• Document Cloud
  • FOIL–Your Right to Know
  • See Through NY
  • Tax Exempt
  • Environmental Justice
  • Campaign Finance Reports

Preserve Ramapo

www.preserve-ramapo.com

  • Home
  • Join our email
  • Donate
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • The Archive
You are here: Home / East Ramapo Central School District / Christopher St. Lawrence / Ramapo cleans house at St. Lawrence’s RLDC

Ramapo cleans house at St. Lawrence’s RLDC

July 13, 2017 by Michael Castelluccio

RLDC 2.0Last night, at the regular Ramapo Town Board meeting, acting Supervisor Yitzchok Ullman and the Town Board removed the last vestiges of Christopher St. Lawrence’s influence in the shadow government that he had operated for years out of the Ramapo Local Development Corporation (RLDC). Recently convicted, St. Lawrence founded and Chaired the RLDC, and also served as the entity’s President. The Executive Director of the RLDC, Aron Troodler, was also convicted on federal charges related to his activities at the RLDC, so all that remained were the loosely hanging remnants of the org chart, including a temporary Executive Director, the bookkeeper, and two chair members. They were all removed, at a savings of $250,000 to the taxpayers, and, more importantly, the action represented the final neutering of a corrupt hidden branch of Ramapo governance that built the ballpark and the Elm Street project.

RLDC 2.0

Actually, there were two meetings last night. The first was the regular board meeting, it was brief, and it was followed immediately by an RLDC reorganization meeting. A board resolution established new officers for an RLDC 2.0. Yitzchok Ullman will serve as Acting President, John Lynch as Treasurer, and Christian Sampson as Secretary. The regular Town Board members (Pat Withers, Brendel Logan-Charles, Michael Rossman, and Frederick Brinn) will all have equal voting power in future decisions. All officers will serve without compensation.

Regarding the terminations of the employees that were serving the St. Lawrence RLDC, the following resolutions were passed:

The Bookkeeper/Comptroller Bracha Gobioff was removed, effective Friday, July 21, 2017. (Note: Gobioff is a member of the Ramapo Planning Board and will continue to remain on that board.)

The Executive Director Kerry Potter was removed, effective Friday, July 21, 2017.

The two RLDC Board members, John Brunson and Moses Gross, also have been terminated.

Change of Special Counsel

St. Lawrence was convicted of 20 of the 22 counts brought against him by the Justice Department, and he will be sentenced on Sept. 28 for those crimes. Still remaining though are the 22 counts brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in a civil action against the RLDC. St. Lawrence and the RLDC hired John Phelan to serve as special counsel to defend them against those charges.

In the reorg portion of last night’s meeting, Phelan’s services were terminated, as of July 13, 2017, and his firm was told to prepare for the transfer of the casework and files to the New York law firm Kramer, Levin, Naftalis & Frankel.

Michael J. Dell

The attorney who will take the lead now is Michael J. Dell from Kramer Levin. There’s an unusual irony regarding the lawyer chosen to help clean up the mess, current and ongoing, at St. Lawrence’s RLDC. Those readers who recall the scandal involving St. Lawrence’s bogus degrees from Harvard (claimed he had a Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree from the Ivy League school—he had neither), it turns out Michael Dell graduated magna cum laude with a JD (juris doctorate) from Harvard Law School, and in his last two years of study was the Associate Editorial Director of The Harvard Law Review.

Two important legal clarifications were explained by Supervisor Ullman at the close of the meeting. We asked about the two mandates insisted upon by the New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. In a scathing audit of the Town and RLDC, DiNapoli claimed that Ramapo officials were likely violating the law because the Board and the RLDC were not acting “at arm’s length” and that they were improperly “mixing Town and RLDC funds.” Ullman explained that the new attorney clarified the situation. The actual laws regarding LDCs allow the direct control of an LDC by the town board, and that the “mixing of funds” was not a legal problem but more of a political conflict by the Comptroller in his attempt to get some reform legislation to curb the powers of LDCs in New York. When we asked if he could provide us the parts of the law that address these issues, Ullman said that he would, and, even more helpful, he would try to arrange an appearance by Dell at a future meeting where he would address questions from the public regarding the RLDC 2.0 in Ramapo.

“The use of LDCs to finance local government operations and projects increases the risk of waste, fraud, or abuse of taxpayer dollars or assets.” Thomas DiNapoli, NYS Comptroller

We also asked about dissolving the remains of St. Lawrence’s RLDC as soon as possible, and the Acting Supervisor said there were economic problems with doing that. There are outstanding contracts that need to be addressed, and possibly reconfigured, but there are the onerous outstanding bonds—long-term debts St. Lawrence created to build his ballpark. The new law firm has explained that there is a possibility that the bondholders will demand an accelerated repayment if the Town takes over direct responsibility for those bonds from the RLDC. Ullman didn’t say so, but we assume speeding up the payment on the $25 million bond can’t be done at this time. As we wait for the two most recent audits (due now at the end of August), we can only guess at how deeply Ramapo is under water at this point.

Documenting the fiscal damage that St. Lawrence created in his decade-and-a-half hasn’t even begun. New audits of the Ramapo and the RLDC books have been ordered, and the pain that the fixes will require will soon become apparent.

Michael Castelluccio
Preserve Ramapo
www.preserve-ramapo.com

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Christopher St. Lawrence, RLDC

Preserve Ramapo tree no border

Preserve Ramapo online since 2003

Recent Posts

  • VOTE! Special Election–East Ramapo School Board
  • East Ramapo wants to cut NAACP legal fees to $1, if not teachers could be fired
  • Appeals court backs NAACP in East Ramapo voting rights challenge
  • Airmont, Central UTA settle lawsuit, dropping discrimination claims as school can expand
  • Ramapo residents who stole millions from school tech program face prison recommendations

Archives

  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020
  • July 2020
  • June 2020
  • May 2020
  • April 2020
  • March 2020
  • February 2020
  • January 2020
  • December 2019
  • November 2019
  • October 2019
  • September 2019
  • August 2019
  • July 2019
  • June 2019
  • May 2019
  • April 2019
  • March 2019
  • February 2019
  • January 2019
  • December 2018
  • November 2018
  • October 2018
  • September 2018
  • August 2018
  • July 2018
  • June 2018
  • May 2018
  • April 2018
  • March 2018
  • February 2018
  • January 2018
  • December 2017
  • November 2017
  • October 2017
  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017
  • May 2017
  • April 2017
  • March 2017
  • February 2017
  • January 2017
  • December 2016
  • November 2016
  • October 2016
  • September 2016
  • August 2016
  • July 2016
  • June 2016
  • May 2016
  • April 2016
  • March 2016
  • February 2016
  • January 2016
  • December 2015
  • November 2015
  • October 2015
  • September 2015
  • August 2015
  • July 2015
  • June 2015

Calendar listing for Posts

January 2021
M T W T F S S
« Dec    
 123
45678910
11121314151617
18192021222324
25262728293031

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Facebook

Other Links

Airmont,

Pomona,

Montebello,

Suffern,

Sloatsburg,

Hillburn,

Spring Valley,

Chestnut Ridge,

New Hempstead,

Wesley Hills,

Town of Ramapo,

Town of Clarkstown,

Rosa4Rockland,

Rockland Water Coalition

East Ramapo Central School District

Power of Ten -- East Ramapo for the Children,

Strong East Ramapo,

East Ramapo Videos,

Copyright © 2021 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in