Dear Hartford Taxpayer,

You will soon receive your 2014 Town and County Tax bill. This bill will show three separate property tax levies. They are; County levy, Hartford Town wide levy, and Hartford Fire Protection levy. These levies show the amount of money to be collected through Real Property taxes.

In 2011, after years of steady large increases, the Town tax levy was decreased by 15% from the year before. Since then, the increases have been very small. The 2012 Town tax levy was increased by 0.7%, and in 2013 Town tax levy was increase by 0.9%. This year the 2014 Town tax levy will have a 0.1% decrease over last year. These incremental increases are all well below the 2% Tax Cap. All in all, the 2014 Town levy is still down 13.5% from the high levy of 2010. Please see the graph on the back of this sheet.

It is important that your Town government works hard to keep expenses down as this directly relates to the Town tax levy. One only needs to look around Town at the increasing number of vacant homes to know the effect of a sluggish economy upon the town’s taxpayers.

Here is a brief summary Town activity for 2013;
• Code of Ethics adopted for the Town of Hartford government.
• The Town and the USPS cooperate to adjust the hours of operation for the Hartford Post Office in order to ensure it would remain open.
• Gilchrist Hill Rd hairpin turn removed.
• First ever Hartford E-Waste collection day provided at the Town Hall which coincided with the Town Wide Cleanup Day. Residents brought in 5 tons of electronics for recycling for free. This will be offered again this year as well.
• Washington County sells its 485 acre parcel on Eldridge Lane which ends the 20 plus years of fear about a possible County landfill. This was a direct result of steady and effective pressure from the Town towards the County.
• Renegotiate contracts with the Hartford Volunteer Fire Company and Argyle EMS, extending the contracts to 5 years which will help to provide budget stability for the Town.
• Adopted a policy to conduct sex offender background checks on all adults assisting with Hartford Youth Commission programs. Even though this is a small town, you can never be too careful.
• In order to mitigate future flooding of the Youth Commission’s baseball diamonds and soccer fields located at the school, the Youth Commission’s volunteers worked to remove the meanders and debris from Big Creek to prevent it from jumping its banks in a storm and washing out the fields. All labor and machinery was provided by volunteers. This work would not have been possible without collaboration between the Town, the Youth Commission and the School District.
• Constructed a large salt storage shed behind the Town Hall to hold 300 tons of highway winter road salt. Constructed a smaller storage shed in front of the Town Hall to hold the sand/salt mix available as a courtesy to residents. Because both sheds were built on weekends by volunteers, they came in 50% under budget.

The Town Clerk’s office is in the process of providing the availability of a card swipe unit in order to accept credit card and debit card payments at the counter. This would cover all fees and payments for everything from fishing licenses to property taxes. You will still be able to pay using the traditional method of cash or check. Online credit card payment will also be available but this would only be for the payment of property taxes at www.xpress-pay.com.

Regards,

Dana Haff – Hartford Town Supervisor

The below resolution on hemp, introduced by me at the Washington County Board of Supervisors was adopted by the County on 12/20/13. Before anyone comments on the spelling of Marijuana, the Feds spell it with an “h” in the Controlled Substances Act of 1970, so I did too. Dana

HEMP RESOLUTION – D.HAFF

A Resolution urging the New York State Legislature, New York Governor Cuomo, Congress of the United States, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), the United States Department of Justice, and the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to recognize industrial hemp as a valuable agricultural commodity; to define industrial hemp in Federal and State law as non-psychoactive and genetically identifiable species of the genus Cannabis; to acknowledge that allowing and encouraging farmers to produce industrial hemp will improve the balance of trade by promoting domestic sources of industrial hemp; and to assist producers by removing barriers to State regulation of the commercial production of industrial hemp.

WHEREAS, industrial hemp refers to the non-drug oilseed and fiber varieties of Cannabis which have less than three tenths of one percent (0.3%) tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and which are cultivated exclusively for fiber, stalk and seed, and are genetically distinct from drug varieties of Cannabis (also known as marihuana); and

WHEREAS, the flowering tops of industrial hemp cannot produce any drug effect when smoked or ingested; and

WHEREAS, Congress never intended to prohibit the production of industrial hemp when restricting the production, possession, and use of marihuana; the legislative history of the Marihuana Tax Act where the current federal definition of marihuana first appeared shows that industrial hemp farmers and manufacturers of industrial hemp products were assuaged by Federal Bureau of Narcotic Commissioner Harry J. Anslinger who promised that the proposed legislation bore no threat to them: “They are not only amply protected under this act, but they can go ahead and raise hemp just as they have always done it.”; and

WHEREAS, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in Hemp Industries v. Drug Enforcement Administration, 357 F.3d 1012 (9th Cir. 2004), that the federal Controlled Substances Act of 1970 (21 U.S.C. Sec. 812(b)) explicitly excludes non-psychoactive industrial hemp from the definition of marihuana, and the federal government declined to appeal that decision.

WHEREAS, the Controlled Substances Act of 1970 specifies the findings to which the government must attest in order to classify a substance as a Schedule I drug and those findings include that the substance has a high potential for abuse, has no accepted medical use, and has a lack of accepted safety for use, none of which apply to industrial hemp; and

WHEREAS, Article 28, Section 2, of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, as amended by the 1972 Protocol, states that, “This Convention shall not apply to the cultivation of the cannabis plant exclusively for industrial purposes (fibre and seed) or horticultural purposes.” ; and

WHEREAS, industrial hemp is commercially produced in more than 30 countries, including Canada, Great Britain, France, Germany, Romania, Australia, and China without undue restriction or complications; and

WHEREAS, American companies are forced to import millions of dollars worth of hemp seed, hemp seed oil, and hemp fiber products annually from Canada, Europe, and China, thereby effectively denying American farmers an opportunity to compete and share in the profits; and

WHEREAS, nutritious hemp foods can be found in grocery stores nationwide and strong durable hemp fibers can be found in the interior parts of millions of American cars; and

WHEREAS, buildings are being constructed using a hemp and lime mixture also known as Hempcrete, thereby sequestering carbon; and

WHEREAS, retail sales of hemp products for 2012 in this country are estimated to be over $500 million annually; and

WHEREAS, industrial hemp is a high-value low input crop that is not genetically modified, requires little or no pesticides, can be dry land farmed, and uses less fertilizer than wheat and corn.

WHEREAS, the reluctance of the United States Drug Enforcement Administration to permit industrial hemp farming is denying agricultural producers in this state the ability to benefit from a high-value, low-input crop, which can provide significant economic benefits to producers and manufacturers; and

WHEREAS, the United States Drug Enforcement Administration has the authority under the Controlled Substances Act to allow this State to regulate industrial hemp farming under existing laws and without requiring individual federal applications and licenses; and

WHEREAS, the United States Department of Justice, on Aug. 29th, 2013 released a memo announcing that it would update federal marihuana laws so as not to pre-empt State legislation affecting marihuana laws; and

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED: That the Washington County Board of Supervisors urges the New York State Legislature, New York Governor, and Congress of the United States to recognize industrial hemp as a valuable agricultural commodity; to define industrial hemp in Federal and State law as non-psychoactive and genetically identifiable species of the genus Cannabis; to exempt industrial hemp from the definition of marihuana; to acknowledge that allowing and encouraging farmers to produce industrial hemp will improve the balance of trade by promoting domestic sources of industrial hemp; and to assist producers by removing barriers to State regulation of the commercial production of industrial hemp; (these items may be taken care of by passing the Industrial Hemp Farming Act in the U.S. House and U.S. Senate); and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That the Washington County Board of Supervisors also urges the New York State Legislature and New York Governor to allow the State to regulate industrial hemp farming under existing state laws and regulations, or those to be passed, without requiring federal applications, federal licenses, or federal fees, and place the cultivation and processing of industrial hemp under the jurisdiction of the New York Department of Agriculture & Markets Commissioner; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Clerk of the Board forward copies of this resolution to the Attorney General of the United States, the Administrator of the United States Drug Enforcement Administration, the Director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, the United States Secretary of Agriculture, each New York County legislative board, U.S. – NY Congressional Rep. Bill Owens, U.S. – New York Senators Charles Schumer & Kirsten Gillibrand, New York State Assemblymen Tony Jordan, Dan Stec, & Steve Mclaughlin, New York State Senator Betty Little, the Commissioner of the New York Department of Agriculture and Markets, and New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo.