A&P Closing; Brown Holds Neighborhood Meeting

ABG just received notice that there will be a community meeting at the Union Baptist Church at 31 Manhattan Avenue (cross street Rt 119) at 7 PM tonight, March 22. The event is being hosted/sponsored by Town of Greenburgh Councilwoman Sonya Brown. She has been on the “outs” with Supervisor Feiner after criticizing him at the first March 2010 meeting. See our earlier blog post for that. Where she isn't on the “outs”, is with the people, for whom we believe she holds their bests interests.

ABG will try to be at the meeting so we can report on what transpires. Given the short notice, we are not sure who else will be attending this meeting. We do know that an A&P representative will be there. This will certainly be worth attending if you have the ability to do so.

We also believe future Town of Greenburgh candidates will be in attendance. Names we've heard as possible Supervisor candidates are Councilman Kevin Morgan (WP), Thomas Bock (R) and Patricia Weems (D). You may recall Weems, she was the last election's Democratic candidate before Feiner, Morgan, et al, got her disqualified on a petition technicality. Frankly, ABG believes Morgan is part of the problem with the Town and Brown is showing real leadership. He's in lock-step with Feiner and she's not. He knows all too well how to get along and plays along as much as necessary - he's mastered it. As a candidate, why wouldn't Morgan be proactive and put a meeting such as this together? Or, better still, why not offer a solution by meeting with executives from the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company? Because he doesn't have to. He stopped caring when Paul stopped caring. They all do it by rote.

ABG likes Bock, who failed in his bid for County Legislator and NYS Assembly. He's a an administrator who knows how to run a business as well as a volunteer firefighter. ABG understands why Bock can't do anything about the A&P as a citizen, but we have watched him fault Feiner at the Town Board meetings and Feiner's impotency regarding the A&P and Pathmark closings. As he rightfully pointed out, Feiner has no clue about running a business, especially a retail one, nor does Feiner understand how devastating his policies toward devaluing Fairview is to the entire retail environment, in effect forcing them to leave the area. We also like Weems, who runs her own business and may have some ideas. We look forward to her attending this event to see what she may have to say.

We believe while Brown's efforts are a promising step in the right direction, anything she accomplishes with the A&P executives will invariably be co-opted by Feiner in his effort to demonstrate how effective he is. That's okay Sonya, we know the truth.