Commentary from Robert I. Rhodes, Ph. D., Chairman, Preserve Ramapo

Ramapo has a hero in the county legislature.  His name is Aron Wieder.  A man of great courage, he has taken on the burdensome defense of our Hasidic community.  Whenever it is suggested that high density housing is overwhelming Ramapo’s resources he goes on the attack.  This argument, he charges, is an anti-Semitic slur directed against his community.

But Wieder is not a hero, he is a racist.  He knows that much of the housing that has been built in recent years for his community was built on land formerly occupied by modest homes owned by Black and Brown families.  They were block busted out of their homes.  Most of the rest of the high-density developments in Ramapo were built on vacant land that had been drastically down-zoned as a gift to Hasidic developers. [Read more…]