To the Editor:

I’d like to respond to the questions Bob Motschmann raised in last week’s letter about the electrical-vehicle charging-station grant that was recently approved for the town of Knox. The $11,835 grant includes more than just the cost of the charging-station device.

It includes allowances for excavation and preparation of the site, including trenching from the town hall to the pad where the station will be mounted; labor for wiring the service box, the wire pull through the town hall building and outside through the trench to the site, and terminations; a concrete mounting pier, including delivery; and labor for installation of the unit.

The grant also covers costs associated with the software to charge users for the electricity they consume.  A 20-percent match requirement can be met by doing some of the work ourselves. Otherwise, we received a separate $2,500 grant for adopting the Unified Solar Permit that can be used to offset the 20-percent match.

In other words, all of these costs can be covered by grants.

This is an incentive grant from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation in support of the governor’s goal of implementing low-emission vehicle infrastructure across the state. It is part of an effort to introduce this new technology to the public.

The opportunity is available now. If we wait, we could miss out on a larger grant, which could allow us to insulate our highway garage.

Amy Lauterbach Pokorny

Knox

Editor’s note: Amy Pokorny is a Knox councilwoman who was instrumental in securing the $11,835 grant. At Tuesday’s Knox Town Board meeting, no one seconded Pokorny’s motion to accept the grant.