The vacant Town of Hamden's Tax Assessor Seat and the Aggressive Felon Taggart: I DO NOT WANT MY FELONY CONVICTION RECORDS SHOWN TO THE PUBLIC - HERE, MY DARLING

I challenged in court - Neroni v Delaware County, EF2025-447 - LEGALITY of ALL tax assessments in the Town of Hamden this year.

WHY?

Because there is no tax assessor to make them - as a matter of law.

WHY?

Because Public Officers Law Section 30 makes it clear that a public office becomes VACANT - as if "nobody is occupying it" - on conviction of the occupier of that public office for a felony.

And, the Town of Hamden's (NY) Tax Assessor office is occupied by a convicted felon Katherine Covell/Taggart.

Hamden Town Supervisor Marshfield addressed that issue publicly - as covered by the local press - deciding to do what Delaware County Court refused to do - lift associated disabilities or seal the conviction records.

Well, Marshfield is not authorized by law to do it.

Taggart - aggressively - is moving in court to (1) strike any mentioning of her felony conviction as "prejudicial" and "scandalous", and (2) sanction me heavily, with monetary sanctions and a bar on access to court - and I am a journalist, my newsgathering by FOIL requests is, as Taggart and her counsel Frank W. Miller of Hancock Estabrook LLP know well, depends on vindication of denials of FOIL requests through Article 78 proceedings, which I may need to bring frequently, as many as there are denials of FOILs.

I do not know what the judge will decide.  And it is irrelevant to what I am going to do here.

A COURT DECISION, a PUBLIC COURT DECISION, and PUBLIC COURT RECORDS of felony conviction of a public official that resulted in a VACANCY in a public office throughout the period that Taggart, with Marshfield's help, was trying to usurp it - are what they are: PUBLIC RECORDS.

So here we go: I PUBLISH THEM.  You can read them here.

And yes, it IS scandalous, not-so-dear Ms. Taggart, the usurper of Town of Hamden Tax Assessor's office drawing a salary of $25,000.00 a year UNLAWFULLY at MY expense, too.

It is scandalous that you killed a human being, a young father of two children while driving drunk.

You were given a slap on the wrist for it - just 4 months in jail - by a judge who you "shadowed" - notably, Dick Northrup, the then-DA, recused, but not Becker, never Becker.

The mother of the killed man made a victim statement at the sentencing - reported contemporaneously by the local press - that you were NOT rehabilitated, that you were seen drunk AGAIN during the period leading to your plea allocution and sentencing.

You have no morals and no conscience and no integrity to have done that.

You should not occupy the public office of Town of Hamden Tax Assessor - more so that you are ALSO a REAL ESTATE BROKER, so the raising of taxes fills your pocket much more than taxpayer-backed salary does - through elevated REAL ESTATE COMMISSIONS.

The law requires you to disclose disqualifying conditions and disqualifying conflicts of interest, not - as you are doing - HIDE it and try to QUASH it and try to PUNISH THE MESSENGER.

You MAY NOT - as a matter of law - occupy the seat of Town of Hamden (NY) Tax Assessor.

You MAY NOT receive that salary.  

And whoever is elected instead of Marshfield must BOOT you and REQUIRE you to reimburse the Town taxpayers with whatever you were paid.

Buyers and sellers of real estate in the Town of Hamden, beware of what is going on:  as a tax assessor, Taggart can and does DRAMATICALLY raise taxes through raised tax assessments.

As a real estate broker, she BENEFITS from raised commissions - from ALL sales in the Town of Hamden, NY.

This type of conflict of interest is in addition to the fact that AT NO TIME Taggart was allowed by law to take that public office in the first place, due to her felony conviction, resulting in a VACANT office of tax assessor in the Town of Hamden this year and all the legal consequences that come with it - which Town of Hamden property owners and taxpayers are welcome to explore with their own lawyers.

The financial benefit Taggart gets from her public office disqualifies her absolutely even had she had a right to occupy that office in the first place - which she does not, by operation of Public Officers Law Section 30.

As to the destiny of Town's tax assessments this year by a hole in the Tax Assessor's office - it is in court already.  I am doing it not only for myself.  I am doing it for all Town of Hamden, NY property owners and taxpayers.