Delaware County staff and supervisors raise equity and safety concerns after Clean Path picked up by New York Power Authority

Shelley Johnson, a county staff presenter, told the Delaware County Board of Supervisors that the private Clean Path transmission proposal has been withdrawn and the New York Power Authority has taken over the project. "They are a public entity, which means they have a mid lane authorities. They have the ability to basically do this project with very little involvement from the local communities," Johnson said, summarizing a letter and document submitted by Kevin Young to the Public Service Commission.

Johnson said the project would move renewable energy downstate and that upstate communities — including the Town of Delhi and nearby towns that jointly filed comments — face most local impacts while receiving limited benefit. "A lot of that is to account for the needed cost to build infrastructure to move energy to the city," she said, pointing to higher supply charges on local electric bills that she said have increased sharply compared with last year.

A county supervisor (name not specified in the meeting transcript) described constituent hardship tied to rising energy costs: "I I have had so many people coming to town hall and complain about their electric bill… People in my town can't eat, so, I support it completely." The supervisor cited a county housing study, saying more than one-third of Delaware County residents cannot afford at least one basic necessity, and argued that higher utility bills worsen that strain.

Johnson said Clean Path originally proposed the route as a private developer and that, under New York state review (Article 7 was cited in discussion), the private proposal was rerun for cost-effectiveness; when Clean Path concluded the route was not cost effective for a private developer, the New York Power Authority — a public entity — took the project forward. Johnson said that, because NYPA is a public authority, tax payments to local jurisdictions and private host-benefit agreements previously discussed may not follow in the same way as they would with a private developer. "Kevin's not certain. He thinks because the power authority is a public entity, nobody will receive tax payments because of the public status of the power authority," Johnson said, quoting the letter she distributed.

Speakers raised local safety and emergency-response questions tied to proposed battery storage and an AC/DC substation planned in the Town of Delhi. Johnson said several environmental and emergency studies referenced in the earlier Clean Path filings were incomplete when the application was withdrawn and that public-safety plans for large battery storage installations — such as evacuation zones, air-quality impacts, and fire response — remained outstanding. One supervisor cited a nearby fire at a similar facility and said it "took them weeks to get the fire out. They had no idea how to get the fire out."

Johnson said Kevin Young, who authored the letter to the Public Service Commission on behalf of local communities, asked to return next month to present in person and to be prepared to ask the board to pass a resolution objecting to how the authority is advancing the project without host-community benefit agreements. The board consented to invite Young; no formal vote was recorded on the invitation.

The board placed the Clean Path/NYPA briefing on its upcoming agenda for fuller presentation and possible resolution consideration.