State of the Town Message
From John A. Burrell Supervisor, Town of Ellicottville (12-26-2008)

Your Town Board has had a busy year in 2008. We have worked hard to deliver the best services in the most cost effective methods.

We are still seeing growth in new assessment although new building has started to slow. Fortunately, as in past years, our new growth has again had the effect of lowering our Town tax rate. However, I believe we need to do more than lower the tax rate. We need to be conservative in our spending practices. I am proud to tell you that our 2009 Budget shows a decrease in total appropriations of almost $80,000. This represents a reduction of more than 2.5 percent.

Our Town Clerk Toni Higgs and her deputy Robyn George continue to be the backbone of our Town government. The Clerk’s Office, on a day to day basis, helps all of our departments run smoothly.
We will start the New Year with a new Town Justice, Andy Stokes. I congratulate Andy and am confident that he will do a great job on the bench for our community. For most of 2008 Betsey Kerns handled both of our Justice Courts and everything ran very well. She was joined by our new full time Court Clerk Kate Earley. Our court facilities have a new bench, furniture and computer system as a result of a state grant that Betsey secured for the Town.

Another new face at the Town/Village Hall is Lindsey Coburn. Lindsey is my new Supervisor’s Clerk. The Supervisor’s office is now open from 10:30am, until 5:00pm Monday through Friday. This gives the community access to the town office an extra hour each day.

We have also appointed Harry Weissman as Deputy Assessor to assist Robin Pearl-Lamphier. Our belief is that in addition to having the Assessor’s office open more often, we will be able to minimize our need for outside consulting firms. We will have people who know our community making the decisions that affect your assessments. Already Robin and Harry have created new neighborhoods to more fairly compare properties. An example is a new neighborhood that consists only of properties in the West Valley School District.

With the resignation of Police Chief Jim Comstock, we chose to appoint one of our long time part-time officers, Larry Graham to the position of Officer in Charge. Larry directs and schedules all of our officers in addition to being on patrol himself. We bought a new patrol sedan this year. Use of this sedan in good weather has cut down on the wear and tear of our two four-wheel drive S.U.V. units. We took two other vehicles out of service during the year cutting the number of police cars from four to three.

For years the Town and Village have worked together on sewer and water issues and plans. There is a committee consisting of the Mayor, Deputy Mayor, Supervisor and Deputy Supervisor called the ”Four Flushers”. We have jointly created a new committee consisting of the same people to oversee law enforcement for our community. It is the Committee Of Police Services “the Four COPS”. We meet monthly with Larry Graham and Village Constable Howard Gifford. After only two months we are seeing a nice joint effort to do what is best for Ellicottville. We also appointed Sally Busekist as a part time Police Clerk. Sally handles tasks in the police office that used to be done by officers. This allows us to have better utilization of our officers’ time for law enforcement work.

Our highway department, under the leadership of Dave Golley, continues to do a great job . We have recently agreed to the terms for a new contract with their union. These employees have worked without one this year and we will be happy to have these negotiations behind us. During the year we replaced one of our two small dump truck/snowplows. This new truck replaced a nine year old unit. We are also awaiting the delivery of a new large snowplow truck. This truck will replace a thirty-one year old, four-wheel drive Oshkosh truck. A front end loader was replaced during the year. We are also in the process of building a new salt/sand storage facility on Bryant Hill Road. Much of the preparation and site work has been done by Dave and his crew.

Our summer youth program at the Village Park was very successful. Becky Spaicher and her staff did a fine job. We are thankful to the Village of Little Valley for the use of their swimming pool.

Our Town Historical Museum was cleaned and painted inside. This work was done by Dineen Painting. All of their labor was donated to the Town. Mary Elizabeth Dunbar puts forth an excellent effort as our Town Historian.

D and J Landscaping have done a very good job maintaining our Town cemeteries. Restoration work continues on the Bryant Hill Cemetery. Most of the work there has been done with grant money and volunteers.

The Town cable television franchise has been negotiated with Time Warner. Under the new agreement, people served by their cable system will now receive the CFTO channel from Canada. This is something that many of our full and part-time residents have wanted and will enjoy.

The previous administration did a wonderful job getting a grant from the state which pays 50% of the costs of restoring our Town Hall. Two projects were added this year. The first was a drainage project around the footprint of the building. The second was new storm windows. These new windows have the added bonus of energy efficiency.

We have just received word of a $30,000 grant that we will use in 2009 towards making the top floor of the Town Hall handicap accessible.

During 2008 we hired a part-time building inspector to assist Tom Abriatis. Ed Fredrickson took on the task of inspecting the construction of the Tamarack Club at Holiday Valley for the Town.

Our Planning and Zoning Boards continue to be active in fostering quality controlled growth in the community. Both boards spend much time and effort (including state mandated training updates) at these tasks and are much appreciated.

Our Board of Assessment Review was busy again this year listening to and acting upon grievances from property owners. They too do a great job and continue their training. They strive to help people have fair and equitable assessments.

The Fire Commissioners of our Joint Fire District continue to do a great job as well. The fire station and equipment are furnished, maintained and upgraded to give our firefighters the tools they need to protect the high investments of property owners.

Our long time Water Department operator, Dale Golley, has been successfully fighting health issues this year. During his absences Tom Dineen has performed very well and has kept our department running and the water flowing. The Village Public Works Department has helped whenever needed.

We continue to work with the Village in any way we can. Mayor Coolidge and I, together with our Boards, are committed to work together for the betterment of our entire community.

I want to take this opportunity to thank all of our taxpayers and residents for the help and input you have given me during my first year as Town Supervisor. Working with the dedicated employees of the Town has been an experience for which I am truly thankful. Certainly the Town Board, Bob O’Brien, Bob Scharf, Greg Fitzpatrick and Ken Hinman deserve my gratitude and the appreciation of the entire community for all of their efforts.

Let me please offer everyone a very prosperous New Year. I pledge that during 2009 I will continue to work with the Town Board and our employees to do what is best for our community while keeping our cost of providing the required services as low as possible.

Thank You,
John A. Burrell
Supervisor, Town of Ellicottville