Town selects site for two charging stations

The Town Board has approved placing two electric vehicle charging stations in the ThompsonMazzarella Park municipal lot off West Market Street.

Town Supervisor Elizabeth Spinzia said the stations will be in addition to ones planned by the village of Rhinebeck.

“There will be [a total of] six to eight stations in Rhinebeck, depending on what the village does,” she said.

Village officials have authorized placing two stations with two ports each in the municipal parking lot on Center Street, behind the fire station, and are working to site another two stations.

Town officials hope to have the Thompson-Mazzarella stations installed by the end of the summer and will use a state Department of Environmental Conservation to cover 80 percent of the cost.

“The village helped us do our grant,” Spinzia said. “They did the paperwork, but this is separate from the grants that they were approved for.”

The rules of the grant state local services can be used to cover the town’s required 20 percent share of the cost.

Consultant Christopher Quimby in December proposed purchasing the charging stations from a company called Lilypad for $11,630.

“The state will pay for two years of service and warranty,” he said. “It will also pay for the first two years of electricity.”

Quimby said the stations will come with software that allows users to pay with a credit card once the statefunded use period has expired.