Allegations of power plays abound after Town Board meeting
The Wednesday, Jan. 27, meeting of the Bethlehem Town Board saw two contentious votes that left Supervisor Sam Messina at odds with other members of the board, in what the new supervisor described as the most mean-spirited and political meeting I’ve ever been in.
But other members of the Town Board, who voted in unison on the two issues, said that the meeting was an example of disagreement in democracy, and accused Messina of attempting to use his office to block their initiatives from the agenda.
Meeting format sparks debate
In a split vote Wednesday, the board appointed Thomas Coffey and Steve Rice to fill two vacancies on the Planning Board.
Messina cast the dissenting vote. He approached the agenda item by proposing the vacancies be discussed among the board, but Councilman Mark Jordan countered by making a point of order that a motion must be made and seconded before discussion can be held.
Messina motioned that the board fill one of the two vacant seats, but his motion was not met by a second. Jordan then motioned that Coffey and Rice be appointed. The motion was seconded and several minutes of discussion ensued.
Messina later said Jordan’s interruption was rude and counteractive to open and constructive debate.
`When you have to refer to Robert’s Rules it generally means you’re out of order or there’s some sort of agenda to the meeting,` he said. `It’s about power, it’s about the numbers.`
Jordan later said Messina was indeed out of order and corrected himself by making a motion after the point of order was made.
`There are established, longstanding rules of order and they apply equally to each board member,` Jordan said. `If one of us didn’t call the supervisor out when he was out of order, we wouldn’t be doing our jobs.`
Councilman Kyle Kotary said Messina’s actions were no mistake, and accused him of manipulating the agenda to suit his own needs.
`Sam intentionally put a vague item of open discussion to create an atmosphere of chaos to hopefully, in his political calculation, would force us to punt again for two weeks,` Kotary said in a later interview.
The supervisor prepares the agenda for Town Board meetings.
Planning Board stays at seven
At the last board meeting, members left the issue of Planning Board appointments open to continue candidate interviews and to discuss if the board should be reordered as a cost savings measure. Planning Board members are paid $5,263 annually.
As evidenced by the 4-to-1 vote, a majority felt the board should remain a seven-member entity.
`I think in the end, given the projects that are developing in this town. I have come to the conclusion that this is a very important board and not the time or the place to think about reducing that board,` said Councilwoman Joann Dawson.
Kotary, who at the last Town Board meeting spoke of the potential for cost savings, expressed similar thoughts.
`I’d rather ensure we have the quantity of quality representation,` and seek cost savings elsewhere, he said.
All five members of the Town Board acknowledged the quality and volume of applications that had been received.
Concerns were expressed over the board’s ability to form a quorum if the seats were left vacant (four of the remaining five members would have to be present to constitute a quorum until the board was formally reformed into a five-member entity). Councilman Mark Hennessey said that important projects before the board require timely consideration.
`I wouldn’t want those to not go forward because we didn’t take action,` he said.
Messina said he believes filling one seat would send an appropriate message to residents.
`It strikes a balance between fiscal awareness and going to seven people,` he said.
Messina alleges cronyism
Coffey and Rice will replace outgoing members Katherine McCarthy and Daniel Coffey, the latter of whom was appointed to chairman of the Zoning Board of Appeals.
Thomas Coffey is an administrator at the Albany County Nursing Home and a North Bethlehem resident. He said he applied for the post to become more involved in town government and also to give his part of town a voice.
`I echo what was said tonight about people feeling not being a part of the Town of Bethlehem,` he said after the meeting.
Rice works in the New York Bankers Association in membership and communications, and formerly worked in the state senate in communications before moving to the private sector. He’s an Elsmere resident.
`I’ve been here my whole life, and it’s a good time in my life now to be able to contribute something back,` Rice said.
Messina spoke out against the proposed appointments Wednesday, saying the appointment of Democratic Committee member Coffey would provide that group undue representation on town committees.
Councilman Mark Hennessey denied this statement during the meeting and called into question Messina’s figures. Later, he acknowledged there are several Democratic committee members on both the planning and zoning boards, but said they are balanced by members of other political parties and emphasized that political affiliation does not play a part in his decision making process.
`Mr. Messina has made a habit of making false and incendiary statements,` he said.
In a later interview, Messina went further, condemning Wednesday’s appointments as purely political decisions the rest of the Town Board flatly refused to compromise with him on.
He said Daniel Coffey’s appointment earlier in January to chairman of the Zoning Board of Appeals was also a politically charged appointment, but one that he was willing to vote along with in exchange for an understanding that the Planning Board appointment process would be free from political considerations. Instead, he said, more qualified candidates were ignored and no effort was made to meet him in the middle on the issue.
`I have not gotten 1 inch of that sort of reasonableness from this board,` Messina said.
Kotary later balked at the notion the appointments were political.
`For the last five years I’ve been on the board, I have and the Democratic majority have appointed members of all parties,` he said. `To continually categorize appointments or individuals who one does not agree with as constantly being political is getting a little old.`
Rice said he is a registered Democrat, though he was a longtime Republican, and does not belong to any political committees. Messina characterized Rice as `a friend of theirs [Town Board members].`
After a period of discussion at the meeting, Messina presented the names of two candidates he thought were better suited for placement on the Planning Board in Kevin Crawford, former general counsel to the state Association of Towns, and Leah Farrell, a recent Bethlehem transplant and former city planner from South Carolina.
Dawson and Kotary said they never saw Crawford’s resume. Messina said he had provided it to all board members.
Board liaisons appointed 4-to-1
In a second contentious moment, the Town Board voted 4-to-1 to appoint Town Board members as official liaisons to town departments.
The item was not part of the prepared agenda. Kotary put the motion forward during the `new business` section at the end of the meeting, a move Messina characterized as `jamming` the item through.
`I’m disturbed that for a long time, through two or three administrations that I’ve seen, that something this significant was added to an agenda without being an agenda item,` Messina said.
Jordan said the proposal has been discussed among the Town Board for weeks now, and had to be brought up in new business because Messina sought to block it from the floor.
`He refused to put on the agenda items that several members of the board said they wanted on the agenda,` Jordan said.
Messina said he had indeed discussed the idea with Town Board members and said he’d like further time to study and refine the idea. He also indicated it might be more productive to have Town Board members work on areas of policy rather than with specific departments.
`I wasn’t prepared nor should the board expect me to zip that through in the first three weeks,` Messina said.
The approved motion means that the four Town Board members are assigned specific departments to communicate with. Kotary emphasized the position of liaison would not enable Town Board members to give department heads direction.
`Nothing we did either further empowers or diminishes a Town Board member’s power,` he said.
Messina disagreed with the usefulness of the program, saying that liaisons are better suited for towns with part-time supervisors. In Bethlehem, he said, the supervisor is meant to be the primary liaison to department heads, who might be confused as to who they answer to under the proposal.
`It looks to me like a layer of government that I’m not so sure we need at all,` Messina said. `I don’t think it serves our town well, I don’t think it serves our government well.`
Later, he expressed concerns about liaisons complicating town business.
`I have to believe they’re using the term of liaison to interfere and create problems with me,` Messina said.
Kotary argued that liaison programs exist in the nearby towns of Guilderland, Colonie and New Scotland, where there are also full-time supervisors.
Former Supervisor Jack Cunningham said the idea of Town Board liaisons was kicked around during his time in office but never made it to a formal motion because there was adequate communication between the supervisor’s office and the Town Board.
`At the time, I don’t think there was a pressing need for it,` Cunningham said. `When I was there, I was working very closely with the board, and I don’t know whether that’s still the situation.`
Cunningham went on to say that liaisons were a concept Messina had expressed support for when he was a member of the Town Board.
Messina said under Cunningham’s administration he had difficulty communicating with department heads due to Cunningham’s policies, but he has instead directed departments to communicate freely with Town Board members.
Kotary said he presented the motion Wednesday because the support was there, unlike in previous years.
`I never had three votes for it before,` he said. `The irony is the only two people who favored it in the past were me and Sam.`
The liaison appointments are as follows:
Mark Jordan: Police Department, Justice Court, Parks and Recreation; Mark Hennessey: Economic Development and Planning, Management of Information Services, Human Resources; Joann Dawson: Senior Services, Assessor, Tax Department, Town Clerk; Kyle Kotary: Comptroller’s Office, Department of Public Works and Engineering, Highway Department.
Moving forward
All Town Board members and Supervisor Messina expressed the change in administration has been met with their best efforts to work together and build bridges. Several referenced the Jan. 13 organizational meeting, when dozens of votes passed with unanimous consent.
Still, there was a consensus that this cooperation was not present before or at Wednesday’s meeting.
`The meeting was reflective of the Town Board moving in one direction and the supervisor moving in the other,` Jordan said.
`I don’t think partisan bickering is where we are heading,` Hennessey said. `Where we have agreement we will work with the supervisor.`
Messina said he made mention of the Town Board during his inauguration and state of the town speeches for a reason: to foster an atmosphere of open communication.
`I think we have a chance to move forward,` he said. `All I need is for the Town Board members to speak with me and focus on government and not political maneuvering.`
Messina indicated he would continue to place discussion items on the agenda.
Kotary said despite the procedural clashes, the discussion at Wednesday’s meeting was largely cordial and constructive.
`I thought we had very healthy and productive debates,` he said. `Everybody aired out their concernsthat should be refreshing.`
The next Town Board meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 10.
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