Town Hall Notes: Dredging Set for Creeks in Jamesport and Aquebogue

Jamesport creeks will get dredged this year, Ken Testa, Riverhead's town engineer, said Wednesday, reporting that Supervisor Sean Walter has agreed to sign an agreement to hold Suffolk County harmless for any damages to bulkheads and the like that might occur in the course of dredging.

Walter had first baulked at the county's indemnification demand, but has now concluded that the risk is worth taking. "If we say no to indemnification, then that impacts our residents," he said several weeks ago.

Testa noted that all other towns on the East End have agreed to indemnity the county influenced, a factor that also influenced Walter's decision.

Testa said that dredging in South Jamesport and Aquebogue would begin around Dec. 15 and would include Hawks Creek, East Creek and the Miamogue Canal. He said the county has begun dredging in East Hampton and would work its way west.

Website upgrade rejected

Lori Pipcznski, the town's information technology officer, appeared at Wednesday's Town  Board work session to discuss what she sees as the need to redesign of the town's website, riverheadli.com.

She said that a comprehensive update would not only allow residents to watch Town Hall meeting on their own computers, it would also give them the ability to select the particular meeting they want to watch and to watch it whenever they wanted.

Currently, Town Board meetings and the like are shown on Channel 22, but people can only watch them at the time they're aired.

Councilman John Dunleavy said he agrees the website should be updated, but added, "I can't see spending money to enhance our website at a time we're raising taxes and laying people off." Supervisor Walter agreed. "I'm looking for the world, but I can't spend a nickel," he said.

Companies to pay more for false alarms

Police Lt. Bob Peeker and Fire Marshall Scott Davonski want to increase fines on owners and renters of commercial and industrial buildings whose fire alarms and break-in alarms turn out to be false alarms.

They also want to make sure the fines are collected to give building owners and tenants a financial incentive to ensure their alarm systems are working properly.

After listening to what Peeker and Davonski had to say at Wednesday's work session, the Town Board agreed that fines for false alarms, which are expensive for the police and fire fighters to respond to, should be as follows:

• Nothing for the first two false alarms.

• $100 for the third and fourth.

• $500 for the fifth and all false alarms thereafter.

Those who fail to pay the fines, the Town Board said, should be subject to a penalty of $750.

The new fee schedule, which has to have a public hearing before it can become law, would also apply to condominiums, co-ops and apartment buildings. The reason is because property taxes on condos, co-ops and apartment buildings are based on the same formula used to set taxes on commercial and industrial buildings.

 Town Board members agreed not to to assess fines on owners of one-family houses. They also agreed on how to split the revenues the fees brought in.

The police would receive full payment for responding to false break-in alarms. Fire districts would be credited with 70 percent of the fees for false fire alarms, with the Police Department, which also responds to fire alarms, getting 30 percent.

The new code, which Deputy Town Attorney Dan McCormick has been asked to draft, would also allow for an appeal process should a false alarm be caused by something outside the building owner's ability to control.

Peeker said that a false alarm code imposing lesser fines has been on the books for year but has never been enforced.