Predictable Incompetence

Predictably, Mr Feiner and his Board voted unanimously to adopt their ill-conceived zoning district change. This move, again predictably, promises to embroil the Unincorporated Greenburgh taxpayers in yet another discrimination lawsuit. The new zoning amendment creates what will be known as a M-SH62 district. Simply, this represents what will be know as Multifamily Senior Housing for 62 year old people and over. Commissioner Garrett Duquesne claims this will create much needed new senior housing.

The zoning change is being made for a specific intent, affecting specifically, the housing structures located at 48, 50, 54, 56 and 58 Manhattan Avenue. This housing is currently considered part of a low-income scatter-site housing complex that is next to the Theodore Young Community Center. Many people who spoke at the Town Board meeting endorsed scatter-site housing as well as low-income housing. Many also endorsed the rebuilding effort as neglect and a lack of maintenance, a hallmark of the Feiner Administration for over 24-years, have cited the need for improvement.

During the Town Board meeting, one younger woman who stated she lives in one of the apartments, begrudgingly got up to speak after she and her neighbors did not receive an accurate account as to what was happening with the project or exactly what was going to happen to their place of residence? Then she stressed while she had concern for her neighbors, she wants to know how she, specifically, would be affected. Again, different answers abounded with Town Attorney Tim Lewis seemingly having the final, although apparently not correct, word in the matter.

During the meeting, Mr Feiner requested Raju Abraham, Executive Director of the Greenburgh Housing Authority, to come to the podium and clarify a few points. Yes, 4 families will be moved out as they won't qualify to be a resident there under the new zoning code. He also acknowledged that the tenants will be moved to a newly renovated apartment with new appliances in a different Greenburgh Housing Authority facility in another part of Town. This sounds like they are being bribed to just shut up and go along with their eviction. He also stated they could move anywhere in the Country as they are Section 8 voucher recipients and they can use the voucher anywhere. Section 8 requires a tenant to spend 30% of their income towards rent. Simply, this is nothing more than subsidized housing.

Commissioner Duquesne has stated the plan is to demolish the currently occupied five buildings and ultimately relocate four of the five families as they are under 62 years of age. Clearly, this is another form of discrimination once this bill was voted through! So much so, in fact that several speakers (of the G10) reiterated the point several times during both comment periods and the hearing itself. Ignoring the advice of attorneys and other well-regarded residents, the Town Board went along with the flawed bill and adopted it anyway, virtually ensuring a lawsuit for $25 million. 

What does this mean? Several things. 

First, this new spot-zoning change is more of the same throughout the Town. We’ve been witnessing spot-zoning by Mr Feiner and his Board with wanton regularity. They've done it with Westhab in Fulton Park, Brightview in Glenview, Shelbourne in Edgemont and so many more locations. Virtually every neighborhood, except Mr Feiner’s gated community of Boulder Ridge, has felt the spot-zoning wrath of Mr Feiner and crew. So, with this new zoning code change specifying by law an age restriction, the Unincorporated Town should expect to be in court again.

Second, is the illegality of creating a law that restricts people of a certain age from being able to move into a neighborhood. In fact, replace “62-year olds” with any other group and see if you can more easily understand why this is wrong on so many levels. Had the Town left out the “age of 62 and older” from the bill now passed into law, and left the onus on the Greenburgh Housing Authority or the group the Town is contracting these apartments with to build, we would not have to worry about going to court for another discrimination lawsuit. In fact, zoning guru Ella Preiser suggested at numerous times that the bill could easily be changed and the liability eliminated. Instead, Councilman Jones took to the bully pulpit to berate and rudely shout down Ms Preiser. Shortly thereafter, Town Councilman Sheehan would jump on the bully pulpit and attack Ms Preiser as well when she got up to speak again. 

Immediately before the rudeness by Mr Jones, Bob Bernstein explained in great detail why the change in this proposal could easily be corrected, but must be done before its adoption. He further explained why this will wind up in court and expose the Unincorporated Town taxpayers to a $26 million dollar discrimination lawsuit. An interesting aside witnessed here again was several audience members, new to the sham known as open government , were actually engaged in a back and forth discussion by the Board members. These same Board members usually refuse to discuss anything with their critics and detractors. And, as we witnessed this night, chose to be rude to regular attendees instead.

There’s already a lawsuit against the Town from S&R (Steven and Richard Troy) Development, who changed their original proposal from luxury houses (2 or 3 McMansions) to an affordable housing proposal on Dromore Road in Edgemont. In an effort to halt the Town from going deeper into the discrimination hole the Board was digging for themselves, Mr Bernstein suggested Mr Feiner and his Town Board hold off passing the “neg dec” for another project after Mr Bernstein warned them not to, as their motion to dismiss the discrimination lawsuit by Dromore Developer's S&R, would be going in front of Judge Cathy Seibel, who cited when reading her decision not to dismiss it, that the Town, Mr Feiner and Board had already been found guilty of discrimination, destroying evidence and lying under oath in the Fortress Bible law suit.

Since the motion to dismiss the S&R lawsuit against the Town was, ahem, dismissed, and the lawsuit moving forward, the Town should tread carefully when they make such decisions as to zoning with the intent to limit who can and cannot move into a specific area of the Town. While decisions like these are terrible for the Town financially, they're embarrassing to the taxpayers who support developing various types of housing throughout the Town. It's also completely understandable why Edgemont residents are actively pursuing incorporation. Who would want to be part of this circus at Hillside Avenue? The numbers are growing. At least the villages are insulated from a good part of this. It has to end. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Senior Housing and the Comprehensive Plan

Here’s something we don’t hear about every day, or ever see happening in Greenburgh. The City of Rye has elected to change zoning for a commercial property into residential in the hopes of repurposing vacant or unused office space in their community. Specifically, construction is slated to start on a 122-unit senior home in a former office building at 120 Old Post Road after the city's Planning Commission completes a site plan review. According to Republican Rye City Councilman Richard Mecca, “…there’s a market for this kind of property.”

The kind of property he’s discussing is the construction of a 122-unit senior housing facility that would provide luxury residential housing for seniors. The office building in question has been unoccupied since 2009. Once completed, the over-55 residents would be able to choose from one and two bedroom apartments. The current building would be razed and a new 245,000 square feet building would be constructed, roughly 3 times the size of the current building. While we question the increased size as necessary, we’re sure the developers have claimed the usual reasons, focusing on their profitability only working with this size building. We’re also sure if challenged, they have another number they are willing to scale it down to.

In Greenburgh, however, we’ve seen the new Comprehensive Plan adopted. Critics, including ABG, point out that it is more of a political document/statement and an encapsulation of what the Town currently has as opposed to providing a blueprint and true plan for the future of our Town. After 8 long years of preparation, public forums and road shows, the document falls flat on its face, allowing Mr Feiner and his Board similar carte blanche with zoning changes throughout the Unincorporated Town. This failing will be evident tomorrow night when the Town Board adopts a change to zoning specific to the Manhattan Avenue area to eliminate the existing HUD housing and build bigger buildings with mix-use retail space at ground level. It’s easy to perceive the Town Board as doing spot-zoning but they will apply this as a Town-wide endeavor to skirt that issue.

The one bright light throughout Mr Feiner’s constant onslaught to allow commercial enterprises in residential areas has been neighborhood pushback. At the former Frank’s Nursery property on Dobbs Ferry Road, Mr Feiner tried to convince residents to accept an 8-story, 83-foot sports bubble in their residential neighborhood on that property. By banding together, they were able to push back with one mantra: keep the zoning residential and build residential housing of any type at that location!

The GameOn 365 owners, who had been encouraged in private meetings with Mr Feiner and his Board  not to worry about the zoning as they would name themselves the lead agency and push the zoning change through, moved their plans to the Visioli golf driving range property next door. What Mr Feiner and crew hadn’t counted on was the resolve and intelligence of the residents. Using the Town’s own laws, they held fast and got every neighbor adjacent to the property to object to the usage. Subsequently, after Mr Feiner played his games with the property and losing more money for the Town, movement on creating a new senior assisted living facility has begun.

To that end, there will be a Public Hearing/Discussion on the proposed CHS Assisted Living Facility at the Planning Board on Wed. Oct. 19th. The meeting starts at 8:00pm. Residents of the Town are urged to attend to see and hear what the plans are for this new facility. This is a story of David beating Goliath. Right now, however, we applaud the City of Rye for taking a positive step in creating housing from commercial property and wished we could see similar thinking in our Town. Only then will we see A Better Greenburgh.

Pit Bull Put Down After Attacking Boy

While we are still trying to get more information, ABG has learned that a pit bull dog in the Manhattan Avenue area attacked a young boy, biting him in the ankle late Friday afternoon or early evening. Our information stated the boy was about eight years old and that the dog broke the boy's ankle. Police were called to the scene and were forced to put the pit bull down. Additional information filtering in to us state that a crowd began forming in the area and police called for backup. Our understanding at this point was that there was no violence. ABG will report more when we learn it.

Lash Kia – Gone?

We’ve spoken to Lash representative Michael Basta (like pasta), about our original post that the Lash Kia was closing their doors. He insisted they were not. In a subsequent meeting with him he assured ABG that they were very much operational and not closing their doors. He explained and we wrote a follow-up article stating precisely that. He had explained that Lash Kia was selling the Kia dealership to one of the northeast’s largest Kia distributors. However, at the day of the closing for the sale, Kia USA put a stop to the transaction. One of our readers recounted her story of trying to get her car serviced there and was told they were no longer an active Kia dealership.

Mr Basta explained that our story was part of the catalyst the Lash attorneys were using in the struggle to move forward with the sale despite Kia USA trying to put a stop it. No explanation was given as to why it was being blocked by Kia USA. Mr Basta had explained how difficult it was to do business in the Town of Greenburgh between the Town’s regulations coupled with the landlord’s limitations. “I can’t put more than four cars out in the lot on display. I can’t put the cars on the grass median between the sidewalk and our lot. I can’t use balloons. I can’t hang signs. I can’t play music. This list is endless.” We sympathize with all of our Town business owners. It’s a daily struggle to just put the key in the door and we have written previously about Town fees, regulations, fines and penalties incurred just to try to make a living. Our Town Board is always seeking new ways to generate revenue through their parochial and exhaustive taxation.

Regardless, in driving by the Kia dealership location at the corner or Rt 119 and Manhattan Avenue, the showroom which previously had several new Kia models on display, several sales personnel at the desks, and customers milling in and out, is now vacant. We know Mr Basta is “safe” as his office was next door at the Lash Volkswagen dealership, but hope that the other employees continued to be employed. ABG hates to see any business close and sincerely hope the sale of the dealership is the reason for the vacancy and not that of excessive regulations, fees and fines forced another business from the Fairview area. It’s tough enough to operate a business without have the Town “pile on” business’ problems.

On an additional note, we still don’t have a retailer to take over the supermarket vacated by A&P about two years ago. There are numerous vacant stores throughout the entire campus of the Crossroads Shopping Center. The landlord has announced they will be giving the entire complex a facelift. County Legislator Alfreda Williams has coined the phrase for this Fairview area as “ghetto-ized by Mr Feiner”. We hope the facelift will attract new and unique businesses. We just have a hard time listening to proposal after proposal by developers, blessed by Mr Feiner and his Board, that continue to include whatever the developers want and then with the requisite “retail space”. With all these vacant storefronts available, why build more? Why not slow down the over saturation of buildings, lessening of green space and increase of impervious space and address the issues already at hand without adding to the problem?

There’s an election coming and ABG hopes the voters are seeing what’s going on and willing to make a long-overdue change. It’s time to transform our Town into something better.

Execution in Greenburgh

Greenburgh Police received a call last night between 8 and 8:15 PM, for shots fired and responded to the vicinity of a shooting in the area of Oak and Warren Streets, close to Manhattan Avenue, where they found a 20-year old man in a car, shot. When they arrived at the scene, he was still alive. Paramedics treated him at the scene and transported him to the Westchester County Medical Center in Valhalla, NY. He subsequently passed away from the gunshot wounds at the hospital. ABG sources have told us that this appears to have been done as an execution-style shooting with two gun shots; One was to the head and the other in the throat of the victim.

There have been other shootings in the area where this body was found. And, while there are several gangs known to be in the area, ABG sources could not confirm if this was a gang related shooting or not. Police officers we spoke with are hoping this is not gang related and does not spark more or retaliatory shootings.

Police said early this afternoon that they are continuing to investigate. The victim’s identity is expected to be released Sunday evening pending notification of his family. Anyone with information is asked to call the Greenburgh Police Department at 914-682-5331.