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Town Plans Big-Ticket Projects

By
Joanne Pilgrim

A draft three-year capital plan under review by the East Hampton Town Board includes $18.2 million for a range of efforts from construction projects to repairs and equipment purchases and would require $10.7 million in new borrowing, according to a presentation by Len Bernard, the town budget officer, on Tuesday.

The plan calls for spending up to $5.5 million to rebuild the old town hall and for construction of a new senior citizen center, at just over $3 million, to replace an aging building on Springs-Fireplace Road in East Hampton.

The cost of the two buildings would be offset by the sale of 11 office condominiums at Pantigo Place in East Hampton that currently house town offices that would be moved to the renovated old town hall, as well as the sale of the defunct scavenger waste treatment plant site.

The former town hall has been empty for several years, since historic buildings donated to the town were fashioned into a new town hall on the same Pantigo Road campus, but plans are under way to once again put the space to use in order to consolidate town departments onto the campus.

At its meeting tonight, the town board is expected to approve a $258,400 bid from Keith Grimes of Montauk to have the scavenger waste plant site cleared and the buildings demolished to ready the commercially zoned property for sale.

Despite the new borrowing under the proposed capital budget, the town’s overall indebtedness would continue to decrease as a strategy of retiring more debt than is added each year continues.

A total of $104 million owed at the beginning of this year is expected to decrease to $96 million by the end of 2016.

Should the capital plan be adopted as drafted, with new bonds issued for the projects listed, the town’s indebtedness would nonetheless fall to a projected $79 million at the end of 2018, according to the budget officer’s calculations. 

With lower debt, Mr. Bernard said, “long term, the town is going to be in a better financial position and able to adjust its spending priorities.”

The 2016 plan includes 66 new items and carries over an additional 18 items from the 2015 plan. The list maps out a timeline for projects to be completed, but decisions are made throughout each year on their priority and the town board must vote to issue bonds to fund each individual item.

Among the undertakings on the list are the installation of a new bulkhead at the head of Three Mile Harbor beginning next year, with an estimated $750,000 price tag; the purchase of new police vehicles, for a total of $600,000 over the coming three years; a $2.5 million mandated upgrade to the police communications system in 2018, and $450,000 in spending on Highway Department truck refurbishments over the three years.

Changes to town properties to make them handicapped-accessible would continue this year and next, with $125,000 budgeted for 2016 and $100,000 for 2017. An additional $100,000 could be added to the projected spending for 2018, Mr. Bernard suggested at a town board meeting on Tuesday, “to show commitment” to meeting the needs of disabled residents and complying with the Americans With Disabilities Act.

“These are things that have come from the various departments as needs going forward,” said Mr. Bernard at a town board meeting on Tuesday. Additions to the capital plan suggested by board members included refurbishment of the former mess hall at the Boys Harbor camp, now owned by the town, including the addition of public bathrooms, for an estimated $208,000, and replacing drafty and rotting windows at Town Hall.

 

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