BERNE — Political rifts are opening just days after Berne’s first town board meeting in seven months, this time over a simple misunderstanding.

Supervisor Dennis Palow — who’s a Republican — told The Enterprise this week that former supervisor Kevin Crosier — a Democrat — showed up at the house of the sole applicant for one of two open town board seats, and suggested that Crosier most likely would have found out the applicant’s name and address from newly-appointed board member Melanie laCour — also a Democrat — who had been forwarded the application. 

When three GOP-backed councilmen abruptly resigned last August, alleging Palow was difficult to work with, the town did not have a functional board until the governor’s office finally appointed laCour.

Crosier told The Enterprise that he had learned the name of the applicant, Kirsten Mahler, from Conservative Albany County Legislator Chris Smith, who confirmed this for The Enterprise. LaCour said she “absolutely did not share any information with Kevin Crosier.” 

Mahler — a recently-enrolled Conservative — had recently interviewed with that party to find out how she could get involved with the town, putting her on Crosier’s radar. Crosier said that once he had Mahler’s name, he got her address from the town tax roll, which is publicly available online.

He said he only knew that Mahler had a general interest in public service, did not know she had applied to be a board member, and that he wanted to offer her some guidance. 

Mahler confirmed for The Enterprise that Crosier came to her house while she happened to be away, and that her boyfriend answered the door and helped Crosier get in touch with Mahler later. 

“I wasn’t upset …,” Mahler told The Enterprise of Crosier’s surprise visit. “It was just very strange to me that all of a sudden Kevin Crosier shows up at my house. I didn’t know why or how he even knew about me, but I did find out later that it was because I was at the Conservative interview.” 

She said that, when she called Crosier later on, there was some “reminiscing” about the ATV hearing that Crosier had been forcibly removed from without justification after Palow instructed Albany County Sheriff’s deputies to do so, and which she had attended. Crosier is currently suing the town over that incident.

“Other than that, he was basically just trying to give me information about how stuff worked and that he was going to have someone else call me,” Mahler said, explaining that it was the Berne Democratic Committee Chairman Jeff Marden who followed up with her. 

She told The Enterprise that she is “not very political” and is still learning how the whole system works, but that she wanted to find out how to get involved after attending a couple of meetings and finding that Democrats in the town are “extremely vocal and angry and disrespectful.”

Mahler said she told Marden that she had “no interest in being a part of your party because I think there’s so many people that are disrespectful and don’t care about the town.” 

She said she registered as a Conservative because it seemed like the “safe bet,” though she said she’s “been told I need the backing of the Republicans or Democrats. Not really sure how that works yet.” 

Palow told The Enterprise that the board will vote on Mahler’s appointment at its April meeting.