Yates officials try to make Lyndonville into something it isn’t

Editor:

I thought the election was over. Time to move on. Yet Councilman Riggi had to throw in one more letter with confusing successes. Then had to spin up accusations of misinformation about what he perceived was misinformation on a part of a few. Who are the few?

Misinformation is a nice word for inaccurate or purposely intending to deceive. Gives no examples. My guess would be myself and anyone who helped me. Let’s have a debate on that misinformation right here on the Hub.

There was no deceit no misinformation. Campaigns bring out differences and truths. Sometimes the truth is ugly and embarrassing. If not for this misinformation accusation I would not have bothered responding to such a letter. Not Mr. Riggi’s best work but since he opened the door I have more to say that otherwise would have been left at rest.

How out of touch can one person be to tout this list of stretched accomplishments? Honestly, A fund was not the fault of this board ($86,000 hole). It was missed by a private auditor the town still employs and it goes way back to 2005 when town hired this bookkeeper. They were forewarned but did nothing about it by many constituents, for many years. Read the Yates and Ridgeway Water Audits from 2012. They are very relevant as they shared same bookkeeper. A past history is why the present situation.

Audit In Yates #4 Water: Books so amateurishly done they were hard to decipher. Water customers were overcharged. Town law was broken. Phony water districts were created within the district. Money that wasn’t supposed to be used was used for the “create” Blood Road extension that ran a water line and ended dead in front of… the bookkeeper – another ignored conflict of interest within Yates.

All beyond them had to wait a few years till it went down Route 18 and came up the front end of that road to finally connect all. To top it off our town had to take out a bond and the taxpayers have to pay all the money back I believe over 20 years. Did that administration know exactly what it was doing? You be the judge.

Ridgeway’s Audit is self explanatory. Nobody to this day paid a price, history repeated itself and it will again somewhere because those in political power protect one another.

Standard and Poor’s rating from B to A-. A B rating is speculative – currently meets payments but faces uncertainties. A full A rating would mean adequate but an A- is not acceptable when dealing with taxpayers’ money. Triple AAA is tops so nothing to brag about. Successful financial management under the tax cap. Unbelievable!

So what is it with politicians thinking that raising your taxes 2% every year is something to be proud of? With the raised assessments automatically raising your taxes coupled with the tax increase it’s more like 5% or more depending on how much your assessment was raised. They should not believe this is a success. Then blames Covid for the village money grab for the 15.29 percent tax increase in 2020. Six years of increases.

The comprehensive plan. Fierce opposition to the first one. Little to no survey response on second one. Comments never released to the public. Probably not good. Living document gives the power to completely control every aspect of your life and land. Only 2 people said no. Myself and one comprehensive plan committee member. A tool for obtaining grant money. Read it yourself. We’re global citizens. The LWRP, in which Mr. Riggi has put time in. Another tool for grant money. Read the September 10th 2018 Town Board minutes. He says, “The town of Yates has a long list of projects that they will be going after the state for this money to do these projects starting with the village.”

That’s where bike paths, nature trails, and sidewalks to nowhere came from. I’m not going to go in detail through the whole list. Most is routine town business, or a personal wish list to change the area (Bio Digester) or taking credit for business growth when it’s the achievements of a AAA business friendly planning board and code officer that really deserve the credit.

I know your fairly new being politically active but I have been around a long time and seen much of this personally. There was no misinformation in the campaign. Get over it and stick to town business. This is not Pittsford or Orchard Park. It’s Lyndonville. Slow down with the changes.

Paul Lauricella

Yates