Into The Realm Of The Absurd
By Thaddeus Flint
It’s generally agreed upon by people who attend a lot of boring town meetings, that there is a direct correlation between how boring those meetings are, and how a town is doing overall. Or maybe it’s not agreed upon, but it’s true anyway. Boring equals better. On the other hand, there is Stephentown. After last year’s summer of their discontent, with all those expensive arguments over a growing trailer park, Stephentown’s Town Board is back on the path to the stable plateau of tedium so sought after by local governments. And yet, for sheer entertainment value, that Town is on something of a roll.
Last month was expected to be a bit raucous because it was the meeting after a music festival. The attendance and delightful participation by The Man With The Large Stick With An Antler Attached only made it even better. The July 15 Town Board meeting started off looking like everything was back to boring normal again, but, that didn’t last too long at all.
The only big news was that it’s going to be slightly more expensive to get rid of garbage starting this August. The cause, as Councilman Bill Jennings has already pointed out several times, is that China doesn’t want our garbage anymore. The affect is that it now costs almost the same to get rid of recyclables as it does to get rid of garbage. A lot of towns are even giving up on recycling altogether. Stephentown, however, is still trying to do the right thing for a healthier planet and will continue to recycle. The upcoming problem would be a deficit increase of around $8,000 to pay the new costs if Transfer Station prices remain the same. Councilman Jennings put together a few options for the Board to see how that increase could be offset. As income at the Transfer Station comes from bags, permits, and the Town making up the rest (currently around $25,000), there wasn’t too much to think about, except one subject: Seniors. Those residents of a golden age (currently 65 or older) were exempted from paying for a yearly permit. That’s done.
“People use to retire at 65 and be dead at 68,” joked the Councilman. Now they stick around seemingly forever. Which is nice, especially if you are one of those people, but expensive when it comes to garbage. Stephentown has become especially golden in the past years. The result being that out of around 590 permits issued to use the Transfer Station in 2018, 240 of those were provided free to Seniors. The new permit prices will now be $10 for the Town’s long-lived residents. Shorter-lived-but-still-alive residents get a $15 increase to $40 a year. Dead residents still pay nothing. The price of bags will remain the same in the interest of the sanity of Transfer Station employees, who would have had to listen to complaints for the rest of their long-lived lives every time someone buys a new purple garbage bag and thinks that the people issuing them also work drafting policy down at the Town Hall.
So that was pretty much the height of excitement for the July meeting, that is, until the Hurleys arrived.
The Hurleys appeared to be new to Stephentown Board meetings and that’s OK. The Town Board is very welcoming to anyone who wants to come and see how things work, especially when things are working swimmingly, which they seem to be. Initially the Hurleys (Pamela and a gentleman who referred to himself as “Hurley Residence,” so we will call him Mr. Hurley Residence because he wasn’t carrying an antlered stick) wanted to talk about the Disc Jam festival. They were unable to attend the previous meeting, as well as the following workshop meeting, but still wanted to add their voices to the general consensus, which was that it was too loud. Point taken, said the Board, with Councilwoman Pam Kueppers reporting that Stephentown is really “working on it” to make sure future festivals follow the rules.
And that’s the point where things started leaving the zone of boring and moving toward something closer to the Theatre of the Absurd. The Hurley residence is on Schmich Road, which they said at various times was either one, two, or three miles from the noisy music. The parents of Pamela Hurley moved there in 2006 from Massachusetts to get some peace and quiet. Plenty of people might have told them right from the get-go that that might not always happen. Stephentown is a quiet little noisy town. A decent portion of residents like noisy things—always have—, and have no problem getting up at the crack of dawn to wake their neighbors at the crack of dawn too, firing up pretty much everything from a weed-whacker to a Gatling gun. As if to highlight that, some kid then drove past the Town Hall on an unregistered dirt bike and nobody so much as blinked. Pamela Hurley told the Board the problem was that “we have no noise ordinance.”
“We do…it’s just ignored” replied Town Supervisor Larry Eckhardt, who seemed a bit surprised that someone coming to a Town meeting to complain about noise had seemingly done no research whatsoever to find out first if a noise ordinance existed. In fact, Stephentown has only one ordinance and it’s a noise one.
But that was nothing. Pamela Hurley said that “Generally in most towns, especially in New England, they are not starting their chainsaws and chippers and things” before 8 am, so if Stephentown had a noise ordinance (which they do) it would prohibit that (which it specifically doesn’t). Amplified music only, informed Eckhardt.
“That does need to be addressed,” said Pamela Hurley. She then somehow linked the increase in noise overall to the noise of the music festivals, saying one has increased with the other. The Hurleys then stated that music festivals are now basically “the whole summer” long.
“No,” said Councilman Jennings.
Yes, said the Hurleys.
There has been only one festival this summer,” and last year there were two, replied Jennings.
The Hurleys didn’t appear to believe the Councilman. By their logic, one was happening right then, although nobody else knew about it or could hear it. Pamela Hurley then asked if anybody was thinking—other than her–about the various animal creatures who also get stressed out from excessive racket? Apparently, nobody else was thinking about that.
But that was nothing.
Citing what she called a lack of “transparency” on the Town’s website, Pamela Hurley wanted to know if Stephentown had a “Planning Board for commercial operations” and, if not, “can we have one?”
Stephentown’s website has a lot going on, and it’s currently being redesigned, but poking at a little blue “more” button easily brings up the Planning Board page. That someone would come to a meeting and request the Town form a Board that has existed for years seemed to momentarily baffle the Town Board.
“We have a Planning Board,” replied the Supervisor, who was starting to look a tad piqued.
But that was still nothing.
Pamela Hurley then went on to formulate what she called “her point.” Basically Stephentown has too many “mom and pop” type operations. The Hurleys seemed to expect that a pharmacy or two, and a bigger grocery store than Dave’s, should have followed them from New England—and would have—but the Historical Society was keeping such development out.
The Historical Society? People really seemed to have a hard time figuring that one out. Was the Historical Society really just a front for some kind of high-powered political group whose goal was to keep things old? Were they up in their church tower right now, scheming to turn back time to the days when Sykes had every single nut, bolt, nail, screw, and spring in the entire world except the one single nut, bolt, nail, screw, or spring you were looking for? Who knew?
Pamela Hurley soldiered on with “her point.” The cheese factory—another mom and pop, apparently–was implicated as well. That building could have been better used. What for? An “animal shelter” or, perhaps, an urgent care facility, she said.
“Stephentown is either not being looked at or allowing to do certain things,” she added. Then there was more about the “mom and pops” colluding to keep down competition. There was so much “mom and pop,” it was as if somebody just binge-watched The Waltons.
“Everybody knows what I’m talking about here,” stated Pamela Hurley to a room of people who didn’t have a clue what she was talking about there.
“No, I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what you are talking about here at all,” replied Councilman Jennings who, like the rest of the Board, seemed momentarily entranced with the absurdity of what was going on there. “Me either,” added Town Clerk Stephanie Wagar. The rest seemed speechless.
“Does anyone else not know what I’m talking about?” Pamela Hurley asked an audience of townspeople she had rendered momentarily dumbstruck.
Councilman PJ Roder took a stab at explaining that the Comprehensive Plan showed residents would love more services, however the population just wasn’t large enough to attract such businesses. But that stab missed the Hurley’s comprehension by a country mile.
“What’s so wrong with having a pharmacy here?” replied Mr. Hurley Residence.
And that was it. The room went berserk. It seemed every single person was yelling at once, with the exception of possibly Councilman Gerry Robinson who looked like he was still rendered speechless. Was this really happening? Only Councilwoman Kueppers pounding on a table with her bare hand brought things back to order.
“Meeting over,” announced the Supervisor.
“This is discrimination!” barked Pamela Hurley.
And that was something.
Stephentown. It’s the only one on earth.