Paul Szmal: And welcome back to FLX Morning on Finger Lakes News Radio. It's 840 and we're holding firm at 60. Sounds like more of a fall type of day than a summer type of day, but at least the sun is out. And we're joined by Chuck Mason, the Auburn City Clerk, to recap last night's Auburn City Council meeting. Good morning, Chuck. How are you, sir?
Chuck Mason: Good morning, Paul. Really good. It's nice to have a little break from that really, really hot couple weeks we just had, though, so we'll take this nice little cool break in the action.
Paul Szmal: Oh, you're not kidding. You're not kidding. The meeting started off last night with the authorizing of an agreement to lease some parking spaces.
Chuck Mason: That's right. We had a couple of resolutions last night at the City Council meeting that impacted the local Auburn YMCA, which is at 27 William Street here in Auburn. And the first resolution was to lease them 20 spaces at the Court Street parking lot, which is the backside of the YMCA building is where Court Street is. And we were able to expand the Court Street parking lot about five years ago with the grant that came in to build the Equal Rights Heritage Center. We were able to take about a quarter million dollars of that grant to do an expansion at the Court Street parking lot. And the Court Street parking lot is definitely a parking lot that gets used, but what we have found over time is it primarily does get used by YMCA users. So there's about 40 spaces over there now. And this resolution last night was to enter into a lease agreement with the YMCA for them to lease 20 of those 40 spaces. So what we will do, the Council, Mayor and City Council last night unanimously approving this resolution, there will be some new signage put up at the parking lot denoting which spaces are for YMCA users, and then the other 20 spaces will remain as being able to be used as part of the city parking lot. So this is a win-win for everybody, I think, in the YMCA. It's a short lease, only a one-year period of time. It's for six months with the ability to extend for six months. I think the YMCA wants to give it a go in the short term and see if it works out well for them, and then if they have the ability to get out of it in six months, they would probably take that. That's why the lease was written as it was, but we're hopeful this will work out for the YMCA. Parking is part of the game that has to happen here in Auburn, especially during the Monday through Friday 9-5. There is plenty of parking available in downtown Auburn, and the City of Auburn runs the logistics and tries to keep that parking turned over for our businesses, but it's at a premium during Monday through Friday business hours, and this will help the YMCA with providing some parking for their members.
Paul Szmal: Alright, yeah, as you said, it's a win-win situation, a little bit of revenue for the city and additional parking for the YMCA of Auburn, so hopefully that all works out. The next item on the agenda was the authorization of a grant application to what's called the Housing Trust Fund Corporation Office of Community Renewal New York Main Street, which sounds like an incredibly long run-on title, and I'm hoping you can explain exactly what that means, Chuck.
Chuck Mason: Yeah, well a lot of times we just refer to these grants as Main Street grants, and we've used these grants before in the City of Auburn to help local building owners fix up their buildings, and it's a grant that is available, and this also involves the YMCA, 27 William Street. They have a need for some renovations to their building, such as repairing the exterior walls, putting in an ADA-accessible ramp, and fixing the roof of the building. So this grant, Main Street grant, would help with the preservation of a very important building to our downtown area on William Street. It would fund a portion of the project, but the YMCA would also be responsible for coming up with the funds for the complete project that the grant does not cover, which would be $104,885. So this grant is just, at this point in time, this is just the Council approving the grant application. These grants, these Main Street grants, do have to be sponsored by the municipality. That's the way that the program works. It is basically a New York State grant, and it is one that we've had success with in the past here in Auburn. We haven't seen the Main Street grant in a few years here, but it's good to have it back because it will, if awarded and the property owner is ready to go with their work, it's a great way to get some work done with assistance from the State of New York. And so we're really hopeful that we'll have some success with this grant. But the YMCA has a new director, and that director started about 60 days ago, and he's one of the things that he did, Scott Censabar is his name, and one of the things that he did right away was reached out to the mayor and city manager, and has been in good communication with the city, and it's great that that has occurred, and we're looking for opportunities to help them out as best we can, and the mayor and council last night unanimously putting its stamp of approval on this grant application for the YMCA.
Paul Szmal: Auburn City Clerk Chuck Mason recapping last night's City Council meeting here on FLX Morning. The next agreement resolution was the approval of a collective bargaining agreement with the City of Auburn and the union that represents emergency medical technicians of Auburn City Ambulance.
Chuck Mason: That's right. And this is basically a short version of the Ambulance Union, if you want to tighten it up there, Paul, they do have another one of these groups that has a very long name. But the City of Auburn began running its own ambulance service a few years ago. We encouraged them, mayor and council and city manager, encouraged them and negotiated with them to form their own collective bargaining unit, and this is basically what was adopted last night unanimously by the City Council as an extension of the initial contract that was put in place with the Auburn City Ambulance Union. So this gets the contract through the midterm of 2026 and probably in the new year the city will start to negotiate a new contract with Auburn City Ambulance Union probably next year in 2026, but this basically extends the current contract and the mayor and city council last night putting its unanimous stamp of approval on this. We appreciate the great work that our paramedics and EMTs are doing for us in the Auburn City Ambulance Department and it's been a very successful program so far and they're the first responders oftentimes to public safety incidents and we really appreciate their service and we've learned a lot here in the City of Auburn over the last couple years about ambulance services as the city now runs its own department and they've done great work. So the council last night putting its stamp of approval on this new agreement which basically extends the contract through the midterm of 2026.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, and that's kind of, it's a good thing so let's keep it going.
Chuck Mason: Exactly, you know, and I can't say enough about the great work that they do. There isn't a day that goes by here in Auburn that I don't see them in action driving to and from City Hall or just out and about in the community and it's great and we thank them for their service to the City of Auburn.
Paul Szmal: And the final item we want to talk about this morning is a story that we've already covered here on Finger Lakes News Radio and fingerlakesdanleynews.com and that was an authorization to relocate the Keegee County Primary Data Center.
Chuck Mason: That's right. And City Manager Jenny Haynes last night, you know, discussing the fact that, you know, we are always looking for opportunities that we can work together with Keegee County and we've been working with them in the last couple years on IT needs as every municipality and every county out there has, you know, every year that goes by there's increasing demand on your internet needs, your IT infrastructure needs, and we've been working closely with Keegee County in that area for the last couple years. So this resolution came about due to the work that we've been doing with them. They had a need, we have a little bit of space that we can allow them to move their equipment into and it's a secure space that has 24-hour presence in the building and that's ideal when it comes to your data center. So the council last night, Mayor and City Council, putting its staff approval on this and just a continuing, a next step continuing part of the process of us working closely with Keegee County on these IT needs for the city and for the county. So this is a positive step in the right direction.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, absolutely. And as always, Chuck, we appreciate the information and the next city council meeting is coming up when?
Chuck Mason: Yeah, one week from tonight and next week's going to be a very interesting council meeting. We will convene here at City Hall. We will have a relatively quick meeting here at City Hall, but then we will be heading down to the Wastewater Treatment Plant to take a tour of all the great work that's happened down there. There's a $50 million rehabilitation project happening at the Wastewater Treatment Plant that's about 75%, 80% done at this point. So the Mayor and City Council next week will be heading out on a field trip as part of the council meeting to take a closer look at the construction that has happened down there, but we will meet and go through a regular meeting first here at City Hall at 5 p.m. next week, Thursday night.
Paul Szmal: All right. Thank you, as always, Chuck. Appreciate it, sir.
Chuck Mason: Paul, thank you. Have a great weekend, everybody. It is 8 51 on FLX Morning.
