Happy Veteran’s Day

On this Veteran’s Day, ABG wishes to acknowledge and thank our brave military service personnel and their families for their sacrifices and outstanding efforts to protect and defend us. God Bless them all.

Williams’ Approach to Occupy WestHelp Has Merit

The Paul acts like he owns Greenburgh. His Town Board knows on which side their bread is buttered and stand at the ready to vote however he mandates. The Board, with it’s typical faux-posturing, are calumniatory of residents who berate their unflinching conviction to the master they are beholden and what he wants done to his playground. Their behavior would almost be comical if it weren’t so distressing. In fact, the chief enunciator is Councilman Francis “Back Pocket” Sheehan, who when faced with a declining republican population, hastily switched parties, poked the dogs away from The Paul and snuggled up close, taking advantage of The Paul’s financial resources, mailing lists, email lists and increasing democratic wealth. 

To increase his span of control, The Paul decided it was time to jettison a few resistant Board members and bring in some fresh blood, someone more malleable to his needs. One of those members he kicked to the curb is a former Town Clerk, now County Legislator Alfreda Williams. She had been the Greenburgh Town Clerk for many years when The Paul stumbled upon current Town Clerk Judith Beville. ABG finds her incessant commenting during Town Board meetings is not only unwarranted, it’s disruptive. As the Town Clerk, she is there to record the proceedings (which are captured on video anyway) and announce the speakers during the public hearings and comments. ABG wishes she would simply do that.

The Paul had started a deflection campaign to draw attention away from his bungling (we’re be kind) of the WestHelp property by attempting to shift blame of his screw-up onto the County. Before the last Town Board meeting ended, Councilman Kevin “The Henchman” Morgan stated that the Town cannot proceed with doing anything with the WestHelp property as the County is holding them up with their inaction. Immediately, after the motion was made to adjorn, Williams stood up from the back of the hall pointed at Morgan and said loudly, “Kevin I need to speak with you, now!” Williams stormed up to the dais and proceeded to give him a reprimand for the misleading and incorrect comments he had just made about the County and the WestHelp property. 

ABG has stated in numerous postings the onus is not on the County to find a tenant, but Greenburgh. The contract specifically states that the Town of Greenburgh Housing Authority will maintain the occupancy with low/no income residents. The Paul is in violation of this contract, costing the Town $1.2 million annually.

With the recent Hurricane/Tropical Storm Sandy fiasco, so many people in Greenburgh remain without power or a place to live. Williams, has come up with a viable and implementable idea to help Greenburgh residents. She wants to immediately open up the currently vacant WestHelp facility to people left homeless or who cannot yet go back to their homes due to storm damage. While The Paul offers nothing but useless attacks toward the utility companies, and insists they hire untrained electricians, he is doing little to actually help anyone. ABG wrote about his methodology after Hurricane Irene swept through and demolished numerous homes and businesses throughout the Town. While he simply gets his media machine to regurgitate his pablum, Williams has struck upon a novel approach to help constituents and the Town. This is the type of thinking that is lost on The Paul and his do-nothing Board. Is it any wonder he ousted Williams?

ABG hopes County Executive Astorino, listens to Williams’ recommendation. Otherwise, he’ll prove to be simply another self-serving politician patting himself on the back. Almost all of our elected officials are scrambling to appear to be doing something while nothing is accomplished by them except insisting on progress reports from the utility companies so they can get airtime. Williams’ idea not only has merit, but exceeds what anyone else is doing to help our residents! Astorino needs to decide that agreeing with The Paul and putting a special needs school on the WestHelp property, which are nothing more than payoffs to his Director of Communications Ned McCormack, and County Legislator Michael Smith, to gain more votes from Valhalla, isn’t as important as actually helping our suffering residents. ABG urges our readers to reach out to their County Legislators and let them know that this is not only a good idea for the facility, but an ideal way to keep the facility doing what it was designed to do: house people in need. We can only hope.

Can He Ignore Them Now?

Residents have been complaining about The Paul’s actions for some time. The G10 pointed out the property’s history having been a dumping location for the White Plains Urban Renewal when that downtown area was being renovated and The Paul ignored them. When the G10 pointed to deficiencies in the environmental study that was proposed, The Paul ignored them. When the G10 pointed out the violation of county and state laws regarding the acquisition of foreclosed properties, The Paul ignored them. When the G10 pointed out that the zoning was residential, not commercial (and knowing he could change it at his behest) The Paul ignored them. When neighborhood residents objected to an 8-story-plus size building on the property, The Paul ignored them. When a developer speaks, The Paul is all ears. When the community speaks, The Paul ignores them. 

The Paul foisted a Greenburgh Town referendum onto the ballot to approve or disapprove the private enterprise’s profit-making sports bubble on 715 Dobbs Ferry Road the day of the election. The Paul stated that the resistance to the sports bubble was nothing more than an exploit by the House of Sports of Ardsley, a new brick and mortar sports facility, whose motive was to fight future competition. They claimed not, stating they welcome the competition. One ABG staffer showed us two mailings she received and a neighbor received from GameOn 365 and pointed out the address label. It was identical to the “layout” when she receives a Town mailing or a campaign piece from The Paul. Her maiden name as it appeared on their home’s deed years ago is what tipped her off. It’s the same for everything she receives from the Town. It’s the only thing she ever receives via US Postal mail with her maiden name.

The Paul rounded up the usual suspect to speak on behalf of the GameOn 365 deal and even offered both sides the opportunity to air a ten-minute video touting their “side”. The two videos could not have been more contrastive. The GameOn 365 video was a slick, vacuous show of pictures with kids playing soccer and seniors being interviewed. In fact, their video even mentioned that voters should flip the “new” 1800’s era ballot over to vote for the proposition. How did they know it would be on the back? Possibly because they did their homework or probably because The Paul coached them as to what to say? The opposition’s video was chocked full of information and facts as to why the Referendum should not proceed. While the count for the two video’s viewing was disparate, it wasn’t enough to sway the vote – which is what The Paul calculated.

The Paul is a shrewd and cunning politician, while fostering the disheveled, unkempt goofball persona. He knew putting this ill-fated idea to a referendum would silence critics whose argument had been to put it out to a referendum. But once The Paul stuck his hand into the referendum mix, he screwed up what may have been a good thing had been done properly. Since it wasn’t done properly, a lawsuit filed by numerous corporations and individuals will be all that is left to save the residents from a dispossessed and impoverished Town Board. And, once in court, The Paul will argue that the referendum passed and the suit should be dismissed or found in his favor because less than 1% of the people spoke. If The Paul loses, he’ll use his standard “battle cry” that this judge doesn’t like him, or it’s a blow to democracy and/or the people. He’ll then begin a new deflection campaign.

In the end, the simple fact is The Paul doesn’t listen to his constituency. He caters to developers and is slowly eroding the Town’s charm and beauty into something most people do not want. The infrastructure has been neglected and ignored to the point of major concern in all neighborhoods with the exception perhaps his own gated community. It’s hard to know just who’s interest The Paul has but so far his history has proven it to be the developers. Perhaps it’s time for the Town to hire a Town Administrator, reduce the Supervisor’s salary, and get the Town on the right track. We can only hope.

FEMA Opens Recovery Center in County Center

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will open a multipurpose Hurricane Sandy recovery center at the Westchester County Center in White Plains Thursday at 3 p.m.

Beginning Friday, the FEMA center will operate from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. seven days a week until further notice.

The center will be staffed with representatives from:

Con Edison to answer customer questions about outages and restorations - Kevin Burke, chairman and CEO of Con Edison, will be on hand Thursday when the recovery center opens;

·FEMA to help individuals and households apply for financial aid for losses and damages caused by the storm;

The Small Business Administration, which will help businesses apply for low-interest loans for storm-related damages;

A variety of social services agencies will also be on hand to provide residents with recovery assistance;

The Department of Health will be at the County Center Friday, Saturday and Sunday and at other locations giving free tetanus shots to anyone involved with cleanup.

President Barack Obama declared Westchester a disaster area, which makes residents eligible to apply for disaster aid, along with local governments and nonprofit agencies.

Residents are asked to call 1-800-621-3362 or TTY 1-800-462-7585 for the speech- and hearing-impaired. If you use 711-Relay or Video Relay Services (VRS), call 1-800-621-3362.

Another option is to register online at www.disasterassistance.gov or via web-enabled phone or tablet at m.fema.gov. The toll-free telephone numbers will operate from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily until further notice.

Before visiting the recovery center in White Plains, FEMA advises people to register for disaster aid.

Those that do visit the recovery center to apply for assistance should be ready to provide a Social Security number (including your spouse’s if applicable); private insurance information, if available; address and zip code of the damaged property; directions to the damaged home or property; a daytime telephone number; and an address where you can receive mail.

Emergency Preparedness? Not In NY!

During Hurricane Katrina, the Gulf Coast took a beating from the weather. Some of it couldn’t be avoided. Then they took a beating from the incompetence of then Mayor Ray Nagin, which exacerbated the suffering of Gulf Coast residents. When he was finished screwing up his portion of the hurricane and it was all over, shady contractors clobbered the residents again under the guise of help. Although, many good samaritans did help a lot of people. Most people were desperate to try to save whatever might be left of their homes after losing most, if not all of their possessions, automobiles and even loved ones. They grabbed at any help being offered. Still, FEMA dropped the ball with Katrina.

Government is like the stumblebum that just can’t seem to get the right footing. Several days after the hurricane had moved on, FEMA was finally able to get in to the area. One fact that many people aren’t aware of is that FEMA must be requested before they can go into any area. It’s a home-rule issue. In the case of Mayor Nagin and his city, he never requested FEMA until the Bush administration reached out to him and explained what he needed to do in order to get federal assistance. Maybe there should be a class for new mayors explaining what they need to do once they are sworn in?

Locally, we’ve witnessed tremendous failures in tandem with tremendous posturing during and in the aftermath of Hurricane’s Irene and now Sandy by our politicians at every level. Governor Cuomo just fired his emergency management commissioner for diverting resources to his home for tree removal. C’mon. A good leader takes care of his people before himself. In this case, he should have taken care of the other residents before himself. While the governor did the right thing with this episode, he’s done little else except for declaring NY a disaster area before anything even happened, providing New Yorkers future funding relief. It isn’t really relief as much as it is the ability to get low-cost loans to rebuild.

So, why then, is the Long Island area still so in need of food, electricity and general help almost two weeks afterwards? The residents of Coney Island are calling their area New York’s “Katrina”, asking, “Why isn't anyone helping us? We have no food, no power, no heat... we are Katrina.” ABG believes it’s because the state has no real emergency plan to help any of its residents.

County Executive Astorino did an interview immediately after the storm with John Gambling. He seems to do these every week. No stranger to campaigning, he typically is complaining about the HUD monitor, the dysfunctional county legislature or some other issue of little consequence to the county’s overburdened taxpayers. When Gambling asked how recovery efforts were going, Astorino said (paraphrasing), “About as good as it can be given the intensity of the storm.” Gambling asked if there was anything he could do better the next time or what if any lessons were learned this time. His response was to try to improve communications between the emergency workers in the field and the Emergency Operations Center located in Hawthorne. Huh?

The state of the art Emergency Operations Center was built in Hawthorne several years ago under the Spano administration. Many first responders have little or no interaction with this center, but many have been given tours of it and told of how every agency would have a seat at the proverbial table. By design it is for all the various leaders of the government to locate in one area, with liaisons to first responders, the press, state and federal agencies. While it looks impressive, it operates like a Friendly’s Restaurant: there are a lot of people working there, but nobody is helping you and no decisions ever seem to get made. It seems like yet another governmental feel-good boondoggle!

Speaking of first responders, the County insisted in the wake of September 11, 2001, that the first responders in Westchester needed a better radio system. The thinking at the time was all the reports from the 9-1-1 Commission was the failure of radio systems was a part of what led to such a high loss of life. Perhaps. But the County radio system operated on three basic channels. Many fire departments and fire districts operated on the own frequency, not overseen by the County and continue to do so. Then the County spent millions upon millions of dollars “improving” the radio system at 60 Control. So what did we get for all the time and money spent? A marginally different system that allows departments to operate on a localized frequency at a call. Does it help the first responders at a scene? Perhaps. Does it help residents during an emergency such as Hurricane Sandy? No. ABG believes it’s because the County has no emergency plan to help its residents.

In the Town of Greenburgh we have three paid and six volunteer fire departments. We have the Greenburgh Police Department as well as the six Village police departments. We have a county police department that really offers very little bang for the buck, save for the Bomb Squad (pun intended). We have a state police department that does very little in Westchester County and especially local communities except to patrol several highways. Both organizations are reactionary by nature and don’t typically do much until something happens. We can’t really blame them if they don’t take much preparatory action prior to a weather event. However, the paid departments all apply for Homeland Security grant money that seems to only be used to pay for overtime. The police chief worked on an emergency action plan for the Town. It may have been used to prop open a door for a resident who ran an extension cord to his neighbor for power.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency - FEMA - was closed Thursday morning, leaving hosts of individuals, families, and children without food or water. Here’s a picture taken Thursday, Nov. 8, of a FEMA Center for their Staten Island office with a sign on the door that said “FEMA Center Closed Due To Weather”. 

Unbelievable!? People are suffering for almost two weeks and FEMA takes a snow day? It’s ridiculous!

When FEMA came into Greenburgh after Hurricane/Tropical Storm Irene, we were told residents that received a visit received a subsequent follow-up phone call the following day asking if a FEMA adjuster or representative had visited the resident. The answer was usually yes. If the resident pushed asking when they might see a check for funds, they were told this was only a follow-up phone call to ensure a visit took place and they need to ask the adjuster, who would tell you to call their 800 phone number. The phone call was only about FEMA being able to say how they were being responsive to victims. Remember, if you didn’t go to them and apply, they weren’t coming to you!

Once a FEMA adjuster visited your home or business, you needed to produce insurance documentations, mortgage verification, utility bills/receipts and the like. Most people who were flooded were hard-pressed to produce the requested documentation. While it isn’t funny, it was a bad joke. When asked when a payment check would arrive, they were told several weeks to process the claim and if everything was correct, a few more weeks to get the check in the mail. Ultimately, it would take about three months! There were no follow-up phone calls after that. ABG believes it’s because FEMA has no emergency plan to really help its residents.

FEMA, like The Paul, doesn’t actually do anything, rather, only points you to someone else. If you ask for money, they tell you to apply to the Small Business Administration (SBA) for a low interest loan. There’s the Office of Emergency Management. Who knows what they are managing, but when people need basic services restored, OEM is nowhere to be found. That is pretty much the story to date. For all the people that have suffered from Irene, Sandy, and the recent nor'easter, they are still without essential services. All our local, county, state and federal politicians continue to claim, “We’re here for you!” or, “We’re doing everything we can.” Which is exactly what? 

Talk is cheap; recovery is expensive – life is expensive, especially in NY. The system needs a major overhaul. We can only hope.

Lose-Lose: Lawsuit Could Stop Exposure

The residents of the Town are in a lose-lose position with Proposition #1, that was “passed” (albeit illegally) in Tuesday’s election. It didn’t matter whether the referendum was passed or defeated. If passed, the Town will wind up paying for the cleanup remediation necessary while losing more money than we are being told the Town will make. If it was defeated, it would cost the residents hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions of dollars to do the needed remediation. Either way, this should have been addressed when the Town acquired the property back in 2011. After all, we have a AAA Bond Rating that could have been used to finance the cleanup that would have cost less back then.

The lawsuit, while a regrettable but necessary action because of The Paul’s stubbornness and penchant for following wrong paths, will hopefully stop this illegal deal and give everyone some breathing room. We can revisit solutions and ideas for the property via a new and legitimate referendum asking the public what they would like to do with this property. It doesn’t need to only be offering a sports bubble or nothing. The lawsuit should also prove that the property needs to be sold or developed as a Town property, such as a soccer park, which The Paul, Commissioner Gerry Byrne and others claim we need so badly.

If a true referendum to decide what to do with the property were offered, there are several directions ABG would suggest. There may be others we’ve missed. First, clean up and “heal” the property so it can either be sold or utilized as a Town property. Second, offer a referendum with several options for the residents to vote on. Third, properly advertise the referendum and distribute unbiased information about the property and referendum. Fourth, do not sign an contracts or entertain any uses until a vote is tabulated after the referendum.

Here’s just a few options we believe should be on the referendum after full environmental remediation:

• Keep the property as open space.

• Keep the property and develop it as a ball field (sport to be determined at a later time).

• Keep the property and look to develop it for (i.e.) a police department station and/or court.

• Maintain the property as residential and develop more homes at the site.

• Sell the property for market value.

Regardless of the outcome, The Paul and his Board should simply follow the oath they took as public servants. If they would do the right thing, the right thing would happen and our Town would be much better off. As the saying goes, absolute power corrupts. The Paul has had 21 unimpeded years to become corrupt. The press is complicit and has stopped exposing multiple wrongdoings for certain politicians. At the local level, we believe The Paul leads this list. We need the press to do their job and expose the wrongdoers. We need The Paul to resign. We need this corrupt Board to resign as well. We can only hope.

Proposition #1 Passes With More Contamination Than The Site

The fix was in, the deal was done, the bed was made and the lights turned out. The lease process began well before the Town assumed ownership of the foreclosed property at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road, the former Frank’s Nursery. Once the ownership passed hands, The Paul let it fall right through his. While everyone familiar with the property acknowledged and explained the hazards and toxicity of the site to The Paul and his Board, he and they ignored them. Those who understand The Paul’s methods of how he operates knowing that once he makes up his mind to do something, he will not back down, no matter how illegal, immoral, dangerous or costly the project is or will be for the Town.

When nearby resident Simon Cohen launched the ‘HelpBurstTheBubble’ movement, he was uninitiated in Greenburgh politics. He portrayed the contaminated site and The Paul’s actions with logical, real and tangible reasons why it shouldn’t be done. In the end, it didn’t matter as The Paul began and continues to ignore the law mandating the sale of foreclosed property. He ignored all of the points raised by not only Mr. Cohen, but others. The G10 (formerly G8) stated and gave proof of contamination, flooding issues, traffic concerns and so on. Unfortunately, it’s the same litany we’ve repeatedly witnessed being ignored by the Town Board, aka Lead Agency, for project after project. Many had asked for a referendum to find out what the residents wished the Town to do with the property. The Paul ignored them. Then, as the opposition started to gain legitimate inroads toward stopping the ill-conceived project, The Paul then decided to hold a referendum only to have or not have the GameOn 365 bubble. Shrewd.

In classic form, The Paul began his deflection methods to distract from the bubble and began talking about all things unrelated. The media, complicit with him, routinely play along, ignoring their role as fact-checkers and reporters (in the strictest sense) of what all and any of our politicians do – legal or illegal. ABG is convinced we will never have any Watergate-type exposé except when the media is seeking to destroy an existing candidate or politician that is from the “other side” or opposes their agenda. Regardless, ABG will continue to champion the truth as much and as often as we can.

So what’s next? A lawsuit against the Town had already been initiated to stop the referendum bubble deal. As others have aptly stated, The Paul will now trumpet his mantra that the people have spoken and it’s democracy at it’s best, blah, blah, blah. Frankly, it’s a shame The Paul and his Board have so little regard for doing the right thing with people’s health. What’s worse is The Paul’s and his Board’s unbridled willingness to move forward with this dangerous, deceitful and problem-ridden project.

Just as importantly, not doing a thorough and proper site evaluation, remediation cost bidding and finally a site remediation before doing anything with the property for political expediency is unconscionable. It appears our elected officials abandoned a moral compass for a buck some time ago. Yet, to knowingly proceed is nothing less than criminal. Let’s hope the (yet another) lawsuit against the Town will force them to stop and do what is truly the right thing. We can only hope.

Daily Voice Pushes Vote for Carcinogenic Property

In an amazing act of desperation, the online site the Greenburgh Daily Voice has written a brief article and put a banner on their home page announcing that the GameOn 365 Proposition #1 is on the back of the voter ballot. It’s bad enough that they’ve chosen to be “in the tank” for The Paul and his developer cohorts by assisting his illegal referendum, but by informing the uninformed where the ballot is, they are guaranteeing a favorable vote simply by proxy. 

They insist on ignoring the reports of carcinogens that have been found on the site and the serious health hazards it presents to the future users of the property as well as the nearby residents. It is an indirect admission of collusion. Had this been asbestos found in a school, the GDV would be hollering for an evacuation, shut down and remediation of the school. That’s what they should be doing here, not pushing the vote!

When the media becomes part of the story, and in fact IS the story, it verifies that the public has few places they can turn for the truth. Stay tuned to ABG for the truth. Maybe GDV will remove their endorsement of this project. We can only hope!

Vote NO – Carcinogens Found on Proposition #1 Site

In a stunning release by Woodard and Curran, the company doing the environmental study for 715 Dobbs Ferry Road, they reported contaminates that exceed acceptable levels for state cleanup criteria for commercial use were found at that location. This is the site of the proposed Proposition #1 which would (illegally attempt to) authorize the GameOn 365 sports bubble project. Numerous concerned Town residents objected to the proposition and repeatedly pointed out the site was believed to be packed full of contaminants and toxic debris, some originating from White Plains construction sites and others from two long-time nurseries.

Due to this finding, The Paul had his Town Board authorize additional money to be spent to investigate the property to the tune of $69,670 more dollars. Not $69k or $70k, but $69,670. Residents had been told by Town Attorney Tim “Remediation” Lewis that the Town would only need to spend $100k for site study and cleanup. This no longer seems to be the case with this new discovery. Regardless, The Paul, Tim “Remediation” Lewis and Francis “Back Pocket” Sheehan had stated at numerous Town Board meetings that the costs for testing and remediation would be capped at $100k. It appears that the inside information they failed to share with the public is slowly escalating to an amount that was previously unforeseen.

In arrogant defiance while being caught with his pants down, The Paul insisted this Proposition is still good for the Town, he insists the Town should proceed as he planned. Interestingly, it was The Paul, when pushed by residents at the last two Town Board meetings, who said that the safety of the children is paramount and the Proposition as well as the lease would not go through if anything was found that deemed the property dangerous to children and their parents. Ironically, no mention was ever expressed for concern of the employees.

It appears that the concerned residents of the Town were correct in their widespread criticism of the actions of The Paul and his Board regarding Proposition #1 and the GameOn 365 sports bubble. The overwhelming evidence confirms what the long-time residents had warned everyone about. Another critic of the Proposal #1, Simon Cohen, who organized the HelpBurstTheBubble movement, was berated by many at numerous meetings and is owed an apology.

Here again is the video the concerned Greenburgh residents made against Proposition #1:

While ABG is pleased that so many were on the right side of this issue for the right reasons, it is discouraging that our elected representatives are not representing the residents’ best interests, but those of the developers. This has to change. While none of our Town elected officials are running for office, ABG joins many others in asking for their resignations. We can only hope.

Proposition #1: Residents Explain Why They’re Voting NO

In a phony effort to espouse “full disclosure” and a sudden concern for the residents of the Town, The Paul concocted a proposition vote for the GameOn 365 proposal. Numerous residents have repeatedly voiced opposition against this project. They have cited numerous legal violations, questionable moral and ethical choices that The Paul and his Board have made regarding this project. ABG has posted previously about this.

Several residents made a video explaining why they are against the Proposal and will vote NO! Many who are against the proposal have openly stated a sports bubble may be a good thing to have, but since there have been so many missteps along the way, they are voting against it in hopes of having the property properly cleaned to correct environmental standards, sold according to law and generate yearly tax income for future generations.

Here is the video the concerned Greenburgh residents made. If you cannot play the imbedded version here, you can view it on YouTube directly at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agF0guDcMaI

ABG urges everyone to vote NO for Town of Greenburgh Proposition #1.