The Williamsville Village Board on Thursday voted 3-2 to hire attorney Todd Aldinger to fight a $300 fine issued by the Erie County Department of Health following a Jan. 10 Village Board meeting at which the mayor and members of the audience did not wear masks, in violation of county and state mask mandates.
The board met remotely, via online video conferencing, following a 90-minute executive session to discuss the hiring of an attorney. During the online meeting, only members of the Village Board and other village officials were allowed to talk. Village Trustees Christine L. Hunt and Eileen Torre both voted against hiring an outside attorney to defend the village against the fine levied by the county.
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"I may be considered a freshman in politics, but I am no rookie in balanced decision-making," Hunt said in a prepared statement that she read to the board.
Hunt also noted what she called the development of a lack of respect for others and an environment of mistrust and toxicity on the board that she said caused the former deputy mayor, Matthew Etu, to resign earlier this month. She said that current Deputy Mayor David Sherman and Trustee Matt Carson – who both voted with Mayor Deb Rogers to hire outside counsel – were appointed to their posts by the mayor and not likely to risk any reprisals by voting against her.
"The mask mandate and best practices to reduce the spread of Covid-19 can be a challenging and tension charged environment," Hunt added. "I appreciate the Erie County Department of Health for doing what is recommended to minimize the spread of this highly contagious variant."
The debate over facts and freedom and rights and restrictions that has roiled the nation since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic has come to a one-square-mile community where complaining about traffic and parking used to rate as the biggest issue.
Rogers, meanwhile, said hiring outside counsel to defend the village against the county's mandate is a common sense decision, and that she trusts reasonable, rational adults to make their own decisions to stem the spread of Covid-19.
"For the life of me, I really have no idea why a billion dollar bureaucracy like Erie County is targeting our one-square mile Village of Williamsville," Rogers said.
Sherman called the county's mandate selective enforcement.
"The mandate from on-high is a constitutional quagmire. It's selective enforcement. To my knowledge, I do not believe any other municipality has been cited by the county or the state. Williamsville is going to be the guinea pig, and I don't think that's fair," Sherman said.
It was not discussed at Thursday night's special meeting how much the village will pay Aldinger to fight the fine in court. Sherman, in a text message to The News, said Aldinger was simply retained as counsel by the board, and that it had no financial projections at this time.
In a statement afterward, Torre said: "This $300 ticket could easily cost the village $10,000 or more just to fight it, whether we win or lose our legal defense."
