Last night's Commission meeting was called for 6:30, for presentations. The main meeting was called for 7:00.
I'm happy to report that we started on time. Presentations were completed by 6:45 (thank you, Rotary Club, NMB Home Depot, and Sherwin Williams, and congratulations and thanks, Jose Andino and Jared Susi), so we took a break until 7. The Consent Agenda was reasonably lengthy, but uncomplicated, and it passed. One item, the school at the church, was pulled for further exploration next month.
Discussion about annexation and sanitation did not draw crowds, and both matters were discussed in some detail. We will continue to explore annexation, and we are considering outsourcing sanitation. All we agreed to do last night was find out how much private companies would charge to do our garbage and trash pick-up. Depending on what they say, we might decide to switch, or we might decide we're willing to pay, maybe extra, to keep what we have. Input from you is more than welcome. Comment in the blog, or write to all of your Commissioners. And come to the meetings. We need your opinions and insights.
One piece of public art (sculpture) was accepted by the Commission, and the Commission decided to try to impanel a new arts committee to choose pieces in the future. One resident, Susan Weiss, advocated for an arts committee, is an artist herself, and agreed to consider possibly accepting a seat on such a committee herself. I didn't get to ask her what her reasons might be not to be on an arts committee.
We're still working on how to make the plan and get the money for log cabin renovation.
There are vacancies on some of the Boards, and with an arts committee, there will be probably five new vacancies. We might also switch from having each Commissioner appoint one Board member to having a Commission majority approve any prospective Board member. If you're interested and available, please let us know.
The meeting ended at 9:00, all business having been completed.
By the way, Rosemary Wais outdid herself. There were three desserts last night (four, if you count two versions of one of them), and regular and decaf coffee. She also "forgot" to bring a receptacle to accept donations. What are we gonna do with you, girl?
Well done and a good start for the New Year! I have always thought that these meetings should run 2 hours... if managed property. It looks like this has been accomplished.
ReplyDeleteWell done Commissioners.
Good to hear it went smoothly. One question though, if our public works / sanitation is seperate from the general village budget and it appears to be (to my knowledge, but I could be wrong) working fine within the fee it charges each of us, why are we discussing outsourcing it? I like our public works and the services it provides, and would even support a higher fee to keep it as is. Gage
ReplyDeleteGage,
DeleteWhat you say is almost completely true. I think most of us feel the system we have used for decades works well. There is one glaring problem, however, and we are faced with how to solve it, and quickly. We have never set aside money for new trucks. We now have two to replace, at a cost of about $120K each. If we are to continue to provide our own sanitation, which is a perfectly fine idea, it will require, by my loose calculation, a one-time assessment of about $225 per dwelling now to buy the two new trucks we need, and from now on a yearly charge of about $25 per dwelling above the regular sanitation fee, so we are funded the next time we need to buy trucks.
As we have now authorized the Manager to make inquiries regarding the sanitation charges of private companies, we will soon enough learn what the cost comparison to doing it ourselves, "in house," will be. I'm pretty sure we can expect this comparison by the meeting next month. I will of course keep you posted.
Fred
Aw I completely forgot about that meeting! I was actually looking forward to attend :-(. I'll make sure I go to the next one. I agree with Gage, why outsource garbage collection, our concern is in the general fund and garbage is on its own pay as you go tax (if I am not mistaken). Thanks for the update Fred!
ReplyDeleteJorge,
DeleteYou and Gage are correct.
Fred
In my 35+ years as a resident, I’ve attended hundreds of these meetings. This was one of the shortest in my memory bank. While sad to see so few residents in attendance, for a change there was respect for one another on the dais, even when there was disagreement. Overall it seemed to be a very effective meeting. Kudos to Commissioners Bob Anderson, Fred Jonas and Roxy Ross, to Mayor David Coviello, to Village Manager Heidi Shafran, to Staff and to those who did bother to attend. Thanks Commissioner Jonas for the recap. The only thing of importance, to me, that was not mentioned was the effort by Village Clerk, Maria Camara, to bring our website into the 21st century.
ReplyDeleteLinda Dillon
My apologies, Linda, and Maria. Yes, of course. Maria showed us a nice model of a municipal website from somewhere in Maine. She says she'll have us there (at the level of the website, not in Maine) soon. As an interesting added bonus, she will be able to include the videos of Commission meetings, so anyone can watch them even if they don't have Comcast and they don't want to bother to get themselves a DVD of the meeting.
DeleteFred
It was an excellent and relatively brief meeting... what a dramatic shift in tone and productivity compared to recent years. I second the comment about Rosemary's wonderful and generous contributions. (We might have to sneak a donations jar in there since she won't!)
ReplyDelete