Under The Cover of Darkness

Republican candidate for Governor and former County Executive Rob Astorino, broke a story at a press conference at the County Airport this week stating that the Federal government is and has been shipping illegal aliens into Westchester County via the Westchester County airport under the cover of darkness. The Feds claim the flights are part of a national operation to reunite minors who had been separated from their families at the southern border. In total, it has been estimated that hundreds of iillegals have been flown into Westchester during late-night flights. If this were a legitimate action, the flights would be coming in during the daylight hours and every politician would be on the runway holding a press conference. The fact that they are doing this at night under the cover of darkness belies it's legitimacy.

“I’m now told the flights have been happening since April. Smaller then. Bigger now. 737s daily," Astorino said. “Being secretive makes it worse. I don’t blame the individuals, I blame the federal government for not fixing our broken immigration system and securing the southern border. And I blame our state and local elected officials for either not demanding answers for us or knowing the answers and not telling us or lying to us. We need answers.”

Westchester County Executive George Latimer excused it saying that the HHS operation was part of President Joe Biden’s Office of Refugee Resettlement operation, and not specific to Westchester, as his administration attempts to reunite children under the age of 18 with their families. Although, when you look at the photos you’d be hard pressed to find young children among the mostly adult-looking passengers.

Assemblyman Colin Schmitt (R-New Windsor) also issued a statement of his own condemning the flights while taking a shot at Democrat leaders.

“It has been confirmed that the Biden Administration has been sending flights carrying illegal aliens who were detained crossing our southern border to the Westchester County Airport,” he wrote in an email blast. “This occurred without notice to the public or county officials.

The illegals were taken from private flights and placed on buses. They were apparently eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, but it isn’t clear how many received the vaccine or not clear how many flights have come into Westchester. But, once on the buses, it’s unknown what communities they were transported to. Scary. We have previously reported that at the beginning stages of the Covid 19 pandemic that the County, vis-à-vis the County DSS and County Executive Latimer, housed 40 Covid positive homeless people into the Days Inn (formerly the Saw Mill River Motel) in Elmsford on Valley Avenue. They didn’t notify the Village, offer funds to assist with the daily ambulance transports to area hospitals for non-Covid related issues, such as an upset stomach, dizziness, general malaise, etc. These people know how to “game” the system to their advantage. For instance, they suddenly don’t feel well  at 10 - 11:00AM or at 4PM and get transported to the hospital in time for lunch or later for dinner. Want to stay longer? If they claim to be suicidal, they’ll be admitted for three days for “evaluation.” When they are finally discharged, the County is obligated to find them another room either in the same motel/hotel or another and transport them there, feed them, provide medical assistance if needed as well as clothing.

This clear abuse of power is an affront to to residents of Westchester County and Americans in general. Secure the border and stop this flow. Sending these detainees to be released in our communities during the COVID-19 pandemic represents a clear threat to the health and safety of our region. Our local representatives need to stand up for the safety and well-being of our residents! You can’t tell us in one breath to get vaccinated and wear a mask and then insert contaminated people into our communities. This must stop! It’s the only way we’ll get A Better Greenburgh.

Small Businesses Will Rebuild Our Economy, Not Politicians

Small businesses are what will help turn around our economy as President Trump leaves office and we exit the most robust economy in history. Promises by the newly elected have been made to wantonly return to the mantra of raising taxes again after a 4-year hiatus. However, the 2017 tax cut under President Trump had reinvigorated the economy and freed up billions in capital for private businesses to invest in growth, expansion, job creation and product development. 

So, even with proof that tax cuts, and not class warfare and pandering to keep taxing the rich (who are leaving our Town and State, see below), the elected officials continue to practice failed politics. This is the perfect time for them to recognize that deregulation, eliminating tariffs, fees and regulations and such will move our economy forward, providing real jobs with real salaries. Mr Feiner and his ilk continue to ignore what works and fall back into the same old rut they’ve been in during his lifetime tenure as Supervisor. In fact, the administration has proven to dislike the residents so much, that they’ve hidden their secret approvals for developers over the concerns of the citizenry.

Anyone who still believes Greenburgh residents (or New Yorkers) don't mind high taxes or heavy-handed governance should consider the obvious recent population estimates from the US Census Bureau or tour our Town and view the overabundance of vacated buildings displaying For Sale or For Lease signs throughout the Town. Residents are voting with their feet! Landlords are unable to sell or rent their spaces because of increased taxes. And yet Mr Feiner and his Board keep green-lighting developer’s proposals that seek first floor retail space with other renters above that. This is a failed model they simply ignore once a proposal hits Mr Feiner’s desk. They also insist on telling us that Millennials don’t own cars or drive, which is also simply is not true.  

According to a report entitled NYC, Downstate Suburbs Account for Most of NY’s 2018-19 Population Dip, by the Empire Center's E.J. McMahon, New York could be on its way “to its first population decline in any decade since the 1970s.” Its headcount fell by a whopping 126,355, or 0.65 percent, to a total of 19,336,776 over the year that ended July l, the estimates indicate - the biggest drop of any state, both as a percentage and in absolute numbers. 

Concurrently, over the decade, the state’s population plummeted by 41,326, or 0.21 percent, even as the nation as a whole grew nearly 7 percent. The big winners: low-taxing Florida and Texas, growing 16 percent and 17 percent, respectively, since 2010. COVID and the extreme local lockdowns from our democratic governor and mayors have surely helped drive New Yorkers to leave. 

As we’ve seen and participated in during the COVID pandemic, the newly expanded work-from-home models for employees mean many won’t return to their offices – and why should they? New York’s extremely high tax burden are among the nation's highest - and state lawmakers are now racing to make it worse. Make no mistake.This exodus promises grave consequences for Greenburgh due to New York withering tax base and a loss of two of its 27 US House seats. 

Get set for even less clout in Washington - and less funding from it. And, since Mr Feiner relies so heavily on grants to pay for many projects, except when he’s taxing Unincorporated Greenburgh residents to pay off his guilty-verdict fines, we don’t see much money coming through to us. Greenburgh and in particular Mr Feiner and his Board must change. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.

Democratic Primary, Not So Cut And Dry

The Democratic primary will be held on Tuesday. For a change, while not the actually election, there are some choices other than the tenured members of Club Democrat. Each candidate has produced the requisite position draft and the incumbents have touted their “accomplishments”. Fact or fiction? You’ll have to decide. Worth noting: there is an ethics complaint that’s been filed against incumbent candidate Councilman Ken Jones by Rodney Lederer-Plaskett, that relates to the Greenburgh Housing Authority(GHA), and Mr Jones’ participation while working for the law firm that represents the GHA, working as the Town Board liaison to the GHA, and that that same law firm, Bozeman Law firm of Mt Vernon, also sues the current residents and past residents of the GHA facilities!

Read the details of the complaint:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1IiCywtfceH00lS2GBwecVJeH71yMoLqF
(if the link doesn't automatically take you to the document, copy and paste the link into your URL address field)
Read the details of the exhibits:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1DLPUd39IJgRwdTC-DsMsc_7-AWkYtfHR
(if the link doesn't automatically take you to the document, copy and paste the link into your URL address field)

If that weren’t enough, new candidate Gina Jackson, recently returned from living in Atlanta Georgia, utilized the GBList (Town email list), violating court rulings established in the judgement in Livson v Town of Greenburgh. You may recall that Ms Livson took the Town to court after being refused the GBList from Mr Feiner and the Town Attorney. They stated it was confidential and didn’t want it used for political (really anti-Feiner) purposes. In short, Ms Livson was battling Mr Feiner and GameOn 365 and believed he was sending out false information to residents via the GBList and wanted to be able to present the other side to the many arguments and statements being made and the truth to residents. She won the court case with a determination that the list would not be used for political or commercial purposes.

Ms Jackson is on Team Feiner, which means the rules and laws don’t apply to her or them. We watched Mr Feiner disregard the law whenever he found it to be a nuisance or simply inconvenient. The GBList was used by her for political purposes several days ago to solicit campaign funds. That was wrong. But the beauty of being on Team Feiner is that there are enough Democrat District Attorneys and Judges that will not do anything about this. So even if someone were to hold her feet to the fire, nothing will come of it. She may have even asked (we doubt it) Mr Feiner about using it to which his reply would be to not worry about it, we’ll beg forgiveness. It’ll go no where. In fact, Ms Jackson sent out a second email utilizing the GBlist.

New candidate Eric Zinger appears to be the only candidate unencumbered by the politics of politics and appears to be the one honest candidate who has followed the letter of the law, played by all of the ridiculous rules designed to favor the incumbents and is doing this for the right reasons. In fact, when the Democrat Club shunned him as he sought a Town Board nomination, he went out on his own and got the required petition signatures necessary to qualify for a run in the primary anyway. This is the kind of drive that should impress voters of any party. 

At the end of the day, this election should be about what our Town Council is doing for all resident taxpayers and business taxpayers and not about special interests, returning favors and/or ignoring the laws. The current Town Board does what it wants with impunity and without regard to what the taxpayers want or need. Instead of complaining about President Trump or the federal government this or the state government that, we need to focus on not getting sued all the time and losing. We need a real Town Legal department that will guide the Town officials to make legally sound decisions and not because it’s something they want but because it’s the right thing to do. If we had new people filling these positions, not the same old, same old, year after year and not under Mr Feiner’s thumb and reliant on his campaign machinations, funds and GBList, maybe we’d see a change that the Town so desperately needs. It needs to start with this primary. It’s the only way to get A Better Greenburgh.

Sanctuary Town

In 1995, President Bill Clinton gave the State of the Union address. In it he said in part, “All Americans, not only in the states most heavily affected, but in every place in this country, are rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country. The jobs they hold might otherwise be held by citizens or legal immigrants. The public service they use impose burdens on our taxpayers. That’s why our administration has moved aggressively to secure our borders more by hiring a record number of new border guards, by deporting twice as many criminal aliens as ever before, by cracking down on illegal hiring, by barring welfare benefits to illegal aliens. In the budget I will present to you we will try to do more to speed the deportation of illegal aliens who are arrested for crimes, to better identify illegal aliens in the workplace as recommended by the commission headed by former Congresswoman Barbara Jordan. We are a nation of immigrants. But we are also a nation of laws. It is wrong and ultimately self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it.”

In 2001 there was more talk about building a fence to control illegal aliens from entering the United States. But indecision, if not simply inaction, took priority over action. Some of the wall would be built while the drug war against Mexican cartels kept the issue alive. At one point, Hillary Clinton sounded almost “Trumpian” on the issue. In 2005, she said: “I am adamantly against illegal immigrants. ... Clearly, we have to make some tough decisions as a country, and one of them ought to be coming up with a much better entry-and-exit system so that if we’re going to let people in for the work that otherwise would not be done, let’s have a system that keeps track of them.” Finally, in 2006, eleven years later, Congress passed and President Bush signed the bill into law sponsored by New York Representative Peter King to build the wall on the southern portion of our country. That move was supported by and voted for by Hillary Clinton as well as many other Democrats in Congress.

So what’s the point? Simply, President Trump is not saying anything new or anything that hasn’t been said before by his opponent’s side. Yet leaders around the country, state, county and yes, even in the Town of Greenburgh, are saying something else. Some, not all, have leaders who are pronouncing their disagreement or displeasure with President Trump’s message to get a handle on illegal immigration, and are openly touting their defiance towards controlling illegal immigration and the negative effects it has. Going after those who have violated our sovereignty and are committing criminal acts should be welcome by these leaders as it will assist them in bettering our neighborhoods.

At the last Greenburgh Town Board meeting, Mr Feiner and his Town Board passed a resolution announcing their blatant disregard for our federal, state and county immigration laws by stating they are committed to opposing... “...other hateful acts that target or demean persons based on their race, sex, ethnicity, religion, national origin, immigration status...” By openly recognizing that the Town Board equates immigration status as the same as racial prejudice or gender bias, they are demeaning the civil rights that people have fought for years to gain. By including “immigration status” in their resolution, aligning it to known illegal practices such as gender bias, racial bias, and more, they lessen their point because being here illegally is already a violation of the law. It’s like a thief reporting that he’s been robbed of something he stole.

The final paragraph of the Town’s resolution says, “...Town Board reaffirms its commitment to preserving and enhancing the environment to maintain and improve the quality of life for all its residents and for future generations.” This is contradictory. It’s actually just another political side-show by Mr Feiner and his Board for a bit of publicity to afford them the grandstanding to say, “Look what we did. We're not turning in any illegal aliens.” In reality, what they did is say they are openly violating the laws of this country, almost challenging the federal and state immigration services to go after them.

The position with this post is not about President Trump or Democrats versus Republicans. It’s about Mr Feiner and the illegal actions of the Town of Greenburgh. It’s no secret that Greenburgh is a sanctuary Town. Our law enforcement, fire and other Town personnel have related to ABG that directives from the “top” down instruct them to ignore the housing and overcrowding issues. This is unfortunate as our first responders are our first line of defense and can and will see when something is wrong and offer input to make corrections. Overcrowded housing, living in the shadows or in the woods hoping to not be discovered is not good for any of us. Our local economy, the safety issue for the overcrowded single family homes in our neighborhoods, increased crime in our neighborhoods and our overburdened community resources, such as water usage, waste disposal, etc., are many parts of the problem. All of this needs to be corrected. If Mr Feiner and his Town Board won’t do it, and they haven’t for 24-years during his administration, then someone else needs to do it. Only then will we get A Better Greenburgh.