GUILDERLAND — At its Dec 10 meeting, the town board here agreed to hire Core & Main to install about 10,000 water meters in homes across town for just under $5 million and also agreed to a table of updated fees, requiring building permits for the first time for projects like replacing windows, roofs, and siding.

After delaying their meter decision for a month, all five board members voted in favor of having Core & Main replace residential water meters for a price not to exceed $44,850,000.

That was the same recommendation presented to the board in November by Jesse Fraine, the town’s engineer, and Bill Bremigen, superintendent of water and wastewater management.

The board heard again from representatives of a rival company, which had submitted a proposal that they said was lower and included more than the chosen company, but this time board members said they had investigated the matter and liked the recommended choice.

The board had earlier agreed to getting proposals to upgrade Guilderland’s system to an Advance Metering Infrastructure, known as AMI, which would let the water department receive data on usage in near real time.

This system would also let the department notify customers within a day if there were to be a severe leak rather than waiting till the meter was read, perhaps months later; it is also expected to make billing easier.

Sensus makes the meters used by Core & Main and they are to be installed by Vepo. Almost 10,000 meters are to be installed throughout Guilderland, starting in late winter with the goal of completing the installation of new meters within a year.

Fraine and Bremigen submitted a six-page memo to the board, detailing the reasons for their choice.

“Jesse and Bill explained that there is a difference between electromagnetic and ultrasonic,” said Supervisor Peter Barber at the Dec. 10 meeting. “Electromagnetic is what Sensus provides … It uses a radio frequency, which is certified by the FCC … Other entities were using cellular.”

Fraine told the board that electromagnetic meters have a “very low failure rate, which we thought was good.”

He also said, “If there’s any interference with that communication, it’s actionable by law because that bandwidth is licensed with the FCC.”

Additionally, Fraine said, the 20-year warranty offered by Core & Main was superior.

“Fifteen [years] of that is at cost and then the remaining five are pro-rated,” said Fraine of the warranty. “But another huge benefit is that, if a meter fails and is covered by that warranty, that warranty starts again for that meter … so you get the next 20 years for that meter.”

Guilderland Center resident Gerd Beckmann asked if residents would be able to read their new meters. He cited a situation his son, who lives in Colorado, had where there was a discrepancy between what the automated system reported for water use and what the meter examiner said.

“You can still read it,” responded Fraine. “There’s still an actual physical means.”

He went on, “If there’s any discrepancies, we obviously [would] go out and  we would work with the homeowner.”

Councilwoman Amanda Beedle described a “great conversation” with Core & Main representatives that Fraine had set up, answering “a lot of my questions as to what made them the superior choice.”

Councilman Jacob Crawford thanked Bremigen for answering his questions and Deputy Supervisor Christine Napierski added her thanks.

“You educated me about the meters and the technology that we are purchasing,” she said. “And I’m satisfied with that … Even though we’re not getting the least expensive meter, we’re getting a very good quality meter that’s going to last for a long time. You can probably save us money with the low failure rate and with the very good warranty in place.”

Councilman Gustavos Santos, too, thanked Fraine and said, “We’re ready to move forward.”

Fraine, in turn, thanked the board “for listening to us and meeting with us and taking the time to dig in a little deeper and go over this stuff.”

Napierski concluded, “It’s a big purchase, an important purchase, so it was well worth doing it.”

Town fees

The board also held two hearings on Dec. 10 on fees set by the town.

The first hearing, on sewer fees, elicited no public comments. The board passed, by unanimous vote, a local law amending the town code on sewer costs and liability.

The town’s sewer system is paid for by fees charged to property owners in the sewer district. The new local law says that the town needs to develop a capital fund that can be used for the replacement of equipment and any necessary expansions. 

“To allocate equitably such costs to the new and expanded users,” the law says, “this section imposes a fee on new connection and expansion of existing connections that approximates the cost to the sewer district.”

“The fees are for new connections to this system,” Fraine told the board, and they are needed to meet ever-increasing costs. “We need to have that revenue coming in so that we can have a good, long-lasting sewer system.”

The second hearing, which included a 22-page list of various town fees, garnered quite a bit of comment, primarily about new fees for replacing roofs, windows, or siding or for doing plumbing work or installing electrical vehicle chargers or solar panels.

“We set some new fees every three or four years,” said Barber, explaining that increases in costs have to be passed on to residents.

Guilderland resident Karen White said the table of changes shows “most of them seem reasonable, just small incremental things that are not too out of line.”

However, she noted a list of a dozen items that, for the first time, will require a building permit — such as $200 for a permit to replace a roof, $75 to replace a window, $100 to replace siding, $100 to put in a standby generator, $300 to put in solar panels, $100 to put in an EV charger, and $50 each to put in plumbing or fire sprinklers.

“So I’m wondering,” said White, if the town is going to incur any additional expenses because of these types of activities. Is there going to be someone coming around to inspect, say, if someone hires a roofer?”

“Every single building permit involves town staff of some type, making sure that the permit complies with the building code and where it’s appropriate,” said Barber.

The table also specifies if someone does one of the listed items, like replacing a window, without a permit, they must then pay double the permit fee.

About requiring a permit to replace a window, Barber said, “The state building code is constantly changing in terms of energy requirements and whatnot … So the bottom line is the state now requires us to actually issue building permits for windows.”

White then asked, “Does this apply to people that are handy enough to do this themselves?”

“Yes,” responded James Melita, the town attorney.

He went on, “This is pretty standard in a lot of other municipalities. I was surprised to learn it didn’t occur here.”

“All of these are pretty pricey things for homeowners to tackle to begin with,” said White. “And this seems kind of like adding insult to injury to make people pay” just to have a broken window replaced.

“Are we going to be able to keep up with the demand now?” asked Napierski. She has heard complaints about waiting for permits, say, for building a deck, said Napierski.

Guilderland resident and local builder Angelo Serafini urged the board to delay voting on the new fees until its next meeting; he said he wanted a chance to thoroughly review them.

“If somebody needs a window change, they can’t wait weeks for a permit,” said Serafini; he suggested expediting the process for permits for small projects like that.

The goal was to get the new fees in effect by Jan. 1, said Barber.

“I guess I’m out of luck,” said Serafini.

Using the $75 window-replacement fee as an example, Crawford said, if that proved untenable, “We would then have to repeal that,” which he noted would involve another public hearing.

Sandra Dollard, who directs the Guilderland Chamber of Commerce, said, “I just want to clarify. So, to replace a window in your home, you will need a permit?”

“You need a building permit for basically anything that’s on the exterior of a house,” Barber responded.

“There’s not other municipalities that have that,” said Dollard.

Barber said there were.

“I’ll check that,” said Dollard.

“I’m sure you will,” said Barber.

Ultimately, the board voted unanimously in favor of updating the fees, with the understanding, Barber said, that “we may have to look at slight amendments on Jan. 7,” the date of the board’s next meeting.