LOCKE - Moving the assessment process to an annual event at 100 percent evaluations was discussed by the Locke Town Board at its Thursday night meeting.

Town board member Jack Corcoran reported on the issue of assessments and the efforts of the county to try to get all towns on the same page.

“They are not forcing or asking us to be part of a county program,” Corcoran said. “They want a fairly reasonable assessment in the whole county.”

There was some resistance among towns to a countywide assessment that had been proposed earlier this year, town attorney Andrew Fusco said.

“Some townships are getting together to get us all on the same path, whether on your own or in a group,” Corcoran said. “It's all fair.”

Town Supervisor Jean James said the towns of Genoa, Summer Hill and Moravia might have greater commonality with Locke.

“Now we have separate assessors who are not all looking at assessments in the same way,” she said.

“A mechanism already exists in the law to share assessors,” Fusco said. He said Locke did a good job in maintaining its equalization rate and that it would be a good idea if all towns could commit to a 100 percent assessment.

James said one problem was getting similar towns in sync.

“Moravia and Sempronius haven't had a reval in seven years, and Summer Hill just did one. Ours is next year,” she said.

Fusco said the state will allow a reval every three years without a penalty, but it is expensive to do a town-wide evaluation, so when times are thin (financially), people are inclined to postpone the process.

The board agreed to keep an eye on the issue to see what could be done.

In other news:

#&149; Insurance for the Town of Locke and its employees was addressed. An agent from Kilbourne Insurance presented a proposal for insurance coverage with the U.S. Specialty Insurance Co., a division of Houston Casualty.

The town had also gotten an insurance quote from Dempsey Insurance.

After hearing that coverage would essentially be the same as the town had in the past, board members appeared to be leaning toward Kilbourne. The issue of the town having to have $3 million aggregate insurance in order to plow county roads was something the town needed to look into before finalizing their insurance contract.

#&149; The board agreed to appoint Michael O'Connor as its code enforcement officer for 2009 at $4,500 per year. O'Connor also is the code enforcement officer for the Town of Scipio. The current code enforcement officer, Doug Staley, is an independent contractor, but O'Connor will be on the payroll.

#&149; At its Nov. 6 meeting the board unanimously resolved to adopt the 2009 preliminary budget of $1,081,624, with $504,504 to be raised by tax, as the official town budget for 2009.

Staff writer Kathleen Barran can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 238 or kathleen.barran@lee.net