12/27/07 - Local lawyers defend county attorney

(As published by Cortland Standard, Even Geibel reporting)

Several local attorneys have come out in support of the County Attorney’s Office, alleging the county administrator is unqualified to be making the accusations of misconduct he has leveled at the office and that this is another example of heavy-handed administration.

Schrader defended his actions and accused the lawyers of having ulterior motives.

With local attorney Mike Shafer of the Riehlman, Shafer & Shafer law firm acting as spokesman, the lawyers also urged legislators to think hard before they renew County Administrator Scott Schrader’s contract in three years.

Shafer and local attorneys Mardis Kelsen and Matt Neuman held a press conference on the steps of the County Courthouse early Wednesday afternoon. Shafer stressed that they were there as individual attorneys, not speaking for the county Bar Association.

Schrader had given a memorandum to the county Budget and Finance Committee on Dec. 13, indicating he believed County Attorney Ric Van Donsel’s recommended settlements for two properties on Williams and Randall streets — included in the failed south Main Street Public Health Building project — were too high and that a criminal investigation was warranted.

“Mr. Schrader’s outrageous suggestion that the District Attorney’s office conduct a criminal investigation concerning the conduct of the County Attorney’s Office,” Shafer said in a prepared statement, “while arising out of the aftermath of the failed South Main Street Development Project, is part and parcel of the County Administrator’s consistent practice of pointing blame at others when one of his schemes does not come to fruition as he would have hoped.”

Van Donsel has not been willing to comment to the Cortland Standard on the matter.

Schrader had also suggested an investigation into Assistant County Attorney Ron Walsh’s conduct, given that Walsh had represented Steve Lissberger, the former owner of the Randall Street property, in a sale to a third party in August without notifying the county.

Walsh said Dec. 14 he was unaware that his client was involved in negotiations with the county at the time the property was sold — Lissberger filed his claim in April, Schrader said — and that he had represented Lissberger when the property was originally purchased in March 2006.

Schrader said this morning that he was still drafting the formal request for an investigation to be presented to the district attorney.