Woodstock Town Board Meeting

This article appeared in the Townsman, September 11 edition

Woodstock, September 9

Like the Beijing Olympics the Woodstock town board meeting began and ended in fireworks. The board met at the unusual hour of 4:00 pm since four of its five members, councilwoman Liz Simonson excepted, are involved in primary races for the Woodstock Democratic Committee and decided at a previous meeting to conduct business early enough to allow their participation in get-out-the-vote initiatives. Only supervisor Jeff Moran, councilman Jay Wenk and Simonson arrived on time and the meeting began with Wenk taking testy exception to Moran's proposed seating arrangements. Councilwoman Terrie Rosenblum arrived at about 4:20, with Collins, who was expected to be late, arriving at 4:30.

Before getting to the business Wenk announced his abandonment, based on his own discussions with plumbers, of his proposal to install a tankless water heater in the Community Center. A Wenk motion to install such a device had been tabled at a meeting earlier this year. He also announced a proposal for the Town to install bicycle racks at various locations including the Chamber of Commerce building, the Community Center, Bradley Meadows shopping center and possible upper Comeau. Details will be fleshed out in the future.

A resolution to authorize the supervisor to sign an agreement with Brinnier & Larios PC to provide engineering design services for the Rock City Road sidewalk project for a fee not to exceed $22,000 was tabled when concerns with the Town's actual ownership of the sidewalk were not satisfactorily resolved. Resolutions to engage engineering services from the same company for Rock City Road crosswalks and additional walkways, fee not to exceed $6000.00, and to provide engineering design services for the upper Comeau parking lot, fee not to exceed $4500.00 were adopted unanimously.

By resolution the town board amended the Town's Traffic and Parking Law to prohibit parking within thirty-five feet of the Pine Grove Street entrance to the CVS parking lot. Although signs will be installed to demarcate the prohibited zones there can be no legal enforcement until the local law is formally amended after a public hearing.

Town employees represented by the Communications Workers of America union, working since January under a lapsed agreement, will see annual 4% wage increases for 2008, 2009 and 2010. The 2008 wage increase is retroactive to January 1. The remaining employees of the Town saw their wages retroactively adjusted to 4%, with the exception of the police department, which works under separate agreement. There was little board discussion prior to the contract's ratification.

The Woodstock Reformed Church on Tinker Street, in compliance with a recently amended Tree Law was given authorization to remove a badly diseased maple tree.

Amendments to the Zoning Law, which have bounced back and forth between different agencies and the company hired by the Town to codify its laws, are now on their way back to the planning board for their review.

The highway superintendent, Mike Reynolds, was given authorization to purchase a used plow truck for $47,000 from low-bidder Boyles Motor Sales.

A resolution subject to permissive referendum to tap the highway equipment reserve fund for up to $260,000 for various pieces of highway equipment was also adopted. Legal notices will appear in the Town's official newspapers.

With the business on the agenda completed, supervisor Moran raised the issue of the Town's policy with regard to water leaks in residences that are connected to both the municipal water and sewer services. Up until now when leaked water was determined by the sewer superintendent not to have entered the wastewater collection system, for instance a burst water pipe emptying water into a basement, the customer was required to pay the full water charge but the town board could assess a sewer charge based on an averaging of the previous four quarters of use. The 2008 charge for water is $0.28 and sewer is $0.81 per hundred gallons. Supervisor Moran was concerned the process for waiving sewer costs was being abused, but after some back and forth on the issue it was dropped.

And then the war came.

As far as could be determined, these are the facts: Earlier this year the town board in unanimous votes appointed Fran Breitkopf and Alison West to two vacant seats on the Woodstock ethics board. Ms Brietkopf is a member of the Woodstock Democratic Committee, and Ms West is a member of the Woodstock Republican Committee, and all parties knew this at the time. Last Friday, September 5, planning board member Paul Shultis jr. brought to the attention of Collins and Moran the fact that the year 2000 local law establishing the ethics board had the requirement that "No member shall hold office in a political party or hold elective office in the Town of Woodstock." By Collins's reckoning this cast into serious doubt either woman could legally remain on the ethics board since they both "hold office" in political party committees. Collins found it particularly galling that Ms. Breitkopf was seeking another term on the Democratic Committee.
Wenk also became incensed by the matter, urging the board to "take responsible action to remove" Breitkopf and West.
Supervisor Moran first questioned the meaning of "office," and then thought that even if it did apply the board might consider amending the law, taking into account the fact Woodstock is a small town and that volunteers are not easy to come by.
Wenk and Collins weren't buying it. "People on the ethics board are breaking the law," Collins heatedly claimed. "What are we going to do about it?"
Rosenblum, when attempting to interject, was roundly advised to recuse herself from the discussion since she is a "significant other" to Ms Breitkopf, which the local law describes as "an individual of the opposite or same sex living in shared quarters for the purpose of constituting a family unit." It was not explained why Rosenblum couldn't continue to participate in a discussion that also involved Ms West, with whom she has no relationship.
It should be added that this tortured debate ensued without mentioning Ms Breitkopf's or Ms West's names.
Sensing that the board might proceed with a precipitous action, Rosenblum expressed her amazement that a board that would ignore a letter from the Recreation Committee calling upon the board to "warn the public" of the "obscene behavior of a member of the public" was now not willing "to wait a couple of days" before making a determination about the qualifications of the two ethics board members in question.
That brought a sudden if temporary hush to the debate, Simonson claiming, "I don't know what you are talking about," but not asking for any clarification. Collins, not deterred, insisted the two ethics board members either "comply or remove yourselves."
Rosenblum's statement, however, seemed to reduce the boiling debate to a simmer, and it finally after forty minutes petered out on complaints by Simonson and Shultis concerning the process by which the ethics board conducts its business, and also a consensus around the suggestion the supervisor write to the ethics board advising it of the imbroglio and asking it to help with a solution.
Wenk finished off the meeting rehashing old business that had already been decided, and the meeting adjourned at approximately 6:25.