Oops! I Did It Again

The January 22nd Town Board meeting found The Paul with his back against the wall – again. This time he neglected to notify the public and specifically the neighborhood, that New York State was moving forward to purchase the vacant property at 88 North Road. Their goal is to build a 3,000 square foot group home for developmentally challenged men. This seemed to be an averaged size crowd of about twenty or so people one expects for a hearing, even though this wasn’t a hearing. It also had some of the G10 in attendance. As we would later learn from every speaker, they had only just found out about this purchase either that day or the day before this meeting.

Richmond Community Services had two representatives speak on behalf of their proposed purchase. They explained that they have 11 similar group homes throughout Westchester. This home would house, “Six young men who have ‘aged out’ from the residential schools they were in as they have all turned 21 years of age.” The term “young men” was used throughout the discussions. ABG finds the use of “young men” somewhat disingenuous in these discussions. While developmentally “young”, these are still men, aged 21 and older who will reside in this home as their permanent residence, for as long as they are alive. The house to be built will have six bedrooms with multiple exits and be handicap accessible.

That these future residents in this future home will be profoundly developmentally disabled and possibly suffer from other medical issues, the representatives claim that their medical needs will be tended to by on-site staff. When pushed a bit, the staff could be specially trained high school graduates. At no point did the representatives state that a live-in nurse, paramedic, EMT or other medically trained professional would be on site. Not allaying neighborhood residents’ concerns whatsoever, the representatives claimed their would be no need for either the police or fire departments to respond to medical emergencies at this location. And while we don’t mind our emergency services responding here, the neighborhood can’t really handle it as a regular occurrence.

After the initial presentation, residents of the Parkway Homes Civic Association and surrounding area spoke. Curiously, ABG’s understanding is that Town Councilman Ken Jones is a Vice President of the Parkway Home Civic Association. Assuming this is true, why didn’t he inform this neighborhood via his position as either Vice President of the Parkway Homes Civic Association or as a member of the Town Council or even individually as a resident walking throughout the neighborhood, telling everyone of the states plans to acquire this property? We can only wonder if he didn’t because The Paul instructed him to stay silent? This isn’t the first time The Paul has not informed neighborhoods of things about to happen and yet he seems to have no problem sending emails at the drop of a hat to boast of an idea for the Tappan Zee Bridge or the Library with a broken furnace.

Speaker after speaker bemoaned the fact that there wasn’t enough time for the neighborhood to respond to this revelation and berated The Pauls behavior toward them regarding such an important change to their neighborhood. Alicia Ford, the President of the Civic Association said the area maintains a Historic Designation, that our taxes are high enough without adding more tax-exempt properties to the Town’s rolls. She stated that there were other group homes in the area, the closest one being on Wyndover Woods Avenue, with 14 residents. She asked what the neighborhood could expect to see after the state decides they no longer wants to house developmentally disabled men there?

Patricia Brown said she lives adjacent to the property and is concerned about the increase in taxes that she, a retired senior citizen, would have to pay to make up for what this home will not pay. “It just isn’t fair to do this to us after working so hard for all of our lives.” Most people agreed that any project that goes onto the 88 North Rd site must be tax generating, otherwise it should not be allowed.

The Paul defended not informing the residents of this proposal as, “It is all my fault for not telling everyone sooner.” The state can come in and simply take over the land with a kind of eminent domain for any property they want and the Town cannot stop them. The only thing they may accept as a reason to not build is a saturation of group homes in the area. Most people are not against group homes if done within reason. If they are going to build a 3K square foot home, it will not match any of the existing houses in the vicinity. It will not blend and actually stick out like a sore thumb.

Fulton Park suffered with a similar problem that Parkway Homes is going through now. The Paul decided that a .7 acre parcel of land should be used by Westhab to build a seven story apartment building and decided that Fulton Park (as well as any neighborhoods) be damned! He spot-zoned the property to accommodate Westhab and like a blitz never seen in our Building, Zoning, and Planning Departments, saw a two-year application and permit process reduced to six months. The Parkway Homes neighborhood has a legitimate complaint. But as we all unfortunately know, The Paul doesn’t care about this neighborhood, only Boulder Ridge – which doesn’t have a group home in it. Maybe the state will change their mind, maybe not. We can only hope.