The city of Oneonta Finance/Human Resources Committee covered several key decisions and updates at its meeting Thursday, Jan. 2.
The committee discussed the necessity of having the city mayor and Common Council members up to date on parliamentary procedures.
Members reviewed the authorization of funds for debt issuance and banking depository designations.
They approved sending to a vote of the full council annual appointments and discussed the Climate Smart Communities Task Force’s success with a repair cafe.
They reviewed employment vacancies, which have decreased from 14 to nine.
The committee also considered a lease agreement for the transit center and a real estate utility easement.
City Community Development Director Judy Pangman gave status updates on several community development projects.
The state grant for Oneonta Theatre roof stabilization grant expired Nov. 30. The grantee no longer has the local match and indicated that it wants to end the grant, then asked for an extension, Pangman said, adding that the future of the roof project is uncertain at this time.
In late 2022, the state Regional Economic Development Council awarded the city $500,000 through the New York Main Street program to assist in the stabilization of the theater at 41-49 Chestnut St. The full budget for the project is $893,000, including a local match from the property owner, 47 Chestnut Street LLC, of $393,000.
Pangman discussed the $205,800 Community Development Block Grant Program for lead service line replacements. The city contacted the owners of about 134 properties with identified lead water services through mailings and postcards to encourage participation in the grant program.
The program will assist four single-family homes and two multi-family homes for a total of $66,500. Due to limited participation, Pangman said the city anticipates having to de-obligate about $100,000 of the grant funds.
The city also will likely need to de-obligate some of the grant funds from the Ash Loss Program since the tree-planting program in the Sixth Ward came in about $14,000 under budget, she said.
Pangman also shared some “really awesome news.”
The city is undertaking a $5,253,000 project to improve the city’s wastewater treatment plant. After receiving a Bipartisan Infrastructure Law grant of $2.6 million, the city received a $2.3 million grant through the state Department of Environmental Protection’s Water Quality Improvement Program, which brings the local share down to $326,500.
The contractor Wendel’s project manager, Brian Sibiga, encouraged the city to apply for the WQIP grant since the project includes phosphorus removal, which is a priority of the WQIP program. As a result, the city was awarded the additional grant of $2.3 million, which brings the city’s share to $326,500, or 6% of the total project cost.
“We got this two days before Christmas,” Pangman said.
The three committee members were joined in discussion by fellow council members Kaytee Lipari Shue and Elayne Mosher Campoli.
This apparently was not a violation of state Open Meetings Law, according to City Clerk Kerri Harrington.
According to an opinion from the state Committee on Open Government from 2021, members of a legislative body who are not members of a legislative subcommittee may attend committee meetings, but “the non-committee members should not be involved in the discussion of committee business.”
“Non-committee legislators should only be permitted to comment in the same way that members of the general public are permitted to comment,” the opinion stated.
That last sentence is the important part, Harrington said.
“The committees have become a place where the public has been interacting more and more with the council,” she said. “I would 100% see an issue if they were allowed to speak and no one else, but members of the public and city staff are encouraged to have dialogue at these meetings to ensure everyone is informed. We ensure the separation by not having them sit in their seats and by them asking permission to ask a question before they do. To allow them to sit in their spot or speak ‘out of turn’ would be treating them different than the public and that wouldn’t be fair.”