Williston Park’s Village Board officially approved Monday a 25-year water service agreement with East Williston, inching the villages’ dispute closer to an end.
The draft agreement, discussed behind closed doors because it involves a lawsuit between the two villages, puts into writing the terms the two boards settled on at a December negotiation, with a few tweaks in the legal minutiae, Village Attorney James Bradley said.
“It’s really everything that was covered in that meeting,” he said — East Williston will continue to buy water from Williston Park with the current rate of $4.33 per thousands gallons frozen until June 2018.
The agreement also says East Williston’s trustees would meet with Williston Park’s before any hearings on future rate increases.
East Williston would pay Williston Park $100,000 in penalties over one year, down from more than $500,000 Williston Park has sought in a lawsuit filed last year.
Williston Park will continue to chlorinate the water, and East Williston will keep handling its own billing and infrastructure maintenance.
East Williston Mayor David Tanner said Tuesday he was “very pleased” the agreement would move forward.
Williston Park sent the finalized document to East Williston’s Village Board Wednesday for review and discussion at a public meeting Jan. 12.
Next week, East Williston trustees will hear public comment on both the draft agreement with Williston Park and the possibility of building the village’s own water supply system.
A Dec. 30 villagewide email said East Williston is considering a bond resolution to fund its own water infrastructure, including a well near Devlin Park, alongside the agreement with Williston Park.
“Our board is trying to ascertain the best way possible what our residents want,” Tanner said in a phone interview last week.
After the Dec. 17 negotiation meeting, East Williston trustees said the estimated $7 million project would not be officially off the table until an agreement with Williston Park was signed. It’s not guaranteed that the village will hold a bond vote.
Tanner said next week’s meeting is the “most complete, open, and, more importantly, transparent approach” the village could take on how to proceed.
“We have residents who are very passionate about building a well and about not building a well,” he said.
Bradley and Williston Park Mayor Paul Ehrbar said discussion of the well came as a surprise, as it was not brought up at December’s meeting.
In a letter to the Williston Times, Ehrbar called it “somewhat disheartening and disappointing, as all felt both villages were moving forward, not backwards.”
“Yet, knowing that, the best solution for both villages is to bring this to a resolution quickly (after ten years of negotiations) as agreed to by both boards at the time of the December meeting,” he added in the letter.
Ehrbar does not expect any Williston Park trustees or administrators to attend East Williston’s meeting, he said Monday.
If East Williston approves the agreement next week, Ehrbar said, Williston Park’s board will present a final draft to the public at its Jan. 19 meeting and then set a date to sign it.
While both villages had asked Nassau County Supreme Court Judge Antonio I. Brandveen to put a stay on the active lawsuit, he issued a ruling Dec. 21 denying East Williston’s motion to dismiss it.
Both Bradley and East Williston Village Attorney Jeffrey Blinkoff said the decision has no bearing on the draft agreement or the negotiations.
The lawsuit will be settled on the terms of the $100,000 payment provided in the agreement if it’s ultimately signed, Bradley said.
