Hempstead: the most dysfunctional town in America, Part IV of VI

Adam Haber

It’s Not Easy Going Green

While the Town of Hempstead blocked more than two dozen initiatives led by Supervisor Laura Gillen and her staff, the most disheartening, for me, was the cancellation of several energy efficiency projects that would have decreased the town’s carbon footprint and generated millions of dollars in positive cash flow.

The first green project blocked in December 2018 involved leasing out the top 30 acres of the closed 120-acre landfill in Oceanside to a third party for solar panel installation.

The project went through a lengthy vetting phase, and the Town Board staff was actively engaged in the process. Unfortunately, it was killed in the 11th hour by the Republican Town Board majority, who claimed that the Town Board-approved engineering firm, ECG Group, would have received too large a commission.

But ECG Group’s 4 percent landfill solar project commission had already been negotiated down from 5 percent by the commissioner of engineering, Doug Tuman, so the size of the commission wasn’t the issue.

In addition, the commission was included in the cost of the project and wouldn’t have cost the town a dime. Tuman also erroneously boasted the town’s thinly staffed engineering department could put solar on the landfill themselves, even though they never investigated trying.

The public needs to know that this initiative would have provided approximately 11 megawatts of solar energy, enough to take roughly 2,000 homes off the grid. In addition, it would have produced $350,000 a year in rental revenue and more than $7 million in income for the town over the course of the project.

To save face, the Town Board hired their own consulting firm, and encumbered $200k for their work, to investigate doing landfill solar in-house. It’s been over a year and nothing—short for not one single thing — has been done.

The town’s infrastructure isn’t the only part stuck in the 1970s. Town buildings, affordable housing and parks have HVAC, windows, thermostats, and lighting fixtures that are decades old. When I originally spoke with Commissioner

Tuman about working together to create a sweeping Energy Performance Contract, he was under the impression that previous administrations had taken care of energy efficiencies. Regardless, I pushed for an EPC bid to be put out. Siemens, a well-respected international leader in energy efficiency, was chosen by a bi-partisan review committee.

The town attorney’s office then delayed reviewing the Siemens contracts for three months. Finally, they admitted that they didn’t have the relevant experience to perform the work. Subsequent to this admission, the town attorney hired an outside legal firm, incurring tens of thousands in legal expenses.

The Town Board then pulled the Siemens contract at a board meeting and tabled it indefinitely.

This project would have generated $6 million in positive cash over the life of the contract and paid for energy efficiency upgrades of about $4 million.

One of the many parts of the contract included changing out roughly 7,000 light fixtures. Yet again, Councilman Bruce Blakeman announced at a board meeting that the town employees could do this work. And, yet again, to date, nothing has been done.

Another simple green initiative the Town Board blocked was an electric car ride-share program supported by a company named Greenspot. Greenspot’s business model installs charging stations and provides vehicles to municipalities solely at their cost.

Once they recoup their costs from installation of charging stations and vehicle purchases from the public’s rental fees, governments receive 10 percent of any additional gross revenue. Greenspot was also willing to install, at no cost, charging stations for Town residents.

Again, this project went through a bidding process, and it was mutually decided, by Supervisor Gillen and Town Board staff, that the town would allow ten vehicles as a trial. The Republican Town Board Majority whittled it down to three cars, then pulled the project entirely.

The purpose of green rideshare vehicles is to take gasoline-powered cars off the road. Councilman Bruce Blakeman has terrible traffic in the southern part of his district, just east of JFK airport.

Yet he refused to answer calls or emails requesting locations to place the electric vehicles in his district.

 

Adam Haber is the former deputy chief of staff of Economic Development and Government Efficiency for the Town of Hempstead.

 

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