East Hampton Village's department heads including Police Chief Michael Tracey, Fire Chief Gerard Turza Jr., and David Collins, the superintendent of public works, presented the village board last Thursday with a long list of big ticket items such as a nearly $500,000 police communications van, a $1.3 million tower ladder fire truck, and nearly $5 million for the purchase of public works vehicles and infrastructure improvements to be included in the village's five-year capital plan.
Mayor Jerry Larsen had asked the department heads to present their requested expenditures directly to the public, he said, because "I think you're going to be a little overwhelmed [by] the amount of equipment that has not been taken care of over the last 20 years, and everything is coming due now."
Richard Lawler, the mayor prior to Mr. Larsen's election in September and a former village board member, had watched the meeting on LTV and took issue with Mr. Larsen's assertion that previous village boards had been negligent. "The impression that the prior board did not fulfill our obligation to adequately fund village infrastructure is false," he said, and cited several expenditures. The boards had approved the purchase of a nearly $34,000 police vehicle in June, and two others for nearly $72,000 in November 2019. For the Fire Department, the board had approved the $421,854 purchase of air packs in September 2019, and a $223,236 fire police vehicle in July 2019. In February, the board had authorized the expenditure of $303,000 for roof and metal frame repairs on a Department of Public Works building.
Nevertheless, the department heads made it clear that the village would need to spend far more on improvements in the coming years. Through 2025, Police Chief Tracey requested the purchase of three vehicles per year. "We could not survive every year without additional vehicles," he said. For the current fiscal year, he also requested two license plate readers that cost about $20,000 each, and the money for the new communi-cations van, which, he said, is the only vehicle in Suffolk County that can be used as a remote dispatch center for emergency services. The $497,258 cost for the van is a "bargain," he said.
"The van has served the village very well," said Mr. Larsen, a former village police chief. "We have all these outside contracts that we have to fulfill for dispatch, and during a couple of hurricanes we had to deploy the van into Montauk which had been cut off from communications from the rest of East Hampton."
Fire Chief Turza said his department is in need of "mission-critical apparatus replacements." The department's coverage area is 31 square miles and includes a mix of residential, commercial, and industrial properties as well as historical buildings and an airport, and the fire district is the largest and busiest in the region, he said. In the current fiscal year, he is seeking to purchase a replacement for Fire Engine #5 at a cost of about $600,000, as well as the department's sole heavy rescue truck, which he described as "the first line of defense" that serves as a "toolbox for every known and unknown situation." The truck in use is 25 years old and no longer meets operational standards, he said. A new one would cost about $650,000. He also hopes to replace one of three chief's vehicles, a 2010 Ford Escape hybrid that looks like "a matchbox car" and "is not up to the task of an emergency response vehicle." A new car would cost about $50,000. He budgeted for the replacements of the other two chief vehicles in the fourth and fifth years of the capital plan.
In the 2021-22 fiscal year, he wants to purchase a new hose truck for $550,000 and a brush truck, used for fighting grass fires and other off-road blazes, for about $250,000. The department's brush truck, he said, does not have adequate electrical or braking systems and "to be honest with you, the insurance company wants it off the road."
The largest upcoming expenditure would be for a new $1.3 million tower ladder truck, which Mr. Turza described as the "most critical piece of equipment." The department's truck is now being repaired and will not be back in use until January. "I do not sleep at night because of that," he said.
In the 2023-24 fiscal year, he wants to purchase a new airport crash truck -- to replace the existing one from 1988 -- for about $750,000.
In the final year, he will be seeking to purchase a $75,000 air-filling station for breathing apparatus tanks. The department has often had to scramble to have the tanks filled by vendors, he said.
The Department of Public Works "capital plan is quite extensive," said Mr. Collins, who noted that his department is responsible for maintaining every village property, above and below ground. "Our guys like to say, 'If it's not on fire and it doesn't need to be arrested, you're calling D.P.W.,' " he said. The department will need more than $4.7 million over the next five years to replace dump and garbage trucks and other vehicles, to rebuild Further and Dunemere Lanes, which are in need of drainage upgrades, to fix foundations and make other repairs to the Sea Spray Cottages, to reconstruct a section of the long-term parking lot, and much more, he said.
The department's fleet of trucks is, on average, 22 years old, he said, and $154,000 has been spent this year to repair them. A 20-year-old aerial lift truck, used for trimming trees, is in dire need of replacement, and a new truck will cost $300,000. The tree enclosures in the business district need to be replaced, as do many of the trash receptacles, which have rotted. The floor in the central garage at the Department of Public Works facility is not level and needs to be replaced, as does a bathroom there. The buildings at Georgica Beach and the tennis and basketball courts in Herrick Park are also badly in need of repair, he said.
Ann Grabowski, the assistant chief of the East Hampton Village Ambulance Association, said her department is currently seeking a generator to help charge ambulances, computers, and rooms in its wing of the Emergency Services Building. Next year, it wants to refurbish an ambulance for $174,000, and purchase two machines used for performing CPR for $33,000. In 2022-23, the department is requesting new power loaders, which make it easier for volunteers to lift stretchers into ambulances, and in 2023-24, it will seek to replace six patient care report computers at a cost of $15,000. In 2024-25, a new first responder vehicle may be needed, she said.
Robert Hefner, the director of historic services, said the restoration of the Dominy woodworking and clockmaking shops is 75 percent complete. The next phase of the project will involve adding the final touches to the shops' interiors, including the "work benches and tool racks to bring us back to what it was like when Nathaniel Dominy was working there." The cost to complete it is $550,000. About half of that money will be used to install mechanical systems that will make it "a fully functioning modern museum." A nitrogen-reducing sanitary system will also be installed on site at a cost of about $100,000. The village has received $85,000 from Suffolk County's Downtown Revitalization Grant Program for the work, and $10,000 from the Village Preservation Society. The goal is to have the museum open by July, he said, and it will be "one of the top museums of early American crafts in the country."
Mr. Hefner said $220,000 will be needed to finish the restoration of Village Hall, $80,000 for painting the Isaac Osborn House on Newtown Lane, and $30,000 for painting the Pantigo and Gardiner Mills.
Mayor Larsen said the village is working with accountants and auditors to develop a plan for paying for the improvements over the next five years, and would likely issue a bond to raise the money.