Good evening and welcome to the Tompkins County Legislature. Today is Tuesday, January 20, 20, 26 and the time is 532.
If you would please join me for the pledge of allegiance.
We could have a roll call of members, please.
Randy Brown, Deborah Dawson, here, Judith Hubbard, here, John Hunt, here, Greg Mezzy,
here, Rachel Oslin, here, Iris Pacman, here, Veronica Pillar,
Lee Schertle,
Mike
Thank you.
Adam Vincent.
Dan Wakeman.
I read Wiser.
Christie B. and Connie.
Travis Brooks.
Donna Black.
Thank you.
At this point we do not have any presentations or
proclamations, petitions, communications or notices.
We will also not have an executive session this evening.
I would like to do some reordering of business.
Kayla Montos is going to join us from the city of Ethica and she just walked in the door
perfect timing Kayla and feel free to get comfortable a little bit and she is going to give us a quick update from the city of Ethica
and then we can ask questions if we have those.
Sorry to put you on the spot. Yeah, that's great.
Is
it on?
Good evening, everyone.
As legislative, like I said, I am K. Lamontos, a council member for award
1.
And so this month in January was a pretty simple month for us, as, sorry, I'm catching
my breath.
As we had five new council members join us, so there's a lot of council orientation.
in a lot of simple procedural items like our bond resolutions.
We also passed two resolutions at our first council meeting, one to support CMC nurses.
And unionizing in the other one was a resolution relating to the events in Venezuela.
We also, tomorrow, will be receiving an update on our audits, so we will have a presentation
on that.
And we will also be discussing a resolution for our roots program, which is our unarmed
responder program.
And then additionally, our mayor appointed our seven advisory groups, which are housing,
economic and community development, public works and operations, finance and administration,
public safety, sustainability, adaptability and resilience, and human services and quality of life.
And if you have any questions as to which council members are on which of the advisory groups, please feel free to reach out either to myself or the mayor and I can provide that.
We can provide that information to you guys.
And that's our update.
Thank you very much.
Are there any questions from legislators?
Great.
Well, Councilmember Mottis, we do thank you for coming in.
It's always a courtesy whenever our municipalities decide to come to our meetings and update us
and explain to us what's going on so we appreciate your time tonight.
And one more thing, my counterpart, who would also be joining me for the county legislature
of date is Councilmember Fabrizio.
She is sick tonight, so she cannot join me, but she will also be joining me in future meetings.
That's great.
Thank you so much.
We appreciate your time.
Next, we are going to move on. I'm going to pass the floor to our County Administrator,
Corsa Cumpi. He has an announcement to make.
Thank you. I believe Elia on mid 2025. We did inform you of a possibility of retirement
the county historian, we did a search, we invited interested in the visuals, several applicants
responded, and I'm happy to introduce the candidates, all the parents and being recommended
to you for an appointment to the position of county historian. His name is Charles Gaffler, and we
would need a motion to effect that appointment.
Can I have a motion, please?
Move by Greg Massey, seconded by Veronica Pillar.
And are there any questions, comments?
Do we need an option to go into executive session?
Please raise your hand.
OK, we're going to do raising of hands, all those in favor.
Please raise your hand.
that is unanimous with a 16 O vote and would Mr. Gutler like to come up and say a few words as our new county historian.
Okay.
I'm very honored and pleased that that was a unanimous vote and there was no discussion.
These are big shoes that I have to fill. Carol Kemin is a titan in the local history world.
She's written textbooks, I hope I don't embarrass her in the next three years, or you guys.
We live in an amazing county we really do.
We've got urban and rural, a very diverse population.
We've got all kinds of natural beauty.
We've got the tallest waterfall east of the Mississippi.
We've got the largest wildlife management area in the state.
We've got three colleges, and we're on KU Geleic, which is the ecological and environmental
heart of this region, and needs to be
protected, and we have a tradition in this county
and in this region of taking great care of our resources, and I'm very pleased to see.
I assume that this isn't the crowd you usually get in meetings, but it actually is now okay.
Please to see people coming out on that behalf.
In any event, thank you very much, and I hope I do your proud.
Thank you.
So as I mentioned before, we are going to have some reordering of business.
We're going to have a public comment going first.
Then we are actually going to move our member file resolution, which I'm assuming is the resolution
that many of you are here for tonight.
the Resolution Requesting New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, DEC, to reject the modified water withdrawal permit application from Cuba operating company.
And so that way, if you hang around a little bit longer, you'll be able to see how we vote and I'm sure we'll debate it for a while.
And the one thing that I would ask, because we do have many people that are going to speak this evening, is that we do not applaud after each speaker
that we keep comments to the three-minute time limit and that we're courteous both of our public speakers and then whenever we start debating of legislators whenever they want to add comment as well.
So, we're going to start off and I'm actually going to let Martha Robertson skip the line. I know she's tuning in via Zoom.
It's only appropriate for someone that's served this legislature for so many years to be able to skip to the front. So, Martha Robertson.
Sean, thank you so much, that's very sweet.
I mean, first of all, thank congratulations to all of you for being elected or re-elected
and Sean for being endeavor for being elected to leadership.
It's a big responsibility and I hope you all enjoyed as much as I did.
I'm speaking in favor of resolution D,
I want to thank the legislators who sent a very detailed and thorough letter to the DEC on January 12th
in support of basically this resolution, the content that's on this resolution, that was
Veronica Pilar, Iris Pachman, Adam Vincent, Judith Hubbard, Deborah Dawson, John Hunt,
Irene Wieser, Christy Bionconey, and Rachel Aslan, excellent that you folks were willing
to put that work together and putting that letter in.
I just really, this is common sense, it seems to me, this is a totally new use of the land
of the site in Lansing.
It's not a water withdrawal permit for a coal fire power plant.
It's only common sense that this should be re-evaluated fully and given due diligence that's
really required to preserve, as the new historian said, sort of the jewel of our region,
to the lake, hundreds of thousands of people and countless animals and plants depend on
queue the lake. The dees seem to be prudent and careful and allow the public also to be aware
of what's going on and how they're evaluating this new use of queue the lake's water.
Thank you very much, and I hope you get a strong vote for this resolution.
I think it's really important for everybody to weigh in on behalf of Cugula Lake and all of our residents.
Thanks so much.
Great.
Thank you, Martha.
For those of you that are at the door, it would be great if a few of you might want to move over here so that we can get as many people as we can without breaking fire.
We're at capacity.
Oh, we are at capacity.
and then we'll be yeah.
Thank you.
If anybody that's done speaking the wants to, they could,
then we can make sure people, if they want to speak, they'll get their chance.
Perfect.
Thank you, Jamie.
So let me just also read the rules for speaking on privilege
of the floor real quick.
I agree to a three minute time limit.
I agree not to raise my voice.
I agree not to use Lude of seeing profane slander
as our libelous language or speaker act in a manner
that would tend to incite a breach of the peace.
I agree not to speak about county personnel matters,
percentile matters include comments about the job performance of name county employees other
than elected officials. I after three minutes I agreed to leave the microphone and yield
the floor transferring time to another person is not permitted. I agreed to be courteous
and not make comments, gestures, outbursts or other disruptions. Well other members of the
public or legislators are speaking. I agreed that if I call as a disruption and amass to leave,
I will leave the chambers.
Okay. We are also having some difficulties with the stopwatch
And so whenever your time is up, we will let you know.
Our first speaker this evening, and I'm going to read out a few at a time so that we could start lining up. We have two microphones, one's over here, and one is over here. If you're here and you would like to speak, make sure to fill out a blue card. They're looking at the back table there. And you could send it to any legislator, and they'll send it up. So our first speaker is Zach Win. Second is Amanda Kirchgaesner. Is Frank Simke.
Good
to go. Thank you. My name is Zach Wynn and I live here in the city. In July of last year,
following a fire at the Asteri, representatives of the casino group attended a meeting of the
Tompens County Industrial Development Agency and made a number of assurances about how they would
better manage the property, specifically mentioning the replacement of the front double doors with a new
entrance. On December 23, I was walking by and noticed the new door,
propped open with a pneumatic mechanism for closing a broken. I went by this afternoon just before
meeting and the doors still wide open. There have been a number of incidents at the
Assyri recently from a woman being held against her will to warn service for thefts and
another overdose. I would like to make the new members of this legislature aware of the ongoing
issues at the Assyri and Conference Center with the last with the July meeting of the
IDA serving as a primer for these issues. I afforded this to you along with pictures of the
broken front door. I'm curious if the legislature, including board members of the IDA, DevDOS and
Greg Mezzie with Rich John being replaced by another member of the Legislature.
Believe the Sino has made good on their commitments from July to better manage the property.
I believe the door being continually broken all this time speaks to this Sino's
fundamental inability to manage the property effectively.
The June meeting of the IDEA, included mention of the ongoing security issues at the
building and the multitude of issues that are rooted in the unfettered access the
esteri provides.
I would like to know if you believe the Sino is making good on the commitments they made
last year has anything Vesino done since last June given you the impression the building
is under better control.
If the answer is no, I invite the members of the IDEA to consider exercising the board's
authority to club back the building's tax evadement regardless of the fallout or consequences
for Vesino.
Thank you.
Amanda Kurtzgesner.
Good evening.
Amanda Kurtzgesner.
I live in the town of Elisis, life long resident of Tompkins County.
In tonight, I want to speak against the center of government building.
I want to begin big by welcoming all of the new newly-seated legislators as well as those returning to the table.
You stepped in or back into office at a time when public service is anything but quiet.
I want to ask you plainly, are you ready for the real work to begin?
Because the real work isn't simply passing budgets, it's making hard choices about what government is for, what it funds and what it postpones,
especially when we are operating under real financial constraints.
Tonight, I want to speak directly about one of those choices.
I strongly oppose any further development of a new center of government building at the
juncture.
In a period of economic uncertainty, expanding and administrative infrastructure is not our
highest priority.
If we're going to fiscally bond capital improvements to our local tax base, those improvements
should be directed towards existing, essential, safety, critical facilities, most urgently
are public safety building.
I never thought I would be in front of you asking for a jail.
Let me be clear, this is not wanting a bigger jail, this is about something far more sobering.
The county jail has become the backstop for unmet need in our county.
Over the last decade, at minimum, this county has invested heavily at great expense and
with good intention, mind you, into the continuum of care, mental health support, housing
initiatives, diversion, treatment programs, crisis response, and yet what we are seeing now is
not reduced to demand.
We are seeing more desperate people seeking services in a system with extreme capacity limits,
and when people cannot access help in time,
when instability escalates into crisis,
guess where they wind up, they wind up in jail.
Okay, again, I don't want this, not of us want this,
but it's that we're living in a reality where the jail
functions as overflow for systemic collapse,
and that requires you as legislators who meet
our most basic obligations.
Counties are legally required to ensure
humane safe conditions for incarcerated individuals,
As well as the people who work there, mind you, those are county employees and safe working
conditions for all of these individuals needs to be at the forefront of our decision-making.
Counties are legally, let's see, it is a state mandated responsibility folks and it's
also a moral one.
So if we're talking about bonding anything, if we're talking about capital investment, I'm
asking you to be disappointed and honest about our priorities.
Councilor Paws, the development of the cog, redirect capital planning and outfitting resources
towards the public safety building, fund the infrastructure that the county is legally
required to operate safely, because whether we like it or not, it's where a growing number
of our most vulnerable community members are ending up. This is not, this is governance,
this is compliance, this is fiscal responsibility, and ultimately it is human dignity. I thank
you for your time, this evening. I know you're going to hear a lot about something else tonight.
I yield the rest of my time.
Thank you.
Frank Zemkick, Paul Kimball, Sam Pool, and Robert Hicks.
Hi, Frank Zemkick.
I'm a recent Lansing move.
I just moved up here two years ago from New Jersey.
Can you hear me now?
Yes.
So, a recent resident just moved here two years ago with my wife.
The new jersey for 49 years, happy to be a lancing resident and really enjoying the finger leaks.
So, I mean, my main concern is the leak.
We haven't been up here for too long, but we do like to drive around the lake and go to the lake almost every weekend.
My main concern is really if lake water is pulled in and then released back into the lake at a higher temperature,
we're going to have more HABs and we don't want that.
We don't know how it's going to affect the existing energy infrastructure.
We don't know how it's going to affect our energy prices.
Honestly, we don't know enough about AI to begin with.
I'm a data manager.
I'm managed data on a daily basis for ECO company.
And we don't even know what AI is doing.
You know, my main concern really is what is AI going to do.
Is it going to do basically what it did to
If it's going to affect white collar workers like it's like it affected blue collar workers for globalization, you know, a lot of my family lost factory jobs and everything
So I didn't want to get into that and I got into data and and data still scares me to this day and I've been using it for a good 25 years
I'm trying to keep my energy prices low and and I would like everyone else to keep prices low as well. So thank you
Thank you Paul Campbell. Yes, my name is Paul Campbell. I am a resident homeowner business owner and taxpayer
living in the city of Ithaca and I'm here to speak in favor of the resolution 1384.
I have I actually have a couple of degrees in engineering and so what I heard that there was a 60 mega watt,
maybe 400 megawatt, drain on the energy to compute things for people.
I said to myself, well, is this a good idea or not, you know, I'm willing to be convinced.
I have spent 40 years of my life installing, designing, managing, and teaching people
how to program computer systems, I'm a fan of AI, I use it in my work, but it is an awful
lot of energy. So, falling back on my nice bike bills over the last couple of years, I did
a few back at the envelope calculations and realized that my home uses a less than one
kilowatt,
24-7, of course. So that means that in a year I use something like 7,000 kilowatt
hours. Sounds like a lot but compared to 60 million kilowatt hours. That's very tiny. This
plan will be using the equivalent of about 75,000 homes the size of mine.
And I said, that's a lot, how big is that?
It's actually more than the dwelling units in Tomkins County and Portland County combined
according to the census.
Therefore, this plan will be using more power than all of the residential properties in
Dump County's combined.
Now, that's a lot, if you care about nice egg and your nice egg bills, it's certainly a competition for your energy.
But that's not why we're here.
We're here because the other thing that has not been characterized as the water utilization.
Carol Wolfe has said that they will use a closed circuit to cool the plant.
And of course, they will because the water inside such a plant has to be very pure.
You cannot run lake water to cool expensive CPUs.
They're sensitive to the breed, they're sensitive to oxidation, they're sensitive to mineralization in the water, corrosion.
And, of course, you use a closed loop system within the plant.
But the heat associated with 60 megawatts has to be dissipated somehow.
And I do not think that Terrell Wolf has done a decent job of characterizing how they intend to use the lake water.
If they're going to be drawing it in, a million gallons a day, the question is, where do they
put it after that?
Does it come back into the lake and if it does, at what temperature, at what depth, we already
have algal blooms in the lake during the summer, will we have them all year round?
Now, we have a precedent for this in Cornell Lake source cooling, but we thought about that
for a long time before it got implemented.
And I would like to think at least that long about this.
Thank you, Paul.
I am going to have to remind everyone that please not clap because we probably have around 30
speakers right now.
And we want to be able to have a nice robust debate and vote on this this evening.
Next we have Sam Full and then Robert Kicks.
Yes, hi.
Good afternoon, legislators.
My name is Sam Pool. I'm a resident of Anthica and Tomkins County and a member of Sunrise
Anthica and the Anthica Democratic Socialists of America. I'm here today to talk about
the resolution introduced by Legislator Dawson regarding withdrawal permit for KU the operating
company. First, let's lay some facts on the table. KU the operating company is a subsidiary
of Carol Wolf. The company currently seeking a permit to construct data center in Lansing. Carol
has repeatedly claimed in public statements and communications to the town board of Lansing that
Other data center will utilize closed source cooling that minimal or no water will be drawn
from or released into the lake in the data center's cooling systems.
Trouille for a percentage of explicitly claimed the cave operating company would surrender
their water withdrawal permits at the application of the data center was approved.
Now, cave operating company is applied for water withdrawal permit anyway and their framing
is a modification, a decrease in the approved water usage by the coal-fired power plant
in the same site.
The permanent application claims the facility currently withdraws 1.44 million gallons per day of water from the KG Lake site through cooling water intake structure and used the water's non-contact cooling equipment.
There's substantial basis to believe this is completely false.
As the power plant sees the operation in 2019, seven years ago, all of the actual all of the facilities that were used for generating power have been removed and we are now growing on the site.
So I'm not clear on how they, how they can have any justification to claim that it is currently
using more than a million gallons of water every day on a site that is currently in operational.
The DEC says that if a new site is being built, it is substantially different from the one that is
current, the current use, then they have to do a new approval process.
They cannot be used, they cannot use the modification, they cannot evade this actual full environmental
review.
None of this should be in dispute.
It's from Terrible's own statements to the operating company filings and the material reality on the ground.
So what conclusions can we draw from this?
The Terrible is deliberately misleading the town board of Lansing, that their site will not require water usage when it will.
While their own subsidiary applies for a permit to withdraw water,
that the Kaga operating company is attempting to mislead the water board,
claiming that the modification of existing permit for a site that has not been operational for years.
In light of these facts, it is essential that we urge that the legislature urge the Department of Environment and Conservation to perform a comprehensive review of the water withdrawal permit request and treated as a new permit, because it is consistent with the facts and the current reality of the site.
Everyone should be in support of this regardless of your feelings on the data center itself.
Even if you believe the data center will be ultimately beneficial, which I do not, having an informed understanding of the costs and the effect on the lake is essential for informed decision making and won't happen without a real review.
I urge the legislature to listen to the dozens of environmental advocates who sent in comments
the DEC and the dozens who are here today packing this chamber, giving testimony, support
the local government doing its due diligence and pass this resolution today.
Thank you.
City school district teacher and was a resident, financing for certain
friend over here.
This was the number of chemical pollutants that are going to be regulated.
However, I did not see any mention of heat nor noise pollution.
Perhaps a state does not value these and making it to the termination, but with a significant rise
in global temperature, despite the temperatures outside.
Any amount of ambient noise all around us, I certainly do.
If any study has been done on the impact on the temperature,
if you go away from Cornell's light source cooling over the last few years,
How does the volume of water appear in these two cases from the AIS error have it closed?
I have no idea how much noise an A.I. Senate makes, but a 1981 EPA report showed that consistent sound pollution is a significant deterrent to human health by raising cortisol, significant noise, also harm our wildlife friends, because it's something that should be considered with judging weather to continue with this crisis.
and I included the reference to this study in my written review.
Thank you for your service.
Thank you.
Next we're going to have Naomi Grayson, Alison Desario, Rebecca Fry, and Shelby of Ethic Acity.
And I'm going to present an
artist and conservationist.
And I hope that you're right then, and take terrible steps to re-submit their application.
Do another permit.
There needs to be a full environmental impact statement for this approach.
Okay?
Better?
There needs to be a full environmental impact statement for this data center.
Obviously, there will be chemicals going into the water.
They have lied repeatedly to get what they want.
Whatever they do, it's going to harm the lake.
The water is not theirs for the taking.
The water does not belong to them.
it doesn't belong to Lansing. It doesn't belong to any one entity. It's not with
will all be affected by this. Most likely negatively, including the animals, if the fish are
harmed, then birds like the ospreys will be harmed, eagles, and all up the chain. So it's actually
pretty serious. I'd really like to know who is in support of this. What kind of
corruption is going on that there isn't already an environmental impact statement
being demanded. What's going on here? This is our water, too. And I'm just here to
to do the right thing and make sure that a new new permit has to be applied for.
Thank you for your time.
Thank you.
Allison Desario.
Hello, my name is Allison Desario.
I have been in Tomkins County for eight years.
I recreate on the lake daily in the summertime.
care about the environment. I'm an environmental biologist and I'm here to support you
passing the resolution 13804. There is a huge material change happening at the
site from the coal power plant to 400 megawatt data center and because of that
change that should necessitate an environmental review to happen by the EC. This is
not just renewal of something, even in their application they say that there's a new purpose
for the facility such property has not yet been determined. The ones through water cooling
system with which withdraws and returns water to from K the lake remains in place for a potential
future use. So they don't even have an idea of what it's going to use for. I don't feel that
can trust that there's not going to be hot water going back in, like other people have said.
And yeah, I think you should support you and I urge you to pass this resolution.
Thank you. We're back a fry.
My name is Rebecca Fry and I'm a farmer, lake regulator, and nice egg customer.
I'd like to thank you for taking public comments on the important issue of the water with
the withdrawal permit renewal for Kayaena operating company subsidiary of Tara Wolff.
I support the legislature passing the resolution to ask the DEC to reject the water withdrawal
renewal application in question. I enjoy using the lake for recreational purposes, especially
swimming and boating. The lake is a critical part of the natural resources of this region,
as home for fish, birds, and other wildlife. The entire plant and animal ecosystem surrounding
the lake depends on the quality of lake water and peaceful quiet living atmosphere.
The humans surrounding the lake benefit equally from an unpolinity ecosystem.
Beyond its environmental benefits, the lake is a central part of the tourism industry of
this area, including local wineries, farms, colleges and universities, trail systems, and
the eateries, lodging, and other establishment that exist to support tourists.
A change to the lake ecosystem would also affect commerce, jobs, and the overall
desirability of the area.
Seeing how lake quality is central first to environmental ecosystems which directly affect
human-created systems, I believe that a full environmental review should be conducted to ensure
that the activities propose that the AI data center would not cause unnecessary harm to
the lake.
An AI data center is a significantly different use than a cold power electricity plant and the water
withdrawal permit should be denied on those grounds alone.
Unfortunately, the applicant has given us many reasons to question the validity of the data
included in the application.
We found numerous inaccuracies including usage data reporting issues with withdrawal infrastructure
issues and confusing and conflicting information presented to the community by the applicant.
It is impossible to make an informed decision with skewed incorrect and unfounded data that's presented to you from an applicant.
In any case, Tara Wolf has already agreed on the record to surrender their water withdrawal permit.
Additionally, I support the resolution to require the Cayuga Operating Company reports to the DEC regularly with a comprehensive review of the impacts from water withdrawal.
One additional note, I'm a farmer.
My electricity bills between 2024 and 2025 show a decrease in my energy consumption.
Why did my bill go up $4,000?
Thank you for your time.
Thank you.
We have, from Ethica City and Rhodes,
Almer Ewing and Evan Alvarez.
I'll also remind for those of you that have just joined us.
If you would like to speak, we have blue cards on the back table there.
Please fill them out.
and you could send them forward to get in line.
So I'll be quite brief.
My name is Shelby.
I've made Efec on my home for the past 10 years
since graduating from Efec College.
I'm very proud to call this place my home.
I'm very proud of the environment.
The farmers who work here, and I want to say that I 100%
support the resolution put forth by members, Irene and Deb.
I could not have said anything better than my neighbor
who just spoke, said all of that.
and in particular her concern about ongoing reports by the DEC for the State of Processing
Center.
I don't think our community needs the State of Processing Center, and I think it's very
clear that it would be a net detriment to our community.
Thanks.
Thank you.
I'm
Anne Rhodes, I live in Freeville, first I want to thank you for your service, each of you.
I really appreciate that you're here, and listening to us, it means a lot.
I'm appreciative of having real democracy in Tommy's County.
First of all, the lake is critical, as you've already heard, but also the lake is sacred.
We live on land that supports us, and all of life is interdependent, and we can't ignore
this fact by allowing this, and then that, and then allowing this, and then allowing that.
Life is sacred, you have a chance here to approve this resolution, you've heard all the reasons.
Personally, I don't trust the network of interconnected corporations that is terrible.
I feel they've been deceptive.
I feel they've tried to strong arm the people in Lansing.
I feel like they have attacked individuals in Lansing.
I think that they think that we're country-bomkins and that they can just walk over us.
So stand up, do democracy, and remember that the lake is sacred.
Thank you.
Next is Elmer Ewing, from the town of Ethon.
This is my name is Elmer Ewing.
My life and I live at 1620 State of El Rose ever since it became available from Bolton
Point.
We've been drinking water from Cue Glake.
How we realize data centers are the wave of the future.
We hope that they will not turn in the wave will not turn into a tsunami.
The data centers are noisy, a devouring electricity,
a thirsty for water.
The corporations pushing data centers, and to do everything in their power to overwhelm
opposition.
We do not want this pattern to continue in Tom Cruise County.
Thus, we support the resolution to require the pay of the operating company report to the
DEC. We need a full environmental review of key operating plans for water withdrawal
from our link. The DEC should require one. By path this resolution, you will help remind the
Department of Environmental Conservation of Kegug, Kibule, is part of the environment, which
it is their duty to conserve and protect.
Thank you.
An Alvarez?
Good evening.
My name is Evan Alvarez.
I'm a resident of Tomkins County.
I speak to you today in support of Resolution D, Doc ID 13804.
The proposed use of the site in Lansing's IR district absolutely involves a material change
in the existing permit conditions.
He development from a now closed coal-fired plant to a 400 megawatt proposed data center.
With many logistical questions still looming around the cooling, potential Bitcoin mining,
local stress on electric grid, affects the surrounding natural environments and many more,
present a significant material change.
And one that warns that the applicant supply for a new water withdrawal permit, instead of being able to modify
slash renew the current withdrawal permit.
What I want to talk about today is why I support this resolution fundamentally.
At its core, this resolution is about the long forgotten concept of community accountability.
The residents and leaders of Topkins County must demand accountability from our industry collaborators.
We must demand that kayak operating company slash lake Hawkeye slash hair wolf codified their decision
for maintaining, modifying, renewing these water permits,
instead of continuing to only vocalize the rationale behind these decisions.
As the verbal explanations change depending on who asks,
we must demand accountability when they claim the Lansing Planning Board is no
right to make adjustments to the site's use agreement involving Bitcoin mining.
We must demand accountability when the site's owner's file erroneous
foil requests to overwhelm Lansing's government staff.
We must hold the county, the company accountable when it's Brooklyn-based CSO,
demands to be a part of Lansing's neighborhood community list serve.
We must demand accountability when this company
alleges, baseless claims, of improper communications
between Lansing's elected officials and threatened legal action.
We must demand accountability when the company
emboldens their most aggressive supporters,
some of which have intimidated us, and even sexually harassed
our women allies.
I want us to demand accountability for Vernon, California,
the town that their subsidiary, Bison Power
launched a lawsuit against in collaboration with the town for the power company by St.
Power.
The lawsuit was filed and led by Paul Prager and Kerry Langliss.
But they were, instead, found guilty of over-billing the town of Ritten
County, California to the tune of 9,400,000, 521 dollars and 68 cents.
Members of the Tompkins County legislature, I ask that you please pass this resolution.
Accountability starts here.
Thank you.
Brian Eden, Michael Hayes, Carrie Kuplinkalera, and Diane Cohen.
Good evening, Chair of Black members of the County Board.
Appreciate your taking this up.
I appreciate your passing 1, 3, 8, 0, 4 with its amendments.
Terrowof has agreed to surrender the water permit or water use, at least on some capacity.
And yet, Terrowof is not the applicant for this permit. One of its many nested LLCs, which are somewhat obscure in the relationship, is the requester for the water.
and Tara Wolf is not in this present context being held linked to that and held responsible
to that. So, any version of this amendment ultimately is going to need to list every single
LLC and associated corporation in the consideration of the water that environmental impact
in the rafts, in my opinion, but I do stand in support of this resolution, whether it's
amendments, I think it's a good first step for the county, but I think it ultimately will
need to be more comprehensive and include all of the many hidden nested corporate dolls
that knit this together in our present leave-skir. Carol Wolf and his group are not a collaborative
public partner in this. As has been mentioned in publicized, they are a party that threatens lawsuits,
intimidates people and seeks what they want, and in that frame of mind they need to be treated
in the same manner, not in a collaborative, they're going to help us out, because I don't
think that's their purpose.
Interestingly, they have a facility that's further along in this
process on Lake Ontario, and in that facility, they made the same promises as here. They don't
need the water, they'd get back the permit, ultimately no one held them to account and they're
using a very large amount of water, contrary to their assertions and are operating with
very little oversight because it was not structured, not all of their little corporations and
hidden feces were not included in a final agreement, so you've got a mouthpiece and so are
back door way into things that needs to be addressed here in my opinion at the beginning.
I would also ask and certainly I appreciate the County Board's thinking and effort
that there's no tax abatements provided to this organization by anyone, not an industrial
board not anyone that they pay full trade and they pay their own higher electric rates so
that all the rest of us, like me, who has retired with the disabled's wife, aren't paying
more for electricity to subsidize their profits.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Next is right me, Eden.
Over the decades, I have brought several resolutions before the legislature for protection of
water quality. For the benefit of the newer members, I'll provide some context for my support
of the water withdrawal resolution. My attention was drawn to the lake by the 1994
work collapse of the rest of Saltman and Livingston County. There were only two Saltmines
in New York State, and there was concern by local residents for the safety of the other one,
the Kyugus Saltmine. Our then assembly member, Marty Lesser, requested a legislative hearing
in Albany to identify the cause of the collapse and de-risk, the potential for Kyuga.
Marty Broker in agreement where the DC would require that an EIS be conducted for the
first time when a permit room was requested for the case of assault mine.
In 2000, the DC reneged on that agreement and an EIS has never been conducted for the
mine.
There are now many local water-based organizations interested in preserving water quality
of Kivgolake. Kivgolake watershed network, water resources,
consult Kivgolake in a municipal organization and clean.
We all have at a fraught relationship with the DEC in our attempt
to protect the lake's water quality.
The county legislature has, by resolution,
support us on many occasions over the past 10 years
without much noticeable positive response from the DEC.
Clean, and there before that, the M.C., have commented
on previous speedies and water withdrawal permits
for the acute operating company, we believe that the site, which has an industrial one for
64 years, should be assessed as a potential brownfield prior to being a proof for a new
use.
Toxic chemical spills in the vicinity of plant as well as the adjacent coal ash residue
landfill.
So our comments on the water withdrawal permit at Pokeston are opposition to the ones through
cooling system, such cooling systems do kill and harm fast amounts of aquatic like effective
the mass rating or grinding smaller organisms and impending larger ones against screens leading
to billions of deaths in the way through the impingement and entrainment of fish.
A fact sheet distributed by Lake Hawkeye assured us that they intended responsible
development.
No lake water use, although the site retains the legacy water intake from its cold plant days,
the new data's campus will not draw from the lake for cooling.
It will use a closed loop system requiring only few gallons of utility water quality water daily.
Almost simultaneously they applied for the modified renewable for their water withdrawal
improvement for the supplier.
For the supplier suppression they have access to the bottom point pipeline.
On their side are they requesting from the DC, a hypothetical permit.
We might decide to use a water-based cooling system someday, so it would be good to have
it that option in our pocket.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you, I'm Carrey Coplink-Alear and I just want to start by thanking all of the legislators and their families and the staff of TomCons County for their service.
I'm very much appreciated and this venue.
I live several miles from the area that we're talking about, former Millikon station.
I've lived there for 16 years and in TomCons County for 44, and my profession has been as a science writer.
I very much 100% support the resolution of legislators Dawson and Wieser, 13804.
It doesn't go quite far enough, but it is fabulous.
And if the DEC is not receptive, I recommend a plan B, because the resource is too precious
to threaten.
Thank you.
Diane Cohen, then we have Hannah Thomas, Harold Mills, Sarah Eichel, and Lisa Martin.
Great. Well, good evening, everyone. My name is Diane Cohen. I'm the CEO of Finger Lakes
Reuse, non-profit organization dedicated to enhancing community economy and environment
through Reuse. I'm also a 42-year resident of Tomkins County and for the last 25 years
I've lived in the town of Ulysses.
Personally, I'm very supportive and thrilled to see
the community engagement on this resolution tonight.
I'm here tonight to welcome the eight new legislators,
and thank you for your service,
and the returning eight legislators,
and also the dedicated county staff for your service
and for your long-time partnership with our organization.
We were incorporated in 2007 on the request of,
and with guidance from Tomkins County's,
recycling and materials management department and over the last year and a half we worked
on our three-year strategic plan and really been lifted up by the community's support
and enthusiasm to expand reuse services in Tompkins County.
I'm going to truncate my remarks in the interest of letting more people come but I'll
be coming hopefully to at least one or two committees to talk more about the opportunities
we see the goals in the county strategic plan that we think reuse can help.
There are some challenges and some opportunities really happy to be in partnership with you glad to see you tonight
But I'm gonna leave the rest of my time for the rest of this concern here. So thank you. Thank you. Hannah tombs.
All right. Hi everyone. I'm Hannah tombs. I'm a Tompkins County resident. I live in Ithaca
I'm also a librarian. So I have a lot of
Ethical and intellectual concerns about AI, but I'm just gonna comment on the environmental concerns tonight
I'd actually like to bring up some findings from a recent study from
the journal Nature Sustainability.
It was conducted by some Cornell researchers
from the Department of Environmental Engineering
back in November.
The results of this study, which was a state-by-state data analysis
of environmental impacts from AI data centers,
the study revealed that if the current growth rate
of AI continues as it is right now,
this will result in 24 to 44 million metric tons
of carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere
by the year 2030.
So literally less than 40 years from now,
as well as draining up to 1,125 million cubic meters of water per year to put that in perspective,
that water usage compared to, you know, that's from a few AI data centers that's the equivalent
to the annual household water use for about 6 to 10 million U.S. households. So that's pretty insane.
Over the last several months, terrible excuse and workaround for concerns about environmental
impacts from the proposed data center is to claim that they're a clean energy company
that they're using a closed-weather cooling system,
which is technically more environmentally sound,
but even if those conditions were true,
which there's very little evidence
to support that any of those promises
that they've made are backed up.
That would actually do very little
to reduce carbon emissions over the long term
from AI data centers.
So they're the impact of those sustainable methods
would be really minimal in terms of the environmental concerns.
As it stands right now,
there's currently no way to really mitigate
or fully control the environmental impacts that come from AI data centers, and that's not my opinion,
that's not a hot take. I'm trying to make that as a fact full stop. So for these reasons,
for these real concerns, real risks that would come from this AI data center, I fully support
the resolution to reject animals, water withdrawal, application. I think it's common sense.
I think it's the right thing to do, and I would encourage the members of the board here, too.
Yeah, act accordingly, so thank you so much. Thank you.
Good evening. I'm Harold Mills. I want to start by thanking you all for your service and welcome the new legislators.
I live in Lansing, a little less than two miles south of the yoga operating company site.
I want to voice my support for Resolution D since I agree that the proposed use of the site as a data center.
Instead of a power plant, we'll greatly alter the potential needs for Kiyuga Lake water withdrawal.
The existing Lake water withdrawal permit should not simply be renewed, but rather a new permit should be required.
To protect Kiyuga Lake and the human and other life that depend on it, a fresh evaluation of the needs at potential impacts of the proposed site activity is in order.
Thank you.
Thank you. Sarah Eichel?
Eichel?
Hi, my name Sarah Eichel.
I am here representing Kaggle Lake Watershed Network.
I just want to say thank you for hearing our comments today.
I'm putting this resolution forward.
Kaggle Lake Watershed Network submitted comments during the DEC's public comment period.
Supporting withdrawing this permit and requiring the DEC to do a new permit for water use.
the original permit that how you go operating a few power plant is we're operating under
is because they were a coal fire power plant this is saying it's just for like water cooling.
Currently the site is just kind of holding space. We don't know why they need this water.
We don't know what it's being used for or why they would have to have a million gallons of water a day.
And that's why we would like the DEC to require the company to
residmit their application and to make them go through that process to
indicate why this water is necessary.
We also recognize that this could be, you know,
setting up the infrastructure for other uses for the power plant.
They indicate that in their application, they said that we're
We're holding the space, we don't know how we're going to use it, so that's why we think it's important for them to reconsider that use and reconsider how this water is being used and how it's being discharged.
And I'll just leave it at that and let other people speak, but thank you for your time and thank you for letting us come out today and support this resolution.
Thank you.
Lisa Martin, Adam Law, Ainsley, Fernando de Argonne, and Ed Pressman.
I'm Lisa Martin, I'm a resident of the town of Lansing.
My home is located a few miles from the site of the proposed data center, and I frequently
hike in paddleboard around the Cugula Lakefront Natural Areas to the south of Milliconsdation.
I would like to voice my support for the resolution drafted by the legislature.
Because the owner's intended use for the site has changed dramatically since the last permits were issued,
a new evaluation of potential impacts on local water resources should be completed.
Additionally, as noted in the resolution,
KUGA operating company Angela Herowulf have made inconsistent and conflicting public statements,
regarding their water use plans for the site.
Raising questions about their intentions in pursuing this permit renewal,
which would allow, as people have mentioned,
withdraw all of 1 million gallons of water per day.
The DEC should be asked to process this as a new permit application
subject to comprehensive environmental review.
Please protect the health of the water and natural resources
that so many Lansing and Hopkins County residents enjoy
and past this resolution. Thank you.
Adam Law. Good evening. My name is Adam Law.
I'm a resident of Hopkins County living in the town of Ithaca
for 36 years. I'm a co-founder and current board president of physicians, scientists and engineers
for healthy energy and organization.
That brings science to energy policy. I am here to support the resolution to reject the water withdrawal permit application from
QUG operating company. This is not a continuation of a power plant. It's a fundamentally different industrial use that requires a new permit and full environmental impact review.
I want to review three key points first, the proposed 400 megawatt data center would involve continuous large scale water withdrawals under operating conditions that were never evaluated under the existing permit.
Treating this as a grandfathered use would bypass the scientific review needed to assess new risks.
Second, Cugula Lake is a sensitive ecological system and a shared public resource.
There is insufficient evidence in the current record to determine how this level in
patent of water use could affect lake temperature water quality aquatic life or downstream
users.
A new permit and environmental review are necessary to evaluate these potential impacts using current data.
Third, if risks or harms emerge, the costs of monitoring prevention and mitigation must not be shifted to local taxpayers.
Without a new permitting process, the county lacks a clear and enforceable framework to ensure that
terror wolf not the public bears the financial responsibility for oversight and any required
remediation. For these reasons I urge you to pass this resolution rejecting the water
withdrawal permit application and require a new permit allowing for an evidence-based environmental
impact review for citing this massive data center on KUGA Lake. Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak.
Thank you.
Anzly?
Anzly here?
Okay.
I'm going to put their card at the end, and if they end up coming back, then we can try it again.
Fernando de Argon.
Good evening, Fernando de Aragon, 28-year resident of city of Ithaca.
It's pretty clear that the lake is probably the most important significant environmental
resource that we have in our county after 25 years with the Kiwi Lixing Byway, not profit,
I can also confidently say that it's the most significant resource for our neighboring counties
As a planner in the county, over the years, I noticed that Home Rule is very strong in New York.
There are very few ways for the public to reach the decision makers on regional projects,
and regional impact projects such as the one we're considering here.
So, you are all that's very important.
I'm very happy that you have this resolution before you.
And I hope that you pass it.
And I urge you to keep vigilant on this topic.
There will be other opportunities and we need you to be our voice
to reach all the needs.
because we don't have regional environmental groups doing this work.
It seems like we go from the local to Albany,
and that is a big leap,
and the role of the counties is a very important one,
and I thank you for your time.
Thank you.
Just to note, Fernando was a long time employee of Tompkins County
and his recent rule retired,
so we're glad to see you back in the chambers.
My name is Abe Presman, I live in Ithaca, and I'm here to speak in support of the water
thingy,
not great with names. I moved to Ithaca, a little over a year ago to build a tech
company here. My first month in Ithaca, my electricity bill was $150. Most months it's
more than that. I have never lived in any place where the cost of electricity is remotely
as high as it is here.
There are months when I spend more on electricity than I do on food.
It's not just me, you can go on the ethicists subreddit, one out of every five posts.
The number one topic is, how is my electric bill so high?
We have some of the most expensive electricity in the country.
You can look it up.
Some of the most expensive electricity in the world.
It does not make economic sense to build a data center here unless you're getting some kind
of kickback.
And if you look, you can look at the numbers.
It's I am paying, I think, 25 cents per kilowatt hour for electricity.
Terrellf has an agreement to, I believe, pay five cents a kilowatt hour for that electricity
they're going to use.
Other people have already walked you through the math on how much electricity the site is
going to produce versus how much it can use.
It's going to use.
I don't need to repeat that, but there is no way you can figure it in which this data
is not going to massively spike the amount of electricity we consume here.
We are in the middle of a hard time for affordability, right here in Tomkins County,
not just in ethic of it everywhere in the county, and in a time when a lot of people are
really struggling to pay their electric bills, their other bills, the best thing this council
could do for affordable ability right now is really anything that can slow down construction
of this proposed data center.
I know we're just supposed to be talking about what are you here, but I urge this council to
about making sure they're checking every box, making sure anything we can do to make sure
that this data center is actually staying above the line is going to be important and
is going to help everybody who lives here with our costs.
Thank you.
I have George A. Kelly do little.
John Closer.
In Madeleine Reed.
Also, if there's anyone here that would like to speak on privilege of the floor, we do have blue cards
located at the back table.
Good
evening. My name is George and I've lived in Tomkins County for a couple of years now, and I'll be brief
decisions made in rooms like this are important. My family is from Cass County, Texas, and
in a room just like this about 70 years ago
a paper mill was given permission to be built in the county, and
Since I was born and to my most recent visit in 2022, everybody there drinks bottled water because the ground water has been poisoned from industrial runoff.
The environmental study is just paramount to this.
What kind of corrosion inhibitors will live using? What sort of biosides?
you know, nitrates, you know, the thermal pollution,
all of this needs to be looked at.
And yeah, I want to yield my time
because there's a lot of people here with a lot to say,
but thank you for the time.
Thank you.
Kelly, do little?
Hi there.
My name is Kelly, do little.
I'm gonna make mine a little shorter than original two
because a lot of these points have been made,
But I do want to say that in a public meeting last fall, I did hear the CEO of Tera
will say that their data center would not withdraw, lake water for cooling.
And given that the CEO of Tera will have his told Lansing officials, that the KU
Gopberating Company has formally agreed to surrender their water withdrawal permit, that
permit having been developed originally in the context of a power generating facility.
But in terrible case, it will actually be a power sucking facility.
The DEC should not process a new request from the COC as a renewal, but rather as a new
permit altogether requiring appropriate environmental review for an energy sucking AI data
center.
Also, I'd like to share with you all some of the information from an Ithaca voice article by
Fernando Figuerole from October 30th of last year about extremely dangerous HABs being reported
in K. Eugolake is early as June 3 to his late as October 27th, H.A.B. has been reported in the
aftermath of natural phenomena like sluggish water circulation, unusually high water temperatures,
and extreme weather events such as floods and drought caused by climate change. However, overfeeding
mainly the addition of phosphorus, nitrogen and carbon from farm and lawn runoff is already a
huge negative factor in the health of our lake. It's an issue with regards to the data
center because the 183 acre site proposed for the AI data center in the phase 1 area is located
on a 10 to 15 percent slope of which currently 55 percent is forest and 12 percent wetlands
that serve to absorb and contain some of that toxic runoff. All that protective acreage
will be stripped away and replaced by an enormous permeable footprint of the data center.
So, considering the negative effects already degrading our lake, does it not stand to
reason that the utmost care over the deliberations of environmental considerations should
be taken by those who are tasked for regulating behemoth construction projects such as
Terrible AI data center.
These are just some of the issues which make me support the legislature passing the resolution
to ask the DEC to reject this water withdrawal renewal application.
And thank you for your service here to all the legislators.
John Glosser?
Hi.
My name is John Glosser.
I'm a resident of Newfield, New York.
I've lived in the Ithaca area for most of the decade, and I'm a New York resident
for the entirety of my life.
I support the legislature.
Passing a resolution to ask the DEC to reject this water withdrawal renewal application.
The nature of operations at this location is going to fundamentally change
And this should pump a full review of the proposed operations by the DEC to ensure these changes are properly managed.
I think producing power to consuming power.
By seeking the renewal of existing permits in both water with drawn speedies,
tarwolf appears to be looking to take advantage of provisions within these existing permits.
Most concerning is the lack of heavy metal testing required under existing speedies permits.
The reason to have the metals caused by combustion of coal power on surrounding communities is
while studied in numerous studies points to the negative health effects of this type of exposure.
Given this information, I'm concerned at the possibility of large site disturbances associated with constructions of facilities of this magnitude.
I think excavation, bulldozers, small silt, sacks around the outside of the property, protecting the way.
We ask ourselves, is that really going forward?
In my opinion, Terrible's unwillingness to act in good faith will make land or people in
the surrounding communities, a good steward of the land will approach this with full transparency.
They would seek a new permit of their own accord and not be forced to, by concerned citizens
coming out like on the evening site.
And lastly, the existing permit allows for the discharge of water into Cugulaic at 98 degrees
Fahrenheit.
This should concern everyone in the room as Cornell University's own system can cool
approximately 900 structures using their own version of a system like this, and release
water to the lake at a temperature of 60 degrees Fahrenheit, which is more in tune with
the net lake's natural gradient. To say the importance of the proposed data center would
be more impactful in the world than what the university can do as laughable, and yet they
to be allowed to exceed this system designed by over 40 degrees Fahrenheit.
And so this, when determining the next actions to take is they relate to what oversight is
given to tarwolf in the future plans in the community.
Again, I fully support the legislation.
Passing the resolution to ask the DEC to reject this water,
we'll throw all room in the application.
Thank you very much.
Madeline Reed, Solomon, Caleb Harnt,
my name is Madeline Reed.
I've lived in Ethica for about two years now.
I moved here for the environment.
The lake, the trails, the falls.
It's been a really important part of me kind of coming into my own adult life.
And I decided Ethica is where I wanted to stay.
And I recently purchased my very first home here in the city of Ethica.
I have extreme concerns about the data center.
And I honestly feel dupped.
feel I never would have purchased a home if the data center were a possibility. I didn't think
that Tomkins County would agree to something like that or allow something like that to happen
here. And I can't imagine how long-term residents feel somewhere as I think of this betrayal.
I am concerned about the environmental impacts on the lake wildlife and human beings in the area.
I'm also very concerned about the electric prices as somebody who just purchased a home.
It's a fixer upper, I'm not there yet, but I've lived in an apartment the last two years and my bills have increased significantly.
And I'm honestly afraid that the prices that are expected if the data center becomes a reality will make my new home unaffordable.
I think that I may not be able to afford my mortgage and my electric bills at the same time.
I also question terrible transparency.
It's something that they label themselves as.
They have it in their Instagram bio.
Yet when I commented on their social media posts.
I'm asking for pretty simple questions. I was immediately blocked. They refused to answer questions. They didn't
even give me a chance to understand what they're trying to do here and how it could be positive for the residents.
So I don't trust that anything they do will be honest. They have a history of manipulating data and straight up lying.
And so I feel like if the resolution is not past, we can't trust what they'll be doing with this permit and therefore I support the resolution.
Thank you. Solomon.
Yeah, dear members of the Tomkins County Legislature.
I'm my name is Solomon Blacker and I'm a resident of Ithaca.
Terrell should not be allowed to build the data center in Lansing.
It will take water from Cugulae and significant electricity, which will strain the grid.
From what many others who have spoken here have said the data center could drop to 400 megawatts,
which is a massive amount of power.
And while Terrell claims they can generate 138 megawatts of clean electricity by this year,
they have not been honest doing their application.
And even if they are correct, even if their possibility still manages to come and choose
by some magic, it will still not cover even 35% of what they want to consume potentially,
which means that the West has to be drawn from an already strained grid.
In addition, it will increase carbon emissions, which is very bad at a time when we need to
mitigating climate change, and Terrell has no plans about where they would put the water after
they withdraw it and use it. Therefore, request that you pass the resolution to deny Terrell's
water withdrawal application. Thank you. Thank you. Caleb Harnes, and then I have Noah Shapiro
Tamir and Vanessa Wood. Hello, my name is Caleb Harned. Thank you very much for your time. Thank
to you, everybody who came out tonight to speak,
such a cold night, you made it all the way here,
really a very impressed.
This is my first time at one of these meetings
and that will speak to you of the importance of this matter.
I'm a 30-year Ithaca and Lansing resident,
a taxpayer, and a nice and customer,
like the rest of you.
The lake has been essential for my life
for many years, from swimming to fishing, to education,
the science boat, if you've never been on the science boat, please.
This is a unique place, an amazing place.
I'd like to voice my support for the resolution presented tonight.
I share the numerous concerns of my community members about this project.
In particular, the environmental and the economic impacts of this AI data center.
I also stand in favor of a new water withdrawal permit and a full environmental review of this data center.
Thank you again for letting us make our voices heard.
I hope you will listen to what we have to say on this extremely important matter.
Thank you.
Noah Shapiro, Tamir.
Good evening, everybody.
Thank you for listening to our comments.
My name is Noah.
I'm a long time full-life resident of the town of Elisis.
Tomkins County student of the school district.
I don't have the facts and figures that all of my community members have.
I won't try to say them, but I will tell a story that about two months ago, I had the privilege
to be journeying through what is known as America's Cancer Alley, or chemical corridor
by Boat and Southern Louisiana, and got to witness firsthand the trauma held in land
water and people of the public health crises that have been compounded by multiple centuries
of extractive economies on the same plots of land.
If you look at the maps, you can see the property lines that were formerly plantations that are today housing some of our nation's largest petrochemical manufacturing facilities, oil refineries and herbicide and pesticide manufacturing facilities.
So standing on that land and standing in that water, you can feel it, right? You know what happens when those kind of crises have compounded for so long.
I have swam at North Point to Gannick for most of my life and there to cost the lake to the power plant that was formerly coal and now stands to turn into an AI data center and
pollute our land, our water, and our bodies. So I ask you to vote positively on this resolution tonight. Thank you.
Thank you. Vanessa Wood.
Hello, my name is Vanessa. Thank you for listening to our comments.
I work in education and water works, I've lived in Tomkins County for 22 years and I am
in dried and I get my drinking water from the lake, I guess what I can add is just knowing
a little bit about algae blooms, there have been watershed, efforts recently, monitoring
harmful algae blooms in the lake and they are starting to pop up like they are increasing
a little bit over time recently.
And the two things that feed them and increase them would be more nutrients or more
temperature in the lake.
So the current, I support the resolution to reject the renewal of this whole plant.
Because first of all, the temperature of the water discharge is almost double at the temperature
of the lake and I also wanted to just point out that it seems clear to me that there's a very strong
consensus of people who are just against the AI Center in general. Also with the general behavior
of the process so far, there's a lot of reason to please be skeptical of any claims about like
not using the water in this lake even though there's an intake structure right there and just
look at the other patterns of AI centers so far and I hope that we can think critically
and have a democratic process that reflects the people of this area who live here in
pay energy bills and use lake. And lastly, just algae harmful algae can hurt wildlife and also
like if people have dogs playing in the lake or whatever they like we've had like
dots of pets from harmful or a little bloom so that's just some one of many
possible environmental impacts that could happen with a higher temperature so
yeah and if the environment was affected negatively it would be nice to have
an environmental review and be able to track you know how things would be
it if the AIS Center went through so that's something to think about as well. Thank you.
Thank you. And just one more time is instantly available. We're in the room here.
Okay. Is there anyone else that would like to speak on privilege of the floor that hasn't
filled out a blue card?
Okay. I want to thank everyone for attending tonight. We're going to go ahead
and put the resolution on the floor and start our, start our debate and start our evening.
I would like to ask Legislator Dawson to move forward.
Yes, thank you, Chair Black.
I would like to move resolution D requesting the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation to reject the modified weather withdrawals permit application from Kyuva operating company LLC and instead require a new application and environmental review process.
Okay.
Seconded by Legislator Vincent.
And I would like to also turn it over to Legislator Wakeman right now.
Thank you.
I'm going to request to be excused.
Recused from this debate by a reason of my employment.
Thank you.
I've presented to Chapter 32 Section 32 B of the Topkins County Code.
that is inappropriate, request for refusal,
and I recommend that it be granted.
Thank you.
Here it's Houston, which is their right name.
And Deborah, would you like to introduce the resolution?
Yes, first of all, I'd like to thank everyone
who came in support of this resolution.
I introduced this at the request of one of my constituents.
And I have to say, honestly, that I am not as well
on these matters as is legislative advisor, for example, who was instrumental in drafting
this as was legislative Vincent. So I can't take credit for a lot of the technical aspects
of this resolution. But I do want to say that my motivation was nicely articulated by the gentleman
who talked about accountability. I think that this resolution is about urging the
nice deck to be accountable for the action it takes with regard to the permits that
it issues and that the request that we've made would also require that the terrible
family of entities would be held to account as to what exactly they want to use this
And beyond that, I would see the floor to a legislators' wiser in Vincent because they had a lot more to do with the meat of this resolution.
Before I shut up, I just want to say that we need to separate this resolution from the question of the Terrible Data Center.
I agree with many of you.
I live in the village of Lansing, which is part of the town of Lansing, and I don't want
a data center in my town, but I acknowledge that the county government has no land use
regulatory authority.
So the best we can do is make our feelings known on how the Department of Environmental
conservation does its job and how transparent and accurate the representations are that the
terrible affiliates in subsidiaries and terrible if itself make in support of their application
for a permit.
Thank you.
Deborah, did you want to move the amendments as well?
Yeah.
I was contacted by yet another constituent who serves on one of the Lansing town boards, who
made some corrections as to the relationships among the various companies specifically,
Kyuga operating company, which is an affiliate, apparently not a subsidiary of TerraWulf,
and the fact that the LSE here is this Lake Hawkeye LLC, which as far as I can determine
is a subsidiary of Terrell Wolfe. They are the Lessie, and Terrell Wolfe is the developer,
and I've tried to make that clear in these amendments which are in your red folders.
Is that friendly to the seconder? Yes. Okay. Is there anyone that the amended changes are not
friendly to? Okay. So we will now be working off of the amended resolution in your folders.
Thank you.
Adam Benson?
Yeah.
I do have a prepared statement I'd like to make.
I call Lisa to start.
I want to thank everyone who came to speak on this resolution before us today, especially
those who are attending their first legislature meeting.
I'm very proud that so many of our community members came here to speak, especially
in these weather conditions.
Now let's review the facts.
In 2021, how you go operating company applied for a permit to withdraw over 1 million gallons
of water per day from Kyugilik.
That application was evaluated in the context of the coal-fired power plant.
That plant has not operated since 2019.
Today, part of the site is being proposed for a 400-megawatt high-performance data center
an entirely different type of facility with entirely different water demands, risks, and operational
realities.
Residents of Lansing and the broader Tomkins County community are worried about the impacts
the data center will have on Kyugilik.
Today, in public comment, we've heard from them about many potential risks to the environment
that this project poses, including but not limited to industrial pollution, changes in water
temperature, and carbon emissions. Additionally, there's a great deal of confusion about what
the permits and question are even for, seeing as cooling for the data center was will supposedly
be a closed-loop system and withdrawal for fire suppression is exempt from permitting.
Section 6, Subsection 621.11, Part H of the state code, says that in agency, in this case,
the Department of Environmental Conservation, may treat a renewal of a permit as an application
for a new permit if there has been a material change to the permanent conditions.
I assume, since a data center is not a power plant, there has been a material change.
As a county, we do not have control over water withdrawal permits, but we have the power to make recommendations
to those that do do. As an issue that impacts Kugelake in the our entire community, I believe
that we are justified as a body and having an opinion on this project and its permits.
This impacts state property, the waters of Kugelake, our lake, and we have every right to weigh in
as a county on one state decisions affect its future. This is why I sign the letter with
preceded this resolution and why I will be voting yes on this resolution. Thank you.
Thank you Adam.
I read.
Weiser.
Yeah.
I want to join with my colleagues in thanking everybody who came out tonight and spoke so passionately about this beautiful lake that is literally the center of our county and so much of our lives.
Some of you I've known and worked with for years, fighting to close the cold burning.
And here we are, again, for I don't even know how many rounds we've gone with this site now, have kind of lost count.
As I was reviewing, and I will say to, I share the concerns I remember who it was, who said, I might have been you, Kerry, who said, you know, we need to be doing more.
wish we could, I wish that we had more teeth than what we have as a county to fight this.
Because as my colleague, Deborah Dawson said, we don't have land use control.
That's something that's the purview of the town of Lansing.
But we do have as my colleague Adam just pointed out we have a voice to use in speaking to the DEC
and holding them to account to their own regulatory authority.
One of the most stunning things when I started reviewing the permit, you know, I think
we all know that the requested permit modification should be rejected, could you operate
and could system company instead should be required to submit a new water withdrawal permit?
Here's the really stunning thing I found when I was reviewing.
the existing permit dates back to 1955.
It's been renewed and renewed since 1955.
And it was issued obviously for a fundamentally different purpose,
operation of a fossil fuel power plant.
Since that time, not only have the function of this site proposed being changed,
But regulatory standards have changed, environmental expectations and best practices for water resource management have evolved substantially.
Yet this permit lacks even the most basic modern safeguards, including there is a page page 13 of their original permit application.
When it talked about how they were withdrawing the water and measuring the water, they don't measure the water with draw they just make an assumption based on the capacity of the pumps that they use.
They don't have a meter to accurately measure the water withdrawal volumes.
That kind of omission would be absolutely unacceptable in a new application today.
And that's why we so much need this application to be taken under a new review with new environmental standards.
I mean, come on.
They don't even have a meter to measure how much water they're withdrawing.
So it's true.
They say that in its true that back when it was a power plant,
they withdrew about 250 million gallons of water a day.
Now, they're saying that they need to withdraw only 100, sorry, a million gallons per day.
But this doesn't eliminate the need for a full review.
Quite to the contrary, it underscores that the facility's operational profile has materially changed.
They no longer function as a power plant, and its future water use is tied to uncertain and potentially different industrial purposes that have not been fully defined or approved.
Given the age of the permit, the absence of modern monitoring requirements, the lack of reliable historical withdrawal data and the material change in use,
there is no regulatory or environmental justification for treating this as a mere modification.
A new application supported by a contemporary environmental review is both reasonable and necessary to ensure protection of kugelake and compliance with current standards.
Thank you.
Mike Sikler?
So I'll be a little bit. I didn't expect to be a little bit, but there was a lot of things to
answer that people had said.
For me, if the data center does go in there, I would like
a data center that does not use the lake at all. That doesn't withdraw any water, that doesn't.
It basically leaves the lake alone. We'll actually open the water front to the public,
which it is not open to now. That is what Tara will so far has suggested.
Now, they will be going in front of the town planning board shortly, I believe, within the next month, and you will see their plan.
I'll get to a little bit of that in a second.
The problem I have with this resolution is I believe it does exactly the opposite of what you'd like it to do.
It is my understanding that the permit that is in place right now is limited to power generation, whether that be coal, natural gas, nuclear, or deep ground source.
under the permit that is in place right now, that they are looking for a renewal of.
Water withdrawal cannot be used for the cooling of a data center.
It's also a cooling system that terrible, anyway, does not use.
And we'll talk a little bit about that because somebody had mentioned that too.
But I think that by asking the DC to weigh in on that permit, as it pertains to data centers,
you are actually opening the door to the DC to expand the permit to other uses.
The state may not do, as you're asking, and they may just say, yes, we believe that the data center is a permitted use.
And yes, within a certain size, we'll let that permit go through, which it currently is not, and I don't think that is what you want to do.
But if you want to roll the dice on that, I mean, I guess you can.
There's a lot of information about things, I've lived in Lansing 25 years and I lived with the power plant for 15 years as it operated.
You know, the water released from the power plant was 16 degrees higher than when it was taken in.
Habs are a problem today. The power plant's been closed for six years and yet we've seen
Habs increase. So while I understand that heat may be a factor, that's a hard case to
make considering we have actual evidence. Somebody had mentioned Cornell Lakeshore's cooling
and if there are studies. Yeah, they study that quite a bit. I mean, I don't have those numbers,
but you can more than, you can certainly go to Cornell and ask about that.
I just see this, listen, I believe that if this does, people are asking, why do you want
to keep this open?
Because I don't believe the company actually has not been transparent.
They've had two public meetings that the CEO actually came to and answered questions for
three hours of peace.
There have been multiple public hearings in front of the town board, and I've been to every
single one of those.
I mean, I've spent days on this.
So when I hear people come in and kind of throw out information that I just don't think
is true, I just have a problem with that.
I'm not here to defend terrible, but it's a publicly traded company.
If you want to know something about terrible, it's all there, quarterly reports.
And yes, Paul Prager owns the Q-operating company, and he is the CEO of a publicly traded
company terrible.
Yes, they are linked, but they are not the same thing.
So if you have a problem with terror wolf, then yes, it's a publicly traded company, you can find out an awful lot of information about them.
A lot of people talked about energy costs, I should touch on that.
But my big concerns going in when I pro-kond all of this out was the lake being protected and I believe that it will be,
I believe this actually threatens it and doesn't protect it.
And energy costs, someone had mentioned they're paying 25 cents per kilowatt hour, you need to call a nice egg.
That's simply not what the supply charge is in the city of Edega.
The supply charge last month for my rental property here was 10 cents a kilowatt hour.
So if you're paying 25 cents, that's what the supply is.
And every single, hey, I listen to all of you very patiently.
It's 10 cents a kilowatt hour, the delivery charge is eating you alive.
That's what's going on.
And if you don't believe me, you can go ask Josh Riley or Congressman, you can go ask your
state center to leave web.
They'll tell you the same thing and they're not in my party, so you can ask them.
But that's what's going on.
They are not seeking tax abatements to my knowledge, also when it comes to power.
Listen, we have an excess supply of power and upstate New York that we cannot send to New
York City, which is powered mostly by fossil fuels.
I don't know why we're building all of this solar upstate, but we are.
Lansing the York is building 160 megawatts of solar in the town of Lansing and the town
I'm Grotten.
The town of Scipio is putting in 99 megawatts of wind, they are putting in 80 megawatts
of solar.
The Kigro operating company Solomon said they're putting in 130 megawatts.
I thought it was 70 megawatts, but go with whichever number you like.
Coral in is putting in 80 megawatts of solar.
Right there you have about 500 megawatts of new energy coming in all within 20 miles
of this data center.
So I don't know what to tell you.
The state clearly is building power for something.
And this should not affect your rates,
which is the bottom one and the thing I'm most worried about.
Anyway,
listen, I am more than happy to have
a rose day of the day, but I hear just so much
factual inaccuracy from folks that come forward.
And I've been dealing with that for about three months now.
All I have to tell you is, you're right,
we don't have land use authority.
This is going to go in front of the Lansing town planning board and when they see it, they could make a lot of requirements.
They can make the requirement that you will not be pulling water from the lake and terrible will have to abide by that.
And I'm absolutely sure that's what the town of Lansing will require.
And they will require other things.
The town of Lansing could have a guy or a woman right on site, 24 hours a day if they would like to see what's going on on site.
We'll see what the town of Lansing chooses to do.
But to act as if somehow this is somebody said there was corruption in the process.
There's no corruption.
Everybody's been pretty transparent.
And if you have any questions, they are taking those questions.
So thank you very much.
Thank you.
We have Veronica Pillard, Iris Pakman, Judith Hubbard, and Randy Brown.
Thank you.
I'd like to go back to the community involvement in the lake itself.
Thank you all for coming.
As other people said, whether you spoke or not, it really makes a difference.
One public commenter said it was their first time
at a later stage meeting.
But that same person has sold me many green star stacks
that get me through this meeting.
So you make a difference.
Thank you.
The Kayuga Lake has been here since long before any humans were here since long before
Ithaca and Toppins County, and it will hopefully be here long after we are gone.
It is, as other people said, a precious, important vital, vital in the sense of like life
sustaining, life-giving resource, and it does make sense to protect it, and it's clearly important
to our resources.
My dear friend Anne Rhodes, who was here earlier and left, said at some point, we need to make
it normal that we protect our water.
She didn't say it today.
She said it.
I looked this up a couple years ago when a different company was seeking a different industrial
project connected to the lake and looking poised to, again, bypass, or end up getting to bypass
that a DEEC review process that probably should have been gone through, because this is a pattern.
I didn't Brian Eden mentioned it.
It was the Salt Mine and Environmental Impact Statement.
So, the same story different day, it is, the lake is so important to all of us into the region.
And it does not heal easily when harmed, unfortunately.
And so I do think it is a good use of government resources to communicate to gather here tonight and talk about it and communicate that
importance to the DEC. It is a good use of the state resources at the DEC to really
Dread down, do the appropriate reviews, take the guideline seriously if a use has changed,
make a new permit.
If standards have changed in the last couple generations since the original permit, review
it again, it's worth putting a lot in to ensuring that something that will affect the
is not going to harm it in meaningful ways, and we can debate all of the facts and predictions
and evidence here, but we're not the body to do this. It should be the DEC, and that's
what the resolution asks. So I hope folks will vote. Yes.
Thank you, Iris Patman.
Thank you. Thank you to those who worked on this resolution. I think it's important for us
do what we can. I think what we're hearing the room is collective frustration about decision
being made by an entity elsewhere that affects a resource that we all use and feeling a
little bit voiceless. So here we're trying our best to say, you know, this is what we hope
you the state will do. And I think what we're asking for is pretty simple is just to follow the
state mandated process, you know, dot your eyes across your teeth. It's nothing outlandish to say
just please explain what you're planning to do with this water. It should be sort of minimal cost
to comply with this, just to put it together, but we don't know what the cost would be to
all of us if we bypass that process. I just wanted to put this in context, so they're seeing
it's about a million gallons a day, a little bit more for the permit, which is an American football
field, if you can picture 300 feet, like 160 feet, and then about 2.7 feet deep, a day.
If that gives you a sense of how much water we're talking about, and so there's really
two options for what they would do with this water.
it would either be through evaporative cooling, which therefore means it's lost to a
Apparation, every single day. So 365 plus million gallons a year of those football fields. Or it's
going to be released back into the lake. And so then we need to know how it will be returned to the
lake, what temperature, what will be in the water at that point, what depth will be at
released all of that. So I think those are questions that we don't have answers to in order
for the state to approve this, those answers need to be forthcoming.
So I definitely support this resolution.
Thank you.
Judith Hubbard.
Thank you.
I have some comments.
But first I wanted to respond to some of Mike's comments.
I think it's important that we work with the same facts, right?
And that we have a shared understanding.
One of the comments you made was that the current permit that they're applying for would only apply to a cold power plant.
But I have their permit application in front of me. It was written in 2021. So they did not at that point know what the purpose of the permit was.
But they are not applying for a permit for a cold power plant. It reads the purpose of the proposed project.
The facility is a retired coal power plant.
A new purpose for the facility slash property has not yet been determined.
So they're applying for a permit for an undetermined use,
which could include a data center.
It could include a coal power plant.
It could include anything.
But if they get the permit,
it does not restrict them for use only for a coal power plant.
It is a broadly applicable permit for an undetermined purpose.
And I think what's important that we share that understanding that this is not pushing them or pushing the DEC to provide a new premise specifically for an AI data center.
It's asking for an environmental review of the process as a whole.
All right, that's all. I have to say about that. But I still have other comments.
I'm hearing your frustration. I think we all feel your frustration, right? We're all pretty frustrated here.
and I think a lot of people in frustrated over the last several months, as they watch this process,
go forward.
And I've been trying to figure out why do we all feel so frustrated, right?
I've lived here a long time, like many of you.
I'm an earth scientist.
I like to know how things work.
And I feel like what's happening is we've given up as a society in New York state.
We've given up our right to make these decisions to the state.
with the understanding that the state will make responsible decisions on our behalf.
We have a department, and it's called the Department of Environmental Conservancy.
It's supposed to, in its name, conserve the environment on our behalf.
And it feels like in this situation that it's not doing that. That's not making these requests
for full environmental review. We're not hearing the environmental review about
electricity use. We're not hearing the environmental review about noise pollution. We're not hearing
the environmental review in this case about water usage. We're not hearing that. We're not getting
that information. And why do we give up our right to the state? New York State. We're not talking
about the federal government here. This is our own state. We're supposed to have some control in
our own state about how these processes go forward.
The process here is not robust.
The DEC may choose to ask for a new permit application.
They do not have to require a new permit application.
Why not?
But because they may choose, we're
left writing these resolutions, asking them
to please do the thing that they may do.
And that's extremely frustrating for us.
It's the best we can do right now.
And of course, we'll do that.
anybody has any creative ideas about things that we can do to try to get our department of environmental
conservation to do a little more conservation, please do send them my way.
Judith Hubbard,
who knew? Wow, incredible. Randy Brown. Yeah, thank you everyone for coming. This is by far the
biggest crowd that I've seen in the five years that I've been here, so it's good to see everybody. I live in
fields up on the hill, so I don't really deal with the late much.
I don't know much about this business, and I can't speak, so I choose the various
warehouses, but I would like to read the resolves in two records, because there's two
resolves there that I want people to know what we're voting on, because the warehouses
are, can be interpreted in different ways.
So, to resolve that the Trump state legislature request that the DEC determined that the pending submission
should not be processed as a routine, renewal, modification, instead require processing
as a new permit application with a project appropriate environmental review suitable to a data center,
high-intensity computing operation.
Resolve further with this new application, the DEC should require a transparent, technically supported
accounting of the maximum expected withdrawals by end use, seasonal peak operational scenarios,
it tightens charge configuration in operation controls.
The potential impacts of water quantity, water quality, and water dependent natural resources,
including cumulative impacts of the other results just about where we send this.
You know, I think this is the third resolution we've done where we've sent this, something
to the DC, and they've ignored the prior two, if memory serves.
So as far as, and we can't demand that the DC does anything, but Annacellus and Leah Webb,
I would imagine, probably support the majority of what you're feeling.
I would call them.
I would send them emails, because they're the ones closest to the two-near state, and
And I'm sure that they would both be very vocal about it.
Regarding, and I will vote for this, by the way.
Regarding the cost to be electric, it's out of control.
And I think that we need a forensic audit of NYSEC to show exactly
what they're buying, where they're buying it, and where they're selling it.
We met with NYSEC about a year ago.
And they told us that they are buying 70% of their electric by contract every year, but 30%
they buy an open market, whatever the market may be.
And they buy it from outside the states, sometimes sometimes from themselves, from some
subsidiary.
And then it is the delivery charge is Mike Siggler mentioned.
That's a big issue.
I think the reason they want to be in this data center where it is, because the power lines
there. I mean, the big power line, it would be required there. The infrastructure is not needed.
I do think that we should be looking hard at a electric cost. I don't know what's flowing
on. My life is the same thing. We're down 12 percent far. We turn everything off. We employ things
and all of it. And our costs have gone up like 30 to 40 bucks a month. And we're in an
I'd board with this.
Thank you.
Lisa Liff.
Thank you.
Judith, they appreciate the clarification.
You just made a Bapie application.
And it'd like to ask those that have submitted the resolution.
Maybe you can give me just a little bit more detail or clarification to this.
If I can ask a couple questions regarding the resolution.
2021, a QGAC rating filed, the permit, is this, has there been any approval or has this
pended since 2021?
I think it's been pended since 2021.
Yeah.
It was just recently an October given a notice of completion by the DEC, meaning that it was
subject to their review and public comment first. Okay, and did the permit prior to 2021
expire or is this still in place requiring a renewal? It didn't expire. It's sort of grandfathered
extended its expiration date was in 2021. They filed their original renewal application in 2020.
DEC then notified them that it was in complete had some questions. They answered the questions in
2021 and it wasn't until now or October of 2025 that DEC issued a notice of completion. I have no
what happened between 2021 and October of 25? No idea. Okay, and then the
where as at the top of the second page,
Tara Wolff, excuse me,
Cugud operating has formally agreed to surrender its water withdrawal permit in
the event. The Cugud data campus receives requisite permits and approvals.
And my question is, who would they surrender that, too, is that surrender their involvement or does this imply a transfer or a assumption to or by another party?
Yeah, none of that is clear.
It's not just that I don't know the answer.
It's that there nothing, none of that has been specified.
I would say the intended implication of terroof saying that to the town of Lansing is that they would give up the permit and not withdraw the water.
But we have no way of knowing exactly what that would look like or even if it would happen.
Or which subsidiary they might transfer it to or how they would go about surrendering it.
So we don't know the answer to any of that, like-
And that was the question I had under this paragraph.
What does this mean?
Yeah.
You'd have to ask them.
Okay.
Well,
I think Deborah touched on it when she spoke.
This isn't a discussion about land use.
This is about water resources and the proper application for what the intended use of the property may be.
I've wrestled with this for months, Mike referenced the solar project that is planned
for our districts, and just as tonight there's a very strong, very strong opinions on both
side of that, there have been, and I've been hesitant to weigh in from the county standpoint
because I believe that it is a home rule issue that you've got your local review processes
in boards in place that are properly assigned to land use.
And at the same time, that project being driven by state regulations,
there's a limit to what the local government can or can't do.
But despite that, it's not typically really a county
peragative to weigh in there.
But under this resolution, that's put forward
tonight and understanding the ambiguity here or just plain set of questions, I'll support
this resolution but that doesn't please don't take that as a judgment on my behalf, whether
I favor or pose the proposal for the reuse of a Q-gooperative.
And you know, sort of emphasized what Judith said earlier.
This is about holding DEC accountable, right?
This is about holding them accountable to protecting our like.
Okay, any other comments?
Mike Siggler.
Why just up to be quick, because about what Judith said,
I mean, I appreciate what she said.
I mean, I definitely listen to it.
I just, I think it's pretty clear in the application.
I mean, it's right there in page one that submits the enclosed application
for a water withdrawal permit renewal for the Cugophacility.
Okay, so we know that it's renewal, and then if you go to page six,
not page six, page five,
it talks about what is the modification.
And the modification is request decrease and approve withdrawal quantity.
It doesn't say we're modifying this for a different news or anything like that.
And then in little part 16, it says new water service areas, public water supply only, so this wouldn't be that.
But the answer to that was no as well.
So
I understand what you're saying.
I still think you're rolling the dice on this.
I think you're opening this to a new use by the DEC.
And the DEC could rule a way that you don't want it to rule.
So anyway, we'll see what happens.
Okay, if there are no other questions or comments, do we want to do a roll call?
Yes, please.
Okay.
Randy Brown?
Yes.
Deborah Dawson?
Yes.
Judith Hubbard?
Yes.
John Hunt?
Yes.
Greg Mezzi?
Yes.
Rachel Oslin?
Yes.
I was Pacman?
Yes.
Veronica Pillar?
Yes.
Lisa Liff?
Yes.
Mike Siggler? No. Adam Vincent? Yes. I read Wiser. Yes. Christy being
Coney? Yes. Travis Brooks?
Yes. Shana Black? Yes.
12-ise, 1-0 and 1-recusal, that passes.
I don't we take a 10-minute break and we will meet back in chambers at 7-40.
Okay, legislators were back in session and why don't we move to legislator privilege of the floor?
Not everyone at once. Anyone that would like to share anything?
This is never happened.
I think
these meetings are hilarious. Literally we have water wall people and then we excuse and there's not a single
Oh, who is that, back there? Oh, no, it's morning. She has to be here.
Okay, go ahead, Mike.
I just wanted to, I would just say this, I just wanted to tell everyone about the passing
of Sandra Lacko.
She, Lansing resident for a long time, and she also worked at the Fratomkins County for
I believe a couple decades, it's not a discounted DMV as a clerk, so.
I just wanted to tell her, apparently, that there are definitely in my prayers, and I just wanted to let everybody know about her passing.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mike.
Next is Travis Brooks.
I just wanted to thank my colleagues and the community that came out for M.O.K. celebration on Saturday.
I've just been a few weeks. We have our Black History Month Challenge Show this year.
It is at the theater, over here, by Cass Park.
What is that theater, co?
Thank you.
My God, it's our favorite theater.
Yeah, it's the hang of the theater, which is cool.
It's the first time we've ever been here.
So we've been doing the talent show for, I don't know, 35, 40 years.
And it'll be the first time at the theater.
It's on February 5th.
So if you are free that evening, come on down.
Thank you.
Anyone else?
Irene Wieser?
Yeah, I'll just let people know that for Caroline residents, there's actually kind of a cool thing inside their tax bill, which is an option to sign up for driving fiber, which is fiber optic broadband coming to the town of Caroline, thanks to the town of dragon.
It's nice to have options, Veronica Pillar and the Greg Mussey.
It's still silly to say with now zero audience, but I did want to acknowledge the killing
of Renee Nicole Good since our last legislature meeting by some ice agents who are supposed
to be enforcing federal laws, and instead are essentially
to stay sanctioned, goons terrorizing, at the moment,
mostly the people of the Minneapolis area.
But it gets a lot broader than that.
I was listening to some stories of interactions
with them before this meeting, and it was not a pleasant use
of my time, but probably valuable.
And I wish I had looked up the number for the Ithaca
rapid response network, which I don't have on me, but it does exist for to alert
community if ice presence is here in Tompkins County. We've had luckily very
little of that so far. I'm not going on wood, but it is a scary time.
That's all.
Thank you, Veronica, for mentioning that.
Greg Massey, and then Lee Shirtloaf?
In honor of Mike Lane, which I think we should try to invoke Mike's name.
Each meeting we have, moving forward.
We refer to Dryden as a crown jewel of the county.
I read just so that we're all the same.
I don't want to say thank you.
Lee Shirtloaf?
I shouldn't be checking messages.
Well, I'm sitting here, but kind of similar to Mike.
I just was informed that, over the weekend, Kathy West, who was our past deputy county administrator for many, many years passed away.
And Kathy had a couple of times served in an interim administrator role for the county.
And took the lead for many of her years
as the Budget Officer or Acting Budget Officer
and really played a key role in a lot of the projects.
And the 90s and early 2000s, and very sad to hear that.
She was a dedicated timekins county, the boy and administrator.
And certainly, you want to send our condolences out to the family.
Thank you, Lee.
Anyone else this evening, Randy Brown?
Yeah, since I've had mouth nice earlier, I would like to say that they responded well to
Newfield regarding the Flair Project.
They're putting in new huge 90-foot metal poles from kind and road all the way to Monterey Falls.
And it goes through and field line all the way through Newfield.
There's about a dozen residents that are being affected by this, and nice said came to a
Newfield Town Board meeting for nice said employees came to engineers and they explained
everything, but still it didn't really calm any residents down that are going to have the
huge poles in their backyards, which they will.
And part of the problem is that the wires that they're putting in are much larger, and they
will droop, I guess, as the right word, about 30 feet, and then they can move about 30 feet
because of the wind. So it does come a fairly close to some of the people's houses. So nice
I get agreed to go visit with each of the residents, which I appreciate, and they're trying
to position those poles to have the least impact on some of these people. Two people just
built brand new houses. They're going to be impacted by this. But they're very responsive and I
Thank you for coming to the meeting and following up.
Great.
Thank you, Randy.
Anyone else?
Okay.
Great.
We are going to move on to the chair's report.
I do have one appointment this evening for the workforce development board, and that's
William Foreman.
And I would now like to move on to the state of the county.
Good evening and thank you for being here.
Tonight I'm honored to share the state of Tomkins County, where we are what we've accomplished
in 2025 and how our shared priorities are shaping the year ahead.
I'm confident in saying the state of this county is strong, resilient, and determined.
Strong because the strength of this county comes not from one single person but from
our collective commitment, especially the commitment of this legislature and the dedicated
County staff, if you turn policy into real-world impact every single day.
Resilient, because even when right with rising costs, housing pressures, federal
uncertainties, and growing service demands, Tomkins County continues to deliver.
The story of this past year is one of dedicated public servants, strong partnerships,
and a clear commitment to serve all of our community members.
Determined, because we stand by our values of respect, accountability, integrity,
equity and stewardship. A few weeks ago, we welcomed eight new legislators to the spotty alongside
eight returning members. That infusion of fresh perspectives, energy, and lived experience
has already deepened our deliberations, sharpened our questions, and strengthened our ability
to make difficult decisions with integrity and care. I'm proud that in this legislature,
new voices are not just present, they are heard. They ask hard questions and they help lead
through thoughtful debate.
Our government work benefits from it.
To the entire legislature, returning members,
he brings institutional memory,
and new members who bring a new vision.
Thank you.
And to our county staff, I echo what has been said
in this chamber and beyond.
You are the mission of Tomkins County government.
You serve with compassion, professionalism, and skill,
and this community is better because of your work.
Tonight I'd like to reflect on where we've been
and share how that foundation guides
focus this year, especially in how we support our staff, strengthen our community, and deliver
services with equity, excellence, and accountability.
Our work is guided by the county strategic plan, and I'd like to highlight our progress
through those shared priorities, organizational excellence.
We know that strong government depends on strong systems, and on a workplace where employees
feel valued, supported, and empowered.
I'm proud that we are currently in contract with all of our unions.
When I was sure a few years ago, a priority was undergoing a salary study that would set the standard for our employees.
I'm happy to report that we have conducted that study and have made adjustments to many of our employees' salaries so that they are more competitive.
We value our employees and are always looking for ways to provide a better working environment and stay competitive.
In 2025, we held 145 committee and legislature meetings, adopted four local laws and tackled
more than 300 resolutions, all with transparency, courtesy, and civic engagement.
Over 170 public meetings were live-streamed, expanding public access and connection to local
government.
We've made real progress modernizing how we measure performance, with a launch of county-wide
keep performance and equity indicators that help us track meaningful outcomes.
We expanded leadership training and staff support and strengthened IT systems to keep vital
county services secure and reliable.
The county strengthened its fiscal stewardship and partnerships by successfully securing and
managing competitive grant funding, including 1 million in additional state supported for
A signed council, a $324,000 assessment system, modernization grant, a five-year OCFS grant
supporting young parents, expanded gift funding for public safety and probation initiatives,
federal funding for the airport, and USDA support for food waste reduction and composting
efforts, bringing outside resources back to the community while reducing local cost burden.
Across Tomkins County Government, departments helped residents navigate change by guiding
people through new requirements and systems.
From emergency communication around SNAP benefits in November, 2025, to assisting the real
ID and passport applications, department relocations, redistricting voters and updating
election maps, hosting our first online foreclosure auction, which is obviously not a great
thing, implementing a short-term rental registry and providing clear hands-on
support, so community members could adapt confidently to new rules and technology.
Equitable service delivery, delivery, equity isn't a buzzword, it's a daily commitment
to fairness, access, and dignity.
Last year, a whole health engaged more than 1,200 residents in the community needs assessment,
ensuring that real voices guide our policies.
We expanded community basement to health services and to schools, support of housing, and
outreach settings, making care more accessible where people live and learn.
While we are very proud of the work we have done in this area, we also realize the need
is great in our community for expansive mental health services.
We will continue to grow this area and focus on meeting our community demand.
Our Department of Social Services has helped 25 families transition from shelter to permanent
housing and is exceeded federal benchmarks in child welfare by prioritizing family-based care
and reducing institutional placements, which is better for kids and better for community
stability. When we talk about changing situations and changing lives, this is a perfect example
of what is working. Providing stability through housing for families is essential first to grow
and move forward as a community. We expanded services for older adults veterans in youth
from new mill sites and embootsmen support to hosting the county's first veterans expo,
shining light on homeless and runaway youth and supporting municipal youth services.
We also celebrated belonging through naturalization, ceremonies, monies, welcoming new US citizens, a powerful reminder of who we are as a county.
Economic opportunity and quality of life.
A thriving community is one where we can live, work, and learn, and grow.
We coordinated the renovation and opening of 227 Cherry Street Code Blue Shelter.
Providing warmth and safety to neighbors, experiencing homelessness during our coldest months.
Volunteers of America, our service shelter provider, treats our visitors with kindness and provides
care management on site is needed.
We continue to see positive results in feedback.
We also know that care management services added to sheltering that provide additional
supports and referrals can achieve better outcomes.
Our planning is a state ability department awarded 1.35 million for the community housing
development fund for housing projects that resulted in 123 units, including affordable and attainable
homes.
Youth employment programs connected hundreds of young people with jobs and training, equipping
the next generation for economic participation and leadership.
And for structure projects advanced across the county, our highway, crews paved, treated,
and stripped hundreds of miles of road, our IT and facilities team supported the relocation
multiple departments and at Ethica Tompkins International Airport we restored direct service to
Washington Dullis. Climate change mitigation and resiliency are strategic plan reflects our
recognition that climate action must be part of everything we do. Departments across the county
continue to embed sustainability and to daily operations and long-term planning from advancing
green facilities and infrastructure projects to integrating climate considerations into transportation
and airport planning, and finalizing the county's Solid Waste Management Plan.
Health and Safety, keeping our community safe and supported remains central to our work.
Emergency response and dispatch teams answered over 126,000 calls last year.
While we completed renovations to the primary 911 Center to ensure reliability and critical moments,
we expanded peer support and critical incident stress programs for first responders,
recognizing the caring for those who serve as part of caring for our community well-being.
Our Sheriff's Office expanded care team, providing crisis-focused response and reducing
reliance on traditional enforcement models where more people-centered interventions are appropriate.
Public safety and community well-being were advanced through coordinated justice efforts
with a district attorney's office,
prosecuting serious violent cases while expanding
alternatives to incarceration.
The county attorney's office providing
county-wide legal support and enforcement,
while protecting the county's interest in probation
and community justice,
strengthening trauma informed procedural
justice practices to promote safer and fair outcomes.
Across county operations,
we strengthen security by standing up a new county-wide
security program,
improving coordination and incident response in public building.
And we are providing some meetings and prioritizing the safety of both employees and people that we serve.
Looking ahead, as we move through this year, our focus remains on strengthening staff support,
expanding community well-being and ensuring that government delivers with equity and effectiveness in every corner of Tompkins County.
We know the challenges ahead from federal and certainties to emergency services challenges and cost of living pressures.
But we also know that our collective marked by curiosity, courage, and collaboration equips us to meet them.
To our staff, our partners, and our residents, thank you for your trust in partnerships.
And to my colleagues in this legislature, thank you for your service, your questions, and your commitment to this community.
Together, we are building a government that works for everyone every single day.
The State of New York, the State of Tomkins County is strong, resilient and determined, and
our best few years are still ahead.
Thank you.
I would also like to take a moment to thank Assemblywoman Anna Callis and State Senator
Leah Webb for making stop to our chambers last Friday.
Legislators were able to meet with our state representatives and received a very thorough update
on what's going on at the state level.
The collaboration between our state and federal representatives continues to be crucial during these pivotal times.
And now I'm going to announce our 26 committees and a few chairs, chair's appointments.
Okay. Budget Capital and Personnel Committee.
Chair Deborah Dawson, Vice Chair Veronica Piller.
Members, Brown, Muzzy, Shirtlive.
Be in Coney. Oh my god. Okay, be in Coney. Sorry. Wiser. Facilities and infrastructure.
Chair, shirt lift. Vice chair, wakeman. Brown, Hubbard, and Hunt. Government operations.
Chair, Brown, Vice chair, Hubbard. Members, Mezzy, Vincent, and Wakeman. Health and Human Services.
Brooks Chair, Bianconi, Vice Chair, Siggler, Pillar, and Oslin, members, Housing and Economic
Development, Chair, Mezzy, Vice Chair, Pactman, Siggler, Hunt and Vison, Members, Planning and
Energy and Environmental Quality, Chair, Wiser, Vice Chair, Benson, the Encouny, Hubbard,
Hunt, Oslin, and Pacman.
Public safety, Brooks, chair, Oslin, vice chair,
pillar, shirt lift, and wiser.
Charger review committee, special committee,
and this is going to begin in June of 2026.
Greg Massey is going to chair that.
Deborah Dawson, vice chair.
Rachel Oslin, member, Mike Stigler, member,
and Dan Wakeman member.
Work first, diversity, and inclusion committee.
advisory committee and Veronica Pillar will share that.
And there are a few things that we've done a little bit different this year.
There was a really high demand for a few committees and we wanted everyone to be able to participate.
So we did increase the number of members in budget capital and personnel to seven members.
And we also increased the planning energy and environmental quality to seven members as well.
And I have a few chairs appointments for 2026.
The Tomkins Center for History and Culture, Rachel Oslin will be our representative.
I.A.E.D. Board of Directors, Legislative Greg Mesie, T.C.
Chair and Vice Chair, myself and Dougherm will be on that.
I.A.E.D. Executive Committee that will be Greg Mesie and Deborah Dawson.
I, A, E, D, Board of Directors, Greg Massey and Deborah Dawson.
Chamber of Commerce, Mike Siggler, and then the alternate will be Greg Massey.
C, C, E, we're actually going to have two representatives this year.
I think it's very important, Randy Brown and Judith Hubbard.
Ethics Advisory Board, Iris Pakman.
She will be the chair of that.
ITC-TC Policy Committee, Legislator John Hunt, and the alternate will be
Lee Shirtliff.
Municipal Electric and Gas, that will be our staff member, Terry Carroll.
Kugelike Watershed, Interim Municipal Organization, Legislator Adam Benson, and Alternate
Iris Pactman.
TC3 Liaison, Legislator Dan Wakeman, that's in his district as well.
Chair Workforce Diversity and Inclusion, Chair Veronica Pillar, Criminal Justice
Advisory Board, Public Safety Chair, Travis Brooks, Special Negotiating Committees, Corrections
Union, that will be myself in Deborah Dawson, Road Patrol, that will be myself in Ivers
Pakman, CSEA, Blue Colour, that will be myself in Ivers Pakman, CSEA, Blue Colour, that
will be myself in Greg Mezzi, I'm sorry, White Colour, thank you.
We're also going to have an assessment working group, which we have not had in years past,
but we've had a lot of questions about how our assessment works, who gets assessed what,
and it is the tasks for this group to take a deeper dive and to work with our staff on that.
And so administration is going to appoint some staff to that.
I can assume it would probably be someone from assessment, and they will head that up and
I did want to appoint three legislators to that who has shown interest in assessment that's going to be Judith Hubbard, Greg Massey, Mike Siggler, and our friend Paul Rossi, who joins us for many of our meetings who we love dearly, has agreed to be on that.
And we were also going to try and be joined by a commercial someone representing commercial real estate in someone representing residential real estate.
We're pretty open to that membership if anyone can think of any one else that might need to join us at the table there.
The city of Ethica sells tax distribution working group and this will meet monthly and I definitely, there is a special place in my heart for the three people that have volunteered for this and that is Judith Hubbard, Deborah Dawson and Randy Brown.
Again, you are very special people and this is God's work here.
So, nice way.
Thank you, everyone.
You're idiots.
I'm just joking.
Thank you for volunteering to do that.
And then we are going to have a city county working group.
I spoke with Mayor of Contomo just a few days ago and it's going to be himself and two other members of the common council.
We're also going to be joined with staff from the city as well as staff from the county.
To meet on a monthly basis.
legislators will be Travis Brooks, Adam Benson, and myself, and then the Cornell Working Group.
We really tried to make it individuals who had districts that surround or interact with Cornell.
Judith Hubbard, Adam Benson, Iris Pacman, Deborah Dawson, myself, and Greg Mezzy.
If I forgot anyone who's district surrounds Cornell, let me know when we can add you.
And then we'll also have staff join us as needed.
And then the Ethica College Working Group is going to be myself,
Travis Brooks, Iris Pacman, Chrissy, Bianconi, and John Hunt.
And again, if there's anyone that I left off that's close to Ethica College
or your district surrounds or is close by, just let me know when we can add you.
Next meeting.
Thank you all for meeting with Deborah myself.
I know it was, it's been a long two weeks,
but I wanted to thank you all for your patience,
and almost every person that walked in came in
with a very open heart open mind said put me where you need me
and that made our jobs very easy.
So thank you for your flexibility and your openness
to try new things.
So let's move on in our meeting.
And if, uh, I don't even know where my agenda is, if we could have a report, um, from
uh, county administration, and of course, a company.
Thank you.
Um, we have the department achievement for 2025 that went to go through and I'm happy that you
too deleted because you've touched on most of the points that we also laid out in the achievement,
as included in your agenda material.
So just to highlight some few things, one of the critical things we're able to achieve is to fill the two key positions in the county as the department has, as Department of Social Services and Whole Health.
We've got Brittany and Jin who did an amazing work for both those two key departments.
And we are also able to fill in internally highways with a very excited about what Nick doing
really wonderful job with the crew over there.
Also, the prize, as soon as the previous director announced his retirement, we have several
people from the community coming to the current administration and asking how the process
is going to be.
I want you to add your voice to the process and I will be very excited about the outcome that we all achieve.
So in your folder, we have various departments and the goals that the achievement that the partner leadership share with us,
and how that also linked up to our strategic objective and plans as well.
So moving forward into 2020, what we will be doing is to how those goals or those achievements individually meet specific aspects of our strategic objective,
as well as linking that to the equity plan that we have also said for ourselves through the county administration as well.
So under the office of the county administration and in addition to the highlighted point by Chair Black and also the hiring of those two key departments.
Under the oversight of Jayce who is a contract and risk administrator were able to execute over 900 plus contracts in county administration.
We also initiated the county equity indicator process for all county department.
Under the Office of Aging, we launched the H-Friendly Business Initiative and 13 businesses
were certified under that initiative.
Co-Friendly newspaper also reached more than 3,000 people, caregivers, new
level also reached over 2,600 individuals in the county as well.
Under the airport, we initiated the new Ethica Airport Sustainable Airport Master Plan
and comprehensive energy assessment as well.
And the aspect of that process is also ongoing, which was approved.
And we also completed the strategy business plan that was approved by the legislatures in 2025.
As many of you know, we also launched a third flight to DC.
And there's it's been performing wonders and we are hopeful that we will be able to sustain it after the initial period that was agreed for this several
Conversation ongoing right now to be able to make the flight permanent the 10 flight to this appointment and also working with other airlines to see how we can improve an increase
the services to Etica Airport.
Last year, I took a trip with the airport team to two different conferences.
And there's some degree of commitment from several airlines to work with us in 2026 and 2027.
So I'm really excited about what lies ahead of us.
Those are working very closely with Cornell.
They want to see a flight to Detroit or Chicago,
and we're working closely with them
to see how we can make that possible in the next year or two.
The airport website is being revamped,
and very soon you'll see a new look at the airport website.
And assessment, we are successful in getting a grant from the state's LLG to support
converting our systems now to Tyler Technology.
We received a grant of $324,000.
I just want to say thank you to Jay and his amazing team for the work they do.
and special times to his deputy who came back from retirement to support us,
get the data conversion process, then I'm excited about the outcome of it in the next year or two.
Another science council program, we use support services and training to produce significant
and positive legal results for program client and both criminal and from the call representation.
We also able to attain several grants that will reduce the local cost to the Indigenous
Defense representation.
We are very excited with Lance and his team and the work that they are doing in that department.
The Board of Relations replaced 125 e-publes, and I put print parts using one funding.
One of the things that I cite me about this county is the iVotestica context that we involve the community in,
and I saw in this room, I believe, early on the meeting, representative, ready, dedicated.
this may be one of the largest meeting attended, but I can say that is on par to the number
of people that I show up during the award of the contest. So very excited.
I would like to see that being here and involving the community and being engaged in the civic process.
So, the Board of Elections was able to launch a sticker contest and successfully selected the
sticker designed by a resident of the county and a student as well. So, that was a wonderful achievement that we indicated.
Also, the Clerk of the Legislature, the Legislature and the Office of the Clerk held
155 public meetings, 10 public hearings, considered the rendered resolution for adoption, and also considered five local law five adoption and adopted for local laws as well.
And also the county attending represented the county in transnational matters central to the counties immediate need and long time objectives such as homeless services.
government and contracting processes and procurement. So, we're able to implement, or we are
ongoing, there's an ongoing implementation of our soil software and also the process of
a contract execution in the county to bring in some degree of efficiency and effectiveness
on how we administer our programs and provide services across the county.
How we invite Bridget to continue, uh, from the moment?
It's teamwork.
It's just really to keep you from having to hear the same voice over and over again.
So, yeah, the next one we're at County Clerk.
So, County Clerk continued advancing forward a fully paperless office through expanded e-biling
electronic recording, thank you to the Civil and Residential Services by hosting three naturalization
ceremonies, welcoming 77 new citizens, processing 900 plus passport applications, assisting with
real ID and enhanced driver's licenses and maintaining 95 to 100 percent customer satisfaction
in at the DMB. DMB is like the best in the state.
So for emergency response, they completed the final year
of the pilot rapid medical response program.
They handled 111,118 calls, held over 36,000 emergency calls,
and nearly 90,000 non-emergency calls,
increased cyber and participation by nearly 3,000 individuals.
They completed the first full year of the peer support program, responding to 84 requests
and critical incident stress management with eight activations.
They implemented a comprehensive county security program, as Shana mentioned, supporting mental
health facilities and the legislature committee meetings.
They expanded public safety outreach by I've already said that, sorry.
And they responded to the growing information demands by processing 989 discovery recording request in 14-foil request, busy office.
For the district attorney, the district attorney's office successfully prosecuted multiple jury trials, including cases involving controlled substances, rape and DWI,
while strengthening public safety through collaboration with local and state law enforcement
to implement the give program, contributing to a notable reduction in gun violence.
The office improved court efficiency by supporting after-hours arrangements actively participated
in reimagining public safety working groups and continue to prioritize alternatives to
incarceration through programs such as lead, treatment court, and mental health court.
facilities, hired a new deputy facilities director,
yeah, quickly completed improvements to the code shelter,
I'm sorry, code blue shelter on Cherry Street,
completed a shipow application, space program and schematic design
for the Center of Government Project, and finalize the design
to commence abatement and deconstruction of that same location on the
site of the 300 block.
For finance, I'm trying to go through these quickly.
I know it's getting late.
For finance, the treasury and finance functions,
strengthened fiscal stewardship and operational efficiency
across the county.
The treasury division expanded for closure outreach,
launched the first online public option,
implemented an online short-term rental registration
system and improved interest earnings.
payroll and accounts payable, reliably supported county operations by processing over 31,000 payroll checks, while advancing system improvements and enhancing the reporting.
They process 31,000 accounts payable items. Accounting unit modernized financial management through new debt, lease, and subscription-based information, technology arrangements,
A.K.A. Spita, tracking software, faster financial reporting, updated administrative policies and supported a clean 2024 audit while the purchase division significantly increased procurement activity, processing 1,861 purchase orders and strengthened collaboration with the departments.
In the highway, the improved transportation infrastructure and safety by paving 22.35 miles,
resurfacing 68.42 miles, and striping 131.32 miles of county rolls, roads while maintaining
highway and county fleet vehicles, equipment, and enhancing road safety with 38 crosswalks
93 stop bars painted and then weights and measures which is a department that's managed by the highway
department. They conducted inspections and compliance activities by visiting 183 local establishments
inspecting and sealing 1483 devices such as gas pumps, pharmacy scales and produce scales collected
50A petroleum samples to state quality analysis and completed 12 non-commercial inspections for
law enforcement schools and local municipalities, and the petroleum samples just for those folks
who are relatively new to the board to legislature, that is something that just started last
year, so that's really a test of it to that department. For human resources, civil service
and human resources of advanced recruitment, training, and employee support, through continued
participation in the New York State Civil Service Health Initiative, approving 64 titles
making 194 appointments and reviewing 5,619 applications, and offering 70 civil service exams
while upgrading Neo-Gov systems for the greater efficiency.
The Department of Strength and Workforce Development by adding key staff, launching the county's
First leadership's development series providing training to 87 employees and managers and
expanding outreach to job fairs, school engagements and onboarding 119 new employees.
Employing engagement and retention were reinforced through recognition events, milestone awards and
expanded benefits, including new health and dental options, retiree savings from Medicare,
advantage and automated 24-7 employment verification further modernizing the system.
And information technology services provided critical support to the Center of Government
Project by migrating multiple department worth spaces.
Quite the feet.
It's obviously new network connectivity and advancing the relocation of the downtown data center.
Core IT operations remains strong with 2,500 plus health test tickets resolved,
major server upgrades, and software migrations completed and expanded use of the laser
fees to improve county-wide processes.
The Department's strength and cybersecurity through new tools, configurations, near-state
shared services, initiatives, and ongoing staff engagement, while GIS supported, essentially
an essential 911 election and FEMA mapping needs.
ITLs also enhanced governance by updating IT policies and proactively monitored emergency
artificial intelligence technologies to inform operations.
Go, let's begin.
Thank you, Norma.
So moving into our Department of Planning and Sustainability, that department updated the
biennual housing snapshot, including the department's first equity indicator, to provide information
on factors influencing housing and cost burden on residents.
The Department also hosted a three-day statewide conference of nearly 30 municipal sustainability
staff from around the state to foster connection shared purpose in ways to be more effective.
They also launched the significant refresh of the IthacaTrails.org website by rebranding,
rebuilding, and optimizing the site for mobile users, among other accomplishments.
The Department of Probation and Community Justice, their entire staff received training on
the Community Resiliency Model, embedding principles of procedural justice into the practices
of the department by removing factors that identify individuals by name or demographic
information.
The department continues to engage in collaborations with ultimate reentry opportunity, college
initiative of state, TST BoC's Cornell Cooperative Extension and other local service providers
to enhance accessibility to community resources for their clients.
And the Department has also begun a data analysis study into the long-standing trend of disproportionate negative outcomes for people of cover,
who are placed on criminal court probation supervision.
Funding from the New York State Department of Criminal Justice Services will be available for this study, and will be conducted by partners from SUNY Albany.
Within the Department of Recycling and Materials Management,
As was noted in the state of the county comments, they've finalized the department's local
solid waste management plan, they've initiated a back-to-basic social media campaign
to introduce residents to the 4Rs, reduced reuse, recycle, and rethink, and they've also conducted
significant work on a USDA-funded project, feeding people and feeding soils in Tompkins County
to support whole hierarchy management of food waste, to include coordinating an on-farm composting
workshop, supporting prepared food donation, and developing resources for businesses who are managing
food scraps.
Within our share of support, they were successful in instituting the second crisis alternative
response and engagement or care team, as well as obtaining recognition from the state DCJS,
along with funding to study the care team model and partnership with RIT.
They successfully negotiated and settled the new bargaining agreement with the corrections
union and continues to maintain and update their transparency hub.
The Department of Social Services, as was noted, hired a senior case worker through
New York State and that case worker has been able to help 25 families transition from shelter
to permanent housing. The department has exceeded their federal child welfare benchmarks
under the Family First Prevention Services Act, noting that 67% of children in foster care
our place in Kinship Care, which is above the target of 50 percent, and 7.9 percent of children
in foster care are placed in institutional settings, which is below the state target of 12 percent.
We know that the department's been a significant amount of time, coordinating the opening of a
code Blue Shelter and Warming Center at Cherry Street, and partnership with the Provider Volunteers of America,
providing hold mother shelter to as many as 55 individuals per night this season.
Our Veteran Services Department has celebrated staff expansion with the hiring of the department's first dedicated Veteran Service Officer.
They've expanded their traditional Veterans Resource Fair into the Department's first Veterans Expo, co-sponsored with New York State Senators Lea Web's Office.
And they continue to engage in activities through Veterans Week, as well as other various opportunities funded by the Joseph P. Dwyer Veteran's peer support project.
In our Department of Whole Health, within the Division of Community Health, they have increased
support for pregnant people and families by co-hosting the first-ever community baby shower
and launching free childbirth education classes within the Mental Health Clinic.
The Department has focused on meeting people where they are increasing services.
Mental health nurses have also partnered with public health nurses to host a vaccine clinic
at an areas supportive housing site.
Within their division of health promotion, they completed the 2025 whole health community
needs assessment and partnership with Cornell students and local agencies.
This process engaged over 1,200 residents and included surveys, focus groups, and stakeholder
interviews.
Further from the department, within the division of children with special care needs, they
continued to address the provider shortage in early intervention by hiring a special instruction
teacher.
And then within the Division of Environmental Health, they've issued 30-boiled water orders, rapidly
addressing a report of e-book, e-coli, and a private water system, collaborating with
finger-like grass roots to ensure safe and successful mass gathering, and with no enforcement
action required, as well as conducting lead and copper oversight and education.
And then within their proposed program, they hosted an art show with art from proposed participants,
which was well attended, not only by participants but also by community members.
Within the Department of Workforce Development, they continue to partner with Ithaca
Area Economic Development to co-develop the Tompkins Build Program, playing a key role in
their workforce opportunity for rural communities, work grant, and celebrating two cohort graduations.
From that program. They also, as was noted, employed 137 youth through their summer youth employment program across 49 work sites.
And they've also, this year, we're successful in sharing the ninth biennial healthcare careers expo with 400 plus registered students from 16 schools, connecting with 35 healthcare exhibitors and career pathway experts.
And then within the Department of Youth Services, they continue to strengthen the homeless
and run away youth service continuum, holding community listening sessions with stakeholders
to gather data to inform emergency and crisis housing for youth.
They continue to develop recommendations for incorporating a youth shelter and young adult
section into the county's broader shelter plan.
And they continue to explore across the departmental collaborations to address this issue
with other county departments.
Beyond that work, they've also continued to improve access to their website, as well as supporting youth programming across the county through the municipal use services system.
And that brings us home.
Thank you, county administration, for that little glimpse of everything that has happened over the past year.
Are there any questions for Bridget, Norma or Corsa on the presentation of
Veronica Pillar and then Greg Massey?
Not a question, but just thank you to all the many many staff who actually did those things.
You make this county run and it's very impressive seeing a lot of highlights in one place.
Greg Massey?
Veronica, so what I was going to say,
And just echo, you know, you sort of look back
and the year seems like a blur.
And then when you put it in this context,
we didn't really have to do much
if any of that work.
We just said this sort of set by and make sure
that I was supported and resource.
And it's really amazing.
I do think we have probably the best county government
in New York State, hands down.
And I would challenge anybody to tell us otherwise.
And we have incredible staff and that's what makes us special.
This was fascinating to see the breadth of work that we're able to accomplish.
I hope the list continues to grow.
So thanks for everybody who contributed.
Thank you.
I respect him.
One to thank you, the staff who did all this work and note that it really feels very
mission-driven and very much in alignment with our mission.
I think it's rare sometimes to hear about a ton of work from an organization and feel like every single item that you're listening is like that is what we want to be doing for people so
I'm really proud of the work and just thank you for it.
Thank you. Anyone else?
Okay.
Okay, thank you, Corsa and staff, we definitely appreciate the work you do and the work
that all of our staff does that makes us look really good.
Okay, more Josephson, County Attorney.
Well, good evening, that really isn't impressive list and so I've been making a list of items
that have come my office as well just since the beginning of the year to give you a sense of
what we're working on and they start with procurement policies relating to procurement that's
governed by the federal transit administration, namely smoothing things that are on procurement
with T-CAT, service animals, DSS issue, various open items with Cornell real estate, open
meetings, law issues, including one's raised recently by legislators and the Yon-Dong
Sago with T-Cog, issues relating to installment agreements and closing some loopholes
of installment agreements for pay off of property taxes that have enabled certain persons
and companies to take advantage of the county.
Data day interactions with HR on employment matters, things like accommodation requests
and the like that have significantly go implications.
Public safety issues and related grant funding.
The foil ability of certain 9-1-1 records, planning for collective bargaining negotiations,
addressing health care costs through potential legal means, and the development of comprehensive
proposal with administration for the Office of Human Rights and the Human Rights Commission.
in addition, in our litigation area, since the beginning of the year, we filed two motions
to dismiss new litigation against the county and have responded in full to one state division
of human rights complaint, alleging that the county denied an individual, a public accommodation
and at one of the county's facilities.
So I look forward to continuing those
and to continuing working on the numerous interesting issues
that are presented to us by individual legislators
and our departments.
Any questions?
Happy to answer.
Randy Brown?
Yeah, I was at a meeting and fought came up from the sheriff's recent decision to not
share that data with any other public safety entity or anybody else.
I told him that I think we have the right to say that, but I was a bunch of your thoughts
to that that we don't have to share if we don't want to.
That is correct, and that is, we have adopted that position also in terms of, well,
without going too deep into the weeds, we have adopted that position as well with respect
to request for public disclosure or flocking information.
Thank you.
Any other questions or comments for Mori?
Thank you, Mori.
Next, we have Darrell Tuttle from Finance Department.
Good evening.
In addition to the normal operations of my department,
my staff's getting ready to distribute approximately 2,000,
1099s when it comes to vendors we've used,
and W2s for the employees that work here at the county.
all to stay in compliance with IRS, this also includes this smitting the information itself to the IRS.
Also, we're getting ready to put the finishing touches on a mandated annual report that I have to do for the New York State Controller for the estates that the director of finance or the deputies are appointed as public administrator throughout the year.
And lastly, I'm getting very close to wrapping up the county's official statement for the 26 that issuance and that should come out shortly.
If you have it, I also have any questions.
Any questions for Darrell?
Okay, thank you Darrell.
Appreciate it.
Are there any resolutions to be added to or withdrawn from our agenda?
Okay, we're going to move on to the consent agenda.
resolutions and appointments to be voted on as a group unless any member of the legislature
requests that a resolution or appointment be instead included separately and individually
as part of the business of standing or special committees. So just to walk everyone
through this is essentially a clump of resolutions that we're going to pass through
all at once. If for some reason you don't feel comfortable or don't want to vote
any one of these resolutions you could do what's called pulling it off. We'll pull it off and then the
chair of the committee will bring it forward separately. Let me know if there are any questions as we move
through this because I don't think we've done consent to agendas yet. Okay. Advisory Board appointments
ID 13790. We have a few HED appointments. Strategic tourism planning board, Michelle Courtney
important honor at large member, term expires December 31, 2028, Megan Omohundro, arts and
culture representative, term expires December 31, 2028,
housing and economic development
committee, resolution A, budget adjustment plan, okay? Just like Randy Brown did. Thank you
for being the example, Randy. Resolution B, budget adjustment planning and sustainability,
Community Development Block Grant, CDBG Award Healthy Homes, ID 13796, and I wonder I haven't been able to see the whole nightmare. I forget I have glasses.
Resolution C, Budget Adjustment, Planning and Sustainability Department, Acceptance of New York State Homes and Community Renewals Office of Community Renewal Community Development Block Grant,
CDBG housing strategy ID137-97.
Can I have a mover for our consent agenda?
Move by Travis Brooks and seconded by Christy B. and Cloney.
And all those in favor of voting for our consent agenda, please raise your hand.
And that is unanimous. Thank you all.
Next we're going to move to the standing and special committees reports.
And we'll move to the Community Recovery Fund Advisory Committee, Deborah Dawson Vice Chair.
The Community Recovery Fund Advisory Committee has not met, and most of what it might
still have to do, will be moved to budget capital and personnel.
Thank you.
Any questions for Deborah Dawson?
Thanks, Doug.
Next is the Downtown Facilities Special Committee, Randy Brown chair.
We have a vet and we're not planning to meet in the near future.
Thank you.
Just reminder too, we are going to go ahead and have our special meeting.
This coming up Monday, January 26th at 5.30.
Thank you all for doing the doodle poll.
And I know that we have some people that might be out of town, feel free to tune in.
and join us via the Zoom link that will be provided by the clerk's office.
Next, are there any questions for Randy Brown?
Or comments? Thank you, Randy. Next, we have facilities in infrastructure committee.
Please share it with chair. I think I get the same report everyone else has. We have not met,
but we'll be in the future and welcome to the new committee members. Look forward to your
It looks like we'll have a busy agenda this next year.
Thank you, Lee.
Any questions or comments for Lee?
Okay.
Next, government operations committee.
Greg Muzzie chair.
As the designated survivor of this committee, I look forward to
reconstituting it with more members and meeting to do all the wonderful things that we do in
And hopefully it can remain its place at the top of the committee list in honor of Manachampion.
Oh, health and human services or any questions for Greg.
Thank you, Greg.
Health and human services committee Travis Brooks chair.
We don't meet until February 18th, but I'm very excited about getting the band back together and bringing in new members.
You're seeing what kind of trouble we can get into and what kind of difficulties we can give.
Of course, over the next year.
It's good.
That was good trouble, right?
We are ready.
That's a good trouble.
Very good trouble.
As long as you don't give me any, I'm very happy.
You're good, more.
Yeah, yes.
Any questions or comments for Travis Brooks?
Next we're going to move on to housing and economic development committee.
Greg Mesichir.
Well, unlike my Slack or colleagues,
we didn't have a new day, just get it, just get it, come on friends, I'm fresh tonight.
We met on Wednesday, January 7th, we had a number of items from our planning and sustainability
department. Most notably we got to see the 2024 housing snapshot, would encourage everybody
to take a look at that watchset meeting or take a look at the snapshot, which I believe
who is already posted on the department's website should be accessible there, looking over
on my friend's system, make sure.
Other than that, I also would encourage you, as somebody who is not an avatrails person,
theethicotrails.org was inspiring to take a look at, there's really highlights the natural
and some of the recreation ways and multimodal transportation trails that we have throughout our community.
Our team and the advisory steering group that worked on that with Nick and our planning department did an incredible job.
It's a great website. It'sethicattrails.org.
But highly, highly, highly, highly recommend everybody takes a look at that.
And even in the cold weather, get out there and try to move a little bit and experience our region.
I do have a resolution pulled from the consent agenda, so if I may, I'd like to move resolution
A. Doc ID 13794, budget adjustment planning and sustainability, community housing development
fund and CHDF for around 24 and around 25 awards.
Can I have a second or please?
Seconded by Randy Brown?
Yeah, I had a question, it was really just a bad question, so as I'm looking at the various
I guess you'd call these grants from the housing trust. So, an example, round 25 project,
Varna, CHTA, and it says, original funding approval, and then remaining counting portion
of awards. So, is that 440 altogether, or a 320 total?
I want to look today, but I want to take a stab at, I'm guessing, we awarded 300, and we have
to pay out which is remaining, is that correct?
So this is a project that's funded by multiple partners.
So the total award isn't all county money.
The town of Dryden has a piece of, I think this one,
I could pull up which partners are involved.
But the remaining county portion is just the part that's coming
from this budget adjustment.
And in this particular case, it's not actually the county's money
that we put into the CHC, it's the funds that come from the IDEA for projects that are
receiving pilots.
So what happens here then, so is for new for sale module homes, and total grant was $3,000,
so we're giving, we're donating $80,000 per housing unit to make it affordable for
some of you to buy.
Okay, so I was just trying to do the math of what we're actually trying to achieve here.
So what are these houses self-for? What's the goal for them to self-for?
They'll sell based on the income of the people who buy them.
So they'll be affordable. They'll be spending no more than 30% of their income on the mortgage taxes and insurance.
Okay. Thank you.
Also, sorry, David. I wouldn't have wanted you to stay this whole meeting. I should have moved you up, so sorry about that.
Happy to be here.
Good liar.
Just vote for it.
Any other questions or comments on resolution A?
Okay. All those in favor, please raise your hand.
And that is unanimous. Thank you.
Okay, anything else for Greg and any questions or comments?
Thank you, planning, energy and environmental quality commitment committee, Veronica Pillar
Vice Chair.
Back to the rhythm of not having met peak has not met since our last meeting, and the next meeting will be
sometime determined by the new peak members.
Thank you Veronica, any questions for Veronica?
comments? Okay, I have the next two and I will say the same as Veronica. We have not met
and again, as far as the intergovernmental relations, it was great to see our state reps.
Join us last Friday and I'm working on getting some of our federal reps to come in and meet
with the legislators. So just want to give you all the heads up. When I write receive notification,
I will let you all know and hopefully we can talk about what's coming forward with some of our
benefits and entitlements that we receive here on the local level. Workforce diversity and
inclusion committee Veronica Pillow chair. We have not met since the last legislature meeting
and we are also not meeting in January after all because that did not work out with the
I'm combined with the appointment process, but we will meet in February at an unknown time
because our wonderful members, I'm so happy to have, don't like the original time,
but we'll figure it out offline.
Thank you, Veronica. Just to point out one thing too that WDIC worked on last year
that I definitely hope someone takes the reins and continues to move forward is they
and I hope someone that is on that committee continues to work on that and bring that forward
hopefully to the budget committee.
Because there was definitely motivation, and it seemed like something that our employees
would really be interested in.
Budget capital and personnel committee, Deborah Dawson, Vice Chair.
Yes, we're slackers.
We have not met this month.
We will meet next month, we have five members carrying over from last year and two new ones,
which I'm looking forward to.
I think one of the things we want to do this coming year is work a little more closely
and collaboratively with WDIC to take more recommendations from that committee and try to
turn them into policies and initiatives.
Thank you.
Thank you, Deborah. Any questions for Deborah Dawson?
Okay, next we are going to move on to number 13 individual member filed resolutions and Travis Brooks has some appointments. He would like to move for us.
That's a few appointments office for the aging advisory committee to buy a esteemed at large member, term expires December 31st, 2021, community mental health service board, do Bergman at large member, term expires December 31st, 2021, and community mental health service board substance use subcommittee,
Student Bergman Community Mental Health Services Board representative term expires December 31st,
Can I have a seconder please?
Seconded by Chris Christie.
My God.
On me.
Yes.
Imagine a bean sitting on a nice girl.
The Bianca.
Thank you.
You were doing so well.
I was doing so well then.
I just wanted to, you know.
Okay.
Are there any comments and we can also go to executive session if we need to talk about these appointments?
Okay, all those in favor, please raise your hand.
Okay, that's unanimous.
Thank you.
And we have two sets of minutes, January 6th and January 13th.
Can I have a mover please?
Move by Travis Brooks, seconded by Dan Wakeman.
And are there any corrections, comments, questions about the minutes?
I see none.
All those in favor, please raise your hand.
Great.
And just to announce, again, our special meeting that's going to occur Monday, January 26th at 530.
And can I have a mover?
Is there any unfinished business?
This reminder that everyone right at your calendar is we need to schedule our committees for
this year.
And can I have a mover to adjourn?
Move by Rachel Aslan, seconded by Judith Hubbard, all those in favor please raise your hand.
That's unanimous.
Thank you.