SILVER CREEK — The vehicle charging stations are up and running. All that’s left now is the posting of the signage. This improvement, which satisfies the New York State Clean Energy Communities Program, aided the village in obtaining a $5,000 grant.

While that is good news, the fountain in the park became a topic of contention at the recent board meeting.

Trustee Warren Kelly, in hopes of keeping the project of upgrading and renewing the fountain going, presented a contract from Delta Fountains with an added clause that the village could back out by Aug. 20 if they so desire. There would be no strings attached, save for the traveling expenses of the representatives of the company for the site visit, which is scheduled for today, Aug. 16.

“This will give them time to come out, meet with our committee, meet with our contractors and if there is something we don’t like about it, we can get out of it,” Kelly stated.

Delta Fountains is one of only two fountain companies that bid on the project; the other was Blue World of Water. The pressure was put on because if the village didn’t take them up on their proposed site visit date of the 16th it would be a few months before there’d be another opening, and by then we’ll be heading into colder weather.

Voting was opened to the board leading to a 2-2 tie, which left Mayor Jeff Hornburg in a lurch. One of the nay votes came from Trustee Vince Tampio who had some reservations.

“One of the issues that I have is the guy doing marketing and you’re going to pay him to come here, there’s something wrong,” Tampio said.

Kelly assured that it was the designer coming out, but Tampio was still clearly uncomfortable with the idea.

“I know, but we don’t pay people to come here,” Tampio said. “That’s one of my issues, otherwise I’m kind of with you.”

“We only had two bids on fountains. We have to take one or the other,” Kelly noted.

“My biggest concern is that that’s the only firm price we have for fixing the fountain,” Hornburg replied, indicating the quote of $35,020 that Delta Fountains gave. “That’s not a total cost. There’ll be more coming after we get the sandblasting and the electrical work that has to be done to it. It’s six-eight weeks after we give them the approval and we give them a 50 percent deposit. I wouldn’t like to accept a bid before I do some more numbers.”

“We can terminate this up to Aug. 20, so if he came out (today), we meet with him he meets all our plumbers, if at that point you don’t want him, we just terminate it. Nothing gained, nothing lost except that we met with him and all the questions that you have you can hit him that day.” Kelly stated.

After discussion the mayor broke the tie by voting yes. The next board meeting is Monday and at that time enough will be known to make a final decision to go with Delta Fountains or not.