Today's Ithaca Journal covers a complicated problem that's come up at two recent Town Board meetings. Reporter Jennie Daley takes a close look at the water contamination problems at Cindy and Craig Basl's home and their struggles with the county and the neighbors to resolve them.
The county has declared the septic system next door, at 483 Hunt Hill Road, to be failed, and enjoined (through the Dryden Zoning Office) people from living there. (Dryden Town Board discussions at the last two meetings have focused on the enjoinment action.) There are some large questions of jurisdiction, evidence collection, and enforcement here, all complicated by the house remaining in the name of a woman who died in 1991 - a will hasn't been completely resolved, and there is a dispute over the septic system between the current holders of the property, and Casey Gaul, who was buying it from them.
The article doesn't offer a lot of hope, as a negative dye test (which doesn't necessarily mean there is no contamination) seems to have kept the county from taking action, but perhaps this publicity into the complications will help the Basls get closer to clean water. Nothing else seems to have worked so far.
(I covered discussion of this at the May meeting earlier, but haven't yet written up the discussion at last Thursday's meeting.)
An article on the Budget and Community Advisory Panel's report to the Legislature on how to handle budget issues quotes two Dryden legislators with divergent opinions. County Legislator Mike Lane describes the report as "asking us to think outside the box and challenge us to reinvent ourselves", while County Legislator Martha Robertson expresses concern that "there are real differences between government and business".
An article on the damage being done by a beetle that eats viburnum plants starts by quoting Dryden resident Ann Levatich.
Posted by simon at June 17, 2004 7:17 AM in Ithaca Journal , public finance , water and sewer