One-term member of the Woodstock town board Bennet Ratcliff is challenging three-term town supervisor Bill McKenna for the Democratic nomination to the top spot in the June 27 primary.
McKenna, a former member of the town board, was appointed in 2017 to replace the late Jeremy Wilber, who was Woodstock’s longest-serving supervisor. McKenna was then elected in November of that same year to his first full term as supervisor.
Ratcliff, a communications and public affairs strategist, has been on the town board since 2021. He served for seven years on the Onteora School Board and was chair of the Woodstock Democratic Committee.
Financial management
McKenna’s list of accomplishments include ushering the town through the Covid pandemic and taking advantage of revenue windfalls by cutting costs through reduced services while people stayed at home.
Some of that revenue resulted in a surplus that will be applied to the cost of the Comeau offices renovation. Voters had approved borrowing $1 million with the remaining $1.9 million to come from capital reserve funds. McKenna, with majority town-board support, will use $1.4 in surplus instead of bonding.
McKenna said the construction budget is still $2.995 million. “The construction costs are still below that number. But there are incidental costs that we’re paying out of that account, the architects fees, engineering fees, clerk of works and whatnot,” McKenna explained. “Because we had two banner years of sales-tax collection and mortgage collection, and, as usual, I held the line on spending and we saw surpluses, we were able to take that unanticipated savings and put it that went into unappropriated fund balance, We’re saving $300,000 [interest]. The cost of the project has not gone up a dime.”
Hollowed out?
Recently, an attorney representing four members of the Woodstock Police Department and an ex-dispatcher filed a complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission alleging a hostile environment of sexual harassment, racial slurs and retaliation for those who complain. It accused McKenna of an inadequate internal investigation.
Ratcliff has said the town does not follow up on complaints.
“We do follow the rules and regulations that are on the books. We have a sexual harassment team that goes out every year and deals with the various employees as well as our volunteer employees,” McKenna said. “We have had some issues with different departments. They’ve been investigated, there have been reports done on them. And there have been actions taken to make sure that they don’t have that again. Woodstock has a zero-tolerance policy on sexual harassment or racial harassment. And we work very hard to maintain that.”
On the recent call for an investigation of the Woodstock Police Department, Ratcliff said honest, transparent government focused on ethics was key. “What is happening right now in Woodstock is that our town employees and our volunteers are being hollowed out because we are not following the practices that we preach. We have to do better than that. What we must do is we must show respect for every person,” he said. “Regardless, we must listen when women complain of sexual harassment. We must not be sweeping under the rug the types of behavior that is now causing our own police department to ask for investigations of certain police officers.”
Ratcliff has called for McKenna to recuse himself from the process because he is a named party in the complaint to the EEOC.
Several years ago, Woodstock formed a human rights commission “to make sure that the public also had a venue to go to to deal with these issues, and we take this very seriously,” said McKenna.
Zoning and housing
McKenna is in support of the proposed zoning revisions intended to promote more long-term housing. “They’ve gone through two vettings now and are presently being reviewed by other committees,” McKenna said. “We will, as we did with the first go-round last summer, look at the suggestions and tweak the law to make it more in keeping with what Woodstockers want. But I am excited because I do believe that these revisions will help to create more affordable housing and bring diversity to our community.”
Ratcliff is opposed to the zoning changes proposed as a solution to the housing crisis. He favors a community development and planning agency model used in the City of Hudson. “This is not a housing authority. This is an agency that is run by the government. And it works directly with state and county governments and non-profit developers to create specifically moderate-and-lower-income housing.“
Cities can take some steps that are not available to towns, however.
“The private sector has already failed to produce affordable housing,” Ratcliff said. “And these zoning proposals don’t guarantee affordable housing. There is an [accessory dwelling unit] carve-out for wealthy property owners that will allow them to pay to not follow these laws. This in-lieu-of payment caters to wealthy builders and investors, and it doesn’t support affordable housing.”
Ratcliff said enforcement was an issue with the proposed Woodstock zoning that must be considered first. “We cannot put 2000 new units in Woodstock with the current building and code enforcement officers. They’re taxed too much.”
Input on the zoning amendments resulted in the withdrawal of the payment-in-lieu-of-taxes option.
Down in the dumps
McKenna has faced harsh criticism over his handling of illegally dumped construction debris at 10 Church Road in Shady. He says it was dealt with as best it could be within the confines of the law. “The town did everything it could do to uphold its laws and remove the construction debris,’ McKenna said. “Last year, I proposed that we put a fund together to do just that. However, the homeowner did do the cleanup that was required by town law.”
He said the state Department of Environmental Conservation does not have an issue and does not recognize the situation as hazardous. McKenna said he was trying to get the DEC to recognize some of the material came from contractor Joseph Karolys’ site in Saugerties and deem it a violation, so the town can force a full cleanup. “So hopefully the state will step up and do a better job.”
The state constitution bars the town from spending taxpayer money on private property without a court order, so McKenna has proposed raising private funds for soil and water testing every twelve to 18 months.
On the Shady dump, Ratcliff said the town needs to get a court order for a complete cleanup. “We have to make the polluter pay,” Ratcliff said. “He’s financially responsible for this cleanup. The town can levy the cost on his taxes and force him to pay. If he refuses, the county can make good on our payments and then they will sell his property at foreclosure and he will pay for it.”
McKenna had proposed hiring a contractor for the cleanup and levying the property owner, but an agreement was reached to have the debris sifted out of the fill. Ratcliff contends all the fill needs to be removed.
Testing that has been done has found levels of toxic chemicals that lead to cancer, immune-system issues, liver and thyroid problems, and cause development in fetuses and abnormalities, he said. Also found were polyaromatic hydrocarbons.
“This is a class of chemicals from burning oil, coal and garbage,” Ratcliff said.“These cause skin, bladder and other cancers. One of them is benzopyrene. Lead has been found in the soil that exceeds standards the state allows for unrestricted use. There are also pesticides these chemicals are in the debris. It is not a maybe it is sitting in Shady on top of our aquifer. This is not an issue for a few neighbors. These chemicals and this debris must be removed. It threatens our water supply.”
McKenna has denied the debris poses a danger to the water supply, noting the concentrations of harmful chemicals would be very low by the time they worked their way into the aquifer.
Foreign and domestic affairs
Recently, questions have surfaced about Ratcliff’s role in a 2009 Honduras coup and a personal bankruptcy that was discharged in 2020, including the bulk of some $632,000 in federal tax debt.
Several media accounts report Ratcliff, working with former Clinton legal counsel Lanny Davis, was hired by a group of Latin-American business interests to represent a dictatorship that ousted Honduran president Manuel Zelaya. The regime led by Roberto Micheletti has been linked to human-rights abuses.
Ratcliff said he had nothing to do with the coup and was brought in to facilitate democratic elections.
“I was an international crisis consultant and I was hired by the General Assembly in Honduras to come down and help bring free and fair elections,” Ratcliff said. “After the military coup of the elected president, I worked with [Costa Rican president] Oscar Arias Sanchez, who was the mediator who led the negotiations, and I risked my life and brought the military coup leaders to the table. We fought hard for — and we’re successful that happened — free and fair elections.”
Ratcliff said the work to bring about elections was supported by Hillary Clinton and president Barack Obama. “The Zelaya removal took place before I was even asked to come and help mediate for free and fair elections,” Ratcliff said.
A July 12, 2009 New York Times article by Ginger Thompson recounted tense negotiations between Zalaya and Micheletti at Sanchez’s home.
McKenna supporters have pointed to Ratcliff’s bankruptcy as a reason to question his ability to be the town’s financial steward, one of the primary roles of a supervisor.
Ratcliff said the bankruptcy has no bearing on his fitness for office. “I don’t think it’s part of the civic discourse to pick over the bones of my dead wife and her divorce,” said Ratcliff, who said the bankruptcy was the result of his ex-wife’s addictions.
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