3/14/07 Committee to give report April 5

(As published by Cortland Standard, Corey Preston reporting)

A breakdown of communication lead the county into the situation it now faces over a proposal to build a $5.5 million public health facility on south Main Street, a special legislative committee agreed Tuesday.
The committee also agreed that it had seen no indication of anything done illegally, but it acknowledged a number of policies and procedures that could use tightening, changing or clarification.
Tuesday was the final formal meeting of the committee, which has spent the past two months examining the failings of the proposal.
The committee identified six options for how the county might proceed as it deals with legal challenges to its decision to annul $894,000 in purchase offers for nine properties in the south Main Street area.
Those options include purchasing the properties to avoid a lawsuit and reselling all or some of them, with the possibility of a scaled-down project, or not purchasing the properties and either battling the lawsuit or trying to negotiate out of the purchase agreements.
The committee also agreed on a list of 23 recommendations for how the county can improve its process for acquiring land in the future.
All of the information will be sent to legislators by early next week, Committee Chairwoman Carol Tytler (D-3rd Ward) said, and the committee will meet with any interested legislators to discuss its findings prior to the March 22 legislative session.
A special session to discuss how to move forward will be held April 5.
Much of the discussion Tuesday focused on how the county could improve its process for acquiring property, considering the numerous space needs that still need to be addressed.
Legislator Dan Tagliente (D-7th Ward) suggested the county avoid going through a real estate broker in the future and acquire property by eminent domain when necessary, while Legislator Tom Williams (R-Homer) suggested a public request-for-proposal process in which competition would keep prices down.
In terms of communication, the committee agreed that the chairman of each legislative committee should prepare a summary every month of key issues brought up in committee for each caucus to keep legislators abreast of significant discussion. Williams said he hoped all legislators would also have a voice in such projects from the beginning.
“I see the role of the Legislature as sort of the big paintbrush, the people saying let’s go down this particular path, and I see the administration as sort of the smaller paintbrush, taking care of all the details,” Williams said. “I’m not sure in my mind who was doing the bigger paintbrush piece.”
Tagliente, who was one of the first legislators to become involved with the south Main Street project, said the committee process the county has in place was responsible for some legislators being left out of the process.