A story in the Woodstock Times (Without a paddle: City pulls the plug on Phoenicia sewer), details the fate of the funds NYC had set aside for Phoenicia.
The New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has
withdrawn its participation in the proposed Phoenicia sewer project,
rejecting the Shandaken Town Board’s request for an extension of the
deadline to establish a local sewer district. In a letter to Shandaken
supervisor Rob Stanley, dated June 1, DEP commissioner Carter H.
Strickland, Jr., stated that the $15.8 million block grant that has been
reserved for the Phoenicia sewer for the past 15 years will be released
to other towns, and that the Catskill Watershed Corporation (CWC)
“intends to terminate its contract” with Shandaken.
In his letter to the town, Strickland noted that the city has spent
$1.9 million over the past 15 years to study and design a wastewater
treatment plant for Phoenicia, granting several timeframe extensions, as
the community considered various options.
“However,” he wrote, “with many missed milestones for action by the
Town of Shandaken, it has now become clear that the community is not
prepared to take the concrete steps necessary to advance a project to
completion…While we view this outcome as unfortunate, DEP can no longer
justify reserving funds for a wastewater treament plant (WWTP) for
Phoenicia.”
The letter concludes with an expression of willingness to continue
working with the town on “stream restoration projects, our septic
program, and enforcement of watershed regulations.”
As pointed out in the DEP letter, New York City has built similar
systems at its expense in Hunter, Fleischmanns, Windham, Andes, Roxbury,
Prattsville and Pine Hill. The latest one began operations last year in
Boiceville.
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