The vote is in

After a number of years of hard work by more than just a handful of volunteers, we’ve reached the point that seemed forever to be on the horizon – conducting the vote on which direction to take on a go-forward basis with respects to managing the W4447 water issue.

With 60 votes cast for and 0 against, the Acres of Ireland Well Owners L.L.C will maintain control of the pond and continue to manage the water release as they have been over the past few years.

The vote was held by mail-in ballot with a number of members and non-members showing up at the Howard Volunteer Fire Department on November 13th for the official count and decision. In attendance were board members Ed Zabrisky, Chip Cutler, and Thomas Kainz. Also in attendance was Brian Sutton, Water Commissioner, Water District 12 of the Division of Water Resources.


Brian Sutton reiterated that he was very pleased with not only how the Acres of Ireland, on behalf of their membership, stepped up to the plate to aggressively resolve this issue in a manner not only satisfactory to the Water Division but in a shorter time frame than had originally been anticipated. More importantly, though, the Water board restated their stance that they “approve the current operating procedure of utilizing the augmentation station to replace water depletions and intend to do so into the future unless some unforeseen circumstance necessitates a change.”

The Board can now progress with the remaining steps to tie the loose ends together and put the water depletion replacement process into a semi-annual routine.

In addition to the vote for the direction of the water replacement, the Board also accepted the nominations of two members to fill the one Board vacancy which opened up as a result of Marv’s moving. Nominated for the position were David Bratton and Ralph Coscarella. The Board will be meeting on Tuesday, December 4th at the Howard Fire Department at 6:30 to review and formally accept the nominations and to determine the best process for conducting the vote. The board will also be discussing the dues for the upcoming year which at this time are anticipated to be only about $45.00. Well owners, whom are not current in their dues will still have to meet that obligation prior to paying the 2013 dues.