr. Starratt-We live at 154 Glen Lake Road, and we live approximately about one thousand
feet from a wood burning furnace that not to mention also I am a plumber I do plumbing
and heating and air-conditioning so I deal with a lot of boilers and actually these are boilers
because they contain water. Your question about the distance from the house and stuff, you
do have distances that you cannot go farther from being that you are carrying and
transferring hot water from a distance and it will cool down. So, you do have a ratio of
about a hundred and fifty feet that you really maximize away from the house but the heights
of the stacks are very important and proper installation as the first gentlemen had said and
proper set up and proper use of any kind of unit being it oil fired being anything. I mean
people have gone by houses that haven’t had an oil fired furnace serviced and you can see
black smoke coming through it. It is just proper care and being responsible for your
particular way of heating your house. As we remember back in the 70’s during the energy
crunch they were big for alternative fuel sources and I think as government officials that was
a big thing then have we forgotten that? What happens is oil does go up to outrageous rates,
gas is already going crazy to cost to heat our homes. Some people in the areas have had
their houses for a long time they are not financially, they are financially fixed and they use
these boilers to keep their costs under control. Being that wood is plentiful, and it a renewal
resource that is a very important thing to take in fact, taking it into account. So, we do live
next to one and we really do not have a problem with it there are days when it is stagnant out
and the air is and anything would be, oil, soot, everything would be sitting down in low
areas. I think the cause of the one that caused most of the complaints, I noticed because I
drove by the house that was there, there might have been some stuff that was not really
supposed to be burned. It seems to be in a gully. It seems to be trapped, the other houses
are higher than that one from my notification of taking a look around and seeing it. So,
maybe there are some things that we can do to ask this person to try to rectify the situation.
I think banning wood outdoor boilers would be a mistake, someday I plan if the oil prices go
up being a plumber, I have left two out lets on my boiler that I just put in so that if I had to I
can run lines out and put an outdoor wood furnace. So, it is just a precaution that everybody
should take. What happens if like I said we get into a large oil crunch and there is only so
many fossil fuels and its just a matter of time before that ever happens.
Mrs. Starratt-We highly agree with Mr. Ireland on everything he said, he was exactly right.
So, we are totally against it, so hopefully you will all review it all and make sure that you are
doing the right thing for the community. I think if you look back to the problems with the
neighbors, they had problems prior to a wood furnace burning, it was other problems prior
to this. I live on Ash Drive as you probably know so we have no problem.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you. Anyone else on outdoor furnaces. Yes, Sir.
Mr. Thomas Washburn-Gentlemen, My name is Thomas Washburn, Cormus Road,
Queensbury One thing Roger brought up tonight in discussing with the Fire Department
that Queensbury we still do have rural areas. I live in a rural area of Queensbury. We have
been here for twenty two years and we have heated our home for those twenty two years
with wood. We purchased an outdoor furnace nine years ago and installed that so we could
take the fire to the outside. Now, we have no more threats of worrying about any fire at all
and we can safely heat our home and in doing this we create no problems because we are in
a rural area. To take and ban something like this would really have an effect on us where we
do not have neighbors.
Supervisor Stec-I was going to ask have you had any complaints from the neighbors?
Mr. Washburn-We have no neighbors because we live in a rural area. So, it would really be
a hardship to us. We have twenty acres we harvest our own wood off our property and that
is the heating system. So, we would have our investment taken away and we would have to
take and transfer our home into a whole new heating system in order to do this.
Supervisor Stec- Mr. Turner has a question.
Councilman Turner-Mr. Washburn do you use your unit in the summer time to heat your hot
water?
433
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Mr. Washburn-No I do not.
Councilman Turner-You don’t so you shut it down?
Mr. Washburn-I shut it right down.
Councilman Turner-And you have secondary?
Mr. Washburn-All I have
Councilman Turner-Hot water tank.
Mr. Washburn-is an electric hot water heater and in the summer time we just turn that on for
that.
Councilman Turner-You do not have a furnace if that one happens to do down?
Mr. Washburn-No, Sir.
Councilman Turner-You do not have a standby?
Mr. Washburn-No.
Councilman Turner-Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-Anything else? Thank you both. Mr. Tucker did you have something you
wanted to say?
Mr. Pliney Tucker-Pliney Tucker Division Road I am one of the dumb ones I have a
fireplace in my house. Do you guys have any knowledge of how many outdoor furnaces are
in the Town of Queensbury?
Supervisor Stec-Well, it is funny you mentioned that, we have the last staff estimate I heard
was ten to twelve and I am going to guess that is probably low but not a lot.
Mr. Tucker-How many complaints have you had that are problems. All I ever heard about
was this one in Glen Lake and I missed the video so I did not see that part of it.
Supervisor Stec-The video was enlightening and is for sure, but as far as I am aware that
was the only one that we ever had anything.
Councilman Boor-To this Board.
Supervisor Stec-To us.
Councilman Boor-I cannot speak to the Building Dept. of anything I do not know what…I
cannot speak to if they have gone to Dave Hatin or if they have gone to the Fire Marshal.
But, to this Board the one that you are referring to is really the only one that we have heard
complaints on.
Supervisor Stec-Chris are you aware of any complaints other than that
Director Chris Round-I couldn’t tell you conclusively.
Mr. Tucker-Well then I guess I want to use the word knee jerk reaction to this situation. If
we have a problem with somebody the neighbors are having problems with wouldn’t the
first step be to go and talk to these people and find out why it is a problem? Rather than
Supervisor Stec-As a general rule
Mr. Tucker-punish all the nice people that are doing things right?
434
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-That is the theme that I am getting, in general whether its outdoor furnaces
or who’s leaves are blowing into who’s yards we have those complaints. You know barking
dogs and loud stereos you hit the nail on the head, that the first step is to try to resolve with
the neighbor. Now, we whether we are talking about barn yard animals in a residential zone
or any of the other nut case kind of activities that we have going on around town that
sometimes you cannot work that out with the neighbor and that’s when you start getting into
this. But, I personally have the sense that we are talking about the classic example of one or
two bad apples ruining it for the bunch. That’s, I think we are getting that kind of feed back.
in general. I did talk with DEC today and you know there is debate as to who’s emissions
are worse, outdoor furnaces vs you know conventional indoor wood boiler, wood stove.
The State is considering all these things but I do know that there are laws on the books
already regarding burn materials, that the State Department of Environmental Conservation
who we pay our tax dollars to fund that department, they are responsible for enforcing these
air quality laws as well. There are mechanisms and laws out there but we do have these
lingering issues that bring us to consider what we are considering tonight. I am not sure that
answers you question, but you are right that you would hope that neighbors would be able to
work that out, however I have heard lots of neighbor stories in general in the town in the last
few years and you were on the Town Board and you know that you cannot always rely on
neighbors to work it out. It takes two.
Mr. Tucker-It does not seem like that it is a major problem, you have been going on here for
what an hour and there hasn’t been a sole came up to this table and complained to you that
they are against these furnaces.
Supervisor Stec-I am sure that we will before we are done.
Councilman Brewer-Let everybody be heard before you say that.
Mr. Tucker-But I am saying it now.
Supervisor Stec-This is an important issue and we are not in a hurry if it takes, we have had
these in years past we will have these in the next coming years where you are going to have
something, we want to make sure we give this as thorough as we can and consider it.
Mr. Tucker-I am not saying that, but I mean, it certainly does not look like a major problem.
Thank you.
Mr. Scott Gunther-My name is Scott Gunther I live on Ash Drive
Councilman Boor-Your last name?
Mr. Gunther-Gunther, I live on Ash Drive I am one of the gentlemen and has a wood stove
outdoor boiler.
Supervisor Stec-Are you the one closest to Glen Lake Road?
Mr. Gunther-Yes.
Supervisor Stec-I drive by earlier this week the Highway Dept. was out fixing to cut brush
and I figured I would stop in and say hello to them and I just did a drive by, I slowed down
with my red pickup and watched for a few minutes.
Mr. Gunther-As you will see with the proper burning of materials it does not emit a lot of
smoke, if there is a call for heat in the home you will get a puff of basically vapor because
the stove has been on an idle mode as that vapor clears out it clears out very quickly and
become invisible. My chimney is about six feet tall I do not have any neighbors around me.
If I need to go to the taller chimney I do not have a problem with that whatsoever. I do have
a problem with the fact that you are telling me I cannot use my stove anymore.
Supervisor Stec-I have not told you anything yet, but I get your point.
435
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Mr. Gunther-I have not been notified of any of the meetings other than by hear say, I have
never received any letters stating please come in and give your opinion of anything.
Councilman Boor-And that is important but you need to understand that you are not
registered, we would not know where you are unless.
Mr. Gunther-I was just told that he was at my home the other day so he knows where I am.
Supervisor Stec-I saw, I knew there was at least one on Ash Drive. I knew…
Mr. Gunther-I do burn the proper materials, it is wood. I am in the general contracting
business the wood that I burn has been cut the year before and dried and if I did not cut it
and burn it, it would be destined to the landfill which we have quite a few of those stump
dumps around. What looks better a stump dump full of useless wood or being used. I also
have a very big investment, the stove cost me ten thousand dollars. My home was electric
heat so I had to convert all of the heating system in side to baseboard heat, that was another
fifteen thousand dollars because I was not able to do that myself. That was all done under
legal terms. Installed legally, done under no, there should not be a problem at this point. I
do not feel that they should be banned at all. If my neighbor feels that they want to have a
stove so be it. If I cannot use my outside boiler I have an alternative my three wood stoves
in my house. I do not really see the lesser of two evils here because I am not going back to
oil, because oil is outrageous already. I do have an old home unfortunately it is not heated
or insulated very well, I have been working on that. My home has been handed down to me,
its something that I am going to hand down to my daughter later on. It is a big investment
and it is something, I am a local person that does support our Queensbury area. That is all I
have to say and if you have any questions?
Councilman Strough-Do you burn pressure treated wood?
Mr. Gunther-No. I burn logs and wood. If I have any cut off two by fours that are dried I
burn those as far as any dimensional lumber but nothing pressured treated. I do not burn
garbage there is no heat source in it. I have a garbage pick up service that I have picked up
every Tuesday. I have no reason to burn garbage. I do not really, I have nothing that I
would be doing that would jeopardize the use of my stove. You are more than welcome to
stop in anytime if you would like. I will show you how it works. Mine is actually a pressure
vessel which I do not know if all of them are or not but that does make it a little bit more
efficient. It actually has seven pounds.
Supervisor Stec-That is what is driving your costs, that is more expensive.
Mr. Gunther-That is correct, it is a seven and a half to thirteen pound pressure vessel it does
not work of atmospheric pressure it works off of, almost like a pressure pot.
Supervisor Stec-But you can run it at a higher temperature you can get more heat into your
house.
Mr. Gunther-Correct. That maybe why it does not smoke so much, I do not know. If you
need a video I have no problem whatsoever either setting up one of your videos or I will set
up a video myself.
Supervisor Stec-I told you I happen to drive by and yours looked very similar to the
Ireland’s and the Sweet’s that I saw very clean stack that day, I mean granted I was there at
your place probably all five or ten minutes, but you know, so I didn’t see the whole start up
and on a stagnant day who knows. But from what I saw I know what you are talking about.
Mr. Gunther-I feel there is more of an issue with the summer time camp fires than there is
with the wintertime wood stove. We are surrounded by all kinds of State and private
campgrounds. If you want to see a valley full of smoke wait until some of those camp
grounds are going and the prevailing wind is coming right down by us. Maybe that is where
some of the smoke problems are coming in, in the summer time. I do not burn mine in the
summer, it will probably be shut down late April somewhere in that range. Because it is not
436
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
effective to burn all summer when I have the oil furnace also. That is how I heat my water in
the summer.
Councilman Boor-It sounds like in your instance and I am assuming probably most of these
since we live in the clement we live in and it freezes you really cannot shut these things
down once we have weather below thirty two degrees, right, where the pipes will freeze?
Mr. Gunther-I do have mine antifreeze protected. Because I do want the option to be
Councilman Boor-But that lowers the efficiency doesn’t it?
Mr. Gunther-It does put, you do not get much heat transfer it does cut down a little bit.
Councilman Boor-I think, we are obviously going to have lots of discussions about this but I
think it is important that the public understands that for the most part once these things are
started in the fall they pretty much have to run through the winter so they do not freeze up.
Mr. Gunther-Correct.
Councilman Boor-So, whether you need the heat or not you still have to have a fire going.
Mr. Gunther-If you are choosing to heat with an outside source, correct.
Councilman Boor-Or you run the risk of freezing and loosing a lot of value in your system.
In other words costly repairs.
Mr. …. -That is an important issue that I would like to address.
Supervisor Stec-Please come back up.
Councilman Boor-Lets let Scott finish.
Mr. Gunther-I am finished if you do not have any other questions. You are all set with me,
Thank you for your time.
….
Supervisor Stec-Anyone else, Yes, Sir, Ma’am
Ms. Gloria Hlavaty – My name is Gloria Hlavaty and I live right next door to Scott Gunther.
I have absolutely no problem what so ever with his wood stove, outside wood stove, wood
burner. He is a good neighbor and I would have appreciated the Town Board of somebody
to have gone to visit him and discuss it. I resent having the article in the paper about banning
when it should have been an open forum before it even mentioning banning. Because I
think you increase peoples temperatures when you do something like that.
Supervisor Stec-We are doing all right so far tonight. But you are right knock on wood.
No, but your point is well taken. We try to be as informative as we can it was discussed in
December and again in
Councilman Boor-January
Supervisor Stec-January or February, and the paper has had a few articles in it but so we
always try to give as much of a heads up so people know, we try not to spring anything on
anyone last minute if we can ever avoid it. But your point being a neighbor is important.
Mrs. Hlavaty-I do want to say that I am also a distance neighbor I am not right on the say
road as the one that was complaining about the video with the smoke, but I know where he
lives and it is a gully, his neighbor that was complaining has a house up higher and I think it
all could have been remedied if someone came in and gave him the ok to have put up a
larger stack. I resent what has been done to him, so, and I just want it on the record.
437
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-Yes, Sir
Mr. Art Brown-I am Art Brown from Birch Road I am the bad apple. My stove has got a
stack the is approximately two feet above the telephone pole, the telephone pole is thirty two
feet. Ok. What happens is the wind on one condition it is not all the bad conditions the
wind blows off French Mountain comes through the wetlands and through the lady’s ice
pond and blows right into two of the neighbors that made the complaint when we get a
northeaster. This was something I really hadn’t, just really hadn’t expected. When it is the
smoky condition that people complain about it is like for about seven minutes on a start up.
I can crack the door open and give the stove more oxygen and it will get rid of the smoky
condition, ok. But what happens is you start getting flames coming out of the door and it is
kind of dangerous to stand there to do that. It also will set the seven hundred and fifty
gallons of water it will set it to boiling in just a very short amount of time and the stove
really was not meant to be run with the door open. I would be willing to put in a taller stack
and smaller in diameter while I was at it.
Supervisor Stec-Can I ask you a question or two and don’t mean to pick on anyone but you
did mention yours is the one that we did receive complains on recently at least we as a Town
Board. Have you, what do you burn in that stove?
Mr. Brown-Pallets. It does not matter I can do it with hard wood. It is not
Supervisor Stec-But you don’t burn, for the purpose of the record, and you do not have to
answer but
Mr. Brown-I do not do pressure treated wood, I am not burning garbage I got garbage
service I have had it continually since I have been there, I pay eight dollars a week for four
cans and they will even take a car tire if I so desire to send it.
Supervisor Stec-That is what I was asking, you are not burning anything that you are not
supposed to burn.
Mr. Brown-Tuesday morning usually about quarter to 8 the garbage truck comes and picks
up my garbage. I got a hopper there. It is just, one thing is we have got a mad man blowing
up our Navy Ships what if they start blowing up oil tankers? It just seems to me that we
have a renewal fuel and. When it quits getting cold I shut down by that time, it is work, I am
pretty tired of it by then. I am interesting myself in just experimenting with getting another
add on furnace that burns, free burn exhaust gas and have something that would be a back
up for when I am not loading the furnace. If my neighbors were friendly I would hook up a
pipe to haul water to their house.
Supervisor Stec-We understand that there are some neighbor issues there and we do not
want to get into the middle of that.
Mr. Brown-You call he, the Building and Code Inspector, I got no use for him. Nobody
talked to me first so they do not get, he does not get any respect.
Supervisor Stec-Lets try to keep focused here. But you are saying you are not burning any
plastic or rubber or oil, just wood?
Mr. Brown-No, I may have a lot of clutter and it maybe garbage to me and may be garbage
to somebody else or maybe my treasures to me and I will get rid of it properly.
Supervisor Stec-The video that we saw and again.
Mr. Brown-Did you see the smoky condition in the video you saw?
Supervisor Stec-Yes. I have seen pictures. What I saw in the video was very different from
what I saw last week at the other one on Ash Drive sorry Sir I forgot your name, Scott, Scott
Gunther, and
Mr. Brown-Well his is a more modern one, maybe
438
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-His is a high tech, certainly.
Mr. Brown-Way, way better.
Supervisor Stec-Different from the others that I saw.
Mr. Brown-They have improved it.
Supervisor Stec-That is why, yours for whatever reason was definitely putting out a lot more
smoke than the other ones that I have seen around town. I think some of the questions were,
coming from that were maybe you are burning something that you should not be and that is
why I asked you and I am glad you told us you are not.
Mr. Brown-I have had a lot of accusations of that. I have had accusations of all sorts of
things.
Supervisor Stec-You are saying you are not burning anything illegal though, and I do not
have evidence to prove otherwise.
Mr. Brown-I really do not want anybody coming to my house, but I could bring you to my
house and I could show you plenty of things that would be on your illegal list. Ok. If I
burned them they would not be there. Ok. In my opinion pine is a waste of time to burn
that and it was kind of advertised that I would burn anything I wanted when I got the thing.
The first year I got three truck loads of it and
Supervisor Stec-There is no heat in pine.
Mr. Brown-I am not saying that was false advertising but I was a little bit miss leading.
That is pine smoke we smell when we go up Nine in the summertime.
Supervisor Stec-That goes to the, about camp fires.
Mr. Brown-Right. I just do not have I currently don’t have a basement to put a furnace in.
Supervisor Stec-How old is you unit?
Mr. Brown-Six years old. I plan on it lasting a hundred and thirty years.
Supervisor Stec-Was it stainless inside?
Mr. Brown-It doesn’t matter I will repair it. You guys got fuel reserve if I change over to oil
to give me if they blow up all the oil tankers?
Supervisor Stec-We don’t.
Mr. Brown-When you make a law just for one person that is called a bill of at tender and be
very careful about that. My dander is up already and I am willing to go to court.
Supervisor Stec-We have not passed anything yet.
Mr. Brown-Any other questions?
Councilman Strough-I have one, now several people have given us this and these are people
favoring they have wood furnaces so I have seen this more than once, it is the HPBA are
you familiar with the outdoor best burn practices? This is the Hearth, Patio, Barbeque,
Association. This is what we have been talking about the recommended stack height. It
says that it should be, if you are between fifty and one hundred feet of any residence the
stack height should be at least seventy five percent of the height of the eve line of that
residence plus two feet. We heard previously from
Mr. Brown-Within how much percent of the eve, the eve on the bottom edge, right?
439
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Unknown-Yes.
Councilman Strough-We had heard from Mr. Tollefson who is the representative of
Central Boiler from Minnesota who spoke earlier. He recommends that the stack be higher
than your neighbors roof line plus two feet. So he has even a more stricter
Mr. Brown-I am not going to be able to go higher than the one on the top of the hill?
Councilman Strough-Well how high would that be then?
Mr .Brown-If I am at twenty two feet I will double it to fifty foot of pipe.
Councilman Strough-Would that bring you up to within the HPBA’s regulations?
Mr. Brown- You said the eves, you said the eves, I am already within a couple of feet of the
eves of my building.
Councilman Strough-No, of your neighbors building.
Mr. Brown-Her building, she is up on the hill she is like one hundred and twenty feet away.
I do when I realize it blowing toward their house I go out and turn it off and put like a nail in
the thing so it just gets a little bit of air. I got seven hundred and fifty gallons of water and it
will stay warm for awhile until the wind changes direction.
Councilman Strough-Do you have a spark arrestor on yours?
Mr. Brown-No.
Supervisor Stec-Anything else Mr. Brown? Thank you for your time.
Mr. Brown-I think there should be something I should say. The first thing is, is the nice
feature of these things, is there is no spontaneous combustion of furniture that has been
sitting in the house for eight years next to the wood stove. You get no spontaneous
combustion of two by fours that is behind brick and cement board walls that are behind the
wood stove. Ok, now, you don’t when you leave the house most of the people, a lot of the
people that have had wood stoves have had an inside one before. When I had them, when I
left the house I always damper it down and did not really want it to be going full boor when
I wasn’t there. You do not have, you do not get that feeling of looking for the fire
department which direction they are headed when you are down at the grocery store. To me
its improvement over the idea and when you got he is ninety eight percent proficient nature
gas and Kerosene stoves have just been around a short time there is a lot of room for
improvement on these things. I think it is a part of the future. When you got, we have used
up two thirds of our fossil fuel in a hundred years it took us fifteen thousand years to make
and somewhere it is just. I am sorry I smoked some people out.
Supervisor Stec-I appreciate you coming tonight though and sharing with us because your
woodstove and not you is the apple I was referring to, that was the one we were getting the
calls on but it raises an issue that is much larger than just what is going on down in that part
of Glen Lake and you know there are a lot of other people that are affected. I appreciate you
coming tonight and answered some questions about your operation. Thank you. Yes, Sir.
Mr. Dave McGowan-Good evening, my name is Dave McGowan I live at forty eight Birch
Road I am north of the furnace on Birch Road and I am also just east with the furnace on
Ash Drive. That sort of puts us right in the cross fire between the two. Just for the record I
am Chemical Engineer by degree and also in practice. I am going to give you just a minute
to study the photographs that I have just put in front of you. Every single one of you is
probably saying holy you fill in the blank. What is really, I have four photographs that I
have distributed to each of the Board Members and what is very surprising is with this
hearing coming, we took those two photographs on the front Saturday morning at nine am. I
was standing on my lake lot and we were watching the plume and all of a sudden it just
erupted into that huge cloud of smoke that you see. I was standing on the lot my lungs were
440
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
burning. I was there I was talking to somebody working on the Searle property on the house
by the name of Karl Arnold when I left Karl his eyes were tearing and he was wiping the
tears away from his eyes and saying I can’t believe that I have to work in this condition for
the next two weeks. The second photo that was taken in February so this is pretty much an
every day occurrence, that photo taken in February the emission were estimated by the State
Attorney General Protection Bureau to be at eighty percent of paucity. That exceeds the
twenty percent which is a violation of the New York State Air Pollution status 211.2 which
prohibits emissions of air contaminants that are injurious to humans, plant or animal life or
the property for which unreasonably interferes with the comfortable environment of life or
property. Everybody on the Board look at those photos, can anybody tell me that, that is not
going to interfere with the comfortable enjoyment of life or property at my home.
Anybody? Second, I would like to read from the Queensbury’s zoning ordinance dated,
st
April 1. 2002. Number 179-6-040 entitled Particulates and Smoke. No use shall emit
particulates and or smoke that is detrimental to the public health welfare and safety. No use
shall emit particles or smoke that exceeds the paucity of two on the Ringelmann Chart. For
those of you who don’t know what the Ringelmann Chart is, it is a system, it is a virtual, the
Ringelmann System is virtually a scheme where by graduated shades of gray varying by
five equal steps between white and black. In other words, white would be zero, total black
would be five. It does not take an engineering degree to look at those photos and see that we
have violated the Queensbury Ordinance. That is definitely greater than two. Secondly on
the books, Ordinance 179-6-030, No use shall regularly emit offensive odors perceptibly at
the property line of any adjoining use. My lungs were burning on my property that is a
direct violation of the Queensbury Ordinance. As you can see from the photographs the
residents of Birch Road have been subjected to detrimental health impacts of the outdoor
furnaces for too long. Queensbury has violated its own zoning ordinances by not measuring
and enforcing the ordinances on particulate and smoke. These photographs clearly show
smoke and particulate densities that are igneous to public health. Those who are undecided
on the Queensbury proposed bans on outdoor furnaces and for those who claim a ban
violates their rights, my family and everyone living around the furnaces rights are being
violated. When the outdoor furnace emission leaves their property enters their lungs our
children’s lungs and our homes, outdoor furnaces in residential use zone routinely violates
Queensbury and New York State Air Quality Ordinances and Laws. If emissions from these
furnaces stayed on the owners property it would not be a problem other than maybe the
owners shorten life expectancy due to the volume of the emissions. But the emission don’t
stay put and surrounding homeowners are the ones that are paying for this. For those who
claim that the emissions are benign with no impact to the homes around them please take
another look at the photographs. Is it noticeable? Is this a nine? Would your home, lungs
and family would you want these emissions entering your home, your lungs, your family’s
lungs your children’s lungs? All year round? For those who claim financial hardship from
having to remove them what is the cost of asthma, what is the cost of children’s lungs, the
elderly’s lungs. What is the cost of not being able to enjoy your home your property due to
someone else’s actions? What is the cost of a reduced quality of life because you and your
family can’t breath the air safely. What is the cost to the neighborhood from a child ten
years old saying, they would rather move than play out side because it hurts their lungs.
Yes, it is happening in Queensbury, home of natural beauty, a good place to live or at least it
used to be. My children experience lung congestion playing outside when the outdoor
furnace is operating due to the high volume of particulate matter emitted. Is Queensbury
going to continue to let the neighborhoods deteriorate due to the operation of furnaces which
violate its open ordinances? Finally, for those who suggest that allowing outdoor furnaces
to operate from October to April is the answer. What is the outdoor furnace, why does the
outdoor furnace owner get to decide when I can enjoy my yard? When my children can
play out doors? When my wife and I can sit out on my deck? When we can skate on the
lake? When the furnace owners can violate State and Town Ordinances. Again, take
another look at the photographs would you want to live next to that outdoor furnace?
Would you want your family or children being exposed to the emissions? Do you want
these things popping up in a development that is new in Queensbury? Would you want to
be subjected to the questionable potpourri of emissions from what ever the furnace owner
happened to find or wanted to get rid of. Would you want the smoke stack transporting
smoke directly into your yard? Would you want to have enjoyment of your yard and home
diminished because of emissions from the neighborhood incinerator? In closing my family
would ask that the Town Board uphold their own ordinances on the books and ban outdoor
furnaces from Queensbury. Queensbury’s inaction regarding these devices have caused law
441
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
abiding home owners to pay with their health. Queensbury a nice place to live, not on Ash
Drive and Birch Road. We believe that we have sufficient evidence that will prove
Queensbury has been negligent in enforcing their own laws and we are contemplating legal
action against the town if the new resolution is not passed. We asked two things, number
one, new construction of the furnaces be immediately banned when the current status
expires in June and number two, that the existing furnaces be shut off and decommissioned
st
permanently as of June 1. This going back to the photographs too, you can take a look at
the roof line and where the pipe is in relationship to the smoke, you will see that the pipe
appears to be just above the roof line. I do not think raising that stack is really going to help
much at all. I was again on my lake lot across the Bay and I could smell the smoke. The
other night in fact yesterday night, when I walked outside I could smell the smoke and it was
fairly dense and I walked toward the furnace you take it my house is probably five or six
hundred feet from the stack where we live and as I got closer I could smell it. The paucity at
that point was not nearly what it is in the photograph. So, there is still is a smell and there
still is a diminishing of quality of life due to that stack in our neighborhood.
Supervisor Stec-Questions.
Councilman Strough-Who’s smoke stack is it?
Supervisor Stec-That is Mr. Brown’s, he is waiving his hand.
Mr. McGowan-Mr. Brown’s, Birch Drive.
Supervisor Stec-Since we have identified and since I believe what was a rhetorical question
I will answer it. I would not want to live next to that and it is my understanding that from
the ones that I have driven around town and looked at this is the exception. The exception
to the rule. The offending furnace if you will that has brought us here. I certainly agree
with you I do not think, this is going on, on a daily basis you know, this is the norm of the
operation of this outdoor furnace I whole heartedly agree with you. But, I would also say
that I from what I have been able to understand in my conversations and my own research
that this is not the norm for the rest of them. Do you have a problem here, oh absolutely. Is
it an enforcement issue, I think that it probably is and I would ask Chris and you probably
will not be able to answer this off the top of your head. I would like tomorrow to know
what call volume, complaints, the file, have we taken complaints? Yes we are responsible
for enforcement of our code however we do not have a police force and we rely on neighbor
complaints and neighbors filing complaints, contacting the DEC and the DEC is the
enforcing authority on air quality, not the Town of Queensbury. We do have an ordinance
that supports DEC but the heavy lifting here is to be done by the State DEC. I do not want
to speak for them but I know that they would complain about budget issues themselves. I
think that it is important for us to know if we had a volume of complaints and certainly I
know and there are people in this room that can attest, the Town is very good at following
up on complaints to the point where sometimes we have very contentious confrontations in
handling complaints.
Councilman Boor-If I could just add a little bit to your questioning on a subject that I think
goes to the heart of this. That has to do with the difference between an Ordinance and a
Law. One of the reasons where ever this ends up what I would like to end up with is a law,
because then enforcement is in the hands of the sheriff. It is not an ordinance and it is not I
believe that laws are enforced by law enforcement officers.
Supervisor Stec-Well, we may as well get into this, yes and no. Mark is shaking his head
and I will let him interject before I throw in my two cents. There are differences between
ordinances and laws but I would also say that the Sheriff
Town Counsel Schachner-The general proposition is not correct.
Councilman Boor-OK.
Supervisor Stec-The Sheriff does not necessarily drive around
Councilman Boor-No, he would have to be notified. But I am saying that the enforcement
body wouldn’t it be the Sheriff if it is a law?
442
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Town Counsel Schachner-That is not necessarily the case.
Councilman Boor-Give me an exception.
Town Counsel Schachner-The Town of Queensbury Code the entire thing is a local law
every bit of the Queensbury’s Code has been adopted by local law and as you presumably
aware we have Code Enforcement personnel that go about enforcing many provisions in the
Town of Queensbury Codes. So, there are many dozens of examples of laws that are
enforced by our Code Enforcement Town Personnel not by the County Sheriff.
Councilman Boor-So when do we make the determination as we did recently to have a law
enforcement officer accompany one of our town employees to enforce something? How
was that decision made?
Town Counsel Schachner-That decision was generally made as a matter of security and
safety.
Councilman Boor-We are talking public safety here so I am trying to get to the root of when
we make these decision and how we make these decisions and when do we decide.
Town Counsel Schachner-I am not arguing with you.
Councilman Boor-I want the information, because I want to know when it is appropriate to
have law enforcement, enforce a law and when is it not appropriate.
Town Counsel Schachner-I cannot answer that question. The example you gave we did not
give the advice, but if asked we would give the advice that if there is a viable, if we would
perceive a threat to somebody health or safety in a given situation we have advised town
code enforcement and various town enforcement personnel to be accompanied by armed
deputy sheriff personnel if appropriate and if possible. In that particular example, if I am on
the right example which I hope I am,
Councilman Boor-It is not critical, but I think its poignant.
Town Counsel Schachner-that advice was taken and I think that advice seemed to have been
good advice and I think we are all the better for that advice having been taken.
Supervisor Stec-I would also add Roger because I think I understand what you are getting at
is that and you probably what to shoot me pardon, the pun.
Councilman Boor-The notion that people haven’t called Code Enforcement in the Town is
ridiculous.
Supervisor Stec-I do not know if they have or they haven’t but
Director Round-The gentleman is referencing a section of the law that, of our local zoning
ordinance that pertains to site plan review projects that there are environmental performance
standards as you know that were new with our 2002 regulations that include some issues
that deal with smoke opacity, noise, odors etc. those are standards to be utilized by the
Planning Board in is review projects in order to impose some base lines. It is not a nuisance
law it wasn’t written with a particular issue in hand in mind and it is not a nuisance law that
is used by the Code Enforcement Staff to pursue this particular issue.
Town Counsel Schachner-If I could add to that if that is the source of the Code language
that the member of the public is referring to them for the benefit of the Board the public and
anybody else understand that, that means that those standards only apply to projects that the
Planning Board has site review authority over. Now, that Chris has mentioned those I am
familiar as well, there are a number of environmental performance standards as well as other
performance standards, traffic and the light that are in our zoning ordinance for projects
subject to site plan review. So, just to use traffic as an analogy we have traffic standards as I
recall if at my personal residence I have more traffic showing up right now that are in those
443
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
standards that is not a viable enforcement issue because my personal residence is not subject
to site plan review. So, those particular standards that the commenter was referring to it
sounds like do not even apply to these operations because they are not subject to site plan
review.
Supervisor Stec-So, you would say, if somebody calls tomorrow and says that neighbor X
and neighborhood Y has a furnace that is putting out smoke like a locomotive and they
complain to us, our recourse on the books, we do not have any then what would
Councilman Boor-We have a law.
Director Round-We refer, further the complain to New York State DEC as we quoted in the
workshop there is definitely an air quality issue I think that is well evidenced that we have
referred them to DEC and DEC needs to take that enforcement action into consideration. I
think you had that some conversation today with the DEC official.
Supervisor Stec-Yes, I did, they have air quality people in Warrensburg, now are they going
to show up at two o’clock in the morning that is the issue. What, recourse do they have,
well they could show up at eight o’clock the following morning and take a complaint and
pursue it from there. That is how it was explained to me, today.
Mr. McGowan-What triggers site plan review? Are you talking about an ordinance that
can’t be enforced prior to a furnace being built? That is what I am hearing there which
doesn’t make any sense, how can I determine if I have got a zero to five Ringelmann on a
structure that it’s not built?
Town Counsel Schachner-I can try, unless I am mistaken and Chris will jump in if I am, I
am not aware of any requirement for site plan approval currently. The only requirement for
site plan approval for outdoor furnaces and therefore the criteria, the environmental
performance standards that exist in our zoning ordinance which is a law, I say zoning
ordinance which is a law a local law. The environmental performance criteria which exists
in our zoning law would not apply to these outdoor furnaces.
Supervisor Stec-So, that section of the Code what, under what circumstances would that
apply?
Town Counsel Schachner-When a project is subject to site plan review. I think the
gentlemen asked
Supervisor Stec-So, if somebody says I am going to build factory in Queensbury and I am
going to have smoke stack on that factory we are going to ask their designers their builders
their engineers about their emissions.
Town Counsel Schachner-Correct, that answers.
Supervisor Stec-They have to be able to demonstrate to us that they are going to meet those
requirements.
Town Counsel Schachner-Correct and the commenter asked how can you know before the
stack is built?
Supervisor Stec-And then five years after the factory is built, five years after the factory is
built, they are exceeding that, now exceeding their site plan approval?
Councilman Boor-Let me convolute it just a little bit more then, ok? What we have here is a
light industrial use of residential properties because we have power generation occurring in
a residential area which means that they are in violation of another ordinance.
…
Councilman Boor-You are generating power believe it or not …yes you are we can talk
about it but
444
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-I am not sure I want to go …
Councilman Boor-I am just trying to bring up the types of things that would be inappropriate
in residential and we can’t
Unknown-We are generating kinetic energy not power.
Supervisor Stec-Lets keep, right now.
Councilman Boor-Its one and the same if you look up your physic’s book .
Supervisor Stec-Tim or Roger sorry, I am used to yelling at you, lets keep it here with those
with the microphones talking please.
Councilman Boor-Well, I am on the Board.
Supervisor Stec-No, I know but not to the audience.
Councilman Boor-Well, I guess my issue here is if you look at power generation its done
with internal combustion whether it is natural gas oil, coal, that is how we get the electricity
when we hit that switch, whether you like it or not. Nuclear in some instances but it is
power generation so, we can argue the semantics all day long but the bottom line is you
essentially have a building on a property that is generating power in a residential
neighborhood and the effects of that generation of power are polluting the neighbors next
door.
Supervisor Stec-Myself Roger speaking for myself and without having had a chance to pick
Counsels brain on this particular matter I mean, that scenario you would be describing every
furnace, every wood boiler, every gas furnace, every oil furnace in the town. I think it is a
stretch where you are going I think personally is a stretch to demonstrate that.
Councilman Boor-I think these people might feel otherwise.
Supervisor Stec-No, I think that clearly this has got to violate something with DEC.
Councilman Boor-I think that if everybody in the Town installed a wood burning furnace
you would have some issues, trust me and it is not the same as turning that switch on and
having Niagara Mohawk power come into your place from a long ways away.
Mr. McGowan-Lets assume that he is correct then that they applied for new construction
and you have no way of knowing on new construction whether the Ringelmann value is
going to exceed to then, prior to construction? Some will and some will not. I think that is a
perfect issue for the ban.
Supervisor Stec-What he said though was that they don’t apply, we are not talking about
new construction, they apply to site plan and these don’t currently require site plan.
Town Counsel Schachner-And for what it is worth I do not know how far you are going to
take this but I have participated in Department of Environmental Conservations sponsored
hearings at which in fact air quality engineers and combustion engineers and other have in
fact made projections and done scientific studies prior to construction as to what the opacity
of values would be what the particulate emission values would be and what the nitric oxide
Sulfur dioxide and a whole slue of other emissions would be. So, I do not know I am not
going to debate, I am not an engineer and I am not going to get into a credential debate but I
do know that science and Supervisor Stec probably knows far more than I about this but
science claims that those predictions can be made.
Mr. McGowan-I am an engineer and sometimes we are wrong.
Supervisor Stec-That is true, not often but sometimes. Thank you.
445
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Strough-Mr. McGowan how frequently or what percentage of the time does the
opacity exceed 20% on this particular wood burning operation?
Supervisor Stec-What my question would be is this a five minute start up event or is this the
normal go on hour after hour.
Councilman Boor-Remember the video? Remember how long that video..
Supervisor Stec-I am asking him, I saw the video.
Councilman Boor-OK. I just did not know if you remembered.
Supervisor Stec-Oh yea, I remember better than you do. It was in December.
Councilman Boor-I am talking about the length and duration of the smoke is what I am
talking about.
Supervisor Stec-It ran for a good forty five minutes the video.
Unknown-In terms of frequency.
Supervisor Stec-First identify yourself?
Mrs. Maryann McGowan- My name is Maryann McGowan I also live at 48 Birch Road. In
terms of frequency we are blessed that we both have jobs outside the home that our children
attend school and that we are not at the home twenty four by seven, if we did we certainly
would have asthma issues and we would have many more health problems than we currently
do because of that furnace. This particular situation in front of you was noticed by my
husband at approximately ten to nine in the morning, that continued for at least forty
minutes, before it appeared that the operator shut it down, at least that is how it appeared to
us. But, that was at least forty minutes. In terms of over all odor producing particulate
quality that happened to be, that happens daily it happens constantly it happens when the air
is stagnant, it happens when the air is coming from the south because we live north of that
furnace.
Supervisor Stec-I think that where we are going at this not a five, ten minute start up once a
day kind of event. This happens more frequently than that.
Mrs. McGowan-That is correct.
Supervisor Stec-And when it happens it lasts longer than five or ten minutes.
Mr. McGowan-more than half an hour.
Supervisor Stec-Sometimes or most of the time it last longer than five or ten minutes, I am
just trying to get an idea here.
Mrs. McGowan-Again, I really cannot speak to that because you try not to be outside when
that is happening and you know the minute you walk outside the door and I can tell you that
when the furnace cycles for example my children have been trying to go out ice skating and
we get a view of the furnace when its cycling and it easily cycles and produces emissions
similar to that every fifteen minutes if not more frequently, depending again on what it is
burning and how cold it is outside and the other variables.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you. Anything else Sir? Anyone else, Yes? ..Sir
Mr. Brown-I am going to leave, I just want to leave you with my phone number, I just it
down about eleven o’clock and I not go filling it all night long. I start up about nine o’clock.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you Sir, have a good evening. Yes Ma’am. Chris would you do
that though tomorrow, I would be curious is there is any data we can glean as to what
complaints we have received.
446
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Director Round-Oh yea…
Supervisor Stec-If you get a call about this right now, what would we do, we would refer
them to DEC we would send somebody we would hang up and say sorry we cannot help
you?
Director Round-..how we deal with them before …make an investigation…
Supervisor Stec-We are, we do not have a code per se
Director Round-..entertain the issue from one aspect …
Supervisor Stec-We need to know what how is it currently done if you have a minute I
would like to hear.
Councilman Brewer-..Do we need to know right now, let this lady speak.
Director Round-The town does not have a local air emission, nuisance law pertaining to
particulates etc. that is one way to deal with it is the output I think you can deal with it the
other way is to deal with the source of the problem. Different communities deal with it
differently, some people like to get rid of the potential problem. Unless you are a very large
community that has unique circumstances you don’t generally get involved with air
emissions type of regulations that has been an avenue for the State. It is a very difficult very
complex avenue I think, we told you at the workshop several months ago that there is a law
on the book, New York State DEC law that deals with air pollution and I think that is what
you are largely what you are dealing with is an air pollution issue. We suggested that maybe
a conversation with DEC might help produce an increase in enforcement.
Supervisor Stec.-I had an informal one today maybe we need to have a more formal one in
the future. Yes, Ma'am. Thank you.
Mrs. Linda Clark-Hello, my name is Linda Clark I live at the end of Ash Drive and the end
of Birch Road and my house is the one on the hill.
Supervisor Stec-Lucky you.
Mrs. Clark-Lucky me.
Mrs. Clark-Before I begin my actual presentation tonight I have two neighbors who have
asked me to read letters aloud to you, if that is all right. Ok. This first letter is from
Kenneth and Leo Searles their home is on One Birch Road, Glen Lake. To Whom it May
Concern. We have owned a home on Birch Road on Glen Lake for sixteen years. My
family has enjoyed being part of this lake community and the larger Queensbury
community. This past year has been spent completely rebuilding our home and in doing so
we have gladly made sure to follow every guideline and stipulation to the letter. We take
great pride in our neighborhood and wanted to go about this rebuild with our community in
mind. This being said we have great concern about the outdoor furnace in our area we are
extremely worried about the pollution that is effecting all of us in this area as well as the
long term effects will be have on Glen Lake. This Monday we ask that the Town of
Queensbury please take this into consideration and vote to eliminate the use of outdoor
furnaces. Thank you for your time and consideration. Sincerely Kenneth and Leigh Searles.
The second letter oh by the way you have copies of everything in your folders, if I miss
pronounce a word you can let me know. The second letter is from Robert and Ann Clarke
who live next door to the furnace, the furnace is approximately fifty feet from their home.
Dear Members of the Board, It is with great concern that we appeal to you to pass a law
eliminating and banning the future use of outdoor furnaces in the Town of Queensbury. We
have lived next to one about fifty feet of this furnace for seven years and know from
personal experience the negative effects of this type of heating to the neighborhood. Our air
quality is affected twenty four hours a day by smoke an nauseous fumes when in use. We
feel that the Town has an obligation to protect the health and well being of all its citizens.
These furnaces may be great for the owners but create health hazards and impact on the
447
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
quality of life of the surrounding community neighbors. The miss use of these furnaces by
uncaring owners is another issue the Board must address. To date the Town has shown no
ability to monitor and enforce violations of burning fuels such as garbage, trash, and other
waste materials which we have personally witnessed. Officials of the Town of Queensbury
instructed us to take pictures of the neighbor violating burning regulations. So, far our
neighbor has refused to pose for pictures fueling his furnace. This suggestion imposes on us
the obligation of monitoring this furnace, we question the fairness of that obligation.
Again, we feel the Town of Queensbury has an obligation and duty to protect the
environment we live in. This includes the lake, the land and the air quality. To grant
permission to a few to spoil the environment for the convenience of a few at the expense of
the rest of the community is morally reprehensible. Please protect my family, my neighbors
and myself by passing a law to ban outdoor furnaces in the Town of Queensbury. Sincerely,
Ann and Robert Clark. As you know I made quite a lengthy presentation at the first public
hearing so I am not going to repeat a lot of what I have said. I hope to present a little bit
more or something different to you. If you recall these are the pictures that I had shown to
you along with the video. So, if anyone has not had a chance to see them please you are
welcome to take a look. First of all I would like to present to you something I did not have
at that meeting, and that would be a letter from my doctor explaining that my physical
condition has been effected my health has been effected by this smoke. Ms. Whitty is a
patient of mine, actually Whitty was my old name, Clark is now my new name, and suffered
for many years with allergies and upper airway congestion which all started when her
neighbor started using an outdoor furnace. I would like to see this exposure stopped and I
support her neighbor being banned from using an outdoor furnace. He said to me that he
would write a more detailed letter if need be and if you would like him to do so. I do want
to let you know that I have been on medication since the first winter that he installed that
furnace. I experience on a daily basis difficulties breathing my eyes burn, I get terrible
headaches, it is just impossible, impossible and it makes me miserable. I am not a real
happy person lots of the time but other times I am. In any case outdoor burns, I found a web
site, I could not believe it because it was such an ironic twist to everything. This particular
web site is an organization which supports the burning or wood as a source of heat, but it is
extremely critical of the outdoor furnace and actually discourages its use. What I did I
actually copied some of these things for you so that you could see what I was referring to.
This is woodheat.org. it talks about in the first article that you see there outdoor boilers,
what it is and I have highlighted some key things for you so you do not have read the whole
thing tonight and we are not going to do that. I just hope that you take the time to read it
later on. They do indicate that this is a very controversial method and you can see the big
problem is smoke. “Boy do they smoke” If you turn you will find there was an EPA test
done on the outdoor burners done in 1998 the average of several test runs for each burner
produces an emission rate of about fifty grams of smoke per hour and an efficiency of fifty
percent. This particular group believes that the test were not representative. The real world
conditions because fire wood was dry and the heat losses from the unit itself and
underground piping estimated to be eight percent by one manufacturer was not considered.
They continue, they know of no real test of units under real conditions but we expect the
actual delivered efficiency would be considerably lower and the emissions likely would be
higher than these test results. There is currently a decision under appeal regarding these
furnaces. The next piece of information that you have is this was really fascinating because
this is actually a whole group of people that wrote to this site and it is their personal
testimonials about the effect of or their experiences with wood burners, outdoor wood
burners. Many of these people own them if not most of them and every single one of them
indicated the major problem, smoke, smoke, smoke. It smokes a lot. It smokes, over and
over again. One of the Board members talked about sparks. One of the testimonials said on
the second page here, but we need to add our own spark arrestor because so many sparks
came out the unit as sold, shoots lots of sparks unless the wood is high quality and very dry.
However with the spark arrestor in place we can burn any day we like anything we like. We
do not need to worry about tending the furnace or starting brush fires so that is an issue.
One women says, I feel trapped because of the smoke, boy do I sympathize with her, you
cannot go outside when that thing is fired up. Yes, it runs pretty much the entire day and it
is at night time when it begins to really smell. The odor can be sometimes it can wake you
out of your sleep. It is that bad. So, you can pretty much assume that, that is when the
garbage is being burned. The next thing in your packet was the McGowans actually brought
it to my attention, the law on the books, Queensbury Code the general, it says General
Legislation Environmental and Performance Standards Particulates and Smoke. I do not see
448
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
any indicators here of limitations. It says here no use shall emit particulates and or smoke
that is detrimental to public health, welfare and safety, no use shall emit particulates or
smoke that exceeds proacity of two on the Ringelmann chart. No use. I do not see where
there is a stipulation as to what use, when or anything like that here. This is right from the
web site. Then I also threw in a real basic explanation of the Ringelmann Chart because we
started complaining nearly five years ago about this furnace and we told by Dave Hatin
there isn’t a law on the book to help you, nothing. He never, never brought the Ringelmann
smoke chart to test to see if this smoke was in compliance of the town code? Since he
doesn’t know about it I figured maybe some of the Board Members didn’t know about it, so
here it is. This is it, this is all you need. Yes, it was developed in the late 1800’s I also read
the history on it, and what you have to do and I know you asked Mr. McGowan if he
checked to see, it is not our job to police these people who are violating the laws, it is your
job. You have to take this chart and you have to put it up against the smoke stack that we
are not allowed to go near or God knows what would happen if we did. You put it up
against the smoke stack and you stand a distance away until this gets gray and you check the
gray with the smoke and the air and I can tell you right now there is no way on Gods green
earth this smoke stack spews anything less than a three and two is the limit. Two is actually
the first list, one would be completely white, two is the second one here this one and then
three, four and five as explained in here is completely black, would be a black sheet of
paper. Never once in five years did we hear anything of this. This could have been
something that would be usable to shut this down. It really just it is mind boggling that I
have had to put up with all these health issues for all these years when there was something
on the books. In regards to the chimney height, he would have to put a chimney in nearly as
high as a high raise building in order to be above my house because I do live on a hill. So, I
do not see how that is really possible. When it comes to regulation we have been told by
DEC and the Town that it is almost impossible to regulate. Because you have to catch this
person doing the wrong thing and it is not just us that has to catch them it has to be DEC and
you know what DEC did come out one time and they did catch him. The caught him once
and you know what they did after all of these complaints? Well this was his first time that
we caught him so we are not going to write up a warning. Well we’ll just tell him, that is
what we were told. Time and time again we have notified the Town in the last five years
and if you do not have it on written record many times I did write it down and I can have
many people come in and testify here that they called the town they talked with Dave Hatin
they have talked to Chris Round and they have talked with a number of people over and
over again about our concerns and we have gotten no where. One of the other things that I
did bring up at the last meeting that I just want to reiterate here is the fact that what these
furnaces do in terms of lending them self to the kind of environment they inspire keep in
mind that this is what it looks like when they start gathering together the things needed to
burn. Of course they are not burning that, it all depends on who you are talking to and what
time of day it is of course. I found it interesting tonight in listening to all the people that
there were very very few people here who were neighbors who actually testified on behalf
of those who own the furnaces. I actually do sympathize with those who have purchased
those furnaces. I am sorry, but I also paid that much money in medical expenses, x rays,
doctors appointments, I have paid that much money too. It is time to put an end to it.
Therefore I have to agree with Mr. McGowan that these things should be banned out right,
they are a health hazard whether they are burning garbage or they are burning pallets or
wood the design of these things is completely un-environmentally friendly. So, I would like
you to please seriously consider this and ban these things from Queensbury. Thank you
very much.
Supervisor Stec-Anyone else first time? Yes, Sir.
Mr. Paul Derby- First on a side note the DEC…Paul Derby 36 Ash Drive Just as a side
note to the Town the DEC really has not been a help for us on Glen Lake on several issues.
I am just wondering if the Town can somehow pressure the State to
Supervisor Stec-If I could just interrupt Paul because, I am, I have been listening tonight and
I have been doing a lot of thoughts on this as has everyone else and I mean clearly there is
an issue with at least this one that we are talking about. I am just stymied that at what I just
heard that we have had, I understand dealing with the State and some of the touchy feely
laws that are out there that are kind of, it is real easy to say it’s there it is not there, it is
fourteen feet or it is twenty feet and you start getting into this well you got to catch them in
449
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
the act and it has got to last you know ten minutes and all the stuff that goes with these sort
of laws like the noise ordinance. So, we go for hours of operation on garbage collection as
opposed to noise ordinance. Now we have an issue over who is going to enforce these laws
is the sheriff going to enforce it or how is this. I find it impossible to believe that DEC is
this unresponsive to this problem and so I, look I am not sure whatever we do when ever we
get around to doing it on this is going to make everyone or no one happy but I mean it is
clear to me from tonight from January from December from these pictures from the pictures
we got from the forty five minutes video tape that ran it was probably longer but we were,
we won’t add on, that something is wrong here . If we cannot handle a problem like this I
mean that is ridiculous. So, I am going to make some phone calls tomorrow I am going to
call our DEC rep. and get him hopping on his new job Mr. Montesi and we are going to get
some resolution on this because this is nonsense. I mean this is nonsense. This is nonsense
not only for you folks on Ash Drive and Birch Drive to have to put up with this but this is
also nonsense that this has pushed us to the point where we have had a dozen other people
that are operating them responsibly that I have visited personally and it has gotten to this
point where we are going to ruin it for everyone else. So, that is where I am coming from,
in I am in a position where I want to say you know what we need to get a hold of this
problem and we need to get some restrictions and we need to have a law on the books for
outdoor furnaces and emissions, yea, absolutely but do I want to go all the way off the cliff
and say you know what you have been operating one responsibly for ten years you are on
five acres of land and you are not bothering anyone and no one has ever complained and
you put ten thousand dollars into this investment I do not want to go there. I want to fix
your problem and we are going to get to the bottom of this and if we got to get the Sheriff
involved and we got to get the State Police involved but if what you are all telling me is true
and all the evidence I have seen so far tells me I am hearing the truth on Glen Lake that
something has to be done with this but I do not want to punish the good guy. It is very easy
to enforce a ban you drive by Monday through Friday working hours you either got one in
the yard or you don’t got one in the yard, you got one in the yard bam you are in it, you go
into the Court System hey the thing is there that is the easiest thing to enforce. But you get
into this well you know we got an enforcement issue I do not believe that you should correct
this problem by, an enforcement problem by just saying well the easiest thing to enforce is
you are not allowed to have them at all. So, are we going to blow this off? No. We are
going to fix this one. But, you know I, hopefully we do not have a whole lot more on public
hearing for this tonight but where I am going for and I think a lot of the Board Members are
inclined to think about this some more. But this problem we do not need to think about any
more. This is a specific instance that we should be able to handle without getting carried
away. Agreed Staff?
Councilman Boor-But lets let these people finish.
Supervisor Stec-Go ahead, Paul.
Mr. Derby-I just wanted to make a note that DEC has not been that cooperative in the past
with things so any pressure at that level would be great. It seems pretty clear to me that
outdoor wood burning furnaces were made for rural areas. You have heard to experts say,
most of them said that. It seems pretty clear that they were not made for residential areas in
particular high density areas. I just feel that they are completely inappropriate in high
density area. Frankly I would not want my neighbor putting one up, we live on fifty foot lots
or hundred foot lots or across the street it is just not appropriate in those areas. So, I think
we could almost make it simpler by saying ok, what is appropriate well maybe in rural area.
Maybe fore instance ten acre lots would be ok, with half mile set backs or something. I do
not know, something to work for, but the idea that you can just put them anywhere in
Queensbury when you have houses right next to each other just doesn’t seem reasonable to
me.
Supervisor Stec-Paul, not to interrupt you again but I will, is we do have two issues here we
have got going forward, what is going to come in the future and then of course we have got
which has got a lot of people on the other side of the issue here tonight, we have got some
existing one and what do we do with that, but under no circumstances should anyone have
to tolerate what I have been hearing about this. Maybe the solution is we do get on and we
do crack down on where we allow these in town but that still leaves the question of what do
450
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
we do with the ones that are existing that have not demonstrated a problem and that is a
separate issue that we need to address at the same time.
Councilman Boor-I think there is going to be some people to speak to that actually.
Mr. Derby-Again. I would make the restrictions so that if they are in these high density
areas that they be phased out within a reasonable period of time. Thanks. That is is.
Supervisor Stec-Mrs. Monahan
Mrs. Betty Monahan-Betty Monahan, Sunnyside Road First, I would ask you Gentlemen to
please use your microphones, when you sit back there in the room the sound carries in this
room terribly. Most of you we cannot hear very well back there nor can we hear the
Attorney. I have only known this situation what I am reading in the paper and what I am
listening here tonight. But, I think you have some problems here. Number one if you are
going to ban wood furnaces you are also going to have to do some kind of a comparison
between wood furnaces, fire places and wood stoves about who spews the most in the air. I
happen to be very sensitive to smoke and I remember during the last, and I am not asking
you to ban anything, I am just doing this as a example.
Supervisor Stec-Good, because then we will not disappoint you.
Mrs. Monahan-But during the last energy crisis I can remember hitting the Northway when
it went into Queensbury and my eyes in the car would start to tear because everybody was
using wood stoves and fire places for heat trying to avoid the high oil bills.
Councilman Boor-What year was that?
Mrs. Monahan-Back when we had some of the energy crisis.
Councilman Boor-70;s, 80’s because
Mrs. Monahan-Any place through there really.
Councilman Boor-EPA
Mrs. Monahan-I realize that, but I am saying you are going to have to make that comparison
to prove that one is worse than the other to be legally sound as far as I am concerned.
Secondly, I think we also have to recognize the position this Country is in today. I think
what has happened in Spain has brought it even more to the fore front. We may not have a
supply of oil that we have expected and we may have to deal with that problem. Thirdly, I
have a feeling here that we are reacting because of one person, one furnace in this Town, let
me put it that way, that is not being operated properly or maybe because of its construction
the age or something cannot operate properly. There certainly ought to be tests that you
could do and I will only refer to a burn barrel type of a situation where we had a gentleman
speak to us in a group that I am involved in. They actually did tests on the soil around the
burn barrel, to show what happen when you start to burn plastic and stuff like that. It would
seem to me and you can and I do not think that Town is in a position to do this or get the
equipment. You can do things to test the air quality in certain areas, you can do other tests
in the soil around it where the vapors from the air are going to land, see exactly what is
going on and it would seem to me that’s one of the first things that you should do. Again,
you know if you had a car in the Town of Queensbury that was going the wrong way on the
Northway at a hundred miles per hour you wouldn’t say nobody could drive a car in the
Town of Queensbury. So, I think you need to look at this sensibly very even handily and
not respond emotionally to what is going on out there in the Town .
Supervisor Stec-Thank you Betty.
Supervisor Stec-Hopefully, that is the path we are on. Yes, Sir.
Unknown-I will be short and sweet here I think everybody pretty well covered everything I
live at 65 Birch directly next door.
451
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-Your name, Sir?
Mr. Peter Dineen-Peter Dineen
Supervisor Stec-Thank you.
Mr. Dineen-I have been there four years now and there is a major, major problem there as
you can see by the photographs. I think it is one of those things when I first moved in there
the first couple of weeks I go, I was wondering why my eyes were watering? Why asthma
issues what have you. It is a big problem in our neighborhood and hopefully that the Board
recognizes and that we are going to be able to do something with it.
Supervisor Stec-We are going to do our best.
Mr. Dineen-Thank you.
Councilman Strough-Peter, some of these photos just show like piles of wood, it is not
sheded it is just piled
Mr. Dineen-Its thrown right in front of there.
Councilman Strough-I mean it is not wood its
Councilman Boor-I would say there is some wood in there.
Councilman Strough-its furniture, its chairs, its screen doors just in a big pile.
Mr. Dineen-Anything that will burn.
Councilman Strough-It is not covered or anything it is just on his back yard or what ever …
Mr. Dineen-Like today it went for three hours, it was not seven minutes, it wasn’t five
minutes it was three hours. From eight thirty to twelve o’clock
Supervisor Stec-That was today?
Mr. Dineen-That was today.
Councilman Strough-Is one of the issues the appearance of one’s yard because of the
materials they are burning?
Mr. Dineen-That is a different issue
Supervisor Stec-Thank you, that is a different issue, Thank you.
Mr. Dineen-If you look at the pictures it is pretty evident.
Supervisor Stec-It makes you wonder if it is stacked next to the outdoor boiler it makes you
wonder where it is going?
Councilman Boor-How hard does it make you wonder.
Supervisor Stec-All right, Peter, those are some new pictures though but thank you, thank
you very much. Yes, Ma’am
Mrs. Lorraine Stein-Good evening, my name is Lorraine Stein I live on 86 Ash Drive. I just
wanted to point out as you have heard, we are sandwiched, my house is sort of sandwiched
in between the two furnaces and I just want to clarify something for me, it does appear to
me, one maybe worse than the other but I have experienced odor, smoke from both. You
know, I have seen them both operating during late summer, fall, and I have had my
windows opened and had to close them because my whole house smelled like smoke. I
452
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
enjoy having my windows open. I sleep during the wintertime with the window open and
the fan on above my head. I do not want to have to, I feel I have a right to be able to do that
and to breath fresh air and I think it is a public health and safety issue that the Town should
consider seriously. These furnaces are really not meant to be in those types of
neighborhoods. No matter what I mean I am talking about both situations here because we
are not talking about just the one.
Supervisor Stec-I do not think and I will speak for myself I do not think at this point I have
any issues going forward with seriously limiting where in the Town these are and are not
appropriate and I do not think anyone on the Board has an issue with that. I think were we
are going to run into harder decisions is what do we do with the ones that are currently
operating, but certainly in any event you know.
Mrs. Stein-I would like to see something done with the ones that are there currently because
of course I do not want to see any of my immediate neighbors putting one below my
window either, so. you know I mean.
Supervisor Stec-New ones I think would be a lot easier to limit, a lot more strictly than what
do you do with the ones that are currently out there. Do we grandfather them, do we phase
them out over time or do we say, hey, make sure you adhere to this or else. There is a lot we
could in between out right remove them tomorrow or keep going as you are.
Mrs. Stein-I would like to see them phased out in densely populated areas like my
neighborhood. Thank you.
Supervisor Stec-We have been on this for awhile I do not want to shut down public
comment but is there, we are looking for new information new comments, I think the two
issues are the two sides of the issue are pretty clear to us. Yes, Sir.
Mr. Pete Skinner-Supervisor Stec and Town Counsel people and support staff, my name is
Pete Skinner I am a registered and licensed professional engineer in the State of New York,
I have recently retired from the Attorney General’s Office where I was Chief Scientist for
thirty three years starting with Louis Lefkowitz over those years I have worked on most of
the big cases that our office has been involved with from acid rain to Love Canal to nuclear
power plants. During the last three years I have done a lot of different cases before my
retirement, but one recurring theme has been out door wood boilers. They seem to end up in
our office because our office is often times the site of last resort for people who have not
found satisfaction with environmental enforcement other places. These devices
unfortunately are more than just an environmental problem in general they are very divisive
for communities like yourselves. All across New York the North East and the Mid West, as
more of these go into densely populated areas their rudimentary design and the emissions
that come from that design and sometimes the miss use of them have caused groups like
your selves to spend long hours trying to figure out how to get somebody else to enforce
laws that are on the books. It is a very difficult undertaking because it pits neighbor against
neighbor. No body likes to get involved with those kinds of disputes. But in this case
because this smoke goes over long distances that often times it is more than just one
neighbor against another neighbor it is one neighbor against many neighbors. Some of them
are not as vocal as others some are very vocal. Some of them are so vocal that they almost
do themselves a disservice by fighting for their rights to breath clean air. So, as we have
received many of these complaints we have interacted not only with the complaints and the
owners but also with the manufacturers, Randy is here I am glad to see him come. We have
done that because we thought when it began that these devices could be remedied perhaps
with an after burner. Perhaps with some other you know retro fits that could fix them, so
they couldn’t be misused and they would operate reliably without smoke So far retro fitting
has not been a solution. The higher stacks have improved some sites but not all of them. As
you well know there are stagnant air conditions that cause these to be a problem. So, we
have worked with other states the North east States air pollution people NESCOM and in
particular Vermont which have rules that prohibit these things in certain areas. These
problems are very severe. I am particularly happy to hear Randy say that he plans to
improve the design, because they are basically very rudimentary they are very hard to
operate without smoke and even when they don’t smoke the smell is pretty nasty especially
when it is released at low levels. So, what I would like to add to this I could go on and on
453
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
because we have looked into this in great depth I am happy to help any of you draft
something, is the following. Number one I think you should extend your moratorium on
new installations until you can figure out some bright line of where they should go because
frankly certain topographies lead to difficulties even though there may be a large set back.
If you want to go see one try Round Lake area where the fellow burns a lot of pine and it is
down hill to Round Lake and when there is an inversion especially cold days Round Lake
starts to fill up with a whole haze area just because of one person, and he burns in the
summertime to heat his pool. So, the problem occurs not just there but many places in New
York and other places so I would recommend extending your moratorium until you can
figure out can we enforce our own rules here, can we past rules that have that have bright
lines that our Code Enforcement Officer clearly says this is a violation, this isn’t. Until you
do that I think you should extend the moratorium. Another question comes in terms of phase
out, when I grew up in Vermont we heated with wood, when I moved to West Sand Lake I
have heated with wood for twenty two years and I have used a certified EPA wood stove
and it has not been perfect but it met the 7.5 grams per hour standards. The study to which
Randy refers here which is by Valentee and Clayton here really has some flaws but if you go
to one of the tables it measurers a number and forty three grams per hour at power outputs, it
is a good deal smaller than what these folks turn out so it could be even higher than that. So,
we are talking about emissions and particulates. And order of magnitude higher than EPA
certified wood stoves. So, when they can meet the EPA woodstove rules, great. Maybe we
can reconsider, but until then I suggest that you need to extend that moratorium. Now in
terms of the phase out, I want to get back to that, I feel badly that these folks have put in five
thousand, ten thousand dollars into their units. Not only have they put a tremendous amount
of money into their units for better for worse I have bought some things I wish I had not
bought, but they have worked very hard to get the wood and put it in there and they put it in
all year long and they do not take vacations because they can’t take a vacation it freezes up
and they have got a big problem. So, consequently you know you get kind of wedded to this
particular device and I can really understand the psychology of it and I have a high degree of
respect for the people that worked so hard to have these things work. So, I understand, what
can I call it, their reluctances to give it up because it should work, especially if you have free
wood because you are landscaper or something like that. So, how can we make those
people whole who have to take it out because their neighbors are too close or the topography
is not right. Around this area there only be one or two perhaps from what I heard tonight
and maybe more when you get closer to the issue. An important thing turned out and Randy
can explain this perhaps in more detail, in Bennington Vermont a landscaper bought one of
these devices from Beacroft Shooter Supply down here in Schaghticoke and put it in.
Immediately there was a problem with the neighbors and he wasn’t aware that Vermont had
set back rules and the like which he violated and he sued Central Boiler and he sued
Beacrofts. To my knowledge it was resolved so that there was a satisfactory financial out
come for that dispute. As far as I know that device is not being used and Randy could
explain it in more detail. I tried to get a hold of the Attorney this afternoon but I could not
get him. So, there is an opportunity for Queensbury to step in here, Chris and others could
work toward resolving this financial issue. The Attorney Generals Office has a consumer
bureau that might be willing to help negotiate an appropriate outcome, so that these devices
could be retrieved and replacement systems put in place so that neighbors aren’t made, don’t
have a problem with these units. So, in this way it would be a win, win. You folks don’t put
people who have in good faith gone out and bought a device that they felt would do the job,
you have helped them feel that they have come out whole. The manufacturer doesn’t want
these embarrassing problems to dog their company would also be made whole because they
would not have to worry about bad press and you folks could go onto other business which
is perhaps more important than hours spent on a few furnaces. So, that is what I
recommend, moratorium extension and a phase out, devices in high density areas where
there is a problem and the owners be made whole through negotiations with the companies.
Supervisor Stec-Thank you, Sir. Any other questions?
Councilman Strough-Do you know of any town that has adopted the perfect law?
Mr. Skinner-Many towns around New York and other places have adopted out right bans
because they felt the enforcement of trying to draw bright line between one that is ok and
one that is not ok was too difficult. As you may know the Department of Environmental
Conservation back in July wrote to these companies and stated lets see if I can get it stated
454
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
just as they said it, they said the Department is concerned however that these products are
not designed or manufactured in a manner necessary to operate they in compliance with
New York State regulations as such the Department whether the sale and use of wood fired
outdoor furnaces in New York also violates New York State air pollution control laws and
regulations.
Councilman Brewer-How do we allow them to be sold if they violate the standards?
Mr. Skinner-Well, I guess that is what they are saying here, that they are evaluating that, I
guess they have not come to a conclusion yet.
Councilman Brewer-How can you accuse somebody of violating standards and not outright
tell them they can’t sell them if they are, if you are making the acquisition but you are not
backing it up.
Mr. Skinner-I am not making it.
Councilman Brewer-I am not saying you the State is.
Mr. Skinner-it is a letter from DEC. I think your point was well taken and you should begin
thorough the region and this came from headquarters and as you know the regions operate a
bit differently from the headquarters, or not differently but they are some what separate.
Supervisor Stec-I will be talking to Region 5 again tomorrow.
Councilman Boor-It might also be appropriate if you read the five recommendations that
they, I believe it is the same letter isn’t it the second page?
Mr. Skinner-No, actually this is a letter to a facility in I think it is in Perry, New York it is
near Genesio, that is a situation where they said during the inspection we saw cresol treated
railroad ties mixed in with the wood and plastic bags and card board in the vicinity of the
unit ready to be burned. Burning of this waste and other garbage violates a number of
different DEC rules and they go onto other rules that this particular one did or could violate.
However, the last time I talked to the neighbors this was still operating. So, it is very
difficult for DEC to close these down but I think you have the where with all and the
capability to take action here locally to protect your citizens without necessarily having an
adverse impact on owners.
Councilman Strough-The way I am looking at it there are a lot of options I think we can go
in I do not know if we are going to find the perfect situation, because we could restrict them
based on zoning, that the higher density zoning just not be permitted in and the less dense
zoning maybe they would be if you did a site plan review. So, you might be able to go
through a site plan review before adopting a nuisance law as was suggested. Possibly a
nuisance law based on best burn practices you know or maybe a combination of those. We
are going to have to sit down and I think as Supervisor Stec pointed out and take a good
hard look at this and see if we can come up with something that would make most people
happy.
Supervisor Stec-John you are new and so I will give you the fire side chat, we will
Mr. Skinner-Is that in the wood shed?
Supervisor Stec-We very seldom except when we cut taxes and even then believe it or not
we don’t, we very rarely make everyone happy, but I think we can get to the point were we
can a remedy. We have got three issues before us , we have a discrete severe issue that
needs to be addressed immediately. We have got the future to deal with and we have got
those that are currently in operation to deal with ad I think we need to look at all three of
those and one is going to be dealt with tomorrow morning the other two maybe we will
discuss a little bit more tonight, I do not want to speak for the board but. Anything else Sir?
Anyone else from the public, I am not discouraging input but we have been here on this
awhile, anything new? Lets try that. Does anyone have any more questions for Mr.
Tollefson? Anything new?
455
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Mrs. Monahan-The gentleman the manufacturer offered earlier to discuss the freezing up of
them when that question came he said he had some information.
Supervisor Stec-Is the Board interested in that, sure, you are here you came from Minnesota
I have five more minutes for a Viking. Thank you again for coming out I thought that was
great.
Mr. Tollefson –If that is an important issue to know, myself I sprained by ankle three weeks
ago I did not fire my stove for two weeks and I had no problems with it and I don’t have
antifreeze in it.
Supervisor Stec-If you are circulating it and you have got a back up.
Mr. Tollefson-Yes.
Councilman Boor-Your house and stuff was heating the boiler essentially correct.
Mr. Tollefson-yes, it takes very little energy to do that and that is one of the
recommendation on the list of recommendations that there be a back up system in place, so
we feel that is an important issue to address.
Supervisor Stec-Did any one have any questions for Mr. Tollefson anyone else on the
Board?
Councilman Boor-Not at this time but certainly I would like a card…
Supervisor Stec-Also you served, the fortunately retired State, if you have business cards
Or perhaps a name or number for us.
Unknown-Not yet.
Mr. Tollefson-Could I ask to clarify your name was Peter Skinner, ok. Thank you.
Mr. Skinner-We talked on the phone. Ok. Thank you.
Unknown-I have a question for the gentleman as far as the newer furnaces and everything
the … you are putting into them stuff like that, the one bought six years ago vs one that was
just bought last year as far as smoke release, dampers, everything else that elapsed does it
burn clean, much more cleaner or is there any kind of a difference?
Supervisor Stec-For the record cause we are trying to capture this on tape and a doubt that
picked up the difference between six years ago unit and a year unit and the technology.
Mr. Tollefson-The future units that we are looking at have extreme advantages .
Councilman Boor-Present or future.
Mr. Tollefson-Future.
Supervisor Stec-Anything else on this issue? All right. Town Board discussion?
Lets start with Roger.
Councilman Boor-Actually I would kind of like to go last the reason being I brought this to
the Boards attention and
Supervisor Stec-You can go second to last, Ted.
Councilman Boor-Excuse me, if you don’t mind I would like to speak.
Supervisor Stec-Last or now?
456
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Boor-I would like to give you my reasoning why I think it is important we do
this correctly so that we do not make mistakes. I put a lot of time into this and I would like
to think that some of the questions you might have I might actually be able to answer. So, I
thought it might be appropriate for me to go last since I put that much time into it. Thank
you.
Supervisor Stec-Ted. John.
Councilman Strough-Well, basically it would repeating what I said before when I said you
might be able to make most people happy
Supervisor Stec-We might.
Councilman Strough-Then you gave me your fire side chat when you told me you can only
make most people happy. So, I do not know, we have to put our expert legal people to work
I think and ..see if we can come up with something that will deal with the issues of
topography and zoning and these wood burning, exterior wood burning or furnaces or
boilers whatever you want to call them. I do not know if it is going to be adopting a
nuisance law some kind of a zoning restriction some kind of Planning Board or special use
permit review. I think we are going to have to sit back down and take a look at this and
extent our moratorium as was suggested.
th
Supervisor Stec-Well the moratorium will continue without action until June 15 and I am
hopeful between now and then we will be off this with a resolution and onto something
different. Mr. Brewer.
Councilman Brewer-My only suggestion would be to allow us time to read what we have in
front of us and then possibly at a later date ask the manufacturer or some manufacturer to
come back and talk with I am sorry I forgot the gentlemen name ..
Supervisor Stec-Mr. Skinner.
Councilman Brewer-Mr. Skinner at a workshop setting, people that own them, people that
don’t want people to own them and we outline some ideas and come up with something. I
cannot sit here tonight and tell you what the answer is, I only know that for two hours on
Saturday I watched literally two of these furnaces burn and neither one of them are in
comparison to the pictures that we looked at tonight and previously.
Supervisor Stec-I concur with your observation.
Councilman Brewer-So out and out ban them because there is a couple of them that are bad,
no, I do not think so. I think we have to put all our heads together and come up with a plan
and I do not know what that plan is right now.
Supervisor Stec-I agree and Mr.Skinner touched on a few items from my conversation with
DEC up on Warrensburg today that they have , the State says that the studies and the
opinions out there and the science is not conclusive that there is a lot of conflicting data out
there and the State is looking into this issue and apparently so that also agrees with what Mr.
Skinner pointed out to the Board. I think I kind of peppered in my thoughts and ideas on
this and where we should head through out the discussion tonight so I will not repeat myself.
Roger or Ted.
Councilman Turner-I will go. As far as I am concerned, I burn wood in my house but it is
not in an outside they call the stove in Vermont a water stove. But, anyway, there is nothing
wrong with burning wood it is just where you are when you are burning it. There are going
to be areas in the Town that are not going to be allowed to have them period. There is going
to be areas in the Town that are going to be allowed to have them because they function well
there and there is no complaints. So, I think we have a lot of homework to do to get this
thing back on the main stream and get a conclusion to this before the next heating season.
Supervisor Stec-Roger.
457
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Councilman Boor-The first thing I would like to say is I appreciate every comment that was
made tonight and certainly the Post Star has portrayed me as the person pushing this ban. I
certainly have problems with the type of furnaces that we have talked about tonight but I
think it is very important because some of the people that own these things need to
understand that from the very beginning and I still believe that these things can be controlled
with the exceptions of what Mr. Skinner referred to as atmospheric anomalies with set back
and zoning. I have always felt that was appropriate I was not in favor of an all out ban. I
am very happy to see that some of the colleagues who wanted to outright ban them have
now changed their mind and are willing to discuss maybe what the more appropriate
measures might be. Now, having said that there is a lot of ways to approach this. I think
one that we might want to look at is what I would call a revocable special use that could be
granted by means of a variance. So, if lets say an established set back and it would be
arbitrary just for discussion lets say two hundred feet from a property line. We poll the
surrounding neighbors and they say you know what we do not have a problem with this.
We say fine, we will give you a variance but it is revocable in the event that at some point
in time it is determined by a neighbor that they are suffering and it proven to be as such.
Then that might be a way to go. It obviously is it a very complicated issue. I also feel very
badly for the people that have had to put up with this one particular burner and I think that
there certainly is responsible use of what I would not call sophisticated technology and we
can argue back and forth on that, but the point I am trying to make here is that I think that is
some of the people that spoke tonight saying that I used this responsibly I have never had
complaints, I don’t believe that I am causing any harm, I think that if you had seen what
these people had put up with for seven years you would understand why we are here tonight
and are dealing with this. If you go over the notes of the workshops it is very clear that I
emphasize one hundred percent with the investment that those of you that own these stoves
has. I feel bad if it results in an eventual taking away of that. I am not suggesting that that is
what we do, but it has got to be left on the table as a possibility. I think that we do live in a
type community where we high densities and we have very low densities. I think great
cases could be made where these things would be appropriate maybe appropriate isn’t the
right word but would be such that they would not cause hardships on other individuals. But
certainly in the neighborhood around Glen Lake and I can name a ton of other residential
neighborhoods these things should definitely not be on half acre parcels. I do not care how
big a stack you put them on or what you do it is just inappropriate. We need to also look at
EPA there is a lot of comparisons being made between people burning in an air tight
catalytic wood stove visa vie what I would call rudimentary somewhat archaic methods of
burning huge chunks of wood. Why huge chunks of wood? Because people don’t want to
have to maintain these a lot, they want to put a bunch of wood in there and leave for forty
eight hours and it is understandable. But the problem is that they burn incredible amounts of
fuel and the notion that this stuff doesn’t go into the air is fallacy and I think truthfully that
as time will show they probably will be banned or the technology as the gentleman from
Minnesota pointed out will have to get remarkably better because the way it is now these are
highly inefficient. That is not to say that there are not certain robust individuals here that
don’t mind tending these things and filling them but there is a lot of work involved. There is
a lot of material that has to go into these things and I think we can strike some kind of a law
an ordinance whereby these things may be allowed in some areas but they should certainly
be prohibited and banned from others. You know this is not supposed to be an easy job it
would be great if we could just go yea well, you do this, you do that and it is over. Half of
you go away very upset the other half would be elated. That is what makes this job so
difficult. Everybody here has seen both sides of this issue and we have got to grapple with
this and I am sure that we will come up with something appropriate. Ultimately, somebody
two, three, four, five people may not be happy with what we come up with. It is hard to say
at this point in time. I know we are all committed to doing what is right we understand the
health issues and we under stand the long term effects of not doing anything. So, I will
continue to work hard on this and I know my colleagues will also and hopefully we can
come up with a solution that makes everybody understanding of it. That is about it.
Supervisor Stec-I would just add that I think it is important for everyone to take away from
this tonight to build on one point that Roger made, the status quo is not going to remain.
Change is coming, for some the change will be too much for others it will not be enough. I
think that was the point that Roger and John both made well. But, like I said we have got
three items to contend with, one immediate, the future and then what do we do with the past.
But I have not heard anyone on the Town Board tonight suggest that they want to take
458
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
action on this tonight, so I have a procedural question. Lets assume that we do not want to
take action on this tonight, we have a public hearing that is open we may or may not, I am
assuming that we are going to want to significantly modify what we have got before us.
What are our options, do we close the public hearing, do we take, do we take action on this
to kill it and what do we need to do in order, lets say we say tomorrow all right, Bob and
Mark you have been hearing what we have been talking about lets go back to the drawing
board and come up with something different. New public hearing or build off this public
hearing or what do we need to do?
Town Counsel Schachner-I think you can do either one, but I would surmise from what I am
hearing from the Town Board that we are talking about a substantially different proposed
local law that you might as well just put it out for a new public hearing new notice.
Supervisor Stec-So, what do we do in the mean time with this one
Town Counsel Schachner-No action is necessary.
Supervisor Stec-No action, just close the public hearing?
Town Counsel Schachner-Close the public hearing and no action
Supervisor Stec-And no action tonight but rest assured we have got a moratorium in place
th
until June 15.
Councilman Boor-And we will extend that if we cannot..
Supervisor Stec-I do not have a problem extending that at all if need be. All of this is a
separate issue from what you all are talking about that is something that I think warrants a
little more vigorous and immediate action on our part or even if and by I say our part I mean
government and likely the State the DEC. We will on the Town’s residents behalf we will
pick up that ball and run with it. But, change is going to happen we are going to certainly
regulate these, we are certainly going to limit them significantly in the town. We have got
questions what to do with the old ones perhaps the thing to do with the old ones is that, you
know that we start enforcing some of this other stuff. I suspect that Ms. Monahan you know
made a good point you do not ban cars because somebody is driving the wrong way down
the Northway or whatnot. I think with that unless I hear anything else from the Town Board
I am going to close the public hearing.
Unknown- …do you know how many there are?
Supervisor Stec-The question is from Mr. Sanford do we know how many there are? The
last estimate that we got from Town Staff was ten to twelve. I am not to guess that, that is
probably lower, that is ten to twelve perhaps that we are aware of. There maybe double that
but I cannot imagine there is much more than that but the last number I got out of staff was
ten to twelve. So, that is the number that we got, I personally suspect that there is more if
we look for them. There is probably many that we do not know about there is likely to be a
permitting process where we know where they all are. I mean there is going to be
regulations associated with this but that is all more for the future. Anything else from the
Town Board. I am going to close the public hearing and lets move onto correspondence.
3.0 CORRESPONDENCE
3.1 Building and Code Report for February on file
3.2 Town Clerk Report for February on file
3.3 Landfill Report for February on file
4.0 INTRODUCTION OF RESOLUTIONS FROM THE FLOOR
NONE
459
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
5.0 OPEN FORUM
Mr. Pliney Tucker- 41 Division Road Questioned the money that the City collected for
County tax and wasn’t turned in, and answers?
Supervisor Stec-I will answer to what I know…to my knowledge there is a 250,000 dollars
that the City is on a track to repay by the end of the month I believe.
Mr. Tucker-Are they paying interest?
Supervisor Stec-I do not know.
Mr. Tucker-The land above the water plant, there was a resolution passed in 1994 that stated
six months after the development was approved for construction that the land was to change
hands, my suggestion lets notify Niagara Mohawk that we are going to sue them and try to
collect for the time we did not have the benefit of this land. The four and a half acres that
the City has its dump on and answers on that?
Supervisor Stec-No answers yet.
Mr. Tucker-The Barber Case
Supervisor Stec-No news there.
Mrs. Karen Angleson-1 Greenwood Lane Questioned if there was any progress on the
Great Escape, pedestrian bridge, lights etc.? Asked for assistance from Betty Little and
Theresa Sayward on this issue… Concerned for the safety of the issue of the people and
traffic.
Supervisor Stec-We have a meeting scheduled for tomorrow on this issue…the Great
Escape has indicated that they will cooperate on getting the lights.
Mrs. Angleson-re: widening of West Mountain Road the shoulders…are you discussing two
four foot walking lanes plus the twelve foot?
Supervisor Stec-The driving lanes as they currently are would not change we are talking
about outside the white lines, widening that on both sides of the road. I think we were
talking a minimum of four feet wide off the white line. Spoke on working with the County
on this project. The Town Board will need to review the proposal before the Town will
commit to it.
Mr. George Drellos-27 Fox Hollow Lane re: Volunteers, Firemen and Ambulance your
idea of looking at them all and pooling them together is a good idea, the time has come…
Supervisor Stec-Noted we have a draft of an RFP for the bill for service we need to get an
RFP out to hire somebody to do the study for a building location for EMS…
Councilman Strough-spoke on the need for a fleet committee for emergency services…
Mr. Drellos-Questioned what would happen if Bay Ridge disbanded…
Supervisor Stec-It is a private non profit, if they went under they would go into bankruptcy
mode. Noted we are not liable. Any other for Open Forum? I should recognize earlier in
the evening Warren County Supervisor Mike Brody was here, we had former Councilman
Dick Merrill here we currently have the Honorable Bob McNally, former Councilwoman
Betty Monahan, former Councilman Pliney Tucker and retired Highway Supt. Paul H.
Naylor.
Mrs. Monahan-Household Hazardous Waste day is coming up, if a Town report is going out
I would suggest you put a list in…
460
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Supervisor Stec-Noted that he would be seeing the first draft of the Qsby. Report tomorrow,
there will be announcements regarding the Hazardous Waste Day and Tire Day…noted the
water report will be incorporated in this issue. Noted if latex paint is brought to the
Hazardous Waste Day they will be asked to bring them to the Ridge Road Transfer Station
where we will take it for free that day..
6.0 TOWN BOARD DISCUSSIONS
Councilman Strough-Asked that a workshop be held on the American Federation of
Musicians, making a proposal for additional concerts.
th
Supervisor Stec-suggested it be brought up at the workshop of the 29. Warren County
EDC luncheon Congressman Sweeney was present at that event. He mentioned his support
for the Exit 18 Corridor…Attended a tour with him at Travlers. …
7.0 RESOLUTIONS
RESOLUTION ADOPTING SEQRA NEGATIVE DECLARATION
REGARDING HOUSEHOLD HAZARDOUS WASTE COLLECTION
DAY
RESOLUTION NO. 161. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHEREAS, by Resolution No. 49, 2004 the Queensbury Town Board authorized
the filing of an application for state assistance from the Household Hazardous Waste State
Assistance Program to fund the Town’s Household Hazardous Waste Collection Day to be
th
conducted on Saturday, June 5, 2004, and
WHEREAS, by Resolution No.: 78, 2004, the Town Board authorized the
advertisement for bids for the furnishing of all materials and performing all work necessary
for the collection and disposal of household hazardous waste in connection with the Town’s
Household Hazardous Waste Collection Day, and
WHEREAS, as part of the Household Hazardous Waste Collection Day activity and
for the grant funding application, the New York State Department of Environmental
Conservation requires that a State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) review be
conducted before the Town’s Hazardous Waste Collection Day takes place or funds are
spent, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board is duly qualified to act as lead agency for compliance
with the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) which requires environmental
review of certain actions undertaken by local governments, and
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
461
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board, after considering the proposed
action, reviewing the Environmental Assessment Form and thoroughly analyzing the action
for potential environmental concerns, determines that the action will not have a significant
effect on the environment, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor to complete the Environmental Assessment Form by checking the box indicating
that the proposed action will not result in any significant adverse impacts, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board approves of a Negative Declaration and
authorizes and directs the Town Clerk's Office and/or Department of Community
Development to file any necessary documents in accordance with the provisions of the
general regulations of the Department of Environmental Conservation.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT
A, Does action exceed any type I threshold in 6 NYCRR, Part 617.4?
NO
B, Will action receive coordinated review as provided for unlisted actions in 6 NYCRR, Part
617.6?
NO
C, Could action result in any adverse effects associated with the
following:
C1, Existing air quality, surface or groundwater quality or quantity, noise
levels, existing traffic patterns, solid waste production or disposal, potential
for erosion, drainage or flooding problems? NO
C2, aesthetic, agriculture, archaeological, historic, or other natural or cultural
resources; or community or neighborhood character? NO
C3, Vegetation or fauna, fish, shellfish or wildlife species, significant
habitats, or threatened or endangered species? NO
462
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
C4, A community's existing plans or goals as officially adopted, or a change
in use of intensity of use of land or other natural resources? NO
C5, Growth, subsequent development, or related activities likely to be
induced by the proposed action? NO
C6, Long term, short term, cumulative, or other effects not identified in C1-
C5? NO
C7, Other impacts (including changes in use of either quantity or type of
energy)? NO
D. Will the project have an impact on the environmental characteristics that caused the
establishment of a CEA? NO
E, Is there, or is there likely to be, controversy related to potential adverse environmental
impacts? NO
(VOTE TAKEN)
RESOLUTION AWARDING BID FOR COLLECTION AND
DISPOSAL OF HOUSEHOLD HAZARDOUS WASTE
RESOLUTION NO. 162. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board authorized the advertisement for bids for
the furnishing of all materials and performing all work necessary for the collection and
disposal of household hazardous waste in connection with the Town’s Household
th
Hazardous Waste Collection Day to be conducted on Saturday, June 5, 2004, and
WHEREAS, the Town’s Purchasing Agent duly advertised for bids and the
Purchasing Agent and Solid Waste Facilities Operator have reviewed the bids and
recommended that the Town Board award the bid to Care Environmental Corp., the lowest
responsible bidder,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby awards the bid for the
furnishing of all materials and performing all work necessary for the collection and disposal
of household hazardous waste in connection with the Town’s Household Hazardous Waste
th
Collection Day to be conducted on Saturday, June 5, 2004 to Care Environmental Corp.,
for the amount of $600 for the site set-up fee and at the collection rates outlined in the bid
463
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
packaged submitted to the Town Purchasing Agent, a copy of which has been presented at
this meeting, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board authorizes and directs the Town Purchasing
Agent to process a purchase order for Care Environmental Corp., in the amount of $20,000
from Account No.: 910-8160-4245 such amount including $600 for the site set-up fee and
$19,400 reflecting the estimated cost of collecting and disposing of the Town’s household
hazardous waste in accordance with Care Environmental Corp.’s collection rates schedule
presented at this meeting, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor, Purchasing Agent, Budget Officer and/or Solid Waste Facilities Manager to
execute any documentation and take such other and further action necessary to effectuate the
terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
RESOLUTION APPROVING GRANT AWARD FOR CASE FILE
#3820 IN CONNECTION WITH WARD 4 REHABILITATION
PROGRAM
RESOLUTION NO.: 163. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS, the Town of Queensbury has established a Housing Rehabilitation
Program which provides grants to cover 100% of the cost of rehabilitation up to a
maximum of $20,000, and
464
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, a single family property, Case File No.: 3820, has been determined
to be eligible for rehabilitation grant assistance and the owner of the property has
requested such assistance, and
WHEREAS, property rehabilitation specifications have been provided to four (4)
qualified contractors for bid, and
WHEREAS, the low bid cost to complete the work specified is seventeen
thousand seven hundred seventy five dollars ($17,775), and
,
WHEREAS Shelter Planning & Development, Inc. has overseen the grant
process and has verified that it has been followed in this case and recommends approving
this grant,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves a grant for Case
File No.: 3820 in the Town of Queensbury, New York in the amount not to exceed
seventeen thousand seven hundred seventy five dollars ($17,775) and authorizes and
directs either the Town Supervisor or Town Senior Planner to execute a Grant Award
Agreement and take such other and further action as may be necessary to effectuate the
terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
RESOLUTION APPROVING GRANT AWARD FOR CASE FILE
#4876 IN CONNECTION WITH WARD 4 REHABILITATION
PROGRAM
RESOLUTION NO.: 164. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
465
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, the Town of Queensbury has established a Housing Rehabilitation
Program which provides grants to cover 100% of the cost of rehabilitation up to a
maximum of $20,000, and
WHEREAS, a single family property, Case File No.: 4876, has been determined
to be eligible for rehabilitation grant assistance and the owner of the property has
requested such assistance, and
WHEREAS, property rehabilitation specifications have been provided to three (3)
qualified contractors for bid, and
WHEREAS, the low bid cost to complete the work specified is fifteen thousand
three hundred forty five dollars ($15,345), and
,
WHEREAS Shelter Planning & Development, Inc. has overseen the grant
process and has verified that it has been followed in this case and recommends approving
this grant,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves a grant for Case
File No.: 4876 in the Town of Queensbury, New York in the amount not to exceed
fifteen thousand three hundred forty five dollars ($15,345) and authorizes and directs
either the Town Supervisor or Town Senior Planner to execute a Grant Award Agreement
and take such other and further action as may be necessary to effectuate the terms of this
Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
RESOLUTION APPROVING GRANT AWARD FOR CASE FILE
#4877 IN CONNECTION WITH WARD 4 REHABILITATION
PROGRAM
RESOLUTION NO.: 165. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
466
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, the Town of Queensbury has established a Housing Rehabilitation
Program which provides grants to cover 100% of the cost of rehabilitation up to a
maximum of $20,000, and
WHEREAS, a single family property, Case File No.: 4877, has been determined
to be eligible for rehabilitation grant assistance and the owner of the property has
requested such assistance, and
WHEREAS, property rehabilitation specifications have been provided to four (4)
qualified contractors for bid, and
WHEREAS, the low bid cost to complete the work specified is eleven thousand
seven hundred dollars ($11,700), and
,
WHEREAS Shelter Planning & Development, Inc. has overseen the grant
process and has verified that it has been followed in this case and recommends approving
this grant,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves a grant for Case
File No.: 4877 in the Town of Queensbury, New York in the amount not to exceed
eleven thousand seven hundred dollars ($11,700) and authorizes and directs either the
Town Supervisor or Town Senior Planner to execute a Grant Award Agreement and take
such other and further action as may be necessary to effectuate the terms of this
Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
RESOLUTION ADOPTING SEQRA NEGATIVE DECLARATION
REGARDING RIDGE/JENKINSVILLE PARK IMPROVEMENTS
RESOLUTION NO. 166. 2004
467
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHEREAS, by Resolution No. 416, 2003 the Queensbury Town Board authorized
establishment of Capital Project Fund #138 to fund expenses associated with parking lot
improvements, design and expansion of softball fields and replacement of fencing at the
Ridge/Jenkinsville Park, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board wishes to conduct a State
Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) review of such park
improvements as well as future park improvements to include, but not
be limited to, the construction of basketball and tennis courts, regrading
of the open field area for multi-use field play and the creation of
additional parking, roadways, trails and restroom facilities, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board is duly qualified to act as lead agency for compliance
with the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) which requires environmental
review of certain actions undertaken by local governments,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board, after considering the proposed
action, reviewing the Environmental Assessment Form and thoroughly analyzing the action
for potential environmental concerns, determines that the action will not have a significant
effect on the environment, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor to complete the Environmental Assessment Form by checking the box indicating
that the proposed action will not result in any significant adverse impacts, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board approves a SEQRA Negative Declaration and
authorizes and directs the Town Clerk's Office and/or Parks and Recreation Department to
file any necessary documents in accordance with the provisions of the general regulations of
the Department of Environmental Conservation.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
468
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
AYES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
DISCUSSION HELD BEFORE VOTE: Assistant Director of Parks and Recreation Steve
Lovering reviewed the proposal for the Town Board Members …
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT FORM
A, Does action exceed any type I threshold in 6 NYCRR, Part 617.4?
NO
B, Will action receive coordinated review as provided for unlisted actions in 6 NYCRR, Part
617.6?
NO
C, Could action result in any adverse effects associated with the
following:
C1, Existing air quality, surface or groundwater quality or quantity, noise
levels, existing traffic patterns, solid waste production or disposal, potential
for erosion, drainage or flooding problems? NO
C2, aesthetic, agriculture, archaeological, historic, or other natural or cultural
resources; or community or neighborhood character? NO
C3, Vegetation or fauna, fish, shellfish or wildlife species, significant
habitats, or threatened or endangered species? NO
C4, A community's existing plans or goals as officially adopted, or a change
in use of intensity of use of land or other natural resources? NO
C5, Growth, subsequent development, or related activities likely to be
induced by the proposed action? NO
C6, Long term, short term, cumulative, or other effects not identified in C1-
C5? NO
C7, Other impacts (including changes in use of either quantity or type of
energy)? NO
D, Is there, or is there likely to be, controversy related to potential adverse environmental
impacts? NO
(VOTE TAKEN)
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING PURCHASE OF ARC INFO
COMPUTER SOFTWARE FOR COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT
DEPARTMENT’S USE
RESOLUTION NO.: 167. 2004
469
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board previously adopted purchasing
procedures which require that the Town Board must approve any purchase in an amount of
$5,000 or greater up to New York State bidding limits, and
WHEREAS, the Town’s Director of Information Technology has requested Town
Board approval to purchase ArcInfo computer software for use by the Town’s Community
Development Department, which software is the complete GIS data creation, update, query,
mapping and analysis system and is composed of ArcInfo Desktop and ArcInfo
Workstation, and
WHEREAS, New York State Bidding is not required as the purchase price for the
computer software is in accordance with New York State Contract No.: PT56395 pricing,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves of the Town’s
Director of Information Technology’s purchase of the ArcInfo computer software from
ESRI, Inc., in accordance with New York State Contract No.: PT56395 pricing for an
amount not to exceed $7,138 to be paid for from Computer Software Account No.: 01-
1680-2032, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Director of
Information Technology, Budget Officer and/or Town Supervisor to take such other and
further action as may be necessary to effectuate the terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote:
Director of Technology Bob Keenan-This is basically
mapping software, it will be used by the Planning Department to create and update maps
that the County creates.
Councilman Brewer-Questioned the status of ID tags.
470
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
Director Keenan-Noted that the equipment came in last week and he had printed one out
today..
RESOLUTION APPROVING YEAR 2002 VOLUNTEER
AMBULANCE WORKER SERVICE AWARD PROGRAM FINAL
LISTINGS FOR
WEST GLENS FALLS EMERGENCY SQUAD, INC.
RESOLUTION NO.: 168. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board previously authorized engagement of
PENFLEX, Inc., to provide the 2002 Standard Year End Administration Services for the
Town’s Volunteer Ambulance Workers Service Award Program, and as part of such
Program it is necessary that the Town Board approve each Emergency Squad’s Service
Award Program records, and
WHEREAS, by prior Resolution the Town Board approved the 2002 Service Award
Program Records for the West Glens Falls Emergency Squad, Inc. (Squad) and as required
the Squad posted the approved listings at its headquarters for 30 days, and
WHEREAS, the Town Supervisor’s Executive Assistant has received the final
listings from the Squad and has advised that the Squad made no changes to the listings since
the 30 day posting and the listings are complete, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board wishes to approve the final listings,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves the final 2002
Volunteer Ambulance Worker Service Award Program listings for the West Glens Falls
Emergency Squad, Inc., and
BE IT FURTHER,
471
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor, Executive Assistant to the Town Supervisor and/or Budget Officer to take any
and all action necessary to effectuate the terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
RESOLUTION AUTHORIZING ENGAGEMENT OF C.T. MALE
ASSOCIATES, P.C. FOR DESIGN, CONTRACT ADMINISTRATION
AND CONSTRUCTION OBSERVATION SERVICES AND
EASEMENT PREPARATION RELATING TO
BAY ROAD WATER MAIN REPLACEMENT
RESOLUTION NO.: 169. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS, the Town’s Water Superintendent has advised the Town Board that
4200 LF of water main along Bay Road from Cronin Road to just north of Bayberry Drive
needs to be replaced, and
WHEREAS, the Water Superintendent has recommended that the Town Board
authorize engagement of C.T. Male Associates, P.C., for design phase, contract
administration phase, construction observation and easement preparation services in
connection with the project for the following amount(s):
Design Phase
A.
1. Design: -
$23,200
2. Design survey including locating wetlands delineation: -$
4,200
3. Environmental (.) -$
wetlands delineation, Stormwater Pollution Plan, et al
8,750
TOTAL DESIGN PHASE: - $36,150 (Lump Sum)
Contract Administration: -$ 9,500 (Lump Sum
B. )
Construction Observation
C.
$23,490
9 weeks @ 45 hrs/week x $58/hr: -
1.
Mileage: 50 mi/day x .35 x 45 days: - $787.50
2.
472
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
$24,300
Estimated Fee:
-
Construction observation
to be billed on a per diem basis based on actual
3.
time worked
.
$550 each
D. Easements -
$1,400 based on subcontractor quote
E. Soil Borings -
as delineated in C.T. Male’s Proposal dated March 8, 2004 and presented at this meeting,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby authorizes and directs
engagement of C.T. Male Associates, P.C. for design phase, contract administration phase,
construction observation and easement preparation services in connection with the Bay
Road Water Main Replacement Project as follows:
Design Phase
A.
1. Design: -
$23,200
2. Design survey including locating wetlands delineation: -$
4,200
3. Environmental (.) -$
wetlands delineation, Stormwater Pollution Plan, et al
8,750
TOTAL DESIGN PHASE: - $36,150 (Lump Sum)
Contract Administration: -$ 9,500 (Lump Sum)
B.
Construction Observation
C.
$23,490
9 weeks @ 45 hrs/week x $58/hr: -
1.
2. Mileage: 50 mi/day x .35 x 45 days: - $787.50
$24,300
Estimated Fee:
-
Construction observation
to be billed on a per diem basis based on actual time
3.
worked
.
Easements - $550 each
D.
Soil Borings - $1,400 based on subcontractor quote
E.
as delineated in C.T. Male’s Proposal dated March 8, 2004 and presented at this meeting,
and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs that payment for
C.T. Male’s services shall be paid for from Account No.: 40-8340-2899, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town Water
Superintendent, Budget Officer and/or Town Supervisor to execute any documentation and
473
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
take such other and further action as may be necessary to effectuate the terms of this
Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor
NOES : None
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote: -
Water/wastewater Supt. Ralph VanDusenReviewed for
Town Board the Bay Road Water project…the County hopes to have engineering report
st
by April 1.
Water/wastewater Supt. VanDusen-The Water transmission enhancement project is out to
bid, the good news is that there is a large amount of interest in the project, we should see
st
a very competitive price the bad new is, since January 1 there has been two significant
price increases in ductile iron pipe and fittings amounting to approximately a thirty
percent increase.
RESOLUTION ACCEPTING DEDICATION OF WILLOWBROOK DRIVE IN
BAYBROOK PROFESSIONAL PARK SUBDIVISION
RESOLUTION NO. 170. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHEREAS, Schermerhorn Commercial Holdings, LP has offered a deed to dedicate
Willowbrook Drive in the Baybrook Professional Park Subdivision to the Town of
Queensbury as described in a Survey prepared by VanDusen & Steves, Land Surveyors,
LLC, dated December 9, 2003, and
WHEREAS, the Town Highway Superintendent has inspected the
road and recommended its acceptance contingent upon the developer 1)
fixing certain drain and sewer manholes and two large depressions near
the Bay Road intersection; 2) after inspection, completing the top coat
of the black-top within two years of the date of acceptance or by March
th
15, 2006, and 3) defining and placing any necessary drainage easement
boundaries, and
WHEREAS, Schermerhorn Commercial Holdings, LP will provide the Town with a
th
$19,800 cash escrow to ensure placement of the top coat on the roads by March 15, 2006,
and
474
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, the Town Water Superintendent has confirmed that installation of
water mains and appurtenances has not been made in accordance with Town Water
Department standards, and
WHEREAS, the Water Superintendent recommends that if the Town of Queensbury
shall accept Willowbrook Drive as a Town Road, that it not accept dedication of the water
mains and appurtenances until such time as the Developer shall have met Town
requirements for such water mains and appurtenances, and
WHEREAS, the Developer understands that it shall not receive any certificates of
occupancy until such time as such water mains and appurtenances are accepted for
dedication, and
WHEREAS, the form of the deed and title to the road offered for dedication have
been reviewed by Town Counsel,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby accepts and approves the
deed for dedication of Willowbrook Drive in the Baybrook Professional Park Subdivision
which deed shall not include dedication of the water mains and appurtenances, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that this acceptance is expressly conditioned on the
Town’s receipt of the $19,800 cash escrow, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor to execute, sign and affix the Town seal to any and all documents necessary to
complete the transaction, including an Escrow Agreement to be in form acceptable to the
Town Budget Officer and Town Counsel,and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs Schermerhorn
Commercial Holdings, LP to record the deed in the Warren County Clerk's Office, after
which time the deed shall be properly filed and maintained in the Queensbury Town Clerk’s
Office, and
475
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs
the Town Clerk to add the road to the official inventory of Town
Highways as follows:
Name: Willowbrook Drive Road Number: 544
Description: Beginning at Bay Road and continuing in a northeasterly direction a
distance
of 1,184 feet and .22 hundredths of a mile and ending at a cul-de-sac.
Feet: 1,184’ and .22 of a mile .
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Strough, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner
NOES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote
: Water/wastewater Supt. Ralph VanDusen- Noted that the
water main is not being accepted at this time. Ms. Jennifer Switzer Budget Officer noted
that the escrow check has not been received…Board agreed to amend the resolution to
reflect that the resolution is conditional upon receipt of the check…
Ms. Switzer requested that from now the receipt of the checks should identified…
RESOLUTION SETTING PUBLIC HEARING ON PROPOSED
LOCAL LAW NO.: ____ OF 2004 TO AMEND THE QUEENSBURY
TOWN CODE BY ADDING A NEW CHAPTER 9 ENTITLED
"CREATION OF TOWN COURT CLERK AND DEPUTY COURT
CLERK POSITIONS"
RESOLUTION NO. 171. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board wishes to consider adoption of Local
Law No.: ___, 2004 to add a new Chapter 9 to the Queensbury Town Code entitled
"Creation of Town Court Clerk and Deputy Court Clerk Positions," which Chapter will
create the Town Court Clerk and Deputy Court Clerk positions in compliance with New
§
York State Civil Service Law 41(1)(d), and
WHEREAS, such legislation is authorized in accordance with New York State
Town Law §130 and Municipal Home Rule Law §10, and
476
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, prior to adoption of the Local Law, it is necessary to conduct a public
hearing,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board shall meet and hold a public hearing
th
at the Activities Center, 742 Bay Road, Queensbury at 7:00 p.m. on April 5, 2004 to
consider proposed Local Law No.: ___ of 2004, hear all persons interested and take such
action as is required or authorized by law, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby authorizes and directs the Queensbury
Town Clerk to publish and post a Notice of Public Hearing as required by law.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
Discussion held before vote:
Town Justice McNally-reviewed for the Board the purpose of
the proposed Local Law.
RESOLUTION SETTING PUBLIC HEARING ON PROPOSED
ACQUISITION OF PROPERTY RIGHTS BY EMINENT DOMAIN
AND AUTHORIZING APPRAISAL OF EXXON/MOBIL STATION
PROPERTY EASEMENT ON ROUTE 9 IN THE TOWN OF
QUEENSBURY
RESOLUTION NO.: 172. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHEREAS, by Town Board Resolution No.: 113,2003 the Town Board adopted its
Final Order approving creation of the Route 9 Sewer District, and
477
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, the engineer working with the Town has determined the technical
requirements of the Project and has indicated that a line will need to run across the property
of the ExxonMobil Station on Route 9 identified as Tax Map No.: 288.16-1-3, and
WHEREAS, the Town has attempted to negotiate with the property owner for an
easement necessary for the Project but it appears that it will not be possible to get a consent
easement, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board finds it necessary to exercise its rights to acquire the
easement by eminent domain in order to serve a public purpose, and
WHEREAS, the Town is required to compensate the property owner for the
property rights obtained, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board wishes to obtain an appraisal of the value of the
easement across the property, and
WHEREAS, the Town has in the past relied upon the appraisal services of Empire
State Appraisal Consultants, Inc., and has found their work to be thorough and accurate, and
WHEREAS, Eminent Domain Procedure Law §201 requires the Town Board to
hold a public hearing prior to commencing a proceeding to acquire property rights by
eminent domain,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board shall hold a public hearing on April
th
5, 2004 at 7:00 p.m. at the Queensbury Activities Center, 742 Bay Road, Queensbury, to
inform the general public about the Project, review the public use to be served by the Project
and the potential impacts on the environment and the residents of the locality where the
Project is to be located and to hear all persons interested in the proposed Project, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town Clerk
to publish a Notice of Public Hearing in at least five (5) successive issues of the Glens
Falls Post-Star commencing at least ten (10) but no more than thirty (30) days before the
date of the public hearing, and
BE IT FURTHER,
478
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby authorizes the Town
Supervisor to engage the services of Empire State Appraisal Consultants, Inc., to provide
an appraisal value of the easement over the property identified as Tax Map No.: 288.16-
1-3 for a total cost not to exceed $1,800 to be paid from the appropriate account as
determined by the Town’s Budget Officer, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Town
Supervisor to sign any documentation, including a contract for appraisal services, and the
Town Supervisor and/or Town Counsel to take all action necessary to effectuate the terms of
this Resolution, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that this Resolution shall take effect immediately.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer
NOES : None
ABSENT : None
RESOLUTION CONSENTING TO LEAD AGENCY DESIGNATION
AND AUTHORIZING TOWN CLERK TO SUBMIT PETITION FOR
CHANGE OF ZONE FOR PROPERTY OWNED BY MICHELLE
CLARK MAILLE
TO PLANNING BOARD
RESOLUTION NO. 173. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
WHEREAS, Michelle Clark Maille has submitted an application to the Queensbury
Town Clerk’s Office for rezoning of certain property and the application has been reviewed
by the Town Planning Staff and deemed complete for purposes of review, and
479
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
WHEREAS, applications for rezoning and zoning amendments are forwarded to the
Town Planning Department and Planning Board for recommendations in accordance with
§179-15-020 of the Town Zoning Ordinance, and
WHEREAS, following such recommendations, the Queensbury Town Board will
review the rezoning applications and take such other action as it shall deem necessary and
proper, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board understands that the reason for this rezoning request is
for a subdivision of the subject property,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby authorizes and directs the
Town Clerk to submit the following application to the Queensbury Planning Board for
advisory report and recommendation:
APPLICATION OF :
Michelle Clark Maille
TAX MAP NO: :
308.06-1-86
LOCATION OF PROPERTY :
North side of Luzerne Road, .85 miles
east of
West Mountain Road and 1,000’ east
of
Burch Lane, Queensbury
APPLICATION FOR :
Rezoning of property
currently zoned Suburban
Residential – One Acre (SR-1A) to
Suburban Residential – Twenty-
Thousand Square Feet (SR-20);
and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby consents to the Planning Board acting as
Lead Agency for SEQRA review of this project and directs the Department of Community
Development to notify any other involved agencies.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough
NOES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
480
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
ABSENT: None
RESOLUTION CONSENTING TO LEAD AGENCY DESIGNATION
AND AUTHORIZING TOWN CLERK TO SUBMIT PETITION FOR
CHANGE OF ZONE FOR PROPERTY OWNED BY JOHN HUGHES
TO
QUEENSBURY PLANNING BOARD
RESOLUTION NO. 174. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr.Theodore Turner
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Roger Boor
WHEREAS, John Hughes has submitted an application to the Queensbury Town
Clerk’s Office for rezoning of certain property and the application has been reviewed by the
Town Planning Staff and deemed complete for purposes of review, and
WHEREAS, applications for rezoning and zoning amendments are forwarded to the
Town Planning Department and Planning Board for recommendations in accordance with
§179-15-020 of the Town Zoning Ordinance, and
WHEREAS, following such recommendations, the Queensbury Town Board will
review the rezoning applications and take such other action as it shall deem necessary and
proper, and
WHEREAS, the Town Board understands that the reason for this rezoning request is
for a subdivision of the subject property,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby authorizes and directs the
Town Clerk to submit the following application to the Queensbury Planning Board for
advisory report and recommendation:
APPLICATION OF :
John Hughes
TAX MAP NO: :
296.12-1-23
LOCATION OF PROPERTY :
Bayberry Drive & Bay Road,
Queensbury
481
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
APPLICATION FOR :
Rezoning of property
currently zoned Professional Office
(PO) to Single Family Residential –
Twenty-Thousand Square Feet
(SFR-20);
and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board hereby consents to the Planning Board acting as
Lead Agency for SEQRA review of this project and directs the Department of Community
Development to notify any other involved agencies.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Stec, Mr. Boor
NOES : Mr. Brewer
ABSENT: None
RESOLUTION APPROVING AUDIT OF BILLS –
TH
ABSTRACT OF MARCH 12, 2004
RESOLUTION NO.: 175. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer
WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board wishes to approve the audit of bills
th
presented as the Abstract appearing on March 12, 2004,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves the Abstract
th
appearing on March 12, 2004 numbering 24097000 through 24128800 and totaling
$568,244.66, and
BE IT FURTHER,
482
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
RESOLVED, that the Town Board further authorizes and directs the Budget Officer
and/or Town Supervisor to take such other and further action as may be necessary to
effectuate the terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Turner
NOES : Mr. Boor
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote: Supervisor Stec-Noted that the Town Board now will review
and approve all Town Audits … Budget Officer Ms. Switzer noted that the vouchers will
be kept in the Accounting Office for review until they are approved and then will be filed in
the Accounting Office.
RESOLUTION APPROVING AUDIT OF BILLS –
JANUARY AND FEBRUARY 2004 ABSTRACTS
RESOLUTION NO.: 176. 2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer WHO MOVED ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. Theodore Turner
WHEREAS, the Queensbury Town Board wishes to approve, ratify and affirm the
audit of bills presented as the Abstracts of January and February, 2004,
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT
RESOLVED, that the Queensbury Town Board hereby approves, ratifies and
affirms the Abstracts of January and February, 2004 numbering 24000000 through
24096900 and totaling $3,992,803.09, and
BE IT FURTHER,
RESOLVED, that the Town Board affirms and ratifies the Town Budget Officer
and/or Town Supervisor’s actions taken during January and February concerning such
audits and authorizes and directs the Budget Officer and/or Town Supervisor to take such
other and further action as may be necessary to effectuate the terms of this Resolution.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004, by the following vote:
AYES : Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough,
NOES : Mr. Boor
483
REGULAR TOWN BOARD MEETING 03-15-2004 MTG. #13
ABSENT: None
Discussion held before vote:
Councilman Boor-the reason I am voting no on this one too is
that I haven’t reviewed these so I do not think it would be appropriate for me to say yes.
8.0 ACTION OF RESOLUTIONS PREVIOUSLY INTRODUCED FROM
THE FLOOR
NONE
9.0 ATTORNEY MATTERS
NONE
RESOLUTION ADJOURNING TOWN BOARD MEETING
RESOLUTION NO. 177.2004
INTRODUCED BY: Mr. Tim Brewer WHO MOVED FOR ITS ADOPTION
SECONDED BY: Mr. John Strough
RESOLVED, that the Town Board of the Town of Queensbury hereby adjourns its
Regular Session.
th
Duly adopted this 15 day of March, 2004 by the following vote:
AYES: Mr. Boor, Mr. Turner, Mr. Strough, Mr. Brewer, Mr. Stec
NOES: None
ABSENT: None
Respectfully submitted,
Miss Darleen M. Dougher
Town Clerk-Queensbury