WILTON – A water line extension to nine homes on Bennett and Thompson streets that have contaminated wells has only one hurdle left.
The Community Development Block Grant has been increased to $145,250 from $61,250 to extend the water line, Town Manager Peter Nielsen said Wednesday.
The Wilton Water Department funds of $36,000, not taxpayers’ dollars, will match the state grant, he said. The grant deadline has also been extended until September 2006.
All that is left is an approval of a waiver from the Public Utilities Commission, he said, pertaining to a ruling on selectmen voting in 1999 not to extend water lines to subdivisions.
That vote was targeted at subdivisions so that if a developer came in with a planned subdivision, the town wouldn’t be required to extend the water lines, Nielsen said, and had nothing to do with remedying public health issues.
Nielsen also said Wednesday that selectmen opened six bids Tuesday for maintenance of six cemeteries, including mowing the grounds, that ranged from $20,800 per year for three years to $80,600 for the first year, $81,000 for the second and $82,000 for the third year of the contract.
The town paid $18,660 for cemetery care last year, he said. One of the cemeteries, Lakeview, is a 17-acre parcel, Nielsen said.
The other bids were more in line with the lower bid, he said, with one company bidding $25,900 each year of the three-year contract, a fourth company bid $26,500, for the first year, $26,600 and $26,700 for subsequent years.
The fifth company bid $26,280 for the first year, followed by $27,330 and $28,610 for the remaining years. The sixth company bid $35,000 for the first year and $35,750 and $36,500 the following years.
Nielsen said selectmen asked him to review the bids and to also see if the Franklin County Sheriff’s Department has a work-release program so that inmates could help take care of the cemetery grounds.
Nielsen said he also informed selectmen that the owner of property at 16 Curve St. that has a pile of debris and a trailer violating the setback requirements of the town’s zoning ordinance has made some progress in cleaning up the property. The owner also has contracts to complete the job, he said.
Selectmen were scheduled Tuesday to consider commencement of legal proceedings on a codes violation at the property but because of the progress asked Nielsen to report back at the Jan. 3 meeting.
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