The County VITA (Volunteer Income Tax Assistance) program is once again available. This program assists Washington County individuals and families that have household incomes of less than $50,000 in the preparation of their Income Tax Return forms. Trained volunteers will sit down with you and help you fill out the tax return.

Day and evening appointments to sit down with a tax prep volunteer are available by calling 1-800-211-5128 ext 100. Appointments are available 9am-4pm beginning Jan. 6, 2014.

Through this program you can get faster returns and free electronic filing. Direct deposit for both Federal and State returns is an option.

Tax returns with stock sales, business or rental income are not eligible for this program.

Dana

This letter to the Editor was in this week’s Granville Sentinel and Post Star newspapers.

Editor: The fire in Hartford that occurred at the Tyler Dairy Farm on Saturday, Jan. 6 shows the importance of local fire companies and the Washington County Fire Control Mutual Aid System.

Most of the fire companies in Washington County are volunteer. Dedicated men and women that are not compensated one penny, but yet out of dedication for their community, leap into action without hesitation. In the case of the Tyler Farm fire, this meant turning out in 20 below zero weather.

Fire pond water that is drafted onto tankers this time of year is just a few degrees above freezing to start with and once it is exposed to 20 below zero temps only takes a few minutes to slush up and freeze inside the various apparatuses. Not to mention what happens to the fingers and toes of the firefighters.

The Hartford Volunteer Fire Company and 22 other fire companies responded to the fire. The extremely cold weather took its toll on firefighters and equipment, but in the end they were able to save the main milking barn and most of the animals against overwhelming odds. I believe the only thing that saved the farm that day was the sheer determination of those involved, including neighbors and farming friends that tended to the herd. The Town Highway Department kept a sander truck on scene to keep the road sanded for the firefighters.

Besides the brave men and women of the Hartford Volunteer Fire Company, I would like to thank the other mutual aid companies from Washington County, Warren County, Saratoga County and Vermont that responded; Fort Ann, North Granville, Argyle, Kingsbury, West Fort Ann, Whitehall, Middle Granville, Granville Engine and Hose, Granville Hook and Ladder, Hebron, Cossayuna, Fort Edward, Salem, Middle Falls, Greenwich, Hudson Falls, South Queensbury, Bay Ridge, South Glens Falls, West Pawlet, Pawlet and Poultney.

Dana Haff – Hartford Supervisor

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.

The Queensbury Spartans just won the NYS Class A High School Football Championship for the first time ever in the Syracuse Carrier Dome.

Queensbury beat Williamsville-North 36 – 7

Ironically both teams are called the ‘Spartans’.

Queensbury’s head coach is John Irion, who happens to be a Hartford resident. John and his wife Patty bought my parent’s home this past spring.

Congratulations to John and the Queensbury Spartans!

The below guest essay, written by me was in Sunday’s 11/10/13 Post Star Newspaper

GUEST ESSAY: DEA cultivated a myth about hemp in America
11 hours ago • By Dana Haff

When is a DEA Schedule I Controlled Substance — which is equal to heroin and LSD — not even a drug?

Industrial hemp, which has insignificant amounts of THC and cannot get you high is considered a harder drug than Schedule II opium, cocaine and crystal meth.

Hemp is Cannabis Sativa and cannot get you high, while pot is Cannabis Indica and can. The feds call both marijuana. Both are in the cannabis family, but are different species, just as modern man and a neanderthal are different species of the same family.

Labeling industrial hemp as a drug is absurd. This country was literally founded on hemp.

The first few drafts of the Declaration of Independence were written on paper from Benjamin Franklin’s hemp paper mill. The rigging and sails of the USS Constitution were hemp. Hemp and tobacco were taxed to clothe and arm Washington’s troops. The uniforms were made of hemp.

Washington, Jefferson and Adams advocated its cultivation to keep our economy strong. We were rolling along with a healthy hemp sector until 1938 when the Marijuana Tax Act was enacted and the newly created Bureau of Narcotics (now DEA) saw marijuana as a means to enlarge its domain.

At this same time, petrochemical giants influenced the government to do some clever tinkering with the marijuana definition to include all cannabis species, regardless of their buzz content.

Nylon was created by DuPont in 1935 and other synthetic fibers were being created. Hemp cultivation was conveniently curtailed, not out of drug concerns, but out of conglomerate lobbyists stacking the deck against their main competition. These were the days of the “reefer madness” movement.

Industrial hemp and pot do not even have the same growing habits. Hemp grows tall and gangly for the fibers in the stalk and pot grows squat and bushy for the leaves and buds.

Hemp is planted in rows about four inches apart, growing about 10 feet tall. If a pot grower were dumb enough to grow his plants within a dense hemp field, it would look like a UFO crop circle from above.

Also, the first thing a pot grower does is eliminate the male plants so they won’t pollinate the flower buds of the females and decrease potency. No pot grower would plant in a field with millions of mongrel hemp males. In fact, one of the best ways to ruin pot potency is to plant hemp nearby.

The THC level of industrial hemp is below 0.3 percent but pot can be as high as 30 percent.

Industrial hemp, as a commodity, has tremendous economic development potential for agricultural parts of America like Washington County. Its uses are widely varied from food stuffs, vitamins, body care products, textile and paper fiber, fuel, to fodder, etc. Pressed seeds are 45 percent edible oil and 35 percent protein. The outer bast surface of the stalk is used for fiber while the inner hurd portion makes good animal bedding or woodstove pellets.

If hemp were not called marijuana, there is no reason why the American hemp industry could not have become larger than cotton. We are the world’s largest economical consumer of hemp, which is ironic because you can legally import parts of the plant but you cannot grow it.

In 2012, the estimated total retail value of all U.S. hemp products was about $500 million and it increases every year. Most of our hemp oil comes from Canada and most of the textile fiber comes from China.

Canada allows 27 different varieties of industrial hemp to be grown. China plans to expand their plantings to more than 1 million acres. It does not take a rocket scientist to see the potential for domestic hemp. We need the New York Legislature and governor to exempt industrial hemp from the definition of marijuana and switch control from the DEA to NY agriculture markets.

Dana Haff is the supervisor in the town of Hartford in Washington County.

Post Star Newspaper 11/5/13
• BILL TOSCANO – [email protected]

HARTFORD — For the fourth year, Hartford Supervisor Dana Haff is reaching out to all churches in Washington County to ask them to ring their bells at 11 a.m. on Veterans Day.

“I remember one Veterans Day when I was a teenager that my dad told me about the Armistice Day bell-ringing tribute. My dad, who was born in 1920, grew up in Fort Edward and could remember as a child how the churches would ring their bells at 11 a.m. every Nov. 11th,” Haff said. “I think it is very important to acknowledge the role that veteran servicemen and women had in protecting our country and this old fashion bell-ringing tribute to our veterans is just one small way that we can do that.”

Veterans Day began as Armistice Day, and in 1920, Gov. Al Smith requested that mayors, village presidents and pastors ring their bells at the appointed time, Haff said.

Based on past experience, Haff expects between 35 and 40 churches to ring their bells Monday, along with St. Francis Cabrini in West Pawlet, Vt., which has a number of Washington County residents among its parishioners.

One church is going further.

Pastor Art Peters at Trinity Church in Granville told Haff his church will ring its bell at Sunday service as someone reads the names of more than 150 veterans associated with members of the congregation. Haff said the church will probably be ringing its bell for more than 10 minutes.

In a letter to all county supervisors, Haff wrote, “I would like to try to have this revival spread to all of Washington County and I am asking for your assistance.”

Haff said the Rev. James Peterson of the Whitehall First Baptist Church and the Granville Baptist Church is helping him reach out to churches in the county.

Post Star Newspaper 10/29/13

Hartford supervisor lauds conservative budget

• BILL TOSCANO — [email protected]

HARTFORD — The way Dana Haff looks at it, town residents should receive part of the credit for the 2014 budget coming in with no tax rate increase.

“I almost think the story of Hartford volunteerism to assist its local government is a story all to itself,” said Haff, the town supervisor, in summarizing the $1.27 million budget the Town Board passed earlier this month. “The people of the town are the ones who allowed us to do this.”

One example Haff used was the building of a 24-by-40-foot highway salt storage barn that will hold 300 tons of salt.

“The point is, $28,000 was allocated for this capital project, but by building it on weekends using all volunteers, it was constructed for half that money,” Haff said.

Other areas in which the town was able to get volunteers to help on projects included the new youth athletic fields behind Hartford Central School and some flood-prevention work near the youth fields in front of the school.

In addition, Haff said, the Town Board feels strongly it needs to be fiscally conservative.

“We don’t believe in that old adage that you have to spend it all this year to get it again next year,” he said, “By being frugal and not spending all the monies budgeted for this year, we were able to roll over leftover funds into the fund balance and reallocate it into 2014.”

The budget calls for about $259,383 in revenue and draws $124,854 from the fund balance. The amount to be raised by taxes is $884,576. The numbers are similar to last year’s, with the total appropriation up $16,960 and revenue up $12,192. The town used $2,947 more from the fund balance than last year, and the amount to be raised by taxes is up $1,821.

One other budget area Haff was pleased with was the fire department and EMS contracts.

The town lengthened the contracts to five years so it would know what the increases would be going forward. In the past, the fire contract was three years, and the contract with Argyle EMS was renewed annually.

“This increase in length gives the town more budget stability because it lengthens our distance to the horizon, as we now know what our outlays will be for the next five years,” he said, noting the maximum term allowed by law is five years.

The fire department and the Town Board agreed to a 1.3 percent spending increase each year over the five years of the contract.

“A five-year agreement with large increases is bad because you are locked in, but this agreement at 1.3 percent is very conservative,” Haff said. “This would not have worked if the fire department members were not a fiscally conservative lot as well.”

Post Star Newspaper – Hartford supervisor sings his ‘yes’ vote as landfill saga ends

October 18, 2013 3:33 pm • JAMIE MUNKS — [email protected]

HARTFORD — The decades-long and storied saga of Washington County’s controversial ownership of a piece of land in the town officially came to an end Friday.

The Washington County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Friday in favor of selling the 485-acre tract in Hartford for $400,300 to a local dairy farmer, but will need to share the sale revenue with Warren County and also pay some closing costs.

“This cost will be a minute fraction of what this fiasco has cost us over the past twenty-some years,” Kingsbury Supervisor Jim Lindsay said.

The Eldridge Lane land, initially slated to become a landfill, never served that purpose and was the subject of multiple lawsuits over the years.

The land was slated to become a landfill for byproducts from the Hudson Falls trash plant, then owned by Warren and Washington counties.

It was deemed more cost-effective to ship ash from the plant elsewhere, so the property sat undeveloped, and Warren County sued Washington County for the money it put into improving the site.

That lawsuit was settled when Washington County paid Warren County more than $700,000 and signed a lien agreement, giving Warren County a secure interest in the property if it was ever sold.

Based on the agreement, the amount Warren County could receive was capped, but since the sale price is nowhere near the cap, the two counties will split the money evenly. There are expected to be some closing costs, which will come out of the sale price amount before the money is divvied up.

Hartford Supervisor Dana Haff has pushed for years for the county to sell the land to return it to the tax rolls. The town sued the county for money town officials believed was owed to the town, a lawsuit that ruffled feathers at the county level, but was settled earlier this year for $40,000.

“It’s not over ‘til the fat lady sings,” Haff said, before singing his “yes” vote.

Gary Fullerton, a Washington County dairy farmer, was the successful bidder in an online auction that closed last month, purchasing all three parcels and 485 acres for more than $400,000.

The property will apparently return to its previous use — it was owned by three different farmers before being purchased by Washington and Warren counties more than 20 years ago.

This article was in Tuesday’s Post Star newspaper regarding Industrial Hemp and its possible agricultural economic development for Washington County. What do you think? Dana

Supervisor: Grow hemp in Washington County
October 14, 2013 8:30 pm • JAMIE MUNKS – [email protected]

Hartford Supervisor Dana Haff wants to start a grassroots movement to push for relaxing industrial hemp restrictions, because of what he sees as economic potential in the agricultural county.

Haff wants to see legislation at the county that would both support the easing of industrial hemp restrictions and also push the federal Drug Enforcement Agency to allow local law enforcement to use discretion about how to use drug eradication grant funding.

Industrial hemp is sourced from the same plant family as marijuana, and so is prohibited under federal drug laws. But a growing number of states are adopting conflicting laws, defining industrial hemp and allowing for its growth and processing. The Department of Justice earlier this year said the federal government would generally defer to states when it comes to marijuana laws.

Haff believes if industrial hemp could be grown locally, it could be a big business in Washington County.

“I think it would start out as a niche market,” he said.

Industrial hemp and marijuana are related, coming from different cannabis strains, with marijuana coming from the flowers and leaves and industrial hemp utilizing the stalks and seeds. The two differ in their levels of tetrahydrocannibinol, the chemical that creates psychoactive effects.

According to a University of Vermont study on the viability of industrial hemp, the THC levels in marijuana can vary from 3 percent to 15 percent, but are less than 1 percent in plants grown for industrial hemp.

Hemp can be used to make a variety of products — rope, clothing and paper products; and its seeds are pressed for oil and can be used in cosmetics, paint and ink. Finished hemp is legal in the U.S., and is used in the manufacture of various goods. But under federal law, it can’t be grown here, so it’s imported.

But now North Dakota, Maine, Vermont, Oregon and Colorado are among states with laws that classify industrial hemp differently than marijuana. Montana’s statute says industrial hemp that doesn’t contain more than .3 percent THC is an agricultural product, and state-licensed hemp growers can grow, harvest, process and sell industrial hemp.

Oregon’s law doesn’t classify industrial hemp as a controlled substance, and also allows state-processed growers to possess and produce it, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Haff has contacted state and federal legislators about the issue, and he’s pushing the effort at the county level, with plans to introduce legislation at a board committee meeting.

The second part of Haff’s push calls for encouraging flexibility in how drug eradication funds can be used, and moving away from cannabis eradication.

Last month at a county Board of Supervisors meeting, Haff said he’d like to see funds intended for cannabis eradication used instead to root out drugs like heroin. His statement followed a vote by the board to accept a federal cannabis eradication grant.

The Sheriff’s Office, in a collaborative effort with other law enforcement agencies, pulled up 3,000 marijuana plants in August as part of annual eradication efforts.

Despite any movement elsewhere in the country toward legalization, marijuana is still illegal here and enforcement of those laws will continue, Washington County Sheriff Jeff Murphy said.

The $10,000 grant supervisors accepted last month was tagged specifically for eradicating marijuana.

“It’s take it or leave it,” Board of Supervisors Chairman John Rymph said.

Rymph said he remains unsure how additional funding will help the hard drugs issue.

“I don’t think you can bounce money against the wall and have the problem go away,” Rymph said. “I don’t think it’s that easy.”

The Washington County Sheriff’s Office is constantly targeting heavily addictive drugs like heroin, Murphy said. If the cannabis eradication efforts, which occupy two days a year, weren’t fully funded by the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, or were taking away from regular patrols or other activities, he wouldn’t fund them in his own budget, Murphy said.

“Three hundred sixty-five days a year, we’re doing everything we can to stop heroin from coming into the county and being sold in the county,” he said.

A number of busts were made recently along Route 149 in Washington County, a passageway from downstate to Rutland, Vt., where heroin is a persistent problem.

Washington County Jail has seen an influx of heroin users. At one point, the number of female inmates exceeded the space available for women at the jail, and some of them had to be boarded out at other facilities. Murphy estimated 90 percent of those women were serving time related to heroin — whether for using, dealing or stealing to support their habit.

Murphy is in the early stages of exploring an addiction treatment program. Heroin users who are in withdrawal when they get to the jail are treated for their medical symptoms. But that doesn’t get to the root of the problem, Murphy said.

“They’re all sick when they come in,” he said. “We’re arresting people, they’re in for a month or two, they get out and start using again. It’s a revolving door, it’s clogging up the legal system and we’ve got to break the cycle.”