The 'Green' · ing of New Hartford...

We figured out early on that almost every time we submitted a Freedom of Information request, it was being sent to Town Attorney Gerald Green. In fact it was laughable when we once went to the Town Clerk's office to pick up a FOILed document. As we were leaving the office, the Deputy Clerk asked us if she could have our copy of the document back for a minute so she could make a copy of our copy that we just picked up...just so they would know what we picked up. Wait a minute...don't they have the original?!

Recently we FOILed a report for monies paid to the town for ALL FOILed documents since 2006. The report made it quite clear that we were being monitored. Other FOIL requests listed on the report from the Town Clerk were not noted in the town attorney's invoices. That is, not until the Observer Dispatch started nosing around the Business Park documents in 2009; then they were apparently placed on the "watch list" as well.

In reviewing Attorney Green's invoices from January 2006 to June 2009, it became apparent that sometimes there were two or three telephone consults a day between the town clerk and/or town personnel and the town attorney regarding FOILed documents; often times followed up by billings for an email sent to the same person he had a telephone conference with.

In February 2008, Attorney Green billed the town for two (2) hours ($300 total) to formulate a F.O.I.L. policy and prepare a response to a F.O.I.L. appeal. In March 2008, Attorney Green even billed the town for his attendance at a free seminar at SUNYIT where Robert Freeman, Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government was the guest speaker; in April 2008, Attorney Green arranged to have Robert Freeman hold an hour and a half seminar for town employees to discuss F.O.I.L. and Open Meetings Law. However, even after Attorney Green billed the town for these informational seminars and for developing a FOIL policy, he still monitored our FOIL requests. Apparently, Attorney Green felt the town clerk needed further guidance when it came to our requests.

All government entities [including schools] are supposed to have at least one Records Access Officer to handle requests for copies of public documents. In the case of the Town of New Hartford, the Records Access Officer is the Town Clerk. It is her job to determine if a document is FOILable and to see to it that a copy of the document is available in a timely fashion in accordance with the NYS FOI Law. This is not rocket science and the New Hartford town clerk has been on the job for many years so she should be very familiar with what is FOILable and what is not. If she is uncertain, she can always contact Robert Freeman, Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government. Mr. Freeman is available for guidance to anyone...free of charge.

Admittedly, there may be a few instances where the town clerk might want to involve the town attorney, but over $12,000 of time billed to the town just to monitor Freedom of Information requests? That is roughly how much Attorney Green billed the Town of New Hartford to deal with FOIL requests that were basically from Concerned Citizens. Documents that should have been readily available to anyone who asked and in some cases perhaps should have been made available at town board meetings as handouts.

We weren't asking for anything that should have normally caused concern...except of course when we wanted information on the Alessi case or when we inquired as to the whereabouts of a 1997 town van that seemed to disappear, or the time we wondered why town license plates were still on a van and several town trucks located on private property after they were sold to a private individual [in some cases without prior town board approval of the sale].

According to the FOI Law:

"Record" means any information kept, held, filed, produced or reproduced by, with or for an agency or the state legislature, in any physical form whatsoever including, but not limited to, reports, statements, examinations, memoranda, opinions, folders, files, books, manuals, pamphlets, forms, papers, designs, drawings, maps, photos, letters, microfilms, computer tapes or discs, rules, regulations or codes.

Sounds pretty clear to us...basically almost anything is FOILable as soon as it becomes the property of the town [including Attorney Green's invoices] with a few exceptions:

Each agency shall, in accordance with its published rules, make available for public inspection and copying all records, except that such agency may deny access to records or portions thereof that:

(a) are specifically exempted from disclosure by state or federal statute;
(b) if disclosed would constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy under the provisions of subdivision two of section eighty-nine of this article;
(c) if disclosed would impair present or imminent contract awards or collective bargaining negotiations;
(d) are trade secrets or are submitted to an agency by a commercial enterprise or derived from information obtained from a commercial enterprise and which if disclosed would cause substantial injury to the competitive position of the subject enterprise;
(e) are compiled for law enforcement purposes and which, if disclosed, would:

i. interfere with law enforcement investigations or judicial proceedings;
ii. deprive a person of a right to a fair trial or impartial adjudication;
iii. identify a confidential source or disclose confidential information relating to a criminal investigation; or
iv. reveal criminal investigative techniques or procedures, except routine techniques and procedures;

(f) if disclosed could endanger the life or safety of any person;
(g) are inter-agency or intra-agency materials which are not:

i. statistical or factual tabulations or data;
ii. instructions to staff that affect the public;
iii. final agency policy or determinations; or
iv. external audits, including but not limited to audits performed by the comptroller and the federal government; or

(h) are examination questions or answers which are requested prior to the final administration of such questions;
(i) if disclosed, would jeopardize an agency’s capacity to guarantee the security of its information technology assets, such assets encompassing both electronic information systems and infrastructures; or
(j) are photographs, microphotographs, videotape or other recorded images prepared under authority of section eleven hundred eleven-a of the vehicle and traffic law.

So the question is...was Attorney Green acting as town attorney to insure that nothing was disclosed to Concerned Citizens that could be determined to be a private or legal matter as defined by the Freedom of Information Law [a determination that should for the most part be routine for a town clerk with many years of experience] or was he working as head of the New Hartford Republican Committee in an attempt to cover his own A$$ as he worked [and billed the town] to further the agenda of a select few "friends" of the Republican Party?

Elmer Fudd says...

The New Hartford town board is considering implementing new "rules for conduct" at town board meetings. The document, spearheaded by Councilman Robert A. Payne, III [according to a statement made in the OD article by Councilman Richard Woodland] was introduced at the last town board meeting on August 12, 2009. However, no resolution was adopted to enact the rules pending review of the proposed document by Robert Freeman, Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government.

When asked about the pending resolution, Councilman Payne was quoted in today's Observer Dispatch article titled, Shhhhhhh! Meeting in session, as saying:

“We’re taking a proactive stance.”

Although Concerned Citizens has been a frequent critic of the current town board, when asked if the new rules were aimed at silencing the group, Councilman Payne responded that:

Referring to Lawrence and Wiatr, Payne maintained the proposal “has nothing to do with them at all.”

“In my opinion, they record all of the board meetings and record them in an orderly fashion,” he said. “Those folks have been very respecting of meeting protocol.”

So there is NO problem, but just in case...

The day after the town board meeting, Concerned Citizens obtained a copy of the proposed two-page resolution; however, according to the Observer Dispatch article there have been some changes since the initial draft was presented to the town board.

An initial draft of the rules would have barred use of still photography and limited the number of video cameras. But town officials say they’ve scrapped those provisions.

According to the document provided to Concerned Citizens, Rule #10 states:

The public is asked to make comments in a civil and respectful manner. Please be advised that your statements do not enjoy the same privilege and immunity given to statements made by members of the Town Board. You are to restrict your comments to matters pertaining to Town business.

We'd certainly like some clarification on that one! It sounds like "do as we say, not as we do!" Very interesting rule, Bob! Definitely in keeping with your vote to close Stormwater Committee meetings to the public and to not release assessment data to Concerned Citizens even though that information is clearly FOILable. At least you are consistent in your effort to keep the public at bay.

Concerned Citizens provided the ACLU with a copy of the proposed resolution and the response from Barrie Gewanter, head of the ACLU in Syracuse was:

...please monitor or have friends monitor how this resolution is applied and let me know if it is done in a selective or discriminatory way. If so, I'll look closer.

Barrie Gewanter
CNY Chapter NYCLU

Trust us, Concerned Citizens will be watching!

According to the article, Councilman Robert Payne said the proposed resolution relating to conduct at town meetings could be discussed at the Wednesday, August 26, 2009 town board meeting. [Since writing this blog, the meeting has been cancelled. The next Town Board meeting will be September 9, 2009.]

Be sure to read Strikeslip's take on the proposed new rules Sit Down and Shut Up... Strikeslip makes an excellent point; besides Concerned Citizens and some Town of New Hartford Department Heads, how many other people attend the town board meetings?

Second Quarter Sales Tax Figures are in...

and they don't look good.

Actually, they look good given the economy; they just fall short of the amount of sales tax budgeted for 2009.

We already blogged about the foolishness of budgeting for more than was actually received for the past three consecutive years. The aggravating part is that the Town was paying a CPA $150 an hour to put together both the 2008 and 2009 budgets.

One has to wonder if this was a case of the accountant being directed by the town supervisor, who now admits he knows nothing about finances, to do whatever it takes to produce a budget with a zero tax rate increase with the assurance that the town can always use the fund balance [rainy day fund] to make up for any shortfall. Certainly no CPA is worth $150 an hour if he can't reasonably predict future receipts by looking at the past; particularly when it so obvious that even in the "good times" the town never saw much over $5,000,000 sales tax revenue. And what kind of accountant would follow that directive, if one was given?

The sales tax figures for the Town of New Hartford from the first quarter of 2006 to the second quarter of 2009 are as follows (click on graphic to view at 100%):

If you total the first and second quarter receipts, they come in about $400,000 short of being half of the 2009 budgeted figure of $5,500,000 and about $10,400 less than was received by the second quarter of 2008. When you consider that total receipts for 2008 were only $4,945,658.73, far short of the $5,500,000 budgeted for 2008, the town has a problem!

Unless a lot of New Hartford residents take advantage of the "CARS" [Consumer Assistance Recycle and Save Act of 2009] Program and the sale of new cars boosts sales tax revenue, or if there are incredible Back to School and Holiday seasons, New Hartford is going to once again fall way short of the $5,500,000 budgeted for sales tax receipts in the 2009 budget.

Soon the town will be putting together "wants and needs" for the 2010 budget. On or before September 30th, the tentative budget is filed in the office of the town clerk. The town clerk has to present the tentative budget to the town board at a regular or special meeting to be held on or before October 5th. Here is a link to our blog about the budget process.

A budget committee has been put together consisting of Councilman Woodland, Councilwoman Krupa, Heather Mowat and three (3) town residents to determine the amount of fund balance the town needs to keep on hand.

Ms. Mowat also advised the town board at the last meeting that the 2008 audit, being prepared by Barone & Howard, should be available in a couple of weeks. We will keep you posted!

It's expensive to keep documents away from the public...

Just ask Town Attorney Green.

We have been looking over Attorney Green's invoices submitted to the town for payment over the past 3 1/2+ years. One of the first things that caught our eye was the constant use of the town attorney's time to look over FOIL requests; particularly the ones submitted by Concerned Citizens which were basically the only ones that were apparently sent to him. (We know, because we also FOILed a list of all FOIL requests that were submitted to the town by anyone.) The Town Clerk is the person that has always been charged with handling FOIL requests, but apparently things changed when the new administration took over in 2006.

We will be devoting an entire blog to the FOIL requests and the amount of time billed to the Town of New Hartford by Attorney Green for documents that should have been made readily available by the Town Clerk.

However, we were quite taken back by the amount of time billed for one particular incident in 2007. We tried to FOIL a copy of the Assessment Database in time for residents to be able to view assessments online prior to Grievance Day. Our May 2, 2007 FOIL request began a long battle to gain information that previously had been provided to us without even submitting a FOIL request...it was just handed over FREE of charge by the previous administration.

Here is a list of hours billed by Attorney Green so that we could get a copy of a disk that should be readily available upon request according to the Freedom of Information Law (click on graphic to view in larger print):

Even after the town board approved releasing the assessment cd to us in July 2007, they continued to use every stall tactic in the books.

On September 19, 2007 and September 20, 2007, Attorney Green billed the town for 3 hours and 5 hours respectively for a total of 8 hours just to review our FOIL appeal! That is at $150 an hour, folks! Twelve hundred ($1,200) dollars! Our FOIL appeal wasn't that complicated [it was a four (4) page letter]...what could have possibly taken that long to review...trying to find a way to continue to keep the information unavailable?

By the way, only one councilman voted against giving us the information in July 2007; Councilman Payne who is up for re-election this November. One of only a couple of nay votes cast by Councilman Payne and it was to keep assessment information away from taxpayers. His other nay vote was in September 2007 to keep residents out of the Stormwater Committee Meetings...way to go Bob!

Town Board Meeting...

Wednesday, August 12, 2009. Meeting is in Butler Hall at 6 p.m. Agenda now online!

Planning Board Meeting and Southern GEIS Public Hearing...

tomorrow, August 10, 2009 at the Perry Junior High on Weston Road.

The Planning Board meeting will start at 5:00 p.m. and the GEIS Public Hearing starts at 6:00 p.m. The Agenda is now online.

Registration is required to speak at the GEIS Public Hearing. You can either register prior to the meeting or any additional speakers will be allowed to register up to the conclusion of the hearing. Please be sure to read the guidelines of the Public Hearing.

Here is a copy of the updated GEIS and an updated Frequently Asked Questions.

If you have questions or comments, now is the time to express them either in writing or at tomorrow's Public Hearing. Written comments will be accepted until August 20, 2009.

Scully Toxic Waste Dump...Digging up the Dirt!

Remember when we blogged about this ...Observer Dispatch article?

Fast forward to August 2009...

(Click on invitation to view larger!)

A couple of days ago, we wrote to Gail Rymer of Lockheed Martin requesting a copy of the invitation that we learned had been mailed to some residents. Ms. Rymer replied:

Mr. Wiatr and Ms. Lawrence,

Thank you for your note. I believe Mr. Wiatr is on our mailing list and should have received the invitation to the meeting. Our mailing list is pretty extensive and includes everyone who has ever contacted us, been involved in previous meetings, neighbors, community members around the former Scully site, and officials and staff of the Town of New Hartford. It also includes the media in both New Hartford and Utica. A news release and media advisory are also being provided to the media. I have attached a scanned copy of the invitation per your request. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me at 800-449-4486 or via e-mail at gail.rymer@lmco.com.

Everyone's invited...If you plan on taking the tour, before you go, you might want to look at this video...it is from 1995 and shows that not all the dirt was taken from the dump site; a good deal of the dirt was deposited along the back fence of the owners of 202 Valley View Road. At the end of the tape, you will hear the homeowner say that "Peter Ouderkirk [Peter Ouderkirk, NYS DEC - Region 6 Headquarters, 317 Washington Street, Watertown, NY 13601] said that the reason the dirt was kept on site was because they couldn't find a landfill." Not every landfill can accept toxic waste.

According to ... this picture provided to us by the owners of 202 Valley View, the mound of dirt even grassed over; that is, until February of 2009 when they were videotaped putting the same dirt right back in the excavation site hole. [This is only a portion of the videotape we have. We apologize for the quality of this video; we had to make a video from a videotape played on a television, but we have the original tape.] The owners of the home tried to tell D.E.C. that the dirt is the same dirt that was taken out of the hole, but they chose not to listen.

Read the report put out by Lockheed Martin as to what they claim they did with the dirt from 2006 to present......Transportation and Disposal Plan. Guess they forgot about the dirt that was taken out of the dump site and piled behind 202 Valley View in 1995 when the first clean-up was underway.

Incidentally, the corporation that recently bought 204 Valley View Road ......as reported in the Observer Dispatch was none other than Glen Acres, Inc. - Peter Cragnolin. Remember our blog...They used that oily substance where??

Now why would a developer buy land that was part of a toxic waste dump that according to the D.E.C. is still being monitored and will be for at least the next year? It is particularly puzzling because in February 2009, Lockheed Martin purchased 210 Valley View Road from the sister of Mr. Peter Cragnolin because of the toxic dump site problem. Hmmm!

p.s. When we first received a copy of the invitation, we telephoned Kay Armstrong at the toll-free number listed on the invitation. At the February 25, 2009 Town Board meeting, we thought we were introduced to her as being a representative of Lockheed Martin.

Must be our mistake, Ms. Armstrong and her husband own ARMSTRONG and Associates and specialize in CRISIS PLANNING AND TRAINING. A free report can be downloaded from their website "What we learned from Love Canal - The 12 Lessons in Environmental Activism". In other words, they are there to try to derail any attempt "to shine a light" on the toxic waste dump site!

Petty Politics...

A Special Town Board Meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, August 4, 2009 at 6:00 p.m. in Butler Hall. Agenda is now online.

One of the items to be discussed, yet again, is the annexation of 11 acres of land in Cherrywood from the Town of Kirkland to the Town of New Hartford so that a Certificate of Occupancy can be issued for proposed new homes and some that are already built.

Though the error did not take place during the current administration's reign, the solution to the problem is in their ball court. Perhaps if Cherrywood was owned by someone other than previous Town Supervisor Ralph Humphreys, Earle Reed and Town Attorney Gerald Green would have seen to it that the problem was resolved months ago.

For some background on the situation, a previous article appeared in the June 13, 2009 Observer Dispatch regarding this annexation; Annexation proposed for development in New Hartford, Kirkland - Building permits denied in Cherrywood senior community

Another article can be found in today's Observer Dispatch Annexation of Cherrywood parcels still a hot topic

In today's Observer Dispatch, the Town of Kirkland states:

Kirkland Town Supervisor Robert Meelan said his town was allowing New Hartford to take the lead in the decision making process.

“If the annexation doesn’t go through, we are prepared to do an inter-municipal agreement,” he said.

New Hartford Town Supervisor Earle Reed and Councilman David Reynolds are against the annexation. There have been discussions at New Hartford Town Board meetings and joint meetings with the Town of Kirkland and still this lingers on!

Concerned Citizens videotaped the Public Hearing on July 16, 2009.

According to Town Attorney Gerald Green's invoices, this circus has been going on since at least June 11, 2008; well over a year. How many hours at $150 an hour has Attorney Green billed the Town of New Hartford for this debacle?

Enough with the petty politics; it is time to resolve an issue that should have been resolved long ago.

Hopefully town leaders are ready to get down to business and a solution will be approved at Tuesday night's board meeting.

The entire video is about 30 minutes long.

Going from bad to worse...to worser...

Well, everything just seems to be snowballing according to the articles in today's Observer Dispatch:

Business park concerns still adding up; and

NEW HARTFORD BUSINESS PARK: A TIMELINE OF DISCOVERY

The town planner admits that he knew in the summer of 2007 that the land for The Hartford was not in the business park. Is that why he met with Town Attorney Green a day before he sent the letter to Larry Adler informing him of the obscure panel that would make the decisions regarding The Hartford? Did the town planner share his revelation with the Town Attorney? Did the Town Attorney advise the planner to be quiet? Did the town attorney write the letter and tell the town planner to send it to Mr. Adler under the town planner's signature?

Summer of 2007...that is well before ground was even broken. Fred Burrows Trucking didn't apply for a permit to clear the land until October 2007.

Even more maddening is the fact that the summer of 2007 was months before the town board obligated taxpayers to a $2.9 million bond to pay for infrastructure on property owned by a private developer using Bond Anticipation Notes to circumvent the permissive referendum requirement normally allowed for bonding. They touted this "development" as being part of the business park thereby justifying the use of taxpayer monies; and now, regardless of the outcome of this fiasco, taxpayers are on the hook and all Earle Reed can say is:

Town Supervisor Earle Reed said things were now on the right track.
“I think things are going to proceed very nicely now that they are in Planning Board hands,” he said.

Too bad they didn't get on the right track before all this took place. Perhaps if town residents were allowed to view the process in open meetings, the train would have been on the right track as it left the station. Perhaps Mr. Adler would have had to pay for his own infrastructure like all other developers have to do!

Was it sloppiness...or were the orders given from above? Was it already pre-determined that nothing would get in the way of this venture when the New Hartford Republican Committee endorsed Earle Reed for Town Supervisor in 2005?

The New Hartford Republican Committee selects the people they will endorse to run for elected offices in the town. As The Hartford was being built, three members (3) of the Town Board (out of 5; that's a majority!) were also New Hartford Republican Committee members; two (2) members of the Zoning Board of Appeals were members of the New Hartford Republican Committee; one (1) member of the Planning Board was a New Hartford Republican Committee Member; Roger Cleveland, former Highway Superintendent, and his wife were members of the New Hartford Republican Committee. The New Hartford Village Mayor was a member of the New Hartford Republican Committee. An Oneida County Legislator was a member of the New Hartford Republican Committee. The Town Attorney was Chairman of the New Hartford Republican Committee. All of these people are still New Hartford Republican Committee members although a couple of them have recently resigned and no longer serve as members of boards.

One member of the Town Board, who is also the councilman from the Ward where the business park is located, was also on the town board back in 1999 when the "obscure panel" was created and the studies/rezoning of the business park were being done...we even met with him to discuss the situation; yet he never openly said a word in opposition. Concerned Citizens had a meeting with one of the Republican Oneida County Legislators from New Hartford prior to the PILOT approval by the Board of Legislators. We discussed the problems with The Hartford being outside the business park. But unfortunately, that legislator voted yes for the PILOT anyway apologizing after the vote and saying maybe we can work together on some other project in the future.

If anyone took the time to look at either the map in the Town Code or the one in the Final Environmental Impact Statement, they clearly would have seen that in 1999 the land where The Hartford is built was an orchard; that orchard was owned by the McCubbins who operated an apple stand on Middlesettlement Road up until the time that 840 was started. Here are the studies from 1999 that are frequently mentioned:

Final Environmental Impact Statement - Rezoning of Technology Park Site (see page 22 for the map)

Findings Statement for the New Hartford Business Park

1999 SEQR - Full Environmental Statement for the New Hartford Business Park

Starting with Supervisor Reed's first town board meeting (well, that is if you disregard the illegal meeting held minutes after the swearing in ceremony on January 1, 2006 with the town board huddled in a corner whispering as they held their organizational meeting) Supervisor Reed told everyone how wonderful and exciting this business park would be for the community! Sure is exciting all right...

Could it get any worse? Sure, it can and will because according to the Town Zoning Code, the land that The Hartford now occupies is the same land where Larry Adler proposes to build the hotel. Soon someone is bound to realize that the zoning for that land does not allow for a hotel to be built on it. Oops!

Don't miss Strikeslip's blog Waiving the Privilege...In New Hartford.