Summary of the Village of Corfu's trustee meeting Wednesday evening. Information provided by Trustee Ken Lauer.
- Mayor Ralph Peterson asked that a committee formed to study the options for police service in the village be disbanded. The trustees agreed to create a committee headed by a village resident with Trustee Art Ianni acting as a liaison between the committee and the trustees to study options for police service. Letters will be included in the upcoming tax bills seeking residents who wish to serve on the committee.
- Without a police administrator, Peterson continues to serve as supervisor of the police department. The trustees agreed that all officers -- all of whom are part time -- will be limited to no more than 19.5 hours of work per week. The village is facing a possible lawsuit because of allegations that officers hired competitively weren't getting work hours and non-competitive hires were working more than 19.5 hours, which is an alleged violation of civil service law. The 19.5-hour rule will apply to all officers, competitive and non-competitive hires. There are 10 part-time officers in the department.
- Peterson nominated local attorney Fred Rarick to the position of acting village justice. State law requires the position. The acting justice is the back-up for the full-time justice. With trustees Keith Busch and David Bielec absent, the motion to appoint Rarick failed 2-1 (three votes needed for any motion to pass). Laurer said he voted against Rarick because Rarick never formally applied for the position. Meanwhile, the two applications the village did receive were never passed along to Justice David O'Connor for his review.
- Former Justice Robert Alexander sent a FOIL request to the village for documents pertaining to the trustees demand that Alexander repay $10,000 in allegedly missing court funds. Alexander is facing possible legal action by the village to recover the funds. Laurer said that Village Attorney Mark Boylan told him that Alexander never signed for the registered letter demanding payment, but that in his FOIL request, Alexander acknowledged seeing the demand for payment in an article on The Batavian.
- Also read into the record was a Dec. 14 letter from the district director of the Unified Court System. The letter deals primarily with the dispute between Alexander and the trustees over the continued employment and supervision of the court clerk, Pam Yasses. Yasses had previously filed a harassment complaint against Alexander. While the letter states that the clerk is an employee of the village and the harassment complaint should be investigated, the trustees should not interfere with the judicial operations of the court. Alexander's term expired in March. The letter concludes that the trustees should take all appropriate measures to resolve the issue of the missing funds.
