Babble Mode

Its almost guaranteed for every Town meeting. Mr Feiner rambles on waiting for one of the other Board members or Town Attorney to stop him before he says something incriminating, über-ridiculous or simply not true. Its similar to the drunk uncle at a wedding who, once he gets a hold of the microphone, everyone will role their eyes and wonder what embarrassment is about to come? Rarely, is there the miracle of silence or a self-imposed conclusion.

Mr Feiner is again running for re-election after being Town Supervisor for 22-years. We ask ABG readers to evaluate his record and decide for themselves if he is really our best choice? AGB knows most people only listen to sound bytes and read the headlines from his conspicuous and sometimes concurrent weekly campaign mailings under the guise of community updates from the Supervisor’s office. While many people are able to financially afford Mr Feiner’s gross mismanagement of the Town, ethically and morally there are others that have been championing doing the right thing. This November election Mr Feiner has a credible foe with Edgemont’s Democrat Supervisor candidate and challenger, Robert (Bob) Bernstein, a community leader and activist.

Mr Bernstein was endorsed by the Greenburgh Democrats 54% to incumbent Mr Feiner’s 35% at their nominating convention. At the same convention they also nominated incumbents Diana Juettner and Francis Sheehan. They seem to work at the behest of Mr Feiner and rarely oppose him for fear of being “Sonya’d” out of the inner circle.  You may also recall that Ms Juettner was also found guilty with Mr Feiner in the Fortress Bible Church guilty verdict. ABG wonders when disbarment proceedings will begin against her and Mr Feiner? Mr Bernstein, along with Retired Town Justice Herb Rosenberg of Dobbs Ferry intervened on behalf of the Town of Greenburgh in a lawsuit by the Valhalla School District for $4.6M and subsequently recovered more than $1.1M for the Town taxpayers after Mr Feiner repeatedly made payments (re: payoffs) to them.

At the last Town Board meeting Mr Feiner was in “Babble Mode” numerous times. “Fair, open and transparent, bidding process, RFP process, confident we did the right thing...” the list of catch-phrases he knows to use that the media will attribute to him are many. The reality is our Supervisor, with our Town Board of enablers, uses the Unincorporated Town as his playground making illogical and bad decisions after bad decisions. And each time one of these is brought up by either the G10 or another Town resident, he’ll go into “Babble Mode”. One thing he is well-known for saying, even emphasizing is that, “This is just my opinion, nobody else’s.” Or, he will stammer, “Speaking just for me, I um, would, um be in favor of this. I’m just speaking for me.”

ABG staffers always cringe when we hear him say this. It’s ludicrous that as the Supervisor, he is injecting his personal opinion into a public session when he is supposed to be neutral. His personal opinions are just that, personal, and should stay that way. As the Supervisor he is always the Supervisor and his personal opinions are moot, similar to how a police officer is always considered a police office even if he is not working or on duty. He is the representative for all of the Town residents and should not be taking sides – period. But our Supervisor, laden with self-generated issues of developer back-room deals and meetings (re: Westhab, Stop & Shop, Cumberland Farms, Toll Brothers, Brightview, EastView, etc.), spot-zoning changes (re: Westhab, Stop & Shop, Cumberland Farms, Brightview, etc.), unaddressed flooding of neighborhoods (re: Fulton Park, Babbitt Court), lawsuits (too numerous to list), guilty verdict judgements (re: one is Fortress Bible), intentionally silencing the public (re: Town Board meetings), developers writing Town laws (re: Westhab, Brightview, Eastview), fee and tax increases against our businesses to assist one over others (re: Apple Farm, Cumberland Farms) and fiscal improprieties (re: WestHelp, Frank’s Nursery, Teamster & CSEA Town contracts), lack of infrastructure repairs, the list seems unending. Mr Feiner skirts the boundaries of the law to give his developer friends advantages and breaks no residential taxpayer could dream of. But because the law technically wasn’t broken, Mr Feiner can get away with what he does.

Under Mr Feiner’s rein, the Town taxpayers have experienced 102% water rate increases, 54% Unincorporated area tax increases, 145% tax increases to Village residents and revaluation discussions for years, ultimately costing residents between $100k to $200k per Town Board meeting (sometimes up to $1.2 million). Mr Feiner claims the Town is bound by NY State’s 2% tax cap legislation and there is nothing he can do to help the situation. He and his Board’s caused the situation they cannot fix through inattentiveness, incompetence and lack of managerial or fiscal skills. In fact, the Town could easily go beyond the 2% tax cap as other neighboring communities have done. But Mr Feiner won’t because he wouldn’t be able to brag at election time that he stayed within it. Skillful? Yes. Ethical? No. Damaging to the Town? Absolutely!

Mr Bernstein offers a beleaguered and faltering Town a positive alternative. Mr Feiner has gotten used to abusing his authority in the Town against the private and commercial residents. Each time Mr Feiner and his Board screw-up, residents managed to get screwed too. Mr Bernstein has repeatedly acted in the best interests of the Town with issues such as WestHelp, Frank’s Nursery, requests from the Town’s legal department with issues beyond their capabilities, the Brightview project, and Cumberland Farms and more. The list of Mr Bernstein’s assistance is almost a long as Mr Feiner’s failures.

This September 10th is the Democratic primary that will decide which of these two candidates will receive the Democratic endorsement and run as the democratic candidate. There is no Republican candidate for Supervisor as the Westchester and Greenburgh Republican party have abandoned Greenburgh. So the choices should be rather straight-forward for Greenburgh residents. ABG believes the choice is clear. Please learn more about the records of each candidate and help make Greenburgh better. Imagine, a better Greenburgh.