ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. (WKBW) — Several people living in the Town and Village of Orchard Park showed up at a Town Hall meeting Monday night demanding answers as to why the proposed change to the borders.
“I’m upset,” says Stehanie Stachuwicz, a Town of Orchard Park resident. “I wish they can get rid of the town and the village and make it one town so problems like this including killing beavers would not happen again.”
7 News reporter Yoselin Person tried to get a one-on-one interview with Village Mayor Jo Ann Litwin Cliton of Orchard Park.
The mayor wasn’t able to chat in-person with Yoselin, but Clinton did do a phone interview with 7 News reporter Kristen Mirand.
“There are residents that would be affected that will go to the village, and some would go to the town. Unfortunately, there has been misinformation,” Clinton says. “This is the only proposal at this point, and there is no phase two.”
The mayor says they’re trying to streamline the water operations for better service.
“So we’re trying to make it that your parcel that you live on that’s in one municipality rather two,” she says.
Others say it doesn’t make sense to them.
“Which will fully go from the town which my understanding we pay less in taxes to the village which to my understanding pay more in taxes,” says Anne Marie Kennick, a resident of Town of Orchard Park.
The mayor says no one won’t see changes of their tax bill until 2025.
There will be a vote on the proposal come January.
“I would just ask our residents to not to get their information from social media, but to refer to our village website tomorrow,” Mayor Clinton says.
