Minutes of the Town of Old Lyme Water Pollution Control Authority
Old Lyme Town Hall Main Floor Meeting Room, January 9th, 2018
In Attendance: Regular members Andrea Lombard, Doug Wilkinson, Rich Prendergast, Donna Bednar, Joe Carpentino, Dimitri Tolchinski, Rob McCarthy, Frank Chan, Sal Cancellieri. Alternate Steve Cinami Absent: None. In addition, 4 townspeople and Selectwoman Nosal were in attendance.
The meeting was called to order by Chairman Prendergast at 7:31 p.m.
Approval of the November 14th, 2017 Minutes
There was no December meeting. Motion by Dimitri Tolchinski to approve the minutes of the November 14, 2017 meeting. Second by D. Bednar. No comments or changes. All in favor, except A. Lombard, who abstained. Motion carries.
Chairman’s Report
- Waste water study grant application extension
Need to extend it - standard process. Asked Woodard & Curran to fill it out. Chairman Prendergast will look at it. Selectman’s office will agree or not agree.
- DEEP feedback on Draft Waste Water Plan review and Environmental Impact Evaluation
Going to talk more about this in New Business. Following a process, which is to make a plan, submit a plan and draft, environmental impact once it has all elements/summary of our plan, goes to The Monitor publication used for public to make comments about plan that need to be resolved. Then comes into record of decision, submitted to OPM. After all that, if OK, it’s a done deal and State will say follow your plan.
- DEEP feedback on Hawks Nest Ground water study plan development
Really great news. DEEP came back and said submittal is great. Existing wells with additional monitoring wells. Didn’t need to re-do a lot of editing. Will talk about more in Old Business.
- Cooperation with Private Beach Association's WPCAs
Haven’t had much communication. Planned a meeting in December to discuss land lease issue and cost sharing agreement, but it did not come to be. Have not gotten any response from them. Going to try and re-engage with them. D. Tolchinski commented that Old Colony Beach has not decided/voted yet on EDU issue, and will bring it to spring meeting of association.
S. Cinami asked if we can comment on the land lease? Chairman Prendergast says not sure if we have enough time to go through line by line. Only recently allowed to give it to committee members. Need discussion, but not top priority tonight, although important. A. Lombard asked what is the next step? Chairman Prendergast replied if we don’t get answers, we still need to go ahead and make decisions. They are not going to wait for us.
Budget Update and Expenses
Current and Proposed Budget
In the current budget, still have $106,000 out of $114,000. Have paid some bills from legal counsel regarding the lease. There is $40,000 in budget for legal fees, and have spent $7,300 so far. The Treasurer has been asked to submit a preliminary budget for next year, which he will do, and next month will have further report. Next year’s budget will be $30,000 less than this year, as Treasurer feels we don’t need as much in legal expenses or consultant fees. Some comments and questions followed.
Review of any new invoices acceptance
D. Wilkinson is not aware of any new invoices.
Correspondence
Chairman Prendergast sent an email in advance of the meeting with a correspondence summary. Old Lyme resident William Folland has sent 37 emails to him since the last meeting with more coming in each day expressing numerous concerns. Chairman Prendergast summarized and replied to some of Mr. Folland’s specific concerns. Chairman Prendergast will continue to respond to emails that might contain false information so that other town committees know to come to the WPCA for matters that it is studying. Mr. Folland will get to read and comment on the EIE when it becomes public. Some discussion followed.
Old Business
Hawks Nest Draft water testing plan update
Chairman Prendergast handed out an updated map of the Hawks Nest area with existing wells and proposed new wells, which was developed by Woodard & Curran. The original budget accounted for 13 wells total. This updated map proposes 7 new wells along with the 5 existing wells for 12 total. Chairman Prendergast reviewed HN498. That well is within 4 feet of a gallery catch basin and therefore might be compromised. Eliminate that well, and come up with another. Wells 5S and 5D - can eliminate one of those. Chairman Prendergast suggested that the committee come up with general idea, have Woodard & Curran update, and vote on it at the next meeting. S. Cancellieri mentioned that we need to map out what is next to these wells. Are there leach fields next to wells? It was suggested that Chairman Prendergast ask Woodard & Curran for a
more detailed map, and that the WPCA Clerk use town records and the detailed map of the area to overlay where the wells are in relation to other geographic features. S. Cancellieri expressed concerns regarding the water being tested coming from Miami Beach, not Hawk’s Nest, and also the area in the west end with scattered houses and marsh land to the north.
Subcommittee EDU research update
S. Cinami is Chair of the subcommittee, and they have discussed and decided that coming up with their own EDU system is crazy when cost is going to be determined. Trying to connect with the beach WPCAs to meet so there is an understanding everyone should have a standardized EDU. Lengthy discussion followed, including: construction cost vs. usage cost; connection fee and benefit assessment fee; definition of EDU; capability of volume of use; square footage of house and number of bathrooms; cost sharing agreement and land lease agreement; overall budget and number of EDUs specified in the land lease agreement; coming up with our own definition of EDU rather than go to the beach WPCAs. Old Lyme WPCA wants definition of EDU that can be used over and over again. Chairman Prendergast and S. Cinami might sit down and discuss.
New business
Election of Officers. Taking nominations for Chair, Vice-Chair and Treasurer. Popular vote wins. Election of officers will go into effect for the next meeting. Results will be published with minutes. D. Tolchinski nominates R. Prendergast for Chair. R. McCarthy seconds. No other nominations. Motion carries unanimously. D. Wilkinson then nominates D. Bednar for Vice-Chair. R. McCarthy seconds. No other nominations. Motion carries unanimously. D. Bednar nominates D. Wilkinson for Treasurer. A. Lombard seconds. No other nominations. Motion carries unanimously. Chairman Prendergast comments: thank you for help and support. There may be times you wonder why you do this. It is important, and he appreciates that you do it.
Environmental impact Evaluation (EIE) discussion
Chairman Prendergast distributed the revised EIE document that he previously sent out electronically. Lengthy discussion followed, including: resiliency of pump house location in flood prone zone; a request from D. Bednar to see model predictive figures; additional grants to lower infrastructure improvement costs; timeline of well installation; request that Hawks Nest sampling be conducted by independent contractor of WPCA’s choice; re-paving of town roads and associated cost; wetlands, marshes and rivers; and aging infrastructure. Chairman Prendergast acknowledged that there is a lot of information in this document, and he understands that there are some concerns. Any additional comments/concerns can be forwarded to him.
Public Comment
Sandy Garvin, Hawks Nest: How will the public get notified as to when the finalized EIE is available, so they can respond? Easiest way to notify people in Sound View would be to send notice to president of Sound View Association, and he/she can send it out. They have updated email addresses. Do you have to go to DEEP website to see the EIE?
Liz Atwood, Hawks Nest Beach: Came to represent Columbus Ave especially. When talking about where wells will be, looking at over 200 houses, streets etc., any discussion of looking at streets. Columbus Ave has Swan Brook near it. Street is split, with 16 properties not in the plan for sewers. Of those 16, 14 are in favor of having sewers. 2 that were against have houses up for sale. Also, with due respect, asked if the committee has looked at conflict of interest of any committee members. How do you remain impartial?
Rob Breen, Sound View: Happy New Year. Thank you for time and effort. As far as EDUs, sounds like establishing standard across entire area to have benchmark is a really good idea. Using only the Vision appraisal database, we know that there are some factual discrepancies. Key points in the conversation have revolved around issue of “what if.” He would like to discuss “what is.” Many properties fit standard definition, several will not. Discrepancies will be unique.
Chairman Prendergast replied to public comment: As far as EIE, it is published on DEEP website called The Monitor. We will put a link to it on our website. Fully expect to get comments. Don’t know about sending to president of private beach association. Also want to send it to everyone who is a tax payer. Will do both. Regarding looking at streets, and the 16 residents that are excluded from the sewer project, Chairman Prendergast fully expects that we can talk to private beach associations to extend the line, which could easily be accomplished during engineering stage. Don’t want to do it at this time. Conflict of interest has been discussed before. Ethics Committee has not found a conflict where anyone was doing willful misconduct. If there is a specific issue, talk to selectman’s office. Related to EDUs, last summer
Chairman Prendergast did a house by house review, tried to use that as basis to assign EDUs. Task Force is working on it now. We know there will be exceptions and buildings that don’t fit the norm.
Adjournment
Motion to adjourn D. Wilkinson. Second by D. Bednar. Motion carries unanimously. The meeting was adjourned at 9:48 p.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Jennifer Datum, WPCA Clerk
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