Brocton renews sheriff’s contract
By ANN M. BELCHER
OBSERVER News Correspondent
BROCTON - The village of Brocton Board of Trustees agreed to renew the village's contract with the Chautauqua County Sheriff's Department during Wednesday's regular meeting.
The board unanimously agreed to renew the service contract with the Sheriff's Department at a 3 percent increase, which covers the deputy, the man hours, the vehicle that the deputy is working with, and all liability costs. The village will be paying out a rate of $23.34 per hour for these services.
The board also heard from Bill Westin, Chairman of the Brocton/Portland Planning board, who reported on the board's recent four-hour course, offered through Southern Tier West Regional Planning & Development Board.
According to Westin, "We're pretty close to what was recommended. It was comforting to learn that a lot of the things in the state plan review were pretty close to what we do." Westin also commented that although the board is in line with requirements, they have had a low amount of applications recently.
In other business, Streets Department Head, Tom Allen reminded village residents that winter parking laws have gone into effect throughout the village from Nov. 1 to April 1. There should be no parking on village streets in order to accommodate easy snow removal from streets and sidewalks. Allen also reported that with the assistance of the village's new leaf pick up machine, leaf pickup within the village should be completed by the weekend.
Village officials are still working on details for a pending water agreement between the town of Portland and the village.
Trustee Dave Hazleton commented at Wednesday's meeting, that he is "still concerned with the water rate that is being charged to the customer," and that the village needs to be looking at the dollar being billed to the village water customer, and the amount that will ultimately be charged to Portland consumers.
Brocton Mayor Dale Abram explained that the long term plan would call for all of the water districts to be supplied and metered by the village, with the town selling the bulk water to their customers. Abram noted that the town and village would like to see equal water rates across the board, with all entities involved. Hazleton, who is spearheading the village's water committee, is scheduled to review Town of Portland water rate billing this week and the board will further review the water cost issue at a later date.
Hazleton also raised the question about how the contract and billing will be affected if there are large volume losses of water within any of the districts. Village Attorney, Sam Drayo also raised the question as to whether the rate will apply to single residences, as opposed to multiple family dwellings. Hazleton reiterated the concern that if a plan for a condominium development was presented to the village, water usage and billing rates may be a concern, and stressed the importance of making sure there are no large volume water losses within the districts concerned. Drayo answered that the contract would call for only household and sanitary use of water within a residence, and would not apply to a business, such as a carwash, or other entity that would have unusual use of the water supply.
The village's next regular meeting is scheduled for Nov. 18 at 7 p.m. There will be a special meeting on Nov. 11 at 6:30 p.m. to discuss the Public Service Commission rate increase for electric service.
