Borough voters say no to bonding proposals
NAUGATUCK — Borough voters rejected bonding for three out of four proposed capital projects at the polls Tuesday.
The only project that gained approval was $5.07 million for infrastructure repairs, which includes repairs to the Whittemore Bridge, installing a traffic light at the intersection of Melbourne Street and Rubber Avenue and repaving 14 roads around the borough. Voters passed this question 5,195 to 2,507.
The other three projects up for a vote — upgrades at the wastewater treatment facility, fixing the Hop Brook pool and moving the recycling center from Rubber Avenue — all failed.
The improvements to the treatment plant were the largest item of the four questions at $12.43 million. The work, which included $11.5 million for the upgrades to the incinerator and $920,000 for a wastewater facilities study, was shot down 3,496 to 4,138.
Although voters said no to the upgrades, the borough is likely to move forward with it anyways since the improvements are a federal mandated.
If the work isn’t done the borough could face fines and be forced to shut down the incinerator in May 2016. How the borough moves forward now remains to be seen.
“There are provisions of law that would allow the borough to bond certain expenditures without going to referendum if the borough is under a governmental and/or court mandate to take certain actions. This is a complicated process which could happen in many hypothetical ways, but ultimately the borough is going to be required to make costly, federally-mandated upgrades to the plant regardless of the mechanism involved,” said Mayor Robert Mezzo in an interview prior to Election Day.
A proposal to restore the Hop Brook pool for $1 million was rejected 2,616 to 4,986. The public pool was closed in 2011 after years of deterioration.
Borough officials were also seeking $775,000 to move the recycling center from Rubber Avenue to one of tow sites under consideration — one in the Naugatuck Industrial Park and the other on the Chemtura property off of Cherry Street Extension. This proposal failed 3,155 to 4,492.
The center has been at its current location since the early 1980s. Officials said the current location is no longer suitable due to several reasons, including the asphalt paving and concrete block walls are deteriorating and its location next to Long Meadow Pond Brook. Officials also believe the site could be developed by a private developer for economic purposes.
