COLUMBIA-GREENE MEDIA • THE DAILY MAIL
A10 Wednesday, February 9, 2022
Feuds From A1
year, more than an average Manhattan librarian, but Benoit countered that a library director in New York City would routinely make $500,000. Benoit concluded the letter by asking the board to “publicly admonish Councilperson Tim Powers for his deliberately misleading statements on social media.” The board did not admonish Powers during the meeting. After the meeting, Benoit said Powers’ issues with the library date back to a book he wrote not being placed in the library. “Mr. Powers wrote a book and he felt slighted that they
Center From A1
Supervisor Jason Watts said of the project. “It would be a community center where they could do Meals on Wheels and the seniors can come in and we’ll put a TV up and have some games there that they can do. We’ve talked about putting some gardens outside for people to work
Challenge From A1
The shelter is open Monday through Saturday from 11:30 a.m. until 4 p.m., and is closed Sundays. Among the many pets available for adoption are 12 Italian greyhound mixes, Perez said. The dogs were living in a house in Canaan that had no heat when the shelter was called for help by the owner, Perez said. “The owner realized they were in over their head and
didn’t include it,” she said. “They had a council opinion that the book was full of inflammatory stuff and so he harbored a grudge against the library the entire time. To the point that he hired an attorney that nobody knew about to try to foster that vendetta. The library operates above board, exactly the way it’s supposed to.” Powers denied that his book, “Chronicles in History: Windows into the Future,” had anything to do with his interest in the library’s funding. “That’s got nothing to do with it,” he said on Tuesday. “They’ve got a copy of it in the library.” A search of the Cairo Public Library’s catalog did not reveal Powers’ book in the library’s system. During the meeting, resident Susan True questioned the
board on whether town money was spent on lawyers’ fees pursuing the library matter. “Was $2,400 spent out of the town’s coffers?” she said. Watts said town money was paid to labor attorney Elayne Gold but could not specify the amount. When True asked if the entire board had voted on the expenditure, Watts said no. “That money was authorized by (then-Supervisor) John Coyne,” Powers said. “I asked him and he told me that I could move forward.” Coyne declined comment on the matter Tuesday. On Tuesday, Powers said the debate over the library’s financing remains an open issue. “It’s not over because there’s still an issue with the way the library is funded,” he said. “Essentially, the way that they’re operating right now is
that they’re operating independently from the town, but they’re still submitting a budget to the town to get their big check. They’re getting a big donation from the town every year for operating expenses and we have no control of where that money is going or how it’s being used. The town board has no control over salary setting, hiring, firing, nothing.” For his part, Watts said the matter is closed. “To me it’s done,” he said following the meeting. “We’re not spending any more money to fight the library. Not under my watch.” Watts, who fought to keep the library’s funding static during the fall budget season, said he has come to realize the library’s outsize influence in the community. “At first I was not a big fan of
the library, but then I started to speak to people in the community and I found out that people liked it,” Watts said. “I had customers who come up from Florida tell me that it’s the most beautiful library that they’ve seen. I guess I needed to get educated a little bit to realize how good it really was. I support the library 100%.” At one point during Monday’s meeting, Watts attempted to cool the tension in the room, gesturing that he wanted people in the town to stop shaking their fists at each other and that they should shake hands instead. “I want to stop the fighting in these town meetings,” he said. Powers said he wants to see the library come back under the town’s auspices and act as a town department or receive money from the state
education department instead of being funded by the town. Powers said that he has been requesting a group meeting between the town board, the library board and the MidHudson Library System to discuss the library’s funding, but said that his request has fallen on deaf ears. Benoit defended the library’s staff and added that the library was being run exactly as it should be. “Our director is beyond reproach,” she said after the meeting. “Her commitment to the library is amazing. She was very upset to have a public attack like that on Facebook. How do you think it’s OK to not let us have a rebuttal? People have a right to know what the truth is.”
with.” Watts said he wanted to employ the town’s building and grounds crew to eventually work on renovating the site on rainy days when they can’t work outdoors. “The county said they would give us a dumpster,” he said. “So I’m going to try to do it with whatever money we’ve got and hopefully moving forward Barton & Loguidice can get us a grant. If they could get us a grant, they said it could be over $1 million. That
would put us right where we need to be to start really moving forward. A kitchen is going to be $70,000 to $80,000. Just by ourselves, we might be able to afford to do the community part with the help of the county. The ambulance part might have to wait, because we definitely don’t have the money for that. But we do have to do something.” Councilman Tim Powers does not have a timeline for when the community center could be completed.
“We really don’t. It depends on how fast the grant money comes in and how fast we can get the ball rolling on it,” he said. “We’re at the very beginning. We haven’t done anything beyond purchasing the building at this point.” During Monday’s meeting, a public hearing was set for the board’s meeting on March 7 for a local law that would establish alternate side parking on Main Street in the town. With cars currently parked
on both sides of Main Street, Watts said it was difficult for the town’s snowplows to clear the main thoroughfare. “It’s very hard for the plow trucks today to come down and swing one way then the other and to miss all of the cars,” he said. “It’s a nightmare. You can never get it clean. It never looks good. There’s always a clump of snow somewhere.” The town is tasked with cleaning the sidewalks on the county-owned road.
Watts said the parking issue has been brewing since he first joined the town board four years ago. “I’m putting forth a public hearing to make it an actual law,” he said after Monday’s meeting. “We’re going to try to mirror Catskill’s law. So if anybody moves from Catskill to Cairo they’ll already know the routine. It has to get easier for the businesses with more people coming into the county.”
surrendered them all over to us.” Perez said. “These little ones are happy, healthy and ready to snuggle up,” Perez said. Also available for adoption is Peaches, the 2-year-old Australian Cattle Dog/Mix that was nearly killed by her owner in Cairo in the spring of 2021. The dog was rescued, and after several surgeries, made a full recovery. A list of all available pets for adoption and photos can be found on Humane Society website at: cghs.org, Perez said. To make a donation, call the shelter at (518) 828-6044, or visit cghs.org.
CONTRIBUTED PHOTO CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
Baby Blu, a 6-year-old Domestic Longhair/Mix, is available for adoption at Columbia-Greene Humane Society.
Twelve Italian greyhound mixes that were recently surrendered are available for adoption at the Columbia-Greene Humane Society.
