The NYS DEC still has not received applications to drill geothermal wells at the Greenburgh Public Library. In the event that aspects of the library project have to be rebid because the DEC does not sign off on geothermal - I have asked the Town Attorney to make sure that the town is protected. Additional costs should not be assumed by the town but by the architect/TRITON. We have been advised for many months that there will be no problems securing permission from the state DEC to drill geothermal wells at the library.
In December the Town Board voted to award bids to contractors. Did it make sense to award the contracts to geothermal contractors before the application was filed with the DEC? 2 of the 5 contractors still have not executed the contract -- delaying the start of the library construction. I am very concerned about the delays in construction of the library. The Town Board will discuss this at Wednesday's Town Board meeting.
The voters approved the library construction project almost two years ago. Construction has not yet started. It is the responsibility of the entire Town Board to oversee the construction project to make sure that we are getting value for our dollar. That's the main reason I have constantly called on the Town Board to hire a full time project manager for the library.
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8 comments:
Paul,your famous dumber than dumber board should have listened to you ,Mr. Samis, Mr. Rettinger,concerning all the facts about the library, They instead,went with some of the people who knew nothing about what was under the now existing building.LET THE FOUR OF THEM PAY FOR THE DIFFERENCE OF MONIES,IF AND WHEN THE PROJECT STARTS.We all know it will be costing more monies in the end.
Mr. Bass, Sheehan, Ms. Barnes & Juettner: Will you accept personal responsibility if it is determined that taxpayer dollars were misspent on the library expansion?
The library expansion project was supposed to start 10 months ago. All we got is a fence around the library. Why aren't our council members doing anything about this?
I bet if we had another vote on the Library expansion, it would not pass. It's a shame only 4,000
people voted in the last vote,but that's what the Library Board wanted. I know, if it did'nt pass by the 66 votes, The Town would have had another vote until it passed, just like the School Districts do with their budgets.
Putting it in perspective, the Town should NEVER have started the bidding process UNTIL obtaining the geothermal permits. Without this, the project would have to incur a major redesign and costly change orders to the winning contractors.
And even if permits eventually are granted, they will be allowed further away on the plot than envisioned and this may affect costs and function.
What instead happened was that the Town Council and their tool, Al Regula, (engaged solely to lend "expertise" to the project) wanted to give the impression that the project was moving forward so they welcomed the next step, the bidding process, even though it was still premature to proceed without first obtaining the drilling permits. It should be reminded that these permits were to have been obtained March 2006. Instead, citizens found out that the Town hadn't even applied by November, or in December, or in January and not even so far in February...whereas the bidding started in October. Without obtaining the cart, the Town continues to pay for the horse which in this case means the Construction Manager whose original contract $612,000 then $680,000 runs out this November.
And since the Town also pays for leasing the construction trailers, they weren't needed either.
At the same time, because the project is over budget (don't get me started) the Town is angling to circumvent the now necessary re-bidding process in only allowing the "winning" bidders in on the "secret" alternatives which will further downgrade the project.
But the stalemate really occurs from not having the permits in hand at the time of bidding.
Nevertheless, last month the Library held a ground-breaking ceremony without the permits -- even without signed contracts just so Library Board trustee Howard Jacobs could be there for the photo-op before he left on vacation. And, the Library prematurely abandoned the building (inconveniencing patrons) also to maintain the illusion of "progress" being made.
I say fire the project manager, Triton AND Al Regula. While he is not serving the Library expansion well in anything but hiding the bad news, this misadventure is harming his Department's (Public Works) performance while he acts like the construction Kommisar which didn't
work out any better for him when building the santitation truck garage or the multi-purpose center.
And it is way past due for the Library Board of Trustees' Building Committee to resign.
While we're on a roll, Town Councilperson Diana Juettner, not a resident of unincorporated and thus not harmed by the Library imbroglio, should be removed as the liaison to the Library. Her particular "talents" should be reassigned to where they can be better utilized, perhaps doing measurements over at DPW.
Again Mr.Samis,thank you.Yes we should have new people on the Library council .I expressed myself many times ,you should run for office . You were right from the beginning with the library .Had the election been held in November[like Paul said],you would have had more time to enlighten the people as to what was wrong.B-B-J-AND S. knew quite what they were doing,fighting Paul all the way .What is left for us to do?
Get a good planner to look at the existing building.In todays world,how many people use libraries. We're in the computer age and othe good technoligies,that this system will be going bye-bye.My childre do not use the library,all research is done via computer.I do not think that my children are the only ones who go this route. Let's use the old building ,with good planning it will be worhtwhile,for FUTUREuse.
Unfortunate in some ways, but 9:32 makes a very valid point.
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