Gaughan Village of Lancaster and Depew officials fully expect that in the near future, they will find on their desks petitions calling for the end of their villages as they know them.

(See editorial on page four)

The New N.Y. Government Reorganization and Citizen Empowerment Act takes effect Sunday, March 21, and will make it easier for residents of villages to force the dissolution of their municipalities.

Under the current law, citizens can force a public vote on the dissolution of any village by providing a petition with signatures from 33 percent of the electorate eligible to vote in the previous year’s election. On Sunday, that number drops to 10 percent or 5,000 — whichever is fewer.

Civil activist Kevin Gaughan, who completed a study, The Cost, in 2006 that stated that the county’s 439 elected officials cost taxpayers $32 million a year, is a proponent of the new law and has set up a Web site at www.letpeopledecide. org to recruit petition carriers to flood area villages and force dissolution proceedings.

Gaughan’s groups plan to hit Lancaster, Williamsville and Sloan first, circulating petitions and trying to force votes two or three villages at a time every two to three months until the county’s 16 villages have been covered.

“Rest assured: no matter in what village or town you reside, our volunteers will be coming to your door soon to make sure that every Western New Yorker has a chance to decide their destiny,” according to a recent correspondence from Gaughan to potential recruits.

The Cost

One of the major problems with the law, according to Depew Village Attorney Anthony Nosek, is that it was enacted hastily without consideration for enforcement if a study were to find that dissolution is the best course of action. Even if a village forms a plan, Nosek said that no means exist for a village to force a town — or two in Depew’s case because it lies in Cheektowaga and Lancaster — to accept the plan.

“There’s nothing about the law that compels the implementation of a developed plan,” he said. “You are voting on an absolute pig in a poke.”

Also, Depew Mayor Barbara Alberti finds faults with Gaughan’s involvement in spreading the dissolution movement across the county. She contends that the push by Gaughan and his followers is partly based on inaccuracies in Gaughan’s research piece, The Cost.

“There’s nothing in that study that is correct,” Alberti said recently, adding that one trustee’s salary was exaggerated by about $16,000.

If Depew’s numbers were off by this much, she asked, how accurate is the rest of the research piece?

The Cost looked at numbers from each municipality based on adopted budgets and interviews with elected officials in 2006. Gaughan said that he, along with students from the University at Buffalo Law School, took 18 months to visit the county’s 25 towns, 16 villages and three cities to interview officials and pore over public records.

A comparison between Depew records provided by Village Administrator Elizabeth Melock for the time period covered by The Cost and what was reported show several discrepancies. One trustee’s salary, for example, was listed at $24,220, but Melock reported that the actual salary was $7,614. Gaughan’s report also listed nine elected officials, but Melock said the acting justice is not an elected official and his salary shouldn’t count. The Cost listed that salary at $21,950, but Melock said it actually was $6,000. The mayor’s salary at that time also was reported as $14,000, but Melock said it was $11,800.

The Cost stated that Depew’s government cost taxpayers $255,147, but the total based on Melock’s numbers would have equaled $251,086.

Gaughan said a lack of cooperation from village officials led to the discrepancies and that he had to file Freedom of Information Act requests for some of the information. When reached by The Bee, Gaughan said he would update his Web site, thecost.org, with the village’s information, but he added that the corrected information changed his overall value by $3,000.

“Depew was one of the villages that was quite uncooperative,” he told The Bee, adding that the numbers in his study are considered conservative because not all the requested information was provided. “The numbers have been there for four years. I haven’t heard anything of their assertions till this telephone call.”

Since the research was presented, Depew has eliminated two trustee seats at a savings of $15,228. Residents approved reducing the board by two members in March 2007, before Gaughan emerged with his research and began a countywide tour to discuss the results.

Courtney Brunelle, political action coordinator for the Civil Service Employees Association who is assisting the employees of the Depew Department of Public Works in studying the dissolution issue, said village dissolution is a Western New York issue.

“This is because Kevin Gaughan loves the word ‘regionalism,’” she said. “No one else in the state is looking at this.”

She characterized The Cost and the push for petition circulators as a one-sided, outside approach. She added that removing the village layer of government would remove accountability.

“We don’t think it makes sense,” she said.

The drive

Alberti also takes issue with the statement in Gaughan’s letter to potential petition carriers, “So as the air warms (and our politicians steam),” saying that she has always contended that she would eliminate her own job if that were the will of the people.

“If I’m not necessary, why should people have to pay me?” she asked. “I am not a career politician.”

She added that what concerns her is that residents will sign petitions thinking they will save money, but that might not be entirely true. While a layer of government may disappear, those who once lived in the village will still have to pay that village’s debt through the establishment of special districts. Also, services such as the youth programs, senior center, fire department and more will vanish.

Representatives in the Village of Lancaster — who were one of the first to take Gaughan’s advice and downsize, eliminating two board seats since 2008 — also want to protect the village’s existence, saying that residents should decide for themselves what is best for them.

“We ’re being told what quality of life we want and how we want to get it,” Trustee Ken O’Brien has said. “The people who are trying to ask these questions, trying to jam these questions down our throat and tell us what we want as a quality of life should look in their own backyards first. Stay out of here, and let us do what we need to do with the people of this community.”

Both the villages have applied for grants to study dissolution in the event that a petition is filed. If a petition is filed, voter signatures must be verified. If the numbers stand, the mayor would appoint a committee that would be given six months to create a dissolution plan. Even if a plan is outlined, officials could decide the plan is unfeasible or towns could refuse to accept the findings, officials said.

Gaughan disagrees that money would not be saved, saying that if 16 governmental levels are dissolved countywide, residents will see a difference. He said he began his research and drive to dissolve villages because Erie County ranks fifth highest in terms of property taxes of the country’s 3,086 counties. He added that 45 governments cover a county with fewer than 900,000 residents, and eliminating village governments would eliminate 84 elected positions as well as any health care and pension costs that go along with them.

“Anyone who says eliminating 16 governments in Erie County will not save taxes is, frankly, wrong,” he said.

The movement for votes on dissolution also will force a study on potential cost savings, something that has not been undertaken before, Gaughan said.

Residents and officials also have expressed concerns that petition carriers will come in from outside of the village borders to try to sway residents, but Gaughan said those carrying petitions will be residents. Since 2006, more than 400 volunteers have signed up who live in Depew, 360 in Lancaster and 17 in Sloan. While law does not dictate that petition carriers be residents, Gaughan said he is making sure they are.

“All of the petition carriers will be residents of the village,” he said. “It’s volunteers who live there who will carry these petitions and allow citizens to have their say.”

When she came into office in 2007, Alberti foresaw the call for the end of the village, but she expected it might take a decade. After being born and raised in Depew, she hates to think of its demise, but she wouldn’t have a choice because she represents the will of the people.

“I didn’t want to be the one to turn the lights off,” she said.

Would you sign a petition asking for the dissolution of your village government? Send a letter to the editor to ljohn son@beenews.com.