Quechee
The Selectboard unanimously approved the measure during a meeting earlier this week, but town staffers say a frustrating correspondence with the Federal Emergency Management Agency has set the project back by another year, with construction now expected to commence in spring 2017, rather than this summer.
“It’s a very challenging process that shouldn’t be so challenging,” Hartford Planning Department Executive Director Lori Hirshfield said Thursday. As head of a department that vets construction projects in Hartford, Hirshfield is familiar with the review process, but she said the federal agency has held up Hartford’s project for months. “It’s very frustrating when you face challenges from the agency that’s supposed to be there to help you in your recovery.”
In 2011, Tropical Storm Irene destroyed a building on the site, which lies between the Quechee Covered Bridge and the Simon Pearce building on Main Street. For years, the community debated whether the area should be topped with an inexpensive cover of dirt and grass after it was stabilized, or whether it should be transformed into a more attractive, and more costly, park that would include benches, landscaping, fencing, walkways and ramps.
In September, the Selectboard agreed to spend money to do preliminary engineering on a design that included a tiered park that was less extravagant than the most expensive option presented, but included most of the elements.
Because FEMA spent money to acquire the site and give it to the town, any redevelopment project must receive that agency’s approval, which federal staffers have withheld while expressing concern about the wisdom of building on the banks of a river that could flood the site again.
But Christopher Herrick, director of Vermont’s Division of Emergency and Homeland Security, wrote a June 28 letter to FEMA officials expressing “urgent concern,” and accusing the agency of singling out the project for delay without a legal basis.
Since last July, he wrote, the project had been under review by FEMA for a total of 345 days.
“My staff has been in contact with state hazard mitigation officers from several other states, representing several regions, and learned that the level of scrutiny being applied to this site reuse plan is not typical,” Herrick wrote.
Herrick blasted the agency for, over the course of 11 months, repeatedly changing its objections to the plan.
“The town is essentially being asked to hit a moving target. … We would have preferred a timely determination of denial,” he wrote, “which would have enabled the applicant to avail themselves of their timely right to appeal.”
Herrick said that FEMA’s objections don’t have “any basis” in the relevant federal guidelines.
During Tuesday’s Selectboard meeting, Chairman Dick Grassi said town officials were probably more frustrated with the delay than the residents who have been waiting for the park to materialize.
“We asked to set up a meeting in Boston (the site of FEMA’s regional headquarters) so we could say, ‘Look, what the hell are you doing to us down here?’ ” Grassi said, according to CATV video of the meeting. “This is costing us money. Every time they hold it up, the cost of materials goes up.”
In his letter, Herrick included copies of correspondence between FEMA and Hartford planners that documented the delays that have occurred since a FEMA agent visited the site last July.
On Nov. 17, the town submitted a formal plan, and requested a status update on four separate occasions, but received no response until March 1. The town submitted a revised plan on April 25 and a newly revised plan on May 3 after a phone conversation during which FEMA expressed concerns.
On June 16, FEMA officials formally requested eight new pieces of information, including a planting schedule “which includes the number of each species, and the spacing between each planting” and “manufacturer’s literature (or other suitable documentation) for the proposed pavers.”
“They really made us jump through more hoops than they had done anywhere else,” Grassi said. “And we’re still jumping.”
Despite the repeated delays, Tuesday’s vote in favor of the $350,000 expenditure prompted a round of applause from a group of Quechee residents who had shown up to support the proposed park.
The park has been a sticking point in negotiations between the town and the Quechee Lakes Landowners Association, which sees the site’s current condition as an eyesore dragging down property values and undermining the village’s appeal to tourists.
The money will come from $98,000 in grant money for flood-hazard mitigation, $125,000 that was set aside in Hartford’s 2015-16 fiscal budget, and up to $140,000 that was set aside in the 2016-17 fiscal budget.
In making the motion, Selectman Mike Morris said he was trying to make sure the project happened, but also that it wouldn’t run over the budget established by engineering estimates.
He noted that FEMA had spent $672,000 to acquire the property and tear down the building that used to sit on it.
“That’s on top of this $350,000,” Morris said. “We’re talking about over a million dollars here for this little postage stamp, which is a vital resource to Quechee, but think about this: Where do we stop?”
Morris said he saw a pattern of municipal projects going over budget.
“I want to start holding engineering companies accountable when they quote us a number,” he said.
Hirshfield, the planning director, said that if the project meets unanticipated costs, it could result in certain elements of the design being sacrificed to stay under budget.
“If we have a big change that’s generated from FEMA, we’ll have to evaluate what that means in terms of the budget and if we have to go back to the board,” she said.
Under the motion, if additional public funding sources, such as grants, are successfully tapped, they will reduce the cost to taxpayers rather than allow the project to go over budget; contributions from private sources could be used to add elements to the design and increase the total project cost.
Matt Hongoltz-Hetling can be reached at mhonghet@vnews.com or 603-727-3211.