It’s been about a week
since we broke the story about the Town using private investigators to get
sworn affidavits signed by Edgemont pro-incorporation residents negating
their incorporation ballot petition signatures. Now, CBS News has aired a brief
story on this latest Town debacle.
Watch it here: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/
In their story, and our original story, the interviewees stated that Edgemont residents were being tricked by the Feiner Administration’s private investigation firm into signing the affidavits by using carefully crafted wording, showing a video we exposed first from an Edgemont homeowner.
Watch it here: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/
In their story, and our original story, the interviewees stated that Edgemont residents were being tricked by the Feiner Administration’s private investigation firm into signing the affidavits by using carefully crafted wording, showing a video we exposed first from an Edgemont homeowner.
You can see that resident video
here:
One resident said
on-air that he felt tricked and embarrassed but still could not believe the
Town would do something like this. Sadly, we’re not surprised.
During the CBS News
piece, Brian Conybeare, interviewing Mr Feiner, asked if the Town was trying
to trick the pro-incorporation residents into signing the affidavit. He said
nobody was being tricked into signing and the Town would not use those
affidavits of people who thought they were. In a signature move, he also said
it was the Town Attorney who hired the private investigative firm
they are using to do this. Was it Tim Lewis or an underling instructed to do so? We were unable to confirm this, but had maintained all along that Mr Feiner would
deny culpability for this egregious move. This is not the first time Mr Feiner
has thrown an employee “under the bus”. It’s also not the first time Mr Lewis
has “jumped on the sword” for his boss.
Behavior such as this
has become a hallmark of the Feiner Administration. While re-election will not impact any of these employees or elected officials, they should, as lawyers, be disbarred. These actions certainly would be cause for dismissal anywhere else. But, in
“Bizarro-Greenburgh”, this kind of bad behavior will probably be rewarded. This
is also personifying the exact logic and reasoning behind Edgemont’s drive to
incorporate and get out from under the Feiner administration’s bad
decisions, costly and illegal missteps. We again think the proper actions by this administration is the
resignations of Mr Feiner, Mr Lewis and the Town Board for condoning these
actions. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.
Just when you thought that Feiner could not get any sleazier! My guess is, to date, he has obtained about 50 of affidavits, and half are from minorities, people who don't speak English as a first language, etc., and is too embarrassed to show them all.
ReplyDeleteFeiner first tried to blame it on outside counsel, the former Judge, Robert Spolzino, who until recently was the firm reprsenting a developer, but I guess Spolzino was too smart to take the fall for this.
ReplyDeletePer Paul -- As Town Supervisor I have the responsibility to do my due diligence in reviewing the petitions to make sure that the petitions comply with the law. The review has not been completed. The Town Board has retained the services of a former Appellate Division Justice of the New York State Supreme Court to assist in reviewing the petitions. I have not met the person who knocked on your door. I have not been privy to what she was asked to say when knocking on doors. Have no idea how many doors the Judge wants her to reach. I have not seen the form that you were asked to sign and have not been advised whose doors she is knocking on. My understanding is that anyone who is assisting him will be reporting to him.
Will Paul's next step to require all petition signers to march naked up Central Ave?
ReplyDelete