Tonight (2018-09-17) was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls Board of Trustees.
As has happened at some previous meetings, essentially all the noteworthy items were part of the reports at the start of the meeting. The rest of the agenda items where pretty straightforward, wasn’t much more then what the agenda itself said. The exception was adding the student representative to the Board.
Morgan Levine, a sophomore at HFL, is now the Village’s Board student representative. She gave a little background on herself, and it does sound like she keeps busy. When asked to comment on why she agreed to this position, she spoke about advocacy. This concerns me, as I see too many ‘advocates’ that are being ‘useful idiots‘. Hopefully this doesn’t apply to Morgan.
A few years back, a veterans memorial was built at the cemetery. In doing so, an old flagpole was left out in the middle of the field. While nothing concrete has been plotted out, there is discussion about doing something with it. This came up as a resident commented to a Trustee about it. Apparently they didn’t like the lone flagpole. Good to hear about the follow up, even if it’s too soon to tell how it will turn out.
Another Trustee attended a training event on ‘active shooters’, which prompted discussion about improving the security on Village properties. I’ll admit I have mixed thoughts on this topic. On the one hand, it is important to protect people, and improving the odds they survive being attacked. On the other, putting a wall between the public servants and those they are sworn to serve pretty much stops their ability to actually serve. Reminds me of the trade off between liberty and safety.
Sounds like 97% of the Village’s taxes have been collected. Which seems to be better then most years.
A resident of Lima, on York st, just outside the Village, will be added to the Village’s sewer. While the legal permits and such need to be double checked, from a practical standpoint they are (almost) ready to go. David (Superintendent of Public Works, etc) plans to do this in house, as it will be good training for his team. Which makes sense, it’s a relatively small project, yet is similar to larger projects that will be coming down the road. The crossing of municipal boundaries is interesting as well.
Heard about another oddity with a property. Apparently the last lot in the Village on Ontario street is only 1/3 in the Village, the rest is outside of it. This came up as a code violation was brought to David’s attention. So now he has to coordinate with Lima. Not that it’s hard, just that there are always plenty of oddities out there.
Wednesday‘s special Planning Board meeting was mentioned. Sounds like it will be a busy meeting. Hopefully Muffy will finally get an answer to the request she made over a year ago.
Mark (Fire Chief) gave a long report. Mostly about challenges with funding radios. Long and short of it: Federal requirements to move to a new standard, County keeps redefining the local implementation details, State denies any grant requests for it. Rick (Mayor) expressed his unhappiness with the situation, making a point that he would push back against the State. I hope it goes well for them, but I’d say it’s another example of how large organizations don’t work well with a ‘top down’ approach.
On a happier note, Mark also shared how the implementation of last years truck maintenance plan is already paying off. Apparently an outside agency inspects the vehicles, and this years inspection was an improvement over the last.
Next was Ed (Ambulance Chief) talking about the staffing shortage he is dealing with. Sounds like it is becoming increasingly difficult to find staff, both volunteers and paid ambulance crews. Doesn’t seem to be a unique problem either, he mentioned how the training courses have been seeing a decrease in enrollment. I hear this in a variety of settings (not just ambulance), that employers can’t find people to fill positions. Does leave me a bit curious what people are doing instead. Then again, it’s not like I fit into the ‘normal’ employee category myself.
Which brought us to the end of the reports, and onto the regular business items. Of which only two seem worth any comment.
Next month, 10/15, there will be a public hearing for a local law to override the tax cap. As Rick pointed out tonight, and I would expect again then, this is a necessary side effect of prudent budgeting imposed by the tax cap law. What the actual tax rate will be is unknown at this time, ask again in late March.
The girl scouts will be having a pumpkin festival in Harry Allen park on 10/20, from 3-9PM. Not the first time they have done this, so not a surprise it’s happening again. I’ve never gone to this, as I get the sense it’s aimed at school age kids.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the September 17, 2018 meeting of the Honeoye Falls Board of Trustees.
Digital version of Agenda was not available anywhere I could find. Perhaps it will be on the Village’s website in the future, perhaps not…