ERIE COUNTY, N.Y. — The Town of Evans board decided not to vote Wednesday night on whether a former town supervisor would have to pay the town back money she allegedly took but was not entitled to.
Just two weeks ago, the Evans Ethics Committee decided that former Town of Evans supervisor Mary Hosler should pay the town back $23,000 from insurance opt-out payments and an additional stipend.
An audit by the state comptroller’s sparked the ethics committee to look into Hosler, finding the former supervisor accepted opt-out payments for the town’s health insurance while she was already receiving the benefits of that health insurance due to her husband also being a town employee.
It also found that she violated town code by voting herself into a position as the town’s budget director that came with an additional $15,000 stipend.
The committee says she owes $6,000 for the insurance payments, $15,000 for one full year of the stipend, and approximately $2,000 for two more months of the stipend before she resigned in February 2023 to become Erie County deputy comptroller for audit.
For those reasons, the committee suggested the town board vote to force Hosler to pay back the town, but the board held off on moving forward with that board. Board members told 2 On Your Side that this recent ethics committee findings contradicts a similar investigation conducted by a previous ethics committee in 2021, which found there was no wrongdoing in the former supervisor’s actions.
However, residents pushed back on that notion at a town board meeting Wednesday.
“It is impossible to believe that the previous town board and the previous town attorney and the previous accountant reached a contrary opinion given the indisputable facts our committee considered,” one resident said. “As they say on television and the world of lawyers, the committee reached this conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt.”
2 On Your Side has made efforts to try to get in contact with the ex-supervisor and is hopeful to be able to sit down with her in the coming days.