Queensbury Town Board jumps gun on voters' decision
Please consider supporting The Front Page with a paid subscription: HERE
Seven years ago Queensbury Town Board member Tony Metivier stood up to his fellow Republicans when they tried to switch the town's legal representation to one with local Republican Party connection.
Metivier pointed out there was a political conflict of interest.
Before the vote, the chairman of the county Republican Party pressured Metivier to fall in line with the other Republicans - or else.
The final vote was 3-2. Democrat John Strough and Republican Metivier voted against.
"I am not going to be anyone's puppet," Metivier said at the time. "I probably voted no just to prove a point."
It led to one of the most contentious periods in Queensbury politics with county Republicans refusing to support Metivier for re-election and working diligently to oust the Democrat Strough as supervisor.
The Republicans went so far as to devise a plan to elect a Republican candidate who did not want to run and then replace him with someone else after the election in a clear attempt to defraud Queensbury voters.
When the newspaper uncovered the corroborating emails, voters recoiled at the scheme and voted all the Republicans out of office.
Metivier remained a pariah in the Republican Party for years afterward and Strough went on to name him deputy supervisor.
In the years since then, Republicans rarely have run a candidate against Strough and the political winds in Queensbury have been relatively calm, even as Republicans gained control of the board again.
Until the past few weeks.
After the untimely death of Town Board member Harrison Freer last month, the obvious plan was for the voters to elect his successor in November.
But Republicans on the Town Board introduced a resolution last week to appoint a successor to Freer before the election without even telling Strough about their plan. With a 3-1 majority on the board - including Tony Metivier - Republicans could get their candidate on the board immediately.
Republican Town Board member Tim McNulty argued that Ward 2 deserved to be represented on the board.
Strough argued that since both candidates had no government experience, they would have little to offer in the six weeks before the election. Strough planned to name the winner of the November election to the board immediately after the election instead of waiting until January.
This all sounds like small-town politics at its worst unless unless you consider what happened seven years ago when the Republicans employed a power play to gain new legal representation with connections to the Republican Party.
That makes these latest actions by the Queensbury Republicans concerning.
The Town Board passed the resolution last week and will interview potential candidates to fill Freer's seat before voting next week on a successor.
Strough called the plan a "little disingenuous" because it was clear to him the Republicans would appoint the Republican running for office. That makes this a political appointment.
Considering what happened seven years ago when the Republicans played politics with its legal representation - and Metivier knows first hand about this - it is indeed transparently political and it is kind of shocking that Metivier is going along with this purely political maneuver.
If you are cynical journalist like me, you might wonder what the Queensbury Republicans have up their sleeve when they get a 4-1 majority.
The resolution states that all of the interviews have to be completed by Friday for a vote at the Sept. 23 board meeting.
Queensbury Republicans are once again giving themselves a black eye with this blatantly political move. It is shocking that Metivier is going along with it, especially after doing the right thing seven years ago.
Let the voters decide in November and keep political appointments out of town business.
Funeral service
A funeral for Dr. Mark Price was held Saturday at the Wellesley Hills Congregational Church in Wellesley, Mass.
Dr. Price was the team doctor of the New England Patriots and Boston Red Sox in recent years and passed away in August at the age of 52 after battling cancer.
One of the officiants was Rev. Lou Midura, the former rector at St. Mary's Episcopal Church in Lake Luzerne, who had worked as a contractor in the Boston area ina previous career and had built a house for Price and his wife.
Light brigade
The North Country Light Brigade was in action again Friday night at the Exit 19 overpass of the Northway.
Their message this week: "Vote 4 women's rights."
Brooks again
New York Times columnist David Brooks wrote this past week that the United States may be undergoing a significant "cultural shift."
Consider these words from Brooks' column:
This is culture. What sort of people do we want to be? What sort of values and manners do we want to see reflected in our national leaders? Who do we want shaping the nation’s social atmosphere? As Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously noted, culture matters most, but government can change culture.
There is a rhythm to cultural change, with periods of public turmoil giving way to periods when people want to turn inward. World War I gave way to the carefree hedonism of the flappers during the 1920s. World War II gave way to the domesticity of the 1950s. The days of rage in the late 1960s gave way to the New Age mellowness of the mid-1970s. People can be up in arms for only so long. The wearier we grow with American carnage catastrophizing, Trump seems not just monstrous but, worse, stale.
We’re still an exhausted and battered nation, but if history is a guide, then just over the horizon there is some new cultural moment coming.
I hope Brooks is right.
Ken Tingley spent more than four decades working in small community newspapers in upstate New York. Since retirement in 2020 he has written three books and is currently adapting his second book "The Last American Newspaper" into a play. He currently lives in Queensbury, N.Y.
The town board is again staging a power play along party lines with a clearly disruptive move to exclude Mr. Strough. Yet, John Strough has worked for Queensbury and its residents for years with his board members without politicking his leadership. Mr. Metiver had enough self respect to resist and reject the shenanigans years before, and now, at a time of divisive and dishonest attacks on democratic processes, he joins the herd. The scent of power is seductive. Unfortunately, some people get used to the stench.
Thank you for highlighting the Light Brigade. They are consistently and tirelessly fighting to spread the message for human decency.
Queensbury Ward 4 councilman Tim McNulty is also Queensbury Republican Party Chair.
It is a conflict of interest, but I doubt many voters know, and probably few care.
I has repercussions. When Rachel Seeber resigned as Qby county supervisor McNulty pushed Hilary Stec (Dan Stec’s former wife) to fill the vacancy. That appointment lasted only briefly but long enough for Stec to collect several paychecks while missing a number of meetings. After that they didn’t push to fill the seat until the election which was still months away.
People should know another thing about Queensbury, out of 20 or 21 seats on the Zoning Board of Appeals, Planning Board, Town Board, and county board of supervisors there is only 1 woman serving - Kimberly Bullard who sought appointment to the Planning Board last year with no thought of seeking higher political office. There are roughly 15,000 women living in Queensbury and you can count the number of women who served in one of those positions in the last decade on your fingers. Possibly only one hand. I can only think of 5 off the top of my head, but I might be forgetting someone. Sometimes the rate of women serving in those representative offices is zero.
That is appalling. All the other municipalities in Warren County have a rate of 20%-40% representation by women. What is wrong in Queensbury?