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NORTH CANAAN — Cost overruns for the nearly complete sewer extension on Route 7 South may or may not filter down to property owners affected by the Canaan Fire District project.
Residential and commercial property owners will be assessed a share of the project cost, but exactly how much depends on a number of factors. The only sure answer is that none of it will be sorted out before the end of the year.
Additional costs, associated mainly with the need to blast out far more ledge than anticipated, have caused the final cost to swell to about $2 million. The contractor and engineer have been paid for the originally contracted costs. What remains up in the air is how and when costs for several contract extensions will be paid.
Fire District Warden Anthony Nania has applied for additional grant and loan funding through the federal Agricultural Rural Development Program.
“I am very confident more funding is coming to us,� Nania said. “I have been informed by the government they have my application, and they have approved the new numbers for the project.
“But getting the funding depends on Congress passing a budget. They have not put forth a budget for the current fiscal year and have been operating the country on a series of resolutions. I don’t think a budget will be passed until the Republican majority is seated in January.
“It’s not that the money isn’t in the budget. We just can’t get it until the budget is actually passed.�
He is hoping to get at least the 45 percent the fire district received initially for the project, and is looking for other funding sources. The Fire District itself may take on a share of the added costs. As well, negotiations with the contractor on a final cost have yet to be done.
That puts the final number left to be raised a difficult figure to pin down right now. Nania said it’s all very preliminary, but could be as much as $200,000. The responsibility for that lies with the 12 property owners along the extended sewer line.
“But that doesn’t mean an equal share for each,� Nania said. “New assessments will be based on the share already agreed to. Mountainside [Addiction Treatment Center] is paying for more than 80 percent of the project, or about $1 million. They would pay that same 80 percent of whatever we can’t get funded of the additional costs.�
Nania said it should all be sorted out after the first of the year. The first billing on assessments likely won’t be done until the first quarter of 2011.
Meanwhile, some minor issues with the pumping station, namely a leaky roof, are being resolved. Mountainside and one residence are hooked up, and others will be invited to connect if they so desire beginning very soon.
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Telecom Reg’s Best Kept On the Books
When Connecticut land-use commissions update their regulations, it seems like a no-brainer to jettison old telecommunications regulations adopted decades ago during a short-lived period when municipalities had authority to regulate second generation (2G) transmissions prior to the Connecticut Siting Council (CSC) being ordered by a state court in 2000 to regulate all cell tower infrastructure as “functionally equivalent” services.
It is far better to update those regs instead, especially for macro-towers given new technologies like small cells. Even though only ‘advisory’ to the CSC, the preferences of towns by law must be taken into consideration in CSC decision making. Detailed telecom regs – not just a general wish list -- are evidence that a town has put considerable thought into where they prefer such infrastructure be sited without prohibiting service that many – though not all – citizens want and that first responders rely on for public safety.
Such regs come in handy when egregious tower sites are proposed in sensitive areas, typically on private land. The regs are a town’s first line of defense, especially when cross referenced to plans of conservation and development, P&Z regulations, and wetlands setbacks. They identify how/where the town plans to intersect with the CSC process. They are also a roadmap for service providers regarding preferred sites and sometimes less neighborhood contention. In fact, to have no telecom regs can weaken a town’s rights to protect environmental, scenic, and historic assets, and serve up whole neighborhoods to unnecessary overlapping coverage and corporate overreach. Such regs are unique to every town and should not follow anyone else’s boiler plate, especially industry’s.
Connecticut is the only state that has a centralized siting entity for cell towers. The good news is that applicants must prove need for new tower sites in an evidentiary proceeding and any decisions have the weight of the state behind them. The bad news is that the CSC used to be far less industry-friendly and rote in their reviews, which now resemble a check list. There is an operative assumption at CSC that if an applicant wants a tower, they must need it, otherwise why spend significant money to run the approval gauntlet? This reflects a subtle shift over the years at CSC from sincere willingness to protect the environment toward minimal tweaking of bad applications with minor changes. The bottom line is that towns really cannot rely on the CSC to do all the work for them.
What CSC issues telecom providers is a “certificate of environmental compatibility” after an evidentiary proceeding (not unlike a court case) with intervenors, parties, expert witnesses, and the service provider’s technical pro’s sworn in and subject to cross examination. Service providers get to do the same with any opposition from intervenor/party participants – like towns and citizens -- and their experts. It’s an impressive process whose ultimate goal is the fine balancing between allowing adequate/reliable public services and protecting state ecology with minimal damage to scenic, historic, and recreational values. They unfortunately often fall short of their mandate – like approving cell towers with diesel generators over town aquifers -- evidenced by CSC only rejecting about five cell towers in the past 15-20 years.
The CSC was founded in 1972 and clarified its mission in the 1980’s to prevent the state from being carved up willy-nilly by gas pipelines, high tension corridors, and broadcast towers. With the sudden proliferation of cell towers beginning in late 1990’s, it became the most sued agency in Connecticut by both an arrogant upstart industry if applications were denied and by towns/citizens when bad sites were forced on them. CSC gradually formed a defensive posture that drives their decisions toward industry with deeper pockets and attorneys on retainer.
For citizens, nothing can wreck one’s day like the CSC. It behooves towns to protect what little toolkit they have, and understand the legal parameters of the CSC’s playing field. The CSC is not a “normal” government agency where municipal/citizen redress is based on logic and local support. Their process is largely immune to everything but specific kinds of evidence – like town regs with setbacks/fall zones, radio frequency transmission signal strengths, sensitive areas identified, and detailed wildlife inventory, among others.
There is a current cell tower fight involving two intervening towns -- Washington and Warren; both with good cell tower regs – over a tower site within 1200’ of a Montessori School, near Steep Rock’s nature preserves with comprehensive geology/wildlife databases that include endangered, threatened and special concern flora and fauna, on established federal/state migratory bird flyways, within throwing distance to a historic site capable of being listed on the Underground Railroad, and with an access road on a blind curve entering a state highway that will permanently damage wetlands, vernal pools, and core forests. There are well credentialed environmental experts, including Dr. Michael Klemens, former chair of Salisbury’s P&Z, as well as the former director of migratory bird management at the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and an RF engineer testifying to alternative approaches, plus three attorneys representing intervenors. It is the most professional challenge I have seen at CSC since Falls Village successfully mounted one that protected Robbins Swamps several years ago.
The hearing is ongoing, with uncertain results. To see what it takes today to stop an inappropriate tower siting, see Docket #543 under “Pending Matters” at https://portal.ct.gov/csc before removing local cell tower regs – the lowest hanging fruit that any town can possess in case it’s needed.
B, Blake Levitt is the Communications Director at The Berkshire-Litchfield Environmental Council. She writes about how technology affects biology.