Like other projects The Paul has covertly moved through his “friends and family network”, with rubber-stamp approval by his Board, this entire proposal reeked of collusion. He proposed leasing the property to GameOn 365 without so much as addressing the pollutants that are saturating and buried into this property. The Town acquired this property in 2011 after Frank’s Nursery filed for bankruptcy, abandoned the contaminated property, and the Town inherited it through foreclosure. Prior to the foreclosure, The Paul was secretly meeting with Robert Gould, of Game On 365, to finagle a deal before the property “went public”. The Paul, pro-developer and lacking any business acumen, all but guaranteed the property to GameOn 365, just as he did to Westhab in the Fulton Park section of Fairview, including the necessary spot-zoning they required.
A nearby resident to the property, Simon Cohen, mounted a campaign against the proposal by launching a website, HelpBurstTheBubble.com and sent a corresponding mailing to area residents. It was this mailing that got the attention of residents that had been purposely shielded from the proposal by The Paul’s duplicitous maneuvering of the process and system. Enter the ever-vigilant G-10, whom have raised numerous flags regarding the often suspect and illegal actions of The Paul and his unethical board. Following suit with questioning the actions of The Paul and his miscreant Board were the Council of Greenburgh Civic Associations.
With the exception of the East Irvington Civic Association, all of the represented civic associations were against this proposal. They were not against a sports bubble per se, but against the process (or lack thereof) through which it was sanctioned, the nefarious taking of residential property for commercial use, the lack of environmental remediation, State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) studies, etc. In favor of the proposal was the East Irvington Civic Association, led by The Paul’s minion, Daniel Gold, who routinely attends Town Board meetings and speaks in favor of most Town projects – as long as it’s not in East Irvington.
The HelpBurstTheBubble.com, the Worthington-Woodlands Civic Association and others decided to put their money where their mouth was and initiated a lawsuit against the Town and The Paul to stop this travesty. The points of the lawsuit were recently amended to expand the capacity of wrong-doing on the part of The Paul and his Board. The points of the lawsuit were: 1) The Town violated Westchester County and New York State Law and exceeded its statutory Authority by leasing the site to GameOn 365; 2) The Town illegally segmented the projects environmental review; 3) The project requires a full environmental impact statement; the Town’s restricted lease with GameOn 365 violates the residency restrictions of the Finneran Law; 4) The Town failed to comply with the mandatory notice requirements set forth in the Town law.
As is typical with The Paul’s administration, the members know to “tow the line” or be jettisoned, as seen with former Councilwoman Sonya Brown. So, once the lawsuit came about, Town Attorney Tim “Remediation” Lewis began his boss’ defense, saying the lawsuit had no merit. Even The Paul would say the same thing whenever it came up. ABG imagines they sat in their offices, cloaked from the phony “open government” The Paul always professes, speculating whether or not they had any chance of winning this lawsuit. Since Tim “Remediation” Lewis’ expertise is in hazardous materials remediation and abatement, we doubt he offered any input. Our best guess is the typically vociferous Francis “Back Pocket” Sheehan was the lone voice advising The Paul with a simple shrug of his shoulders, realizing this was a no-win, Sonya Brown moment.
The Paul, ever the consummate politican/non-practicing lawyer, determined without the help of his consigliere, this would be yet another lawsuit he had no chance of winning. Critics of the lawsuit weren’t so sure. But The Paul needed this lawsuit to go away so he could put another notch in his win column against the G10, the neighborhoods, civic associations and the residents, all while helping his developer friend. But what to do? Finally, he gleaned the answer from the lawsuit he was so afraid of losing: sell the property. As mentioned earlier, the lawsuit had recently been amended to incorporate the County law, which says, “The supervisor shall sell, either at public or private sale, as the town board may by resolution direct, and upon such terms and conditions and for such sum or sums as the town beard shall by resolution approve, fix and determine, any property or any part or parts thereof acquired by the town by reason of any tax lien or transfer of tax lien and convey title thereof in the name of the town.”
Now that The Paul has announced the Town will sell the property at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road to Game On 365 for $1.55M, he has effectively thwarted another costly lawsuit which would have been avoided if he had simply followed the law to begin with. The Town is also circumventing the Request For Proposal (RFP) process, assuring that no other higher bids could earn the Town more money for this almost-open-government-sale, performing any real market value assessments, or have any other pesky fact or legitimate detail get in the way of The Paul delivering the promised property to the preferred developer. ABG is unsure of how The Paul set the $1.55M sale price, except that during the RFP process to lease the property, the Town was offered $1.5M to purchase the property. Apparently, the Town is allowing Game On to pay a hair ($500) over that price even though it’s an incredible gift for 7 acres of prime real estate. We are still waiting for the “problem solver” to solve the biggest problem we have in Greenburgh. We can only hope.
The HelpBurstTheBubble.com, the Worthington-Woodlands Civic Association and others decided to put their money where their mouth was and initiated a lawsuit against the Town and The Paul to stop this travesty. The points of the lawsuit were recently amended to expand the capacity of wrong-doing on the part of The Paul and his Board. The points of the lawsuit were: 1) The Town violated Westchester County and New York State Law and exceeded its statutory Authority by leasing the site to GameOn 365; 2) The Town illegally segmented the projects environmental review; 3) The project requires a full environmental impact statement; the Town’s restricted lease with GameOn 365 violates the residency restrictions of the Finneran Law; 4) The Town failed to comply with the mandatory notice requirements set forth in the Town law.
As is typical with The Paul’s administration, the members know to “tow the line” or be jettisoned, as seen with former Councilwoman Sonya Brown. So, once the lawsuit came about, Town Attorney Tim “Remediation” Lewis began his boss’ defense, saying the lawsuit had no merit. Even The Paul would say the same thing whenever it came up. ABG imagines they sat in their offices, cloaked from the phony “open government” The Paul always professes, speculating whether or not they had any chance of winning this lawsuit. Since Tim “Remediation” Lewis’ expertise is in hazardous materials remediation and abatement, we doubt he offered any input. Our best guess is the typically vociferous Francis “Back Pocket” Sheehan was the lone voice advising The Paul with a simple shrug of his shoulders, realizing this was a no-win, Sonya Brown moment.
The Paul, ever the consummate politican/non-practicing lawyer, determined without the help of his consigliere, this would be yet another lawsuit he had no chance of winning. Critics of the lawsuit weren’t so sure. But The Paul needed this lawsuit to go away so he could put another notch in his win column against the G10, the neighborhoods, civic associations and the residents, all while helping his developer friend. But what to do? Finally, he gleaned the answer from the lawsuit he was so afraid of losing: sell the property. As mentioned earlier, the lawsuit had recently been amended to incorporate the County law, which says, “The supervisor shall sell, either at public or private sale, as the town board may by resolution direct, and upon such terms and conditions and for such sum or sums as the town beard shall by resolution approve, fix and determine, any property or any part or parts thereof acquired by the town by reason of any tax lien or transfer of tax lien and convey title thereof in the name of the town.”
Earlier, The Paul stated that instead of selling the property in a depressed market, the Town board opted for a 15 year land lease which will generate close to $5,000,000 for the Town in total for 15 years. They continually claimed there would be financial benefits to the Town by retaining ownership of a valuable property while receiving annual income that far exceeds any potential tax it would receive from selling the property. ABG doubts that would be the case if this property were remediated and properly marketed for sale. As is standard with a land lease, Game On 365 will begin paying full rent upon the issuance of building approvals and receive rental credits for all money they spend on the remediation. So with a quick reality check, the Town will be paying for all the remediation and not collecting any rental income for years!
Now that The Paul has announced the Town will sell the property at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road to Game On 365 for $1.55M, he has effectively thwarted another costly lawsuit which would have been avoided if he had simply followed the law to begin with. The Town is also circumventing the Request For Proposal (RFP) process, assuring that no other higher bids could earn the Town more money for this almost-open-government-sale, performing any real market value assessments, or have any other pesky fact or legitimate detail get in the way of The Paul delivering the promised property to the preferred developer. ABG is unsure of how The Paul set the $1.55M sale price, except that during the RFP process to lease the property, the Town was offered $1.5M to purchase the property. Apparently, the Town is allowing Game On to pay a hair ($500) over that price even though it’s an incredible gift for 7 acres of prime real estate. We are still waiting for the “problem solver” to solve the biggest problem we have in Greenburgh. We can only hope.
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