The Hartsdale Fire Department Annual Operation: Candy Cane

It will take place rain or shine on Sat., Dec. 10th, 9am – 1pm. Off-Duty Hartsdale Firefighters will spread Holiday Cheer by escorting Santa Claus around the community in a Fire Apparatus Sleigh handing out Candy Canes to all attending children & adults

The Hartsdale Fire Department is proud to announce our annual Operation Candy Cane, which will take place rain or shine on Saturday, December 10th, 2022 from 9am – 1pm. Off-Duty Hartsdale Firefighters will spread Holiday Cheer by escorting Santa Claus around the community in a Fire Apparatus Sleigh handing out Candy Canes to all attending children & adults. Printed below is a full list of Stops & Times. To make sure everyone is at the correct location awaiting Santa’s arrival, the Location Marker Signs shown below will be posted at every stop. Due to the busyness of Santa’s schedule, please allow for some flexibility with our estimated arrival times. If you can’t make the posted time for your neighborhood - you can always try and meet up with us at another posted stop!

 

We ask that all children are accompanied by an adult, stay clear of the fire engine, and arrive at the designated locations 5-10 minutes prior to the posted times.

 

For more information regarding Operation Candy Cane, updates, or for more interesting information about the Hartsdale Fire Department’s services, news, activities, fire safety, and fire prevention please check out our website at hartsdalefire.org. and follow us on Instagram at @hartsdalefire.

 

We want to wish everyone a safe and healthy Holiday Season…!

9:00 HARTSDALE TRAIN STATION
9:15 ROCKLEDGE CIRCLE / ROCKLEDGE ROAD
9:22 LAKEVIEW AVE / MAPLE STREET
9:29 CORNELL DR / PRINCETON DR
9:36 15 FIELDSTONE DR
9:43 BRIAR CLOSE / COLONY DR
9:50 BLDG 1 @ 125 N. WASHINGTON AVE
9:57 PINEWOOD / WILDWOOD RD
10:04 HOMEWOOD CT
10:24 WOODS END RD / WOODS END LN
10:32 SHAW PL / SPENCER CT
10:39 STEVENSON AVE / POE ST
10:46 TENNYSON ST / HOLMES AVE
10:53 HOLMES AVE / BURNS ST
11:00 BARBARA LN / JEAN LN
11:07 EDGEWOOD RD / CROSS WAY
11:14 SHERBROOKE / BURKEWOOD RD
11:21 SOUTHERN RD / HOWARD PL
11:28 DEER HILL LN
11:35 CROSSHILL RD / TOPLAND RD
11:42 BIRCHWOOD LN / RICHARD TERR
11:50 MARION WOODS (Drop off Only)
12:00 HARTSDALE TRAIN STATION/VILLAGE

 

Fire Consolidation: Up To His Old Games

Today is the Fire District elections for the three paid fire departments in Greenburgh. In the last Fire district elections, Mr Feiner successfully utilized Milt Hoffman, who has since passed away, and his support group in an attempt to “take over” the fire districts. The ultimate goal by Mr Feiner is to control not only the decision making process, but their budgets. Not content to bastardize only the Town’s finances, he seeks to wield total control over all of the Town’s municipal services. But there are problems with Mr Feiner’s takeover bid.

First, is that the voters are smarter than that, although not many come out to vote in fire district elections, they were quickly brought up to speed by this and other site’s voluminous information as to how they operate and requirements thereof. Additionally, local visits by the Fairview Fire and Hartsdale Fire Departments’ Chiefs to neighborhood meetings quickly dispelled falsehoods created by Mr Feiner, parroted by Mr Hoffman and crew and informed the public as to what the “real deal” was regarding their budgets and expenditures.

Second, state law will not allow Mr Feiner to simply take over. In order for a fire district to disband an existing Fire Board of Commissioners in NY State, for whatever reason, they are required to have referendum requesting the change. At that point, 10% of the voters would need to approve it. That number goes up if the change is voted through and then the community decides to “undo” that change. Regardless, it’s the Board that must initiate the vote to go to referendum. Since the existing Board will not do what he wants, he will begin the process slowly and when there is a majority of his people sitting in Board positions, he’ll have them vote in favor for a consolidation referendum. He’s in no rush as long as it will happen. Don’t believe us? Look at all the other Boards in Town where he has appointed the members and the decisions they make, usually in his favor.

Third, Mr Feiner will have no issue coercing his State representative friends to change the law to accommodate his desires. As witnessed with the Finneran law change to assist his friends from GameOn 365, he had our State Assembly and Senate representatives change the Finneran Law to allow sports bubbles throughout the Town. He used a potential offer from the Sportime organization as the low hanging fruit to prove this was not for GameOn 365. He insisted Sportime would renovate the basketball and tennis courts at Veteran Park if they could erect sports bubbles over the tennis courts and then manage the courts for a fee throughout the year. They objected after he saddled the deal with more than they could afford. It was all a scam and never intended to happen. Deal dead, he was able to push for the 8-story GameOn 365 bubble on Dobbs Ferry Road. But the residents resisted his strong-arm tactics, insisting the property be used for what it was zoned, residential housing.

Since these options were quickly dispelled by many who read the story beyond the headlines, Mr Feiner was forced to drop back, regroup and try to change from within. In the last election, he participated in robocalls to fire district constituents asking them to vote for certain candidates, who unknowingly to most, were “his” chosen people. One such election that was successful in the Fairview Fire District was with Claire Pizzuti, a member of the Fairview Fire Monitors, the group run by Mr Hoffman. Whether or not Mr Feiner continues this path simply means those of us trying to keep politics out of firefighting will also continue to be diligent in making sure the facts are distributed and understood by the public.

It’s alleged that Mr. Feiner may have one of his supporters also running as a write-in candidate in Greenville. As mentioned earlier, these elections typically have low voter turnout. It sets the stage for a write-in candidate to possibly win the election “out of the blue”. In Hartsdale, we understand that Mr. Feiner is backing attorney Guy Novo, challenging incumbent Anthony Frasca. Residents have said they’ve been receiving robo calls from Mr. Feiner endorsing Mr Novo again in this election cycle. Mr Feiner’s up to his old games again. While still pushing for consolidation in Fairview and Hartsdale, he does not live in any of the three fire districts. If you listen to the rumor-mill, he either lives in Scarsdale or Hastings. Regardless, we think the public will see through the charade. And, that’s what will make for A Better Greenburgh.

Political Machine Wins, Consolidation Moves Closer

Tonight’s Fire District elections proved once again that Mr Feiner can get his candidates to win an election. Like communism, where they aren’t concerned with this generational time frame, but the next one, Mr Feiner has begun laying the ground work for his takeover of the Fire Districts via consolidation with this “generational election”. He posted two candidates who favor consolidation and with no surprise, after his robo-calls and expensive mailings, handily won the Fire Commissioner election in their respective communities.

Next year he will do the same thing and the year after. Once his “Friends of Paul Feiner” are installed on these Boards, Consolidation will be back on the table. Only this time, instead of trying to strong-arm the districts into Feiner-compliance, he’ll do it from within by having a three to whatever number vote favoring a referendum on consolidation. And as he proved with GameOn 365’s illegal lease, then sale, it will pass, delivering him control of the independent fire departments in the Town.

The election results winner in Fairview was predictably Claire Pizzuti of the Fire Monitors, over the other two candidates. In Hartsdale, the winner was also predictably Michael Goldstein who sat on Alan Hochberg’s consolidation committee that Mr Feiner put together in his initial push for consolidation that failed. And, Anthony Frasca won his limited term election in Hartsdale. In Greenville, Walter Grodin, running unopposed also won. While it went against Mr Feiner’s wishes, the three propositions in Greenville passed by a large margin, proving Mr Feiner still has reason to sweat over Edgemont.

While we cannot prove Mr Hoffman used his considerable Journal News influence to fabricate a story about the Greenville Fire Department accident requiring an investigation while responding to a fire call in Pelham, it is amazingly coincidental that the request for an investigation over a two year old accident happens to surface a day or so before a Fire District election.

The sad part of these elections, beyond the obvious stacking of the Boards, is that out of thousands of people who could have voted, roughly only 300+ did vote. How disappointing, especially when people in other parts of the world are fighting for a right so many here take for granted. Most of those who voted probably did so because they were contacted by a robo-call from Mr Feiner or the candidates. The rest just didn’t care. We’ve written about them often, the willfully ignorant OIMBY’s.

Congratulations to the winners and thank you to the other candidates for participating. To the winners, we promise, we’ll be watching.

Ethically Challenged Supervisor Can't Play By The Rules

We have often said that Mr Feiner ignores the laws he doesn't like, often violating those same laws in the process. We've also written quite often that he skirts the law, never mind totally ignoring the intent of the law. We've also stated in numerous articles that he says its just his personal opinion about topics he should remain neutral about. Well, he's at it again.

ABG has just received communications from a number of people who have received phone calls from Mr Feiner on behalf of "his friend", candidate Mike Goldstein. Apparently these calls are being made after hours by Mr Feiner, so of course, its okay because he isn't doing this during business hours. But while he may be able to justify his actions for the takeover of the fire departments, voters will probably not realize the difference. He should remain on the sidelines silent - until after the election.

The intentional, and we'll even go so far as to say the unintentional, consequence of this action is that once again Mr Feiner's unethical action is undermining the fire district election by injecting himself into them. He knows this. But again, the public does not. While the Paul Feiner political machine is behind Mr Goldstein and Ms Pizzuti in Fairview, we should not have Mr Feiner's politicization of our fire services as part of these elections.

Each community with paid fire departments has Fire Commissioners within their respective Fire Districts. That is where you should begin your action for change. Running for a Fire Commissioner position should not be a cavalier undertaking for ulterior motives and causes, but one of commitment and resolve to better both the firematic side and taxpayer side. To date the fire Chiefs from Fairview and Hartsdale have extended themselves to the communities and the civic associations and have proven their resolve to communicate, work with and answer to the public.

We ask our neighbors to not be swayed by in-person or robo calls from Town officials. We have endorsed several candidates and will reiterate that here:

Fairview: Todd Cammisa

Hartsdale: Andrew Lee and Anthony Frasca

Greenville: Walter Grodin

Greenville Propositions 1, 2 & 3: Yes.

If you are curious as to how we made our decisions, please see our previous articles.

Hoffman Letter Exposes Link to Pizzuti

Our readership is a smart one. They prove this time and time again with their comments, suggestions and emails to us that they are informed and appreciate our dedication to telling the other side, sometimes the real side, of the story. While we always appreciate their input, apparently our posts about the pending Fire District elections on Tuesday have touched a nerve with some new readers and frankly campaigners. We will remove articles from other publications and accusations allegedly from other media sources whether in quotes or not. Another policy we maintain is to not allow profanity or attacks against others. 

In our last article, we mapped out the plan we believe Mr Feiner has launched some time ago to take over the Town's Fire Departments. While this is not Area 51 type information, some comments have been made that Claire Pizzuti does not know or is not involved with the Fairview Fire Monitors. This is not true. At several Fire District and other meetings Mr Hoffman attended, he stated the Fire Monitors would be putting up their own candidate. In the beginning of her campaign,this point was touted. In fact, on her campaign flyer it says, "Member of the Fairview Fire Monitors Committee and chosen without opposition by the Committee to be a candidate for Fire Commissioner". Third, we have reprinted below an email Mr Hoffman has sent out to his team seeking help for the elections, which clearly indicates their involvement.

Hoffman's letter to his team (in blue; other media outlets redacted by ABG):

Dear Fellow Monitors:

          We are nearing the end of our mission to place a taxpayer with no special interest on the Fairview Board of Fire Commissioners. On behalf of Claire Pizzuti, our energetic and great candidate and myself as a co-ordinator, thanks go to all of you who have put in time to deliver our fliers and spread the message in other means such as email, telephones and personal contact. We have had a large mailing to areas that could not be covered by door to door distribution. Some foot distribution ends today. I think, for beginners, collectively we have done a terrific job in letting people know there is an election and Claire's community activity bio and her message is known.

            As we look forward to voting on Tuesday, we must get the voters out. Our task will be more difficult because of the rain that is forecast for that day. I believe that telephone reminder calls, or even email messages, should be made tomorrow (Monday) and even Tuesday. I happen to have some phone listings in the district. If you want any names and numbers for your area, please email me with the names of the streets. I'll try to accommodate as many people as possible.

          For those who are able, I suggest you offer to drive to the polling place those who have no transportation. In a message I attached to the fliers I distributed, I offered rides and gave my telephone number. I have received several requests and expect more.

          Our media release was picked up so far by the internet news agency called Patch, by two weekly newspapers, the White Plains Examiner and the Rising.

          We do have a special need. We need a volunteers to sit at the twi polling place as watchers. If you volunteer to be a poll watch for the entire six hours or even for several hours, please message me at once because we have to notify the district clerk.  Thank you.

          Ours is not the only  contested election in Greenburgh. A group somewhat similar to our committee is running Michael Goldstein, for Hartsdale commissioner. He is a former auditor of federal agencies and a person who served four years ago on a town study commission of the three fire districts--a commission that predicted The Perfect Storm in taxes that now faces us.

          The Greenville district does not have a contested election, but some residents might have wished they had. Today's Journal News has a story on page 3 detailing an investigation of the Greenville commissioners by police and the district attorney into allegation of a million dollar insurance fraud. If you do not read the Journal News, you may go to Lohud.com for the story. The newspaper also has another story on page 7 that mentions a controversial bond issue that voters have to decide in Greenville.. 

         Again, thanks from me, Milt Hoffman, on behalf of the entire Claire Pizzuti team tghat means all of you.       

The article Mr Hoffman refers to of a probe of the Greenville Fire Department and District’s handling of an accident was when the aerial ladder was involved in an accident in August 2012 while going to Pelham to standby in their firehouse. Why was a Greenville ladder going to Pelham when other area fire departments and their ladder trucks are closer and could have gone? That’s a subject for future discussion. 

Mr Hoffman refers to this article because the article links the aerial ladder in this accident as the one that will be replaced if the bond proposal is passed. That’s it. And, the damage was $4,000 to repair the truck. Anyone who has been to a body shop lately knows a simple fender-bender averages $5,000. ABG is not saying there shouldn’t be an investigation and if wrong-doing is found, punishment meted out. What we are saying is the two issues are unrelated – unless you need to sell newspapers or help in your campaign for fire commissioner.

By the way, to the campaign people for Ms Pizzuti who keep copying and pasting in the comments section what we posted about her, you can stop now. Have you noticed we keep deleting it? We have left your campaign comments for Ms Pizzuti posted even though we don't have to. As for the person who claimed this was a biased article, feel free to write an article, send it to us and we will post it. Otherwise, too bad. And, based on a suggested post, we have turned off the ability to post anonymously mostly because of the actions of some who were abusing the feature. 

Regardless of your feelings about what we have written, we hope our residents will go to their respective fire houses on Tuesday evening and vote. As an aside, we learned that absentee ballots are not available for these elections. Again, state mandates without local control keep fueling the difficulty of these elections and must change. Only then will we have A Better Greenburgh.

Supervisor Seeks Takeover of Town Fire Departments Through Elections

It’s a long-range plan. Mr Feiner has often expressed displeasure with not having control of the Town’s Fire Departments vis a vis the Fire Districts. There’s nothing new to this arena, recognizing that Mr Feiner is a control fanatic. The “Aw, gee-whiz,” persona is nothing but an act. Some 22-odd years ago Mr Feiner was advised by a resident to develop the disheveled schlep act so people will think he’s not that swift. Not only did it work well for Mr Feiner, he perfected it. That same resident now openly and vehemently admits being against Mr Feiner and his politics. His “act” was almost exposed during the debate against then-candidate for Town Supervisor Robert Bernstein. When Bernstein became critical of so many of Mr Feiner’s ill-fated and costly schemes, Mr Feiner’s lips began quivering, he stood up and began waving papers almost yelling, “It’s all right here. I have proof you’re wrong.” Sadly for Mr Feiner, Mr Bernstein’s facts were correct.

Many believe, as does ABG, that Mr Feiner was behind establishing the Fairview “fire monitors” group led by his compatriot, Milt Hoffman, a retired editorialist from the Journal News. It’s believed by many this group was tasked to smear certain members of the Fire District, Fire Department and create a phony cause against them. This deflection plan was pure Paul Feiner and was hatched in anticipation of the Fortress Bible Church decision being rendered against Mr Feiner, fellow Board member Diana Juettner and the Town to the cost of $6.5 Million! Lest we not forget the lost $1.2 Million the Town was losing each year because Mr Feiner decided (supposedly on his own) to terminate the WestHelp affordable housing contract with the County. Or, that he needed to take focus away from the contaminated Town-owned-through-foreclosure property, the former Frank’s Nursery at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road. While trying to gift the property to his friends from GameOn 365, Elm Street Sports of Ardsley made an offer of $3.5 Million dollars in cash and a promise to bear the entire cost of remediation. Mr Feiner said, “No.” Then out of no where, a gift was delivered to him.

David Hecht of Elmsford had taken the County test to become a paid firefighter. His hope was to be hired by the Fairview Fire District. But apparently, he had two strikes against him. First, they challenged that he was not a resident of Greenburgh, but of the Village of Elmsford. Residency is a mandate by the Fire District to get the job. Second, he was somewhat older than other candidates. Regardless, he was called in for an interview. Whatever transpired there is only conjecture by those not in the room. Ultimately, other candidates were chosen. Mr Hecht, sensing his firematic future with the Fairview Fire Department was slipping away, sued the Fire District for age discrimination. During the testimony of what has been described as a disgruntled retired firefighter/former employee, it was said that then-Chief Anthony LoGiudice as a Lieutenant numerous years earlier had made anti-Semitic comments about Mr Feiner. This was a home run for Mr Feiner as he now had the ultimate deflection he needed. How does Mr Hecht factor in to this? Keep reading.

Characteristically, Mr Feiner began his email blitz to the residents of the Town while sending press releases to the media at an unprecedented pace – even for Mr Feiner as well as doing interviews. Publicly, he demanded an apology from then-Chief LoGiudice. Privately we wonder if he said he could care less about what the Chief said, just that he can get a lot of publicity from it. Even though the comments had been made years earlier when he was a Lieutenant in the fire department, Chief LoGiudice made two apologies. He sent a written letter of apology to Mr Feiner and then went and apologized to Mr Feiner in person. He even made a donation in Mr Feiner’s name. Apology seemingly accepted, the media storm began to wane. Focus was being redirected back to the lawsuit’s guilty verdict and the $6.5 Million dollar fine, $5.5 Million of which would not be covered by insurance and paid by taxpayers. Since Mr Feiner lied under oath and was found guilty of discrimination in Federal Court, the insurance company was released of its obligation to pay the full amount. So, Mr Feiner jumped back on the anti-Semitic rant and went after the Chief again.

With so much negative media attention focused on Chief LoGiudice and the fire department, and suffering from leukemia related health issues contracted during his service at the “pile” at Gound Zero in NYC after the September 11, 2001 attacks, Chief LoGiudice took some time off. While new medications were helping him cope with normal day to day living, he felt the department would continue to suffer if he stayed on. He retired. This was the first major step in Mr Feiner’s takeover plan. 

We believe, as do others, that Mr Feiner then suggested Mr Hoffman and the “fire monitors” to go on the attack of the Fire District’s Board of Directors. This group of people, many who would not say if they lived in the district or not, became disruptive at several Board meetings. It’s certainly possible that some might not be Fairview residents even though they were allowed an opportunity to speak and participate in the meetings. Ironically, the press showed up for several of the meetings. Who called them for that publicity?

After raising false allegations of a lack of transparency from the Fairview Fire District Board, Mr Hoffman would speak at these meetings, sometimes seeming incoherent and almost rambling. He gave his own incorrect facts and figures which were either fabrications or simply unsubstantiated information. He could often be heard huddling with his people saying that “they” were going to run their own candidates so they could take over the Board and the Fire Department! This sounds like what Mr Feiner probably wanted and even asked Mr Hoffman to do.

Now it’s election time. Three candidates are running in the Fairview Fire District race for one open Commissioner position. While the ballot petitions were done in November and submitted in early December per NYS law, the three candidates seem to be doing what some have accused the Fire District and Fire Department of doing: being secretive and not transparent. It has been very difficult to find out anything about the three candidates. So we did some investigating and here’s what we learned and ultimately believe is happening. While this is pure supposition on our part, you be the judge as to who you may want to vote for or not. We are not saying that any of these candidates have not been honest or above board, but there are too many questions unanswered.

There are three candidates running for Fairview Fire Commissioner - 5 yr term:
1) Claire Pizzuti. 
Ms Pizzuti is an attorney by profession. She is also a “member” of the Fairview Fire Monitors group that we believe (and cannot prove) Mr Feiner has Mr Hoffman running. Ms Pizzuti has embarked on a mailing campaign. That's pretty expensive and extreme for a volunteer position. Mr Feiner has sent out a GBList email blast with the three candidates names, however Ms Pizzuti’s was printed larger than the others. We wrote about this on December 4th, entitled Supervisor Seeks To Influence Elections.

As a member of this monitor group, our fear is that Ms Pizzuti will be a pipeline back to Mr Feiner, whether directly or indirectly through Mr Hoffman. As such, will they “suggest” how she should vote? We are concerned that she will not have the taxpayers best interest at heart. But we are still concerned that eventually, when there are enough “Friends of Paul” on the Board (there's a new member voted on every year), they will push for a Fire Department Consolidation, which Mr Feiner will advance via referendum (re: GameOn 365) saying, “Let the people decide.” The referendum will be voted on by the entire Town and Villages even though they may not be part of or utilize the Fairview Fire District and Department. The referendum will pass and then the Fire Department will fall under the auspices of the Town Board (aka Paul Feiner). ABG believes this would be disastrous for the taxpayers!

2) Keith Guerra. 
Mr Guerra is a retired Greenburgh Police officer and we appreciate his service to the Town. He invariably knows many Town employees, processes and procedures. First, in his bio, Mr Guerra says he wants to “work diligently to search for ways to improve the department’s efficiency”. The fire monitor group and civic associations met with the Fairview and Hartsdale Chiefs to discuss what they are doing about costs, operations, and efficiencies. Because the Chiefs proved that efficient operations were already underway the decision was made by Mr Hoffman to publicly drop the push for consolidation (at this juncture). Second, is we already have two former police officers on the Board, Michael Kotter (who, to be fair, switched from the Greenburgh PD to the Fairview FD, from which he is retired.) and Damon Young, also a retired police officer. We don’t believe another police officer adds balance to the Board. Third, and we said you'd see this again, we’ve been told David Hecht carried ballot petitions for Mr Guerra. 

3) Todd Cammisa.
Mr Cammisa is a retired Yonkers firefighter. Our belief is that our Fire District Board will benefit with more firematic experience on it. We also believe an outsider, not entwined with the systems in Greenburgh may bring a fresher perspective to the table. We also understand Mr Camissa is going door to door campaigning. We are more comfortable with Mr Cammisa as a Commissioner.

There are two candidates running for Hartsdale Fire Commissioner - 5 year term:

1) Michael Goldstein.
We remember Mr Goldstein being part of Alan Hochberg’s original Fire Department Consolidation Committee formed by Mr Feiner without any authorization, legal representation or real standing with the Fire Districts or the community. The fire personnel members on this committee proffered their own report challenging the findings of Mr Hochberg’s report and recommendations. ABG believes the ruse was merely to substantiate Mr Feiner’s request proving consolidation was needed with this foregone conclusion. The fire personnel report proved with real facts and numbers why consolidation would be more costly for the taxpayer and not improve services or efficiency. We are concerned that Mr Goldstein might also be a pipeline back to Mr Feiner and wonder if he would act independently of him?

2) Andrew Lee.
We were unable to learn much about Mr Lee beyond his having been both a volunteer and career firefighter. However, given the past of his opponent and Mr Lee's firematic background we are more comfortable with him as a Commissioner.

3) Anthony Frasca - 1 yr term.
Anthony Frasca is running for a one-year term to complete the balance of a 5-year term he was appointed to fill when a former commissioner vacated the position a year early. We believe Mr Frasca should continue as a commissioner.

There is one unopposed candidate running for Greenville Fire Commissioner - 5 year term:
1) Walter Groden.
Walter Grodin has an extensive firematic background and has served as the coordinator who ran the Westchester County Department of Emergency Services Fire Training Center in Valhalla. We believe Mr Grodin is a good choice. 

Our investigation went not only into the candidates, but the three proposals in Greenville. 
Proposition #1:
The Greenville firehouse roof is in fact leaking. Ignoring this needed repair will add to future structural and infrastructure costs.
Proposition #2
Mr Feiner robbed $2,000,000 from the reserve funds and the Town Board condoned it to deflate the real tax increase the Town should be imposing and continue to say the budget came in under the NYS Tax Cap. The Fire District unanimously voted to borrow money while interest rates are low, for the 2014 and 2015 certiorari payments that the Town representatives have said is coming. 
Proposition #3
The financing of a new aerial ladder fire truck due to age is another justified expense. ABG had questioned whether or not the truck might be refurbished instead of replaced. We learned that typically the fire department will sell the old truck and those funds will go toward the new truck as well.

We believe the three Greenville proposals voters will be deciding upon this coming Tuesday are valid and justified. Interestingly, Mr Feiner, who again has no skin in this game living in either Hastings or Scarsdale, is fighting these expenditures. Also interesting is the fact that Mr Feiner cannot tend to his own budget without stealing funds from Peter to, ahem, pay Paul, but has no problem weighing in on non-Town budgets.

We hope we have presented enough information for you to see the "other side" of the equation. We hold nothing against any of the candidates. However, since politics in Greenburgh seems to have been tainted now for some, oh, who knows, twenty-two years or so, we felt it important to share what is taking place behind closed doors. Open government only works when you don't talk about it but actually practice it. That hasn't been happening for some time in our Town and needs to change. Only then will we have A Better Greenburgh.

Supervisor Seeks To Influence Elections

An email sent by Mr Feiner, utilizing the Town’s official email list - known as the GBList, was received by several thousand residents. ABG believes he intentionally sent the email with the subtle, but noticeable endorsement of his chosen candidate. We also believe Mr Feiner is behind the creation of the unofficial and unsanctioned group calling themselves fire monitors. Could this group’s cherry-picked candidate have been chosen as a puppet for the benefit of influencing and even controlling voting outcomes and decisions that the corner office in Town Hall desires? ABG believes so.

Below is a screen capture of the email that Mr Feiner sent to residents on “his” email list. Notice that the first name is larger than the others. This smacks of subliminal advertising that was outlawed years ago when the television industry embarked on similar deception. Since Mr Feiner is not in television or advertising, per se, he’s probably not broken any laws, just a moral code of conduct. Frankly, we believe you’d be hard-pressed to find much in the way of morals from the leaders of the Town after scrutinizing their past actions.
Screen Capture:













Because of Mr Feiner’s bad behavior with the email, a letter was sent to him from the Fairview Fire District. Here is the contents of that letter (italicized by us for differentiation):

Dear Mr. Feiner:

The Fairview Fire District received a copy of the election information that you provided via the Town’s gblist. The information that you provided is not in the form that the Fairview Fire District provided to you. By emboldening the name of one candidate for fire commissioner, you may have performed a disservice or harm to the other candidates whose names were not emboldened. 

Thelia Mauro

Fire District Secretary

Fairview Fire District

19 Rosemont Boulevard

White Plains, NY 10602-1680

(914) 949-2828

Website: www.fairviewfire.org

Facebook:  www.Facebook.com/FairviewFire

candidates running in Fairview (in order of ballot position):

Claire C. Pizzuti

Todd V. Cammisa

Keith Guerra

We agree with the Fire District’s contention that Mr Feiner’s actions were inappropriate and improper. Some might ask, “What’s the big deal?” Frankly, Mr Feiner has been attacking the Fire Department, their officers and the Fire District as well as their Board of Directors for some time now. It is commonly known that he has always wanted to have control over the Fire Department’s budget and personnel. However, just because Mr Feiner wants it, doesn’t make it legal, right or something that should happen! Thankfully, the law will not permit him to wreak the havoc on the Fire District as he has done with the Town.

Another issue that has often cropped up is Mr Feiner’s use of the GBList for his own benefits and agendas. In fact, when Mr Feiner sends out these email blasts, usually one or two a day, under the guise of providing information to residents, what he is really doing is campaigning through subliminal advertising all over again. He has also used the GBList to attack others who either disagree with him, his policies or the Town Board. 

In fact, because the emailing scheme perfected by Mr Feiner works so well for him and has been used against others who disagree with him, many insist this lopsidedness must end. Worthington Woodlands Civic Association President Dorrine Livson requested from Mr Feiner and the Town Board a copy of the GBList via the FOIL process so her civic association could present other points of view to association’s residents. Her request was refused. She appealed. She was refused the appeal, although she knew her appeal would be refused as the appeal process is “adjudicated” by, none other than, the Town Board - the same people refusing her original request! So much for open government and transparency - mere buzzwords to Mr Feiner, et al. Undaunted, Ms Livson begrudgingly went to court to present her case where she was victorious! She waits now for the GBList while Mr Feiner appeals the court decision and drags his feet toward compliance.

Mr Feiner knows how to skirt around the edge of the law while disregarding the intent, flavor or underlying tenets of the law for his own benefit. Taxpayers be damned! This must change. It is up to the voters of Greenburgh to see this change happens. Only then will we have A Better Greenburgh. 

The Big Votes in Fire District Election

Greenville FD map courtesy of Google

The biggest votes in the Fire Districts races will apparently take place in the Greenville Fire District. It encompasses a pretty extensive area that includes some affluent neighborhoods. Most notably are Edgemont and the Fort Hill area. Here’s some information regarding the three proposals.

Greenville Voter Proposal #1 
This proposal is for the Greenville Fire District to borrow up to $285,000 to repair and renovate its only building, their fire headquarters located on Central Avenue. They previously had a major renovation in 1991. Now, some twenty years later, they are looking for a new roof, waterproofing, and parking lot repaving.

Greenville Voter Request #2

The second proposition is to borrow up to $550,000 to pay tax certiorari refunds. Tax certiorari refunds are payments made to commercial property owners in Edgemont who successfully petition the Town for reductions over multiple years in their property tax assessments. The district is forecasting that the amount of refunds it will need to pay the settlements can’t be covered by the district’s operating budget.

The Town has apprized the fire districts to expect an unprecedented level of tax certiorari claims to be settled over the 2015-16 period once the town-wide reassessment project is finished. Mr Feiner reduced our fund balance by 40% (approximately $2M) which is normally used to cover our own certiorari obligations in another ill-fated attempt to balance this year’s budget. Ill-fated because if his prediction is true, and ABG believe it is, the Town will not have enough money to pay it’s own certiorari payouts!We average $100K per meeting and have peaked on occasion to $3M.

This 40% reduction will offset next year’s tax hikes so that town officials can tell voters they’ve met the state tax cap again. Can you say, “Election year hijinks?” What ABG believes should happen is a) the Town doesn’t raid the Reserve Fund; b) the Town loan the necessary funds for the certiorari adjustments that must be made by the Fire Districts instead of them having to borrow money commercially; and c) since the certiorari adjustments are due to the lack of a Town-wide revaluation for at least the last 22-years, the loans should not have any interest attached to them.

Greenville Voter Request #3

The third and largest proposal for borrowing is for up to $950,000 to replace the district’s 13-year old ladder truck that is approaching the end of its useful life. Not knowing what the expected lifespan of this aerial ladder is, it is difficult to say exactly when it should be replaced. We don’t know the condition of the ladder or even if the ladder should be refurbished, which would extend its life by about ten years and save the taxpayers some money. That's a decision the Fire District's Board must answer. Although, most residents in Edgemont that ABG discussed these three proposals with were in favor of approving all three proposals, including purchasing a new aerial ladder truck. 

ABG often writes about the willfully ignorant voter in Greenburgh. History has proven that not many people will be voting in these fire district elections and that few ever attend the monthly Board meetings. While the deck is said to be stacked against the residents/taxpayers at this point because of their lack of involvement, we can only hope to see more people getting involved. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Three Vying For Fire Commissioner's Seat In Fairview

The difficulty with the election process for the Fire District’s throughout the state is mult-faceted and seems almost intentionally convoluted. Here in Greenburgh, we suffer from the same maladies as other fire districts in the State. The date for the election is the second Tuesday of the month, which is December 2 this year, set by State law. The official times to vote are also set by state law, which is a somewhat incomprehensible three hours per day! Incomprehensible given the bedrock this country was founded upon. While we have been unable to find anyone who believes this is a good idea, we wonder why it has been allowed to continue for so long?

This election cycle finds three residents in the Fairview Fire District running for one open seat, vacated due to a 5-year term ending. While many people we’ve spoken with have not heard of or from any of the three candidates, it appears each candidate has not done a good job of reaching out to the community. This is ironic as many critics of the fire department and fire district have been quick to say there is no transparency from the Board, the Chiefs or the Fire Department. While ABG disagrees as meetings are always open to the public and Board members forthcoming with information when queried, everyone is entitled to their point of view. An argument could be made that these candidates just seems like more of the same.

ABG has acquired the following information about the three Fairview Fire District candidates. While we have not interviewed them, and do not typically endorse candidates, as we learn more, we will share what we find with our readers. Due to the limited scope of the petition ballot process, the short period of time from that point until the elections, there has been little time to schedule a debate or public forum to hear from these candidates. We invite them to send us a position paper and their intended plans should they be elected. The information presented below was acquired by ABG staffers from numerous civic organizations and reprinted without formatting is in alphabetical order.

Todd Cammisa
Dear Neighbors,
   I am running for the position of Fire Commissioner for the Fairview Fire District. Given my schooling and extensive work experience I am more than qualified and capable for this position and your consideration.
   I am a Greenburgh resident and have been for over 40 years. In 1984, I graduated from Westchester Community College with an Associates and Applied Sciences degree in Electoral Technology. I recently retired from the fire service having served with distinction for 24 years. During this time I garnered valuable knowledge, on interior firefighting, OSHA regulations, and NFPA standards.
   For the past 10 years, I have attended the Cornell University School of Industrial Labor Relations. While there I studied extensively on all phases of collective bargaining, grievance arbitration, interest arbitration, mediation, improper practices with PERB, the Taylor Law, and GML 207A statutes and laws.
   On December 9th I am asking for your vote.
Polling places will be open from 3:00 pm to 9:00 pm at Station 2 on Dobbs Ferry Rd. and Fire Headquarters at 19 Rosemont Blvd.

Sincerely,

Todd Cammisa

56 Woodlands Ave.

White Plains NY 10607

Email: TVC127@gmail.com
Cell: (914) 450-3762

Keith Guerra

   Keith Guerra is a viable candidate to become the next Fairview Fire Commissioner.  He is a 26 year resident of the Town of Greenburgh in the Fairview Fire District.  He values the community in which he lives and has been involved in it for many years.   He served dutifully as a Police Detective for the Greenburgh Police Department and retired in 2008.  In addition to being a public servant, Mr. Guerra also volunteered his time coaching the youth in his community.  He was involved as a volunteer with the Elmsford Little League, as a coach and a Board Member.  He also coached two different sports in the Town’s Youth Recreation Leagues.

   During his tenure with the Police Department, Mr. Guerra helped to start the first ever Police Youth Camp, and Police Youth Court in the Town.  He also worked closely with the Police Union and was part of the Contract Negotiating Team which collectively bargained 3 Union Contracts. 

His experience working with unions carried over into his next job, as the Director of Public Safety for the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation of the State of New York.  While there, Mr. Guerra also managed a 2.8 million dollar budget for a Department of 42 Law Enforcement Officers.  His experience managing such a large budget, which involved purchasing of Vehicles, Equipment and Training for the members of the department, will serve him well if elected as the new Fairview Fire Commissioner.

   Mr. Guerra cares about his Fire District.  He has worked with members of the Fire Department, and has also worked with the Town Supervisor and Town Council.  He believes the Chief and Firefighters in the Fairview Fire District are professionals, who are great at what they do.  If elected, he will work diligently to search for ways to improve the department’s efficiency. 

Note: no contact information provided.  

Claire Pizzuti

CLAIRE PIZZUTI
INDEPENDENT COMMUNITY LEADER, EXPERIENCED LAWYER
COMMITTED TO FAIRVIEW TAXPAYERS
Claire Pizzuti is a 30-year resident of Fairview/Greenburgh, a lawyer and business woman who is active in civic affairs. She is committed to protecting the taxpayers and providing transparency in the decisions of the Fire Commissioners.
Claire Pizzuti works for our community
· Active in civic affairs of Fairview/Greenburgh
· Lawyer with 40 years of insurance industry experience
· Board of Directors and Treasurer of Hilltop Farms Civic Association
· Member of the Fairview Fire Monitors Committee and chosen without opposition by the Committee to be a candidate for Fire Commissioner
· Volunteer with the Greenburgh Auxiliary Police Department for 7 years, 4 years as Sergeant
· Certified by the New York State Municipal Police Training Council as a Peace Officer in 2008
· Member of the Greenburgh Community Emergency Response Team (C.E.R.T.) for 5 years, 3 years as Sergeant
· New York State Emergency Medical Technician
The taxpayers in the Fairview Fire District have been kept in the dark too long regarding policy decisions and expenses that affect our tax base. The fire taxes in Fairview are among the highest in New York State. Our residents deserve more transparency. The Fairview Fire Department provides excellent service to the community and we must try to lower our taxes without sacrificing services.
Claire Pizzuti will be a Fire Commissioner who will serve the needs of the public and the firefighters.
VOTE for CLAIRE PIZZUTI on Tuesday December 9, 2014 from 3:00 P.M. to 9:00 P.M.
Election Districts 41,44,45,46,47,48,63,64,67,78 at Fairview Fire Headquarters 19 Rosemont Blvd.
Election Districts 42,50,51,61,77 at Fire Station 2 Dobbs Ferry Road and Worthington Road

Note: no contact information provided.

Fire District Elections Approach

On Tuesday, December 9th, the three fire districts in the Town will be having their yearly elections. Those districts are the Fairview, Hartsdale and Greenville fire districts, which all have paid fire fighters. This election does not apply to the Village Fire Departments. One point of contention about these elections is the timing of having them in December. This time has been set by New York State law. While complaints to change this have fallen on deaf ears locally, this would be an issue that our New York State Senators and Assembly representatives must change if we are, in fact, interested in voting at a different time or if we want to vote in the regular November elections. Since we’re past the election promises of those candidates, they are nowhere to be found.

Interestingly, the hours of operation are set by the Fire District leaders and involve paying for the poll workers, who are not from the County’s Board of Elections and are paid out of the Fire Districts’ respective budgets. While state law only requires the polling locations to be open for three hours, from 6pm until 9pm, all three districts have extended this time by several hours. The hours and locations to vote in the three fire districts are:

Fairview: 
3:00 p.m. until 9:00 p.m. The polling locations are Fairview Fire Headquarters at 19 Rosemont Boulevard; and Fairview Fire Station #2, at 290 Worthington Road.

Hartsdale:
3:00 p.m. until 9:00 p.m. The polling location is only at Hartsdale Fire District, Station 1, at 25 South Central Avenue, Hartsdale, NY.

Greenville:
2 p.m. until 9 p.m. The polling location is the Greenville fire house at 711 Central Ave.

Candidates and Issues By District:

Fairview

There are three candidates running for one open Commissioner position, which is a five-year term: Todd V. Cammisa, Keith Guerra and Claire C. Pizzuti. The Fire Commissioner’s position is unpaid. There are no bond proposals or propositions on the ballot.

Greenville

The is only one candidate running for one Commissioner position, which is a five-year term: Walter Groden. The Fire Commissioner’s position is unpaid.

There are three bond proposals on the ballot that residents should be aware of and vote on:  

1. A proposal to repair and renovate fire headquarters. Since a major renovation was completed in 1991, a series of updates are called for such as a new roof, waterproofing, and parking lot repaving. The portion of the bond that will finance this project will not exceed $285,000.

2. The district is required to repay the Town of Greenburgh certiorari (tax grievance) claims. An unprecedented level of claims due over the 2015-2016 period cannot be covered by the district's operating budget. The bond issue will cover up to $550,000 in certiorari claims.

3. The district's ladder truck is 13 years old and is approaching the end of its useful life. The bond proposal for a replacement vehicle will finance up to $950,000.

Hartsdale
There are three candidates running for Commissioner’s position, two of whom are seeking the five-year terms and one of which is seeking to fill the remainder of a term that was vacated:

The candidates for the 5 year term commencing on January 1, 2015 are: Michael Goldstein and Andrew Lee. The Candidate for the 1 year term to begin on January 1, 2015 is Anthony Frasca. The Fire Commissioner’s position is unpaid. There are no bond proposals or propositions on the ballot.

We recognize that the hours of voting in the fire district elections is constrained and may not be conducive for everyone to participate. The difficulties of this constraint are thrust upon us by New York State, almost like an unfunded mandate. We need to contact our New York State elected officials to change this. We will be posting information about the candidates as and if we receive them. Until then, we urge you to vote: Voice Of The Electorate. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Consolidation Deflection Plus

Recently there was a private meeting with the self-appointed Fairview Fire Monitors and the Fairview and Hartsdale Fire Chiefs along with Mr Feiner. Why would Mr Feiner be participating? Because they aren't really self-appointed, he is the catalyst behind the Fire Monitor group, pulling their strings, if you will, and making sure all the headlines and faux issues deflect attention away from his mismanagement of the Town. This isn't the first time the Master Deflector has done this.

More scrutiny of the Town and actions of its employees is not only necessary, but imperative given the constant illegal actions of Mr Feiner. The change of venue with the former news website, the Greenburgh Daily Voice has given Mr Feiner carte blanche to write anything he wants directly onto the site with little or no fact checking. So, in spite of an outdated and cumbersome Town website where Mr Feiner has free reign, he now has the ability to amplify his mantra, usually poised to benefit someone other than the taxpayers.

The Fire Monitor group is just another example of his control of the issues behind the scenes and ultimately the media. Case in point, when it was time for the Town Board to vote on the budget, he kicked up the high fire taxes as his deflection to hide the almost $17 million dollars in bonds that passed through the Town Board faster than a bullet fired from an outdoor shooting range. With the exception of the G10, there was no outrage with the budget passage. Nor was there even a mention about the Town's oft-touted superior AAA Bond Rating which Mr Feiner always boasts. This would have been a perfect opportunity to mention it, finally in the correct context. Instead, we get more duplicity from Town Hall.

Mr Feiner "kicked off" the fire tax issue when his own contaminated land sale debacle blew up after being brought to the public's attention by us and others with the former Frank's Nursery property. Mr Feiner desperately tried to gift the contaminated land to his friends from GameOn 365 with an illegal lease. When that illegal action was publicized and a lawsuit threatened, Mr Feiner backed down. When he tried to manipulate the sale to GameOn 365 for half the amount that was offered by Ardsley's House of Sports ($3.5M), an established and full functioning business, he incredulously blamed the public of bid rigging and it was their fault that the land sale fell through. Through it all, Mr Feiner knowingly withheld the fact that the Town never had clear title for the property he was trying to gift to his friends. The Town couldn't sell the contaminated property even if they had followed part of the law!
 
More recently, he has reneged on his offer with the Worthington Woodlands Civic Association, as well as the public, to enforce the conditions for an auction of the former Frank's Nursery property to only qualified bidders who intend to use the property as residentially zoned. The Civic Association fought vehemently for this one provision. And, while Mr Feiner had actually insisted on Civic Association inclusion, at the eleventh hour Mr Feiner changed the bidding structure.

This latest twist means bidders will no longer be required to comply with existing residential zoning for the property allowing bids from any bidder, regardless of intended use and totally disregarding the neighborhood and its civic association's request for zoning adherence. According to Mr Feiner, it was a legal necessity. ABG believes the real reason is the structure he had originally put in place would have virtually guaranteed GameOn 365 not be a contender or even the winning bidder. More importantly, he wouldn't be able to control the outcome as a favorable one for GameOn 365. And Mr Feiner's end-game, no pun intended, is to deliver the contaminated property to GameOn 365, one way or another.

All of this is nothing more than deflection - period - taking attention away from the Town's budget fiasco(s). A financial source extremely close to Mr Feiner admitted that the next couple of Town budgets promise to be very painful for the Unincorporated taxpaying residents because of impending increases which will border on obscene. This tells us we should expect more deflection, whether it's a high-line park in Hudson River with the Tappan Zee Bridge, regulating gun ranges, developing and delaying adoption of Comprehensive Plans, withholding tax revenues collected by the Town for the fire department fom the fire department, collapsing park pools, or anti-Semitic charges against other Town employees. We're sure there will always be more to come from Mr Feiner to muddy the facts until he gets what he wants.

One final comment about the Fire Monitors sans Mr Feiner. They are in agreement with several civic association leaders and the fire chiefs that it is not necessary to push for a referendum to consolidate the two "cherry-picked" departments. Numerous residents and the Fire Commissioners, the Chiefs and their members proved with facts and figures that any savings that might be had initially would be short lived and ultimately more costly to the taxpaying public. Since both the Fairview and Hartsdale Fire Chiefs have been openly discussing the issues surrounding consolidation, and their efforts to control costs and expenses, the Monitors agree that the dialog is improved and a pause may be warranted. Perhaps a study about consolidation in the future will be requested and even done. ABG hopes it won't be a knee jerk reaction to another one of Mr Feiner's unqualified comments. We'll discuss this more in another post as necessary.

Greenburgh taxpayers take everything Mr Feiner does "on the chin" and more importantly, with their wallets. This must change. It requires a public that is not content to accept the meager bribes from the Town, or with phony certificates at Town Board meetings. It requires the residents to abandon their willfully ignorant status and become involved. It requires a certain amount of paying attention which our current crop of politicians count on the public to not do. Again, this needs to change. Only then will we see A Better Greenburgh.