LEGISLATURE STUFF - Trucking Down Memory Lane

CATSKILL - Two brand spanking new trucks costing only a thousand bucks apiece will be purchased for the Greene County Highway Department following action taken by the Greene County Legislature.

Lawmakers authorized the acquisitions at their recent regular monthly meeting, a decision met with fiscal jubilation.

The rigs are being bought through the New York State Office of General Services which will deliver them wrapped in ribbons and bows.

April Fools, albeit a few days late. The one-tons will actually empty the piggy bank of $165,635.76, almost 83 G’s each.

That was the lowest of five bids, ranging from the next cheapest, $168,860, to the least cheap, $176,186, according to legislature documents.

The duet of regular cab Ford F-600 XL’s, secured from Scorpio Motors LLC dba Greenwich Ford in Greenwich, will come with dump bodies and plows.

While the expense of equipment and materials continues to shockingly escalate, it prompted a reminiscent chat with Wes Benson.

Benson is the highway department garage manager and former boss man at his own shop, Wes’s Mobile Repair, in the town of Ashland.

He wouldn’t venture a guess on how much a one-ton might have cost when he first got in the business, before he turned 18, now being 64.

Benson easily recalled going to work as a fulltime mechanic for Hunter Mountain, in his late teens, getting paid $3.50 an hour. “That was big money back then,” he says, laughing. “I was living large.”

And Benson fondly remembered Clarence “Bucky” Van Valkenburgh, who hailed from the town of Lexington, talking about earning a huge $1.50 an hour, plus an extra buck-fifty because he had his own chain saw.

Benson has sold his business, along Route 23 on the eastern outskirts of Ashland, now used by the town for a highway garage.

“They were thinking about building a new one but with the prevailing wage, it would have been over a million dollars,” Benson says, noting the guys from Ashland walked into a complete working shop.

Begrudgingly returning to the financial present, the legislative resolution states that funding for the pair of one-tons was already budgeted.

Lawmakers further authorized the purchase of a new, 2023, John Deere 304 G-Tier wheel loader for the Solid Waste Department, laying out $87,330, all said and done.

The resolution notes that a 2022 model Takeuchi TW-80 wheel loader owned by the department was recently damaged by fire.

Insurance paid the county $42,145.47 for the loss. The county has been renting the John Deere, and the dealer, United Construction & Forestry, based in Clifton Park, dealer will forego $6,000 in rental fees.

The dealer will also accept a $10,000 trade-in on the Takeuchi, lowering the county’s obligation form $103,300 to $87,300, legislative documents show.

In other matters:

—Lawmakers authorized an agreement between the Greene County Community Services Board and Cambridge Brain Sciences.

Under the 1-year pact, the county will pay Cambridge Brain Sciences, also operating as Creyos, $6,600 for use of a web-based software.

The software is, “designed to enable healthcare providers to administer tests assessing cognitive functions, such as memory, attention, reasoning and planning, to patients, and download reports for offline analysis,” legislative documents state.

Greene County Community Services will be able to consider this a billable mental health service, legislative documents state.

Lawmakers reappointed members to the board of directors of the Greene County Economic Development Corporation for one year terms, commencing April 1, 2025.

Those members are Andrea Macko, representing a local business owner, and Amanda Karch, representing a local tourism business.

Lawmakers reappointed Bradley Cummings of UHY LLC, representing a local public accounting firm, and Allen Austin from the Bank of Greene County, representing an at-large business, to two-year terms with the Economic Development board of directors.

And lawmakers reappointed Mark Maraglio, National Bank of Coxsackie, representing a commercial lending Institution, and Brian Kozloski, Century 21 - New West Properties, representing a Local Realtor, to three-year terms on the Economic Development board of directors.