WAWARSING – Town councilmen and supervisor Leonard Distel approved a resolution at their town meeting last week to support the Town Clerks And Tax Receivers Association in its efforts to resolve issues involving the United States mail.

"We've had an on-going problem since they closed the Newburgh sorting facility," said councilman Stephen Bradley. "Our tax collector Robin Anderson informed us a while back that some of the bills she sent out in early January never arrived, some folks she had to send to twice, and several she had to send three times before they got them."

Checking with the local postmasters in Ellenville and Napanoch, Bradley was informed that since the Newburgh closure, mail from the area was being hauled to Albany to be sorted. In the event that Albany was too busy to sort the mail, it was being transferred to Newark, NJ, sorted there, sent back to Albany, and then back to Ellenville and Napanoch.

"That just increases the chance for mail being lost," Bradley added. "For us to have to mail a tax bill three times to a local customer before they get their bill is ridiculous. So we are fully in support of what the Town Clerks and Tax Receivers Association is doing here, trying to get this back local."

Also up for discussion were bugs. According to Bradley, several pieces of equipment that are part of the Kerhonkson pump station have to be replaced after an insect, possibly a spider, crawled into a variable flow meter and electrically fried the instrument. While a claim for $6,000 plus has been filed with the insurance company to cover what was lost and replaced, the board approved the purchase of parts to get the pump station working the way it needs to be now.

Also being upgraded is the variable frequency pipe locator used by town employees to locate pipe lines and valves. According to Bradley, the town's current one is old and antiquated and doesn't work particularly well, resulting in the town having borrowed the villages' more modern locator a few times. However, he added, when a new home was going up in Napanoch and the sudden need and lack of a working pipe locator surfaced at an inopportune time, town employees ended up borrowing equipment from a private contractor. Purchasing the PL 2000 Multi-Frequency Pipe Locator from AP Certified Testing LLC of Ringwood, NJ, for $3,615, the board agreed, will eliminate the need to use broken equipment and further sharing, plus the purchase will include training for all town water and sewer employees.

In other news, the town board approved various payments to Blauer Associates of Nescopeck, PA and approved an agreement for providing administrative services to assist in the implementation and administration of the Small Cities grant for refurbishing the Kerhonkson Water District, to be capped at $24,000.

To date, Blauer has located and secured $1.8 mllion in grant funding for the town over the last three years.

Also discussed last week were the annual spring flushing of hydrants in Napanoch and Kerhonkson, to take place throughout May, and planning for a 'Clean the Honk' day being organized by local resident Stephen Grunet — call 532-1633 for information.

In other business, the town will be purchasing a video camera to tape town and planning board meetings and is planning on airing the meetings on Channel 23 starting with the first meeting in May.

"One of the things that I think is important, once we get into another election season, is to tape our debates," Distel noted, pointing out the recent sparse numbers in attendance for such events. "Both parties need to send their message out and this is something that can be helpful in the future."