CAIRO — Town Supervisor Jason Watts is defending an August vote to approve a town real estate deal that he is now publicly opposing.
During a town board meeting on Aug. 30, Watts, in his role as town councilman, seconded a motion to grant former Supervisor John Coyne the authority to sign a contract for a piece of property on William Dinger Road.
Watts then joined Coyne and council members Tim Powers, MaryJo Cords and Stephen Kralovich in unanimously approving the deal.
Watts said Friday that when he took office Jan. 1 as the new supervisor, he was surprised to learn the town did not include the $70,000 land deal in the 2022 budget.
Watts said Coyne told him the purchase of the property near Route 32 and McDonald’s was necessary for water infrastructure, something Watts no longer believes.
“I voted for it because we were taking the supervisor’s advice on why we needed it,” Watts said Monday. “Now that I know all the facts and I know everything that’s going on, it’s not needed. We were told by John Coyne that it was vital infrastructure for water and sewer. Then when I started meeting with different people about water and sewer, I started asking them what the piece of property was needed for. They told me, ‘Nothing.’ So then I asked the town attorney if we could get out of it and he told me, ‘Jason, you’re already in contract, they put $1,000 down.’”
Powers said Monday that Watts was involved in all of the board’s budget sessions last year.
“He sat through all six budget meetings, so he knows what was in the budget and what wasn’t,” Powers said. “Originally when the purchase of the Miller property was discussed, we planned on doing it on a bond. He’s just using it as cannon fodder to say we can’t pay for it. We planned on getting a bond for it because we figured the bond would be slow enough that it could be paid off in a couple of years.”
Watts said he voted against the 2022 budget.
“I was the only one who voted no on the budget because they did not put stuff in the budget that they said they were going to do,” he said. “That’s what I mean by setting me up to fail.”
Powers said Watts has not discussed the possibility of funding the land purchase with a bond since taking office.
“Where that piece of property is located is right in the area where Greene County plans on going across Route 23 for infrastructure,” he said. “Without the town purchasing that property, they would have to get the state to do a right-of-way. That would probably take more time to get all of that in order or they could across it. The Millers were looking for a right-of-way into the property, which has already been developed into a walking trail. So we figured as a board that it would save a lot, knowing they had the property for sale, if we just bought the property and finished developing the Mountaineer Trail and also having that piece that the county could use to get infrastructure across Route 23 without having to do a right of way.”
In the minutes for the Aug. 30 board meeting, it is noted that the Barton & Loguidice engineering consulting firm in Albany had “said that this was good to buy for future opportunities.”
Watts said the reason for purchasing the land was misrepresented to him.
“I was misled,” he said. “John was the liaison for the Water and Sewer Department and John was our supervisor. So why wouldn’t I believe him as a board member? He was talking to the county and Delaware Engineering. I just called my bookkeeper to make sure everything I’m saying about this was true and she said yes. They didn’t put it into the budget. We voted yes and they still didn’t put it into the budget.”
Coyne did not return a request for comment on the matter.
Watts said that when he asked Coyne how to pay for the property he was told to find grants to cover the land purchase.
“There’s no way to get out of it,” he said. “If they sue us, we’ll lose the same amount of money and we get nothing.”
Powers said Watts also voted for Board of Ethics members Monica Kenny-Keff and Leonard Asaro last summer. Watts said last week that he was told at the time that those were the other pair of candidates qualified for the roles and must be confirmed.
“He knew about all of this,” Powers said. “It upsets me because he’s accusing me and council member Kralovich of undermining him. When we had our first meeting with Mr. Watts (as supervisor), we told him as long as he ran things by the book and how they’re supposed to be done, we’d back him up 100 percent. As long as it’s in the benefit of the Cairo taxpayers.”
Watts said tensions with some of the all-Republican board dates back to his victory in the Republican caucus last year to serve as GOP nominee for supervisor.
“I wasn’t their first choice and I won,” he said. “It started then but now that I became supervisor, they’re making things a little bit harder. But we’re doing things the right way. I just want to be honest and fair to the entire town.”
Powers said his relationship with Watts was not contentious during Watts’ two-year tenure as a board member.
“I’d say 95 percent of the time we were all on the same page with everything,” Powers said. “So it doesn’t make any sense to me.”
Powers also noted that there is language in the Cairo employee handbook about publicly disparaging other town employees.
“We need to look at that because he’s (Watts) trying to make me and Mr. Kralovich out as being these big ogres who are out there trying to destroy him and that’s not the case at all,” he said.