To the Editor:
As I attended the recent Berne Town Board meeting, I witnessed the continuation of the lies and deceit that have become the norm in Berne — the exact behavior residents have strongly voiced their opinion about, in recent conversations I've had with them while campaigning for town board.

They are completely disappointed with the back-biting and thuggery in their town.

Legitimate experienced volunteers and appointees have been replaced with soldiers of the Palow/Lyons regime. Hired, not for their experience or credentials, but for their willingness to spread lies and slander.

Mr. [Chance] Townsend, the executive director of the building department, whined and cried about how difficult it was to answer the daily mail requests by residents and their Realtors. Responding to file searches is a daily occurrence in the building and zoning departments of all the Hilltowns.

If there are questions regarding a particular parcel, it’s up to the code official to do a site visit and verify what the status of a parcel is. It takes time and energy to do this.

The Lyons/Palow regime has raised the building  department budget to $100,000 annually, up from $30,000. Lyons and Palow have added three new building inspectors in addition to the executive director of building permits, bought four computers and four iPhones, and recently purchased a new data-collection system for the building department at who knows what cost to the taxpayers.

Berne now has four times the manpower and four times the budgeted dollars of any surrounding Hilltown.

Every time Townsend quits or complains about money, Lyons kowtows to his request, at great cost to the taxpayers.

Townsend complains that there are too many open permits in Berne; well, let me tell you: Rensselaerville, Westerlo, and New Scotland have thousands of open permits, combined. Thousands. Townsend has been over his head since day one, whining and complaining that he needs more hours, he needs more money. Lyons gave him everything he needed, and he still comes up short.

No matter how much lipstick they put on this pig, it's still a pig.

The planning board chairman is requesting a “waiver” to the subdivision regs so he doesn't have to use the usual process. He asks the town board to look into a waiver. A waiver already exists in the subdivision regs in Berne, and has for 40 years. If you take the time to read the law, anyone can find it easily: Section 170-25.

Planning boards are reluctant to use a waiver for fear of setting a precedent that they couldn’t back up for future decisions.

With regards to a notebook computer I purchased seven years ago, I recycled the remains of the notebook in the Berne electronics recycling totes [“Berne’s building department is moving towards a smoother, more transparent process,” The Altamont Enterprise, Letter to the Editor, July 29, 2021].

The battery had been dead and the cost to replace it exceeded the scrap value of it. There were no programs on it that contained any town records.

So Mr. Townsend will have to look in the hard copy files in Town Hall to complete his file search requests.

Tim Lippert

Berne

Editor’s note: Tim Lippert, formerly Berne’s building administrator, is currently running for Berne councilman on the Democratic ticket. He currently works as  the building inspector and code enforcement officer for Rensselaerville.