Town Screws Up Again – Costs Us Millions – Again!

After Paul Feiner was found guilty of discrimination, destroying evidence and five other counts against him in the Fortress Bible Church of Mt Vernon, NY case, “he” had to pay a fine of $6.5 million dollars. In reality, he paid nothing and got off “Scott free.” Although he aways insisted the insurance company would pay the fine prior to the verdict, we soon learned that the insurance company did not have to pay the full amount, contrary to what non-practicing attorney Feiner insisted. Why? Because there was a clause in the policy (loosely interpreted) that relieved the insurance company from that entire obligation because Mr Feiner had been found guilty in Federal Court of the charges, negating that contract. So, the insurance company paid only $1 million dollars and Greenburgh taxpayers, not Mr Feiner, are paying the $5.5 million dollars difference!

It seems that even though the discrimination book is not yet closed on this despicable act by Mr Feiner and his Town Board at the time, another costly settlement has been underway for approximately 5 or so years. Now a settlement has finally been reached and resulted in another multi-million dollar payout by the Town. S&R Development Estates, which acquired the 2.3-acre property at 1 Dromore Road to build a 45-unit apartment complex in 2006, based upon a mapping error by the Town, filed suit against the Town and won, resulting in another massive payout by the Town for $9.5 Million dollars.

The Town Board was advised numerous years ago that there was a discrepancy with the Zoning maps for Dromore Road and that they should be corrected before a developer seeks to purchase the property and build something in the neighborhood, vis é vis the Town, that the surrounding area residents might not want. Well, as sure as Mr Feiner is proof of why we need term limits, S&R Development Estates purchased the property to develop as multi-family housing. And while Mr Feiner has consistently failed to stand up for most neighborhoods and always sides with the developer du jour, here’s yet another example of how he failed the other property owners on Dromore Road, specifically the Green­burgh Na­ture Cen­ter, whose largely wooded 33-acre prop­erty abuts the lot in question, the Sis­ters of the Blessed Sacra­ment, a Catholic or­der whose sanc­tu­ary also bor­ders the prop­erty, and res­i­dents of the un­in­cor­po­rated com­mu­nity of Edge­mont, and the Town residents in general. 

S&R later sold the prop­erty to Wilder and Bal­ter Prop­er­ties of Chap­paqua. They are a de­vel­oper spe­cial­iz­ing in af­ford­able and work­force hous­ing, which is probably what they plan to build on this site. Unfortunately, affordable and workforce housing is just a moniker for low income and/or subsidized housing and the issues that follow it. But those issues will soon belong to the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament, the Greenburgh Nature Center and the Edgemont residents whether they incorporate or not.

So whose at fault with all of this? Mostly Mr Feiner and his current and former Town Board members, Francis Sheehan, Diana Juettner, Eddie Mae Barnes and Steve Bass, as they were made aware of the inaccuracies in zoning and chose to do nothing to correct it. And, once they eventually did try to take action, it was simply too late – and ultimately too costly. The Town Board de­cided to limit the li­a­bil­ity to res­i­dents of un­in­cor­po­rated Green­burgh and not the six vil­lages, in­clud­ing the River­towns (as always). “Since this is a land use mat­ter and the vil­lages have their own land use boards,” said Mr Feiner, “I don’t think it would be fair to have the vil­lages con­tribute.” What Mr Feiner really means is that the Village voters are the people who have kept him in office this long and he doesn’t want to take a chance of alienating them - especially now that he has a challenger for this election! He also failed to mention that the Village’s Mayors and Trustees actually do an infinitely better job of protecting their residents from developers than he has ever done. It must be nice…

If incompetence were ever to go mainstream, its model would be right here in the Town of Greenburgh with any of the career politician Feiner’s administrations. Would a Town run by his challenger, who worked in the failed NYC DiBlasio administration, be any better? Highly doubtful. The Republicans ceded the Town to the Democrats long ago and now they are bearing those fruits at an incredible cost to us all. Electing “more of the same” from the Democrat pork barrel puts at fault those same people, an established one-party, poorly ruled Town. This must change. It’s the only way we’ll get A Better Greenburgh.

Only $166 MILLION To Consolidate With No Guarantees

In the summer of 2018, the Hartsdale Neighborhood Association (HNA) had a regular meeting at the Highview school on Central Avenue next to the Empire College and behind Webb Field. That’s the field on Central Avenue with the 9-1-1 Memorial that keeps falling apart. The Highview school is a grammar school with mostly younger students in attendance at the rear of the property.

During this particular meeting, Greenburgh School Superintendent Tahira Dupree Chase was a guest speaker and there to talk about a few things school-centric. One of them was related to recent school shootings and the safety of the kids at our schools. Everyone agrees that these horrible shootings should stop but for every one idea that can be implemented there’s an argument made against it. It seems to be a vicious cycle that will likely continue. Regardless, we learned that Safety Officers were being hired amongst other things that were being done to protect the students. Of course, this is good. But with the increased security presence becoming more well-known and pronounced, it tarnishes the reputation of an already tarnished school system. As a parent, many wonder if sending their child to Greenburgh schools is a good idea or if private school is the better way to go? Obviously, there are many families who cannot afford the private school route regardless of any safety concerns they have. But many residents have chosen the private school route.

Superintendent Chase indicated, as do so many who want the public to buy-in to their consolidation proposals, that the cost wouldn’t be much, about $97 per family per month. Broken down even farther, she equated it to $3.50 a day for a premium cup of coffee (for the next 30 years)! While the coffee analogy may make her plan more palatable (pun intended), the reality is our taxpayers are already hurting as we continue to pay off (and anticipate) guilty verdicts against Mr Feiner and his administration. We’re into year two of the Fortress Bible Church guilty discrimination verdict for $6.5 million with pending law suits in connection with the Shelbourne, Dromore Road and Ferncliff projects. And while a daily cup of premium coffee is not a problem for the extremely well-paid Dr Chase, many residents don’t make that kind of money and struggle to merely get by, glad when they can afford a deli coffee.

But consolidation for what purpose is the nagging question? To simply say we would have all grades on one campus is not enough. To also say that we would sell two current schools that are either in disrepair or needed repair begs the question why weren’t they maintained to begin with? Or is this a page from Mr Feiner’s playbook with WestHelp. Let the buildings intentionally deteriorate so such a dismal picture can be painted showing the need to jettison them? Possibly. And by bringing the younger grades to this campus, what of security and threats to them in our ever-burgeoning active shooter world. Somehow the separation seems like a viable alternative.

The Greenburgh Central schools have a more surmountable problem of education. They are now teaching the Mandarin language from kindergarten through the high school senior class because studies show it’s an up-and-coming language. It used to be that French or Spanish were the two more popular foreign languages to learn. Frankly, after hearing some of these students speak, the school probably needs to be working on speaking better English. And, with all of the special programs and remedial classes that are maintained, the lack of a fundamental education seems to be absent. Our suggestion to Dr Chase is instead of trying to apply lipstick to make it look pretty, fix the glaring problems before undertaking such a major expense and cost to the taxpayers.

Since we never see the school budget get lowered – as we are always told to vote for it “for the kids” – raising our taxes and moving all of the kids to one location solves little. Let’s not forget that 49% of the Fairview district is tax exempt so the other 51% are carrying them – in effect paying twice the amount they should have to pay. So now, instead of $3.50 per day or $97 per month, it’s more like $7 per day and $194 per month. That’s significant to seniors on a fixed income, low income families, out-of-work taxpayers and others just struggling to get by. Even more significant is the lack of proof of savings by executing this multi-year change should voters elect to approve it. Dr Chase needs to get her house in order before she looks to build a new one and then move in. While this seems like a great exercise for a resume update, we need more tangibles before we decide to go along with this. While the budget increases are touted as “for the children,” the reality is it’s for the teachers and other personnel costs. We don’t need to speak Mandarin to know that this system needs attention before we start raising taxes for this expensive game of chess. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Announcing Nothing Says It All

All they want to do is vote. All they want is to become a Village. All they want is to control their destiny. All they want is to get out from under the incompetent, illegal, and bad decisions repeatedly made by this Town’s mismanaged and incapable Town Board. Hey, wait a minute... we all want this. But we all can’t afford to do what the Edgemont Incorporation Committee (EIC) has undertaken. Be it the expense, the lack of expertise or the support that doesn’t exist elsewhere in the Town, most of the rest of Unincorporated Greenburgh is saddled with what the EIC has confirmed is a problem. The Town not acting in their/our best interest.

In another calculated move this week, Mr Feiner chose to announce he had reached a decision as to the sufficiency of the EIC petition but would not make it known publicly until after he met with his Town Board early this week. If the decision has been made, why not just announce it? The legal requirements involved are simple: determine the sufficiency (or not) of the petition and let the EIC specifically, and the public in general, know the decision. But Mr Feiner, the Master of Deflection, the King of Compounded Confusion, the Purveyor of Publicity, the Convolutor of Crappola, decided early on that he was against the incorporation and attempted to thwart this effort at every juncture. Hence, the delayed announcement. But again, why?

The EIC’s move to incorporate and the efforts against it may or may not be legitimate. There are other events at play that factor into the Master of Deflection’s suspect actions. Take, for one instance, the Town’s maneuvering with the Dromore Road fiasco; or another instance to get the Shelbourne Assisted Living facility approved by any means necessary and take some of the attention off of the EIC case. The reality however is that it highlights the exact reason the EIC is seeking to incorporate!

What's also interesting is that Feiner Planning Board appointee Hugh Schwartz has been a vociferous proponent on the anti-incorporation side of the fence. Mr Schwartz has publicly positioned himself as being recused as a Planning Board member from the Shelbourne project because his wife works for the law firm representing Shelbourne. However, we came across this piece of information that may indicate otherwise where he requests to talk to Town Attorney Tim Lewis about it. Hmm, this makes us wonder.

Mr Feiner usually has many irons in the fire, enabling him to dance from one controversial issue to another. What he fails to publicize is why. We believe it is simply to be able to change any conversation from the question raised to something else, hence the moniker, Master of Deflection. The issue at hand, beyond Edgemont's right to vote for incorporation, is what else is he doing?

Some have said Edgemont activists fear Mr Feiner will reject the petition, and is conferring with his Town Board to plan a response once the announcement is made. We've also learned from some in Hartsdale that the EIC is considering circulating a new petition, and expanding the boundaries of the proposed village to include parts of Hartsdale, including the hamlet's parking district. The boundaries must be determined by the proponents of the village incorporation. Not the Town, an existing fire district map or school district map. In fact, it can be drawn by a kid with a crayon and agreed to by the EIC and submitted as final. Clearly, there is more going on and wonder how much is from the corner office?

Strangely, when questioned at numerous meetings about what preparations were made by the Town should an incorporation take place, Mr Feiner hesitated and said, “Nothing, because I don’t believe it will pass.” Many were taken aback. Shortly after one of the last meetings about Edgemont incorporation, Mr Feiner said he wanted a citizen’s group to look into what the Town could do should incorporation takes place. He subsequently appointed Luis Polit to chair the Greenburgh Unincorporated Area Citizen’s Contingency Committee which would be tasked with seeking solutions. 

One condition of acceptance was that Mr Polit would receive no interference from the Town or Town Board and get to appoint all of the committees members. While this sounds above-board, a documented video exists of Mr Polit physically pushing Robert Bernstein after a disagreement the two had while serving on a different Town committee. Additionally, Mr Polit recently made this statement after being forced to cancel a meeting with department heads and town commissioners, “I suspect they were told not to participate in this meeting until the petition gets resolved, so I kind of read between the lines.” Obviously, while Mr Polit might believe in preparedness, open government and independence, Mr Feiner is clearly not interested in any of these!

Mr Feiner’s ability to “game” the political system to his advantage is well-known and he surely has another ace up his sleeve. Or, he’s looking to delay this until after the (re)elections. It remains to be seen exactly how this will play out. All bets at this point indicate that Mr Feiner will reject the petition on the grounds of some obscure or undefendable technicality. It will warrant yet another taxpayer lawsuit that didn’t have to be. That is not acting in the best interest of the Town. What is in the best interest of the Town is for this administration to step down. With or without a seventh village, it’s what will help us get A Better Greenburgh.

Tensions Run High In Emotional Protest

Emotion filled the packed room. Overflow was in an adjacent room and the cafeteria. Little did the Ardsley residents know how Mr Feiner operates and he was using them for his benefit. Knowing he would be sworn in this night having been re-elected yet again after running unopposed, he wanted a big crowd. He got it. There were 376 people in attendance. In fact, Police Chief McNerney informed us that after 150 were counted and allowed into the main hall, they began directing people toward others rooms in the building to adhere to the fire code occupancy restrictions.

Mr Feiner worked the Town’s GBList to its maximum. The GBList is the email list Mr Feiner treats as his own even though he continues to violate a court order for him to release its contents under the Freedom of Information Law. Between the proposed Jefferson Apartment complex project and other area construction in the Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, and Hastings area, neighbors have a lot to be upset about. This proposal is for the abandoned and unused property on Lawrence Street, formerly used and currently owned by the Netherlands-based company Akzo Nobel. ABG is against the over-development of Unincorporated Greenburgh, but recognizes that this proposal is a legal use for this land. The zoning is commercial and Greenburgh zoning for commercial property includes multi-family housing use.

Traditionally, Mr Feiner and his Town Board operate with flagrant disregard of neighborhood concerns and over-sized projects. This clearly falls in that category. There are many examples of where a developer has built too large a project, blessed by Mr Feiner and his Board even after hearing from upset residents at packed meetings. Several, but not all, include Westhab in Fulton Park, Brightview Assisted Living in Glenville, Regeneron in north Elmsford/Tarrytown, Dromore Road and the proposed Shelbourne Assisted Living facility in Edgemont at the former Sprain Brook Nursery and more. The point is, this Town Board routinely favors the developer over the homeowner, taxpayer and resident. So, what will happen?

Speaker after speaker bemoaned numerous points against this project. No one spoke in favor of ithe Jefferson proposal except the developer. Obvious issues with this proposal are increased traffic, increased school enrollment, no tax benefits for Ardsley and our constant harangue of flooding and future increased flooding to the area. Ironically, PO1 on the agenda was for the Town Board to vote for a resolution adopting the 2015 Westchester County Hazard Mitigation Plan update. This is classic Town Board. Why fix the problem on both the Bronx River and Saw Mill River corridors when we can talk about it and say the County has a plan? It will never get better as long as these politicians are in office.

There was also a litany of varied speakers in attendance. They included current and former Ardsley Mayors, Trustees, Ardsley school Board members and several emergency responders from the Ardsley Volunteer Ambulance Corps. The emergency responders stated they have about 30 or so members and while their call volume is increasing, their membership is not. The point being that whenever you increase the amount of residents, the responders’ call volume increases. This was exactly the issue broached by Police Chief McNerney at a previous Town Board meeting when the discussion was about adding another assisted living facility, this time at the old Sprain Brook Nursery site. More personnel would be needed, whether paid or volunteer.

Retired Judge Herbert Rosenberg apologized to the residents of Ardsley as a resident of Dobbs Ferry for the nightmarish construction and disruption caused to them from the Rivertown Square development currently underway. Many have been stuck on area roadways caused by traffic backups, accidents and construction equipment being positioned on the site.

During the proceedings of this “scoping” session, Mr Feiner played the crowd as we’ve seen done before. Most recently he protested the shopping center expansion on Central Avenue only to capitulate. Unfortunately, that's what we believe will happen here. He will postulate often about being against this, injecting sound bite snippets that he will later post on his websites (greenburghny.com, greenburgh.dailyvoice.com) and YouTube. He'll have the Town videographer carefully craft his swearing in, showing the huge crowd and then the scoping session, again, utilizing the crowd. Sadly, we think he'll capitulate again and approve this project. After all is said and done, he knows the Ardsley residents that showed up last night will be reduced to half for the next meeting. In time, he will wear them down until there is no opposition. We hope this won't happen.

The demands currently being made of the developer can be considered reasonable or unreasonable, depending on which side you are on. ABG would like to see a scaled down project on this site if it were to proceed. There may be other ideas in the works for this location. The Town Board usually meets with developers two years before their proposals are made public. One of the former project leaders for this told ABG staffers during a meeting a year ago that they had previously pitched this project to Mr Feiner, who gave them a favorable response back then. Something is going to be built at this location. We’ve seen Mr Feiner go through hell and high water to push the GameOn 365 sports bubble into a residential neighborhood. We hope that doesn't happen here. We also hope that all sides are willing to sit down and work together to create a proposal that all those involved can live with when that time comes. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Developer Receives Preferential Treatment

An email and corresponding “snail” mail went out to Town residents of behalf of a developer by Mr Feiner immediately after a recent Town Board meeting. No sooner did he publicly say he was against the developer's project to increase the amount of buildings in the Midway Shopping Center and reduce the corresponding parking spaces due to safety concerns at a Town Board meeting, when he must have realized he had bitten another hand that feeds him! But this was no ordinary email and snail mail letter. It was a poll. There have only been two that we can recall. The other one was in support of his friends from GameOn 365.

So, Mr Feiner needed to redeem himself with some quick back-pedaling. Even though he operates unimpeded by the majority of taxpayers, he “slipped up” when he said he goes to the Midway Shopping Center daily and has had close calls there himself. He may have had close calls driving in the shopping center’s lot, but not being an expert in traffic control, it was strictly his opinion. For that matter, he may simply be a terrible driver. There may be no recognized safety issues at that shopping center except for a raised acid level when you are trying to find a parking space.

The applicant was seeking to add two more structures (initially) to the shopping center. Numerous area organizations and individuals have protested, claiming the area is saturated with traffic congestion already. The Town’s unofficial practice toward a concept called “shared parking” and “under-utilized parking”, make the argument against the expansion a difficult one. Still, the confluence of cars in this successful shopping center makes entering, parking and exiting extremely frustrating. In fact, the developer decided to offer numerous safety improvements to the area and the shopping center if their proposal was approved by the Town Board. One resident objected about the Town being held hostage by the developer who would only commit to the improvements if they could build another structure (since reduced from two down to one).

At some point, their proposal got scaled back to the addition of only one new building instead of two, perhaps as a “suggestion” by Mr Feiner. They argued, perhaps rightly, that for them to invest in the upgrades they had planned, they would need this additional building’s approval and ultimately its income to be, wait for it, “cost effective”.

Armed with the knowledge that the “willfully ignorant” will go along with almost anything he proposes, nor give the proposal the scrutiny it deserves, he sent out both the snail mailing and e-mailing, seeking “Citizen Input”. We’ll tell you shortly what we expect he will say he found. But first, how many other project developers has he done a poll for? We can recall several projects including Westhab, Deli Delicious, Dromore Road, Brightview, Stop and Shop (on Rt 119) among others, where Mr Feiner sent out emails and snail mailings (at taxpayer expense) championing these projects. But the answer is zero. The difference with GameOn 365, was that he desperately sought to initiate an illegal lease for the them with the former Frank’s Nursery property on Dobbs Ferry Road. He’s been their biggest cheerleader. The referendum for GameOn 365, carefully worded to only force a positive outcome, did just that. The Town was promised $5M as an incentive for passage of this referendum. However, the devil is always in the details and the referendum, whether legal or not, could not help an illegal lease move this ill-conceived deal forward! 

In fact, even more potent than this seemingly casual request for a yay or nay vote for Midway, knowing full-well that the foregone conclusion would be in the affirmative, is the fact that Mr Feiner made the case for the developer by laying out all of their points. Why would Mr Feiner do this and not the developer? Why did GameOn 365 have a strategically worded referendum created on their behalf and now a taxpayer-funded mailing? If you think this expansion is a good one, drive a bit north to the Westchester Square shopping center and get ready to use your imagination. It’s the one on Central Avenue that houses Trader Joe's, CVS and Best Buy. They have proposed expanding Trader Joe's store, and adding a standalone building to the north east of Best Buy for a CVS drive through. There will also be a new walk-in medical facility built on the south side near Trader Joe’s. To allow for the additional traffic, new entrances and exits will be built out onto the side streets on both sides of the shopping center.

Mr Feiner is trying to cover both sides of his backside as he speaks out of both sides of his mouth. At a recent Town Board meeting, when he said he was against the expansion of the Midway Shopping Center unless safety improvements were performed, he placated the Edgemont group and others who have spoken vehemently against this expansion. Edgemont satisfied, he knew one of his first phone calls the following morning would be from the owners of the Midway Shopping Center. What to do? Deflect - and fast. So, Mr Feiner did what he always does when he is caught lying. Mr Feiner, who could also be known as “The Deflectomatic”, has a lot of hustling to do. Soon we will hear that he received a lot of responses about this project. He’ll say the majority were in favor of it. He’ll need to tread lightly. If he angers Edgemont, they will threaten again to incorporate. Make the developers mad, and donations of food and campaign monies may go away. What to do?

This is far from over. There are many issues taking place on the Central Avenue corridor as Mr Feiner tries to orchestrate a change to that area to his vision of what Central Avenue, and then Rt 119, should be. Is it what you want these two thoroughfares to be? If banks were only open from 9AM until 3PM, shared parking with a restaurant might work. Otherwise, ABG believes it’s a recipe for over-congestion and ultimately a disaster. It must be stopped. Only then will we see A Better Greenburgh.

Honest Answers Welcome But Deflection Triumphs

Whenever Mr Feiner's latest guilty verdict is highlighted, he goes into what we've tagged as "deflection mode". You've seen this time and time again and we've written about it as often. The difference between us and the mainstream media is that we see it exactly for what it is. They, on the other hand, will reprint what he says without question or challenge. ABG believes they've abdicated their role as the fourth estate. Knowing he will get them "to play" by simply saying a few media-friendly buzz-words, he stated the Town's fire districts should consolidate. He began his rant to consolidate the Fairview and Hartsdale paid fire departments and deflected attention away from his failing budget, guilty verdict judgements and the general financial distress the Town of Greenburgh has been delivered. His ploy worked, his schemes have worked but his actions are failing. His policies are failing. HE is failing.

Mr Feiner has a small cadre of die hard loyalists who will do his bidding for him, allowing his appearance of being hands-off any hot button topic - such as fire district consolidation. In fact, when a Town Board meeting is not going his way, he will get on his mobile device and rally his troops via text messaging for help. As he stalls the meeting with his ramblings, awaiting his serfs arrival, they are given quick and unfettered access to the microphone. Their standard response might be an iteration of, "I was watching this at home and was so upset I had to come in to speak..." Others, in particular the G10, must sign up early and wait until called, usually after these troops have had their privileged say. Mr Feiner has perfected this routine and utilizes it often.

When Mr Feiner's guilty verdict was announced, the victorious Fortress Bible Church Discrimination lawsuit was almost put to bed. The judge had given ample opportunity to Mr Feiner and the Town to settle the case outside of the courts, but Mr Feiner, a non-practicing attorney, did not take advantage of the golden opportunity before he and the Town Board. His being obstinate, based on how many times Mr Feiner acted against the law and found guilty by the courts, keeps costing us more and more money we just don't have. One question we have been posing for years is why Mr Feiner can be found guilty in Federal Court on seven counts of discrimination, lying under oath, destroying evidence and still not be disbarred? It's business as usual in Greenburgh and for that matter, New York. Chicago has nothing on us.

Mr Feiner knows the taxpayers have deep pockets and brags they're only being zapped with a 3.4% tax increase, well under the NYS 2% Tax Cap, to pay for his illegal actions. We were under the (mistaken?) assumption that Mr Feiner had been personally found guilty and required to pay the penalties associated with the verdict and be forced to personally pay toward the verdict levied.

His latest deflection is to appear supportive of a 9A Bypass to reduce congestion on the 9A corridor. Naturally, like most of his follies, the "best chance of making this happen is now," a statement often made by Mr Feiner for projects he is interested in. This was the recent article in the once-critical and now-friendly White Plains Examiner. Under his hand, he had the Town Board adopt a resolution supporting New York State's pursuing of a 9A Bypass. This is like kissing your aunt on her cheek - it's nice but just doesn't mean anything. Its interesting that now that our Town Planning Commissioner has resigned to go wreak havoc in Stamford, CT., that Mr Feiner comes up with this exercise in futility. Next up? A press conference with his state representative buddies providing them more air time/publicity but producing little more than the promise to draft legislation to investigate the possibility and funding feasibility to study the need to see if there is a traffic congestion problem on 9A. It will go nowhere because there is no funding available for any of this.

Mr Feiner has included the Villages of Ardsley and Elmsford into the fray. Both of these villages are suffering because of the building that has taken place throughout the Town. What he doesn't address is the already congested traffic throughout the Town and the two mega-proposals in the north-end of the Unincorporated Town north of Elmsford at the old Union Carbide property. His press release, dutifully reprinted by the Examiner, says that the Town has $4.3 million dollars in a 9A Bypass Fund collected from new real estate taxes from new developments, but doesn't say what its availability of designated uses might be. We're back to that Aunt you kissed earlier. Its like her telling you she has put money aside for you when she dies, and then doesn't die anytime soon. Its nice but doesn't do you any good.

Saying you're for something is okay. Unfortunately, Mr Feiner is for everything with little action toward anything except providing for his developer friends and donors. Now that the shooting range has been closed, the bloated budget is done, the 10% salary increases for all elected officials complete, the verdict for Fortress Bible Church rendered, WestHelp still unoccupied costing us $1.2M/year, the Frank's Nursery property languishing, Brightview Assisted Living underway, Dromore Road dragging on, the Ferncliff School relocation gone, the Finneran Law changed with no sports bubbles, Midway Shopping Center expansion before the Town, the Trader Joe's expansion painfully lumbering on, the Landmark at Eastview 100+acres proposal starting to see the light of day, the fire consolidation scheme doing its damage, flooding in low lying areas still not addressed, racism at Town Hall unchecked, paving of Deli Delicious' entire property approved, and the Greenburgh Daily Voice turned over to Mr Feiner for his unfettered use, why shouldn't Mr Feiner do what he does best and add to the obsfuscation with a 9A Corridor Bypass to the mix?

 It's time for real leadership in Greenburgh. The stranglehold of political leverage is slowly proving why one-party rule, lack of ideas, and one voice is not good for our Town. The willfully ignorant must change and become involved. Our Town must change. Only then will we start to see A Better Greenburgh.

Coalition To Protect Their Jobs

A recent meeting hosted by The Paul at his personal meeting room (Town Hall) found numerous politicians assembled in a move to preserve their jobs and limit any competition from challengers, regardless of their party affiliation. ABG is reminded of the recent changes in Albany by the democrats to increase their span of control. Here, however, is a move under the guise of campaign reform that promises to increase the incumbents’ chances of never being voted out of office.

Former 20-year Westchester County Legislator and current NYS Assemblyman Thomas “Proclamation” Abinanti rarely spends his own money on a campaign. He prefers to use mailings from his elected office instead. It’s his personal Golden Goose. As a “news” or “informational” mailing, he as well as other elected politicians, are able to mail his entire constituency repeatedly and use duplicate and/or unique mailings at no cost. The cost is shifted to the electorate through our taxes. No doubt you’ve seen the mailings. They may come in the form of a letter or more often as a glossy array of photos showing proclamations being presented, checks exchanged, and ribbon cutting ceremonies to preserve a tree in someone’s name. It really doesn’t matter what the event as long as the politician has a photo of it.

Abinanti’s plan is to introduce a state bill that would have villages, towns, cities and counties fund elections with public money. Municipalities that participate in the program would provide candidates with $6 for every $1 that the candidates might raise. He claims that his bill, which would put a strain on municipalities that are struggling with tight budgets already, would reduce the influence that big donors have on campaigns and politicians. This move seems like something Abinanti would create to save a buck. Any money that he may have raised and is in his campaign war chest would not be used and go directly to him at some point. What it really does is aid the incumbents as they maintain a donar list and benefactors who continue to purchase what they want by greasing a politicians campaign.

During this meeting at our Town Hall, Yonkers City Council President Chuck Lesnick, known in Yonkers as “Lesnick the Liar”, said, “Opting into the program would cost Yonkers. They hold elections every other year and our costs are about $500,000 each election. He added “You can’t judge everything in terms of dollars and cents. What is a clean government worth?” What indeed? The Yonkers Inspector General seems to constantly work in hyperdrive doing investigations of political wrong-doings in the City of Hills, where nothing is on the level.

Finally The Paul added his two-cents worth saying, “Campaigns should not be about raising dollars but should be about issues.” It should always be about issues but never is. The Paul has over $100K in his campaign war-chest that will continue to grow and remain untouched. The Paul will once again be running unopposed with his two Stepford Board members Francis “Back Pocket” Sheehan and Diana “Sleepy” Juettner. Apparently, the Greenburgh Republican leadership prefers to remain in the shadows rather than do the work required to mount a campaign against them. For a change, The Paul is right that it should be about the issues. Issues such as: Fortress Bible guilty verdict, Dromore Road zoning, increased Service Station taxation on Central Avenue, WestHelp contract violations, WestHab spot-zoning and zoning violations, Rt 119 over-development, Assisted Living facilities zoning on undersized parcels of land, and more. But in Greenburgh, where it should be about the issues, it won’t. If our politicians never leave office, we’ll never get better representation. This bill should be killed and one for term limits should be offered instead. We can only hope. 

Densification

The last several years have proven that The Paul is not interested in preserving the “green” in Greenburgh. He’s not alone. The County has a master plan that incorporates an increased densification of the southern portion of the county as well as the Unincorporated sections of Greenburgh, especially on Rt 119. Regrettably, The Paul and his cohorts, from his Stepford Board to the developers to other politicians, all believe in a master plan that includes blacktopping our green space.

Many projects throughout the Town exemplify this endorsed densification. Planning Commissioner Thomas Madden, knows where his “bread is buttered”. Not only does he go along with The Paul’s plans, he goes beyond them. He pursues every avenue to help create larger and more grandiose plans throughout the Town. Residents will find Madden routinely endorsing plans that will add to his job security and eliminate our suburban Greenburgh into a more urban one. Stop and Shop on Rt 119 and Brightview Assisted Living in Glenville are obvious ones that come to mind.

Changing the zoning in the Town at the whim of a developer’s request has allowed The Paul to give away our green space, congest our neighborhoods, lessen the attractiveness of purchasing a home in the Town, increase traffic, flooding and overwhelm an outdated and beleaguered infrastructure. The latest example of this is the zoning change requested by the Brightview Assisted Living Center in the Glenville Neighborhood. ABG has previously written about this particular issue. In short, Brightview is utilizing a lack of definition in our zoning code for Assisted Living in hopes of getting a “custom made” zoning change that will benefit them.

There are several issues at stake with this. First, the Comprehensive Planning Committee, which was tasked for developing a Town Comprehensive Plan, continually has new requests asked of it, forcing their Comprehensive Plan to be delayed for submission and adoption by the Town. Second, each time another task is requested, the Town Board proceeds with any changes it pleases to keep the developers happy. This thwarts any benefit we might get if our Comprehensive Plan was presented and approved. Third, it’s currently overdue with no visible submission date on the horizon.

Spot-zoning is illegal. Simply, spot-zoning is when the Town Board changes the zoning for a particular project, developer, neighborhood or parcel of land. This is routinely done throughout the Town by The Paul and his Stepford Board. Again, it is illegal. We’ve witnessed spot zoning for numerous projects such as for Stop & Shop in Glenville, Westhab in Fulton Park, Dromore Road and Central Avenue in Edgemont, soon-to-be for sports bubbles in Veteran Park and at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road and Assisted Living Centers in Glenville. If The Paul wants it, it will happen. ABG recognizes the need for some change and the right for property owners to do what they desire with their property. But there needs to be a balance of uniformity and conformity within Town guidelines when this is done to maintain a level of attractiveness and functionality within the Town. That’s what our planning and zoning regulations should do. Yet, with The Paul and the Stepford Board subverting them, the planning and zoning boards are impotent to stop them.

With the Town zoning in place, when an owner/landlord/developer wishes to use the property for a proposal the zoning does not allow, property owners and/or developers are required to go to the Zoning and Planning Boards and request a variance or change. Most often, this is exactly what happens for an owner or landlord. And, depending on the proposal, they may rightly be refused their request until concessions and accommodations are made to conform with the zoning. There are many reasons for refusal by numerous Boards. Sometimes, the refusal is based on size (too large), style (doesn’t blend), traffic (increases/hinderances/flow) and the like.

When it’s for an individual homeowner, or small landlord, they are tasked with redoing their plans and proposals at their own additional expense and re-applying to that particular Board. When it is a developer asking, and they are refused, they simply confer with The Paul behind closed doors. When they emerge with their marching orders, they’ll all dance the dance as required by The Paul and present their proposal to the Board with soft, attractive water color renditions with the lovely landscapes to his “go-along” Board. From there, the developer’s game is in play. The Board will vote to become the lead agency and begin the sham approval process – regardless of what’s wrong with the project.

As was done with the Hebrew Hospital Home of Westchester, at 61 Grasslands Road, The Paul told them they could receive site approval to add buildings to their site if they donated a fire truck to the Fairview Fire Department. Once Rescue 3 was ordered and delivered (since replaced), site approvals sailed through the Town Board like beer flows at an Octoberfest! When The Paul told the Fortress Bible Church to donate a fire truck to the Fairview Fire Department, they said, “No!” Not surprisingly, Fortress Bible Church began receiving no site approvals and the internal departmental run-arounds that residents are so used to. Ultimately, with no additional fire apparatus in the offing, no site approvals took place and nothing could be built. Fortress Bible Church refused to play “FeinerBall” and sued the Town on seven counts AND WON! The Town went to an Appeals Court and again Fortress Bible Church WON! One of the reasons The Paul claimed against the Church was the increased traffic and safety issues it would cause on Dobbs Ferry Road. If this was an issue then, why did he not see it as an issue for the proposed GameOn 365 property across the street which promised more traffic?

The Town’s Zoning and Planning Boards are appointed positions by The Paul. Perhaps this would be okay if The Paul and his Stepford Board were not part of the process. The Zoning and Planning Boards can only make recommendations to the Town Board as the lead agency. Subsequently, when the Zoning or Planning Boards make a recommendation to the Town Board, it is just that, a recommendation and no matter how competent, correct, caring or pellucid either of these Boards are with their information, the Town Board is not bound by it. Whether it involves receiving a piece of fire apparatus or not, the lead agency moves ahead with more developments throughout the Town. The increased densification of the Town needs to stop. Projects that increase our impervious space are not helping the Town’s residents who routinely get flooded in normal rain storms. The aging infrastructure, ignored by The Paul for his entire 20-plus years tenure have left the Town residents hurting. The illegal actions of The Paul and his Board have taken it’s toll. It has to change. We can only hope.

Mission Accomplished!

When The Paul started the Citizens Committee meeting Monday night, there were the usual faces in the audience. Also in attendance were those The Paul can count on to lob him softballs and non-question questions. This fact was reiterated throughout the meeting and highlighted by one woman who claimed, “We have to take personal responsibility when a storm in coming to be prepared. To do this,” she continued, “residents need to go to “ready.com” for a list of items one might need.” While not bad advice, it’s like watching the TV news before a storm or before a holiday. They’ll start broadcasting what you should do, not do, for how long, and so on for days on end only to see people demanding help because they didn’t heed the advice. 

For the uninitiated, this was strictly a ruse for the public. The Paul sent emails to his devoted followers to attend. And, attend they did. ABG assumes he prompted them to ask “his” questions, offer advice and of course, dish out compliments where “they” believed appropriate. His ploy worked so well, the room began to list as resident and non-resident alike stated that ConEd was the villain. It was working. Most in attendance ignored the obvious: The Paul did nothing to help before, during and after the storm - again! It was more of his standard operating procedure as The Paul got unencumbered publicity before his end of the month publicity quota expired. Frenzied reporters scrambled to get photos and names of speakers, already knowing their medium would simply use The Paul’s press release talking points for the bulk of their articles. In fact, they simply could leave early since they had all they needed before they got there!

As the constant campaigner, The Paul has developed his craft of subtle campaigning into a well-honed and revered art form. When he was awaiting the court’s verdict in the Fortress Bible case, he needed to deflect attention from his illegal actions and fast! Thankfully, the TappanZee Bridge had entered the campaign season from Obama and Cuomo and gave The Paul a deflection subject better than he could have imagine: save the old Tappan Zee Bridge as a park. He wasn’t the first person to come up with this. But since he has unfettered access to the media machine in Westchester, they gave him the platform he needed and led this rally for a short time until the governor trumped him and cast him aside. But the deflection was working.

The Paul and the Town of Greenburgh were found guilty, with the decision appealed and upheld in Appellate Court, of violating the Church’s first amendment rights of free speech, free assembly, equal protection, due process, and the Town had discriminated against the church under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act or RLUIPA. The judge cited the Town for “intentional delay, hostility and bias towards the Church's application.” This is a damning decision as to what’s wrong with and the lack of quality of leadership in the Town!

Thankfully, The Paul’s the Tappan Zee bridge emergency fiasco and gifted him the “out” he needed as he became the lead proponent of morphing of the current Tappan Zee bridge into a High Line Park, similar to what NYC did to a much-different and safer rail track in Manhattan’s west side. But the park wasn’t the issue. Deflection from the Fortress Bible decision was. ABG wonders why there isn’t outrage throughout the Town demanding the resignation of The Paul and his corrupt partner from that event, Councilwoman Diana Juettner? ABG believes he told her to keep her mouth shut and he’ll get her out of this. She obeyed.

The Citizen’s Committee would not have stopped the illegal actions of The Paul, Juettner and the other Board and various Department members who answer to The Paul of bad and illegal behavior. But The Paul certainly could have asked felon and fellow-schemer Alan Hochberg to investigate by forming a Citizen’s Committee subcommittee (as opposed to the faulty Ethics Committee) that could continue The Paul’s deflection toward another (mis)direction. Sure, there would be the questions and legal challenges from the G10, but they would wither through time as the phony decision from the committee would find The Paul did nothing wrong. Can you say Tammany Hall?

New Castle Town Supervisor Susan Carpenter was one of the attendees as well as several New Castle residents. Why they were remains an inconsequential mystery. Could it be she believed she might get an education in solutions management or campaign strategies by attending? She said that her town of was faced with the same problems as Greenburgh. As if scripted by The Paul, she too berated ConEd, the Public Service Commission and offered no solutions. If we continue to elect the same people, listen to the same press conferences and never hold their feet even near the flame, we should not expect solutions or different outcomes!

So The Paul has anointed ex-convict Alan Hochberg to chair the do-nothing committee to find fault with others and assist in deflecting attention from The Paul’s illegal, immoral, and ill-conceived actions until the next fiasco rears it’s ugly head from the shadows. Whether it is the Fortress Bible decision ($8 million), the WestHelp debacle ($1.2 million), the Water Department deficit ($4 million), the Dromore Road decision, Cumberland Farms, Brightview Assisted Living Center, Stop and Shop on Rt 119, flooding in Fulton Park along the Bronx River, flooding on the Rt 9A corridor in Elmsford, 400+ new condominiums off of Taxter Road, 400+ new condominiums at Eastview (both adding to the Rt 9A flooding), 20 new McMansions in Tarrytown/Greenburgh across from Kraft Foods and last but certainly not least, the GameOn 365 Sports Bubble with it’s über-contaminated site on Dobbs Ferry Road, The Paul is costing us a fortune. It must stop! 

The meeting for the Citizen’s Committee concluded with little more than finger-pointing and no solutions offered and the promise to discuss it more. The unsuspecting committee will meet, proctoring some ideas gleaned from The Paul’s press releases and have Alan Hochberg dutifully hand them to The Paul, feigning interest. There will be the requisite pomp and circumstance and then the committee will fade into the rising flood waters until the next time. They’ll never provide a solution to any of Mother Nature’s fury, the Town’s inability to help it’s constituents and The Paul’s ineptness with dealing with anything that doesn’t require having someone else do something. The best we can hope for is for The Paul and his Board to resign. The least we can hope for is they step aside and let the residents provide solutions. We can only hope.

New Neighborhood Association to Form in Worthington & Dobbs Ferry Roads Area

Each effort by The Paul to cater to a developer is typically met with resistance or protest from a select group of residents we affectionately refer to as the Greenburgh 8, or G8 for short. They are usually at every Town Board meeting to scrutinize The Paul’s actions, whether the Town Board meetings start with Town business or the campaign circus The Paul and his Stepford Board are so fond of. They are the speakers at every Town Board meeting, reading staggering facts and information to an aloof, unengaged and seemingly bored Board. Is it possible that there no other residents are concerned with the costly, illegal and unethical actions of The Paul and his Stepfords? ABG thinks not.

Apparently, there are others trying to affect changes for the benefit of the Town via neighborhood civic associations. Another in the never-ending list of The Paul’s debacles is the GameOn 365 sports bubble that has been proposed to built on contaminated Town-owned property “for a song”. We’ve posted before about the reasons this “done-deal” developer-centric deal should not happen. Most of the Town’s assorted civic associations are against this project for a host of valid and discernible arguments. But, it doesn’t matter to The Paul, as he keeps this project moving forward at full-steam. Knowing he has done so many things with this project which are either illegally or morally wrong, he has decided to do what he does best: deflect! Ever the shrewd politician, he decided to take the moral and legal onus from his shoulders and dump it in the lap of the public by offering the GameOn 365 for public referendum.

To the uninitiated, you may be thinking putting this to a referendum is a good thing for the Town and democracy at it’s best. Had it been done first, ABG might agree. Most are not seeing or realizing this is still a bad project for the Town because of all the issues, problems, illegalities and future considerations that have been raised about this project. They will not go away just because the project was put out for referendum. Here’s the kicker: The Paul knows he will get a minimum of 7k votes for this project at the next election and perhaps even more because it is a major election and more people will be voting. He knows this because when he ran unopposed for supervisor he received about 7k votes! That means that 7k voters will either blindly vote the party line and whomever is running on it as the endorsed candidate or for whatever the “project” or referendum is, without bothering to investigate the facts or look at other factors simply because they maintain differing party affiliations and ideas. ABG would hope this time might be different. We can only hope.

Worthington and Dobbs Ferry Roads’ residents had gone to the meetings about “The Bubble”, concerned about the 8-story (83 ft tall) sports bubble to be installed as a temporary(?), 15 YEAR, structure on the contaminated dump, formerly Frank’s Nursery on Dobbs Ferry Road. Prior to Frank’s Nursery it was Flower Time Nursery. Prior to that it was used as a dump for the city of White Plains. When Frank’s Nursery defaulted on their taxes, the Town assumed ownership of the foreclosed property and left it to languish. Then, as The Paul began costing the Town more and more money through guilty lawsuit verdicts, expired income-generating contracts and the like, he began doing what he always does, putting more and more hare-brained, off-the-wall ideas “out there” in hopes of making back some of the money the Town is hemorrhaging through his incompetence and bad actions.

After seeing how incredibly dysfunctional and problematic our Town’s operational government is, an incredulous group of neighbors tried reaching out to each other and began to see that they were not alone. Deciding to formalize and create a Worthington & Dobbs Ferry Roads Civic Association, they sought a location to meet and were instructed by other civic associations to use Town Hall for their meeting venue. They began distributing flyers for their first meeting and have decided to meet this Monday evening on October 1st, at 8PM at Greenburgh Town Hall on Hillside Avenue in the main meeting hall. We hope they are successful in having their neighbors participate. While The Paul’s bubble fiasco is certainly one topic for concern, there are many others requiring discussion. This promises to be an interesting evening, regardless of where you may stand on Town issues. We hope they start at the appointed 8PM time, unlike the other meetings held in this hall and the neighborhoods respond and support this effort. We can only hope.