Jason West, the former New Paltz mayor who won national attention for conducting same sex marriages, is going to be mayor again. He won his seat back on May 3, four years after he was voted out of office. He said this time around, he doesn’t have anything quite as extravagant as the 2004 marriages planned.
Back then, West turned the small village of New Paltz into a media frenzy by marrying same-sex couples in front of the Town Hall.
West felt it was a necessary measure to marry same-sex couples and begin something no one had done. “In 2003, when I ran for mayor the first time, it was in the back of my mind as something I wanted to look into,” West said. “I wanted to find out if it was legal and if it wasn’t, why not.”
During his first month as mayor, West had the village attorney look into the legalities of same-sex marriage in New York state. The attorney then wrote him a memo stating that there were no laws at all on same-sex marriage in the state. So West took this opportunity to change the town and possibly the state. Since there were no laws in place, West decided to perform the marriages and see what came of it. There were already states that were legalizing same-sex marriage and West wanted to see if the marriages would push for laws legalizing it in New York state.
West planned a spring wedding in the park. However, he had trouble finding couples that would agree to be married by him, an act that would thrust them into the spotlight. He spent that summer, fall and winter finding couples. “We wanted to have the tuxes, dresses, the band, the reception, the whole nine yards,” said West. “It was something morally that needed to be done. Once the legal opinion was in that we didn’t know (if it was legal or not) we decided to go forward.”
On the day of the wedding, there were hundreds of supporters. Not very many protesters showed up at the weddings, according to West. “I think there were seven protestors,” West said. “Businesses had signs, restaurants had special features, the Gilded Otter had a special drink called the Nuptial Ale, it was a lot of fun and people really got behind it.”
When asked if he would change anything he did after all of the attention he got, West said, “not at all. I might try to make it bigger. My opinion hasn’t changed at all and if anything my conviction has gotten stronger.”
West moved back to New Paltz a year and a half ago, after living in San Francisco for a short time. After settling back in, West realized that many of the projects he had started as mayor had been put on the back burner. Feeling that these projects were important, and that there was more to be done, West decided to run for mayor in the 2011 election.
When he first announced his campaign, West got quite a bit of support. He did quite a bit of campaigning, including some talks at SUNY New Paltz. He also had a meet and greet with people in the town, and went door to door to talk to people.
West won the election on May 3. However, not every member of the village was pleased with this, including one of West’s opponents, John Cohen. Cohen is not pleased with the way West has handled his past both personally and as mayor.
Cohen said that he allowed West and his volunteers to use his property to perform some of the marriages. He says that this almost got him in a large deal of trouble with the District Attorney.
“This is half true,” West said. “I was stopped by a court injunction. The volunteers who had helped with the weddings set up a 501c3 called the New Paltz Equality Initiative. Mr. Cohen offered his vacant property for the weddings to former Village Trustee Julia Walsh.”
This allowed for the weddings to go forward on Cohen’s property. However, seeing as how these acts were not legal, Cohen was in potential trouble because he was involved and allowed them to happen on his property. There were several weddings done on his property, for which Mr. Cohen has said for years he is very proud,” West said. “Mr. Cohen also made sure to have souvenirs made so that he could sell them at the weddings.”
West plans on getting started right away. One of the main goals is to deal with the issue of noise within the village. “I think that late night noise is an issue we have to deal with, but I think the currently proposed noise ordinance is not the right tool to do so,” West said. “It’s even anti-business, and seems to want the village to be more like a library or a monastery than a healthy mix of college town, eco-tourism haven and arts community.”
Post by Jessica Mahoney-Cudney
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