ALEXANDRIA BAY — Alexandria Town Supervisor Brent H. Sweet said he and the Town Board have been doing a lot of work to make residents feel like their tax dollars are at work, and said he wants to keep that work going.
Mr. Sweet has been town supervisor since 2018, and served for five years as a councilman before that. Throughout his years in town, he’s owned six businesses and served on the Alexandria Bay Board of Trustees for a decade.
He’s running against Daniel B. Peterson, who challenged him in the 2018 election as well, in a Republican primary on Tuesday.
As town supervisor, Mr. Sweet is the chief financial officer for the town of Alexandria. He must be directly involved in almost every decision made by the town government, and is responsible for the financial health of the town and its various funds and districts.
He said it’s his philosophy to break each fund out and consider it on its own merits, and balance each budget independently.
“Revenues have to match expenses, and that’s part of keeping the tax rate town,” he said. “This town has one of the lowest town property tax rates in the region, we have a good amount of money saved, we’ve been very efficient.”
Mr. Sweet said, as he runs for his second term in office as town supervisor, he wants residents to know he’s been doing a lot to turn their tax dollars into tangible improvements for the town.
“We now have an improvements line item in the town budget, to make investments directly in various town properties,” he said.
Mr. Sweet said, under his leadership the town has put money into the waste transfer site, including installing a cardboard compactor to make cardboard disposal easier, and have started rebuilding a number of the town’s playgrounds.
In Redwood, crews will soon start installing a new, nearly $20,000 piece of playground equipment to replace an aging wooden play structure, and the other parks owned by the town will see work soon as well.
Mr. Sweet said he’s also balanced the town’s funding to area historical societies, ensuring the Redwood Historical Society gets financial support from the town.
“We now fund the Redwood and Alexandria historical societies the same amount, and before the town wasn’t giving any financial support to the Redwood society,” he said.
Looking ahead at another term, Mr. Sweet said he wants to continue improving the town’s amenities and infrastructure. The town board is already working on getting a complete renovation of Thomson Park funded through New York state. Over the winter, some local families worked to create an ice-rink surface at the park that saw a tremendous amount of use, and he would like to see other improvements in that area to make it even more attractive.
The town will also be replacing all town-owned sidewalks in the village of Alexandria Bay, and making moves to secure a grant to pay to replace all the aging sewage pumps in the Redwood sewer district.
Mr. Sweet’s challenger in the race, Mr. Peterson, is well known in Alexandria as the foreman of a lawsuit that alleges the town acted improperly in managing the Redwood sewer district. Mr. Sweet said that lawsuit, which has gotten significant attention and media coverage, does have an important part to play in this race. Mr. Sweet and eight other current and former town council members are named in that suit, and will be held financially responsible for any damages if the case is decided against them.
Mr. Sweet said he and the rest of the town board are working to solve the financial issues with the sewer districts, and have hired two accounting firms to discover any wrongdoing.
“We have one report back and one draft report back and they see no wrongdoing,” Mr. Sweet said.
He said he wants voters to know there was no wrongdoing, no fraud and no malfeasance in the handling of the town’s finances.
A court-ordered audit conducted by a firm hired by Mr. Peterson says the town owes the Redwood sewer district over a half-million dollars because of fees that were too high and inaccurate, inconsistent billing.
The town-supported audits state that the town handled its financial responsibilities with the water and sewer districts appropriately.
The court case over the issue is ongoing, and both parties are expected to return before Judge James McClusky next month.
Early voting for the Republican primary in Alexandria already opened on June 12 – voters were able to go to Watertown and cast an early ballot for their precinct at the Jefferson County Board of Elections – but on Tuesday voting sites will open at the town of Alexandria office and the Redwood Fire Hall.
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June 20, 2021 at 06:55AM
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Peterson, Sweet face off in Republican primary for Alexandria town supervisor - NNY360
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