The Ulster County town of Olive has a new law on the books: A one-year moratorium on all gas drilling activity, including the transportation of fracking waste, within town borders.

The law was approved unanimously by the town board at their regular meeting on Tuesday, May 8. Olive's moratorium was enacted a month after the town board formally declared their intention to pass a local law on gas drilling, in a resolution passed on April 10.

At just a page long, the law is brief and to the point: The moratorium applies to the "exploration, extraction, transportation, disposal and storage of shale gas, waste products from extraction of shale gas, and infrastructure supporting extraction of shale gas within the Town of Olive."

But it does have a provision for a company involved in gas drilling to get a waiver, if the company applies to the town board and puts up $10,000 in escrow:

Above: A Google map of New York State post offices that will have reduced hours under the new plan. Click on a red dot to get information about a post office's current hours and their planned reduced daily hours. Use the controls on the left to zoom in or out, or click and drag the map with your mouse. For a larger view, click here. Data from the United States Postal Service.

A state-owned property at 67 Wurts Street in Kingston that Ulster County executive Mike Hein wants to convert to county-owned veterans' housing. Photo courtesy of the Office of the Ulster County Executive.

At a lofty price of $1, it won't be the biggest item in Ulster County's budget. But the purchase of a state-owned property at 67 Wurts Street in Kingston to provide veterans' housing is a big priority for Ulster County executive Mike Hein.

Hein announced today that state Senator Bill Larkin will be sponsoring a bill at the county's request. The bill will authorize the state Commissioner of the Office of General Services to transfer the ownership of the property, which was previously used as an Ulster-Greene ARC group home for people with developmental disabilities, to the county for $1.

A natural-gas compressor station. Photo by Penn State Live; published to Flickr under Creative Commons license.

The Sullivan County Democrat reports today that the Millenium Pipeline Company is seeking to build a natural-gas compressor station in the Delaware County town of Hancock.

The company owns and operates the Millenium Pipeline, which stretches across New York's Southern Tier and brings natural gas from the western part of the state to markets in metropolitan New York. The Millenium Pipeline runs through Hancock.

The compressor would allow the pipeline to carry more gas, the Democrat reports:

“My understanding is it’s on some land we already own,” explained Millennium spokesman Tom Collins last week.

At 12:30pm on Wednesday, May 9, the Gilboa Dam alert sirens will be tested.

Regular tests of the system will be held on the second Wednesday of the month henceforth, the Times Journal reports.

The sirens, which were heavily damaged during flooding from Tropical Storm Irene last year, were finally repaired in April, to the tune of $220,000. The Schenectady Daily Gazette reports that in light of last year's catastrophic floods, Schoharie County is considering activating the sirens for flooding, not just the risk of dam failure:

[Schoharie County Emergency Management Director Colleen] Fullford said she expects county officials to discuss whether to revise the siren plan in place. Up until now, the public has been told that the sirens will be activated when the Gilboa Dam is at risk of imminent failure or when there’s an emergency that could result in dam failure.