The Saranac Lake Village Board is sticking to its final fire and rescue contract proposal with surrounding townships.

“We’ve show due diligence, we’ve shown good faith,” Trustee John McEneany said at last night’s village board meeting.  “Why couldn’t the towns simply sign our final contract.”

Last week the village made what was described as its “last ditch” attempt to settle a fire and rescue contract impasse with the Towns of Harrietstown, Brighton and Santa Clara. 

The village asked for 12-month contracts based on the amount each town budgeted for protection from the village in their 2007 budgets.  A January 26 deadline was issued.  If the towns don’t sign by then, fire and rescue services from the village and volunteers will cease.

On Friday, the towns met and made another proposal to the village, offering significant increases on what they paid in 2006.  They also asked the village to agree to a memorandum of understanding to explore more than a half-dozen contract issues.

While no agreement has been reached yet, the two sides are closer then they’ve been so far. Mayor Tom Michael said they’re about $7000 apart for six months of service or $14,000 for a year’s worth.

Trustee John McEneany said the eight issues the towns want addressed include some major “quagmires” like legal and financial issues. 

But he supported one of the main requests from the towns – the creation of a fire and rescue advisory board with representatives from the fire department, village and towns, to work on some of the long-term issues the two sides have been unable to resolve.

McEneany suggested they agree to create the advisory board while sticking to their final contract offer. “The village has stepped up to the plate,” McEneany said.  “For $14,000 these towns can step up to the plate.”

But Trustee Christy Fontana said it didn’t seem like they were working with the towns.  “I don’t want to say ‘sign it or else,’” she said.  “I think it would be nice if we could come to an amiable agreement.”

McEneany, however, said all the issues the town’s want addressed can’t be solved before the January 26 deadline.  “We need time to go over this,” he said.

Mayor Michael said he’d call a meeting of the town and village boards on Friday at the Saranac Lake Volunteer Fire Department so they can work out the language of an agreement.  “I do believe we’re getting closer,” he said.

The towns – Brighton, Santa Clara and Harrietstown – are reportedly scheduling public hearings on the village’s fire and rescue contract proposal.

The Town of Franklin has reportedly agreed to the village’s original one-year offer.  North Elba and St. Armand had agreed to a six-month deal but will be asked if they’ll extend to a full year.

SCHOOL BOARD DELAYS DECISION ON TEACHER’S STATUS

The Tupper Lake School Board agreed Monday night to keep an elementary school teacher on administrative leave until they hold a special meeting January 17 to revisit the issue.

Superintendent Dan Bower has not publicly referred to the teacher by name at the advice of the district’s attorney but did say an arrest made by State Police on Friday and the person on leave are related.

On Friday, sixth-grade teacher Glenn Poirer and a 16-year old turned themselves in to State Police.  They were charged with third-degree criminal nuisance, a misdemeanor, and released pending appearances in Tupper Lake Town Court.

A press release issued by State Police Troop B headquarters in Ray Brook specifically identified Poirier as a teacher in the Tupper Lake school system.

The arrest stems from an underage drinking party that occurred in mid-October at a hunting camp off of Kildare Road.

On October 31 Poirer was placed on administrative leave over allegations of misconduct.  A district employee for more than ten years, he resigned as the girl’s seventh grade basketball coach in December.

Bower said at last night’s meeting that after learning of the incident there were students in the district that were disciplined.

As State Police continue their investigation, Bower said the district was close to wrapping up theirs. “We still need some information,” he said.

Since the arrest just occurred last week Bower said they set up the January 17 special meeting so that district officials could consult with their attorney to determine what course of action to take next.

In other news acting Athletic Director John Button said representatives of Section X were coordinating a realignment committee. Button said the purpose was to make competition fairer. “We’re thinking about changing the three divisions that we have at the present time to make a little more equity among teams of the same size,” he said.

Button recommended Bower and the board draft a letter of support and send it to the section’s executive director.

Vice President Pat Facteau, serving as president in Michael Decehne’s absence, said he’d have Bower write something up and send it off.  

LAWSUIT FILED OVER TL RESORT REZONING, PILOT

A group of Tupper Lake residents and several environmental groups have made due on their promise to file a lawsuit against the town and the proposed Adirondack Club and Resort project.

The Association for the Protection of the Adirondacks, Residents Committee for the Protection of the Adirondacks and several adjoining landowners allege that the Tupper Lake planning process is flawed and that the proposed payment in lieu of taxes financing plan is illegal.

The lawsuit was filed Monday in the Franklin County Clerk’s office on Malone. It asks the joint planning board’s decision to reclassify roughly 6,400-acres as a planned development district be struck down.

The suit also claims that the proposed PILOT program is illegal because municipal law does not allow industrial development agencies to fund residential developments. The developers have applied for financing through the Franklin County IDA.

Jack Delehanty, a neighbor to the proposed resort, said in December that they weren’t trying to chase the project away. “We want Big Tupper to return with the fewest environmental impact and fiscal impacts possible,” he said.

Meanwhile a coalition of environmental groups, including some of the same ones involved in the lawsuit, held a press conference this morning in Albany calling on APA Chairman Ross Whaley to send the project to an adjudicatory hearing before an administrative law judge. They say the town and park agency regulations are too weak to adequately protect open space, wildlife habitat and water quality.  They also say the development would overwhelm the town’s taxpayers.

The coalition is also reaching out to Governor Eliot Spitzer. They’re asking the governor to make sweeping changes at the APA that include appointing his own choices for Executive Director and Chief Counsel.

“Governor Spitzer announced last week that he wants to see ‘smartgrowth’ planning principles used for new development across New York,” said the Resident’s Committee’s Peter Bauer. “The Adirondack Club and Resort project is a case study in dumb growth.”

The opposition to the project comes as the APA is scheduled to hear a technical presentation tomorrow at the Harrietstown Town Hall in Saranac Lake and take initial public comment at the Tupper Lake High School. 

The park agency is expected to decide in February whether to approve the project or send it to an adjudicatory public hearing.

DAY WHOLESALE WINS INJUNCTION AGAINST THE STATE

A Tupper Lake wholesaler has won the latest battle in the ongoing debate over the collection of sales tax on cigarettes sold to non-Indians on Native American reservations.

A State Supreme Court Judge in Erie County has granted the request of Day Wholesale and a fellow business for an injunction that will prevent the state Attorney General’s Office from enforcing a 2005 law that called for the collection of sales tax from non-Natives.

Judge Rose Sconiers found the rules and regulations needed to implement the law had not been created.  Specifically, she said, the state has yet to issue or distribute tax exemption coupons that would be used by Indians.

“The law cannot function without a system that involves Indian tax exemption coupons,” reads the decision.

The New York Association of Convenience Stores supported the Attorney General’s attempt to enforce the law.  The failure to collect sales tax from non-Natives, the group said, has cost state residents millions in lost sales tax revenue and puts businesses near reservations at a competitive disadvantage.

Jim Calvin, President of the New York Association of Convenience Stores, says they’re disappointed with the ruling.  But, he said, there’s nothing preventing the Tax Department from issuing the tax exempt coupons to Indians so sales tax could be collected on sales to non-Indians.

“It appears the Attorney General is now prohibited from enforcing the law that requires collection of taxes on Indian sales to non-Indians,” he said.  “But it does not appear to us that the tax department is prohibited from implementing the law.”

Calvin said they’re hopeful Governor Eliot Spitzer, based on his record as attorney general, “will proceed in enforcing the law.”

Spitzer said he would direct his tax department to implement the law to comply with the judge's ruling.

“I believe in both a level playing field in respect to competition in the market place and also appropriate respect for the sovereign nations,” Spitzer said. “But I think the statute that was passed a couple years ago was an appropriate statute so we will be moving forward.”

An attorney for Day Wholesale and the Seneca reservation businessman who brought the case said the decision means that for now, wholesalers will continue to ship unstamped cigarettes to Indian retailers.

“It would appear that the (state Department of Taxation and Finance) is going to have to go through a rule-making process in which they talk about how the coupons will be allocated...not to mention the mechanism that's going to be used by the tribal governments in distributing these coupons,” attorney Margaret Murphy said. “Until that time, it's business as usual.”

COUNTY JAIL OPENING DELAYED TILL SPRING

The opening of the new Essex County Jail in Lewis has been pushed back until mid-April because of vendor delays.

Construction of the 120-bed jail complex was scheduled to be complete this month.  But Sheriff Henry Hommes told the County Board of Supervisors Monday that there have been setbacks in installing the security system and telephone lines.

Black Creek Integrated Systems of Alabama is the vendor for the security system.

Verizon Communications will be connecting the phone lines, including special lines for the Enhanced-911 Call Center in the jail’s Public Safety Building.

E-911 Coordinator Don Jaquish told supervisors that Verizon said they won’t be able to hook up the phone lines for two weeks.  And the county has yet to hire dispatchers for the facility so the opening of the 911 center will likely be delayed until mid-April, he said.

The county hasn’t hired dispatchers because the state hasn’t released results of a civil service test, according to Emergency Services Director Ray Thatcher.  “As soon as we get the test results back, we’re going to be hiring and start the training,” he said.

For those reasons, Board Chairman Noel Merrihew of Elizabethtown said the jail’s opening has been pushed back.  “We’re going to strive for April,” he said.  “I’d say mid-April.”

Even though the jail won’t take its first inmates until then, correction officers may start training in the facility as soon as mid-February.

NCCC BOARD TO MEET WITH COUNTY OFFICIALS

For the first time since North Country Community College’s plans to renovate or relocate its Saranac Lake campus went public, the college will meet with officials from its two sponsoring counties.

The college Board of Trustees has invited Franklin County legislators and Essex County Supervisors to a luncheon on Thursday in Hodson Hall on the Saranac Lake campus.

A news release from the college says a presentation and discussion regarding the Main Campus expansion and renovation is planned.

The college board, at a meeting in December, narrowed the choices for the future of the main campus between staying in Saranac Lake or moving to the former Upstate Biotechnology site in Lake Placid.  The Upstate site, which has a 50,000 square foot building and 34 surrounding acres, is currently on the market for $5.9 million.

The college is looking for room to grow due to surging enrollment and a lack of space at the Saranac Lake campus.  Any capital plans would have to be submitted to SUNY by the end of the year or they’ll miss the next five-year capital development cycle.

Essex and Franklin Counties would also have to approve and help pay for the project.

Thursday’s meeting between county officials and the college board gets underway at 12 noon.

APA MEETS WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY, FRIDAY

The Adirondack Park Agency has a lot on its plate this week as the agency board holds its monthly scheduled meeting in addition to a technical presentation from developers of the Adirondack Club and Resort project to be followed by a legislative hearing.

On Wednesday the Regulatory Programs committee will meet at the Harrietstown Town Hall from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. for the technical presentation.  The public comment session will take place in the Tupper Lake High School auditorium beginning 6:30 p.m.

The full agency will convene at 9 a.m. Thursday for the executive director’s report. Then at 9:15 a.m. the State Land Committee will hear the first reading of the Ausable Point Public Campground Intensive Use Area Unit Management Plan. The committee will conclude their session with ongoing discussion of State Land Master Plan interpretation issues including snowmobile trails data.

At 11:15 a.m. the Park Policy and Planning Committee will view a GIS presentation on use patterns on lands classified as resource management.

In the afternoon, the Regulatory Programs Committee will determine the approvability of one project and two permit renewals. The committee will consider approval for a boathouse proposed on the Raquette River in Tupper Lake. The applicant, Stuart Lalonde, is seeking to build a boathouse in an area designated as recreational river. Key issues include shoreline and wetland protection and visibility.

The committee will also discuss a permit renewal for the Lake George Commission’s Nuisance Aquatic Plant Program. The applicant is asking for an additional five-years to manage Eurasian watermilfoil using hand harvesting, suction harvesting and installation of benthic barriers.

The committee will also consider renewing an APA permit for disposal of uncontaminated wastes from maintenance and construction activities by highway departments.

At 2:30 p.m. Thursday the Administrative Committee meets to discuss the status of the agency’s automobile fleet and purchasing policies.

The Enforcement Committee will wrap things up on Thursday at 3:15 p.m. by hearing presentations summarizing the 2006 enforcement program and overview of the first year accomplishments of the enforcement prevention program.

On Friday at 9 a.m. the agency board will meet for a “year in review.” Each division will report to the agency on accomplishments made in the past year. The full agency will then convene for committee reports and take actions if necessary.

POLICE AND FIRE REPORT

State Police in Tupper Lake have arrested a local man for allegedly giving them a false name when he was charged with driving while intoxicated last month.  20 year-old Brian J. Lucey of Tupper Lake was arrested yesterday on charges of second-degree criminal impersonation and second-degree obstructing governmental administration.  Police say he allegedly told them his name was Brian LaFlamme when he was arrested December 31 for DWI.  Lucey appeared in Tupper Lake Village Court last night.  He was arraigned and sent to the Franklin County Jail on $2500 cash bail or $5000 bond.  Lucey is scheduled to appear in village court again December 22.