(Photo provided by Kevin L. Smith of The Cortland Voice).
The village of Homer recently completed an environmental survey that sets the village a step closer to removing the old Newton Line Dam in the Tioughnioga River.
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) initially ordered the village to complete an environmental survey to check the area for potential endangered species of mussels in the vicinity.
That survey is now done, village deputy mayor Pat Clune said. The village is awaiting results before launching a request for proposal (RFP) seeking a contractor who can remove the aging dam off of Route 11 and South Main Street.
The dam has been abandoned “for years,” Clune has said in previous conversations with The Cortland Voice. It is still “partially there,” he added, noting that the structure is “in shambles and crumbling.”
“We are expecting to get the mussels survey report sometime this week,” Clune said Tuesday. “As soon as we get that we intend to let the RFP go as soon as possible.”
DEC will review that survey in the next 45 days, village clerk Dan Egnor said.
“I met with the folks who did the mussels survey and they said they found nothing as far as endangered species or anything like that,” he said. “We should be good to go.”
Egnor did not have an estimate of how much the project would cost in total until the RFP process is complete. The village secured a $215,000 DEC grant in 2020 to help with costs, but has not been able to use it due to delays in the project.
The grant could expire this December, Egnor said. The village has already asked for time extensions on the removal project, and Egnor said he hopes the village can request one more from DEC.
“My gut says that if we got a contractor hired for that RFP and we could show DEC that we're in a good position to actually do the work by the end of winter, I am sure that we’ll get another time extension for this project,” Egnor noted.
Clune appreciated village residents for their patience on a project that has already had a long timeline.
“We were expecting to have this done much sooner,” he said. “A lot of things happened along the way and some things got delayed, which postponed the whole project. We’re just persevering and we’re going to see this through.”
