Before
THE TOBYHANNA TOWNSHIP BOARD OF SUPERVISORS
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In Re: Proposed Ordinance No. 459
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Tobyhanna Township Government Center Building
State Avenue
Pocono Pines, Pennsylvania 18350
Tuesday, March 12, 2007 beginning at 6:30 p.m.
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PRESENT: JOHN E. KERRICK, Chairperson
HEIDI A. PICKARD, Vice-Chairperson
HUGH LAMBERTON, Board Member
ANNE SINCAVAGE, Board Member
EMANUEL KAPELSOHN, ESQUIRE, Solicitor
ALSO PRESENT: PHYLLIS HAASE, Zoning Officer
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PANKO REPORTING
537 Sarah Street, 2nd Floor
Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania 18360
(570) 421-3620
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1 MR. KAPELSOHN: All right. I'd
2 like to call to order now the hearing to take
3 public comment on proposed Ordinance No. 459, an
4 ordinance amending the Tobyhanna Township Sewer
5 Ordinances No. 383 and 401, providing for
6 changes in the amount of tap-in fees within
7 section 4.02 of said ordinances.
8 The proposed Ordinance No. 459
9 would basically increase the minimum tap-in fee
10 from the current fee which is $4,000 to $5,800.
11 The increase to $5,800 is based on a sewer
12 system tap-in fee calculation study that the
13 township commissioned Entech Engineering to
14 perform, and which was performed between the
15 fall and the beginning of January; fall of 2006
16 and the beginning of January of this year.
17 In December of 2003, the governor
18 of Pennsylvania signed into law HB51, which is
19 now known as Act 57. Act 57 is an act that
20 provides for the imposition of tap-in fees with
21 various components that are designed to allow a
22 municipality, such as this township, to recover
23 specific capital costs that it has spent in
24 installing sewage treatment facilities,
25 collection lines and so forth. And that Act 57
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1 provides certain methods of calculating those
2 costs and then allocating those costs by means
3 of tap-in fees to the users of the sewage
4 treatment system.
5 Entech was hired by the township
6 to do a study and calculation based on Act 57,
7 taking into account current costs, the capital
8 expenditures, the new legislation and so forth.
9 And Entech came up with the $5,800 number as the
10 number that the township should appropriately be
11 charging at this point in time. So that's a
12 general explanation of what we have under
13 consideration here this evening.
14 Would anyone here like to speak on
15 that issue?
16 Yes, sir.
17 MR. HARRY RENZ: Harry Renz, M
18 like Mark, R-e-n-z. Is this going to be for
19 every sewer enforcement -- every area where the
20 sewers are, Tobyhanna Township sewers, or is
21 this just the Blakeslee area?
22 MR. KERRICK: This is just
23 Blakeslee area.
24 MR. HARRY RENZ: Are there other
25 sewers that belong to Tobyhanna or --
4
1 MR. KERRICK: There are no other
2 sewers in Tobyhanna Township that belong
3 to Tobyhanna Township.
4 MR. HARRY RENZ: Oh, I mean, are
5 there any intentions to taking any over or
6 expanding anything?
7 MR. KERRICK: Not to the best of
8 my knowledge.
9 MR. HARRY RENZ: My other question
10 to follow up on that is, when we all got sewers
11 in 1998 or whatever it was, I thought that all
12 the fixed costs, the moneys received from the
13 Feds and everything was already taken into
14 account and everything, including the sewer
15 processing plant, was already casted in concrete
16 and it was set. As far as our recoveries and
17 everything and the base of 680 per year was all
18 set, you know, before. I'm wondering why it
19 changed now.
20 MR. KERRICK: You're talking about
21 user fees, Mr. Renz?
22 MR. HARRY RENZ: Well, the user
23 fees that the sewer plant -- the tap-in fees
24 that go along with it, we paid 700 for the
25 initial users or hookups because it was
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1 subsidized and then the bill went to 4,000. But
2 I -- the $680 is set for what is being processed
3 now. But I thought all the costs for hooking in
4 was all set up in the very beginning because
5 there were so many units that were available on
6 the X amount of dollars that was -- the cost was
7 based on that. This was back in '97.
8 MR. KERRICK: Those costs were
9 factored in, but don't you think things have
10 changed since 1997 until today --
11 MR. HARRY RENZ: Well --
12 MR. KERRICK: -- as far as
13 expense?
14 MR. HARRY RENZ: What I'm asking
15 is, those costs were fixed and set at $4,000
16 except for the very first ones because they got
17 a subsidy from the federal government, the
18 grant. I'm just asking, nothing should have
19 gone up because the tap-in fee was set on those
20 basic units. That was what I understood,
21 anyway. If they added onto the sewer and came
22 up with new basic using whatever the increment
23 is, that could be tapped into or raised.
24 Am I -- did I understand it wrong
25 from before?
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1 MR. KERRICK: I wasn't here then
2 so I can't explain that, but I can tell you that
3 nothing's been added on that costs the taxpayers
4 anything. There's been some additions to the
5 sewer line, but that was always paid by the
6 developer, wherever it was added.
7 MR. HARRY RENZ: Well, that's what
8 I'm saying. Why would we want to increase the
9 money now when it's all been --
10 MR. KERRICK: It's not --- I'm not
11 sure I'm understanding your question, but it's
12 not being increased for people like yourself
13 who --
14 MR. HARRY RENZ: I know, I know --
15 MR. KERRICK: -- previously tapped
16 in.
17 MR. HARRY RENZ: -- that's why I'm
18 asking --
19 MR. KERRICK: It's for someone who
20 wants to tap in today who did not tap in
21 previously --
22 MR. HARRY RENZ: That's right.
23 That cost was already set up.
24 MR. KERRICK: I'm sorry to
25 interrupt you, but some of your costs that are
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1 figured into this are your user fees. And
2 obviously they have gone up considerably --
3 electricity, chemicals, sludge hauling -- since
4 1997. That's ten years.
5 MR. HARRY RENZ: The user fees
6 started at $680.
7 MR. KERRICK: This is also -- a
8 small percentage of that is calculated for user
9 fees as far as the plan.
10 MR. HARRY RENZ: Okay, but what he
11 read --
12 MR. KERRICK: You're welcome to
13 look at the report.
14 MR. HARRY RENZ: I understand, but
15 the way he read it was just pretty -- to address
16 the hookup fees.
17 MR. KERRICK: That's all this does
18 address, but a portion of that is all in the
19 formula.
20 MR. KAPELSOHN: It takes into
21 account, to an extent, the cost of operating the
22 facility -- the increased cost, the increased
23 capital value of the facility, the value that
24 someone's getting by tapping into the facility
25 at this point in time, ten years later, than
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1 when the initial users did.
2 MR. HARRY RENZ: I understand all
3 that, but now you're saying that that also
4 addresses the user fees which is the $680.
5 MR. KERRICK: That's not what we
6 said.
7 FEMALE VOICE: No.
8 MR. KERRICK: I'm just saying the
9 tap-in fees, a portion of that formula that they
10 use, the engineering firm uses, that also
11 calculates a percentage of what it takes to
12 treat -- or the cost of what it costs to treat
13 your sewage. Unit costs have, in some cases,
14 doubled since 1997.
15 MR. HARRY RENZ: I understand.
16 MR. KERRICK: Whenever those
17 fathers looked in the crystal ball in 1997, they
18 didn't do a very good job of the future. It's a
19 lot more to operate now than it was then.
20 MR. HARRY RENZ: John, I
21 understand that. It --
22 MR. KERRICK: And when they told
23 you that the user fees were good for 20 years, I
24 don't know how they could have said that.
25 MR. HARRY RENZ: It's not -- I
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1 don't think it was twenty years. I think it was
2 ten or eight.
3 MR. KERRICK: Well, I heard 20.
4 MR. HARRY RENZ: Well, it was
5 supposedly written in there.
6 MR. KERRICK: If it was ten, it's
7 good because it hasn't raised in ten years.
8 Then everything went well, they did look in the
9 ball and found out.
10 MR. HARRY RENZ: Okay. But I
11 guess you've got me more confused than ever now.
12 MR. KERRICK: I'm not trying to
13 confuse you. I'll be more than happy to allow
14 you to look at this and go through it.
15 MR. HARRY RENZ: Rather than
16 belabor it, I'll read it.
17 MR. KERRICK: Okay. Would you
18 like a copy? I'll give you a copy.
19 MR. HARRY RENZ: All right.
20 That'd be fine.
21 MR. KERRICK: Any other comment or
22 question?
23 MR. TIM KEIPER: Wouldn't the
24 sewer plan --
25 MR. KERRICK: Could you identify
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1 yourself?
2 MR. TIM KEIPER: Mike Keiper.
3 When the sewer plant was
4 originally put in, wasn't every lot in the area,
5 wasn't that in that calculation of being hooked
6 in?
7 MR. KERRICK: The calculation for
8 a vacant lot was only charged an assessment fee.
9 It wasn't -- a tap-in fee was not figured in.
10 So now you have the vacant lots that are being
11 used and a tap-in fee of $4,000. It doesn't
12 compute, and that's why they came up with this
13 house bill to -- obviously your costs have
14 increased.
15 Up until 2003, once your tap-in
16 fee was set you couldn't adjust it. If you do a
17 study and have -- go through the channels we
18 went through, we found out that we weren't
19 recouping what we needed to recoup to pay the
20 loan off.
21 MR. TIM KEIPER: Wasn't that in
22 the calculation of the -- of every lot that
23 was -- eventually was going to be tapped into
24 it? Or wasn't that -- they just took the
25 residents that was there now?
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1 MR. KERRICK: They pretty much
2 took the residents that were there on the vacant
3 lot. The only thing they used was the
4 assessment fee.
5 MR. TIM KEIPER: They didn't
6 include the tap-in fee figuring down the road
7 that no one would tap into it?
8 MR. KERRICK: I don't -- I can't
9 answer that a hundred percent until I read --
10 I'd have to go back into the old -- where they
11 came up with the figures.
12 MR. TIM KEIPER: Because if I had
13 a lot on that property and decided now to put a
14 house in, it's going to cost me $4,000?
15 MR. KERRICK: It'll cost you $5800
16 to tap into the sewer versus $4,000.
17 MR. TIM KEIPER: And then pay so
18 much a month to --
19 MR. KERRICK: That still doesn't
20 cost as much as a sand mound costs.
21 MR. TIM KEIPER: All right, I
22 understand. That's still a big chunk of
23 change --
24 MR. KERRICK: Yes, it is.
25 MR. TIM KEIPER: -- from what the
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1 original people paid.
2 MR. KERRICK: Yes, but the
3 original people paid $700.
4 MR. KAPELSOHN: And no doubt
5 somebody who taps in 20 years from now is going
6 to be paying a higher fee still because that's
7 what happens with costs.
8 MR. TIM KEIPER: But did the cost
9 go up that much?
10 MR. KAPELSOHN: Apparently,
11 according to the Entech study and the equations
12 for calculating the figures provided in the
13 state legislation, which is what Entech uses,
14 this is the appropriate amount. So I can't tell
15 you the specifics of how they do their
16 calculations. It's in the report, which you're
17 welcome to a copy of.
18 MR. TIM KEIPER: Yeah, well, it's
19 all French to me because I have sewer.
20 MR. KERRICK: I'll give you one
21 example: Sludge, we've been paying $0.08 for
22 years. I can't remember exactly what it was
23 when I started. It's going up to $0.12 to
24 dispose of the sludge.
25 MR. TIM KEIPER: I agree that
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1 things do go up but that seems like an awful big
2 jump.
3 MR. KAPELSOHN: Yes, sir?
4 MR. HARRY RENZ: Harry Renz.
5 I don't know your name, sir, but
6 you're correct on the original -- I was in all
7 the meetings when they put the sewers in. The
8 one thing you didn't mention was that every lot
9 was assessed $1500 towards the cost of the sewer
10 plant.
11 There was a $700 tap-in fee
12 subsidized -- the balance was subsidized by the
13 federal government. I forget what we got, a
14 million dollars or something like that -- and
15 then there was a basic $680 charge per annum.
16 And this gentleman is correct.
17 They counted all the lots that the sewer plant
18 could hold and said this is the maximum amount
19 of lots. And they just said any lots, whatever
20 it was, and they added in some commercial units
21 with it, and they came up with a fixed price.
22 Now, I understand what John's
23 saying, if it went from $0.08 to $0.12 per
24 sludge -- not that I want to pay higher sewer
25 costs, but that particular charge seems to be
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1 getting dumped on the new hookups rather than be
2 spread over the entire sewer usage because the
3 sludge is coming from the users. They're my
4 thoughts on it.
5 MR. KAPELSOHN: The best thing I
6 can suggest is to read the Entech study so you
7 see how the calculation is made, what figures it
8 takes into account, what the state's standards
9 are for making the calculation, because I think
10 we have to -- we have to believe that Entech
11 followed and properly calculated, according to
12 the state's equation that they provide.
13 MR. KERRICK: Someone else?
14 Anyone else with a question or comment?
15 Any questions or comments from the
16 board?
17 Going once, going twice.
18 There being no further comment,
19 this hearing is closed.
20 (Hearing concluded at 6:45 p.m.)
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8 I hereby certify that the
9 proceedings and evidence are contained fully and
10 accurately in the notes taken by me at the
11 hearing in the above matter; and that the
12 foregoing is a true and correct transcript of
13 the same.
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16 ______________________
17 EVILYS E. BRATHWAITE
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