Town Board Workshop
Town Board Media 2024.11.21

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November 21, 2024 · 49 min read · auto-transcribed · View original
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captions Language: en uh anybody talk to Charlie is he coming tonight is just not making it until the regular Tom board meeting I maybe he's rowing himself here he could be and obviously I don't know if a workshop we need legal but it is 6:30 so I want to welcome everybody uh in the live audience and also Al watching it uh home on this rainy Thursday November 21st 2024 to the town of Webster uh Workshop uh tonight we have three scheduled agenda items and the first uh agenda item is a presentation by Bridget Harvey our director of communications and Paul Adams our uh Director of Finance on the Spectrum Charter One franchise fee Revenue that the town gets annually so I'll the Baton to you guys all right yeah we thought we would do uh just a quick review of the uh revenues that are related to the uh uh Cable cable uh TV franchise access fees uh essentially F yeah next slide essentially we have the annual cable TV franchise fee uh in the past we've actually uh had some revenues from a franchise fee audit and uh since uh the cable department is basically being wound down we'll also have some revenues from the sale uh or auction of the assets on the next slide um as you can see the annual cable TV franchise fee uh it's received annually from Charter One Communications usually around March of each year uh the amount received is based on cable subscribership in the town of Webster um historically historical Revenue data on this on this slide dates back to 1995 as you can see in the 2000s uh cable TV really took off so so did the revenue uh we're last I think last year we did about 520,000 in Revenue uh so you know it it became popular in the 2000s and believe it or not it's still popular um so and I'll just mention before we go on to um the next slide that this is unrelated to Cable access television production and purely is based on subscribership as Paul mentioned that is correct so back in 2015 we actually had uh an audit performed by a firm called Troy and Banks um the result of the audit came in in 2016 and they actually recovered $44,000 so basically they took a look at the franchise fee agreement uh compared it to what we were actually receiving and uh detected any uh variances from the contractual Arrangement so it was a 50% contingency uh based contract and we're actually looking to do this again uh so actually on tonight's board slate of board resolutions as a res resolution to um move forward with Troy and Banks since it's been about eight years since they've done so uh we think uh based on what troan blanks is telling me they think uh they would expect uh a pretty good recovery uh but you never know what you take a look so it is a 50% Contin ConEd fee contract they don't find anything you don't pay anything and they have had successful audits performed in some other jurisdictions uh such as Selena Rond in the City of Buffalo and as Paul mentioned earlier um with the wind down of um cable access um the a assets that are not in use or that have reach the end of their um useful life from this room in here um or the Spectrum building or cable Studio over on picture Parkway um will be assessed by um experts from our it Department as well as um AV consultant the AV consultant who we have partnered with um to do quite a few things over the past year um so these assets include video equipment microphones Furniture Etc so what's next for us is nothing in terms of the annual franchise fee as we mentioned no action is needed for the receipt of that um as Paul mentioned Town board will consider a resolution to conduct a cable TV franchise audit um with Troy and Banks and then um what's next is the assessment of those assets of um the equipment that is being stored and has come out of the spectrum building over on uh picture Parkway as well as um the equipment in this room that has reached its the end of its useful life for the town or it's it's um just no longer in use by us um so that's all are there any questions where where will this be where will it be sold is there a certain auction or how is it sold I guess I need to talk into the microphone how's it sold um so I think that would be something that we discuss with um likely Dan agu who we've contracted with um for AV Services who is more attuned to um the AV where something reliable would be in terms of auction or sale and what the best way to get any return on that would be yeah understand I the last audit in 2015 was a 44,000 recovery Here I Go Again was it 50% back then as well so they found $888,000 and we got 44 uh no I believe they found 44 and we had to pay 22 okay I got it got it I think it also has a residual uh effect if they find an issue with the contract uh that will correct it going forward so theoretically theoretically your Revenue should be higher each year going forward well I think it's a great opportunity I mean if there's no no cash outlay to find money I think it's a great opportunity I'll be curious to see what happens because in my in my opinion as of late it seems that cable is going down in Li of streaming services so it'll be interesting how much and if anything is found yeah um certainly subscribership is trending down but I I think the price the the prices have been raised so the amount we received has actually stayed pretty steady which has shocked me I mean at some point it's got to come down I I at the uh it it no I don't want to disparage cable TV Spectrum Charter One uh time water their predecessor uh but I think in M's and business classes they call it the death spiral has anybody ever heard of that of course I I got some people shaking their head in the crowd um what is what is happening in a lot of ways is that the Spectrum subscribers in Webster were at around 10,500 uh back in the 2015 2018 range um in the four quarter I think of 23 a year ago they were around 7700 subscribers and that's what you mean by the streaming services and all that it's not because the population is going down people are going probably into streaming services and leaving the cable TV um but our Revenue uh from the franchise agreement that was signed who knows how many years ago is 5% of the cable fee not 5% % if you have Spectrum phone not 5% if you have Spectrum internet connection if you have cable TV through spectrum and anybody who has it go and look at your monthly bill you'll find on there the 5% fee it's only tied to the cable TV portion well subscribership has dropped 30% but as many people know in the world the cable TV fees have gone up significantly so what it's created a flat revenue for us which is nice I mean we picked up $500 $550,000 a year but I it just you just wonder you know unless there's a Resurgence of cable TV uh subscribers in years to come um I think the town board and our budget process has to get prepared for that number dwindling one other thing I'll say about the assets that you had asked about Jennifer is that the the cable building cable Studio you called it Bridget um over on picture Parkway picture about 2,000 square ft that for I think 30 plus years the town occupied um really at the pleasure of uh Charter One um Time Warner um we have emptied that whole 2 square feet out uh in past board meetings we have done resolutions to send things to uh disposal or recycle or whatever so we have been picking away at this I think a lot of the stuff that we're not sure whether we're going to sell donate repurchase to other Town departments is in the 3,000 ft room that is behind the clock right there um so as as Bridget said we're trying to parse through that to make sure uh we know exactly what we got and what we could do with it either from one of the other government departments or uh if it's back has to sell it or or what so hopefully that gives some color to this sounds good John or Jenny M I have no questions great presentation thank you yeah thanks all right we're a few minutes ahead uh Russ you ready to rock all right so our next item up tonight is uh Ross zisin who is uh a citizen of the town of Webster a very accomplished entreprenurial business owner who has opened and sold many businesses but is also the CEO of what's the clay once again uh Nova ambulance Nova Northern anandra volunteer ambulance in Clay New York and the reason why he is still in that position is he moved here about 10 15 years to go from that area is that correct that's right and we have gotten the benefit of his subject matter expertise on ambulance EMS um and he has uh co-chaired for the last a year plus uh with councilman Cahill who is the uh EMS Ambulance liaison for the town board so I can't thank Russ enough because he's it's all volunteered time on his part um I owe them so you're up all right so U basically over the last uh year or so or at least since last December we've been talking about what the long-term options for EMS would be and recently at previous meetings we've talked about how we would produce a RFP a request for proposal and put it out to the local ambulance agencies to see if there were any ambulance agencies interested in in in responding to such proposal and be able to provide ambulance services to the town of Webster in lie of uh the previous provider that is no longer in business um and so uh Monroe ambulance and Penfield ambulance originally responded to what we did as a pre RFP questionnaire that we put out uh just to get some basic information from the potential agencies that that might respond that would help us and inform us on how to write the RFP and then we uh sent a formal RFP out in mid October and um both Monroe ambulance and Penfield ambulance responded to that by the deadline of November 18th and we have just received those as today's the 21st we got those a couple days ago right about on the deadline M and um and so now the committee that I'm on with John kahill uh will review those rfps and and um give some feedback or recommendations to the board on what we have found in them and and if there's any um further questions we can go back and ask those as well but that's where that process stands and on the next uh slide so one of the other things that we're asked to consider is what about since the town has the authority to operate an ambulance which is not normal most towns do do not have that Authority the town of Webster does what what about letting the town operate an ambulance build an ambulance service here internally with employees and am own the ambulances and own a building um so we've looked at that and one of the things that um as supervisor flare has mentioned is I'm the president and CEO and founder of an ambulance that's a maybe a little bigger than the town of Webster would have M um so I and I built it from the ground up I know what it would take to build it and I know what the cost would be I try to translate the historical costs into what it would be in around 2024 and that's what you can see on the slides in front of you you know through in other words at the low end you've got the that one column that'll tell you that's about payroll would be about $2 million the first year we'd have to buy about a million dollars worth of ambulances and a facility that might be about $2 million if we were to get a a facility that may be pre-existing on the high end and that adds up to 5 million then you can see those numbers on the high end where payroll could go again not knowing exactly what it you know the ambulance Revenue would be and what the ambulance need would be we have a good idea but not an exact need um and the ambulances on the 1 million column might have been more on the used Side on the 2.4 million that would be on the newer side and I'll give you folks an example I just bought an ambulance about two weeks ago empty empty $216,000 okay then you put a stretcher in it nowadays if you if you've seen ambulance services you've seen you know the stretches aren't the old days where you you know got a couple of Hefty people lifting them you know push your button it go you know could lift up a three or 400 lb person which is nice for our paramedics it's not straight in their backs we can have older people who work but those stretchers are 40,000 for the stretcher and about $20,000 for the equipment in the ambulance that then sucks it in so that's about 60,000 and now a defibrillator when I first started from those of you remember Roy and Johnny you know those defibrillators used to be2 or $3,000 now our we have very complex cardiac monitoring defibrillation uh you know um things that all kinds of extra equipment in that defibrillate that we didn't used to have that measure oxygen levels and carbon dioxide levels about 50 or $60,000 for one of those per ambulance that's three so an ambulance a stretcher and just that one piece of equipment we're already up to about 250,000 so if you had to buy enough of those which we we assume based on what I know what we might need here and what I do when I company I run we need 46 ambulances so you're up at about $25 million to fully outfit those ambulances here along with if you had to buy a building of a small building say 5 6 7,000 square ft you may be a 5 million we have a 15 ,000 foot building if I had to replace right now would probably cost about $15 million at a million dollar you know for 5,000 sare ft so you could see where you know that range goes from 5 million to about 10 million to get into this business and then the projected Revenue there of about 2 to three million um that first year obviously that would be a problem we'd be we'd need somewhere between 3 and 7 million right that would be the deficit we we need that money to get this thing going and where would that money come from well that would um obviously it would have to come from somewhere taxes donations something but it's a lot of money I mean you can see the as it talks about why you know some of the payroll that would include pensions which is hey if the town had one the one thing we wouldn't necessarily have trouble with is getting EMS providers I have EMS providers boy if they could get a pension I I'd probably lose them right because we don't have that that available in in what we do um in any event and the other variability on you know why is there such a FL a a variance in the income of about a million dollars or you know about 50% variance there right is you got to there's this thing called pic Medicare pays so much Medicaid pays so much medic I'm sorry Medicaid pays so much you know and then private insurance pays a bit more you you have to take into account what percentage of your people that you're taking to the hospital or are Medicare Medicaid and private insurance we have an idea of what that is based on some numbers we got from the previous provider and the folks that are doing service for us now but we can't be 100% sure so it it's a hard one to predict perfectly in any event um the committee is recommending that that's not a great option for long term for the town so out of the you know out of our job of looking at the rfps and looking at potentially building it you know as a person who's built it you know we're recommending that's not a great option you know based on you know not only the numbers but you know the cost to run an ambulance um get the get it up and going is pretty high the volatility in the EMS industry it's um it's one of the things is it's not very well supported in New York state I I think you went to a conference that talked about that yes um we're not even as a paramedic we're not considering Ed essential workers in New York if you can believe that you know what that means that to be considered essential workers in New York it means the government funds you and guarantees that you're going to be there we're not guaranteed you you as citizens of New York state are not guaranteed Ambulance Service there's nothing there's no laws there's no regulations that guarantee that um and it's not getting any better so uh if anybody wants to be legislatively involved let me know I can can bring on the team um obviously at this it's a bit small for the you know even though the town of w Webster is a it's a got a reasonable volume of of ambulance calls it's going to probably be you know four or 5,000 maybe you know maybe 3 to 5,000 the economies of scale are just barely there at those numbers you know when you're doing 6 to 10,000 all right now you got a reasonable business model and that's you know one of the things as CEO and president I look at the business model it'd be very hard to sustain um at that level and you can't go out and make ambulance calls not legal you go around hitting people cars that's probably not the right way to do it um and you know the the companies that respond to the rfps have significantly higher call volumes and they can benefit from those economies of scale and um that last bullet goes sort of back to what I say in the controversies in the in the way the government is treating this you know we see the government pushing towards consolidation in another and saying well ambulances should be um run by counties right I don't know how they're going to do that and take all these private companies and make counties take them over but that that is where the push is going and we've seen a lot of ambulances go out of business I think in this County we've seen more than half of them that existed 10 20 years ago are no longer in existence um so for that reason we're recommending that's that's one thing we can recommend today is to not do that not not start the ambulance business here and look more towards Outsourcing to the third parties to fulfill our ambulance needs thanks Russ um any questions or comments from the board members uh my my question doesn't really matter because I couldn't agree with you more that I don't think this is something I certainly as a town board member I have an appetite to pursue um and I I guess I have two questions one is would it be fair to say Russ that if that you did start an ambulance service many years ago if it were today I can assume assume that you might not jump into something like that again it you know if it was a 10,000 call right area yes um potentially okay I mean most of the ambulance services in New York state um the smaller ones are all 501c3 not for profit right so nobody you know I mean guys I'm not doing it I don't make money I'm not a stockholder an owner and most of us aren't so if you just wanted to but if you needed to have an ongoing concern of business business that could be self- sustained yet had about 10,000 calls it would be a reasonable thing to consider okay I think it' be I think you'd have to be a little crazy but you could that that actually leads right into my next question and that is if this were a municipal service that the town were to start up and take over um we would not be a not for-profit and I don't think donations is something we could accept well the Don true but the other thing is that I can tell you the donation us being a 501c3 is historical and is as for most of the ambulance companies um we haven't made the last time that we did a fundraiser we made six $133,000 in Pro in net and that was 20 years ago right but then and that was when we used to be 100% donation base when our budget was $60,000 our budget last year was 6 million so 13,000 is just you know it's it's not worth the effort actually no but but also if we were to exercise our CO as a municipal owned Ambulance Service we would not be able to accept donations because it would be completely different than the not for-profit right but again I think you know if you were you know I don't know maybe the township of Webster would you know maybe we'd be very donation friendly but you wouldn't be able to know right thank you I I appreciate the information and it uh just confirms my thoughts on it thank you Russ and thank you also for your expertise your knowledge and the significant amount of hours that you have put into this endeavor oh the past year well hopefully we'll have a a good look at these rfps and have some more feedback for you in the weeks not months but in the weeks to come looking forward to that information thanks Russ all right thank you all right um we are 12 minutes ahead and I got uh well I see it queued up for melin industry so you know what we're going to go with that I want to let Matt Chatfield know if we catch up on this 7:30 time slot that presentation that you have for that public hearing I'd like to do it at the workshop all right but Matt you're up Matt melin is up yeah thank you all right good evening and thank you Tom Bard for having us in we're very excited to share some things that's going on with our company and our proposal for Publishers Parkway so like Tom said I'm Matt mcalpin I'm the owner president CEO of melin Industries with me here tonight I have Darla Lacy our Director of Finance Joe felichi our director of operations Mark lockerby who's our what are you now just busting his chobs Mark recently retired he was our CFO and now hired consultant he's been uh very instrumental in what we're trying to accomplish here as well also with us is Sarah costage from costage engineering she's been helping us out with putting the proposal together so before we get started on I'd like to talk a little bit about who we are and what we do go to the next slide please so we are a Precision sheet metal fabric company so for those of you that are not familiar with manufacturing and a particular sheet metal fabrication what that means is we bring in raw material primarily steel we bring it in sheet form um sometimes in a coil sometimes as a tube and we process it we cut it we form it we fold it we sometimes insert some Hardware into it we weld it both manually and robotically we do a lot of robotic welding we send it out for finish and then we assemble it and everything we do is business to business so it's not like you're going to go to mcelin Industries and buy one of our products right we don't sell anything directly to the consumer um but everybody in this in this room tonight has interacted with our products in some shape or form so if you ever ridden on a highspeed train or an electric bus um or if you ever ordered anything online that process of automation from the warehouse from getting on the Shelf to your front door we have a lot of parts that help out with that um and if you ever bought anything in a store and you used a self checkout kiosk we build a lot of she metal components in that so that's some of the industries and the type of parts we build and Russ I definitely would like to know how many sheet metal parts are in those beds those hospital beds that's $440,000 a stretcher that's a it's a market we got to look into so that's what we do um and who we are um you know we're we're a family-owned and operated third generation company my grandfather started it 60 years ago he's been celebrating our 60th Milestone this year um you know Grandpa uh went from the family dairy farm on salt Road here in Webster to uh to sheet metal FB so some ties there to the town uh we have quite a bit certifications within the company I listed ISO 901 here because most people are more more familiar with that one um we are a veteran owned small business um we're also a profit sharing company uh we formally introduced this program to our Associates 7 years ago and in a couple weeks we're going to have our annual holiday lunch where we're going to announce that we're paying profit chearing again for the seventh year in a row we're very proud of that as well uh Community involvement um we've been getting involved with a lot of local trade associations trying to um build the welding trade within um Western New York um you know we've been working a lot with um rtma um we've been working at the uh Rock withy hands events the last three years and we've been working with local high schools uh in fact last week we were at Fairport High School I believe for career day and tomorrow Joe's going to be at Webster high school to talk to a tech class so we're trying to build interest in manufacturing early on um and then from a sustainability standpoint we put our eadus uh bronze score here uh we are registered on alatus um you know we uh company our size you might be surprised to hear that we actually track our carbon footprint a lot of companies our size don't do that don't even know how to do that um so we do that we're registering aquabus for the bronet which basically means we're in the top 35% of companies that are tracking their sustainability and how well they're doing with that so that's who we are um the next slide I did put our a list of core values on here I'm not going to go through them all but this is really who we are this is our company DNA um this is how we uh perform on a day-to-day basis it's how we do our performance appraisal and this is how we hire we hire for culture first and skill set second okay next slide please so why Webster this is the property we're here to talk about tonight Publishers Parkway um but you know we didn't uh we didn't throw a dart yesterday and found ourselves looking at Webster properties this has been a long time coming to say the least uh first and foremost I'm a a lifelong resident of Webster I grew up here my wife and I are raising our kids here our kids are in the weer schools um and we're both heavily involved in in these Sports in the in the town um and I I just I couldn't love the idea more of having our company and Webster as well so how did we get here about a year ago a little bit over a year ago our senior staff team was doing our annual uh strategic planning and we Qui quickly found that we needed more space and when we took a look at all the facilities we're current currently Leasing and when those leases are up and the growth we're expecting the next couple years we needed more space the next step we took uh the opportunity to create a couple heat maps on where our Associates are driving from to come to work along with our key leadership and along with a couple other variables we narrowed it down that to we wanted to be east of the city but not too far east we need to be close to the throughway and we need to be really close to a major highway so we narrowed it down to four towns and we talked to all four towns and um I was very happy with the response I got from Webster um I think one of my first calls was to Tom Tom put me in contact with Matt chadfield um we looked at a couple properties nothing really shook loose at the time um then I had another deal going on with another property that fell through unfortunately fortunately I wouldn't be here if uh it did but uh about three months ago I sat down with Matt and Josh and they brought up the map of Webster and we just started looking at different properties try to identify who owns it and would that be a good fit for melin Industries so we found about six or seven properties and Mark and I had our homework to do and at the end of the story this one shook loose so that's why we're here today so I just wanted to give a background on that all right next slide so this is the concept that Sarah's team helped us put together um and what you see here is the long-term proposal so it's h it's a total of 300,000 Square fet but the short term would be the initial need which we think is going to be about 100 to 120,000 Square ft we're we're debating that internally right now know a couple things that we like about this property is we believe that the utilities are are sufficient for what we need we're in the process of putting our our will service letters together or the application for our will service letters um that's going pretty well so far um you know also the area um it just seems like we fit there you know we uh uh we're light manufacturing and warehousing company um you know Calvary automation to the West occupies nearly 400,000 square feet mirr show management adjacent 160,000 Square ft so seems like it's a good fit for us to be right there in the middle um we we've gotten a little bit of a a chuckle between our team because this is right next to a football field and an ice skting rank our facility in wallworth we share a building with a sports complex and our facility in East Rochester we share uh a building with with pickle ball courts so maybe football and ice skating is the natural fit for us here uh a couple other things that you know we think is a great fit here is you know this first initial building represents uh job growth about 20 to 25 um you know these are going to be positions that have to do with robotic welding programming um par coat technicians engineering um some some pretty good jobs that we're going to be able to create there uh you know one of the things I talked about earlier about uh working with some of the high schools um our senior staff team continues to talk about bringing up the Next Generation and Welding has been the biggest need for us over the last five years but we're starting to see a need in other areas within manufacturing laser cutting press break forming um so we have a long-term plan at least this is the dream to put an education center together um so that we can continue to teach this these Generations coming up about Manufacturing um we think Webster is a great place for that and being across from the high school um we feel like we have a lot to offer there uh one thing you might notice on the top of the screen here U we left the northern portion of the property empty for now we're leaving that undeveloped um early discussions with the town um there is desire to develop that um I think one of the things I heard was a possibility of a new library someday um that's something we're very interested in talking to the town about um we want to be a part of that um and more importantly we want to develop a long-term relationship with the town wster had a I had a chance to walk the property couple weeks ago Mark and I did with two environmental scientists um it was a it was an interesting walk I I've never seen so much Poison Ivy in my life but we got through it um but there's also a problem with the property where the ash trees are are dead and if they're not dead they're dying um so that um insect infestation that took over Western New York over the last four or five years it's hit this area pretty hard um but you know our intention um is to treat this facility like all our fa facilities we take very good care of them um we like to keep a clean building um we're not a the type of manufacturer that um has equipment stored outside or materials that need to be stored outside we' like to keep a very clean building um because it's important for our Associates that when they drive to work they can be proud of where they're working impress our customers and and certainly our community um from a sustainability standpoint um this is something we look at all the time like I mentioned we're we're one of few companies especially at our size that can track their carbon footprint we're taking our sustainability efforts to the next level with our next facility so we're actively researching um it GE geothermal heating um we're still trying to get our arms wrapped around that one but solar energy is something we're we're taking a strong look at as well as uh rainwater uh Rec claim so there's a lot of sustainability eff efforts going there so with that being said I'd like to answer any questions about what we put together in front of you today and of course I got Sarah here to answer some questions you might have for her as well I don't have any questions I I like what I hear I am familiar with your company um I love the fact that you're coming home to Webster um I like what I hear on the education center this the sustainability the future Generations which has obviously served your company for three generations that something that you live um and of all the plans that we have looked at for this property uh this is the first one that that really excites me oh great thank you yeah like the fact that you're working with local high schools too I think is very important to bring the young kids up through learning the trade I don't think we've put enough emphasis on the trades for Generations in in not only in the state but in the country um the other only other question or only question I have is have you worked with um recruiting from bosis at all we have um yeah and and actually quite a few facilities and still actively that's fantastic well I see in here that you are a veteran own small business as well so I you know thank you for that service and um the how soon are you think to proceed with this project great question um so ideally as of right now and that's one of the great things about our industry is the only only constant is change but as of right now we believe we need to be in the new facility uh by mid 26 at the latest yeah okay because I know to Wi the process up do now Master plant and I'm hoping that after you know everything is settled and all the zoning and things like that is in place and this will be perfect and the timing you know will be aligned with each other yeah y great thank you I think everybody said it all the the other I think a lot of um or at least a couple different Senior Living developments were um considered for this space I think this as Patty said is is exciting it fits with the use it's not going to have the traffic that a senior type of um living you know senior homes would have um I think it's great across the street from the high school it it's wonderful that you're from Webster my son is in school for welding so for that reason because it is a growing need so it's exciting to hear that that's coming here and who knows maybe it can be an opportunity for him when he graduates yeah let me know when he graduates please may may may of May of 25 I I I have to say I'm biased because I I know the mccalpin family his grandfather who uh his grandmother and grandfather still live here in Webster um it was really one of my mentors growing up because my father and his grandfather were good friends um and the mpen name the Mel Industries they do things the right way they always have and it permeated down from Frank his grandfather right to his father Ken who was the second generation and now it's with Matt the third generation I mean the apples don't fall far from the tree so I'm biased I think this would be great and what I really appreciated about Matt and the crew coming in uh a month or two ago um is that I take it it's the dark orange is the first building correct yeah and that's the farthest you know it's closest to 104 but the farthest you know from Publishers Parkway um they had said one they were hoping that he could build this complex over 10 years where it wasn't seen from the road uh but two um because of their other facilities that they have and they mentioned a few of them as certain things age out or leases are done this is a 10-year plan to get their whole operation here and they saw right from the beginning that we need to approach this with the board planning board zoning board showing the full 10 years and not just saying hey let's just show you this $100,000 100,000 foot building in the far corner here um because they do things the right way and and they totally understood that they come back in five years for these other things it's a totally different town board totally different planning board totally different zoning board so um I'll get off the uh m in uh Soap Box Matt but appreciate the kind words Tom you mentioned traffic earlier you know that was one thing that we did take a close look at when we looked at the property and um you know the majority of our Associates shift starts at 6:00 a.m.

so you know the timing of the traffic in that area will work out great yeah and Jenny I love your question because I know that this was kind of like let's let's have Matt and the crew come in uh and show this and then I know that Josh uh and Matt Chatfield and Matt and the whole crew here have talked about okay based on questions comments thoughts um it's very possible that we'll be hitting um Town board planning board zoning board uh actions on this and all that goes into that within the next month or two so that goes to your timing you want to build a building and be in by mid 26 I got news for everybody that's a year and a half away so so thanks Matt lot can happen between that and that too so that's true we were just talking about well if uh if we can get it done by the end of 25 we we might have use for it so keeping an open mind about it sure sure thanks thank you thank you thank you Matt Matt chadfield do you think uh with 18 minutes to go you could potentially uh ZIP through this uh I I'll let everybody know we uh we have done a resolution back on October uh 17th I want to say to do a letter of intent for applying to the restor New York grant for the West Webster Hamlet and certain properties there uh certainly one of the focal ones was and is uh 600 Ridge the old uh furniture strippers um the deadline to apply for that Grant is December 20th and um there is some public hearing aspects to this process and Matt uh I know we we have a uh we have a resolution to set a public hearing that's on tonight's regular board meeting agenda but I know that you had said to Josh you'd like to kind of give the the board and the community to this presentation to kind of triage why yeah absolutely I'll hand it to you great thank you um Matt Chatfield executive director of the Webster e Economic Development Alliance um been working with the alliance and S of Webster been working on West Webster for several years now uh a solution to the blight caused by 600 Ridge Road for an extensive period of time uh but we are making quite a bit of progress uh on that effort um just to remind the board uh the town was awarded uh some revital uh some master planning funds from the genese Transportation Council back in 2022 that Master Plan was finished in 2023 here's the study area and uh the public sentiment that came out of that was we need to enhance safety for pedestrians and bicyclists we need to improve um the look and function of Empire Boulevard but most importantly we need to solve the problem with the corner of gravel and um old Ridge Road so tonight real quickly we're going to talk about uh the Restore New York grant program there's a funding opportunity available uh for application to the town and that funding window is going to close pretty soon um and we'll quickly talk about what we're hoping to accomplish but you know this is the the timeline and I'm not going to belabor the uh this timeline but just to show you you know there's been an extensive amount of activity and Milestones that have taken place uh since June 2021 um heading through into I would say March of 2024 when the town was uh the beneficiary of the county foreclosure and now is has title to 600 Ridge Road so now it's the town's responsibility to figure out what to do with this and uh we've been working diligently uh with internal Town staff to try and uh find that solution and one of the ideas that we have uh and just speaks to the community Demand right to see the BL the blighting impacts of 600b Road uh the community input the heat map the focus of most of the public comments for that Master planning process were on uh the four-way intersection so to talk about 600 Ridge um the state made an announcement back in September that this funding source was available and in early November um the town actually sought potential private partner um to be uh The Entity that would rehabilitate this structure right so the town would be able to secure the funding from the state and then could actually subgrant that onto a private sector uh entity um but the private sector entity would need to come up with the funds um upfront and then we get reimbursed um unfortunately you know we had an underwhelming response from our development Community to that opportunity so absent a private sector developer private sector investor to to uh you know cooperate with the town and potentially you know seek to get under contract um and help re rehabilitate the property we're left with a conundrum we have a property that's in failing condition we have a roof that is in failing condition um we have cost estimates for activities to just stabilize the structure that range from 12,000 and upwards um of dollars that are difficult to have the public sector Swallow at this point without knowing what the future of the building is um so the what happened there we go so the funding program will provide for um engineering design demolition construction environmental remediation uh we're hoping to mate a project that would help get this property prepared for future development most likely it would entail a demolition of the structure it would entail an expanded environmental investigations and then follow through with remedial activities to get the site prepared for new development um that's currently what we're hoping to propose to the state so that would take place September December 20th is the application deadline uh quarter one quarter two of 2025 is uh the anticipated award notification and the great thing about that date is that's like a a milestone date so from that point forward expenses would be eligible so at that point the town would be able to move forward with any sort of activities if need be based on timing or need um and the extent of uh dilapidation uh of the building and then would those funds would be eligible to get reimbursed um and then hopefully you know close out the project by the end of 2026 so and so why now continue we still have momentum from the master planning process the town is now finally in control of this building uh the town was unsuccessful in round seven of the Restore New York program that uh Grant submission I sat right in the state right in this chair probably two years ago uh we submitted in January of 2023 uh um but we didn't have a very good project put together because the town didn't have control and there was no clear path to control at the time um we continue to have broad public support to deal with this uh this this structure um and the goal is to deal with the structure with outside assistance right rather than having the town foot the bill uh which is in the multiple tens of thousands even just to demolish the building um luckily this particular program is now on a by uh actually a multi annual uh funding round used to be every three years this program was eligible the past two years they've actually gone you know quite a bit further and now there's actually two funding rounds annually as for the past two years so if the town decides not to advance an application at this point it's likely that Midway through 2025 there may be another opportunity um or and if it's unsuccessful at this point there's going to be another opportunity in the future as well to apply again so it's um no really no harm no foul Our Hope and we've been working with the ownership of 602 Ridge Road Jade Palace which is on the market for sale we've been working with them in hopes that they could find a Suitor that would buy that property and then potentially enjoying the town on a larger application that would impact that property as well um as of today's date we don't have another developer that would be interested uh that's actually under control of 602 which is the Old Jade page Heritage House for those of you who are predate my uh you know my years here so our best bet scenario is if we can get both properties um within the same application but as of currently right now we're not anticipating being able to do that so we have approximately these are some ballpark numbers we have about a $275,000 total project which includes some contingencies um and a bunch of uh engineering and uh investigations and probably a remedial action plan like assuming the next steps um to solve the environmental impairment so right now the anticipated restore request would be for 250,000 um with you know approximately 10% or 25 to 27,000 of matching funds that would be required by the town just additional pictures I think everybody knows what the building looks like Jade Palace property you know a theoretical Rehabilitation of that property Soup To Nuts including site work 2.3 million um theoretical if if we could find a Suitor for that would be a $700,000 ask town is eligible to ask for up to $1 million from the state so this is definitely part of a prolonged effort sustained effort by the town of Webster to facilitate growth and revitalization of the Hamlet the planning study there's still multiple steps that the town can take to continue build upon that momentum um especially the recommended zoning changes um streetscape improvements I sat here a year ago um when we applied for tap Grant which is transportation Alternatives program funding through uh the federal government via I wouldn't say a loophole but I would say a an outlier our application was denied we actually interviewed the the federal uh Transportation committee that scored our application and they said it was really a silly thing and we they encouraged us to apply again so the town's in a great position to apply again for streetscape sidewalk uh and funding for that area um and then of course continued investigations for for Ridge Road so there's still a lot of things that the town can be doing even absent the award of These funds to continue making progress and with not a lot of dollars spent right we we're talking about you know $100,000 um to continue to push the revitalization of this neighborhood just some renderings from the just to remind you of what those streetscape uh projects would potentially look like so in potential sources of funding for the project uh Town budgets um maybe squeeze a couple dollars of arpa funds out of the budget uh I know it's going fast but there just a little bit can go a very long way in the hamlet um and of course some private investment and and I know that Josh and his team are looking diligently at at other Federal um sources of funding as well so with that if there's any particular questions I'd be happy to answer did I meet your timeline sir very great okay man what's the structural condition of 602 Ridge Road not 600 so of 602 yes St Pals there has been no Engineers assessment of the structural Integrity of that building I've walked through it several times I've walked through the basement of the building several times um I believe the building is very salvageable but the the the quality of the structure is difficult to match with what the market is looking for right the ceiling Heights are low right the the there's a lot of columns and walls that are all structurally bearing um it would take someone with a great vision and I'm not saying it's not worth uh trying to rehab that structure um built in 1885 it's a very old building there's always been a a pub or a Tavern on that corner since like 1860s so right um I'm not saying it wouldn't be worthwhile it just takes a special person to be in a lot of those times because that building is that old when they start doing rehab and you know tearing down walls they want run into all sorts of problems yeah I mean the building's been cut up pretty good over the years yeah last time it was in 600 um Ridge Road walk through the basement upstairs I honest to God I don't see the worth in Shoring that up at all um and I was pretty amaz I was pretty surprised by the cost of the your cost estimate to demo that um oh that's 150,000 that's that that that includes site work utility work um there's a little bit of fluff there for the application how much so far did the grants that we got for this um currently to my knowledge the town does not have any Grant funds towards 600 Ridge Road nothing we are seeking our first Victory also 600 would that possible if we demolish it and make it into like a com you know a um community park or something so the master plan contemplated two alternatives for that corner uh the parcel is pretty much a posted stamp right now um so the vision of what would be able to what you could accomplish with a public space um wasn't really flushed out in the master plan um I think the the master plan does PR preferred to see some sort of structure on that corner to keep the village Urban Hamlet character of that intersection um whether or not it's a new building or that that that existing building but um like a AO having it be a vacant um having it be vacant um you know I think right now having to be an open public space absent a better response from the marketplace um I think the town would be doing more to try and keep people from parking cars in there or I think it would become more of a headache I'll be honest if it was a vacant lot no it's not a vacant but you know like a place where yeah people just come and sit you know the town owns the property so the town is very much able to you know take another stab at what it wants to accomplish with that corner Jennifer no thank you for that I don't know why we wouldn't apply right I I don't know why we would pass on this application timeline and wait for the next one let's let's apply and keep keep it moving forward thanks man absolutely thank you so Bridget that was fantastic we take a couple minute break we shut down the workshop now and we come back in a few minutes and start the regular Town board meeting so that concludes our uh Town board workshop for the evening thank you we'll be back on the air in 3 to 5 minutes to start the Reg

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