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Butterfield Library files Article 78 Against Town
Referendum stirs heated debate and raises issues of accountability
by Maria Theodore Leiter
On March 30, 2007 the Town of Philipstown, its Town Board and Supervisor, were served with an Article 78 proceeding by the Julia L. Butterfield Memorial Library in connection with last November's referendum election. The Petition is seeking to compel the Town to hand over $276,000 in funding called for in the referendum that was passed by voters during that election.
"It's unfortunate that it's come to this," said Town Supervisor William Mazzuca in response to the lawsuit. "We will just have to deal with it. We will make our response."
The attorney appointed by the Town Board last Thursday, Richard Goldsand, told the PCN&R on Monday that he was preparing a motion to have the Library's Petition dismissed on the grounds that the Library did not comply with the publication requirements of election law.
"I hope it's not dismissed and if something else can be worked out I'm all for it," Library President Judith Meyer said in an interview on Monday.
At a recent Town Board meeting, Mazzuca said that he knew when Library President Meyer first came to him with the proposal for the referendum that it would end up dividing the community. The matter threatens to pit those voters who supported the measure, who say they now feel disenfranchised by the Town Board's actions, against those who claim that they were left out of the voting process.
"I didn't think there was any reason this would divide the community," said Meyer.
Emotions were high last week, where the issue was discussed during the public portion of the Town Board meeting.
"I'm a huge supporter of the public libraries because of all they've done for me in New York City with the NY Public library system there, where I spent every Saturday as a boy," said Stan Freilich, Garrison resident and former Garrison School Board President. Despite this, he said, "I've come here tonight to support and to thank the [Town] Board for its position and to say that living in Garrison, I was totally unaware that that vote was taking place. We didn't know. I didn't know. I know there were various letters back and forth in the paper about who did and didn't know. I received no emails; there were no sign boards in Garrison with respect to the vote."
Cold Spring resident Dr. Kara Bickham spoke for the other side: "There are some town voters who feel very disenfranchised. We educated ourselves about the election with regard to the referendum. I would like to know where the Town Board was when this was going on. I think the library did a good job presenting their side and I know that all of you had concerns about this memorandum, and yet there are many people who never even heard your side before the election. Nobody from the Town Board contested that election. If there was a problem with the election, if there was a problem with the information being disbursed, that should have been the responsibility of our town's elected officials." She questioned why the Board did not contest the election within thirty days.
Bickham also said that in not protesting beforehand, the Board had handed the library a justifiable reason to sue the Town and was now costing the taxpayers in legal fees.
"The Board purposely didn't take sides," said Mazzuca, adding that their feeling was that it was up to the people. Councilman Richard Shea, in an earlier interview, said that the Board had always supported the library and chose to remain neutral with regard to the vote, assuming that the library would properly notify the public.
"There is a technical issue here that has to be resolved," said Garrison resident Joe Regale, who in the past has raised concerns about accountability of taxpayer funds with relation to fire departments. "And it seems to me that in good faith the Town has given the library a decent amount of money over the years and now it looks like, instead of saying we should be able to sit down and get a couple of people together to say what are we going to do about this if we don't think this was done right, it seems to me that this institution, that we have, under no obligation, funded essentially out of the goodness of the heart of the taxpayers, is now turning around and taking the money that we've given them, using that money to sue us to force us to give them more money."
At Thursday's meeting, a petition asking the Town Board to actively pursue the nullification of the November 2006 election, signed by 95 residents, was submitted to the Town Board by Joselle Cunane of Garrison. The Town Clerk said she believed the petition was still being circulated. According to a couple of sources, a second opposing petition is also being circulated.
Mazzuca said that he understood the library's wish to secure funding, but not their attempt to more than double their budget. More to the point, Mazzuca and other Town Board members were furious with what they alleged was a targeted campaign that left residents of Garrison and Continental Village out in the cold.
But Library Director Gillian Thorpe and Meyer said that the targeted emails and direct mail campaigns were put out by a separate fund-raising entity, the Friends of Butterfield Library, and that the library fulfilled its own obligations under the law.
Meyer said that the Library printed information that was available at the library and on its website. "The website is available to everyone. I think it was fairly publicized. We hit enough places between the websites and the two papers. We did as much as we could with the amount of money that we had," she said.
The library's attorney points out that the Town Board did not raise these objections prior to the election, and no one has since challenged the election. The statute of limitations for filing such a challenge has long since passed, said Robert T. Schofield of Whiteman Osterman & Hanna LLP.
The lawsuit and the Town's refusal to pay the increase center on election law requirements, but, the issue has also raised questions about accountability to taxpayers and the underlying education law that allows free association libraries to avail themselves of the referendum process. That law was passed to allow libraries to go directly to taxpayers for support from the larger communities they serve and to give voters a way to offer support for their public libraries. In 1995, an amendment was passed to include municipal and free-association libraries in that process. It won unanimous support in both state houses.
"[The 1995 law] was setting up a mechanism that allows a small library that has grown into serving a larger area to get support from the larger community that uses it," explained Schofield.
Senator Hugh T. Farley, in arguing for his amendment said that the law would stop the residents of larger municipalities from "free-loading" on smaller municipalities.
In this community, however, residents are served by two libraries. According to figures put out by the Mid Hudson Library System, the Butterfield library's annual circulation figures for 2006 were just over 30,000, while the Desmond Fish Library had a circulation of over 53,000. The Desmond Fish library is also a free association library and would have the same referendum process open to it.
Previously to the 1995 law being passed, such libraries, which are private not-for-profit corporations, with boards not appointed by a governing body, nor elected by taxpayers, would first have to take steps to create special taxing districts, a process that required enabling legislation from Albany and public hearings and resulted in publicly elected trustees. In the case of the Butterfield Library, this would mean an amendment to their 1928 Board of Regents Charter to allow its board to be elected. But, the 1995 amendment as interpreted allows it to keep its autonomy.
Thus, oversight of local taxpayer funds is effectively transferred from locally elected officials to the State Board of Regents. This change is not made apparent in the brief referendum wording used by libraries that simply states that the Library is seeking to increase its funding.
Under its by-laws, the Julia Butterfield Library board is self-appointed. Members can serve for life and, when there is an opening, the remaining members appoint the replacement. Meyer has served as President for 5 years and has served on the board for thirty years. The Vice President of the Board is Mike Riner, Treasurer is Abigail Watson and newest member Candy Zgolinski serves as Secretary.
Thorpe said that she felt that residents would be opposed to any step that would require it to change the will of Julia Butterfield. Meyer said that she was proud to serve with the members of her board, who she describes as pillars of the community.
Asked to comment about the accountability of the JBL board, Meyer said, "We are open to discussion, but ultimately it's our decision. If people have suggestion, we take it under consideration. Truly, if someone comes up to us with an idea, we would consider it. We have nothing to hide. We are open and operating the way Mrs. Butterfield would like us to, so we are doing our best."
According to the Library's Website, board meetings are held on the second Wednesday of each month and are open to the public. Thorpe said that she was required to submit her annual budgets to the Board of Regents.
The Board of Regents does have the authority to withhold funding as it sees fit. However, it does not, as a matter of course, concern itself with the financial stability of a local municipality, or with the wishes of town residents as to how the library chooses to spend the money going forward.
Mazzuca is concerned that if he hands over the funding, that taxpayers would not have any say on how their money was being spent. He pointed out that as long as the library had to negotiate with the Town Board for annual funding, they have provided elected officials with budget figures. Those elected officials can ultimately be unseated by voters. He was stunned to learn that the library, as a private organization, would not be obligated to do so once their funding was secured by the referendum. It should be noted that case law has held that free association libraries are not bound by freedom of information laws.
"People of the town should be able to see how their money is spent without going down to the library," he said.
Councilman Richard Shea said that he had never run across a law that makes funding perpetual, with no mechanism for adjusting the funding, except to increase it. He said he did not think people realized the kind of fiscal impact this would have on their taxes. It would mean an 11% increase in their taxes year after year.
The petition points out that the issue of the library's board was raised prior to the referendum by a letter to the editor in the PCN&R. In it, John Dunn, who served on the Desmond Fish Library Board from 1992 through 1995, and on the Board of the Mid Hudson Library System Board in 1996 and 1997, suggested that Butterfield amend its by-laws to allow its board to be elected.
Dunn stated in his letter to the editor:
"Essentially, then, the JBL would become an institution almost completely publicly funded; it would be guaranteed this funding annually, with no taxpayer review; and its board would be under no obligation to submit to the voters any accounting of how the money is being used. While the law allows this, this is poor law and bad fiscal policy."
Senator Vincent L. Leibell, along with Senator Farley, currently has a bill before the legislature that would add public library systems to the referendum law. That would allow the Mid Hudson Library System to Petition the counties it serves for similar referendums. Leibell's office was asked to comment on the issues raised here, but asked for additional time to review the matter as the Senator was in the midst of the budget process.
The Library's Petition, if accepted by the State Supreme Court of New York of Putnam County, is scheduled to be heard on April 21 at 9:30am at the County Courthouse in Carmel.
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