RENSSELAERVILLE — After its first use, the town’s code of ethics was revised and passed by the board with a new timeline.

The Sept. 11 vote was unanimous and set into law changes that were largely designed for efficiency — time limits were set for various steps in the process for the board of ethics to hear and investigate a complaint.

The changes reflected the board of ethics’s first case, when, in 2013, it took several months and cost the town money in attorneys’ fees.

Now, complaints have a 90-day time limit from the incident to the report of it. Exceptions are included for late discovery of an ethical violation or fear of retaliation.

At its first meeting to determine probable cause, the board of ethics is now required to determine whether an attorney will be needed. Legal expenses require town board approval.

The revision also includes standards for the board of ethics to follow: clear and convincing evidence, “meaning that it is substantially more likely than not” that the violation was made.

While the original law stated that records of the investigation would be confidential until the board of ethics made its recommendation to the town board or dismissed the complaint, now any complaint “shall be confidential and not open to the public, except as otherwise directed by the Town Board or as required by law.”

As a board of the town created by law, the ethics board is considered a public body that is required to notify the public of its meetings and vote before entering executive session for specific reasons.

The revised ethics law dealt with the board's procedures, not standards of conduct.

Town-car use

Responding to criticism in a community newsletter, town board members voted unanimously to formally allow the use of the town’s car for town business, when it’s not being used for taking residents to medical appointments.

The Chevy station wagon was bought new in 2009 using a $15,000 member item, also known as pork barrel spending, sponsored by state Senator Neil Breslin. Seethroughny.com, a website that pools government information, describes the money as being from the Office of the Aging, its purpose as a gas-efficient car to transport elderly or disabled people.

The car is used for elderly people throughout the week, driven by volunteers, but the car has been used occasionally to pick up parts for the highway department and for the town clerk, Victoria Kraker, to go to the post office and the bank in her work for the town, Supervisor Valerie Lounsbury said. She said there were no restrictions on the grant.

“If she doesn’t take the car, we pay her mileage,” Lounsbury said of Kraker during the Sept. 11 town board meeting.

 “It just is a money savings to our taxpayers to use that car. Otherwise, we’d have a car that is rusted out,” said Councilman Robert Bolte, who says the mid-size car gets 29 miles per gallon.

Marie Dermody, a former town supervisor, wrote about the car’s extra uses in the R’ville Community Newsletter, which she helped found earlier this year.

“I’m a true believer, pretty much, in following the letter of the law and, if we got the money under the pretext of using it for senior purposes, then that is what it’s used for,” Dermody told The Enterprise. She said she was not aware of the car being used for town business while she was in office.

The R’ville Community Newsletter was started after the town’s own newsletter was removed from the budget. With the town beginning to restart its newsletter, Dermody said she will have to wait until she knows if her newsletter will continue to publish; it is an electronic-only publication distributed through email.

Lounsbury said she hopes one or two issues of the town’s official newsletter will be published before the year ends. It will be available through email and in printed form for pick up.

“You will be able to pick them up at the library, the café in Rensselaerville, the Medusa General Store, at the recycling center, and town hall,” she said.

Other business

In other business, the town board:

— Voted unanimously to give the highway superintendent the authorization to bid on equipment and tools up to $20,000, without prior approval of the board. The authorization expires at the end of the year and requires the superintendent to notify the board of a bid soon after it is made.

The resolution came from the practice of online bidding by the highway superintendent.

“It presents a practical problem of needing to bid on relatively short notice,” Thomas Fallati, the town’s attorney, said during the meeting. “And that presents a practical problem of needing to covene a town board meeting [on short notice]”;

— Heard from Doug Story, the town’s water and sewer operator, who said a leak in the Rensselaerville hamlet water system was found and fixed the week before, but he is continuing to look for ways to stem a persistent loss of water in the system;

— Approved a bid for sealing the Preston Hollow park bike path. Lounsbury abstained because she sits on the park’s committee; and

— Approved a shared service agreement with the town of Westerlo for the reimbursement rates and use of a senior bus. With both Rensselaerville and Westerlo residents on the bus, excluding regular shopping trips, the rate for Westerlo is 70 cents per mile. It’s $1.40 per mile if only Westerlo residents are riding.