New Paltz leaders agree again to explore consolidating governments

Meeting jointly for the first time since 2020, town and village leaders on January 24 discussed taking another shot at combining the New Paltz local governments. Mayor Tim Rogers is eager to explore a coterminous government, a structure that combines aspects of town and village models that is relatively rare in municipalities around the state. Rogers says that this is because it’s a somewhat new option. 

Keeping with longstanding tradition, comments from the public were invited before the elected officials shared their own thoughts as they gathered around the table in the old village firehouse on Plattekill Avenue. That campus of village and town buildings is a location that Rogers and Neil Bettez, the town supervisor, have long eyed as being the natural place to concentrate municipal workers; a years-long process has resulted in not only village firefighters, but town court and police personnel all being relocated to North Putt Corners Road, emptying most of the square footage. The firehouse was also a suitable symbol of Rogers’ vision; under state law, villages can have fire departments, but towns cannot. All town residents of New Paltz are served by village firefighters, either because they are simultaneously village residents or thanks to a municipal agreement between village and town leaders. State laws have many quirks like this: only towns can have assessors, for example, and villages cannot own bridges. As Rogers ultimately explained, the coterminous model allows for the municipal government to be designed using the state laws written for towns and villages alike, picking whichever options best meet the needs of the residents. 

Those residents who did speak were either skeptical or guardedly optimistic. There have been attempts to turn two governments into one multiple times, starting in the 1940s, and none has yet succeeded. Robert Feldman, a former deputy mayor, recalled one such attempt as being “divisive.” Questions were raised about whether the community could support a unified government at all. David Lent, a town supervisor in the ’90s, was concerned that residents might have to pay to extend water and sewer service to every building. Lou Cariola worried that the burden on planning and zoning volunteers would be too much. On the other hand, Nikki Nielsen imagined that some form of consolidation would come to New Paltz eventually, and warned that if the form isn’t defined by residents, then it could be proscribed by outsiders. Others wanted to ensure that no decision on this question is made in haste, either by prematurely shutting it down as a bad idea, or by rushing a change through to voters before it’s clear why other alternatives should be discarded. 

In inviting this conversation, Mayor Rogers produced a one-page description of a process that would result in voters making a decision this coming November. The mayor did make it clear that there is no mandated deadline, only a desire to schedule this vote to occur during a general election that could have a higher turnout. What Rogers said was the most important step was simply approving a resolution to apply for state grant money that’s been set aside to explore these very questions. 

Rogers was prepared to address some questions. One reason that the mayor is enthusiastic is because based on a formula in state law, New Paltz under a coterminous scheme would get about a million dollars more in state aid every year, in perpetuity. There is some skepticism about the value of any promise in perpetuity. Rogers acknowledged that future state legislators could renege on that promise and pass a new law, and said, “We could lose CHIPS and school funding as much as coterminous money,” using the acronym for the state program that provides funding for road and highway paving and improvement projects. New Paltz is poised to make this shift, with the village’s police department being dissolved in the 1970s, representing the last major redundancy between the two governments. It’s also very helpful that this is a village wholly within a single town, which isn’t a requirement. There are villages elsewhere in the state that straddle two or even three towns, and nine villages are actually in two different counties. It would be comparatively easy to make New Paltz into one government for one community. 

If a grant is awarded, the money would be used to update the study undertaken in 2011, and then to create a reorganization plan laying out what this new government would look like. Rogers agreed with Cariola’s concern about giving proper support to the members of the planning board, and zoning board of appeals, saying that this is “probably the thing we are weakest out right now.” Merging would provide an opportunity to retool all of those processes, which the mayor has come to believe are not working well given the complexity and sophistication of projects now being proposed throughout the community. 

Some of those present expressed discomfort with the process, feeling it would be a bit short on details until after voters express their preference through a referendum. As described, a successful referendum would open up more state funding to implement the reorganization plan, identifying the detailed specifics needed to bring everything into focus according to that plan. That’s how this, a board-driven process, is laid out. There’s another alternative, one that’s driven by citizens who collect enough signatures to force a vote on a new government. That’s a process that does have deadlines, and doesn’t give any opportunity to design those detailed changes before they are implemented. In Pawling, a citizen-driven referendum was held in 2020, but did not pass. 

Consultant Ben Syden, whose company the Laberge group was involved in the Pawling process, explained that under a board-driven process the reorganization plan in fact has a great amount of detail. Syden described a process that would include a grant-funded study, development of such a plan, a public hearing and revisions to that plan, and finally a referendum. 

Town council members were supportive of the idea of studying this question, and voted in favor of applying for the grant. The consolidation question is again on the table in New Paltz. 

Water payments still being withheld

Village of New Paltz officials haven’t been paying the water bill. Specifically, since August no payments have been made to the New York City Department of Environmental Protection for water from the Catskill Aqueduct, which is used to extract over a billion of gallons annually from this region to use primarily in New York City. Instead, those monthly payments are being placed in an escrow account that is being used to cover costs to village ratepayers that are not being reimbursed to help manage maintenance shutdowns of that aqueduct. These include installing and removing temporary infrastructure, such as flashboards at village reservoirs to handle increased volume; expenses incurred by village employees and consultants to prepare for and manage the system during these shutdowns, including new brown-water incidents; and issues that ultimately result from introducing water from the town’s fifth water district during shutdowns. Payments totaling $98,414.24 have now been placed in escrow. 

Mayor Tim Rogers has requested intervention from state senators to resolve these issues, along with “lengthy delays” in reimbursing costs that have been approved.