DAILY GAZETTE
Schenectady, NY
February 3, 2005
FULTON & SARATOGA COUNTIES
Finances, autos focus of probe of lake agency
BY JOE MAHER Gazette Reporter
The state comptroller's office is digging deeper into activities at the Hudson River Black River Regulating District and the state attorney general's office is involved as well, officials said Wednesday.
The investigators have been interviewing lake-area residents who have been critical of the district, which operates the Great Sacandaga Lake as a flood-control reservoir.
The investigators have conducted interviews by telephone and in person, according to those interviewed, and are looking at the disposition of surplus vehicles that had been owned by the district as well as other issues related to finances and the budget.
A spokesman for the attorney general's office declined comment Wednesday, saying policy is to neither confirm nor deny that an investigation is under way.
But a spokesman for Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi, who issued an audit that was critical of the district in November, confirmed that the office's investigative division is working on the case.
"We had said that we were going to refer some matters to the division of investigation and that's what we did," spokesman Dan Weiller said.
Two years ago The Gazette filed a Freedom of Information Law request regarding the disposition of certain vehicles that district critics said were sold to a high-ranking district official.
One of the vehicles in question was actually sold to a Johnstown dealer, Apollo Northeast Sales and Service, according to records provided by the district, although the vehicle eventually did wind up in the possession of the official.
Another ended up in the possession of one of the official's family members although it had been sold at auction to another person.
Another area of interest is the disbursement of approximately $289,000 in consulting fees in 2003 when the board had budgeted $18,000.
When Hevesi released his audit last fall he noted a lack of oversight and improper practices by the district's board.
The audit found the board was paying its secretary-treasurer and legal counsel full-time wages for part-time work and reporting the work as full-time to the state retirement system.
Auditors also found that the district provided full medical, dental, and vision benefits for board members even though the district's enabling legislation called for no pay or other compensation for board members.
Regulating District Executive Director Richard Lefebvre, who replaced Willard Loveless about a year ago, said the investigation is news to him.
"I’ve talked with the comptroller's office but not about anything but the published audit," he said.
Loveless left after a controversy in which the district proposed an increase in the access-permit fees it charges lakeside residents, increases topping 1,000 percent in some cases.
The increase outraged lakearea residents and resulted in the Hevesi audit as well as staff and board resignations.
Lefebvre said that the district has corrected many of the 21 deficiencies noted in the audit and is working on the others.
DAILY GAZETTE
Schenectady, NY
February 5, 2005
FULTON & SARATOGA COUNTIES
NiMo suing for Sacandaga tax relief
BY JOE MAHER , Gazette Reporter
Attorneys are exchanging motion papers in a state Supreme Court case that could determine whether five years of payments from Niagara Mohawk to the Hudson River Black River Regulating District were made in error.
While the case before Judge Robert Best involves only the disputed 2000 payments, regulating district general counsel Shari Calnero said Friday that the outcome of that case would likely set a precedent for other disputed payments in ensuing years.
As part of their case, Niagara Mohawk’s lawyers are arguing that lakeside property owners derive a benefit from Sacandaga Lake and therefore should have to pay to help operate the flood-control reservoir.
"That [contention] has come into the whole lawsuit," Calnero said. "NiMo claims because there are other people benefiting out there, there are other people who should be paying their share of the district's cost."
However, Calnero said, that issue is separate and will not be decided by this suit.
"It's more that they are asserting that argument,' Calnero said.
The attorney representing the utility, from the Albany firm of Hiscock and Barclay, didn't return a phone call Friday.
Niagara Mohawk spokesman Al Bianchetti said the utility's assessment for 2000 was $800,000.
"Our view is the assessment should be zero because we do not own or operate power plants there anymore," he said.
The lake was created more than 70 years ago. The enabling legislation called on beneficiaries, mostly downstream municipalities that didn’t have to worry about spring flooding anymore, to pay for reservoir operations in perpetuity. Other beneficiaries include businesses such as Niagara Mohawk.
Characterizing lakeshore property owners as beneficiaries -- because of higher property values -- would break from the original legislation.
Those owners argue that they are already paying more in taxes as a result of higher property values. If they were deemed beneficiaries, they would in effect be penalized twice, lakeside property owners have argued.
LEADER-HERALD
Gloversville, NY
February 15, 2005
District OKs change in benefit plan
By ANNMARIE MARANO, The Leader-Herald
JOHNSTOWN - The Hudson River-Black River Regulating District no longer will provide health insurance benefits to former members who served on the board after 1992.
The district had been paying about $100,000 a year for the insurance benefits, said Executive Director Richard H. Lefebvre.
Members who left the district board were getting the benefits for life, Chief Fiscal Officer Henry S. Hess said at a district meeting Monday.
The change will take effect in 30 days.
Last year, the regulating district stopped providing health insurance benefits to sitting board members. The benefits included health, vision and dental care.
A state Comptroller's Office audit last year criticized the agency for providing the benefits. The state says the district's board members are entitled to no compensation.
The state changed Environmental Conservation Law in 1992, discontinuing salary or other compensation to board members. Despite the law, the regulating district continued to provide the benefits to sitting and former board members.
The district will continue to provide benefits to board members who served before 1992. A district resolution says the district will continue to provide the benefits to those former members "pending legal review of the propriety of continuing said benefits."
The resolution, read by legal counsel for the district Shari Calnero, said the board has requested the opinion of state Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi on providing benefits to "pre-1992 board members."
When the district was founded, board members were offered pay and benefits. The district stopped paying board members in 1992, but continued to pay benefits.
"It isn't just a case of pulling the plug, it's a case of doing what's right," Lefebvre said of discontinuing the benefits.
Lefebvre said if post-1992 board members want to continue their existing benefits, they can pay premiums at least 15 days in advance of each monthly benefit period.
The regulating district will continue retirement benefits for district employees.
Hess read a proposed policy that "more clearly defines retirement."
"We're clearly defining what retirement is and clearly specifying that benefits will probably be more in line with what working employees get than what a person had when they retired," Hess said.
The policy would recognize that if changes are made for current employees, they can apply to retirees as well, Hess said.
In certain language, it gives the board that option. Some retirees expect that benefits will continue for the rest of their lives.
DAILY GAZETTE
February 10, 2005
FULTON & SARATOGA COUNTIES
Forum to address Sand Island concerns
Trash among problems at Sacandaga recreation spot
BY JOE MAHER, Gazette Reporter
Sand Island, a small, thin strip not far off the North Broadalbin shore, is a popular destination for Great Sacandaga Lake boaters in the summer.
People like to spend the day sunbathing on the beach, having picnics and using the island as a starting point for water skiing and tubing excursions.
But with popularity come problems. Sanitation is one. Sometimes people have to watch where they walk to avoid stepping in waste on the island's interior.
The Hudson River Black River Regulating District, which operates the 75-year-old manmade lake as a flood-control reservoir, plans to conduct a spring forum on Sand Island issues.
It would be a brainstorming session designed to identify problems and potential solutions, according to the regulating district's executive director, Richard Lefebvre.
"I've proposed to create a Sand Island forum that the regulating district would host," Lefebvre said Wednesday. "The purpose of it is to study and understand what the issues are at Sand Island and then improve it so it can be a fun, healthy and safe destination."
Besides sanitation, other issues include trash and overnight camping, which is prohibited on regulating district land.
Shoreline neighbors report seeing numerous boats tied up overnight on the island in the summer. But Lefebvre said if people are sleeping in their boats, that's OK.
Lefebvre said he envisions hosting the first Sand Island forum in the spring.
He intends to invite the state police, the sheriff's departments of Fulton and Saratoga counties, town supervisors, county officials, representatives from commerce, the state Department of Environmental Conservation and lake interest groups.
". . . I think that everyone has a responsibility to come together to see what needs to be done and then to implement a program," Lefebvre said.
Wally Hart, president of the Fulton County Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry, applauded the move.
"I know that the Sand Island issue has been a big concern for everyone on the lake, so I think that's a great thing," he said.
On a related topic, Lefebvre also wants to create a new group, an advisory council made up of the same type of lake-area stakeholders that will be invited to the Sand Island forum.
He described the Sacandaga Advisory Council as "an initiative to find stakeholders who would like to come together as a peer-review group to give advice, to hear proposals, and to just generally be involved in an advisory capacity."
"I've reached out to some groups. I'm a little concerned in that I can't have a committee of thousands. I need a committee of workable size that would be able to take possible reforms -- I’m looking at rules and regs -- I'm looking for a sounding board, a panel of peers, to review it," Lefebvre said.
That advisory council would differ from the existing Great Sacandaga Lake Advisory Council, which was created during the federal relicensing process for the hydropower plant at the Conklingville Dam and concentrates on environmental enhancements such as fish stocking.
The chamber's Hart said a coalition of lake-area interest groups, including the chamber and the GSLA, had requested that the district form an advisory council — "not political appointments" — and he's glad it's under consideration.
Peter Van Avery, co-founder of the Batchellerville Bridge Action Committee, said the group should have a broad-based membership with a number of access permit holders.
"It's very important that access-permit holders have a very strong presence on that committee," Van Avery said.
"The immediate problem is the access-permit holders are not represented by any particular group, no group like the Great Sacandaga Lake Association or the BBAC . . . [represents] more than a few percent of the lake's access-permit holders," he said.
"Unless that committee includes a whole bunch of access permit holder groups it will not be representational and its recommendations will be worthless," Van Avery said.
THE RECORDER
Amsterdam, NY
February 15, 2005
District office space being reviewed
By CRAIG CLARK
Recorder News Staff
JOHNSTOWN - The executive director of the Hudson River-Black River Regulating District says an architect has started working on a consolidation study of the public authority's office buildings.
A look into consolidating some of the district's offices was one of the goals that Executive Director Richard Lefebvre requested from the board of directors during his state of the district address last month.
During Monday's directors meeting in Johnstown, he said an architect has been hired and has begun interviewing the staff in the district's Albany office. Interviews with the staff at the Sacandaga field office in Mayfield are planned soon. It appears the consolidation study is concentrating on a possible merger of those two offices. The district also has offices in Watertown.
Lefebvre said the architect is getting a handle on the work performed and the room needed, adding he expects to soon have the architects' suggestions and information on the initial cost of consolidation and the potential savings to present to the board.
Progress is also being made on other initiatives the executive director outlined for the year, such as the review of the district's regulations and the Use Handbook for the Great Sacandaga Lake.
"It's a very, very big project," district counsel Shari Calnero said of the rules and regulation review, adding that after the district has completed the review the Governor's Office of Regulatory Reform will be brought in to review any proposed changes, after which public input will be sought.
Lefebvre said things are also progressing on the planning of a Sand Island Forum. With heavy use there are sanitary concerns on the island and he hopes to gather together local officials to figure out the best way to manage the island and make it a safe and clean destination of boaters.
DAILY GAZETTE
Schenectady, NY
February 1, 2005
FULTON COUNTY EDITION
NORTHAMPTON
Fireworks permit for park event resolved
BY JOE MAHER, Gazette Reporter
The town, not the Hudson River Black River Regulating District, is responsible for issuing permits for an annual fireworks show at the Sport Island Pub.
Sacandaga Park neighbors complained to the regulating district about the show, expressing safety concerns and asking who was responsible for issuing a permit for the show.
In prior years the district has not issued a permit for the event.
Prompted by the complaints, the regulating district asked Attorney General Eliot Spitzer for a formal opinion as to which government agency should issue the permit.
The event is held on state land administered by the regulating district but is also in the town. Spitzer said the law is clear that if the event is in a town it's the town's responsibility to issue the permit.
Town Attorney Michael Poulin said Friday that Northampton doesn't currently have applications for fireworks show permits, although he said that didn't necessarily mean the popular event would be canceled.
"I don't know if the town’s going to set one up or not. There's a lot involved," he said.
Poulin said he and Supervisor Ted Collins have discussed possible action but have not reached a decision on what route to take.
Leo Boland, a spokesman for SPARD, Sacandaga Park Area Residents for Responsible Development, said he's glad that Spitzer has resolved the issue.
"It's about time that someone will take responsibility for the safety of the community with these fireworks and bonfires. SPARD has asked the past three years who's responsible and no one would give us an answer. Now the attorney general has told us," Boland said.
"When you talk about fireworks it's like mom and apple pie, but you're talking about the safety of the residents of Sacandaga Park," he said.