Tonight (2018-09-10) was a meeting of the Mendon Town Board.
While I generally don’t like special meetings and rescheduling, the only reason I was able to make it to this meeting was because the Village Planning Board rescheduled their regular meeting (which would have been tonight) to next Wednesday.
As a technical aside: If you’re bringing a laptop to a meeting, to give a presentation, make sure it can run the program and bring a power cord. To his credit, John (Supervisor) was opening his presentation before the meeting, but acknowledged the system had been complaining lately. And the lack of power cord meant it shut down early. It worked out, as he was essentially done at that point anyways. But I’m getting ahead of myself, much happened before then.
A gentleman (who’s name I missed) spoke up during the public comment and the public hearing, on essentially the same topic. He was speaking on the Mendon Green development project, and made a point of saying it was just him, with no lawyers present. He must be used to speaking for a group, because he used ‘us’ and ‘we’ alot for one person. He was generally unhappy with how the Town was handling zoning, in particular with how it applied to his project. Seemed to have procedural concerns more then anything else, although I didn’t know enough of the context to identify them. While he was clearly biased (as he stands to gain from him stance, imagine that), I give him credit for making the attempt to find a resolution that has everyone happy. If nothing else, his presence made sure the Board was aware, when they got to the re-codification public hearing, that zoning shouldn’t be written for one particular project/property owner.
Tonight had a public hearing for zoning re-codification, as mentioned towards the end of last months meeting. Full disclosure: I do sit on the Town’s Zoning Board, for whatever that is worth.
I hadn’t managed to read the entire 394 page document in detail, but my quick skimming didn’t find anything of concern. Which is the way zoning is, it’s the details where the devils hide.
As expected, comments were lacking on this. Only the one gentleman mentioned above, who essentially repeated his comments about his development. Although he did offer an idea about zoning properties differently based on the availability (or lack thereof) of utilities. Mostly sewer, but I suppose any could apply. Seemed like a decent method for dividing which properties are zoned which way.
Yet again, roosters become a discussion point. It sounds like the zoning will set a limit of one (1) rooster per 3 acres, and must not be closer then 150 feet to the property line. Again, seems like a decent enough restriction. And a particular property owner can always request a variance.
Did get an amusing quote from Sheldon (Town Attorney) to take out of context. He said it was “OK whatever you do”. To add that context back in, he was referring to verbiage and options in the code. In his opinion, any of the ideas presented were legally acceptable. Just had to make sure the language used in the code matched the idea being expressed, since those that end up enforcing the law won’t have the discussion to reference.
Worth noting, while the public hearing was closed, no zoning was changed tonight. From discussion, it is likely the proposed changes will be sent to the County for review, and then be approved at a future meeting (probably next month).
Somewhere it came out that the former GM plant has new owners/tenants getting ready to move in. Hasn’t happened yet because of some delay, which seems to involve the overlapping taxing authorities. Still, sounds like progress is being made, even if it’s not as fast as desired. Which is the way it always is, hurry up and wait.
Which brought us to the big presentation of the night: the 2019 Tentative Budget. While the presentation was very much the big overview, there were a few interesting tidbits. Expenses are planned to be $93k lower then last year. Town tax rate is essentially flat, as planned to be the same as last year. Which in turn, was a smidge lower then the year before, where it had been flat for the previous five years.
There were a pair of pie charts that showed the property tax and how much of that was linked to where. For those in the Village ~5% of the pie was Town taxes, and for those outside of the Village (yet still in the Town) ~8% of the pie was Town taxes. The School was ~70% of the pie. Could be yet another case where tortured numbers can tell us anything, or could mean the Town doesn’t tax that much, at least when compared to the other taxing authorities.
Looks to be a plan for converting the former library at 15 Monroe into a recreation area. Unclear if it will be open next year, but work towards that goal is in the tentative budget. I don’t like to see vacant buildings just sit there. Doubly so when it’s government owned, ie public property. If they can’t use it, they should at least sell it. While I may change my mind by the time it’s done, I am glad to hear there is a plan. Sounds like this plan will be it’s own presentation in a few months.
Which brought us to the previously mentioned drained battery and the resulting end of the presentation. As John said, he got through all the important stuff.
CHIPS (presumably Consolidated Local Street and Highway Improvement Program) came up again, this time in regards to radios. The Highway department‘s system is getting old, so they are planning to replace them. If it goes as planned, won’t (directly) cost the Town anything, as the State will reimburse. Still paid for by taxpayers (as everything is), just allocated differently. On the other hand, nothing lasts forever, so it is prudent to plan for replacements.
For those of you that have embraced the dark side, Primary elections look to be this Thursday, September 13. Apparently polling locations are the same as the general elections, for those of you registered with a party.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the September 10, 2018 meeting of the Mendon Town Board.
Link to agenda on Town website until they update it, losing the past.