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TOWN OF EAST HAMPTON
Brownfields Redevelopment Agency
Monday, March 23, 2009
7:30 p.m.
Eaton E. Smith Meeting Room
MINUTES—UNAPPROVED
Present: Chairman Scott Bristol, Ron Buccilli, Mary Ann Dostaler, Vice-Chairman William DeMore, Public Works Director Keith Hayden, Kay Willson, Dan Wolfram, Carla Sylvester.
Also Present: Judy Pogmore, Recording Secretary
1. Call to Order:
Chairman Bristol called this meeting to order at 7:35 p.m.
a. Adoption of Agenda/Added Agenda Items
Chairman Bristol requested a motion to change the order of agenda, adding to #5—New Business, a new category 5B—Establishment of Brownfields Subcommittee. Under #6--Old Business Ron Buccilli would like to add a new category 6b—Goals and Objectives. Mary Ann
Dostaler made motion to accept the amended agenda, seconded by Dan Wolfram. Motion passed.
2. Approval of Minutes—2/23/09 Meeting
Chairman Bristol requested motion to approve minutes of 2/23/09 meeting. Mary Ann Dostaler voted to accept the minutes as presented seconded by Ron Buccilli. Dan Wolfram abstained as he wasn’t present at 2/23/09 meeting.
3. Public Comments: None.
4. Liaison Reports:
Mary Ann Dostaler stated mother board meeting will be held March 30, 2009. (Chairman Bristol will be attending.) In April a public hearing to be held relative to community block grant opportunity. They are looking to solicit ideas and input from the community. A part of the requirement of the grant application is to hold public hearing. PDF was distributed by Town Manager about what types of things EDC is looking for in town grant. Chairman Bristol will touch upon this item under 5D of agenda—Grants/Funding Search Committee. At town meeting this past Tuesday it was voted to approve easement for placement of pumping station and sewer line attachment in front of American Distilling. In regard to water tower—is an agenda item on council meeting for tomorrow night for pre-bid approval discussion on hazardous
material abatement and demolition on that parcel.(Mary Ann Dostaler will attend council meeting tomorrow night and keep us apprised.)
5. New Business:
A. Presentation: None.
B. Establishment of Brownfields Subcommittee:
In light of combining the Redevelopment Agency with Brownfields and to keep communications open with all committees, Chairman Bristol would like to enlist Dan Wolfram to head up this subcommittee. Vice-Chairman William DeMore requested any recommendations made relative to expenditure reports, etc., be brought back to this committee for discussion before proceeding. As an example, relative to expenditures, any task release/work order for a specified amount of money to do a particular job, Chairman Bristol outlined the subcommittee would make any recommendations to this entire agency for approval and we as an agency would endorse such and pass it on to Town Manager Jeff O’Keefe for approval. Chairman Bristol further stated the contract states an expenditure cannot exceed the grant: 1) Cannot exceed
task order without written authorization; except in rare circumstances, and in those rare circumstances still have to get verbal approval from Town Manager O’Keefe before proceeding, and 2) Cannot exceed amount of money that is in the grant. To quantify this, Chairman Bristol will draft and distribute a resolution, prior to the April meeting, empowering a standing subcommittee to be established, and explain what this standing subcommittee would be responsible for.
In summary, Relative to Article IX, Sections 1, 2, and 3, Chairman Bristol recommends we create a standing Brownfields committee as subcommittee of the Brownfields Redevelopment Agency, and further recommends Dan Wolfram be appointed to head that standing subcommittee. Dan Wolfram accepted this appointment; however, requested four agency members, a change to the three agency members currently recommended in the bylaws. Ron Buccilli suggested we could float a bylaw amendment and resolution by the committee to reflect this change.
C. Brownfields Discussions:
- Receptor Survey—Dan Wolfram explained a receptor survey is typically requested by the DEP when a site has been identified as having some contamination. They want you to identify where the sensor receptors are within a certain buffer around a site. This could be wetlands, etc. A sensor receptor survey was done on this site in 2005 by Tighe and Bond and updated in 2007. Contracted Metcalf and Eddy to update it to see if property owners changed, if those on well water weren’t on well water anymore, etc. Carla Sylvester is overseeing this project/report. She states revisions have been made and have identified a few more property owners that are on public water.
- Well Sampling— Dan Wolfram stated contamination found at Watrous Street was of nature that required DEP be contacted, and they request sampling domestic drinking water wells, particularly those that are down gradient and immediately adjacent to the contaminated property, as those were where the highest threat of contamination exists. We have a well on site that was right in middle of this contamination. That well was sampled in October or November of last year and it was clean. Went back and found all these wells had been sampled in the past for presence of PCB’s and no PCB’s were present. Had gone back and forth with EPA and DEP as to what to sample and how to sample, spoke with chemist at state lab, etc. Thad King recommended we sample just those wells down gradient and abutting to the property and will do
testing in a phased approach. If something comes up we will expand the investigation. Eight properties have been tentatively identified as abutting or down gradient from the contamination. Next step is to talk to Thad King. The labor costs are being provided by Chatham Health District budget, with analytical through state lab with no cost to us. If Thad doesn’t have budget or personnel to physically go out and test, we would have to contract with our consultant to go out and gather samples for state lab to analyze. The analysis wouldn’t cost us but the labor costs would come out of our grant money.
- Draft RI Report—Chairman Bristol, Dan Wolfram and Carla Sylvester met with consultant Tighe and Bond, who wrote investigation report for Watrous Street. This had to do with Phase 3 investigation work done there and PCB’s investigation done there once we found the PCB’s. The draft report was reviewed, deficiencies found, and Tighe and Bond are going to redraft the report.
- Fence—Dan Wolfram states the contamination at Watrous and the way cleanup has to happen at this site in a phased approach, requires permanent fencing or temporary “real” fencing on property boundary to secure the site. Site has to be secured as promised by town to DEP and EPA. Dan recommends Kropp Environmental contract directly with the town. Dan will work with Public Works Director Keith Hayden on this issue and converse with Town Manager O’Keefe to get this work done, and will probably have Metcalf and Eddy involved and an environmental company or a fence company. The fence may be covered by the assessment grant. Dan would like to get this fence installed as soon as possible before warmer weather. Public Works Director Hayden can put this out to bid, get three bids, take the
lowest bid, and use the lowest bid to get fence installed. Chairman Bristol prefers monies be taken out of assessment grant to cover costs associated with the fence installation; however, if price is over $20,000, suggests it be communicated back to our agency before acting on it.
- Response to DEP— Dan Wolfram stated the town has response letter due to DEP, from the town, explaining to them how we are progressing pertaining to this site. This particular letter Town Manager O’Keefe received relates to the PCB’s. Dan will draft letter before next meeting in April. Vice-Chairman William DeMore stated Dan can send out draft report for Town Manager O’Keefe or his designee, as long as no particular promises made to do something or spend a certain amount of dollars.
- Workplan—Dan Wolfram stated we need to continue characterization of site in order to identify where the bulk of PCB contamination is so we can look at removing it. Metcalf and Eddy was contracted to do that work, and a draft work plan is promised this week.
- Grant Extension—Dan Wolfram stated we need to think about extending grant for Watrous Street. Clean up grant for Watrous Street expires in Sept. of this year. PCB issues that were identified is a circumstance that will require some finesse and they offered to extend it about 4 or 5 months ago. Dan declined at the time because we were hoping to use up the cleanup grant by that time. We still may, but there is a lot of regulatory review involved and EPA requested if we decide to extend the grant that we do so by June. Will speak to Christine Lombard to see what we can do about extending the grant. The work plan that Metcalf and Eddy is writing needs to be finalized and reviewed by the agencies, which could take a long time. By the time we get it back from the agencies with their edits, if any, it will
have to be redrafted and sent back to agencies again. There is a waiting period. We need to go out there and do the collective work, write the report and send it to the agencies for approval before we can write the remedial action plan to remove the PCB’s.
- Quarterly Report--Relative to the Quarterly Report, Dan Wolfram stated we have a quarterly report due by end of April. He will bring that report to our next meeting in April so we can review it as an agency.
Mary Ann Dostaler moved to accept Dan Wolfram, as the former chair and present member of the Brownfields Steering Committee, be authorized to execute the activities as outlined above. Vice-Chairman William DeMore seconded the motion. Motion passed.
- Status Update--Chairman Bristol states 103 Main Street is the vacant lot where a lot of the equipment has been staged. It is across Pocotopaug Creek from the library. Mary Ann Dostaler and Public Works Director Hayden said he believes the contaminated soil was removed from here. Chairman Bristol stated additional sampling needs to be done.
- Quarterly Report—Utilizing the cleanup grant, expect to be back working at Gong Bell, which is 103 Main Street, in two months’ time. Will put in quarterly report for April.
D. Grants/Funding Search Subcommittee:
Similar to the establishment of the Brownfields standing subcommittee, Chairman Bristol stated he would like to consider seeking out funding sources for the redevelopment portion of our task. As he alluded to earlier regarding our funding, it will probably not come from the town so will have to reach out to block grant program or other programs to provide the funding that we need to continue to move forward with the Redevelopment Agency, the redevelopment zone and overall land use planning portions. If we opt to organize a second standing subcommittee, he would like to recommend MaryAnn Dostaler to head that up. Similar to Brownfields, Chairman Bristol made a motion to create a special subcommittee charged with seeking out and hopefully procuring, at the request and direction of the entire
agency, additional sources of funding to facilitate general redevelopment goals and objectives. Ron Buccilli moved that we establish a special committee. Vice-Chairman DeMore seconded the motion. Motion passed.
6. Old Business:
A. Merging of Brownfields Committee and Redevelopment Agency:
- Change of Name on By-Laws—Because of the merging of the agencies, Chairman Bristol states we need to change the name of our agency. He suggests we table any further discussion on the bylaws until we look at the establishment of the Brownfields Subcommittee next month. He questioned whether anyone would be opposed to eliminating the limit of three members from our bylaws with regard to the standing subcommittees, as Dan Wolfram is requesting four members. (This will be tabled for further discussion at next meeting in April.) Because everyone is in agreement with four members, Chairman Bristol will go ahead and draft something up for Brownfields Subcommittee during the interim.
B. Goals and Objectives:
Ron Buccilli stated he would like for us, as a committee, particularly Brownfields, to put some goals to what we hope to accomplish for the next fiscal year. This should be approved by the town manager and thus would give us focus. Chairman Bristol suggested everyone bring a couple ideas to the next meeting.
7. Public Comments (pertaining to current agenda items only): None
8. Confirm Next Meeting: The next meeting is scheduled for Monday, April 27, 2009, at 7:30 p.m.
9. Adjournment: Chairman Bristol moved to adjourn the meeting at 9:05 p.m.
Respectively submitted,
Judith L. Pogmore
Recording Secretary
3/25/09
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