Hilltown Archives — The Altamont Enterprise, March 26, 2009
Planning board’s Sherman appointed as the new chairman
By Zach Simeone
WESTERLO — After a month without leadership, the town’s planning board will now be headed by Tony Sherman, its third chairman in less than a year.
At its March 3 meeting, the town board appointed Sherman as the new chairman. The chairmanship was vacated on Feb. 5 by Andrew Brick, who was appointed as town justice the day before. Also considered to fill the position of judge was Kenneth Mackey, long-time volunteer firefighter and rescue-squad member in Westerlo.
Brick, who has practiced law for 13 years, told The Enterprise in January that he could better serve the town as judge than as chairman of the planning board. He had been appointed as chairman of the planning board after Leonard Laub was removed from his post last April.
Laub was removed from the planning board after refusing to fill out a Civil Service application. He turned down the pay he would have received for his position as planning board chairman, asking that the money instead go towards town use. The town board made a resolution requiring him to fill out the application, but again, he refused, and was removed from his post.
Sherman became a member of the planning board in July of 2008. He did not return phone calls for comment over the last two weeks.
The town board reinstated the planning board in 2007 after disbanding it 14 years before. The planners have been charged with developing Westerlo’s first-ever comprehensive land-use plan.