Saying Goodbye to Open Government

Most recall learning in grammar and high school that elected leaders are representatives for us, the people, the residents, the tax-payers, the constituents. And more importantly, they are supposed to be honest and conduct themselves ethically. During the 22 years Mr Feiner has been in office, he has increasingly been met with resistance from the critical side of the public, no longer enamored by his Gomer Pyle-ish “ah-shucks”, goofy and disheveled act. Certainly, his opponents are an well-informed, unintimidated and sadly, a very vocal minority. They show up religiously at meeting after meeting, illuminating the viewers at home of Mr Feiner and his hand-picked Town Board’s actions. Mr Feiner and his Board have tried subtly and elusively to devise ways of stopping the public from interfering with their blatantly substandard and often illegal actions.

ABG has written previously how the Town Board, following Mr Feiner’s well-honed lead, will adopt his “saying” du jour, such as, “There’s a group of people who are against everything the Board (feel free to substitute “I”, “We”, “Us”) is trying to do. He’s right. The residents in attendance will typically resist is actions on reasonable, legal and ethical grounds. He’s lied so many times about so many issues that they are scrupulously attentive to his words and actions. He’s even lied to cover the lies. Several Town Board meetings ago, the Board engaged in several back-and-forth conversations with residents at the podium, “burning” valuable public comment time. Ultimately, as they tried to end the meeting before their now, self-imposed 11PM ending time, Ken Jones shouted at a resident to, “Sit down! Sit the F*** down!” Classy move. That was the excuse this night to end the meeting. Again, classy.

It was at this point that the Board members, tired of being beaten up for their costly and bad decisions, finally found the excuse to end the meeting, truncating the public comment session of the “open government” Mr Feiner used to tout. And where was the press for all of this? Probably covering the opening of a new restaurant in Nyack somewhere.

At the following Work Session meeting, usually ended prematurely into Executive Session to shield the public from the truth, this same “open government” administration discussed in detail how they could stop or at least limit public comment and keep the naysayers at bay. It was an interesting exercise in resurrecting the Society of St. Tammany right here in Greenburgh! With a lack of checks and balances in a single party Town, we are reaping what we have sowed. This blatant abuse of power by this administration is disturbing. What Mr Feiner has gotten used to is the wholesaling at his will of the Town of Greenburgh for what he and Thomas Madden want – not what the residents want. And when someone questions him, his Norm Crosby-like double-talking obfuscates and essentially obliterates any real answer, leaving the taxpayer shaking their heads, stunned by what just happened.

As this administration moves toward limiting input from any residents and taxpayer, they risk alienating a constituency that is finally opening their eyes and seeing what is really going on in our Town. The limits being placed on the public are increasing. The administration has mandated an 11PM end to the Town Board meetings. This would be okay if the meeting began on time, didn’t have Mr Feiner’s blathering and worked on the substance of the agenda. But that isn’t happening. The Board will spend a minimum of one to sometimes two hours doing presentations, giving awards, watching student produced movies, acknowledging Town personnel promotions, music recitals, poetry readings and more. Everything except dealing with Town business. This is a form of subtle campaigning by Mr Feiner, a smart ruse employed to not only purchase votes, but to delay the amount of public speaking portion of the meetings. Why? It’s really quite simple really. They allow the 3-minute session and curtail the later 5-minute session. It’s a “legitimate” way, in his mind, of controlling his critic’s time at the microphone and their broadcasting verifiable information against him. Three minutes doesn’t give enough time to establish much for the speaker. Most will typically say they will be back to finish at the 5-minute session. By the way, no other local area government operates this way.

So what can the public do? We need more people attending Town Board meetings. We need more people writing letters to the editors of area newspapers whether dailies or weeklies, to highlight what’s going on. We need more candidates to run against the current Board. While Mr Feiner is being challenged in a Democratic primary for endorsement by fellow Democrat Mr Robert “Bob” Bernstein, the incumbent council members are running unopposed. Why are the Republican, Conservatives or Independence party’s not putting up candidates? Westchester Republican Chair Douglas Colety says he’s written off Greenburgh. Greenburgh Republican Chair and Village of Hastings resident Tim Hays says the same thing but for a different reason. He likes Mr Feiner. 

And what of the voters? Mr Feiner ran unopposed in the last election and got almost 7k votes – running unopposed! Certainly there must be more voters unwilling to blindly pull the party line and strike a change for the better. Let’s hope Mr Bernstein can stimulate them to come out and vote in the primary. We need real open government in Greenburgh and not Tammany Hall politics. As Ghandi said, “You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”