Gavels, Bills, and Boardroom Battles: Greenport's October Meeting Recap
Updated: Oct 10
Town of Greenport, NY, Oct 10 — Greenport's October town board workshop and meeting on Wednesday, October 7th, may well have been the wildest yet, surpassing even what transpired during the past two meetings in September and August respectively. Amongst other things it featured: an immediate executive session, a wooden gavel liberally wielded by the supervisor, an attempt to rename Fairview Avenue made by a councilman wearing bowling shoes and sunglasses, a resident in the audience who wouldn't let go, and the citation of James 1:19.
Before the workshop portion even began, Supervisor Kathy Eldridge asked for a minute of silence for Greenport's Planning Board chair Ed Stiffler who had unexpectedly passed away the night before. What made it poignant was that the meeting agenda had two items on it that related directly to Ed: One was to reappoint him as Planning Board chair for another five-year term and the second was a letter Ed had written to the town board asking to hire Laurie Smith as secretary to the Planning Board. Kathy would later read out loud this letter and the audience was painfully aware that it may have been the last letter Ed had ever written.
What followed the moment of silence was an unusual proclamation by Eldridge, one where it seemed she wanted to set the table for a quieter and more contemplative meeting by invoking James 1:19: "I know there is a lot of frustration in this room, and I want to recognize that we are all called to a higher standard—to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger because human wrath never solves community problems". She would later repeat these words verbatim at the beginning of the meeting portion:
Needless to say, these words were quickly forgotten by everyone in the room, including herself.
Board goes into executive session
With the preamble concluded, it should have been off to the races but councilman Jim Dolan made a motion to go into executive session "and discuss personnel in the Building Inspector's office", seconded by Clayton Clark. Thus the panelists shuffled out of the room.
It's safe to assume that during the executive session, Dolan had another go at suspending code enforcement officer Albert Eldridge. This may have been prompted by our most recent article alleging a breach of ethics when Albert Eldridge sent a letter to Deputy Supervisor Clark in April 2025 disclosing his employment with Hudson Valley Fisheries.
When the board members and Town Attorney Fitzsimmons returned 20 minutes later, it soon became clear that little had been achieved. After voting to come out of executive session, no motion regarding Albert Eldridge's role of Code Enforcement Officer was made.
Old ShopRite building offered to Greenport
Eldridge informed the audience that the old ShopRite building was still for sale and could be bought by Greenport for $2.7 million as a potential site for a new highway garage. This building had been up for auction at the end of July but, as Clayton explained, did not reach the minimum bid.
Highway Superintendent John Mausolf was surprised to hear that the building was once again under consideration and remarked that "it's not the ideal location". Given its size, he asked "what else are you going to put in that building beside the garage"?
Dolan reminded the board that the building's price was initially $1 million and had sharply jumped up the moment Greenport expressed serious interest in acquiring it. He questioned if the town should even entertain negotiations with a seller who conducted themselves in that manner.
He had other concerns regarding the suitability of this building. Previous discussions considered consolidating various municipal departments in the site, such as the Highway and Fire Departments, town hall and Building Inspector's office. He didn't think it was conducive to good town business when "elderly people [buy] garbage bags and fire alarms start going off in the building". He suggested that an apartment complex would be a better use for the building and it would bolster Greenport's property tax base.
The discussion was tabled after Dolan agreed to take charge of the quest to find a suitable location for the highway garage rebuild.
Highway chief still can't review his department bills
It was around this time that temperatures appeared to be rising. John Mausolf stood up and got straight to the point in his characteristic Columbia County drawl. He appeared to be addressing Clayton Clark: "The bills—it's like pulling teeth to get my bills. I went to Deputy Supervisor Clark, requested them. Never heard back. So are you again over here at town hall; asked about the bills, you said 'I forwarded that to supervisor Eldridge'."
"Didn't you just come in and look at your bills?", interrupted Eldridge. "Let me get to that", Mausolf replied and proceeded: "Then I had to FOIL them. I had to do a FOIL request. That was denied. So then I did a formal appeal and the refusal was reversed. I was told I had to come to town hall to see Highway Department bills. I made copies. Still, no signatures on them. I don't even think the board reviewed them because there's no initials. There's no nothing.":
What John is describing here is a continuation of what we recently described in Greenport's sabotage of its own Highway Chief after Mausolf found that his bills were no longer sent to his department but straight to town hall where they remained largely hidden to him. It's disheartening to hear from him that the situation does not appear to be resolved.
Kathy's subsequent take on this situation is quite interesting. Apparently, she had just recently discovered that the Highway chief has in fact access to QuickBooks, a piece of accounting software often used by small municipalities to handle departmental billing. When Mausolf disputed that he had access and that it wasn't even installed on his department's computers, he was informed by Eldridge that "you can put it right on your computer at the highway garage".
Given the recent discovery of this fact, by her own account, the question arises how the Supervisor expected John Mausolf to know about this. Not that he was interested in it anyway: "So why am I doing QuickBooks? [...] The process was working for seven years. Why was it changed the past four months?"
Jim Dolan, uncharacteristically quiet throughout this exchange, wasn't holding it in any longer and unleashed a series of questions and accusations while ignoring the occasional attempt to interrupt him. In the direction of Eldridge, he asked: "What changed the last four months for you to disrupt this whole payment process? And now we have a new confidential secretary...is she overwhelmed with work now? Have you added new duties for her that you're telling the Highway Superintendent he may want to do his own QuickBooks?"
Irate, Dolan added: "I am asking the supervisor if she has an explanation, but she usually doesn't. Do you have an answer, Supervisor?" Eldridge conceded that she didn't:
Dolan spars with Supervisor and Apicella
At this point, Dolan had fully warmed up and wasn't willing to limit himself to billing issues in the Highway Department. He brought up various other grievances and different topics quickly phased in and out. As Dolan was grilling the Supervisor on her claim that she didn't know how the Flock camera at the entrance of the Greenport Town Park had come about, he had angered Guy Apicella enough for him to make his first, yet not last, appearance: "Supervisor....supervisor, get control of this meeting".
Some time during this exchange Eldridge's wooden gavel, a new prop not yet seen, came down twice for the first time. "Zip it, Dolan," Apicella chided in Dolan's direction who shot back with "Who are you?" This was when Dolan collected "warning number one" from the Supervisor.
Remarkably, despite simultaneously fighting two fronts in Apicella and Eldridge, he prevailed and succeeded in asking an uncomfortable question unmolested that wasn't met with a response: "I want to know why you deliberately lied last meeting, and so did the Deputy Supervisor, when you both said you had no idea, you did not know, who authorized and approved that camera going up at that location"
As the embattled Eldridge was trying to hide behind the minutes of the past meeting and what they claimed had allegedly happened, Dolan took aim at these minutes. This section of Wednesday's meeting probably warrants its own article as it relates to the undeniably poor quality of Greenport's town board meeting minutes. In Dolan's words "they're convoluted; there's no sentence structure; they're incoherent [...] I just know it's garbage" and he encouraged residents in the audience to go online and have a look at these minutes themselves.
It should be noted that at this point, the meeting hadn't actually yet moved on from the Highway Superintendent updates agenda item. With great difficulty, and another use of the gavel, Eldridge managed to temporarily wrestle control away from Dolan. Clayton Clark used that opportunity to pass the word back to John Mausolf who had one more item to bring to the board's attention.
Once again, John's wife Debbie, the former confidential secretary, who Eldridge fired in May, was contacted by the Bank of Greene County, this time concerning a bond payment. "They said they tried to get ahold of Supervisor Eldridge several times. She wasn't answering her phone, which seems to kind of be standard procedure here nowadays. Why, after five months, is she still listed as a contact?", asked Mausolf.
Eldridge's attempt of an explanation didn't provide much clarification: "Because she [Debbie] gave her personal information....Mrs Pierro [Lisa Pierro, the new confidential secretary] now has her own phone and it was called. It's called lockout. We had to get a new QuickBooks license because we couldn't get into the QuickBooks and that cost us almost seven thousand dollars to get a new license. The phone call went to the former bookkeeper, and they asked her for the code or whatever, and she said, no, she wasn't going to give it".
Mausolf in response asked the question that must have been on the minds of a few people in the room: "How did you get locked out of QuickBooks?"
It was the cue for Dolan to come out of his brief hiatus. He accused Eldridge of ineptness and incompetence. "If you cared anything about residents in the Town of Greenport, you would immediately resign. You are driving this town over the cliff. Not only that. They [Greenport residents] deserve honest and transparent government, and you're denying it.", he added.
This woke up Apicella who announced that "if this continues, I am going to leave the meeting". "You're not here anyway", Dolan promptly fired back:
Shortly thereafter, Supervisor Eldridge closed the workshop ten minutes ahead of schedule which prompted Apicella to walk out of the room.
Town Engineer's dedication to Greenport questioned
Jim Dolan used the time between the two meetings to turn his attention to Town Engineer George Schmitt, Greenport's Town Engineer, who had gone missing for six weeks following the August town board meeting.
"I got questions for George, the engineer", Dolan started innocuously. He reminded George of a motion Dolan had made at the August meeting (unanimously adopted by the rest of the town board) for the Town Engineer, Water Superintendent Rutkey, and John Mausolf to work out a comprehensive list of all things that needed addressing to fix the deficiencies in Greenport's wastewater system, especially in Lorenz Park, and present it at the September board meeting.
"You didn't show up at the last meeting. You didn't supply that document. You didn't say anything. You just disappeared. Did you not understand what the conversation was in August and what that motion we approved said?"
George Schmitt, still calm at that point, explained that he understood the motion very well but hadn't been available to attend the September meeting. He went on pointing, not entirely convincingly, at the things that he was still doing: "We're still doing sewer work and are looking at things there. I am trying to gather data, so again, it's a complicated situation and problem. It's taking me a little bit longer to pull everything together".
When Dolan explained to George that the resolution was not a request but a requirement and George dismissed this notion, Dolan took his first bite out of him: "When we pass a resolution, if you want to be our engineer, you want to be employed by this town, it is."
Schmitt was not happy and it prompted a sharp response that was not well received by members of the audience: "You like to grandstand and make issues. This town ran perfectly before you showed up."
In the ensuing argument, it became apparent that Dolan and Schmitt were not on the same page at all. While Schmitt thought that some of the engineering analyses he had already started was enough to satisfy the motion made in the August meeting, Dolan appeared to have a more fundamental complaint. He felt that George Schmitt had been unresponsive and showing very little urgency, both with respect to the collapsed roadway on Mt. Merino as well as the wastewater problems in Lorenz Park.
George didn't agree and maintained that he had always worked well with Mausolf and was "unaware of any problems between Mouse [John Mausolf] and myself". Mausolf wasn't fully on board with this and responded that "it seems like it's been a problem lately".
That concluded the hour allotted for the workshop portion of the meeting and Eldridge called the room to order for the actual board meeting to begin.
Clayton Clark's statement regarding Flock cameras in Greenport
Right at the start of the meeting, Deputy Supervisor Clark announced that he was going to make a statement regarding Greenport's Flock cameras and the grant that paid for them. The statement did not directly concern itself with how the Flock cameras, specifically the one on Joslen Blvd. at the town park entrance, were put up or if their deployment was ever discussed by the town board.
It was mainly talking about how the Greenport Police Department had secured an LETECH grant from NY State of nearly $70,000 in 2024 which was reported to the town board at the June 2024 board meeting. Clayton then went on and stated that the town board never passed a resolution accepting the grant money:
The lack of this resolution is problematic because it is what authorizes the Supervisor to accept grant money. Lacking this authorization, the NY State Comptroller could theoretically flag subsequent expenditures out of this grant as being unapproved.
One sentence in this statement stood out: "There [sic] has been past practice regarding the grants" and what it tries to say is that it has been common practice in Greenport to accept grants without an accompanying town board resolution.
This is not a tenable situation for any municipality and Clayton's statement is effectively an acknowledgement of this fact. In the Register Star's article on the meeting, the paper quotes Town Attorney Rob Fitzsimmons:
"The town board will advise all departments and adjust practices in the future to have a formal motion or resolution to document the acceptance and approval of grant funds”
Towards the end of his statement, Clayton expressed the wish to set up a special meeting later this year to discuss the fate of the two Flock cameras operated by the Greenport Police Department. The town board briefly deliberated and ultimately set that date to Tuesday, Dec 8.
This however may be a moot point now. Greenport PD Sergeant Jeremy Huyck, in the same article, told the Register Star after the board meeting that the police department did not intend to extend the contract with Flock, which runs out in April 2027. It is not entirely clear to us why this wasn't communicated during the meeting instead.
What followed were the expected departmental reports from the Water, Highway, and Fire Departments as well as letters that the town had received, read by the Supervisor.
Acknowledging and sharing letters to the town with the public has not been a common practice in Greenport. Seeing it happen this meeting made some audience member wonder if the Supervisor was on her best behavior because News10 ABC had sent a reporter and cameraman down from Albany.
An amusing moment occurred when Guy Apicella inquired if Mausolf was on top of the road salt situation given its price was now $26/ton and it made the Highway chief chuckle: "$26 per ton? It's $95 per ton. If you can get it for $26 a ton, let me know where." Apicella insisted it was 26 given he was on the Columbia County Traffic Advisory Board. Clayton Clark then stepped in and corrected Apicella: "It's up $26".
A budget hole is looming in the Water Department
Water and Wastewater Superintendent Jimmy Rutkey reminded the room that as Hudson Valley Fisheries had ceased operations, their water use went from 200,000 gallons per day down to only 400 gallons.
Likewise, the Town of Claverack which buys water from Greenport, found a substantial leak and as a result, their usage dropped from 1.5 million gallons per month to only 770,000.
While Rutkey said it reduced wear on the water pumps and their energy consumption, Town Accountant Michael Torchia conceded that Greenport's water sales were a large source of revenue which has been significantly reduced now. He estimated the reduction at around $300,000 per year.
A resident takes over the public comments
Greenport resident Frank O'Connell said he had "a couple of questions", only for those couple of questions to eventually eat up 80% of this section of the meeting. In his defense, the questions were not without merit.
Frank initially inquired about the loss of approximately $300,000 of revenue in the Water Department and how that would be made up. He was worried that money would ultimately be transferred out of the general fund into the water fund. Accountant Torchia assured him that no money was currently being transferred but he mentioned that James Rutkey also had an extensive wishlist of things that needed to get done and that may ultimately affect the fund balance.
Torchia stated the obvious two options to remedy this is to increase water rates or dip into the general fund balance. Transfers out from the general fund into the water district fund is what Frank was concerned about as it would mean that residents living outside of the water district would be cross-subsiding the operations of the water district. Superintendent Rutkey noted that such a fund balance transfer would later have to be paid back by the water district.
Here is maybe where the concerned resident went a little off the rails. He went into esoteric minutia of municipal budgeting involving separate accounts and budget lines. At some point, he asked Supervisor Eldridge if she ever allotted time to the water district which left her, and portions of the audience, scratching their heads. Eventually Town Acccount Mike Torchia put an end to this and stated that the Supervisor and other shared resources of the town government are paid out of the general fund balance and that's the way it is.
Frank's next question was of wider interest: "What's the schedule to get that roadway [Mt. Merino Rd.] repaired?" Over the next minutes, he was methodically drawing time estimates for different steps out of Mausolf and George Schmitt and concluded, after adding them up, that a full repair of Mt. Merino Rd. could maybe be completed in June or July 2027.
Kathy's gavel eventually came down again and put an end to Frank's inquisition of Mausolf and George Schmitt over the intersection of Route 23 and Mt. Merino Rd.
Guy Apicella proposes to rename a street
As the meeting moved on to board member comments, Apicella took the stage—quite literally, as it is a frequent habit of his to stand up and walk around when making important declarations.
His first order of business however was to offend a fellow town board member ("I won't have diarrhea of the mouth, like a certain board member") before he delivered a retrospective of the Fairview Avenue repaving carried out by A. Colarusso & Son earlier this year. He was full of praise for the smooth and quiet road surface, the wide lanes and the beautiful striping but conceded that Colarusso had "one problem with the female flag woman".
At this point, the audience started to get a sense that something amazing was about to happen and they were not disappointed.
Apicella confidently kept going: "I want to give kudos where it's due, and that's due [sic] the Supervisor Eldridge. It took 30 years more or less to get this job done. So when the meeting with Colarusso [unintelligible] the board ought to consider renaming Fairview Avenue [from here on unintelligible]"
While the audience's reaction drowned out Apicella's voice, members in the audience attested later that the new name was supposed to be Kathy Eldridge Avenue.
A little later, Jim Dolan remarked: "Rarely am I speechless. But when he opens his mouth, I end up being speechless."
Apicella performed two more bits, each hilarious in their own right, but we decided they didn't make the cut.
The meeting ended with Clayton Clark announcing that he was going to miss the November town board meeting due to a wedding he was attending in Arizona and he wished his political rival John Porreca good luck in the November election.
Conclusion
There was an awful lot to unpack in these two back to back meetings. Members of the Deflock Columbia County group who were present that night later called it "unhinged".
What stood out immediately were the flawless meeting agendas, both for the workshop and the following board meeting, distributed before the meetings. When Kathy subsequently cited James 1:19, frequently addressed the audience directly more than she usually does, occasionally smiled, and even read correspondence the town had received, the suspicion arose that the presence of News10 ABC may have prompted these change for the good. Unless a network TV station will be present at the next board meeting, we expect a return to the usual drudgery.
Just as with prior meetings, her carefully crafted plan didn't work for a few reasons. After the meeting, Kathy ignored and walked past News10 reporter Dan Passante as he was trying to ask her questions. This was reflected in Dan's report when it came out later that evening.
It is not known if Apicella's bizarre performance towards the end was his own plan or if it was suggested to him by Kathy. If it was, Kathy should remember that a plan involving Guy Apicella as a critical load-bearing component is usually dead on arrival. The audience nonetheless appreciated the laughs.
Clayton was left to do some unpleasant things—reading the prepared statement about the police grant—which one would have expected the Supervisor to do. He remained calm throughout the evening, maybe too calm. Clayton wished his opponent John Porreca luck in the November election which was a kind, if somewhat unusual, gesture.
Dolan of course remained Dolan. He is still going hard after Kathy Eldridge and not even a gavel could stop him. John Mausolf's bills may still not be paid on time or with vouchers signed by him. In Greenport, the simplest problems can sometimes appear unsolvable. It seems more and more likely that it will require a new Supervisor to resolve.
A more general observation is that despite the chaos that still reigns at Greenport town board meetings, subtle improvements are happening. Clayton's public acknowledgement that the town had been mishandling grants for years is encouraging. The meeting he proposed for December 8th, now made obsolete by Greenport PD's decision not to extend the Flock contract, meanwhile promises more transparency and involvement of Greenport residents in town business.
Ed Stiffler's passing the night before the meeting was honored with two moments of silence, one before each of the two meetings. The Town of Greenport has lowered their flags to half-staff in memory of Edward. In comments on Facebook, Sharon Zempko from the Town Clerk's office noted the smiles Ed had brought to them while former council member Janice Brodowksi called him the "greatest guy in Greenport".
In brief
A number of useful resolutions were passed as well.
Resolution 50 appoints Laurie Smith as permanent secretary to the Greenport Planning Board.
Resolution 51 adopts the New York State Climate Smart Communities (CSC) pledge. What sounds rather technical is actually the first step to register Greenport in the CSC program administered by NY State. Greenport's participation in this program will improve the town's standing and increase its chances to acquire grant monies which can go towards important infrastructure projects such as Greenport's wastewater system. The next step will be to find volunteers to be on the CSC task force.
Resolution 52 would have appointed Ed Stiffler to another five-year term as chair of the Planning Board. Sadly, due to his passing away it was withdrawn.
Resolution 53 provides for a special town board meeting on October 13 at 5 PM to approve the tentative budget. A mandated public hearing on this budget will happen later this year. We haven't yet seen the budget proposal but will acquire a copy soon.
Resolution 54 authorizes the Greenport Police Department to purchase a new police vehicle, to the tune of $65,637.
Comments