By Mike Donoghue, Senior Correspondent
Woodstock municipal employees say they are concerned about bad behavior by one member of the public at and around Town Hall, but a review of village police records shows no worker ever filed any complaints for threats or misconduct at the municipal building.
The Vermont Standard filed a Vermont Public Records Request after a typed letter with no signatures and a sign-off by “concerned members of town hall staff” was submitted to the village trustees and town selectboard indicating they fear for their safety.
Village trustee chair Seton McIlroy and selectboard chair Ray Bourgeois promised last week that their boards would review the listed concerns.
However, apparently, the alleged concerns have failed to rise to the level of anybody contacting Woodstock Police, a Vermont Standard investigation revealed.
Woodstock Interim Police Chief Chris O’Keeffe initially reported to the Standard last week during a phone call that he could not recall any public complaints filed.
Upon his actual review of the department’s computer system this week, he repeated that no complaints from village or town employees of incidents at town hall were found going back to October 2024.
Attempts to reach McIlroy and Bourgeois this week to get reaction to the lack of employee complaints to police were unsuccessful. They did not respond to phone and text messages before the Standard’s weekly deadline.
In an interview with the Standard, Woodstock attorney Nicholas “Nico” Seldon said that he believes the employees are making false claims about him. He is married to Woodstock Police Chief Joe Swanson and has tried to defend his spouse when municipal manager Eric Duffy placed him on leave and tried to demote him to a patrol officer this year.
After a judge’s ruling, the village trustees recently agreed to have Swanson restored as Woodstock Police Chief, but he was told he remains on paid leave on the sidelines and was ordered not to do any of his assigned duties as head of the department. The trustees have said they plan another demotion hearing.
Seldon, a lawyer, has his car covered with large blue and pink signs that say “Fire Eric Duffy! We deserve better.” He also has a bumper sticker urging the firing of Duffy as municipal manager and “end Woodstock corruption.” The car can be seen frequently throughout Woodstock and Seldon often leaves the car parked outside Town Hall during the day while he is at work.
He told the Vermont Standard that he parks his car about 6 a.m. outside Town Hall, long before the doors open, and retrieves his car about 12 hours later, long after regular municipal business hours have ended.
Duffy did reach out to the Windsor County Sheriff’s Department this month to hire a deputy sheriff to monitor two local meetings on the nights of Dec. 16 and 17, Sheriff Ryan Palmer told the Vermont Standard.
It was unclear what the motive or potential threat Duffy was responding to that needed law enforcement. Duffy did not file any complaints with village police.
Duffy sent a text message this week to the Standard repeating many of the safety comments he made to the newspaper a week earlier. Duffy declined comment Tuesday when asked about the lack of complaints to police by municipal employees.
Palmer said Woodstock taxpayers will be billed $480 for each meeting. The going rate for a deputy sheriff to staff a night meeting requires a minimum four-hour callout pay at $120 an hour, the sheriff said.
Palmer said he was told that Woodstock Police did not have enough staff to allow a village officer to sit in for the two meetings.
It was unclear when the two elected boards voted to approve expending local tax dollars for extra security at the selectboard meeting on Dec. 16 and the trustees special meeting on Dec. 17.
During a joint board meeting on Dec. 19, part-time Woodstock Police Officer Mark Donka monitored the session, the Standard was told.
The draft minutes for the earlier two meetings give no indication of any safety problems at either session. The minutes also don’t list the deputy sheriff as among those attending either meeting.
The trustee’s minutes indicate that Seldon “made a citizen comment” during the public portion of the session. The Open Meeting Law mandates, “the minutes shall cover all topics and motions that arise at the meeting and give a true indication of the business of the meeting.”
The draft has no hint or true indication of Seldon’s comment during the meeting.
A video of the meeting shows Seldon was not at Town Hall, but rather phoned in with his comment. He spoke for about 70 seconds and focused on an ongoing concern that he and other residents believe the trustees fail to follow Vermont’s Open Meeting Law. He cited a transparency problem that night with a planned executive session.
McIlroy and the rest of the trustees never responded to Seldon’s comment and moved on to a budget discussion.
Yet the municipal employees apparently have concerns, but aren’t naming names.
“Employees feel increasingly on edge at work and vulnerable to this individual’s actions. This behavior has gone beyond routine public frustration and has become a legitimate workplace safety issue, negatively impacting staff well-being and morale,” the employee letter said.
“Staff have made good-faith efforts to remain professional and uninvolved, but the behavior has continued to escalate,” it said.
The records researched by O’Keeffe show Seldon has filed three motor vehicle complaints against a municipal employee, including a claim she drove at him in the wrong traffic lane. Seldon said he provided his dash video to the police. The complaints have been passed among several police officers, and O’Keffee said no action was warranted.
There also were two separate complaints recorded against Seldon, police said. They were listed as “citizen assist/complaint,” an all-inclusive category used by police to classify complaints.
Swanson’s lawyer, Linda Fraas, told the Standard this week that she has added Seldon as a client for any possible false claims made about him by municipal employees or officials. Seldon confirmed the hiring to the Standard.
For more on this, please see our Dec. 31 edition of the Vermont Standard.
