The AES “PILOT” application has been cleared for landing. The Niagara County Industrial Development Agency is expected to approve the payment-in-lieu-of-taxes application at its meeting Wednesday.

The public hearing for the county’s biggest taxpayer went smoothly at the town hall Monday. It lasted 30 minutes and was nothing like the 2006 marathon hearing which had to be moved from the courthouse to Barker High School auditorium. An overflow crowd had a heated debate concerning the application for tax breaks for the international power company four years ago.

IDA Assistant Director Lawrence D. Witul, who conducted the meeting, said a transcript will be forwarded to the agency’s board of directors, which is expected to approve the PILOT. “The town, the school district and the company had gotten together and worked something out that’s agreeable to all parties,” he said.

Legal knots were untied at a meeting at the IDA offices in Sanborn just hours prior to Monday’s public hearing. The Town of Somerset, Niagara County and the Barker school district already have agreed to the PILOT and are happy to put a decade of expensive legal wrangling behind them.

AES Eastern Energy has agreed to pay $15.8 million in taxes annually for five years, and there will be no further litigation between AES and the municipalities.

“The agreement is going to get rid of all the lawsuits of the past which have been costing us a real fortune with the lawyer fees and everything else,” resident Paul Higgins said. “Everyone seems to agree on the numbers that will get money back into the school, county and the town. It’s going to be a win-win. You just can’t keep arguing forever.”

After resident James Hoffman opened with objections to the PILOT and requested that the public hearing be tabled until February, members of the town board and subsequent speakers gave the application enthusiastic support.

School Superintendent Roger Klatt noted that the PILOT provides revenue certainty through 2016 at a time when state aid to education is unclear.

Deputy Supervisor Dan Engert thanked IDA for allowing taxing jurisdictions to work through the issues. “This model of passivity on the part of the IDA board in allowing the taxing jurisdictions to work through this can be a model for future negotiations in the county,” he said.

Supervisor Richard Meyers emphasized the agreement was the work of a partnership among the town, school and county. “I want to thank the IDA for putting it back in the elected officials’ hands to make the decisions,” he said

Peter Bajc, who replaced Kevin Pierce as AES plant manager in October, planned to speak but decided not to. “I want to convey our appreciation that we were all able to work together on this,” he said. “I only heard stories. This is certainly a better way to have relationships with the town you’re in. We’re happy to work this out and this meeting was much better than what I heard.”

Engert called the 2006 meeting a mess.

Norman Jansen was among the hundreds of people who attended the public hearing in 2006. “The town expressed what we wanted, but here we expressed what we really wanted,” he said. “I’m very much in favor of this PILOT. I think it’s great. The lawyers were a waste of money. Sit down and talk about it is the best way to go.”

Bajc declined specific comment on the PILOT, but agreed to set up a time to discuss further questions after “engaging the corporate folks.”

AES Corp. provides energy in 29 countries. It claims a workforce of 25,000 people.

Hoffman, a planning board member, says the large, multinational company should not be given a tax break. He argued that residents are experiencing a triple whammy from the previous PILOT, which was nullified by the Fourth Appellate Court of New York. He said that negotiating a new PILOT with AES is an inferior approach and said the AES property should be taxed on assessed value.

AES has no incentive to get out of it early, according to Meyers. The PILOT can be adjusted in five years and because of the uncertainty in the coal industry, the PILOT can be negotiated again.

Alice Balcom, who has lived in the town since 1969, said, “It’s been too long and too dragged out. Never mind shooting the golden goose. We’ve been trying to shoot the golden goose for years here.”

“It should have been done five years ago, just people sitting down talking,” said Dan Hogan a longtime resident who lives on the Lake Ontario shore.

Contact reporter Bill Wolcott at 439-9222, ext. 6246.