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On Tuesday morning, the village of Fredonia removed its Facebook page.
"The village Facebook page was removed temporarily on Sept. 30," said Mayor Doug Essek during the Village Board meeting on Monday. "The page is highly unmonitored and it was apparent that users were getting very upset that their questions, statements and complaints weren't being answered or engaged.
"Throughout this incident residents and water customers were directed to call village and county officials with questions and concerns. The page was removed and replaced with a group page to see if that would correct the issue, it did not and the original page was put back up on Facebook the same day. Unfortunately the village webpage went offline due to being at bandwidth limit."
According to Essek, the village's processes and technologies are many years behind where they should be. A new webpage was recently unveiled last week and Essek encourages residents to use that as a means of communication between the village.
"Once we are able to archive all the past information on the village Facebook page it will be removed permanently," Essek said. "We've been advised by (New York Council of Mayors … and our attorney that … we not required to have a Facebook page."
The page was created in February 2016 by former Mayor Athanasia Landis without board resolution. As such Essek chose to remove the page in the same fashion.
"Future administrations can do with it what they want to," he finished.