The evening of 2026-10-05 was a meeting of the Mendon Town Board.
Alas, once again, I was elsewhere. But thanks to modern technology, a recording is available.
Following up on questions at the last meeting, Pete (Highway Superintendent) gave background to the soccer field project. Which resulted in some back and forth with Joe (Supervisor). The cynic in me says this was a politically motivated argument, with the actual fields tangential at best. But I would like to be wrong. A more generous interpretation would say this is a case of details being lost in the transition last January, while everyone is acting on good intentions as they try to sort through things. I like that explanation much better then the cynical view.
Rebecca (Board Member) said she is looking to get the Community Engagement Advisory Committee going. I applaud her tenacity for following up on this, as it had kind of fallen to the wayside. But she also listed off a number of reasons for that falling aside. Perhaps this is a case of, despite wanting to do something, there are too many other more critical tasks. And it is better to let this one stay on the wayside. Time will tell.
Tanner (also Board Member) reported on the ambulance contract. In particular how the formula determining who pays how much is being reviewed. And a proposal to remove population from that formula, focusing more on call volume and assessed value. As the idea of reviewing this formula has been discussed for a number of years, I’m interested to see where this ends up at.
Budget adjustments were made, sounded like the ones from last meeting plus another. Either way, good to see this worked out in the end. Better late then never, and good to avoid negative balances.
Changes to Ethics Board were approved. Most substantial portion appears to be number of people on the Board. Going from 3 to 5. If you are interested in sitting on this Board, the Town is looking to fill the newly created vacancies.
Karen Marchese was hired as a human resource consultant. To be paid hourly as needed. Appears to be the same person as last year, thus at least a passing familiarity with the Town.
A redaction policy was approved, although some concerns about interaction with FOIL were stated. Did remind me of the old advice about not putting anything online that you wouldn’t want to see on the front page of the paper. While ‘online’ has expanded considerable since I first heard that advice, it still applies. If you never give the Town anything you wouldn’t want published, you don’t care if it’s redacted or not. If you do care? Perhaps you shouldn’t be sharing that online. Some things are still best face to face, were there is at least some expectation of not being recorded.
Tanner brought up a number of ideas for the Mendon Youth Center (MYC). Perhaps best of all, many of them had little to no financial impact. Unfortunately, it sounds like the roof of that portion of the building needs to be replaced before the MYC could open. And that has an estimated cost of ~$80k. Still, good on Tanner for gathering the ideas. If/when the roof gets fixed, they can be explored.
Joe presented the 2027 Tentative Budget. He shared it should lower tax rate, and lower a number of expense categories ~10%. The Board seemed eager to dig into the numbers (Colin would be proud), and I expect a special meeting to be scheduled for that review.
A number of Honeoye Falls business’ are holding a trick or treat event Saturday, October 31st, 11:30 AM – 1:30 PM. For those of you who either don’t want the kids out too late. Or want the warm up round before going out later for more trick or treating.
And those are my Observations From Audience Land (such as they are) for the October 05, 2026 meeting of the Mendon Town Board.