Board resolution threat for reservoir access

By CHRIS CONROY

BETHEL, NY — After emerging from an executive session that left the room virtually empty of people, the Bethel town board passed a resolution that will allow the supervisor to address health and safety issues regarding access to the Toronto dam area.

Beginning the August 14 meeting despite the blackout, the Town of Bethel board proceeded briskly through their agenda. Ten minutes after power returned, with items still pending on the agenda, the board entered an executive session. As is usually the case, the gathered crowd left.

When the board emerged from the executive session, a “resolution authorizing consolidation of recreation/boat launch areas on Toronto Reservoir” was introduced. The resolution recognizes letters received from the Sullivan County sheriff, Town of Bethel highway superintendent, the chief of the White Lake Fire Company and the chief of the Smallwood-Mongaup Valley Fire Company. These letters, according to the resolution, all “outline health and safety concerns associated with the Toronto Dam Area.”

The resolution further states that the safety concerns cited in the letters are due to the fact that “the narrow road provides for difficult access for emergency vehicles to respond to an emergency and constrains regular vehicle patrols by law enforcement agencies.”

The correspondence from the highway superintendent recommended that the town-owned portion of the road be abandoned due to the fact that it dead-ends into private property.

This road is the only public access point to the boat launch at the Toronto dam area. A second access to the reservoir exists off of State Route 55 and is referred to in the resolution as “the Route 55 Area.”

The Toronto dam area access has been a source of contention among the board, the Smallwood Civic Association, Mirant, and Woodstone Lakes Development for more than a year.

The Civic Association has argued for complete access to the launch. Mirant owns and runs the power generating dam on the reservoir. Woodstone owns all the land between the end of the town road and the water.

Passing with a vote of 3-0, with supervisor Allan Scott abstaining and board member Victoria Simpson absent, the resolution authorized the supervisor to “review and investigate the health and safety issues presented to the Town” and “to confer with [Woodstone] and [Mirant] to assess the practicality of closing and consolidating the Toronto Dam Area with the Route 55 Area….” The final statement of the resolution allows the supervisor to “take whatever steps necessary to resolve the health and safety issues” in question.

As he sees it now, Scott sees the closing of the Toronto dam area access as the best solution. Improving the road to the point where the safety concerns would be alleviated is, Scott said, “foolhardy and expensive.”

Two points of access are mandated by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in the agreement which Mirant operates under. According to a FERC representative, the terms of that operating agreement were being submitted for review near the end of 2002.

Scott said he is not yet sure how the FERC requirement will affect the solutions available to the town. That, he said, is part of the investigation process.

A definite timetable for the investigation has not been set, but Scott, who is leaving his office as supervisor on September 2, said he would like to see it taken care of as soon as possible.