The Futility of Do-Nothing Elected Officials

Following the Memorial Day Parade, which honors our fallen war heroes, we had occasion to run into Assemblyman Democrat Tom Abinanti, who was doing the politician’s dance, Pressing The Flesh. In passing he made a comment about how he contributed to getting the Saw Mill River corridor cleaned out, aiding the homes and businesses that get flooded from storms every year. And, we challenged him that he has done nothing to aid the residents and businesses along the Bronx River corridor. His response was the usual, “I introduced a bill mandating the County be responsible for maintaining the river." It's a page right out of Mr Feiner’s playbook. Appear concerned, promise to "look into it" and then write a letter to another higher-up elected official and he has completed his obligation to do something.

When pushed, Abinanti tried to flip the conversation as to why we weren’t at some non-existent firematic event in Mt Pleasant the previous weekend, we countered this query with a response, "It wasn’t our district." His response was predictably, "Exactly.” He explained that the Bronx River corridor isn’t under his district. Oddly, it is! So why lie about it? Probably because he knew he’d been exposed. Then he claimed he couldn't talk because he was already late, mostly, we believe, for the pictures with local officials (re: media exposure – especially in a desperate election year).

Not surprisingly, Mr Feiner also panders to the media while excelling at pandering to residents. When residents along the Bronx River corridor were über-flooded by storms Irene and Ida, Mr Feiner once again promised action, which turned into a letter to Representatives Stewart-Cousins, Abinanti, A. Williams, Shimsky and probably a few others that wouldn’t be significant other than to reference a number of people he reached out to. The disingenuousness of this action was after he wrote the letter, not only was he done with his responsibility of helping his constituents, but he went to Fulton Park and promised residents there that FEMA (similar to another four-letter word) would purchase their homes from them, eliminating their nightmare. Never happened, plus FEMA explained there were numerous benchmarks the Town must meet before that would happen. Mr Feiner conveniently left that out.

Back to the campaigning, Abinanti claims he submitted the bill to the County, which passed and then he left for the State Assembly. He maintains it was then up to newly elected Shimsky to pick up that mantle and run with it. Maybe. The reality is it was up to Williams as “the Bronx River corridor falls in her jurisdiction” - to use Abinanti's words. The bigger issue that feel-good politicians like Abinanti utilize is pretending to address an issue through introducing legislation but not including funding for it. Yes, Abinanti drafted the plan but never drafted funding for it -- a waste of time!
“The Board of Legislators has done nothing on it since,” Abinanti said. “This is not a state function. My opponent is just trying to deflect from the failures of the Board of Legislators.” Shimsky countered with, “County government will need support at the state and federal levels on a year-over-year basis. Given the degree to which the problem is going to become more pervasive and severe, county government can’t do it alone.” Sounds good, but did they do anything about it? You know the answer.

His supporters claim he has co-sponsored over 500 bills, which passed both houses and he has been the prime sponsor of over 100 bills alone. One such “co-sponsored bill” was for fire department ambulance billing for fire departments that operate ambulance service to their community. What he doesn’t mention was that he only got on board as a co-sponsor after it left committee and it was assured of passage and being signed by the Governor. By the way, this bill has been introduced over 10 years ago and only got traction after the former Governor resigned. So, while Abinanti has been in office for 14 years, he again played it safe and sat on the sidelines. Just like with his impotent County flood responsibility bill.

I in a recent debate and discussions of housing and the high cost of living, Shimsky underscored that much of the county needs significantly subsidized and affordable housing.
“We have to make sure we get more affordable housing units built and think about where housing for a broader array of income levels can be built where it would not be as expensive,” Shimsky said. The obvious answer, never to even be whispered, would be upstate. Abinanti's solution? He said he and fellow state legislators have worked to control the high cost of living by eliminating taxes on gasoline, cutting taxes for the middle class, finding alternative resources for local governments to cut property taxes and allowing Westchester to increase its sales tax. For Abinanti’s 40 or so years as an elected official, he has helped increase all of these same taxes without regard to how expensive he has caused the area to get. “We’ve got to decrease the cost of living for people at this very expensive time,” Abinanti said. An expensive "time" that he is culpably responsible for creating as a 40-year career politician.

On an upcoming Tuesday near you, the Democratic primary will be held. Between early voting and other contrivances that have been added to the existing system, It promises nothing new. We’ll be saddled with the same old faces, clichés, hollow promises and ultimately less action with more finger-pointing and blame. The Democrat stalwarts will come out and either decide more of the same with Abinanti is ok or they’ll decide he should be pastured and give Shimsky a shot. Either way, the people whose homes and businesses flood will be forced to endure more of the same as well as the deck gets shuffled yet again.

WestHelp Agreements Violated Again

At  the last Town Board meeting they proved once again that it lacks integrity, transparency and honesty with their skewed methods of governance. This latest move belies Mr Feiner’s often used canned phrases of ‘due diligence’, ‘transparency’, ‘faith in the process’ and others. This time the Town Board held a special meeting, a covert meeting if you will, to change the tenets of the previously agreed upon use of the WestHelp facility on the Westchester Community College campus and negate the agreement that had been developed for the property. Originally created and used as an affordable housing facility for mothers with under school-age children, you may recall Mr Feiner chose to leave the vacant facility open after the County ceased using the facility for homeless families. Its original intent and design had been as an affordable housing facility.

With a seemingly veiled public disclosure at the ending of last Wednesday nights Town Board meeting and without any public session, or any public discourse, Mr Feiner and his Board skirted their elected obligation entitled to by the public regarding the WestHelp property. It highlights Mr Feiner’s contempt and low regard for the Greenburgh taxpayer. He and his Board members voted in a hastily contrived “special meeting” to change the determined use for the now degraded WestHelp facility. You may recall, after the lease with the County expired due to Mr Feiner’s twice refused contract acceptance, the facility was vacated by the County’s Department of Social Services (DSS). Mr Feiner took it upon himself, condoned by his Board, to not only leave the facilities unsecured, but to accelerate its degradation so it would need to be torn down, appeasing the residents of Valhalla who were mostly against the site in the first place. The reason? Votes.

The site was the brainchild of the HUD Chair Andrew Cuomo, who was appointed by then President Bill Clinton after Cuomo’s political aspirations were halted when he insulted New Yorkers with several negative comments when he was running for governor. Knowing what short memories voters have, he was whisked away to Washington to wait out the furor. Once his past history was forgotten, he began his anointment to the Albany throne. As governor, he disagreed with Mr Feiner’s newest proposal for the WestHelp site to sell the property to the Ferncliff School for the disabled. County Executive Astorino, as well as other County Legislators, disagreed as well but chose inaction over The Town’s violation of the in-place and still active contract. ABG conversed with County Legislator Alfreda Williams, who said the County Board would need to address any contractual violations and decide how to proceed. Nothing was done.

So, after languishing for four years at the mandate by Mr Feiner, the County finally agreed to let the Town submit a proposal for the site or lose this gift-horse property completely. The facility had generated $1.2 million dollars a year in revenue to the Town. Had the Town continued to receive those funds, we would have had $4.8 million that could have been used toward paying down the $6.5 million guilty verdict fine levied against Mr Feiner after being found guilty by a Federal Court for discrimination, destroying evidence, not being a credible witness and more. In the meantime, Mr Feiner keeps insisting the Town remained within the 2% NYS Tax Cap while raising our taxes 3.4%. More political posturing aided by Cuomo’s 2% Tax Cap hype.

After the NYS Division of Human Rights granted the Town permission to impose age restrictions toward the property’s usage, it was decided to create a Senior Living Facility on the WestHelp site in accordance with the terms of the original lease with the County. They would reconfigure the 108 efficiency apartments into 74 apartments to be rented out to senior citizens. The facility would then be managed by a previously denied management company, Peekskill’s Marathon Development Group. Mr Feiner originally tried to award the contract to a developer with no background or experience in property management. In fact, the deal  that Mr Feiner originally refused to award to Marathon is the same deal as before with two major and costly changes. First, the deal will only bring in $127,000 per year, down from the original proposal Mr Feiner killed. Second, the Town, in particular the Unincorporated Taxpayer, will wind up paying for the remediation to the site! This was another decision made behind closed doors, possibly in an elusive Executive Session and never a posed to other bidders. Faith in the system? Transparency? Due diligence? Hardly.

Messrs. Morgan and Jones “brokered” the same deal that was laid out initially and are now bragging of this “new” deal as though they are master negotiators. They’re not. Because of Mr Feiner and his Board’s actions, the Town not only lost the $1.2 million a year in revenue, they knowingly and arbitrarily decided to cost the Town even more by dragging out this process and agreeing to what had already been proposed, less the four year reduction of income for the Town, income for Marathon and most importantly income that would have helped the resident taxpayers. Now, however, the taxpayers will be “on the hook” for the remediation costs, no matter what they amount to. Additionally, Marathon will wind up managing 54 apartments instead of the originally agreed upon 74 and the seniors that might have been afforded homes will still be left wanting.

If Mr Feiner and his Board were truly interested in providing affordable housing and not just posturing about it, they could have assigned the 108 apartments to some of the 250 families on the Greenburgh Housing Authority’s waiting list once the County ceased their operation of WestHelp.That would have amounted to about half of their waiting list of Town residents being helped. This would have alleviated the blight of Greenburgh residents and probably others seeking a home. There was no stipulation in the original contract about who the Town could place in the apartments once the Town took it over. But since this administration is not sincere about addressing the problem, those people continue to wait - over four years later.

Another connivance by Mr Feiner means more delays and another possible rejection for the use of the WestHelp property from the County. We’re pretty sure that Mr Feiner did not make the switch from senior to affordable housing to help County Executive Astorino in the County’s fulfillment of the federally mandated housing agreement in Westchester. Although, given Mr Feiner’s history of guilty verdicts in court, we have to wonder if he has had any experience with those judges and cut a deal? Regardless, after rejecting proposals from bona fide housing management companies, turning down a cash sale with all remediation costs included, trying to change the use from housing to a school, being found guilty in paying funds to the Valhalla School District, after accusing residents of undermining his (illegal) deals, it will be no small task to see anybody living at the WestHelp facility. That is, unless they are in tents. This must end. It’s the only way we’ll get A Better Greenburgh.

Tax Revenues Down, No Relief In Sight

We wonder how Mr Feiner will work around the NYS 2% Tax Cap and still be able to go unchallenged about raising taxes? He recently sent out an email (we're awaiting the snail-mail version) stating, “The town of Greenburgh is committed to complying with the tax cap - which limits tax increases. Unlike some government entities in the region and state our tax increases have been below the tax cap every year since the cap was enacted.” This is only partially true as the politicians have provided numerous "outs" for them to be able to say they adhered to the tax cap when they really didn’t. Case in point, while Mr Feiner says he and his Town Board stayed within the tax cap of 2%, our taxes increased this year by 3.4%. It hardly seems they're adhering to the cap!

Another way around budgetary constraints is to avoid the budget completely. An example of this would be the “special meeting” held by the Town Board to covertly approve $1.5 million to rehabilitate the Glenville Water District storage tank. “In the near future,” Mr Feiner said, “We will rehabilitate additional water tanks located around the town.” Then he added, “We're reviewing another contract to address other tanks. I anticipate extensive infrastructure work to take place in the coming years. . . .but don't have costs yet.” Of course he doesn’t have costs yet - those pesky details. Nor will he. What he has figured out this time is by holding unscheduled, almost ad hoc, “special” budget votes under the guise of time constrained emergency decisions needing to be addressed for unplanned problems, he gets to skirt the typical scrutiny of this expense. As we’re witnessing this time, it’s water tank refurbishing. By doing it this way, he avoids the budget process, the planning and a real public hearings process and of course, the 2% tax cap limit.

All this was done on the cusp of learning that sales tax revenue for the Town is down by 2.4% for the Town, or $152,000. The reality is its not a huge amount of money. It’s a bit funny that sales tax revenue is down, and yet Mr Feiner and his Town Board continue proving they are anti-business by increasing fees, taxes and costs to local merchants. Their actions belie their words. His latest  coup de grace was the hotel tax that he personally insisted Legislators Stewart-Cousins and Abinanti push into law on behalf of the Town and our “destitute” financial condition. The convoluted thought process espoused by Mr Abinanti is that this is a victimless tax because it only effects out-of-towners. Hardly. And, Mr Feiner, a vociferous proponent of the tax, is the one who single-handedly created the Town’s financial crisis. Oddly, he never mentions those points. What eventually will happen is corporations will begin to trim their travel to the area because of costs, which will create a domino effect with other industries whose products and services coincide with corporate travel and expenses.

Those who subscribe to the theory of big government assuming the local cost burdens by the County, State and ultimately Federal government must realize that they too are experiencing lower sales tax revenues. In fact, the actual report that Mr Feiner used to publicize our minor drop in tax revenue stated that Westchester County also saw a drop in sales tax revenue of 2.59%. Rockland County stayed about the same and Putnam saw a 3.15% drop from the first half of 2014. “There has been a general downward trend in sales tax collection growth over the last several years and that is continuing in 2015,” said State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli in a statement. “The slow growth in sales taxes could pose fiscal challenges for local governments across New York, especially for counties who rely heavily on sales tax collections to pay their bills.” ABG doubts Mr Feiner really cares about the loss of money, but enjoys more the opportunity to use it for yet another campaign piece through email and snail mail. It’s all about publicity.

Part of the decline in revenue is driven by online shopping and higher gas mileage vehicles purchasing less gasoline which is causing the drop in the local state and federal governments revenue. We looked at a chart of taxes per state. Simply, New York gas stations charge over a dollar in taxes per gallon. Here’s a blurb we found on one of the websites we accessed trying to learn about the gasoline taxes. It reminded us of when we try to decipher the costs and taxes on our phone bills.

Excerpt from report:
Petroleum Business Tax (13-A) - requires annual adjustment (gasoline $0.178/gal, diesel $0.1605/gal).  Petroleum Testing Fee (gasoline): $0.005/gal. Additional sales taxes apply: State Sales Tax: $0.08/gal ($0.0875/gal in the Metropolitan Commuter Transportation District (MCTD)); local sales taxes also apply (some counties levy this in a cents-per-gallon manner.) Prepaid Sales Tax rates (see Publication 790, “Chart for Prepayment of Sales Tax on Motor Fuels”): $0.175/gal, $0.21/gal, $0.16/gal for Regions 1, 2, 3, respectively. Oil Spill Prevention, Control, and Compensation License fee: 0.08 cents per barrel plus a surcharge of $0.0425 cents per barrel, all petroleum products ($0.0029/gal). 

The costs from lawsuit guilty verdicts against Mr Feiner are crippling the town’s taxpaying residents. We all need relief. But imposing new taxes onto visitors to our area is not the answer. Westchester County has the highest taxes in the nation. Greenburgh’s taxes go up consistently every year, tax cap or not. The NYS Tax Cap, while a great PR stunt for the politicos, is not helping provide relief to the beleaguered taxpayers. Greenburgh residents and businesses need help from inane decisions such as this recently passed hotel tax by agenda-driven politicians. We need actions of character, moral compass and decision-making that reflects what the majority is interested in achieving, such as more open space, lower taxes, less development and congestion. We need elected officials who represent the constituency, not the developers and others with little or no “skin in the game.” Only then will we see A Better Greenburgh.

Feiner Pushes New Tax While Professing Tax Cap Compliance

The Rolling Stones' song, You Can't Always Get What You Want, sometimes rings true, except in Greenburgh. Mr Feiner has stacked most of the decks to his benefit for his own agenda. If a taxpaying resident doesn't like a zoning requirement that was created back when our leaders favored a real vision for our Town, they could move and find another place to live. If people found this planning attractive and wanted to be a part of it, they could move to Greenburgh. But nowadays, Mr Feiner and a quid pro quo handshake with developers, can and invariably does, allow it to be changed, regardless of community input. Concurrently, whatever the Planning Review and Zoning Review Boards say is only a recommendation to the Town Board and easily ignored or dismissed by at least three of the five on the Town Board providing Mr Feiner the changes he seeks. It's purely a stacked deck against the resident taxpayers. Now he's going beyond the residents.

Touting the NYS 2% Tax Cap, Mr Feiner has jumped on the "taxing bandwagon" with all of his cronies. He professes to be operating under the NYS 2% Tax Cap through semantics and a willfully ignorant electorate, but he does not actually stick to it. Our State, and in particular our County, has the highest taxes in the nation. And, Mr Feiner just asked his Albany best-buds, Legislators Stewart-Cousins and Abinanti to pass a 3% tax levy that the Town could apply to hotel rooms. What this means is the Town will get a small fee per room, a yearly "windfall" by applying this tax to visitors to Westchester and in particular the Town of Greenburgh.

What Mr Feiner and many politicians like him refuse to acknowledge is that each time another tax is added to a hotel bill, some corporate accountant sits with a calculator analyzing their traveling colleague's expense report and questioning if they really need to go there to begin with, or stay overnight. Eventually, businesses will begin to change their travel habits and affect Mr Feiner's newest cash cow. Since past performance is an indicator of future results, we know Mr Feiner will invariably have another Fortress Bible-like decision waiting against him in the wings. Here's a suggestion for Mr Feiner: stop breaking the law and you won't need your buds to create more taxes!
 
The New York State Legislature approved a law that authorizes the Town of Greenburgh to generate additional needed revenue by having a 3% hotel tax. This tax could generate from non-resident visitors to the Town significant revenue--probably somewhere between $200,000-$500,000 a year. There are almost 2000 hotel rooms in town. According to Mr Feiner, "The dollars received will be used to REDUCE your property tax bills and to comply with the tax cap." Really? Each time he says this he fails to produce either hard numbers or cold facts - and we never see a savings. He speaks in generalities, platitudes and what we like to call a circular conversation. You've seen him do it often. You ask a question and he has some colloquial story or personal experience and steers the conversation away from what the original topic was. Of course, there's always the, "This is just my personal opinion..." Sorry Mr Feiner, your position as Supervisor is like that of a police officer. You are always the Supervisor, just like a cop is always a cop and never really "off-duty", and saying something is your personal opinion doesn't hold water. Now, if you want to step down as Supervisor to have a personal opinion, we'd be happy to give you an open forum...
 
The Town has been seeking permission to impose a hotel tax since at least 2009. The New York State Legislature had previously authorized New Rochelle, White Plains, Rye and 43 counties in NYS to have the tax--but not Greenburgh. 46.5% of the counties that had previously been granted permission to have a hotel tax by the state have smaller populations than the Town of Greenburgh. Mr Feiner argued that NYS was not treating Greenburgh fairly. Now he knows how the residents feel.
 
The villages of Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, Elmsford, Hastings, Irvington and Tarrytown as well as villages within the Town of Mount Pleasant were also granted permission to adopt a hotel tax this week by the legislature. But most of these communities with hotels are generally used in part or total for DSS (welfare) recipients. They had formally been known as Welfare motels. So we pay top dollar for these people to live in small rooms with no conveniences beyond a bathroom. We're sure not everybody in these hotels are DSS recipients, but the fact remains that not only did Mr Feiner push for this tax increase, but we a) will not see our taxes go down, and b) in the end only increased the taxes on ourselves. We need politicians that have our best interest at heart, not theirs and the re-election campaigns. It's time for term limits in Greenburgh. 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.

Secret Negotiations Exposed with Trans-Pacific Partnership for NYS

Representatives from the community will hold a People’s Town Hall style event to provide information on the effects the TPP would inflict on everyday average Americans. The event will include an expert on trade, a panel made up of Labor, Faith, Community & Environmental organizations and an opportunity for local elected leaders to explain what they have learned from and to the public.

WHERE: Greenburgh Town Hall 177 Hillside Ave, Greenburgh NY
WHEN: Tuesday, April 22th, 6:45pm

Currently, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is being negotiated in secret between the United States and Pacific Rim countries including Malaysia, Mexico, Japan, and Vietnam, which are 40% of the world economy. The massive proposed agreement would destroy jobs, eliminate regulatory protections, and allow international trade tribunals to overturn American laws. An example would be the Investment State Disput Settlement. In short, any law passed by state or federal government to protect the environment or jobs in America could be considered a barrier for free trade. This would allow foreign corporations to sue not for damages but for potential lost profits – making the ceiling for damages open to astronomical numbers with no recourse for those being sued!

Fast Track legislation, which would create a process to ram the agreement through Congress, was introduced in the Senate and House on January 9th. Fast Track legislation surrenders Congress’ Constitutional rights with respect to trade policy. Among other limitations to Congress’ authority, Fast Track forces an up-or-down, unamendable vote with limited debate on a final deal, preventing meaningful consultation or input, and straightjacketing opponents to the deal.

NAFTA and WTO, which like the TPP mostly cover issues not directly related to trade (such as tariffs or customs and border crossing), were pushed through using the Fast Track process. Fast Track legislation is vital to concluding the 12 nation negotiations on the TPP.

Politico and The New York Times have detailed growing bi-partisan opposition in Congress, with ideologically diverse groups and interests opposing Fast Tracking the negotiation process. To date, no House Democrat has been willing to co-prime-sponsor the legislation, which closely tracks 2002 legislation rejected by the large majority of Democrats.

Wikileaks recently released leaked details of the secret agreement, covering intellectual property rights and Rx drug pricing and environmental issues. The leaked drafts confirm opponent’s fears. The TPP would destroy jobs, eliminate food safety standards, benefit Wall Street banks, and over-ride U.S. laws. 

Representative Nita Lowey will be on hand to discuss what good trade should look like for America. Assembly members Shelley Mayer, David Buchwald will respond to the implications TPP will have to NYS. Present will also be representatives from Senator Latimer and Stewart-Cousins offices, Westchester/Putnam Central Labor Body, Concerned Families of Westchester, Mount Vernon United Tenants, WESPAC, Lower Hudson Valley Chapter of Sierra Club, Food & Water Watch, Hudson River Presbytery Peru Partnership, Westchester MoveOn.org

Greenburgh To Pay for Initial Remediation at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road

An admission was made in an email (shown below) to the Worthington-Woodlands Civic Association President, indicating the Town of Greenburgh will probably pay for the remediation of the oil spill at the former Frank’s Nursery site at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road. The contaminated property has languished  since before the Town acquired the property years ago. ABG has maintained throughout this boondoggle that ultimately it will be the Unincorporated portion of the Town, The Paul’s “whipping boy”, that will foot the bill for cleaning up this property. This letter from the New York State DEC’s Todd Ghiosay confirms what ABG has said all along.

Todd Ghiosay
NYSDEC
Division of Environmental Remediation
Spill Prevention and Response
100 Hillside Avenue - Suite 1W
White Plains, NY  10603-2860
Phone (914) 428-2505 ext. 361
Fax (914) 428-0323>>> 4/19/2013 4:15 PM >>>

Dear Todd,

Thank you for meeting with us on Wednesday, April 17th.

Do you have any information for us regarding the property we discussed?

Sincerely,

Dorrine Livson

REPLY:

Mrs Livson

Victor Carosi returned my call and informed me that his consultant did have an informal meeting with someone at DEC but he did have a name.  He also said that the town is evaluating whether the property will be sold "as is", leaving it up to the buyer to do the remediation or whether the Town should do the cleanup.

Victor did say the he believes that the town will be handling the oil spill cleanup to clear the spill number. 

The last line of his letter is the real indicator of the Town’s intent. ABG is not sure whose decision it was for the Town to pay for the cleanup but doubt it was Mr. Carosi’s. ABG wants to know when this decision made? There’ve been no open discussions about this at any public meetings that ABG is aware of. Was it made during another one of the now-routine Executive Sessions the Board has become so desperate of utilizing? The Paul and his Stepfords have no difficulty shoving their hands down our pants to get at our hard-earned money every time they get more proverbial egg hurled onto their faces due to an impending financial penalty, fine or judgement headed their way. Hold onto your wallets.

If you’ve watched any Town Board meetings within the last six months, you’ve noticed anytime a difficult question is asked or an embarrassing judgement/decision by the Board may be exposed, the secret signal (think The Sting) is given. The designated Board member makes the motion to adjourn to Executive Session, the others stumble over themselves to offer a second to the motion and keep the public from knowing what The Paul (Mr. Open Government) and his Stepford Board will soon discuss behind closed doors.

There are several issues at play here for the Town residents (and several Attorney Generals) that our loyal followers already know. First, The Paul entered into secret negotiations with GameOn 365’s principals long before the Town acquired this property through foreclosure. Can you say collusion? Second, after the Town had acquired the property, a discussion ensued about how the library construction would impede the public’s use of the library facility and the former Frank’s Nursery was proposed as a temporary library site. That suggestion quickly screeched to a halt once it was learned that carcinogens, a fuel oil leak, and the earlier use of the property was uncovered as a dump for White Plains’ Urban Renewal waste. Ironically, the overhead high tensions wires bordering the property seemed to be of little concern.

Third, collusion with GameOn 365 began the illegal scenario but was by no means the only misplay by The Paul and his Stepfords. Once GameOn 365 finalized their Sports Bubble plan, they needed investors to pull this pyramid-like scheme off as their organization is made up of a bunch of stock brokers without the funds to proceed. GameOn 365 needed the lease to promote the offering to potential investors. They winked and explained to The Paul of their plan to erect a gigantic, 8-story (83ft tall) inflatable bubble on the site, make a few outdoor fields and pay the Town $5M. They had him hooked once The Paul heard he could make $5M dollars. The Paul had lost so much money with his screw up of the WestHelp deal, Fortress Bible guilty verdict (and others) that he began salivating like a vampire at a blood bank. GameOn 365 went in front of the Town Board as a formality and officially pitched the plan. The Paul told them to love it, so they did! Shrewdly, The Paul offered to lease the property to them for 15 years for a total of $5M. That breaks down to about $300k per year – an amount The Paul was unwilling to accept for the WestHelp property that the Town doesn’t even own.

The Paul has been pushing sports bubbles in the Town for years but could not proceed because of a restriction through the Finneran law. What to do? Wait a minute... The Paul asked his buddies Tom “Proclamation” Abinanti, now a NYS Assemblyman and NYS Senator Andrea “Platitudes” Stewart-Cousins to railroad an amendment to the Finneran Law allowing bubbles through their respective chambers during the “it’s getting late and we have to hit the road” final minutes of their respective legislatures. Done (deal)! The Paul could proceed with his promises to illegally offer the lease.

The Paul even had one of our Recreation Commissioners (there are two – just like our magic tax-cap number), Gerry Bryne, speak to Greenburgh’s need for more sports fields. Rather than remediate the property and develop it as a sports field if we truly need more sports fields, The Paul sought this illegal lease. Then The Paul decided to add insult to injury and hold a referendum for the illegal lease deal, trying to validate his illegal deal. Knowing the public is clueless, he knew if he worded the referendum “properly”, adding in yard signs and newspaper ads, voters would read it for the first time at the voting “booth” and it would pass – which it did. But illegal is still illegal even though he successfully duped the majority of voters into approving it.

ABG readers also know that anytime someone disagrees with what The Paul is doing, his classic response, “If you don’t like what I’m doing, you can sue me.” So they did – again. Another sports-oriented company with a different clientele and business model, House of Sports of Ardsley, NY, initiated a lawsuit along with several others, to block the illegal lease. The premise for their lawsuit was that NY State and Westchester County law mandates any property acquired by a municipality must be sold or utilized by that municipality. GameOn 365 littered the landscape with yard signs claiming this deal would bring $5M to the Town. How could this be bad for the Town?

The saga continues, but is now on hold as The Paul claims the Town is doing its “due diligence” regarding the two offerings. Read: stalling. The Town Board members have been instructed to say the same thing, so they do. As they parrot what The Paul tells them to say, the property sits unremediated and unused. The site is about the size and scope of the WestHelp property that The Paul insisted should be used for the Ferncliff School for the Developmentally Disabled. And mysteriously, he has never suggested using 715 Dobbs Ferry Road for the Ferncliff School. Why not? ABG continues to insist the Town do the right thing and ask for a Request For Proposals (RFP) for the site and see what else we might get?

ABG has previously predicted the Town’s decision will be to sell the property to GameOn 365 – even though House of Sports has offered double the amount of what GameOn 365 has for the site and promised to pay for the remediation. The Paul and the Stepfords will site all kinds of excuses but they will be irrelevant. GameOn 365 can’t “up the ante” because they have no “ante”. House of Sports has cash in hand. ABG continues to predict the Town will wind up paying for remediation of the property either directly or through credits of some sort once GameOn 365 gets the property. ABG doesn’t really care what is built on the property but acknowledges it is zoned for residential housing and should remain that way. We can only hope.

Aurora Borealis and SPF-40

We hope many were busy with family and friends enjoying the holidays and this time of year. A recent forage into the wonderlands of Eastchester brought us to an interesting version of their sports bubble, located at the Lake Isle Country Club and run by the infamous bubble kings, Sportime - sans The Paul. You’ll recall how The Paul petitioned his Albany buddies Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Tom Abinanti to covertly get the Finneran Law changed in 2012 in the wee hours of the legislative morning, allowing the Town (really The Paul and his Stepford Board) to install sports bubbles at will. This was a scheme The Paul had been planning since about 2005.

As we ventured southbound on Rt 22, we knew the Lake Isle Country Club would be on our left. Unsure exactly where it was, we were suddenly awed by what could only be considered Westchester’s version of the Aurora Borealis, aka our northern lights! With a marker like this, the space shuttle could have navigated a landing. As we pulled into the parking lot of the Lake Isle Country Club, we couldn’t find a roadway that led to the bubble. We decided to drive to the next street south of the entrance we had entered and see if we could access it from a different side. We could not. But as we got lost in a seemingly well-to-do neighborhood of middle to large sized homes, we were always able to get our bearings from “the glow” of the bubble.

We returned to the Lake Isle Country Club parking lot and decided to walk toward the bubble. The walkway was not illuminated by light fixtures and yet the amount of light provided by the bubble was more than adequate for us to proceed. As we got a bit closer, it got brighter and we discovered the bubble was in fact three bubbles! These were not as large as what has been proposed at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road by GameOn 365 and The Paul. The GameOn 365 bubble will be approximately eight and a half stories high in a residentially zoned neighborhood! ABG is realistic and knows that since The Paul wants this project at all cost, he will make sure his Stepford Board “rubber stamps” the zoning change to whatever GameOn 365 requests – and then some.

You may recall the proposal from GameOn 365 ends if the zoning or planning boards vote against it? Well, don’t hold your breath, especially now that The Paul is touting an unethical, but technically legal, sale of the property without putting it out to bid. He insisted on holding a referendum for the done-deal that many opposed stating that the referendum was needed to see what the people wanted of the property. The Paul’s reality has nothing to do with “the people” and everything to do with what he wants. He wants the bubble and so he’ll find a way to make it happen! Unfortunately for the residents that live in the area, The Paul discarded their opinions and opened the decision to the entire Town. This was an underhanded, low-blow to the Worthington Woodlands communities. The neighborhoods opinion toward decisions that directly affect them should always be paramount and respected by our “elected representatives” and not tossed aside to get the outcome The Paul sought. In a real version of Greenburgh, The Paul would work for us, not developers and campaign contributors!

Once we arrived at the bubble’s entrance, we joked about needing to apply SPF-40. We entered an empty lobby with a receptionist who said hello and went back to what she was doing. We ambled over to a window overlooking two tennis courts with what appeared to be a clay court. A young employee with a Sportime shirt came over to see if he could help us. We asked numerous questions, such as how high is the bubble? “Gee, I don’t know.” We guestimated the height to be between four to six stories at the pinnacle. What are the hours of operation? “It varies.” Do they own this facility? “No, Lake Isle Country Club does.” Do they operate it year round? “No, only during the winter when the bubbles are ‘up’.” Lake Isle operates it during the summer, although their goal is to take over the operation year round.” Do the neighbors complain about the light “No, it’s during the winter when they are inside and don’t see it.” Who owns the John McEnroe Tennis Academy; is it Sportime, Lake Isle, Eastchester, or John McEnroe? John McEnroe “owns” it and Sportime operates it.” As we talked he seemed personable, pleasant and knowledgable about the tennis program but nothing regarding the operational side of the business.

As we exited, this same young man walked with us toward our cars, continuing to answer what questions he could. One of us commented on the brightness of the illumination from the bubbles. He told us because of the transparency of the material, and its ability to transfer light, if the sun is out they don’t even turn the interior lights on because it provides enough light inside. ABG staffers in attendance commented that the luminosity of the bubble would be amplified with a larger-sized bubble.

ABG is not against a bubble if it is in the correct venue. The Sportime bubble in Eastchester is located in the middle of a country club and not surrounded by homes. Rather, it is surrounded by a golf course. Sportime was going to install their bubble model in the Anthony Veteran Park, but has decided not to. The Paul won’t discuss it, but ABG believes it was because The Paul and the Stepford’s placed so many mandates on them that they realized the project would not be cost effective. While The Paul doesn’t understand Return On Investment, Sportime does. It’s why they walked. So while The Paul was able to get his Albany cohorts to amend a law that at one time protected the Towns Unincorporated residents, the change has rendered the amendment counterproductive for the Town but not GameOn 365. ABG believes the property at 715 Dobbs Ferry Road should stay residential and be developed as such. If the GameOn deal is so good for the Town, it should be located on Town property, perhaps in Veteran Park. Sell 715 Dobbs Ferry Road through a legitimate assessment, bid process and then take the highest bid for the land, not a deflated price arbitrarily created by The Paul. For once, we’d like to see the Town to do the right thing. We can only hope.