by Randy Pellis
FULTON, May 29, 2019 — Having heard the uproar of public outcry, the Fulton Common Council will reconsider their decision to demolish the dam at Sharp’s Pond after an engineering study determines what it would cost to save it.
A resolution ordering that study will be presented at the upcoming council meeting, Tuesday, June 4.
Originally thought to cost $1 million to fix the dam versus $150,000 to demolish it, the council voted at their May 21 meeting to demolish and thereby reduce the 100-plus- year-old Sharp’s Pond to its original free-flowing creek. At a public meeting Tuesday evening, attended by all six councilors, the mayor, the Commissioner of Public Works, a county legislator, a number of mayoral and council candidates, and other members of the public, no one was able to say where the $1 million figure came from.
“I made a bad vote,” said Fifth Ward Councilor Tom Kenyon of his May 21 vote in favor of demolition. “But I was looking at just dollars. I looked at $150,000 to take it down, and I don’t see where we had anybody quote us a million dollars to fix it. I don’t see it. But, I wasn’t thinking to ask to see it. So, I put $150,000 over here and I’m saying ‘Oh, it’s going to take us a million dollars to fix it.” So, that was my vote, and I should have voted the other way.”
That pretty much summed up the rationale behind the entire council’s unanimous vote to demolish the dam. The realization their vote was based on unsubstantiated information led them to call for the information they truly need to make an informed decision. Depending on the results of the engineering study that will provide that information, the council’s May 21 resolution may be rescinded, giving way to a call that it was said is coming from the community and grew in intensity throughout the meeting: save the pond.
During the course of the evening, the history of the pond, the dam, its maintenance, the intentions of common councils over the past 44 years, and more recently, the past 11, especially in relation to the DEC (state Department of Environmental Conservation), and the costs involved were all in contention, though well-laid out by Commissioner of Public Works Charles J. (C.J.) Smith.
After inspecting the dam a number of times over the last 11 years, failing it, requesting information from the city, and being ignored and stalled, the DEC finally gave the city two options in a June 2017 letter: either fix the dam or demolish it.
“They gave us two options in that letter,” C.J. Smith explained. “It’s either reconstruction or rehabilitation. If we were to go forward and put a new dam in, that’s reconstruction.
It’s beyond rehabilitation. That dam is circa 1890, early 1900s. It’s beyond rehab. It
needs full reconstruction. In doing that, you still have to deconstruct the dam that currently exists.
“What we’ve voted on in the last two-and-a-half years is decommissioning the dam. Any meeting we’ve had concerning Sharp’s Pond has been talk of decommissioning the dam.
“My thought process (on this) is, this has been around since 1900. Throughout those years, Fulton has been way better off financially, and we have not maintained (the dam) to the level it should have been. In recent years, it’s never been inspected where it was said, ‘Oh, that’s in good shape.’ So, we’ve been a lot better off monetarily over the past 50, 60 years and we haven’t found the way to maintain it. So, my thought process is, we’re in worse financial condition now than we ever were before, how do we expect that we’re going to be able to maintain it now moving forward after it’s rebuilt?”
The complete reconstruction of the dam will be a very involved regulatory process, according to Smith.
“This isn’t just throw a couple guys in the water, throw some concrete blocks up and mortar. This is permitting that’s involved through New York State DEC Fisheries, New York State DEC Section 10 Rivers and Harbors permitting, New York State DEC Dam Safety, and on a federal level, the Army Corps of Engineers, that’s assuming that it’s under a Section 404 nationwide permit. So you have to go through and get all these permittings from every regulatory agency just to do any work on this.
“I’m in a position where I have to act on regulatory agencies on a daily basis,” Smith said, “and throughout discussions leading up to today, it has been the decommissioning of Sharp’s Pond dam. So, I’m reacting to what we’ve decided and going forward with it, and saying I’ve got to get this, this, this, this permitting, this done, the engineers have to do this, this, and this. So, that’s what I’ve been doing in the last two years acting on it.
And so then today, we’re at a point now where we’re talking about having a public discussion about it, and I get your concerns. And I’m not the sole driver of ‘No way, nope, we’re not rebuilding the dam, we’re deconstructing it, we’re making a creek.’ That’s not where I’m at. This was a group decision at the time, and that’s what was decided on. It’s completely up to the Common Council and the mayor.”
Over the past two years Smith has been working with an engineering consulting firm, at a cost of $56,000, toward demolishing the dam and re-creating “a naturally-flowing continuation of the creek.”
The total cost to demolish and re-create came as a surprise to a council that expected to hear a price tag of $150,000.
Using city workers would be “the most cost-effective way of doing it,” said Smith. “It would be about $250,000 all together to remove (the dam and re-create the creek).”
Hearing this, Second Ward Councilor Dave Ritchie reacted, “We went from $150,000 to $250,000 already.”
A portion of a 2017 bond was meant for demolition of various city properties, Smith explained. It was not specific, but part of it was intended for Sharp’s Pond.
“At that time,” he said, “Nestle’s demolition was the priority. So, this took a back seat at that time. Since then, I have not had the money to move forward for the project. So, that’s why last week we bonded for additional money for it. In 2017, it was intended that we were going to be in the neighborhood of $250,000 for Sharp’s Pond. Then some of that money was utilized. Now we needed more money to actually do the project. That’s what you bonded for last week was the $150,000.”
The history of the city’s maintenance of the dam and its dealings with the DEC appear to be little-known by the general public, and the council’s seemingly sudden vote to demolish the dam, though discussions of it have actually gone on for years, seemed to many in the community to be overly hasty.
Fifth Ward candidate for Common Council, Audrey Avery expressed that view. “What is the urgency in this (demolition) being done by the end of the year?,” she
asked. “It’s been there for how long? What is the urgency right now? Why can’t we wait, let our council rescind the resolution to destruct and wait for the next administration to take care of it? I mean, there’s no urgency. There’s no urgency. That’s what we want.
That’s why we’re here. I’m not speaking for myself. There’s hundreds of people in the city that are disgusted. This should not have happened. We should not have voted yes just to vote yes. Let’s save it. Mayor really, we want to save it.”
Councilor Ritchie then added this bit of history he’d found in old newspaper clippings:
“It was 1975 when they blew it up to rebuild it,” he said. “One of the reasons they did that was to preserve it because it was supposed to be a historical site. So why do you want to ruin a historical site already?”
Audrey Avery responded, “Right. We don’t want to do this. Why did you all vote yes then? We don’t understand. That’s why we’re here.”
C.J. Smith jumped in. “I’m not looking to act on this by the end of the week,” he said. “I was looking to act on it two years ago when I had four constructive meetings about this with the councilors and the mayor.”
Again, Councilor Ritchie: “This started in 2010 when it was supposed to be inspected. I wasn’t here then.”
Fifth Ward Councilor Dennis Merlino then responded, “That’s the exact question we’re addressing. Why wasn’t this done then? Why wasn’t this done then? As a councilor, I
hear that question more than any other: why wasn’t it done then? That’s why we’re doing it now.”
Audrey Avery: “It’s natural beauty. It’s something that people want. We don’t want it destroyed. We should be fighting for it.”
Councilor Merlino: “We don’t want it destroyed. We want this incarnation of a fishing stream, a safe fishing stream that our kids can enjoy. You go there now, it’s an atrocity.”
Audrey Avery: “Because we let it deteriorate. When you let things deteriorate, that’s what happens.”
In case you can’t tell, by this time, emotions were heating up rapidly. Yet, a movement to rebuild the dam seemed to be growing throughout the room.
Fourth Ward Councilor Sam Vono summarized that feeling well and was first to initiate an actual community-wide action plan.
“What I’m hearing from the residents,” he said, “is to restore or rebuild but not lose it. So, that being said, why can’t there be some sort of a movement that says, ‘Save the pond.’? Get everybody in Fulton on board with this. Get businesses on board with this.”
Councilor Merlino voiced his support. “If it’s a historical site, and we can get the private money, I’m all in,” he said.
Councilor Vono added, “The Fulton Historical Society is well-aware of what’s going on and is interested in helping with this project.
“And I still think,” he went on, “regardless of what’s happened before, it’s all water over the dam. You’re wasting time. Just get to the point. Do we want to restore or not? Do we want to get a movement that says, ‘Save the pond’?”
Councilor Merlino urged this decision be slowed down.
“I would like to delay the decision,” he said. “I want to do every bit of research before changing the plan. We have two months until we have to revisit this vote. The bonds don’t go out until the end of July. So, a decision doesn’t have to be made until we’re about to bond for the work. We have two months to find out is it (the pond) on the registry (of historic places), is the public interest there, are we going to get private investment, do we have grants available, what kind of money can we get before we do that? So, we make this vote right now to take the whole project off the table, then that leaves us in complete limbo. We can continue this process, getting more information along the way, and then make a decision after we found out. I’m all for saving it if we can.”
Finally, Mayor Ron Woodward seemed to have had enough of the back and forth. “Do you want to restore it or not?” he asked and polled the council.
The desire to restore the dam was unanimous. With that, Councilor Ritchie threw a $100 bill onto the table as the first donation to the “Save Sharp’s Pond” fund.
The mayor again took charge of the meeting.
“We need the council to authorize C.J. or somebody to get an engineer in here to do a study and say what it’s going to cost to rehab it,” he said. “I’d like to do a resolution on that.”
It was then agreed such a resolution would be presented at the June 4 meeting of the Common Council.
County Legislator Frank Castiglia recommended the mayor name a commission to save the pond and voiced his support for the bonding reconstruction of the dam would require.
“The city is in an uproar about this,” he said. “At some point in time, you have to not look at dollars and cents. I’ve always been against bonding for equipment. The thing that I agreed with you on bonding for was the Nestle site because it was going to give you a return on your dollar. You bond for this pond, you bond for this dam, you’re building on something that’s going to give you a return on your dollar, because I can guarantee you, if people come to this city, and we’re doing everything we can to bring people into this city, and they come and they see what they have, and what you have for recreation and something for them to take their kids and learn how to fish in, something to walk around, a trail to walk around for exercise, they’re going to want to come here and live here.”
C.J. Smith ended with these words of caution: “Moving forward,” he said, “if you reconstruct the dam, we have to be better at maintaining it. We have to allocate x amount of dollars in those years for the maintenance that’s needed. So, when it comes to budget time and we’re like ‘how are we going to dwindle this budget down?’, we can’t just say ‘let it go’ because we’ll be in the same position we are right now.”
Lastly, mayoral candidate Deanna Michaels wanted it to be clear for all to understand just what the council had decided that night.
“The vote is not to save it (the dam),” she said. “The vote is to look into the cost that it would take to save it.”
All agreed and the meeting was adjourned.
Audrey Avery was named treasurer of the newly-founded “Save Sharp’s Pond” fund and will be accepting donations. Donations can be sent to her at 204 South Fourth Street,
Fulton, NY 13069. She can be reached by email at [email protected] or by phone at 315-345-0482.
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You can see that Mr. Merlino is trying to walk the line and that is his style. He has gone from”we had no option” to we must research this. You should have researched this 2yrs ago. Right now people want you to find out how much and do it. Not find out and then decide again. No the only reason to wait is to find out how much we have to bond to repair the dam and what grants are available.
I am looking forward to seeing what the study on replacement/rehabilitation yields, concerning costs/information. The historical aspects also needs to be addressed, as well as potential protected wildlife that may exist in that particular ecosystem, which could also yield potential funding opportunities. At least at that point, even if it does prove to be cost prohibitive, we can honestly say we tried absolutely everything possible to save Sharp’s Pond. The city owes at least that much to this community.
I am all for researching every option to improve Rowlee Beach and save Sharp’s Pond, as I said. And I also expressed that we need more public input.
Every single person at that meeting had been hand-picked and sent individual, personal email or personal invitations. A small group that calls itself “hundreds” were the members in attendance.
It appalled me that prior notice was not given to all members of the general public that we were going to meet specifically about the fate of Sharp’s Pond.
Looking out for ALL the residents of 5th Ward, and ALL the residents of the city, most residents hadn’t been to Sharp’s Pond in decades. Most residents expressed that they think all the parks should be fixed up, but putting all the money and effort into one park could be a problem. And most residents expressed that they certainly wouldn’t want their taxes to go up because of it.
We need to research what can be done that is in the best interest of ALL residents of the City, while trying to improve the condition of this park that used to be so important to the people of Fulton.
The one comical moment of this heated meeting was the statement, “The thing that I agreed with you on bonding for was the Nestle site because it was going to give you a return on your dollar.”, which was met with open jaws because that person absolutely crusaded against the demolition of the Nestle site, crusaded against bonding, and crusaded against Aldi coming to Fulton.
But back to the point, we need to improve communication to ALL MEMBERS OF THE PUBLIC when we are going to discuss important issues!
The general public was never informed that a meeting about Sharp’s Pond was going to take place, and the decisions made at this meeting may affect your taxes, and may affect whether their tax dollars, and the priorities of the City, will be for their local neighborhood or for Sharp’s Pond.
Research is vital to making an informed decision, but opportunity for ALL of the public to be involved in the decision process is more important.
My following email to my fellow Councilors when they informed me that at the last minute a DPW meeting was changed to a Sharps Pond meeting was met with anger by those Councilors.
My email:
“Are you really going to have a meeting about Sharp’s Pond, for the public, with no prior notice to the public?
You told the public that tonight’s meeting was a DPW meeting, but are holding a surprise meeting to decide the fate of Sharp’s Pond, again, without prior notice to the public.
I’m calling BS.
If you want to have a public meeting about Sharp’s Pond, call a public meeting about Sharp’s Pond.
The public is angrier about meetings they don’t know about than they are about Sharp’s Pond.
LET THE PUBLIC KNOW, WITH NOTICE, BEFORE YOU MEET ABOUT A TOPIC!
The Public is demanding it!
Dennis Merlino”
So Mr. Stacy, what you are saying is typical of a politician, do a study but when the study is done we are going to do just what we wanted to do no matter what the study says. Yep, I think everyone should see what you just said. Also what you said before wasn’t honest. You know where you say something to the effect like your buddy Mr. Merlino…”We had no option”…two peas in a pod… boy is Fulton in trouble with you representing them…
I really wish some of these politicians and community members who decide to have a “CAUSE” did their homework and had the facts BEFORE they start to put on a show……
Question: Has a study been done about the downstream effect of no dam at Sharp’s Pond during a heavy spring run-off? I have seen Waterhouse Creek go from a trickle to a raging torrent and flooding in the sixth ward during a spring melt-off and that’s with the dam and Sharp’s Pond holding some of it back.
Check your flood insurance!!
Dennis do your job and maybe we would not have needed this meeting. Why do you act like your the higher power in our city. You voted to demolish it now your talking from bith sides of your mouth. A typical politician who has much to gain. You are not as smart as you give yourself credit for.
This previous Memorial Day, my son and I went to my child fishing spot, Sharps Pond.
Ironically, he caught his first Large Mouth Bass there, just as I did back in 1997.
I hope it stays that way for my other son Jack, who was recently born last February.
Additionally, anyone that thinks that Sharps Pond can be coverted into a stream and provide the same fishing experience currently, either does not know anything about fishing, or is a complete lyer that is simply trying to get their own way.
Fishing in a stream is a completely different experience, than a large pond or lake. Most species at Sharps Pond, if converted into a stream, will simply look for larger bodies of water.
Thanks for the memories, Fulton.
Oswego Resident….
What’s scary is the fact the 1 million dollar is thrown around, voted on , with no knowledge of where that figure came from. Why no written estimate? Shouldn’t it been put out for bid? I wonder how many other things were voted on without real knowledge?
“Stupid is is what stupid does” the Mayor sits there like he had nothing to do with the deferred maintenance of the DAM over the last 25 years but pushes his pet project cleaning and dredging the Lake up because he wants a legacy project.
Seems to me the biggest cost is getting through the Regulation and bureaucracy of the NY State, otherwise the cost would be affordable. Think of the Building you could build for a million dollars, and we are only talking about a concrete Weir. Need to clean house in Fulton it has been the blind leading the blind for too long.
And, again, do some homework, get the facts…….
The Dam stops natural spawning in the Spring. Trapped & speared that whole length of that stream for years. Perch, N. Pike suckers, etc. Let it go back being natural in runs from the Oswego River to the Oswego River.
Everyone please if you are on board to save the Pond from being decommissioned and the pond turned into a stream, you need to attend the meeting this Tuesday June 4th at 7pm at the Fulton City Court. We are not trying to step on anyone’s toes or cause any other issues, we just want to stop this until the next Administration takes over. Thank You.