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TOWN COUNCIL
BOARD OF FINANCE
MINUTES
SPECIAL MEETING
NOVEMBER 4, 2011
I. CALL TO ORDER
The meeting was called to order at 4:00 p.m. at the Avon Town Hall, in the Selectmen's Chamber by Chairman Zacchio. Members present: Mrs. Samul, Messrs. Shea, Pena, and Evans.
II. STORM RECOVERY UPDATE & DISCUSSION CONCERNING DEBRIS
MANAGEMENT/DISPOSAL
Chairman Zacchio reported that we have been involved with numerous meetings from Monday, October 31, 2011 on and regained power at the Town Hall on November 1, 2011 in order to start getting some of the communication on our web sited updated. He reported that until yesterday at a noon meeting with the Governor’s office and the State Emergency Management Team we were not getting really good support from Connecticut Light & Power (CL&P) and any resident can recognize that as we have not seen any utility trucks in and around Town. He reported that we were able to get Route 44 up quickly and those utility trucks tended to disappear; that was positive as we were probably the only main strip in the Valley that did receive power and some of the pusher on that was to get gas stations and restaurants
open. He reported that from our perspective it has been an issue of manpower on CL&P’s part and the crews coming into the State. He reported that until yesterday’s meeting where the Town Manager along with Kathy Eagen, Farmington Town Manager and the representative from Town of Simsbury really drilled into the Governor as well as Mr. Butler, who runs CL&P. He reported that the severity of the situation in Avon, we really did not get a lot of action; fortunately they listened to us on that call and we began to see some trucks rolling in. In addition to that we had a press conference yesterday afternoon with the Town of Farmington and Mike Karp where we also voiced our huge concerns from the safety aspect of our roads not being open.
He reported that with twenty people on our Public Works crew they have done a phenomenal job with what they could do in terms of getting to the largest pieces of debris that they could get around without the wires wrapped into them but without CL&P we have had a number of neighborhoods trapped including Mr. Zacchio and took two days to cut out in order to get residents to the shelter or to safety. He reported that we had a meeting this afternoon in Simsbury along with town staff from Simsbury, Granby, Farmington, Canton, and Avon; Northeast Utilities has taken over and above CL&P on the recovery efforts and have a fairly comprehensive plan on getting the whole Farmington Valley back powered and are sticking to, although we are skeptical, that 99% of the State will be back up by Sunday, November 6 at 11:59
p.m. He reported that the 1% is not concentrated and is going to be broad based across the State of Connecticut as per their assumption. He reported that their plan in meetings that will take place again at 8 p.m., tomorrow at 10 a.m., and daily checkpoint meetings includes not just the liaisons that have been embedded with the Towns but they have broken the Farmington Valley into two districts with a head person within each of those two districts that are monitoring progress every day. He reported that there are eight line crews and four tree crews working in Avon today, by tomorrow there will be twenty line crews and eleven tree crews and by Sunday twenty-five line crews and fifteen tree crews. He reported that there is a prioritization list in terms of which roadways come up. He was just informed that Avon High School and the West Avon Road corridor is now open and powered.
He reported that there was a discussion this morning with Senator Blumenthal as well as he attended the meeting in Simsbury this afternoon around FEMA and disaster recovery dollars that may come to us which is a big concern for us on the debris side because the estimates right now are astronomical in order to clean up debris and by the end of this meeting we hope to at least give the Town Manager direction enough to start debris collection efforts; whether or not that will be our final way of cleaning up Avon or not remains to be seen, he does not think that it will be, but we will have some action today. He asked the Town Manager to give a little more comprehensive view of what is going to go on over the next three days and finally have a discussion regarding our polling places because elections do need to take
place on Tuesday, November 1 and we are not confident in the power being restored at Roaring Brook School which is one of the polling places and we need agreement that we would make that decision now and our Town Clerk as long as the Registrar of Voters agree can consolidate polling places in one spot, we assume that will be the Avon High School, in order to facilitate elections on Tuesday, November 1.
The Town Manager reported that it has been a very long couple of days. On Sunday, October 30, town crews, Social Services, the entire town basically mobilized to manage our response to what is really nothing less than a natural disaster. He reported that the scale of the disaster is complete, it is widespread; there is no street in Avon, at least any street with trees, which is left untouched as a result of the event. He reported that we do have a number of items to talk with Town Council about today. One of the most important is debris management and disposal. We have had discussions with a number of contractors; Public Works has been working very hard over the last couple of days along with their counterparts from the Farmington Valley to put their heads together and talk about solutions
for what in Avon could amount to approximately 100,000 cubic yards of debris to be disposed of.
The Town Manager reported that in terms of the activities that the Town is undertaking over the last couple of days from a staff perspective we have a CL&P liaison that was assigned to the Town of Avon on Sunday night, came in first thing Monday and has been embedded in our Emergency Operations Center (EOC) which is located in the Avon Police Department. Since Sunday, October 30, the EOC has been staffed 24/7; we also activated early on the shelter at the Avon High School which has required 24/7 staffing and has helped hundreds of residents and are averaging approximately fifty overnight guests there and hundreds throughout the day coming in to shower, charge electronics, eat a hot meal, etc.
The Town Manager reported that there will be a lot of after action discussion after all of this is said and done. CL&P is going to have to answer some very difficult questions. We have been talking with our legislators at all levels about that but for now all the Towns in the Farmington Valley are focused on getting the power back on. To that end, we had a very difficult conference call yesterday with the Governor and the CL&P President which really was the culmination of several days of frustration and miscommunication and promises that were made and not kept by CL&P. Last night we had the National Guard arrive into the Farmington Valley to assist with our restoration efforts. Today we had a Farmington Valley meeting in the Town of Simsbury where the Valley towns were presented
by Northeast Utilities leadership with a plan of action with measurable benchmarks for when the power will be back on, not only in Avon but the Farmington Valley and despite the drilling from the officials that were present, they are sticking to their self-imposed timeline of 99% by Sunday night. The Town Manager’s response to that was we are going to hope for the best and plan for the worst but he thinks there is a lot of skepticism about that.
The Town Manager reported that moving forward we are going to continue with the full court press as we have. We have put as much pressure as we possibly can to get restoration while taking care of our residents. He reported that there will be continual status and update meetings here in Town Hall and various conference calls that the Governor is hosting. He reported that it has been very difficult to get the word out with respect to a lot of the steps that the Town has taken with respect to our management response to this. We are making use of every means possible to do that so that residents know that the shelter is open and that there are resources available to them. The landfill is open; residents have rotting food in their refrigerators/freezers and they need to know that without a permit
they can go there to dispose of it.
Some residents in attendance spoke and brought to the attention of Town Council their concerns, frustrations, and/or questions regarding the polling places and storm debris pickup, including lack of utility trucks and lack of communication by the Town, and landfill operation hours.
The Town Manager responded that the Registrar of Voters have been in very close contact with the Secretary of State’s office as its office has been holding daily conference calls to provide direction and a form for questions for Registrars with the election coming up. The election will take place next Tuesday, November 8 and by State law the only way that a location can be moved is if it does not have power.
Chairman Zacchio reported that the goals for power restoration today included West Avon Road, the High School, the Middle School, restoration on Huckleberry Hill Road (which happened last night) and neighborhoods adjacent to that, Lovely Street, Waterville Road, and Arch Road. By day they have specific goals and meetings with us along with the Farmington Valley leaders to hold them accountable as best we can.
The Town Manager reported that CRCOG has been involved with this; there was a conference call yesterday with participation broadly amongst the Capitol Region and the take away was that the Farmington Valley is in a completely different league with respect to damage. Other communities are talking about cable restoration, being 50% without power, and are nowhere near our level of devastation. Chairman Zacchio reported that what he told them at the press conference was that CL&P is spending all of their time on abrasions in the east part of the State and your war wounds are sitting right here in the Farmington Valley and just have just ignored us.
Chairman Zacchio reported that there is a list of downed poles and list of priorities for the crews and their priority is safety as they have to make sure that they are shut off to the other parts of the district or someone is going to die when they come on. He reported that just because the crews are not there does not anticipate necessarily that nothing is going on.
Chairman Zacchio reported that we tried to get on WTIC 1080 twice and it is one of the reasons we jumped on with Mike Clark with the press conference yesterday.
Chairman Zacchio reported that we have not received a real, solid declaration from FEMA yet in order to understand what is reimbursable; we have seen numbers up into the $3.5 and $4.0 million range to collect brush in Avon. FEMA would reimburse us approximately 75% of that if that is what is done and we decided to do; the Director of Public Works has a number of options for us to consider today. If we start moving that brush prior to having declaration and having a FEMA organized person watch none of it is up for reimbursement. Whether we hire someone ourselves, start doing that within our own Town services, or we have residents bring it up to the landfill and say it is free, then we have two problems, one is we will run out of room at the landfill pretty quick and the second is that it will cost us tens
of thousands of dollars just to grind at some point; we considered staging it in different areas, MH Rhodes is a possibility, but the second we move it we put ourselves at risk as to whether or not we can get reimbursement on that. We need a short term solution because we want people to start moving with it. We have been asking residents to bring it out to the curb, butt end out, stack it, it is unlimited, we are figuring it out, at least to get people moving and hopefully by the end of today we can make a determination on a short-term basis what we are going to do; on a long-term basis he is not sure because we pull the trigger on a $3 million deal and we do not get any reimbursement for it, the Board of Finance is here for this discussion for that purpose because we have a real issue as winter is coming, we are going to have no place to put snow, we need to move on it now, we understand and that is one of the reasons we are here.
The Town Manager reported that the Deputy Director of FEMA was in Town today and he gave him an earful and he certainly has a sense of the devastation and FEMA is going to do everything that they can. He talked to the legislative delegation, Senator Blumenthal was here earlier today, Congressman Murphy, and what this really requires is a declaration from the President of the United States to allow a 75% reimbursement. We do not have any timeframe for when it might be coming. He reported that one of the items that Senator Blumenthal mentioned today is the fact that currently forty-eight states in the nation have these same types of disaster declarations that have either very recently been approved or are pending; it is a broader political discussion but our delegation all committed to fight as hard as
they could for it.
The Town Manager reported that Council has been provided with a memo and spreadsheet with some options to consider. He reported that from the town staffing, human resources perspective this has really been quite a challenge and that across the board we have been lock-step all along with respect to our management of this, the employees at the Board of Education and the employees in the Town have really gone above and beyond and done everything that we have asked them to and no more so than our Director of Public Works and Deputy Director of Public Works; the last couple of days they have been crunching numbers and giving a lot of thinking to these policy options they are going to talk about.
Bruce Williams, Director of Public Works, reported that they put together several items. Alex Trujillo, Deputy Director of Public Works, reported that the contractor seems to be where most communities are looking at, to get a rapid and effective response in the Town and clean up the debris and handle it properly and documented so we get the most reimbursement should FEMA come through for us. He reported that the pros to a contractor is that the debris will be cleaned up in a timely manner, we are hoping in five to six weeks to beat the snow fall, we would have documentation assuring that we would be FEMA-compliant, there would be a reduced liability to the Town as we would not have any hazards out there for the commuting public, and the cost assuming it will be covered under FEMA should the declaration be
signed. The cons to a contractor is the financial burden on the Town, taking the oversight from a private company and managing it ourselves using other resources and should we make a mistake it might impact the FEMA funding. The other choice is a combination of a contractor and town employees or town-hired private contractors; cost may be reduced on the contractor side compared to the first option but we do not know what the total cost on the other side is going to be by hiring contractors, the time for staff as we are very limited, the potential worker’s compensation claims as the exposure will be greater, the time to clean up would be extended significantly, part of the Town might be completed while other parts may not be completed as well, FEMA compliance being the elephant in the room as there might be issues because if we cannot prove where the vegetation debris came from they might not honor it which will then increase the cost on the Town side. He
reported that in-house there is no pro to it; we will be doing clean up clear into next year, we have limited labor, all our operations and projects that we have going would have to stop other than snow removal and it will be impacted, we do not own any equipment that can handle this kind of work, rental costs for the equipment, if it is available, is unknown, we have fuel costs, and we estimated based on a 100,000 cubic yards the number of trucks that we have that each truck would have to make 1,340 trips to handle that load. Chairman Zacchio reported that Dunning is taking wood chips for free. The Deputy Director of Public Works responded yes, that is our source but you still have to transport it from your grinding site to Dunning and if you are within fifteen miles that hauling cost is about $6.25 on the State contract per cubic yard to transport that product. Chairman Zacchio reported that we used to do brush collection and give residents an allowance, have
you determined from a cubic yard price perspective what that cost us before? Director of Public Works responded it was $45,000 but did not know the cubic yard price as it was based on the quantity of homes; if we average 20 cubic yards per home some homes have over 200 cubic yards in their front yard from damage. Chairman Zacchio asked if they are considering all of the logs as well. Director of Public Works responded yes. The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that under FEMA any money that you make off this vegetation comes off their reimbursement, the labor and the time is going to out do your benefit.
Mr. Evans reported that the big issue and decision that we make today is not to compromise the FEMA reimbursement; if we have a potential $4 million bill for this and potentially get 75% reimbursement he would not want to think that we would take action today on an emergency basis through a compromise of running into that reimbursement. Mr. Evans questioned if there are things that concern safety or hazardous conditions out there on our streets or neighbors’ yards that need to be addressed today for either getting crews to restore energy or for the safety of automobile or pedestrian traffic or for anybody in Town that we need to address today. The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that part of the debris management program is addressing a lot of the hazards that are still up above our heads with
the hangers, leaning trees deemed hazardous and are complete take down trees, in addition to what is on the ground. We are looking at the full picture, not just what is on the ground when we are looking at cost that FEMA will reimburse us, but what does it take to complete this project from beginning to end addressing all the issues. Mr. Evans agreed that you have to take that approach for the whole debris management and you have the expertise in your department to address the situations that require immediate action today. The Director of Public Works questioned if there is concern about the FEMA reimbursement because if we do not address those trees under the FEMA event then the Town will pay 100% of that tree when it falls, the leaner falls, the hanger comes out of the tree, not to mention the potential liability if a person is struck by a limb. He reported that with this FEMA project we would be able to have this taken care of for 25% of the cost,
assuming we get the reimbursement. Chairman Zacchio reported that Senator Blumenthal stated that there are forty-eight states with pending claims outstanding so when we get it is as important as if we get it. The Director of Public Works reported that we have settled a lot of our claims and have been paid for our smaller FEMA events and this by far is a catastrophic event.
The Town Manager reported that in terms of our Storm Irene costs we had at the time seemed liked a catastrophic failure on Eddy Street with the sewer pipe, we put in for all of that, and it did receive the appropriate presidential declaration and we do not have the check yet. The Director of Public Works reported that the claim has been signed. Mr. Evans questioned if there is a tree hanging down in some delicate position that could compromise someone’s house, he does not want to wait for FEMA to decide if they are going to reimburse it if it is going to be a safety issue. The Director of Public Works responded that many communities have just moved on and said that they have to pick up and/or take care of this. The Deputy Director of Public Works added that they are following the FEMA
protocol so when the declaration is made they are in compliance. The Director of Public Works reported that based on this numbers are going to be substantially lower after talking to several vendors and asked them to put their estimates on paper and he recommended that we put a bid on the street very quickly to get a good competitive bid. He reported that the State bid price is the highest number and we can do much better than that.
The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that the “do nothing” option means the Town saves on clean-up costs, the residents bear the clean-up and disposal costs, landfill capacity will be significantly reduced if not totally eliminated and should it be eliminated than the cost to clear the landfill site could be as much as $2 million. He reported that equipment would still be needed to handle waste at the landfill with a grinder at $5,000 per day, a loader at $9,000 per month, etc. and if the equipment if available. He reported that we would not be entitled to any FEMA reimbursement going this route. The Town would be exposed to liability because of public safety issues with the other dangerous trees that are in the right-of-ways, snow operation will be impacted because the clean-up will
allow the snow to be placed in the right-of-way and reduce the road width for vehicular traffic.
Mrs. Samul reported that there are hangers, precarious limbs, etc. and questioned if the Town and our people go in and remedy those situations still following FEMA’s protocol and be reimbursed and protect the community at large at the same time and at what costs to manpower, etc. The Director of Public Works responded for the most part yes we can take those down and put them with the debris pile. Mrs. Samul questioned if the wires might be hot. The Director of Public Works responded that these hangers are not involved with wires and a lot of them cannot even be reached with the Town’s bucket truck but in essence yes we can take them down. Mrs. Samul questioned if we would jeopardize FEMA compliance. The Director of Public Works responded no, we would put them in the right-of-way
and remove the safety hazard. Mrs. Samul questioned if it is hours of work to remove 1,000 hangers. The Director of Public Works responded that he does not have the numbers yet, maybe weeks. Mr. Pena asked if we have the FEMA rules and regulations and that we can give them to the outside vendor to manage it. The Director of Public Works responded yes.
The Director of Public Works reported that he asked the Town Engineer to look into the capacity at the bulky waste site. In 2008, there was 51,600 cubic yards left and of that we need 25,000 cubic yards to cap the landfill with the impermeable and top soils. Chairman Zacchio questioned that assumes we do not apply for a permit for a higher cap. The Director of Public Works responded that we can go for an elevation change but there is a process to do that and we also have a large neighborhood that is abutting that property.
Chairman Zacchio asked what the options are of what we can do tomorrow. The Director of Public Works responded that we put out an RFP to solicit bids; the longer we wait the more stuff that comes to the curb and the snow shelf is gone. Chairman Zacchio reported that he spoke to the Simsbury Director of Public Works an hour ago and they have advised people to put it out to the curb, they think they are picking it up by Wednesday, they are really worried about FEMA on the same token and do not know what to do, but need to get moving on something and they are getting a lot of pushback from residents already that it is too soon. Chairman Zacchio reported that we have a number of residents who are able and willing to haul brush today and we have to supply them with a place to put it that is not $40 per load. He is thinking about our load capacity at the landfill which he realizes is an issue and would be mayhem if we opened it up tomorrow. He wants to get input as to what a
temporary solution is that we can get people moving; people are frustrated enough and if they have a chance to move it and we do not want them to, he does not want to walk away with that message today. The Director of Public Works reported that would be potentially ineligible for FEMA and that pile would have to be segregated but you could not prove to FEMA where it originated. The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that one of FEMA’s rules is to put out an RFP for pricing and not just take someone off the street because it is a good number. Council agrees with that process. Chairman Zacchio reported that he is past that for the moment and to tomorrow. Mrs. Samul questioned that the Director of Public Works advice is to wait and not have residents taking the debris to the landfill. The Director of Public Works responded that his advice is to continue to do what you are doing and bring it curbside. He reported that six vendors
from throughout the country have come to his office and want to work for the Town of Avon; the only way to do this is with a short notice RFP. He reported that if you start putting debris at MH Rhodes you have taken that site and potentially made it ineligible. Mrs. Samul clarified that we are not talking about one week on an RFP, but instead twenty-four hours.
Mr. Evans reported that there seems to be a consensus to go out to bid. Mr. Pena added it should be short-term. Mr. Evans questioned if the bid should also include dealing with the trees in the precarious position. The Director of Public Works responded that it will. Mr. Evans reported that he may be willing to be convinced in a few days, if we do not have further word from FEMA, to take action to do that even knowing that we are at risk. Chairman Zacchio responded that these are only right-of-way hangers. Mr. Evans reported that safety concerns still exist.
Mr. Speich, Board of Finance member, questioned with taking care of the hangers if CL&P has to be with us. The Deputy Director of Public Works responded that these are hangers hanging in a tree and not on the wires. Chairman Zacchio questioned if CL&P would take down a lot of the hangers down when they are putting wires back up. The Director of Public Works responded not if they are not touching their wires. The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that the utility company looks at their wires is just like we look at the right-of-ways, they have a right-of-way around their wires and if that branch is hanging over they do not care; it is what is within that right-of-way that can come down as a hanger and touch their wire causing the ground fault.
Mr. Gugliotti summarized by saying that the President does what he is supposed to do, FEMA approves it, then FEMA is going to help with 75% reimbursement of the approximate $4 million clean-up and we want that to happen, but there are things that we can do to jeopardize our qualification for FEMA; totally sitting back and doing nothing and waiting for FEMA to show up with its approval in one or two weeks and be safe with the 75% means waiting a couple of weeks before we remove some of these limbs that we are all worried about that are hanging around out there now that are not utility pole problems. He reported that we are trying to find something to do on an interim basis and yet not jeopardize the potential for the FEMA reimbursement. He is hearing that there is a way to hire someone to do some of that
removal, the cost if done correctly is still FEMA reimbursable and it will not jeopardize the bigger amount of money from FEMA later on. He questioned if that is where we are at. The Director of Public Works responded yes. Mr. Gugliotti reported that we can hire a contractor to remove the hangers with an RFP and get that part of the work done; is the cost of that reimbursable to FEMA? The answer is yes. He also asked if any of that jeopardizes the 75% of the $4 million that the rest of the job is going to cost. The answer is no and the object is to provide the proper documentation to FEMA so it will qualify.
Mr. Pena asked if there is a problem by the resident moving their debris to the curb; do we still get reimbursed by FEMA? The Director of Public Works responded that we are going to clear the right-of-way so it would be FEMA reimbursable. A comment was made that if we leave everything curbside and the vendors come and haul it away and chip it, is the end result of that material going to go on our landfill and if so what is it going to do to our capacity. The Director of Public Works responded that it would take all of the capacity that we have left at the landfill. He reported that Dunning Sand & Gravel has agreed to take it at no charge for now.
Ms. Bratton asked if we are limited to certain companies based on State rules. Mrs. Samul responded that they do not have to be a business located in Avon in order to use them or any other external parameters imposed by FEMA. Ms. Bratton reported that during the initial few days of the storm residents were out, almost like adopt-a-street, and asked if there is anything that people might have done that would have been a problem with FEMA. Chairman Zacchio responded that if it is the right-of-way FEMA covers it. Mr. Gugliotti reported that the long range project could be as much as $4 million; we are talking about an RFP to get us from today’s point in time to a point in time when the big FEMA clean-up starts and asked what the order of magnitude is of that project, how much money do you think
you are going to need to spend to get that done in a meaningful way? The Director of Public Works responded that the RFP will incorporate everything, the hangers is just one line item. Mr. Gugliotti clarified that we are looking for the contractor to do the whole $4 million project; we are going to get started now and do the select items to help clear the roads. He reported that we are committing for $4 million clean-up hoping that FEMA pays 75%, if they do fine and if not we are still getting the clean-up done, regardless if we have to do it. The Director of Public Works responded that he spoke with a member of FEMA at the briefing today, the preliminary damage assessment is going to be done on Monday, November 7; this will not drag on and there will be a declaration relatively quickly. Mr. Gugliotti asked if FEMA is coming in early next week how long would it take to go through the RFP process. The Town Manager responded that the only criteria
required for the RFP would be the FEMA criteria. Mrs. Samul questioned that all we have to do is to agree to go forward with the RFP, then come back and agree to a particular vendor. The Town Manager responded yes and the real authorization piece of this is for Council and Board of Finance for the appropriation of the funds to pay for it. Mr. Gugliotti reported that the release of the RFP would be in accordance with FEMA regulations and asked from a Town Charter or State statute stand point if we are in compliance. The Town Manager responded that he has already had the Town Attorney review that and we are fine. Mr. Evans questioned if we have to have another meeting next week to appropriate and decide on the bid. It was agreed that there would be another special meeting next week. A question was raised regarding FEMA and insurance requirements for all contractors. The Town Manager responded that the contractor would be fully insured
and bonded. Chairman Zacchio reported that we are in agreement to have a mercy RFP completed as soon as possible and a special meeting will be held on Wednesday, November 9th at 6:00 p.m.
The Director of Public Works reported that he would like some direction on the landfill regarding storm debris. The Town Manager reported that with Storm Irene which was on a different scale with debris Council authorized an extension of the hours of operation at the landfill. He reported that Council may want to consider an extension of the hours and for permit holders reducing the cost of disposal in recognition of the hardship. Chairman Zacchio reported that the landfill already does not operate at a break even stand point so we have to charge something. Mr. Evans questioned $10 would be for any size load per load. The Deputy Director of Public Works reported that costs per load currently start at $40. The Director of Public Works reported that he would advise against it and rather
see it in the right-of-way. He added that there currently is a debris site at the landfill from Tropical Storm Irene and if that is contaminated those FEMA funds will be jeopardized. Mr. Gugliotti asked when someone gets a landfill permit do they not sign something that says it is the discretion of the Town that if an emergency arises you do not have to go to the landfill. He added that there is a possible jeopardy to Tropical Storm Irene debris, there is not enough capacity at the landfill, and we are trying to provide this $4 million alternative to have the debris picked up from the streets so if we can avoid creating a problem at the landfill we need to look at that too.
Chairman Zacchio reported that we are authorizing for an RFP to move forward, hold a special meeting on Wednesday, November 9th to review the bid results, and we will leave the landfill and the prices as they are today; we will get a message out to the residents on every means possible and advise them that we are working on a permanent solution for brush pick-up and advise them to bring it to their curb with any specific conditions. Mr. Pena questioned how soon we can send out the RFP. The Town Manager responded that it could be sent out today.
Chairman Zacchio reported that with regards to the polling places it is not our decision to make but it sounds as if that is well within the hands of the Town Clerk and the Registrar of Voters. Council would advise them based on what we know of power restoration and Roaring Brook School being out of that power grid and the Avon High School already being live that they would make a determination to combine those polling places for Tuesday, November 8th and asked the Town Manager to pass that along. He reported that we have updates tonight with the same group around 8:00 p.m. for what was completed today and another update tomorrow morning for what will be completed tonight, and we will continue to keep our finger on that and hope that we see a lot more crews. He reported that the biggest
concern on the number of crews in town is that Northeast Utilities had counted a small number of poles down in Avon and he has personally seen ten times that and because those were their owned poles versus AT&T’s own pole but they did assure him that in normal circumstances if a car hit a pole and it was owned by AT&T they would come to the site and wait for AT&T to put their pole in; they are waiving that completely so if the pole down is not owned by CL&P and impedes their progress of putting the lines up they are dropping the poles themselves and should move things a lot quicker. He reported that CL&P guaranteed they had the ability to move many more crews into the central part of the State which includes us and the concentration in the Farmington Valley to accomplish Sunday night’s goal. We will keep a tight watch on them now that we have a hold of them; we have a person assigned to us for Northeast Utilities and will be talking to
him a few times a day. The Town Manager reported that we have had one person assigned from CL&P all along, now we have someone from Northeast Utilities who is at a much higher executive level.
Ms. Bratton questioned if there will be a school type of announcement under a separate announcement versus what is being talked about. A question was asked what the chances are of school on Monday, November 7th. Mr. Mala, Superintendent of Schools, responded highly unlikely after listening to the conversation and about to go and send the message that there will not be school on Monday, November 7th after listening to the Director of Public Works’ report about the hangers and he is not willing to put us in that type of situation.
Chairman Zacchio thanked Alan Rosenberg, Director of Social Services, and all staff at the shelter who have been fantastic and doing a tremendous job to make it run so well. He also thanked the Town Manager and all of his staff. The Town Manager also recognized Jamie DiPace, Emergency Management Director, as he has really been the incident commander and in the midst of all of this since before the storm occurred. Chairman Zacchio also extended thanks to Chief Rinaldo and the Police Department who have been canvassing our elderly in neighborhoods that were locked down doing wellness checks and to Bill Vernile for keeping the number of staff flowing on the operations side. Mr. Evans extended thanks to Chairman Zacchio who is putting in extra duty not being with his family or at his job, and not only
taking care of his own neighborhood but serving in the best interest of the Town; it is a frustrating time and a lot of people do not know the effort being put in not only by the Town Manager’s office and everyone else but Mr. Zacchio needs a certain amount of thanks as well.
III. POSSIBLE ACTION – No formal action was needed at the meeting.
IV. ADJOURNMENT
The meeting was adjourned at 6:00 p.m.
Attest:
Caroline B. LaMonica
Clerk
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