Sound like autocracy? It is.
To the Editor:
I attended the Monday night hearing for the proposed local ATV law and the town supervisor once again violated the First Amendment, this time by colluding with police officers he had arranged to be ready and waiting in the wings to bodily remove a resident and silence him simply because the supervisor considers him a political rival.
He shouted that resident down, not letting him be heard while he was marched out by two uniformed, armed men for no reason at all. Sound like autocracy? It is.
The supervisor and the superintendent of highways apparently have some “friends” in the ranks of the sheriff’s department. I find this very disturbing.
The superintendent of highways/Albany County GOP chairman has used numerous police agencies, including the sheriff’s, to threaten and harass me simply because I am considered a political rival. A few years ago, the superintendent sent a sheriff’s department officer to my home, lights flashing.
My father-in-law thought there had been an accident or something. But it was just a threat from the superintendent of highways delivered via one of his apparent buddies at the sheriff’s department. Curiously, that officer would not return my calls.
The officer had advised my elderly father-in-law that an official complaint had been filed against me for “illegal photography” of a town work zone. He took the guy’s name. It took a day of phone calls to get the sheriff’s to admit it even happened. The superintendent bragged about doing it (in his official capacity)!
And the superintendent’s later false allegations at my workplace resulted in a mandatory months-long state investigation. These guys would do anything for political gain and their misuse of the police should be investigated.
The former chairman of the Conservative Party filed a federal complaint against me also based on false allegations. That resulted in another months-long mandatory investigation that was eventually dropped because it was just baseless politically motivated harassment.
The current supervisor (and his predecessor) made false allegations of my “misconduct” to the sheriff’s department and those two subjected me to multiple town “investigations.” I was interrogated in my own kitchen by the rightwing hack of a lawyer they hired with tax dollars (this guy should be disbarred).
His task was just to try to drag me through the mud. In these “investigations,” he came up with nothing but a bunch of insulting “personal opinions” and recommended no legal action. Pathetic.
So our planning board chairman, who is using his position to push a law to benefit himself, suggests last week we all sit down together for a kumbaya moment with these people who misuse police agencies to punish anyone who dares have a different opinion? Really?
It’s not funny, but certainly is laughable. This is pure autocracy. Don’t worry about democracy — it’s already gone! Most with opposing ideas or views have been driven away by weaponization of code enforcement, intimidation, harassment, and people who think it is appropriate to waste everyone’s time scheduling a public hearing based on an unreviewed “rough draft?”
That’s not the way the process works. It takes a lot of work to put a local law together right to have it ready for a hearing. I’ve been part of that process. That didn’t happen here!
Joel Willsey
East Berne
Editor’s note: Joel Willsey, a Democrat, is a former member of the Berne Town Board.
The Albany County Sheriff’s Office could not be reached for comment.
The Enterprise previously covered the investigations to which Joel Willsey refers (“Berne Town Board has spent $15K on investigating Dems,” July 28, 2020).