Editor’s note: This story contains explicit language that some readers may find offensive.

A Hunter Fire Company lieutenant and fierce critic of local government quit after a profanity-laced roadside argument with Village Mayor Alan Higgins over whether to close a flooded stretch of Main Street as a July 29 storm dumped eight inches of rain on parts of the town.

Tyler Kelaher, a second lieutenant who has been with the company for over seven years, resigned and returned his equipment on Aug. 4, before the two men had been asked to clear the air by speaking ahead of a fire company meeting.

Kelaher, 33, said he stepped down to keep the dispute from jeopardizing “firefighter employment opportunities, interviews, background investigations, or potential job offers that are currently in progress.”

The argument turned on a question that surfaces in nearly every flash flood in the Catskills: who decides when a road closes, and when. Kelaher said he assumed the call belonged to the fire officers on scene. Higgins, 50, said Main Street had to stay open so residents could go in and out of the village.

No village law assigns that power. Main Street through the village is state Route 23A, a state highway. And the town was operating under an emergency order declared by Supervisor Sean Mahoney that gives local emergency services the authority to close roads.

State law is clearer on the chain of command. In People v. Loren, a 2005 Court of Appeals decision, the court held that a volunteer firefighter may stop or divert traffic at the scene of a fire, accident, or other emergency, but only when the fire chief has delegated that authority. Village Law gives the chief “exclusive control” of department members while the department is on duty.

That puts the call on Main Street with Fire Chief John Laveglia, not with a second lieutenant and not with the mayor. Higgins said Laveglia told him he wasn’t planning to close the road. Laveglia declined to comment.

The storm dumped nearly eight inches of rain on parts of the town of Hunter in the morning of July 29. Kelaher said he drove to Main Street between 9 and 10 a.m after a countywide call went out for firefighters to staff stations, and that Laveglia asked him to bring a truck to a portion of Main Street.

“My assumption was, like any other eight years of doing this, we were going to either stop traffic or just close the road and wait for the floodwaters to recede before sending people through the water,” he said. “I pulled to the shoulder and I got out to start directing traffic.”

Three drivers were waiting, Kelaher said, and he told them he believed the road would close because of the flooding. One was Village Clerk Kathleen Hilbert, whom Kelaher said was trying to reach the village office to answer calls from residents. 

“I said to her, ‘I think we’re going to be shutting this road down soon, but if you want to pull forward you can ask John, our chief, if you can find a way to get to the office,’” he said. 

Kelaher said he was walking back to his personal vehicle when Higgins, who is also a firefighter, pulled up and rolled down his window. 

“He said, ‘Are you a fucking idiot?’ Kelaher said. “He said, ‘Who are you to be telling people you’re closing this road down? It’s not your decision to make. You’re an idiot, you don’t know what you’re doing.’”

Higgins then pulled over, got out, and “aggressively came after” him, Kelaher said.

“The intention was not to speak to me,” he said. “The intention was to get in my face, to push me.”

The two yelled at each other in front of Laveglia, who did not intervene, Kelaher said, before he walked away.

In a video Kelaher provided, which he said he shot while walking away, he can be heard yelling back at Higgins, calling him a “fucking scumbag” and a “fat piece of shit.”

“My only concern when I go on these calls is for someone’s safety, not to get in an argument, in a fight with an elected official,” he said. “The next thing you know, I proceed to walk away, and he’s standing next to our Fire Chief, screaming at me, instigating the situation, calling me a ‘punk piece of shit.'”

Kelaher filed a report with the Hunter Police Department. The Overlook has requested a copy.

Higgins told a different version in an interview on Aug. 5. He denied using any profanity and said that while he did yell, he had every right to during a dangerous storm.

The exchange began, he said, after he told Kelaher not to close the road. Despite floodwater that made Main Street difficult to navigate that morning, Higgins said it had to stay open as an evacuation route.

“I said, ‘People are trying to leave the village,'” he said. “He had just told my village clerk in her car, ‘I’m going to get the fire truck, I’m closing Main Street off.’ That’s why I yelled at him. Because you know what? You can yell at people. Especially when he’s trying to shut the route out that I have to keep open.”

Laveglia had told him he wasn’t planning to close the road, Higgins said. 

Higgins said after he yelled at Kelaher to keep the road open, Kelaher told him to “go fuck himself.” He said he pulled over and got out of the car but just wanted to talk to Kelaher, not to escalate the situation or get physical.

Kelaher said he thinks the real source of the conflict is his social media posts, where he is a frequent critic of Higgins and the village government. In the March 18 village election, Kelaher urged residents to write in his name. Higgins, who ran unopposed, won with 45 votes to 14 write-ins, according to the Greene County Board of Elections. It’s unclear how many write-ins were for Kelaher.

“I’m not writing personal things about this man and his wife and his children on Facebook,” he said. “I am hitting on the facts of what’s right and wrong, and what I think is right and wrong as a taxpayer in the village,” he said. 

His criticisms mostly focus on what he says is a “misuse of money and funding” in the village.

Higgins did admit to calling Kelaher the “village idiot,” saying his social media posts were distasteful. 

“He bashes the village of Hunter at every opportunity,” he said. “That’s why I call him the village idiot, because he makes himself look really stupid.”

Higgins said the police department called him on July 30 to tell him Kelaher had filed a report. On Aug. 4, before the resignation, both men were asked to talk before a fire company meeting that night and clear the air, he said. Kelaher turned in his gear instead.

Higgins said he thinks Kelaher holds a personal grudge. 

“He’s trying to do all kinds of stuff, and it’s all for this, I don’t know, maybe personal thing against me,” he said. 

Higgins said he didn’t understand why Kelaher had resigned.

“Over an argument? I would have had to resign 100 times already,” he said. “Every time there’s a meeting there’s an argument with somebody.”

Connor Greco is a staff reporter for The Overlook covering Windham, Hunter, and surrounding Greene County communities. Send correspondence to connor@theoverlooknews.com.