Fourteen Forum

Tonight's Town Board meeting may provide some insight into the thinking of the Town Board with regard to the Conservative Party’s great cash cow, Water District 14. The Town Board must act, either setting a date for a public vote on whether to permit some $830,000 to be approved and paid for by all town residents for work already billed to Water District 14 or withdraw the plan. A good chunk of our money has already been improperly paid to the contractor without required change orders. To date the district is $740,000 over the agreed to and stipulated bid of 6.4 million with still more work to complete. Thank God for the diligence and competance of the auditors of the State Comptroller's Office who have been doing digging that's been unnerving to some people with their hands on the public wallet.

We might also learn more about the grant for $100,000 the town is to receive from Senator Bruno’s office which is to be directed at Water District 14. It seems no one has been told the specifics of what the money is to be used for and how it is to been expended. We note that the Supervisor has not played games refusing to accept the money, sign contracts, send in paperwork and so on that he employed to delay the $80,000 grant finally received from the Rensselaer County IDA. (Perhaps because this money may wind up in the pocket of his Conservative Contractor.) No Special Board meetings will need to be scheduled with this grant to force him to follow the rules. But the Town Board better keep an eye on how this gets spent, especially ensure that the Board approves all disbursements.

Town residents may learn whether they will be given the right to vote on the Evers' proposal to have everyone pay for the cost overruns of Water District 14 so that his contractor can legally keep the money already improperly paid and then some. The North Greenbush Pipeline rarely makes predictions, but we bet taxpayers will send Mr. Evers and his Contractor Chairman a resounding message, NO!

Town Clerk Assails Adversaries
We'll save the details for Friday. Suffice to say that the Town Clerk has been busy trying to smear her adversaries with the State Comptroller, accusing them of having "no show" jobs. She must be confused with her brother's position working somewhere in the State Senate where no one cares whether you put down you graduated from Manhattan College on your official job application when in fact you didn't.