Leave to Reese to Waste More Taxpayer Dollars

The following appeared in January 25, 2009 Journal News

North Castle looks to split cost on buying Dubos open space

By Elizabeth Ganga
The Journal News • January 25, 2009

NORTH CASTLE - With Mount Kisco in contract to buy the Dubos property overlooking Byram Lake, what's left in the long saga to keep the 30 acres as open space is to divide up the $475,000 purchase price among the interested entities.

The Westchester Land Trust has committed up to $15,000 in seed money. North Castle Supervisor Reese Berman has said the town will likely split the rest with Mount Kisco. The North Castle Town Board will have a public hearing on spending the money from its open space fund at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The purchase price is low because the parcel, on Baldwin Road, is essentially undevelopable. The current owner, the Rene Dubos Center for Human Environments, attempted to sell the land to developer Michael Cappelli, who wanted to build luxury homes on it, for $1.2 million. But the sale was blocked when the state attorney general objected. The attorney general, who oversees charities, convinced a state judge in White Plains that the sale would have violated the intent of the donations used to purchase the property in 1979. The Eugene and Agnes Meyer Foundation and the DeWitt Wallace Fund donated $275,000 to the Dubos Center to purchase the land and keep it natural. The center had wanted to build an environmental education center nearby but it never happened. Instead, the center hoped to sell the land to pay its debt.

The state Supreme Court will also have to review the sale to Mount Kisco and North Castle.

Way to go Reese. If Mount Kisco wants to pay $475,000 on land that the Court has already rule cannot be developed, let them. Why should North Castle pay a cent? The Attorney General blocked this sale and the price is low because the property cannot be built on. Reese just can't stand the idea of having all that conservation money in the bank burning a hole in her pocket and has to do something with it.

North Castle Board Not Up To The Task

The following letter appeared in the January 22, 2009 Journal News.

The current North Castle Town Board is completely unable to deal effectively with the global financial collapse and its effect upon the local economy. Now is the time to be confronting issues that greatly inflate the cost of government, such as retiree health benefits, wasteful highway spending, inefficient town practices and all around governmental inefficiencies.

However, Supervisor Reese Berman and her control group are victims of the status quo. She refuses to cut any retiree health benefits, even those wrongly given out, opting instead to lay off a cop. She refuses to re-examine the cost of the Town Board members' salary, health and pension benefits, opting instead to increase taxes. It is quite obvious that her prior experience as a school librarian has not prepared her for the fiscal challenges that now confront our nation and our town.

Kerry H. Lutz

Armonk

Mr. Lutz is spot on. Berman has no background to be dealing with multi-million dollar financial issues, especially during these perilous times.

New Garage Proposed For Westchester Airport

The following article appear in The Journal News on January 5, 2009.

Company proposes passenger parking garage just outside Westchester airport

Elizabeth Ganga
The Journal News

NORTH CASTLE - An aircraft parts exporting company with its headquarters next to the Westchester County Airport wants to build a parking garage just outside the airport boundary for passengers who can't find a place to park at the airport.

The president of Aerotech World Trade Corp., Jan Endresen, could not be reached last week but North Castle officials who have gotten some details said he wants to build a garage for several hundred cars on New King Street just outside the northern edge of the airport in the town of North Castle. Travelers would be able to drop off their cars with valet parkers and take a shuttle the short distance to the terminal.

"They're trying to make it as efficient as possible," said North Castle Councilman Bill Weaver, the president of another airport company, Westair, which fuels, parks and stores airplanes.

Aerotech World Trade Corp. will present its plans to the North Castle Town Board, Planning Board and Conservation Board on Jan. 12.

If completed, the garage could be a boon to travelers, who struggle to find parking at the airport, but it could stir up neighbors' concerns that more parking will mean more flights and more noise. Opponents of airport expansion fought to limit the size of the 1,100-car airport garage before it opened in 1994 and to contain the size of the terminal.

"I think that whoever came up with that plan is stepping into a lot of doo doo there," said Leonard Altizio, a founder of the Westchester Aviation Association who lives in West Harrison, of Aerotech's plans.

Neighboring towns and homeowners associations will pressure Aerotech and the town of North Castle to scuttle the proposal, he said. More parking wouldn't be a good thing, he said, and could upset the balance between commercial and private aircraft.

Another tool used to limit the airport's size is an agreement between Westchester County, which owns the airport, and the commercial airlines to cap commercial flights to four every 30 minutes with a total of 240 passengers. But with AirTran and Jet Blue flying to Florida from Westchester, the airport has become more popular with vacationers, who stay longer and tie up parking.

The number of passengers has grown significantly since 2006. The estimated number of commercial airline passengers for 2008 was 1.8 million, up from 1.6 million in 2007 and about 1 million in 2006. The county created a several-hundred-space emergency overflow lot but for the last few years has focused on getting travelers to leave their cars at home. It began an advertising campaign, started a bus service from White Plains and created a cell-phone lot for people picking up passengers.

"When they built the original parking structure, it didn't even meet the needs of the terminal capacity agreement," said Deputy County Executive Larry Schwartz, referring to the limits on commercial flights. A new garage will not increase the number of flights, he said.

Despite the problems, the county has no plans to build more parking, he said.

"We've been relatively successful in educating the traveling public in leaving their cars at home," Schwartz said.

It's not clear whether a garage will draw more people to the airport or simply cause passengers to drive rather than getting dropped off. The impact on traffic is also not clear since there may be fewer trips if people take their own cars instead of relying on others to drive them, resulting in two trips. But some people may stop taking public transportation and shift back to driving.

This is exactly the type of development that North Castle can use. It won't require any more school, police or fire resources, will result in hundreds of thousands more in tax dollars and will not result in one more air traveler. There is currently a severe shortage of parking space at the county airport. As a result, many people are forced to get dropped off by friends, relatives or taxis. Construction of an additional garage would increase parking capacity and town and school taxes. This is exactly the type of project that Berman should push through the planning process. The town needs the money and the traveling public needs the parking. Hopefully she will have the good sense to do so.

NYC DEP Buys Old Bowling Alley

The following story appeared in the Journal News on December 29, 2008.

NORTH CASTLE - The hulking old bowling alley that has marred the view from Route 22 for years will be torn down within six months now that New York City has purchased the property from local developer Michael Fareri.

Later, if plans pan out, a wetland restoration will be attempted on the almost 7-acre property off Old Route 22. The property, formerly Armonk Bowl, is part of the drainage area of the Kensico Reservoir, which holds drinking water from upstate on its way to millions of households in Westchester and New York City, and the city Department of Environmental Protection is buying up land to protect the water quality.

We're quite sure that Supervisor Berman is rejoicing over this "Victory." However, did the town really win? It lost an ideal site for a new supermarket and millions in tax revenue. Time will tell.

Town Layoffs are Inexcusable

Town layoffs are inexcusable

Shame on Armonk ("North Castle lays off five employees to get 4.5 percent tax hike," Dec. 19 story). I have been a resident and land owner in North Castle for more than 60 years, and never thought I would see the day when any of our town employees got fired to reduce the budget; especially a police officer, and at the holiday season. Ask yourselves how would you like to be laid off right now? We are not a poor community; big, expensive gas-guzzling SUVs line Main Street with its expensive shops. To save a little money on the backs of town employees is criminal.

At a retirement party for outgoing Supervisor Jack Lombardi, a notable Town Board member stated: All board members need to ask themselves in the future, how would Jack Lombardi handle this? Not this way, my friends. God forbid a police officer arrives a minute too late in your time of need because of a cut from the budget so we can have another cup of coffee at Starbucks. Where are our priorities? This is a bad decision, and we should be ashamed of ourselves.

Bob Gladman

Nice letter Bob, however you entirely missed the point. The town is not being effectively managed. Millions are wasted each year in retiree health benefits, inefficient road department operations and other items too lengthy to mention here. The key to retaining our quality of life is to cutback on things the town doesn't do well and contract them out to the private sector. However, if you are willing to voluntarily increase your share, we are all willing to support you.

Great New Armonk Website Started

This article appeared in the Journal News on January 2, 2009

NORTH CASTLE - An Armonk resident with a background in advertising has created a Web site that aims to combine town news with information on the arts, the outdoors, transportation and other facets of the community.

Michelle Boyle launched the site, AllAboutArmonk.com, two months ago in the hopes of connecting disparate elements of the community. The home page covers some of the major local news stories over the past several weeks, including the Byram Hills school district budget, local gas prices, the sale of the Armonk Bowl property to New York City, the town budget and the town holiday display. Other pages focus on police news, health and fitness, and education.

"The home page, I try to keep fresh and very current," Boyle said, by publishing items as they become available rather than on a weekly or monthly schedule.

AllAboutArmonk is the latest of several new Web sites and print publications in central and northern Westchester trying to fill the niche for local news. The nonprofit NewCastleNow.org, which covers New Castle, was launched in October 2007 with a university grant promoting digital journalism. The Examiner, a print paper, started in September 2007 and covers Mount Kisco and Pleasantville, and has been steadily expanding.

Boyle has two children in college and one at Byram Hills High School. She has been involved in many local organizations, including the Friends of the North Castle Public Library and the town Conservation Board. She said she started AllAboutArmonk.com in reaction to the disconnectedness she saw among organizations and institutions in town and as a way to use her skills and interests in the Internet and advertising.

"One thing led to the next, and I just created one," she said.

Though Armonk is in the title, Boyle hopes to report news from all over North Castle and interesting items beyond its borders.

Caryl Hahn, a resident of the Windmill neighborhood in Armonk and a friend of Boyle's, was considering creating her own Web site before she heard about Boyle's. Hahn said she grew up in Ossining, where there was a paper so local that it published school lunch menus, and she saw the void in town.

She's happy Boyle took the leap. "Twenty years ago, it would have been a newspaper, and now it's a Web site," Hahn said.

Since starting the site in October, Boyle has added a columnist but has done the bulk of the work herself. She said she hopes to develop a team of writers, columnists and ad representatives. The idea is that most of the content will come from the community. As people or organizations let her know what is going on, she will put it on the site. Since October, the site has gotten more than 5,300 hits, she said.