Cobleskill Sets New Highway Scope of Work

COBLESKILL - Last Wednesday was the first official meeting of the joint highway committee, a group formed by the Town and Village Boards to discuss their shared services agreement.

The committee was manned by Deputy Mayor Howard Burt and Trustee Larry VanHeertum with their DPW Head Aaron Cooper to represent the Village, and Councilpersons Alan Rubin and RJ Mallery with Highway Superintendent Lee Johnson to represent the Town. 

As the meeting began, the Village was eager to continue discussions about the Town’s charge of $74,000 for snow removal, but Mr. Cooper suggested that they first fix the agreement’s scope of work before talking about figures, to which the committee agreed.

Members updated the agreement line by line, most of which had already been discussed in thorough detail by both Mr. Cooper and Mr. Johnson.

The two of them explained that they would be more than happy to share services in the form of labor and equipment with one another, as both departments have helped one another in the past.

The list began with street sweeping and line painting, which the Town will allow the Village to take over and will supply them with the necessary tools to do so.

For catch basins and culvert repairs, Mr. Cooper has a line item in the Village’s budget, but will take on Town employee labor as part of their shared services.

Cold patching for potholes will fall upon the Village and Town as separate responsibilities, but whenever hot mix is needed, they will share both the rental machine and the cost of said machine, splitting the bill halfway down the middle.

Mowing around guardrails will be a shared service where both the highway department and Village employees will work together. 

Finally, arguably the biggest change is the approach to snow removal. Instead of the Village taking on sidewalks and municipal lots, both those along with the streets will be plowed by the Town, and the Village will supplement manpower to help whenever they’re available.

In addition, a Village employee that’s aiding the Town may leave to get to another emergency if they are needed elsewhere. During normal hours, the Village will continue to pay the employee as usual.

As the Town handles the roads, the Village will be responsible for plowing specific parking lots, such as the village offices, sewer and water plants, and the swimming pool.

All present at the meeting were amicable to the changes, with Mr. VanHeertum saying “I have complete confidence in these two men. They’re the experts to hammer this out.”

As for the $74,000 charge, the Town successfully explained to the Village that there should be no additional tax burden on the Village residents. Instead, what will happen is that they will be shifting away from taxes to enter into a contract, with everyone’s highway town-wide taxes going down and the Village taxes going up for the one lump sum.

While the agreement will still have to be reviewed and accepted by the two Boards, the committee was largely happy with the outcome, and set a standard recurring meeting date so that the two sides won’t fall out of communication with one another again.

The next time the committee will meet will be the first Monday in November at 1 PM, located at the highway barn.