Trustee LeeAnn Lazarony

The Fredonia Department of Public Works has another temporary new supervisor — but the village Board of Trustees still has not voted on whether to bring back recently terminated DPW Director Dave Bird.

Trustee LeeAnn Lazarony successfully pushed Monday for the hiring of Jenness Merrill, a retired DPW employee, as supervisor of the department.

“He’s worked at the DPW for a long time, he comes highly recommended and he’s willing to give us a hand,” Lazarony said at a trustees’ workshop Monday. “He doesn’t want to do it permanently, he doesn’t want to come out of retirement — he’s willing to do it until we can find someone.”

Merrill will make $36 an hour with no additional benefits. Although trustees generally vote on items at their twice-monthly meetings, Lazarony sought a vote on his employment at Monday’s workshop. It went 3-1, with Trustee Paul Wandel dissenting.

Former Village Attorney Samuel Drayo complained from the audience about the trustees voting at the workshop. Mayor Michael Ferguson replied that attorney Melanie Beardsley, of Village Hall’s contracted law firm Webster Szanyi, advised that trustees can vote on resolutions in a. workshop.

Ferguson sought to remind trustees more than once during the workshop that they have a vote to rescind the recent termination of Bird on next Monday’s meeting agenda. Wandel, who voted against flipping Bird, put that on the agenda.

However, Trustee Ben Brauchler — who backed Bird’s termination, along with Lazarony and trustee Christine Cruz Keefe — stated that the board should consider and vote on Merrill first. Doing it at the workshop was Lazarony’s idea, though.

Ferguson did not support the firing of Bird. However, he noted that Bird’s immediate interim replacement, Doug Bunge, is retiring in a few days. Therefore, it’s very important we have supervision in place,” the mayor said of the Merrill hire.

Lazarony handled the regular Department of Public Works report Monday. It was an upbeat and detailed list of various, routine tasks the department’s workers do around the village. Lazarony also stated that the area around the DPW barn has been cleaned up.

“I want to be proud of DPW and I want the workers there to be proud of what they do,” she said. “I’m really excited that they’ve really just stepped up.”

Later on in the workshop, Wandel said he was set to meet with Bunge and Ferguson about a “succession plan” for DPW.