Monday, November 03, 2008

DO YOU WANT TO MEET THE GOVERNOR WEDNESDAY?

Governor Paterson’s office contacted me. The Governor will be in area on Wednesday at 3:30 PM and asked me to provide their office with a list of 10-12 residents who reside in Greenburgh who are concerned about budget issues. If you are available to meet with the Governor in a Town Hall setting on Wednesday between 3:30 and 5, please advise by emailing me at pfeiner@greenburghny.com. I need your name and e mail and phone.

PAUL FEINER

28 comments:

Anonymous said...

WOWWEE Is he going to tell us something that we don't know.
Do you think that he would listen to a Greenburgh resident who will lay it on the line as to how our money was squandered on centers that bring in diddlesquatt.
Do you think he would listen how the State comptroller had to investigate the wrong doings over and over again with no solution on the towns part.
Let'see who shows up for this meeting.
I bet the same people that cry poverty will be there with bells on
crying a little louder.

Anonymous said...

Why? If you don't listen to us what guarantees do we have that the governor will listen to us? I'm sure he'll say he's glad that we brought this or that to his attention and then he'll go back to Albany and do whatever he wants. I have no faith in my elected officials, none. They have displayed a level of disinterest in the middle class that is unbelievable. They care about their campaign chests and popularity ratings more than they do about their constituency.

Anonymous said...

Why not invite Lasser, Bernstein, MccNally, Krauss, Samis and Reinenger?

Anonymous said...

why not danny gold - king of taxter ridge?

let him explain to the gov what a great purchase the state made under his pre-predecessor - george pataki -

Anonymous said...

You are being kidded; this is just the pilot for a new post-budget reality show, "Do You Want to Meet the Governor?"

Another offering from the Town's Council on the Arts.

Greenlighted from an idea developed by the "Seinfeld" team who brought you a "show about nothing".

However, don't be alarmed, no Greenburgh Police will earn overtime during production and the Town Clerk will not receive an additional stipend for filling in as program moderator.

And all of the Governor's answers will be recycled in accordance with Greenburgh's tough policy on speaking limits.


"Before we start, I just want to be sure that everyone understands the rules du jour; you may speak for 3 minutes on any topic, Governor. If we have time at the end, you may have an additional 5 minutes, unless the meeting goes beyond 5:00 in which case you can submit written comments to the Town Board unless they paying house calls on residents or taking municipal finance courses at Xposure University" -- Tim Lewis

And Governor, would you like to see our new Library before you leave to visit the other three cities on the Money list.

Anonymous said...

Aha, you Mr. Samis, with the entertaining writing and the perfect grammer -- it is not the "other" three cities. We are not a city.

Anonymous said...

"We are not a city." Which is why Money Magazine stated the correction and has removed Greenburgh from future consideration. Embarrassing that Greenburgh still boasts of this error.

Anonymous said...

Dear 3:47,

Ain't nutting wrong with my grandma.

I covered the town/city Money mix-up in my 12:45 post on 10/31.

Bin dere, dun dat.

Anonymous said...

Other non cities like Clarkstown in Rockland also received the Money Magazine designation. Anon 5:01 is wrong.

Anonymous said...

Let's be sensible here. Think seriously about talking to the Governor. How about the State paying for Medicaid instead of making the County pay for it which then winds up in our County taxes.

Urge the Governor to continue efforts to force School Districts to raise school taxes no more than 4 percent a year, as he has proposed. And while the Governor is at it, urge a proposal to keep Town and State taxes to more than 4 percent a year!! Go for it!! so that we can afford to live in New York, Westchester, Greenburgh and our local school districts. This is a golden opportunity, given the nation wide finanacial down turn. If it can't be done now, it never will be done.

Anonymous said...

It is time for a change. If obama wins you and your bunch on bandits days are numbered.Please don't even consider running again .Sonja and kevin start looking for a real job. You where hoodwinked.Paul it is time to move on .Even if McCain wins you and your bunch got to go

Anonymous said...

I can't be there, but maybe someone could talk with the Governor about updating municipality regulations. This village/unincorporated setup is so outdated and creates silly dramas. We should just be nine villages who may (or may not) choose to share some services.

Anonymous said...

Dear 11:01 -
I support a tax cap too. The difference is that I would also require a SPENDING cap.
The problem is that, for example, if Greenburgh had enacted a spending cap in, say, 1992, the results would be a complete disaster.
In 1992, all of Greenburgh, villages and unincorporated, had a population of less than 40,000. Today the population exceeds 90,000 for all areas.
The total Town budget was just short of $13 million. At a 4% rate of growth, today the budget would be about $25 million.
I'm sorry, but I cannot figure out how 90,000 people can be supported by a budget of $25 million without unbelievably diminished services.
Think ahead people - do you really want to live with what you are telling the politicians you want?
Think about the services missing from a Town budget that is only 1/3 the current proposal.
Never give even a well-meaning politician a blank check!

Anonymous said...

Dear 6:31 "correcting" 5:01,

How does citing other mistakes by "Money" magazine diminish the mistake regarding Greenburgh.

"Money" is not a high-minded, serious magazine which conducts careful research. What they did was scan census figures which made them assume that above a certain point on the list, it must be a city. Something that speaks volumes about hiring interns.

"Money" treats its subject matter as seriously as, say, "The Journal News". It's slot among its sister publications is to act as "The Entertainment Weekly" of personal finance and it makes no representations (indeed editorially it would resist such a notion) that is a source of information for scholars. A statement which often applies to magazines sold in supermarkets.

"Money" goofed; they admitted their goof. The only one who maintains and treats this joke seriously is, of course, the Town Supervisor who is the champion of low brow rhetoric.

And, he will be quoting this ranking well beyond this year's mistaken inclusion. If "Popular Mechanics" said that Greenburgh is the 10th best place to get a tire rotated, you can expect to see a press release and a blog topic with the de rigeur anonymous postings "Good job, Paul".

Anonymous said...

Hal--Would it have been better if Greenburgh WAS NOT named by Money Magazine as one of the best places to live in the United States?

Anonymous said...

Dear tricky 11:54,

Would it be better if the bank had not made an error and credited your account with $100,000 that was not yours?

Would it be better if there were weapons of mass destruction?

But even that is not what your manipulative question augers.

In formal argument there are such constructions known as syllogisms which are "tricks" employed in phrasing a question so there is no wholly correct answer for the respondant to make.

Thus, by substituting, such a device for the argument itself, the counterpart of the argument yields to a fallacy inherent in the question. Questions may be disarming but that does not mean they aren't really deceptive or disingenuous.

My favorite examples in this category are:

If you are a Democrat (or Republican) and anonymous asks:

"Are you a dumb Democrat" (or Republican)? How do you answer? 'yes' you are a Democrat and thus you are dumb or 'no' because because you aren't dumb but have to deny being a Democrat.

You are married and anonymous asks:
"Have you stopped beating your wife?"

'Yes' and admit you used to beat her or 'No' and leave the impression you still beat her.

So what this seemingly simple question by anonymous asks is: "would it have been better if Greenburgh was not named..."

This enlists a consideration about basic adherence to truth and morality, whether benifitting from
someone's mistake (Money Magazine) is an appropriate choice. Which is why I started this reply with two questions of my own.

That the Supervisor seized upon this ranking before it was understood that the conferer made a mistake by entering Greenburgh in the competition of CITIES was initially tolerable. However, the problem, like so many of the horses that the Supervisor rides, is that once he knows that his "triumph" is bankrupt, he still supports it. Willful or intentional perversion of the truth is called FRAUD.

Consider that this FRAUD now appears on the Town's letterhead, on its website and atop every communication by the Supervisor.

Let me ask instead this question: Would it be better if the Greenburgh Town Supervisor did not perpetuate FRAUD?

Lawyers are invited to comment.

Anonymous said...

MONEY MAGAZINE's designation of our town as one of the nation's best is good news for property values and bad news for Greenburgh haters.

Anonymous said...

No, it is bad news for the country.
If Greenburgh is among the best, how sad for the rest of the folks.

Anonymous said...

i'd rather meet samis.

Anonymous said...

Meeting Samis is easy. Make a very generous contribution to Feiner98 and the Supervisor will have John Kapica's storm troopers detain Hal at the next Library Trustees meeting.

Anonymous said...

LETTING PATTERSON COME TO GREENBURGH IS A BIG MISTAKE.

Could we explain to him the bad situation that this town is in.NO.
There will not be enough time.
Could we tell him how we too are struggling to make ends meet.NO

Is he going to listen to any of us who live in the 80th best place to live.NO

Is he going to listen how disatified we are with services.?

Will he lower our taxes????

No I will pass on this meeting with the governor. He's no different than me .
We both put our pants on the same way.

Anonymous said...

Get rid of the Sanatation dept and get a contract with a private company. We can save millions!
While you're at get rid of the police dept. contract out with the county or state police. We could save millions more!
close the community center save millions!

Anonymous said...

Paul why don't you follow what the governor is doing to lower the taxes.

Now mayor Bloomberg is doing the same so why not you.

Anonymous said...

Thats right Bloomberg cut the library hours, cut services and made hard choices. Patterson said the school districts will be getting less and they should get their act together. And yes again the spastic demented writings of unabomber HAL. He throws more scuds then were launched in Iraq. When you sit lonely and in touch with yourself in front of the computer what sick thoughts go through your mind HAL. Let loose say what you really mean. Make that other person in the mirror proud. I for one am happy with how the town is moving forward. It is obvious that the town isnot news worthy right now and that is great. If it irks you HAL do something off the cuff . Make a statement. Excite your self

Anonymous said...

Paul

Please let the Governor know that GC7 needs to be closed. The children need to be sent to other districts so they can get a quality education.

Anonymous said...

Paul, could you list the people from the community who attended as a result of your posting / email? Please don't include Assemblyman Brodsky and Legislator Bronz as I am sure they attended in their elected roles.

Thanks.

Anonymous said...

GC7 has nothing to do with the town of greenburgh, and is improved under new superindentendt. If you dont like it, run for school board.

Anonymous said...

Mrs. Roper firing is not justified the truth is she was fired for trying to collect money from Gay Silverman - Valerie Whitehead "sugar daddy" - Valerie on the Silver Streaks payroll.

Gay Silverman still has not paid for using the pool- $20,000 that belongs to the TOWN taxpayers. Roper was a employee who collected fees and did an excellent job and made the lazy lifeguard work! Yes, I was there when they did not sit in the lifeguard chair-Ms. Roper enforced this and other aquatic protocols. People have you forgotten the child who drowned in that pool with the full time staff. Who will have the last laugh?

Whitehead on the other hand is stealing town money by hiring no show job workers. What's the District Attorney doing with the investigation? If she's not proscuted for her crime we know it's you Paul. Paul you want ways to raise revenue - How about collect the fee's already owed by your campaign contributor GAY Silverman-$20,000 a chunk of change taxpayer deserve.
Step up to the place Paul - and fired whitehad for stealing because she should not have been working while under a criminal investigation and we would still have a great employee - Mrs. Roper