Common Council, Informal Meeting

1. 0:48Okay, this is the formal meeting for December 8th, 2025. Copy of draft minute for November 10th, 12th, 19 246 meetings have been posted on the city website. Copies of committee reports have also been posted on the city website. two communications. One is sidewalk improvement district 2026 budget which council members should um study because it's going to be coming off this with this and the Columbia County Board of Election Certified election results. So, we're going to have quick reports [snorts] and then a um after the reports we will have a executive session. Let's get the reports going and we start with the fire chief. All right, begin and out here. All right, we had 30 calls last month. Four of those were fires. One was down at the small fires down waterfront bathrooms.
2. 1:53Two of them were building fires in mutual aid districts. Uh, one was burnt food. Uh, we had one motor vehicle versus pedestrian accident. That was a car bike up on Harry Howard Avenue at the bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike bike path up there by the Ferman's home. Three hazardous condition calls. Uh two smoker odor removals. One was a hydraulic leak in the CH. The other was a burnt food from the prior night that they smelled the next day when they came in there. So one good intent pull and then 19 false alarms run here about 383 for a year. probably going to break 400 again. We're about 4 or 500 now where when we got in about 350 a lot lower. So getting busier as time goes on here. So that's all I got. Well, that was short and sweet. Any uh questions from the council? Any questions from the public? >> Thank you, Chief.
3. 2:55>> Thank you. Next, uh, Calvin, you department [clears throat] presentation. All right. Good evening, council. Uh, so last week, um, I'll start on the first slide. Just wanted to, um, feature some of the film from, uh, that was created, um, in respect to the youth department. This was featured last week at Spark Center. And so I just wanted to um show you guys a portion of the film and encourage you all to watch it uh fully. Yes, we're playing roughly 10 minutes. We may
4. 3:57want to guess we should be Wait. I'm not sure. I can. It should be going through here, but it's not. >> Okay. >> Somehow it's getting lost. >> All right. Well, um Well, nonetheless, >> I should point out um I think it's a great film partly because I'm in it. Um but it's everybody should watch it, especially if you're a on a council. Certainly. Um so, so again, that um that link to the video is within the PowerPoint. So I
5. 5:00encourage encourage everyone to watch that. Um and so we could jump back into the power slide two. And so um this is an overview of all of the programing paper and third grade and programming. Just uh did a condensed um slide here. Um and just to recap, November was a pretty uh busy busy month for us. at the center were able to uh pull off our fall festival which kind of lended itself to our open house. Um that went very [clears throat] well. Huge success with our families, programmers and partnering organizations that we collaborate with throughout the year uh and community members alike. And so it was a real uh real fun event. Give us um the opportunity to showcase and celebrate um everything that our youth have accomplished. Um, and so it's really a good kind of a not not quite the send off of the year, but leaving it up to And so the next slide on the left here,
6. 6:05that was uh one of the showcases from Bendle Stiff Circus. Um, our kids uh were still walkers. We had some unicyclists. Um, and [clears throat] to the right that is one of our members in the um fire department gear. the fire department came out with the truck, let the kids explore the truck, put on some of the equipment. Uh so it was a really fun uh interactive day. Um we also had other things going on. We had a hip-hop dance performance with some of our um students in the uh in Lindsay Faulner's class. We also had art display with uh some of the youth. Um, and we also had some of our middle school kids who made uh veggie chili uh for the event. So again, it was a inspiring showcase to show um the uh talents of our students. To the left, um that's some of our youth at the Hudson Sandwich Shop. Christopher Dew, he's been collaborating with us uh for the past few months. um really just
7. 7:10being um of service to our youth. They've arrived there to get uh free, you know, free food and so um this was their opportunity to explore the food truck. And then to the right, uh we brought some of our kids to the rehearsal of the Little Mermaid production at the high school. Uh one of our very own staff, Damian Virgo, was also in the play. He played Sebastian. Uh so uh to the right there, those are some of our youth uh attending that field trip there. Um next we have uh YBL basketball. So basketball registration is uh come to an end and so uh we have roughly 148 kids signed up which we we anticipate that number may climb. Just again typically when we close we kind of get those those late late uh registrations. And so we do make room to get those folks involved. Um but again, as of today, we have 148 kids signed up. This is an indication of strong um
8. 8:14community engagement. It's also, as I mentioned many times, it's a theater program to Blue Hawk athletics. So it's within reason for the kids that were with us in sixth grade to have made the modified teams in seventh and eighth grade. Uh it also shows a high demand for structured youth programming [clears throat] and that's something that we try to remain committed to. Um and it's you know I think it establishes trust with our families that were able to provide you know a safe uh uh environment and one that offers quality athletic experiences. So moving forward we we'll be um creating teams coaching assignments and scheduling. And so that's something that folks can look forward with our basketball league. Again, we're always looking for volunteers to help improve this program as well. Next, we have uh some staff student recognition. Uh to the left there, we have uh Marion Venolstein. He is a first grader. This is year two with us. Um
9. 9:21Marian came to us as a very, very quiet, reserved little guy. Um as you can see there, uh golden smile. He's uh certainly become more outgoing and uh engaged with our with our staff and so um really happy to see him up there. Uh Kayla Hawkwood, you guys may recognize that photo Kayla with our staff of the month um last year and she's continued uh to really uh do a great job. She was awarded staff of the month again. Uh Kayla is a high school senior. um we would love to have her come work with us after graduation, which is still a possibility, but Kayla has plans to go on to college and so we want to um help her along that journey as well. And then to the right, we have Zayen Perry. Zayen was our student of the month for third through 8th program. Zayen is our fourth grader who's been with us roughly say about three three four years now. Three, four years. And so, um, Zayen, he's he's, uh, consistently in program, shows
10. 10:26up with a a really loving, uh, kind energy, and he, yeah, he's a really awesome kid. And so, um, again, he featured month here. I don't know who that was. Sorry. [clears throat] What's the next slide? and just wanted to wish you all, you know, happy holidays on behalf of Putin News Center. Um, you know, again, we are going to continue to feature different uh events involving community and we always like to see our council members there to support it. And that is my report for the evening. Thank you, Calvin. Any questions? >> Happy holidays. >> Thank you. Thank you as well, public. Okay. night. We're moving fast. Next up, uh, Captain Miller. I'll start by saying Chief Franklin is
11. 11:33back. She just got back, but I figured I'd finish out the, uh, rest of the year here. Um, so I'll start with the section 9 reporting. We had zero defensive action reports for November. Um, we had four mental health calls and we had zero overdose incidents to report. We had 38 arrests for November. We average about 10 a week uh with 60 charges. The officers um wrote 93 traffic tickets for November. For our body warn camera uh reports, we had no issues with them. For our parking, we issued for November 3,23 tickets for November. um 2,466 tickets were paid in November. So our revenue for November was $110,6696 and it was up 3% from last November. Uh just so you know, parking's going to start this month removing the meter
12. 12:35heads from Orange Street because we're all we're going to the kiosk and the uh the digital. Uh other than that, the uh incident, we had an incident on Winterwalk. It was a busy one this year. We had actual accidents and others, but we had a man enter a business on the 300 block of War Street with a knife. Um they called 911. We were able to respond there. He had left prior just prior to us getting there, but he had dropped the knife. So, our officers recovered it. Our officers went to his house cuz we determined who he was. And he had another knife. So, the officers had to tase him. Thank god no one was hurt. They were able HPD was able to get him in custody with the sheriff's department's help, but we brought him to CH for uh mental health. That's an ongoing investigation, so I'm not going to speak much more of that at the time, but I'm just happy that no one got injured. That's about it for my report for November. >> Question for council members. Captain, how can you um call you gotten in November as it starts
13. 13:42opening up >> at the at the warming center? >> I I don't know that off the top of my head how many calls we had. >> Okay. >> I know we have had calls there, but I I don't know the exact number. >> I'm sorry question. >> The warming center, how many times have we responded there for evidences? We have. I just don't know the exact number. >> Margaret, you have a question? >> Yes, I do. Um, so, uh, since parking has been against your recommendation last month, uh, parking on on, uh, is now free for the month of December. Uh, what exactly are the folks who are charged with um, doing the parking enforcement? What are they doing for the month of December? There there are two like they're part- timerrs, but what are they doing in the month of December now that there is no parking meters >> for this month? They're going to be
14. 14:46removing all the meter heads >> off of War Street and the side street. So, that's going to be that's going to take some time. That's a lot of work. They have to remove them, pick them up, bring them down to DB DPW and this and that. So, that's going to take time. And then they've been doing general like enforcement for no parking zones, handicap zones, that kind of stuff. So there's work for them to do for sure. >> Are they still going to the hospital and they're >> Yeah. Okay. Handicap >> parking. >> Thank Thank you, Captain Miller. >> You're welcome. >> Thank you. [clears throat] Welcome. >> They already start moving the middle or they they're going to start. >> They removed the ones from the municipal lots already. >> Okay. So, they're all going, but they're going to start doing the actual Warren Street and the side streets off the Warren, but it's, you know, it's a lot of work. And then DW has to take the polls out and all that. So, it'll take some, it's going to take some time. >> Uh, Jennifer, you have a question online. >> Yes, I I have a question. So when they
15. 15:48take the meter heads off, are they replacing some of the meter heads with caps so that they can put signage? >> Yeah, some of them will stay because the signs will go up, but not but not all. >> Right. >> So maybe every seven or 10 spaces, something like that. >> Yes. >> Okay. Thank you so much. >> Of course. Are they um I know at one point the plan was to keep the meters at the handicap parking so somebody can you know it's easier to access right now. Is that still the plan to keep at least the meters in the handicap have parking spots? >> No, that I'm not aware of. >> No. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. That was one of the plans because it would be hard for somebody in wheelchair to >> No, we plan like we >> Yeah, but right now right until we do total trans trans right now until you know until we do the transfer not everybody, you know, >> you're suggesting leaving the metersic
16. 16:51at least get them removed last. >> Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just because as that transitions, right, it'll be very difficult if someone doesn't have access to or if they want to pay >> Yeah. Teroo. >> Okay. Any other questions? >> Thank you all. Thank you. Thank you. >> Heather Campbell who's online by the way for those who don't know our council is also online. >> Heather, >> yes, I'm here. Uh I unfortunately do not have any documentation to share with you today. Um, I basically spent the last two hours on the phone with our IT guy because uh my computer got hacked and somebody uh very cleverly um almost got themselves a $350,000 wire transfer today. So, um I did take a quick and and as part of the fact that I got hacked into also the report that I generally generate got um bastardized and all the charts are gone.
17. 17:55So, I did not have enough time after all of the tech to be fixed to do anything. I did take a quick look at the numbers and there's really nothing substantial that has changed in any of the the regular numbers that we uh do. Once I get it figured out, I will update it retroactively and send it out to everybody. I just uh so in addition to that, the key things I would want to mention are um we did in fact get um our audit finally completed. Um, it has been issued to the majority of entities that require it, including the federal clearing house. Um, and both the regular financial statements and the u federal single audit and the department of transportation single audit, all three of which we had to do this year are up on the website uh for people's perusal. Uh, I can delve into it a little more detail uh in the next meeting. I think everybody's aware of, you know, the single most compelling thing, which is the general fund took a $1.3 million loss in 2024. Um, so that's just something that we're trying to be
18. 19:00mindful of. Um, and like I said, we can go over that information in more detail next year if people are so interested. I'm also happy to sit with anybody who wants to delve into the numbers on a more detailed level. Um, you know, feel free to reach out to me and we can set up a time to review. Uh, in terms of foreclosures, we uh, finally got all the pieces together. So, this week we will be issuing, and by we, I mean the attorney, uh, Frank Bruno of Bruno and Lavine. They will be issuing a demand letter to the people who remain on the foreclosure list. That list is now down to approximately either 69 or 70 people. Um, it's about two four $2.4 $4 million of outstanding uh collections of which about 700,000 is uh penalties and interest and the balance is uh the original property tax which as we all know has already been recorded in revenue at its particular you know in its particular year. So, so that's not new revenue, but the penalties and interest will be. Um, in addition in that mailing, um, and
19. 20:04if anybody wants any kind of more information, please reach out to me in terms of, you know, if you want information for your constituents. But in addition to the demand letter, there is also a, um, a one sheet that I pulled together that talks about the original and the revised installment plans and what the basic terms are, so people know that that is potentially an option for them. And there's also a brochure from Galvin Housing Resources that offers free, uh, foreclosure counseling to property owners. And so, um, I've actually asked and and was given some additional of those brochures for us to hold in our office. So, if we have taxpayers come in and they're at risk, we actually have the brochure that we can hand out to them as well. But that whole packet will be going out this week at some point. And then housing resources will be following up with their own uh not solicitation because they're not really trying to solicit business per se, with their own offering letter uh reinforcing the fact that they offer these free services to taxpayers um that are at risk of foreclosure.
20. 21:06Um it's uh you know, it's it's it's a wacky time in in the city Hudson Treasury between that and uh the new software we're trying to get. We had to get the delinquent school taxes in the system and and letters put out. And you may have seen some complaining about getting letters that uh they that were not accurate. That is in fact true. That is because um Bank of Green County collects and Bank of Green County uh apparently collected for a period of two days and did not uh render any of the collections to our office to let us know that they had made collections and paid. So, there were probably I'm going to say about 20 properties that got letters saying that they had outstanding taxes when in fact uh Bank of Green County had collected it but not uh let us know. So, I think we've handled all of those uh people at this point. Um so, that's wasn't a great thing, but I think it's been resolved at this point. Uh the next big challenge obviously is again this is going to be
21. 22:08the first year that we're trying to issue not only the new tax bills with the new software but also with the new SID feed that's never been done before. So um yeah it should be fun. Um and that's all I have off the top of my head. I will tell you I will actually spend two minutes just in terms of the scam just to let you know what happened. Uh I was expecting an email with a link in it uh that I had to click through in order to verify a document that had to be uploaded to the federal clearing house. This was related to the audit. I was on my phone in my car traveling trying to get this done while I was on vacation. I got an email that had a link saying, "Hey, here's a link you need to verify your thing." I thought it was the link that I was waiting for. Turned out it wasn't. It was a spoof. uh they were able to get my um Microsoft Office login because they asked me to reertify my login in order to to get to uh the uh upload site. Um and from that point they were basically
22. 23:12able to start sending emails out under my city email address. Uh they were very smart about it. They reached out to the bank. They had an email that purportedly was from me introducing my new finance administrator by the name of Mike Fleming. And Mike Fleming followed up with the bank a few months later, a few days later, um, asking about the process for wire transfers and went through the process of becoming a signatory and submitting a request for a wire transfer of $350,000. Um we we are uh very I'm not going to say fortunate because obviously it's all intentional but we have a number of uh safety checks in place for something like this. So I have to submit something they call they have to verify it. It has to be verified by a second person. Um and so uh between the bank's diligence and our diligence we were able to make sure that it didn't happen. But it was clever enough that it was sending emails out uh presumably under my city email
23. 24:15address, but then also CCing them with my city address. But then they tunnneled into my Outlook and created a rule. I don't know how familiar you are with Outlook, but basically went in and created a rule that said basically said anything that comes in from this guy, immediately take it out of the inbox, put it over in this folder over here that nobody looks at, and then immediately stop processing anything having to do with that email. So, it's getting clever. They're getting very, very clever. I'm obviously pleased that we had all the elements in place to thwart it, but um yeah, that's that's that's not great. So, I just wanted to share that with you because I know other people have been getting emails. I probably get one or two or three every month from, you know, either a council member or a department head asking for information because they want to change their direct deposit. We're pretty familiar with those. So, so we ID those pretty quickly, but this this was a this was a level above. So, just wanted to share that and ask everybody to be diligent. >> So, Heather, it wasn't ransomware. It was actually targeted from
24. 25:19>> Yes. >> So it wasn't like a ransomware. >> No. >> No. Right. >> Okay. And real quick, what any update on paddic, please? >> Uh the Yes. Uh the only update I have is I did receive last week I received the document we needed from Andy Howard, the city attorney, uh in order to proceed with the um auction. Uh I just have to update it with what the current amount due are. We just have to set a date and then um determine how we're going to get the communication out there that there is in fact an auction happening and a property available. And I'm not quite sure how we go about doing that. Usually there's someone else involved and there isn't this time. So, but yes, we're we're making moves on that. >> Thank you. Jennifer, you have a question? >> Yes. Is is there a way to find out who who actually is responsible for this and a way to prosecute them? Um I know I know the bank is going to continue to pursue that. Um we did have we've had a couple smaller incidents in the past where um it was much you know
25. 26:23much lower tech in that somebody uh intercepted checks that were off to a vendor and literally you know used computer graphics program to change the pay to themselves. um um with our help and with H uh uh HPD's help, we were able to actually identify that person and prosecute them. Uh so we will obviously do we will do whatever we can to try and find this person. Uh but according to the IT guide, there were there were emails originating literally across the globe. So, you know, they're obviously, you know, they're interconnected and using, you know, all sorts of >> So, can is there a way that to get the federal government involved to figure out who this person is or I I don't know >> because this is crazy. >> Yeah, I I agree. No, I I will definitely ask the bank. Obviously, they must have uh more experience in dealing with this than we do. So, um I certainly plan on following up with them. They've already
26. 27:24said that they're going to continue to pursue it, but I'm going to ask them what the other, you know, regular approaches are. So, >> okay, good idea. I appreciate it. >> Margaret, you have a question? >> Yeah. I just wanted to make a comment to Heather. Uh, first of all, I'm really sorry that you had to go through this and well done for handling it the way you did. That's all. >> Thanks. But thank the rest of my team and thank the Bank of Green County, too, because it really was an all all handsin effort. >> Okay, moving right along. Uh Rob Perry, are you there? >> I'm here. I'm here. [clears throat] Windows green. Oh, shoot. Come on, [sighs] man. The hell did I do? What?
27. 28:30Share Windows. There we go. Okay. [clears throat] Sorry. Um, so, uh, service revenue for October was $63,837. Um I thought that was a a pretty high amount. So I did check it against our historical values and that was the single highest month that we've had uh during the twops the 12 years or so that we've been receiving septage revenue. So and I just created a little list with the top 10 months and you could see that most of them are in the you know the last couple of years. Uh next [snorts] and we're at right now we're at a a 2025 budget was $525,000 for revenue and right now we're looking at meeting that potentially exceeding that by about $10 or $15,000. Um, in 2017 or two, I'm sorry, 2007, we received a
28. 29:34consent order from DEEC about the [clears throat] uh sewer plant and not being able to manage operations or able, you know, not able to meet the requirements of the Speedies permit. And so in 2010, we spent $12.5 million upgrading the sewer plant so that it became compliant. And uh that project was finished in 2012. uh 2013, we submitted the information to DEEC requesting that the consent order be lifted and we be issued a new permit that basically matches what's in the the plan's capability. Um that didn't nothing happened. We received an administrative extension in 2015 and nothing happened and nothing happened until about two years ago when DEC said, "Okay, now we're going to start looking at we had to resubmit everything using um wasn't just resubmitting the the pre-existing it was you know generating all new information. So it's two years later
29. 30:35and we know that uh basic they've created a draft of the new speed permit. There is uh a public comment period I believe. So, I've uploaded the documents that DEEC sent to the city on the DPW's web page, and it's under uh a category called Speedy's uh update. There is a a number uh phone number and a contact name at DEEC if anybody wishes to uh provide comment. Uh it's James Eldrid and uh his number is on my uh report that is that accompanies this uh the picture show here. and it's also available um online. So uh anyway, one of the there are two things that are stand out as part of the new speedies permit. One is uh affluent sampling. So this is every time there's a a significant rain event, we have that chlorine contact tank that takes everything over 6 million gallons. uh it it does get hit with uh chlorine, but
30. 31:40there's going to need to be an automatic sampler attached so that way it when that happens, it actually grabs it. So that way we were able to physically verify whether or not there's a chlorine residual or not. And um so that's not a huge undertaking. You know, it will be technology. It'll it'll you know, require upgrades to the systems and and so forth. The uh the one the other one that's a little bit more major um right now the edge of our process is the chlorine disinfection which I've circled there on the top. Um there'll be actually a new process which will be decllor. Uh that is the chlorin the the sodium hypocchlorite does the disinfection kills all the remaining bacteria but just before it goes out it's going to have to have another chemical um chloroioide added to it that will basically kill whatever chlorine is left over. Um these are new discharge limits. Everybody else is under them already. Um the difference is that it's
31. 32:43you know it'll be an entirely new process with an entirely new chemical to store new chemical container a new chemical feed system. Uh so this you know this will probably be a bit of a capital project. Um as part of the the pro you know the what they've proposed they've also given us the proposed schedule compliance. So, you know, from the time that they make the decision to ratify this uh this permit and assuming the changes uh these these remain unchanged, you know, we're going to have two hours to put the uh design documents for DEEC approval for a lot of these uh upgrades and then from that point on, we'll have another two and a half years to actually do construction. So uh you know we are looking at uh some changes to the treatment process and uh at and this is all at the plant itself. Um it's you know obviously this storm water separation project is dealing with other compliance issues uh out in the system.
32. 33:46So this is something that we can uh expect uh more you know for you to hear more about in the upcoming years. the um for the water department we did some pipe cleaning of the transmission main. So this is the pump that the city owns. We purchased this about 10 12 years ago or so. And uh so we do is we actually uh use the pump to take water from the the creek and we use that to pressurize the main so we can push the poly pig through and it goes all the way through. This is a a a uh a structure on the Wilts Manor. And uh the pig pops out of here. At this point, we switch it from a 16in to a 12 in because there's a different a reduction in the size of the main. Uh but you know, you can see how kind of nasty the water is. This blows out into the ground where it will return to nature. um as part of the spool piece. You know what happen is every once in a while
33. 34:47that will they just start to wear down. So, you know, this is the coupling that we use to hold the piece to slide out of the way so we can remove the spool piece to get the pig in and out. Um when we were putting it back, you can see there was a little where I circled. It's twisted a bit. Uh so, you know, the inner uh lining became unusable. uh we just replace both of them at the same time because there's no sense in just doing one when they're you know they're both of the same age. Uh we want everything to be consistent. uh as far as um you know and Heather just gave us a detail [clears throat] of the security cyber issues that that she went through which uh we'll have a meeting with Homeland Security and Department of Health I believe sometime this month uh hasn't been scheduled yet but uh you know Department of Health and Homeland Security are taking a a very proactive and actually going out to facilities to assess what we have for cyber security. Uh this for us it's
34. 35:51obviously it's not about hacking to get any kind of confidential files. You know the intent it would be uh that somebody would would hack to modify our process to try and make the water either not produce it or make it uh undrinkable non-potable. So uh it's a you know a similar kind of threat just for a different outcome. So that will take place uh this month or early next month. far as DPW. Uh just, you know, year- end projects. Come November, the asphalt plant closes down. So, we try and get whatever we can done in the street. This is over at Willard Place. There's kind of a lot of lot of drainage that's been popping up for a number of years. We've tried different solutions. Uh this one's a little bit more involved. We actually excavated down, installed a drainage structure. At this point they install a blown drain to feed the drainage structure to get all the surface water and ground water direct it to the drain. Um you can see here where you know at that point we black top the restoration
35. 36:54to create a swale to capture any surface runoff and the stone along the side is the the French drain to grab any of the water that runs off uh or or is going subsurf subsfi. So that project's done. Uh there's no more street work now until the asphalt plant works opens in April. Anything that we do in the streets now will be emergency uh related only. We did have our first storm of the season uh last week. So you know we got about 4 to 5 in. Here's a loader filling up one of the trucks with salt. And uh we have four large trucks. They each hold about 6 to 8 ton of salt. So, you know, we use them uh throughout the throughout the the meat of the storm. And, you know, we probably put about a 100 or so ton on the roads, but I mean, that's you have to attack the storm when it's coming down so that way the roads are nice and clean uh a day or two later, which uh they are. So, it's a cost of doing business in the Northeast.
36. 37:58The um just [clears throat] a a quick little thing about refu. So I you know I had a discussion with uh one of our our local professionals last uh month and it was about the world famous garbage bag vending machine and you know I was questioning why everybody seems to be so preoccupied with it and so uh her question was well why do we why do we sell garbage bags at all and it's not the first time I've had had that question so uh this is what happens right now which many people don't realize is that Columbia County solid waste Whatever you throw out in the blue bags we put in the garbage truck, we haul that to the county transfer station over on Newman Road. They charge us uh in real money for everything that goes over the scale. We get charged $128 a ton per uh for garbage and we get charged $90 a ton for recycling. So we do have a revenue source for the garbage. We do not have a revenue source
37. 38:59for recycling. It's a cost center. But so well what does a what's a ton cost? Well uh if you figure out if you divide it by you know 2,000 lb then you know once you you take a 15 gallon bag if there's 30 lbs of garbage in a 15 gallon bag then at $2 we break even. We break even for what we pay the county. Uh that doesn't go towards any of our own payroll. It doesn't go towards any of the fuel or maintenance of the trucks. doesn't go towards the equipment itself. Uh it's just 100% pass through to to the county. So, you know, the the question was, well, why do we sell them at all? Well, if if we don't sell bags, the first thing is we have $100,000 worth of revenue that disappears. So, even what we what we do today were to remain unchanged, we would have to raise taxes by $100,000. But we know a lot would change. First of all, all of our residents
38. 40:01that have these are going to say, "Well, why should I pay $45 a month for a 90gallon container when it's free?" So, every single one of those cans that you see throughout the city will disappear. And you can see there's a lot of bags in there. And that won't change. So now and you could figure that the amount that we bring which is probably about 78 tons a week is going to go to 15 or more than 20 tons a week and we're going to get charged for that. So you know that's going to be an increase of a couple hundred,000 a year. Uh you also have to ask whether or not the businesses are going to say hey we pay taxes too. Uh you know so now do the dumpsters go away and do we have to collect all that? you know, you can figure there's another 100 grand in tipping fees. You're also going to have to add a crew and another truck uh because the volume is going to exceed eight hours a day just like it did, you know, many years ago when this city had
39. 41:04a dump. So, you know, the short of it is that if we stop selling, you know, uh right now we sell the garbage bags because that works for a niche market, which are those people that, you know, do less than 15 gallons a week or 30 gallons a week. Uh obviously these higher volume users have a a different option that suits them. Um so that's that's the the short of that uh why we charge for garbage bags. The vending machine is there because we used to have you could only buy it with cash at city hall from the hours of 10 to 4. Now you can buy it at 2:00 in the morning if that's what fits you. And that's all I have. Okay Rob, the first question is from Barbara. >> Okay. Uh yes. So Rob, I just going back to your first uh one of your earlier things about the decllorination. >> Yes. >> On the state. Are there any grants or monies available from the state to help address that? >> Well, obviously we're going to look for
40. 42:05that. Um you know, I I don't I don't know. Um I I would think there there there should be. You know, we've got grants for, you know, when we built the upgraded the sewer plant, that was $12.5 million. We have $6.5 million in grants uh for that project. So, and this, you know, the storm water separation project is $66 million and we have $50 million worth of grants. So, I I'm hopefully, you know, optimistic. We've got a couple of years to find it if it's out there. That's for sure. >> Okay. Got it. And with regard to the garbage bags, my favorite topic. Uh I mean obviously I' I've been looking at this for years. Um the revenue generated from the sale of the bags equals about half of the c cost of actually dealing with uh you know picking up and and tipping fees and so forth. Uh we could maybe think about selling uh stickers rather than bags because that might
41. 43:07reduce some of the cost. It's not going to be >> there's a there's a cost. Yes, a sticker cost less than the bags, you know, and you wouldn't have necessarily the folding cost. Exactly. >> You know, so you'd save it. However, I could tell you what's going to happen as soon as you do that. The people are going to take a sticker. They're not going to buy a 15 gallon garbage bag even though they bought a 15 gallon. >> They're not going to buy a 30- gallallon garbage bag. They're gonna go to Harrington's and buy a [laughter] 10 a 10 mil 60 gallon contractor's bag. >> I do actually know that. And and the when you look at the breakdown of the cost of the call bag business, I think uh maybe two years ago, the whole folding of bags was $15,000. So, it was not like the biggest problem that we had. >> So, yes, I get it. I get it. >> Yeah. Anyway, >> more on the bags to be to be discussed. >> Oh, yeah. Everybody's favorite. I don't even think it's about the bags. It's I
42. 44:09guess it's the machine, remember? [laughter] >> Yeah. Rob, hi. Um, on the septage, what capacity are we at now? >> Well, we're maxed at 50,000 gallons a day. Uh and you know that we don't really you know our max days are usually in the in the 40,000s um anyway and that that limit is a regulatory limit imposed to us by DEEC. It's not a It's not a physical limit of the um machines, but right now we're if you want to say what our capacity is, we're at 100% because we have all of the vendors that have expressed an interest. Uh you know, we've had some that go to Albany, there are some that go to Pikipsy. Um there are some that come exclusively to Hudson, there are some that split. So, uh, you know, we're available to a dozen or so haulers and, uh, you know, they they they choose to come as they see fit. So, >> okay. Questions?
43. 45:10>> Sure. >> Okay. Thank you, Rob. Um, >> all right. >> I need a motion and a second right now to go executive session. We have three different things we need to discuss. Um, Dwan, Gary, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. >> I. column for the purpose of discussing um pending and potential litigation. >> Got that folks. >> And contract negotiations >> and and I'm sorry and uh um union negotiations. >> So pick up a stand first.
44. 46:21>> I'm just Amazing. >> Yeah. Does the list go down? The meeting's locked. >> Okay, that's fine. It's fine. We're not recording. >> Let me stop recording. Happy.

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