Council Approves Funding for Town Vehicle Fuel Management

By Adam Swift

Tuesday night, the Town Council approved spending almost $70,000 on a new fuel management system for the town’s vehicle fleet.

“What this will do is track fuel usage in all the different departments,” said Public Works Director Steven Calla. “We had a similar tool that we probably last used about 10 years ago and it is now obsolete. We know how much fuel we use as a whole, but we can’t identify it department by department.”

Town Council President James Letterie asked if there were any state requirements regarding the reporting of fuel usage by vehicle.

Town Manager Tony Marino said the goal is to track fuel usage for the Green Community requirements. Currently, Marino said the town estimates the fuel usage based on mileage and the type of vehicle.

The new system will be funded out of the town’s building maintenance stabilization fund, which currently has a balance of about $300,000, according to Precinct 1 Councilor and finance subcommittee chair Richard Fucillo.

“This is money specifically put away for things like this,” said Fucillo. “It increases transparency for how much fuel we are using. Like Director Calla said, we had a system like this before, so I think increasing transparency is a positive thing, and this had a positive recommendation from the finance subcommittee.”