NEW MILFORD — Dozens of residents came out Thursday night to hear a plan to build a power plant the old Century Brass mill site.
While residents seemed to approach the proposal with an open mind, many raised questions or concerns about what the project would mean for the environment and the town’s economy.
Residents were also wary because of a previous proposal from Sempra Energy to build a power plant in town in the late 1990s, which was overwhelmingly rejected by the town.
“This isn’t Sempra,” Mayor David Gronbach said at Thursday’s Economic Development Commission meeting. “It’s a different site. It’s a different technology. Hopfeully, it’s a different attitude. Give these guys an opportunity.”
Under the proposal, Panda Power Funds, a company based in Dallas, would buy the site for $2.8 million and build a 550-megawatt plant powered by natural gas on eight to 10 acres of the 70-acre parcel.
The project is expected to provide 300 to 500 jobs during construction and then 25 to 30 full-time jobs to operate the plant when it comes online, which company officials expect would be in 2021.
Officials from Panda Power Funds unveiled the plan at Tuesday’s Town Council meeting and were on hand at Thursday’s commission meeting. According to its website, Panda Power Funds is a private-equity firm that develops, owns, operates and manages investments in clean energy.
Bill Pentak, vice president of investor relations and public affairs for Panda Power Funds, stressed it was still very early in the process and there would be many opportunities for the public to learn about the project and speak with representatives.
Residents would have to approve the sale of the land at a town meeting. If the plant is rejected after the vote, the company would leave and the land would revert back to the town’s control.
Air quality was the biggest environmental concern at Thursday’s meeting.
Pentak said building this new plant would replace a less efficient or coal-powered plant somewhere else in the country, which would ultimately improve the country’s air quality.
While everyone at the meeting agreed natural gas was cleaner than coal, they worried the emissions would pollute New Milford’s air, which already has toxins blown in from industrialized areas in surrounding states, including Pennsylvania. Some residents also challenged how clean natural gas is when it’s added to the pipeline Panda would use. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
CCM: CT's unfunded mandates penalize taxpayers, municipalities
Patricia Daddona
Connecticut has an all-time high of more than 1,250 state mandates, but relief from even six of the more burdensome ones could provide savings for property taxpayers and municipal budgets.
That is the overarching finding of "Unfunded State Mandates: The Corrosive Impact on Property Taxpayers," a study released this week by the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities.
Each mandate that is unfunded, or only partially funded, adds to the already overburdened property tax, and reduces local discretionary authority, said Ron Thomas, deputy director of CCM. Connecticut has had nearly 60 new mandates over the last two years, he added.
"If the state believes an existing or new mandate is appropriate public policy, then the state should be prepared to pay for it," Thomas said. "Enacting mandates is one thing, but to simply pass the buck onto Hometown Connecticut ─ should have no place in today's political and economic climates. Each mandate that is unfunded, or only partially funded, only adds to the burden of the property tax."
Some key proposals from the CCM report on unfunded state mandates in Connecticut include:
- Allowing towns and their boards and commissions the option to publish legal notices online, which could improve citizens' involvement in the operation of local government;
- Updating the thresholds that trigger the prevailing wage mandate for public construction projects, which would free-up state and local dollars and jumpstart and expand projects; and
- Prohibiting municipal fund balances (essentially "emergency contingency funds") from inclusion when determining municipalities' ability to pay.
The “Safety Certification for Transportation Project Professionals” (SCTPP) program is aimed at the thousands of transportation project supervisors, foremen, inspectors, project planners and designers who could make a huge, industry-wide safety impact by learning core competencies necessary to identify and mitigate potentially life-threatening on-site risks.
The SCTPP program is also intended to create a “safety benchmark” for all future civil engineering and construction management program graduates who are interested in employment with industry-leading firms.
“Ensuring that our project sites are the safest possible environments for all who work in and travel through them can't just be the safety director's job,” say ARTBA Chairman David Zachry, president and CEO of the Zachry Corporation in San Antonio, Texas. “There are no safety 'accidents.' There are safety incidents. And we need to do our best to prevent them. It is our moral obligation and it is good business practice.”
Zachry, who has been a driving force behind development of the SCTPP program, adds: “Our goal, collectively working through ARTBA and its Foundation, is to cause a demonstrable reduction in the number of deaths and injuries that occur on and around transportation project sites each year. We believe we can do that if all of the key decision makers, from project inception through completion, have safety top of mind. This program will identify and reward those who have demonstrated competency in this critical management area.”
ARTBA recruited a high-level, independent certification commission to establish operational policies to guide the SCTPP program and provide leadership, governance and on-going oversight.
The nine-member commission is co-chaired by Ross Myers, CEO & chairman of Allan Myers, Inc., the largest civil construction and materials supply firm in the Mid-Atlantic region, based in Pennsylvania, and David Walls, president & CEO of Austin Industries in Dallas, Texas, one of the nation's largest diversified construction firms with an annual volume of $2 billion and over 7,000 employee-owners. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE