May 26, 2020
I hope everyone enjoyed the great weather over the weekend as we remembered those who lost their lives for our freedom. As the unofficial summer kickoff it was great to see so many boaters on the bay. We will all need to be careful with our personal interactions with people for the foreseeable future.
The River Board is now following Plan 2014 which is why the outflows have been reduced over the last several days to 9,580 cm/s. That represents approximately 200 cm/s over the shipping limits (L limit). It is important for us not to become complacent. The upper lakes are all setting high level records and all that water is coming our way over the next few years. We need to keep contacting our federal elected officials with our concerns. The water level is currently 247.19 and continues to drop slowly. The USACE forecast calls for the water to be 247.05 or 2 inches less than it was Friday on June 22nd.
For those that have sand bags in your yards, please begin to think about a more permanent solution. I expect the level of support for flooding events to continue to decline from NYS. This may make sand bags difficult to come by in the future. In addition to the permanent solutions some have done, there are many temporary barrier options. We will have a list of what we are aware of out soon. A search on the internet will find many to choose from.
The beach grass planting went very well on Friday and Saturday. We had a significant number of volunteers from around the village as well as the landscape architect team from Costich Engineering. The village highway team will continue to put up the snow fence along the berm to help capture the blowing sand. Another planting will be planned for October. The next step in this project is to complete the 60% Design Report and get NYS to approve it. This is the trigger to release funding and will further the permitting of the final project and the walk overs. Our designer, Tom Hart has been a great asset on this project.
We hope the Kayak Launch is back in service later this week.
There will be a “Senior Parade” on Saturday in the business district and around the loop. The Sodus Seniors will be in their decorated cars. This is an opportunity to help them celebrate their high school graduation.
Independence Day celebrations will be very different this year. All the Lighthouse activities are cancelled; the Sunshine Car Parade has been postponed to September 5th. Our fireworks display is still undecided. We have reached out to the Governor’s office among others for direction. The Board will make the final decision at our June meeting on June 18th.
Village tax bills will be mailed on June 1. Please use the drop box or the online service through our web site to pay them. The link to do that is here: https://soduspoint.info/online-payments/
Please take a few minutes soon to complete the 2020 census. Census data is very important for our area. It helps to determine how much federal and state money we get and it helps form our legislative districts. You can access the census at https://2020census.gov/.
The village offices will remain closed to the public until at least Phase 2. All village employees are back to normal work hours and will continue to ready the village for summer. Feel free to call or email with any questions or concerns.
Please practice social distancing and stay safe so we can continue to open!
Dave McDowell