A regular meeting of the Jewett Town Board was held on November 17, 2003. Supervisor Michael Flaherty opened the meeting at 7PM. Present were Board members Mark Middleton, Thomas Hitchcock and Paul LaPierre. Also present were Attorney for the Town Tal G. Rappleyea, Building Inspector Robert Bosworth, newspaper reporter Mike Ryan, Planning Board Chairwoman Jane Bostrom, Town residents Charles Kutcher and Tom Wilson and the town clerk.

Minutes of the October 8, 2003 regular meeting were approved as presented on a motion by Hitchcock, seconded by LaPierre and carried with Councilman Middleton abstaining as he was unable to locate his copy of the minutes to read them.
Minutes of the October 8th and 15th budget workshops were approved as presented on a motion by LaPierre, seconded by Flaherty and carried.
Minutes of the September 29, 2003 meeting with Town employees was approved as presented on a motion by LaPierre, seconded by Hitchcock and carried with Councilman Middleton abstaining as he was not present at this meeting.
Councilman Hitchcock asked Attorney Rappleyea "how does that operate as far as emergency meeting? We are called here to discuss something and it's evident from the discussion that starts that we've got a situation. We go into an emergency meeting. I'm not sure it warranted an emergency meeting but is that legal?"
Attorney Rappleyea "the Board can met, basically, on a moments notice for a situation emergency or not. From a legal standpoint as long as once determined that a meeting needs to take place outside the regular meeting as a special or emergency meeting, the legal steps that need to be taken are a) notice be posted and a phone call at least made or an effort to contact the newspaper."
Councilman Hitchcock "The meeting took place by us being called to come down here and talk to the employees about the handbook. It was ascertained after chatting with them for a while that there were some problems with the handbook. There were three of us here all of a sudden we're going into an emergency meeting and we took action which I felt uncomfortable about. I don't think it warranted that type of emergency status. Never the less it's over and done with. I don't particularly like to do things that way when no one is informed and it wasn't like the roof was caving in or something of that nature. It was something that could have been handled at another meeting where everybody was present and people have been notified that we're having a meeting."
Councilman Middleton "I'd like to follow up. Your explanation is indicating that perhaps it was illegal. There were no steps to call the paper or anything like that."
Councilman LaPierre "It was a single issue and all the principal parties to that issue were present with the exception of Mark."
Attorney Rappleyea "In that particular situation it's going to be an executive session anyway because it's personnel. So anything that might be done would be done in executive session outside the public purview anyway."
Councilman LaPierre "It wasn't called as an executive session."
Councilman Hitchcock "In my humble opinion, having been involved in many executive sessions, we were not talking about individual workers, we were talking about a handbook. Which is, I think, an open document to this Town and it's employees. I don't like these kinds of things to happen because we took some action there, which was hurried and was not well thought out and it got by me. I would hope that at some point we would revisit that handbook. I think this Town should have a handbook. I'd like to see that ironed out so we do have a handbook for the employees of this Town."
Councilman LaPierre "We did discuss that with the people at the meeting. They were going to itemize the specific issues they had and get together with us for a discussion about that."

The Supervisor's report was given out.

The Building Inspector gave out his monthly written report, which he reviewed.
Councilman Middleton asked for an updated list on the unsafe buildings for the December meeting.
A motion was made by Hitchcock seconded by Flaherty and carried to accept the building inspectors monthly report.

The Board reviewed the Zoning Officer's monthly report and discussed some items.

1) Alpine village on Goshen Street maintains some unregistered vehicles for maintenance use plus a couple other unregistered vehicles that will be removed in the future.

2) 129 Kloss Road has numerous unregistered vehicles. Councilman Hitchcock said that even though the owner isn't in residence whomever is in residence should be responsible for removal of the vehicles. Attorney Rappleyea said the next step would be to put them on notice that we're coming on such and such a day and the cost will be applied to the taxes. He will check to make sure this is the next step.
Councilman Hitchcock suggested that Dan Ryan would take the vehicles and we should get this cleaned up.

3) Attorney Rappleyea will do some research on accessory building.

4) A motion was made by Hitchcock seconded by Middleton and carried instructing Attorney Rappleyea to do whatever is necessary to take the owner of Rough Rider Ranch to a higher court and obtain a resolution to this matter.

A motion was made by Flaherty seconded by Hitchcock and carried to accept the zoning officers monthly report.

On a motion by Flaherty seconded by Hitchcock and carried the Board approved Resolution #18. The subject of the resolution is "opposition to above ground lines through Greene County".
ROLL CALL: Aye 4 Flaherty, Hitchcock, LaPierre, Middleton
Nay 0

Under courtesy of the floor:

A question was asked about the status of the election. Supervisor Flaherty said the election has been certified.

Councilman Middleton asked what the Town was doing to replace Mr. Rubinger?
Supervisor Flaherty said that Mr. Rubinger would decline the justice position. Supervisor Flaherty spoke with the Board of Elections and was told to treat this as a vacancy. As of January 1, 2004 the Board can make a one- year appointment to the justice position and the office would be up for election in November of 2004.

Councilman Hitchcock "We will have one novice judge starting off ice January 1st. We didn't try to do something to appoint someone in the interim? We still have an opening on the court. We could approach the current judge who was defeated and maybe implore him to see us through the next year."

Attorney Rappleyea "The alternative would be to go to another Town to use their acting judge."

Supervisor Flaherty, on behalf of the Board, is to request help and support from Justice Selkirk to fill in for the first quarter of next year.

Bids were opened for a triangle of surplus land, .917 acres, located at old Little Timber Road and new Little Timber Road.
One bid was received from Saverio Accardi for $4,500.00.
A motion was made by Middleton seconded by LaPierre and carried to accept the bid.
A motion was made by Middleton seconded by LaPierre and carried to place the total proceeds from the sale of the surplus property into the "Fund for the future of Jewett" account.

Under old business:
Councilman Hitchcock will contact Steve Cook to see if or when he will be able to work on the bathrooms in the Municipal Building.

Under other:
The Town Clerk will call Glen's Carpet and ask if they can come and put the trim molding on the stairs, as it wasn't done when the new carpet was put in.

The Town Historian position is still an open position.

Concerning the painting of the salt barn. Supervisor Flaherty stated that there is only one panel left to be painted on the front.
Councilman Hitchcock thought the whole building was going to be painted.
It was suggested that the highway crew could finish the panel on the front.

Councilman Hitchcock asked for an update on the encampment on Beaches Corners Road.
He was told that no action has been taken lately.
Councilman Middleton asked that the Zoning Officer make this a top priority.

Councilman Hitchcock was concerned that we're paying for a web page and current information is not being put on the web site. He would also like to see the Planning Board and ZBA minutes placed on the web site.
A motion was made by Flaherty seconded by Middleton and carried to have Councilman LaPierre contact Mr. Peters and asked him to contact the Town Clerk weekly for any new information.

A motion was made by LaPierre seconded by Flaherty for the Board to go into executive session concerning land acquisition. A motion was made by LaPierre seconded by Flaherty to come out of executive session. Councilman LaPierre will pursue the matter.

The bills were audited and ordered paid. The general fund was $18,005.06 on abstract #11, claim numbers 231 to 272. The highway fund was $13,873.07 on abstract #11, claim numbers 161 to 183.

There being no further business the meeting was adjourned at 10:20PM on a motion by Middleton seconded by Flaherty and carried.

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Patricia Merwin Town Clerk