In recent months I have been posting info about exciting & fun programs. Many of the events are featured, in detail, on www.rivertownsguide.com.
Some of these fun activities are free or very inexpensive. Free does not mean poor quality.
Tonight, for example, I attended the outdoor concert sponsored by the village of Elmsford at DeLuca Park. The concert featured Charlie Lagond & Friends (Omar Hakim, Darryl Tookes, Gene Torres, Yayoi Ikawa, Armand Hirsch). The program was fantastic --the quality of the music outstanding.
These musicians have performed at Presidential inauguration balls and have performed with artists such as CHuck Mangione, the Jackson Five, The Temptations, The Spinners, Natalie Cole, Mariah Carey, Madonna, David Bowie, Sting, Quincy Jones, etc...
The stage lighting added to the event. Everyone who attended had a great time. By the way--Charlie Lagond has a music school "Lagond Music School" in Elmsford.
The village of Elmsford deserves much praise for sponsoring such a high quality program. Many residents of unincorporated Greenburgh also enjoyed the event.
I hope that next year we can organize a town-wide weekend fun activities calendar--coordinating, among the river villages and town fun events so the dates don't conflict with each other. Each of the participating communities should help publicize all the programs neighboring communities sponsor.
PLEASE TRY TO ATTEND SOME OF THE UPCOMING EVENTS HELD IN YOUR BACK YARD. YOU WON"T BE DISAPPOINTED.
PAUL FEINER
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24 comments:
"Tonight on our stage, we going to have a really big sheew"
How about proclaiming Elmsford the village of the month and award them a certificate of appreciation.
Since the Town Board shows no interest in collecting all the money that is due to the Town, you better take in something that's free. Let's see, $2.7 million in unpaid parking tickets, $300,000 from the Greenburgh Housing Authority, $1.8 million sitting in the Water Fund.
Great going Mr. Supervisor.
millions due from the valhalla school district too!
send beville a bill
Paul's Fire District consolidation committee has its first big decision to make tomorrow. Do they include a study of the Fire Protection Districts or don't they. My guess is that Feiner has already ordered Hochberg not to. Feiner does not want the taxpayers to know that the citizens of the Fire Protection Districts are funding the Villages!!! Yes, that's right, their tax dollars are being gobbled up by the Villages and NOT for their fire protection! State Law dictates that only up to 35% of the contract amount can be given over to the Village Fire Departments for Fire Protection. Remember those words "up to." That means that by LAW, a MINIMUM of 65 cents of every dollar that the citizens of the Fire Protection Districts pay out in taxes remains with the Villages!!!!! Shhhhhhhh! Feiner does not want that info out there for public consumption. Feiner is raping the Fire Protection Districts in order to fund the Villages!!!! Is this why several of the Fire Protection Districts are run at a defecit Paul???????
The fire commission wishes to study the efficiency of fire protection in Greenburgh . It must include all areas of the issue including the protection districts. The town provides considerable monies to the districts. It is not logical to exclude the protection districts. The town board lauds tranparent government.
If ihe commission is truly independent and objective, it must vote to include the fire protection districts in the study.
With Hohberg and Hoffman aboard, this Commission already has made its conclusions. Feiner did not put TWO of his Boys on the committee for nothing!
This is Feiner's new strategy - he is putting cronies on all the boards so that he can take control. On board's where he has limited say he has managed to increas the number of members so that again, he can put his cronies on the board. On one particular board he made an illegal appointment - the appointee did not qualify. His response, "sue me"
I have several questions and or comments.
1) If the STAR numbers are incorrect can you tell me when and if they will be fixed?
2) How come there was no mention of the filming of the new Will Farrell movie that was filmed in Hartsdale last Thursday? How much did this cost the town in police and fire overtime and how much was the town paid? (Town Board mebers were on scene)
3) Please bring back the misc. topic as people (including me) are posting under irrelevant topics or topics that are 10 days old. This makes the website a disorganized mess. Marc please fix it!!!
Thank You!
To Anonymous 9/29/2009 10:03 AM:
The impact of the STAR program in 2009 vs 2008 as published was incorrect. The amount on your tax bill this year is correct.
For example, for the Ardsley School District, the impact of the STAR program was a decline of $157.57 not $268.21 as communicated by the Supervisor.
All of the amounts were overstated.
I agree, all fire protection should be studied by this consolidation committee.
Paul lives in a fire protection district and does not want his taxes to go up!
Thanks again Mike!!!!!
This is another study that will go nowhere. How can you possibly conduct a study of the fire districts if you're told that certain districts can not be included? Feiner & Morgan are in fire protection districts with low taxes because they use volunteers. They don't want anyone to jeopardize their taxes - even if it comes at the expense of the rest of us. Either study all the districts or stop talking about consolidation.
Speaking of studies, what happened to the $65,000 Hartsdale Drainage Study? The information was incorrect yet the consultant was paid in full. Yet another taxpayer sponsored bookshelf study!
What about the Comprehensive Master Plan? A half million dollar study that is now more than 2 years in the making. It will be outdated before it is ever completed. Put that on the shelf, too!
We all saw how Moegan answered Bernstein concerning the fire consoladation at the last meeting.
Well Feiner's mind and Morgan mind have been made up because it concerns them
They are not thinking about the other residents of this town.
One can see that certain members only want to help tose in their own districts.
Sadly this situation is dividing the town a bit more.
What should hve been done that a full scale study be made concerning all of Greenburgh BUT
we can see that this would not happen since the supervisor and some board members don't give a damn.
What do they have to hide??
Could it be that tax monies have gone to the wayside.
Kolesar what is your take on this matter.
You seem to be the only one that can come up with some honest answer although you do live in a village..
Elmsford screwed Greenburgh as far as the library goes now they will screw the unincorpoated area with this fire consolidation .
The residents of Fairview should demand that a full study should be made so they can see how and where their tax money is going.Since the new chief of Hartsdale is an Elmsford resident you can rest assured that this will not be done.
Get together and fight --you all pay taxes so you deserve answers.
The new fire chief in Hartsdale is not just an Elmsford resident -- he's an Elmsford Trustee. Don't think for one minute that he'd allow a study that would subject Elmsford to any risk that it would lose a million bucks in revenue from fire protection districts in unincorporated Greenburgh. It's a shame though. The one fire district that could really benefit from this is Fairview.
FAIRVIEW RESIDENTS WAKE UP.
THE TOWN IS TRYING TO PULL A FAST ONE.
NAUGHTY NAUGHTY CHIEF YOU KNOW VERY WELL THAT THIS SITUATION IS ONE HUNDRED PERCENT WRONG.
WHAT A WAY TO START A NEW JOB.
Has anyone noticed when Kevin is trying to coverup wrong doings he gets very combative.
Just take a look at how many times he opened his mouth at any meeting to see how he tries his hardest to get his point across.
He didn't come across as an honest politico concerning Fairview.
He triedto turn things arround saying that the speaker was against volunteers.
He does not listen to the truth.
The speaker was right in saying that during the day the volunteers are out working soooo who answers the calls. The paid firefighter.
Was the speaker wrong Kevin?
I can't speak for other villages, but in Ardsley the volunteers cover 24/7 365. We have members of the Village DPW who are also volunteers as well as NYC fire personnel who cover during the day when they are needed and available. There are local businessmen and others who work in the area and are also available to cover. To imply that a (the) villages and thus the fire protection districts which they serve are unprotected during the day is just not true. As a village property owner, I wouldn't be able to get homeowners' coverage if there were no fire protection for vast periods of time.
Even if volunteers do in fact cover Ardsley 24/7, the fact that they have other jobs means that, in an emergency, there might still be a critical delay in response times. But even if assuming that Ardsley volunteers can respond in the fire protection districts they cover just as quickly as the paid full-time professionals in a neighboring fire district could respond, which is a big if, why shouldn't the opportunity to serve the fire protection districts be subject to competitive bidding in any event? Why is it that the villages in Greenburgh have a lock on this business? Something's awfully fishy when a Town refuses to allow competitive bidding, and won't even allow the issue to be publicly discussed. Wanna bet that the Town officials who refuse to allow the fire districts to bid on this business either have political ties to the villages (i.e., members of the Town Board who can't get elected without village support), or they live in villages that might be out-bid. Who loses? Why the taxpayers in unincorporated Greenburgh, that's who.
Look at the volunteer ambulance corps is Ardsley. They are volunteer and capable when they can get volunteers to go to calls. Dobbs Ferry ambulance corps has to cover calls in Ardsley on a regular basis.
I have no problem with a review of the manner in which fire protection is provided to portions of unincorporated Greenburgh. I believe that all organizations ( businesses, not-for profits, government) should periodically reevaluate how they operate and why.
The study and evaluation is likely to be fairly complex and somehow I doubt that the current committee has the time, expertise, and resources to do a thorough job. However, one must be careful. For example, the Chauncy fire protection district sits atop the hills south of the Village of Ardsley. I sincerely doubt that Greenville could handle this area. Open it up to competitive bidding rather than basing the costs on actual expenses and my guess is that the fees charged to this area will skyrocket as there will be no competition. The same is true for the Donald Park fire protection district. I don't think that one can force someone to provide a service.
There are many questions I could add in response to some of the anonymous postings, but I'll keep those to myself for the time being.
The suggestion that competitive bidding will cause costs to skyrocket is absurd. Competitive bidding usually results in the lowest cost provider getting the contract. Right now, there's no competitive bidding for the fire protection districts. As a result, the villages can simply furnish the Town with a number as to their "costs" without regard to whether the service can be provided by others for less cost. It may well be that some districts, like Donald Park and Chauncey can't be made subject to competitive bidding because there's no other fire jurisdiction that's contiguous to those locations. But it's also possible that, for example, Ardsley itself might be able to provide a cheaper alternative for Donald Park than, say, Hastings can. But to not even take a look at it?
And what's so hard about taking a look at this? Right now, the only oversight that exists at all is from the town board, and there's no evidence that they provide any oversight at all.
Inviting competitive bidding would simply allow those in a position to make a bid to do so. It will then be up to the town board to determine whether the bid protects both public safety and taxpayers' wallets. What could possibly be wrong with that?
Only those afraid of potentially disturbing the villages' monopoly on these services would be opposed to that.
Dear 9/30 (9:56) _ Let's get it right. The Library wanted to screw Elmsford by raising their rate 30% each year for three years. Elmsford told them where to put their raise.
What is wrong with asking Elmsford or any other municipality that does not have it's own library to pay the same as the rest of us? If Ardsley is cheaper, fine. We should not give our services away...Feiner loves to give our services away.
Competitive bidding - absolutely does not always result in lower costs. My guess is that the paid districts have higher wage rates & benefit packages. That will result in higher bids.
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