www.preserve-ramapo.com
Photo: John Meore/The Journal News
This article appeared Jan. 30 on www.matzav.com
The development has been shut down for months. But its developer has been quite busy.
After the unprecedented stop work order issued by the Town of Ramapo last October against Viola Estates Condominium on Viola Road – the first such order resulting from neighbors fighting the town’s unrestrained overdevelopment – the developer of Viola Estates got to work. [Read more…]
The classroom building at the Bais Yaakov Elementary School on the old Edwin Gould Property in Chestnut Ridge (Photo: Mark Vergari/The Journal News
CHESTNUT RIDGE —”The owners of the former Edwin Gould property are being taken to state Supreme Court by the village and county over a school that officials charge opened there without proper inspections and permits.
Village officials asked a state judge on Wednesday to close down the private girls school operating inside a building on the sprawling 145-acre campus along Chestnut Ridge Road, saying it had been operating since early December without those clearances and site plan approval.
“We’ve asked the court to basically close down the school until they comply with our building and zoning regulations,” Mayor Rosario “Sam” Presti said Friday. “Anything and everything that’s been going on there has been done without applying for our permits. We’d like to ensure the building is safe.” [Read more…]
The owner of a Clarkstown transportation company who runs the Rockland County bus system was arrested Thursday morning on federal charges for allegedly taking payments for work on Rockland BOCES vehicles that was never done.
Richard Brega, 49, allegedly paid bribes to BOCES Transportation Director William Popkave and falsified documentation to indicate his company, Brega D.O.T. Maintenance Corp., had repaired and maintained school vehicles, prosecutors said in a news release announcing the five-count indictment.
U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said the pair schemed to defraud BOCES then “tried to cover their tracks through fake invoices and deceptive money transactions.” [Read more…]
Front Page of The Journal News Sunday Jan. 8, 2017
The journalists involved in the “Ramapo Nears Breaking Point” project will present a panel discussion on the issues raised on Jan. 25 at the Rockland Community College Technology Center in Ramapo. The event, from 7 to 9 p.m., is free and open to the public, and will take place in the Ellipse lecture hall. The college is at 145 College Road in Ramapo.
Ramapo High School Photo/The Journal News
“If the state does not continue to provide a $3 million allocation in aid this year to East Ramapo, the school district will have to cut universal kindergarten and art classes in elementary schools, which are two programs that were just restored in the fall, according to a report by the district’s monitors.
In “A New Beginning,” which was released Tuesday morning by the state Education Department, monitors Charles Szuberla and John Sipple report on steps taken by the East Ramapo district over the last year to turn itself around, outline priorities and identify challenges that lie ahead. [Read more…]
Lake DeForest Photo by Rosspilot.com
State regulators cut back on a proposed rate hike for Rockland’s largest water utility in a ruling Tuesday, which included slashing how much the company could recoup from its investment in a failed Hudson water treatment plant.
The state Public Service Commission’s modified plan reduces by about $960,000 a request agreed upon by Suez Water New York and the PSC’s staff, and knocks $8.2 million off the amount Suez can recover from its abandoned Haverstraw desalination project. [Read more…]
The gated entrance to the Bais Yaakov Elementary School of Rockland County, a private girls school on the old Edwin Gould Property in Chestnut Ridge. Photo: Mark Vergari/The Journal News
“A private elementary school for girls on the grounds of the former Edwin Gould property opened last month without permits and is not in compliance with zoning and fire code regulations, according to village officials. [Read more…]
Sarah Wallace and the Channel 4 I-Team investigates the girls school on the Edwin Gould property. Click on the image for video.
A state appellate panel found Ramapo acted legally when it took away a congregation’s religious tax exemption for illegally setting up trailers at a Forshay Road property.
The Appellate Division decision, released Wednesday, says Congregation Ateres Yisroel’s zoning violation allowed the Ramapo tax assessor to remove its religious tax exemption in 2012. The congregation had installed two trailers without proper permits for use as dormitories at 33 Forshay Road for more than 20 students, in violation of the property’s certificate of occupancy. [Read more…]
“Ramapo’s property tax bills are going out nearly two weeks late because of a software glitch with the vendor that prepares the statements for printing and mailing, the town announced Tuesday.
Bills will be mailed out Wednesday (Jan 18), according to Nathan Oberman, the town’s receiver of taxes.
The delay affects about half the town’s property taxpayers. Property owners who pay their taxes through their mortgages were not affected, Oberman said. [Read more…]