The Auburn City Council should decide today whether to send a local law to the voters that would expand its spending power for energy projects. But not before the public gets its say.

Today's council agenda includes multiple items concerning a proposal to put a $15 million cap on any public utility project. Among those items is a public hearing on raising the cap, which is currently set at $2.5 million.

If the council approves raising the cap, voters will also have to pass a public referendum in the November election. The proposal also would set a limit on bonding for those projects at $10 million, meaning the city would have to find alternate funding for projects exceeding that amount.

Any bonding measure also requires a super majority, meaning four of six members of the council would have to approve the borrowing. The council voted earlier this year to remove the cap altogether, but later learned that a public referendum is required.

City officials have said the current cap limits its ability to move forward on green energy projects. An example often cited is a proposal to build an anaerobic digester that would convert biosolids from the waste water treatment plant into natural gas and compost. That project has been projected to cost between $6 million and $9 million.

The digester was initially paired with a project currently under way to build a power plant that will turn methane from the landfill into energy, but the two split due to cost issues. The landfill plant is being built by an affiliate firm of Poughkeepsie-based Central Hudson. CH-Auburn will run the $6.2 million facility for 15 years before handing it over to the city, according to the proposal.

Auburn Corporation Counsel John Rossi said Wednesday the $2.5 million served as a check on spending. But the economics have changed in the past 16 years, he said.

The current proposal will still offer checks and balances, Rossi continued. Placing a bonding limit lower than the spending limit will help prevent issues with the city's bond rating, he said. And members of the city council have already stated an interest in finding state and federal grants to help fund these types of projects.

“This gives you, I think, the best of both worlds, and has the function of a check and balance,” Rossi said.

The $2.5 million cap was approved by Auburn voters in November 1993. According The Citizen archives, the city was limited to $2 million total per year for all power projects combined before that public referendum. The $2 million limit was put into place in 1980, according to past news reports.

At the time, officials were looking to expand the city's ability to build hydroelectric facilities along the Owasco outlet, but no further power plants were built after changes in federal law regulating electricity prices made such projects no longer worth their costs.

Staff writer Christopher Caskey can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 282 or christopher.caskey@lee.net

If you go

What: Auburn City Council public hearing

When: 4:30 p.m. today

Where: Memorial City Hall, 24 South St.