The evening of 2023-05-15 was a meeting of the Honeoye Falls Board of Trustees.
Potentially the most important topic of the meeting: Who owns the falls, and by extension, who should be taking point on keeping it from sweeping the Haviland’s house away. Apparently part of the Hamilton dam (the falls dam has a name, news to me) has been damaged over time, and a portion of the water is flowing around it. Causing (potential?) issues at Haviland’s house.
From discussion, it sounds like there are two basic options: Do repairs, likely requiring temporarily redirecting the creeks water. Or let it continue, which will end up compromising the foundation of the house. I fulling expect letting a house collapse into the creek would be unacceptable to too many, so the second option might realistically end up being controlled demolition before it got that far. But water plays by it’s own rules, it cares not for our opinions.
A group of HFL students presenting on Climate Smart Communities. They felt a little vague on what they were looking for, and Rick (Mayor) said as much. Apart from Honeoye Falls becoming a Climate Smart Community. But what exactly that would entail… Either way, no one was against exploring. So I expect this group will be back at some point with more actionable steps.
Also being explored is a Length of Service Award Program for the Fire Department. Put simply, this is a retirement program for fire fighters. I have nothing meaningful to say on the program itself, apart from a comment by the presenter. He acknowledged the volunteer crisis in emergency services. Which reminded me of an article I read about how so many of the crisis’s we deal with today aren’t solved. Because solving them would remove them as an exploitable tool. Which is the extreme extension of the idea ‘never want a serious crisis to go to waste‘. Which only impacts the Fire Department in that they are experiencing a crisis. Do we solve it, and let it go to waste in the process? Or does someone leverage it for personal gain, regardless of if that solves it?
Rick reported on some County conversations. In particular, the County is looking at how to sponsor 100Mbps/$30 internet connections. I have no idea if that is a pipe dream or something serious. If it worked, I wouldn’t mind that plan, as it beats my current one in both speed and price. Or is this another crisis?
Immigrants also came up, and how they are getting bussed to New York City (I did not hear ‘illegal’ explicitly said, but outside that context I don’t think the conversation makes sense). And from NYC, they then spread upstate. Apparently the County is looking at how to provide support for them. Which I found interesting, as it raises the question of does the County provide support for me? No, I work to gather the resources needed to keep a roof over my head and food on my table. I’ll freely admit government has (too large of) an influence over that, but I’m doing the work. Yet migrants wandering up from NYC get taken care of? Too few details to really comment, and I’m in favor of grace as much as the next Christian, but the logic felt lacking. Or is this another crisis?
All that out of the way, there were a whole bunch of quick items. As happens at many meetings, but what stood out to me was the scale. The recording would give a more objective measurement, but it felt to me like the first ~1/3 of the agenda took ~3/4 of the time.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land for the May 15, 2023 meeting of the Honeoye Falls Board of Trustees.
Online copy of Agenda was not available anywhere I could find. Perhaps it will be on the Village’s website in the future, perhaps not…