Council approves Sunrise Wind milestone funding agreement for North Light and resiliency work

The New Shoreham Town Council voted on Sept. 2 to approve a milestone funding agreement with Sunrise Wind to fund three town projects: rehabilitation of North Light, coastal resiliency planning, and visitor‑experience adaptations.

Amy (staff member) told the council the agreement breaks funding into project‑specific releases and that payments are largely front‑loaded. "If you look at the appendix, you'll see that the payments are actually pretty front loaded in terms of payouts, a portion at the time when the town executes contracts with the consultants," Amy said. The agreement provides released funds upon executed vendor contracts, with subsequent milestone payments tied to percentage completion and paid invoices on the North Light work.

Under the arrangement presented to council, coastal resiliency planning payments include an initial up‑front amount followed by annual releases on the agreement anniversary; the visitor‑experience/adaptations portion had a smaller up‑front payment. Amy told the council the federal permitting process governs some project elements and that the town could not unilaterally change those permit conditions.

Council members asked about the project's exposure to the broader Sunrise Wind permitting and construction timeline; Amy said the project was still being constructed and not on hold, and she advised the council to be mindful of the permitting landscape when structuring contracts. "Be aware of the landscape that we're in as we make commitments, but … we might as well get started and be aware of how we structure our contracts so that if there were a hiccup, we're good," she said.

The council moved to approve the funding agreement; the motion passed by voice vote. The meeting audio did not include a roll‑call vote or individual vote tallies. Meeting materials included an exhibit showing milestone payment triggers tied to executed town contracts, a 50% milestone, invoice receipts and final completion for the North Light rehabilitation, and the timing schedule for the resiliency planning contract.

Council members asked staff to structure forthcoming procurement and vendor contracts to account for potential changes in Sunrise Wind's federal permitting timeline and to return to the council if material adjustments become necessary.