• 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 / 2017 Election / The Journal News endorses A New Direction for Ramapo

The Journal News endorses A New Direction for Ramapo

October 25, 2017 by Michael Castelluccio

The Journal News has come out early with its endorsement of the New Direction for Ramapo candidates—Bill Weber. Shani Bechhofer and Grant Valentine.

”The Town needs a fresh start, with new leadership that recognizes that the visions of the various Ramapo communities may sometimes conflict, but always need to be heard and respected.”

“We endorse Bill Weber for town supervisor. Weber, a CPA, offers financial knowledge and a strong commitment to ethics and transparency.”

”This is a town that needs a fresh start.”

Our Endorsement Ramapo Town Supervisor

The Journal News October 25, 2017

Ramapo is a town of economic and ethnic diversity that too often is defined by its divisions. The town’s reputation is stained, not only by so many officials’ malfeasance, but from a deepening community divide that was milked by past leadership to amplify power. The town needs a fresh start, with new leadership that recognizes that the visions of the various Ramapo communities may sometimes conflict, but always need to be heard and respected.

We endorse Bill Weber, a Republican who leads the New Direction For Ramapo ticket, for town supervisor. Weber, a CPA, offers financial knowledge and a strong commitment to ethics and transparency.

Democrat Michael Specht, who leads the Ramapo For All ticket, has worked as a deputy town attorney and demonstrates a core knowledge of municipal government. But this is a town that needs a fresh start.

RAMAPO SUPERVISOR: 6 takeaways from debate

RECAP: Rockland county exec, Ramapo supervisor debates

POST-ST. LAWRENCE: What do Ramapo changes look like?

Town residents have suffered the embarrassment, and fiscal fallout, from a series of corrupt acts by various town officials. Former Supervisor Christopher St. Lawrence was convicted of federal charges stemming from cooking the books to make the town’s finances look rosy; in the same securities case, a former deputy town attorney pleaded guilty to fraud and testified against St. Lawrence. In an unrelated case, the town’s chief building inspector admitted fudging town records. A former town board member admitted official misconduct when he was on the town’s Zoning Board of Appeals; he had previously been convicted of mail fraud, but was still elected to the Town Board. And that’s just the record since 2016.

Weber, though, is not just a default candidate. We find his accounting background especially valuable at this juncture. Town finances are a mess and a mystery. “We still don’t have audited budgets from 2014,” Weber said during an Oct. 18 debate at Rockland Community College. “We don’t even know what our fund balance is.”

Remember that in the town’s recent past, St. Lawrence served as supervisor, town finance director and head of the town’s local development corporation — all at the same time. As Specht said during the Oct. 18 debate, the town’s fiscal records are considered suspect by current auditors, who are working “from scratch.”

Amid Ramapo’s tense ethnic and racial divides, Weber has made more than just gestures toward bridge-building. He leads a ticket that has representation from different party affiliations and various backgrounds, with Democrat Grant Valentine and independent Shani Bechhofer running for town board seats. Valentine, a Chestnut Ridge village trustee and Rockland Community College trustee, is retired from the New York State Division of Parole, where he worked on re-entry standards; he has been active with CEJJES Institute, a Pomona-based foundation dedicated to improving the lives of disenfranchised people, especially children of color. Bechhoffer is a professor at Touro College Graduate School of Jewish Studies and a consultant to Jewish day schools and yeshivas. “We look like Ramapo today,” Weber said during our Oct. 18 debate.

Specht’s Ramapo For All ticket includes Ramapo’s current acting Town Supervisor Yitzchok Ullman, a Democrat who is seeking re-election to his town board seat. While Ullman now strives to set the town on a better path, we cannot ignore the seemingly blithe neglect of board members in the past. Ramapo For All’s other town board candidate, David Wanounou, served as an appointed member of the East Ramapo School Board for a period.

Development, or rather overdevelopment, takes a front seat in any discussion about Ramapo’s future. Both candidates make clear that the town’s current master plan — adopted in 2004 and perpetuating problematic “develop as right” allowances for eastern Ramapo — needs a fresh look.

Specht said his role as attorney for the town’s zoning board was limited to offering advice to his clients, not setting policy. Specht has said he would, as supervisor, update the town’s master plan, and institute a building moratorium while studying the best way forward.

Weber also wants to revisit zoning regulations in town. The New Direction platform acknowledges rapid population growth and insufficient infrastructure as issues that must be addressed together. He calls for well-trained planning and zoning boards (members are appointed by the town board) and more attention to traffic planning.

Both candidates support open access to town parks, including stronger management and use for the run-in-the-red Spook Rock golf course and the Palisades Credit Union ballpark, the home of the Rockland Boulders that was a nexus for St. Lawrence’s fiscal tricks. Weber has been a supporter of a ward system for the town board, with each member representing a district in the town. Specht, who as a town employee worked on legal arguments against a referendum to institute a ward system, said he found a ward system unnecessary.

Weber, a Montebello resident, admitted he doesn’t have all the answers. He pointed to his diverse slate and said, “I’m a good listener and I’m a good learner.” That’s what Ramapo needs now.

The Journal News 

Share this:

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

Related

Filed Under: 2017 Election

Preserve Ramapo tree no border

Preserve Ramapo online since 2003

Recent Posts

  • East Ramapo announces mid-year teacher layoffs, combined classrooms
  • East Ramapo Board of Trustees Voting Results
  • Finally, a choice for East Ramapo voters
  • What’s Ahead for Northeast Ramapo? Town Board Unanimously Approves Moving Forward to Change Code
  • VOTE! Special Election–East Ramapo School Board

Archives

  • February 2021
  • 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

February 2021
M T W T F S S
« Jan    
1234567
891011121314
15161718192021
22232425262728

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