OBSERVER Photo by Gregory Bacon Mayville Mayor Rick Syper is accused of badgering, hectoring, yelling at Chautauqua town code officers, attempting to influence zoning determinations in his favor.

MAYVILLE – Chautauqua town officials are looking to end overseeing code enforcement for the village, saying the reason is due to how the mayor treats the town code officers.

During the Chautauqua Town Board meeting Wednesday, board members passed a resolution “terminating an intermunicipal agreement with the village of Mayville for shared code enforcement services.”

In September 2021 the village dissolved its code office, contracting the town of Chautauqua to handle all code issues, including fire inspections, issuing building permits, and working with the village’s planning and zoning boards.

The village is paying the town $16,000 for code enforcement service.

In the resolution voted on by the Chautauqua Town Board, it states, “this decision is made solely due to the persistent and inappropriate conduct of the village mayor, Rick Syper, toward the Town’s Code Enforcement Officers, including repeated instances of badgering, hectoring, yelling, and attempts to influence zoning determinations in his favor.”

Syper does occasionally attend the Chautauqua Town Board meetings, but was not there on Wednesday.

During the town board meeting, Supervisor Don Emhardt said, “There’s been some disagreements between the village and the town so it’s best that we just go our separate ways.”

After the meeting, Emhardt said this decision has been debated among town officials for a few months.

“We have to support our employees,” he said.

Thursday morning Syper was reached by phone and said he was unaware of the town board’s action the night before.

“I didn’t know anything about it,” he said.

Asked for his reaction, Syper replied, “We haven’t had any conversation with the code enforcement officers for months, so I have no idea about anything.”

When asked if he ever “badgered, hectored, yelled or attempted to influence zoning determinations,” Syper replied, “Have we had conversations about Tim Hortons and other things? Absolutely, but I don’t know if that’s badgering.”

Syper said he has also had communication with the code office about enforcement of the village’s trash law.

“We’ve had emails about the trash law saying that he didn’t know about it, so I emailed him that he was at the board meeting when we passed the new trash law and he was part of it,” he said.

The agreement between the two boards requires that termination to be effective 180 days from the date of the written notice.

Syper said he expects the village board to find its own code officer like it has had in the past.

The village’s former code office is currently being rented by the Chautauqua County Sheriff’s Office for its re-entry hub. Syper said the village will look into finding a new office for their code officer once one is hired.