This week’s Mamakating Planning Board meeting was a good-natured snoozer with some buzzy, contentious history. Kevin Lechner, the owner of a propane company, came before the group requesting changes to a plan he proposed over two years ago when he was hoping to bring his propane business to the town. The plan was eventually approved and the company is in Mamakating now. But back in 2022, when the board first heard Lechner’s proposal, he was so frustrated with the approval process that he gave emotional public comment at the next town board meeting, asking for planning board attorney John Cappello’s dismissal.

Lechner owns KL Enterprises and Lechner Propane, on McDonald Road near Kohl’s in Wurtsboro. In 2022 he and his engineer prepared the paperwork needed for the planning board to approve letting Lechner Propane move from another part of New York to Wurtsboro. Owner Lechner had worked with Mamakating’s building inspector, Mary Grass. He’d asked her if his company qualified as a public utility, since it deals with fuel. Grass had responded by giving him a printout of the town’s definition of a public utility, and it appeared that the propane business would qualify.

But Grass did not write out an official determination, and Lechner didn’t know he needed one. When he came to the planning board meeting on May 10, 2022, he was surprised to learn that he was missing a crucial piece of paper showing a decision by Grass, and that the board would therefore not be able to consider the project that night. Board chair Lorrence Green apologized for the inconvenience. Attorney Cappello explained in lawyerly language and in a lawyerly tone of voice that, glitches aside, the board could not bend town rules that evening to approve the plan. Instead, Cappello explained, it must always follow strict procedure. Lechner looked and sounded incredulous, if not furious.

He wasted no time going to the next town board meeting to complain that Cappello had disrespected him. After Lechner made his accusatory public comment, Paul Deninno, owner of Bashakill Vineyards, took to the podium and accused Cappello of delaying the vineyard’s opening for three months by insisting on a special use permit, though Deninno claimed that he didn’t need one according to town laws.

Then Mamakating Local Development Corporation (MDLC) chair Fred Harding said that the town had lost businesses and projects because of delays caused by minor details that could have been easily resolved. He suggested that culture changes were needed to support new businesses, and added that Mamakating should “improve the way we react when someone comes to our town to start a project.” Planning board chair Green, who was also at the meeting, acknowledged problems in the process and said he’d begun trying to streamline it.

Cappello stayed on as the planning board’s lawyer. And Lechner’s subsequent appearances before the body got smoother.

Lechner was back before the board this week seeking approval to amend his original site plan. He got permission two years ago to keep two big propane tanks on the site. Now, he asked to add another one immediately and two additional tanks in the future, for an eventual total of five. It was a different atmosphere than the last go-round. He quickly got the board’s OK, amid an atmosphere of pleasantry and even some laughter. The board also voted unanimously to give the amended site plan a negative declaration – a determination that the changes Lechner proposed will have no discernable bad effects on the environment.