The folks who bought Nepara want to annex the part of the property that's in the Village of Woodbury into the Village of Harriman.
They feel that they can get a better price when they sell it if it's all in one village.
As reasons for disassembling a municipality go, this is certainly one of the dumber ones.
Woodbury would lose ratables (taxable property), maps and districts would have to be redrawn and their would be one lousy precedent on the books when the next annexation petition is filed.
All so that a speculator who bought a property, knowing that it was in two villages, can try and maximize his profit.
There will be a public Hearing on this Tuesday (June 26) night, at 7:15, in Harriman Village Hall.
You might want to show up.
30 comments:
I thought that we made a village so that there couldn't be any annexations?
That's not what you heard from the Uncle (or from Sheila Conroy, or the Community Party, or from the Pieman and SOCA/COCA/ALMOND ROCA/OCEAN).
All of the aforementioned were shouting - loudly and repeatedly - that creating a village had no effect on annexation.
The only people saying that villages are protection against annexation were Ralph Caruso, John Burke and the folks backing the Committee for the Perversion of Woodbury.
They were thye same folks who claimed that your taxes would only go up $58.
If you are unhappy about being lied to go tell them, not me.
I hear Ralph and comapny are getting friendly with the folks running the V of Harriman???
Swiller said it too while he was on the dais of the public hearing/discussion. He states that he recanted himself but those in attendance did not hear him.
Swiller never claimed that the village would cost only 58 dollars get your head out of your A@s!
Actually I did not say that. At SOCA's first forum, one of the speakers said it, and within five minutes we announced a correction. As to "no one heard it" I suppose you also claim that no one read the my view I had in the Record that repeated the correction:
September 24, 2004
Clearing the record on annexation of village land
By Jonathan Swiller
Two powerful laws ran head-on into each other at the SOCA forum Sept. 14. The first, New York State Municipal Law, states that one village can annex land from another village. The second, Murphy's Law, tells us that whatever can go wrong will go wrong.
A little background: SOCA, the Southern Orange County Alliance, brought together experts from around the region to answer people's questions on village formation, annexation, the Kiryas Joel pipeline, growth, planning and the environment. Our panel consisted of Michael Edelstein, president of Orange Environment; David Church, the Orange County planning commissioner, and Doris Ulman, the village attorney for a great many villages in Rockland County.
We also invited a staff member from the office of the General Counsel to the state Department of State. At first State Department officials seemed eager to come. Then, within days, they began to come up with a series of roadblocks. In the end, despite invitations from Assemblywoman Nancy Calhoun and County Executive Ed Diana, they were "not available."
At the forum one of the most important questions was: "Can a village annex land from another village?" This is exactly the type of question that the State Department lawyer was invited to answer. In his absence, Ulman fielded it. Unfortunately, it was not something that she'd encountered in her work and she answered incorrectly.
Within minutes, SOCA member Rud Lawrence had the correct citation highlighted in a copy of the state's municipal law. Ulman read it over and issued a correction – no harm, no foul. Except …
It was just after Ulman's first answer that a Record reporter had to leave the forum in order to meet the paper's deadline. She missed the correction.
She is a fine reporter, and before she handed in her story she called SOCA Chairman Joe Ferguson, to doublecheck. Unfortunately, because he was on the dais, in the middle of the forum, his cellphone was turned off. Newspaper deadlines are unforgiving and she had to file her story.
The next day, the Record carried the story of the forum. The headline and lead paragraph presented exactly the wrong information. Murphy trumps New York state.
There are three points that everyone attending the forum should have gotten: (1) Land can be annexed from a village. (2) A new village cannot be created out of any part of any existing village. (3) Whether or not creating a new village will raise residents' taxes depends entirely on the choices made by that village.
This was our first shot at putting a forum together, and it was definitely a learning experience. Next time we'll do our best not to invite Murphy.
.................
you can find it for yourself at:
http://archive.recordonline.com/archive/2004/09/24/24myview.htm
I went to the village candidates debate (the one Ralph was too scared to go to) that OCEAN and the Record put on.
At the beginingSwiller said that people were still believeing that a village stopped annexation and he repeated that that was not true.
People were saying from the very beginning that a village wouldnt stop annexation and that the costs would not be worth it. This editorial appeared in the THR
August 19, 2004
It doesn't take a village to stop Kiryas Joel
By Jim Booth
I have become very concerned by the recent rush to create a Village of Woodbury. The creation of this village is believed to be an apparent attempt to stop the encroachment of the Village of Kiryas Joel into the Town of Woodbury.
Recently, as has been reported in the Times Herald-Record, Michael Queenan, the chairman of the Woodbury Planning Board, and Donald Siebold, a member of the Woodbury Zoning Board, who are together members of the Woodbury Republican Town Committee, began circulating a petition to create the Village of Woodbury. This said village would encompass the entire Town of Woodbury located outside of the Village of Harriman.
It has also been reported that Ralph Caruso, who serves jointly as the town Republican chairman and the Zoning Board chairman, is also behind this endeavor. While I applaud these three men for their proactive stand on the issue of Kiryas Joel, I believe that their plan to create a village to apparently stop K.J. is without a doubt the wrong move.
What concerns me is that there has been no public discussion or forum sponsored by the petitioners on the creation of this village, the reasons why we need it, or the costs it will bear on to homeowners, etc. Usually, efforts to create villages are done more openly. For instance, residents living in the southern portion of Blooming Grove have commenced an effort to incorporate the southern portion of that town as a village.
Recently, a meeting was held for homeowners in that area to discuss the pros and cons of incorporation. To my knowledge no such meeting was ever sponsored by village organizers in Woodbury, or if such a meeting was held, it was not publicized in any way. No informational pamphlet, Web site, or other means of information has been disseminated by the aforementioned petitioners.
I fear that the people of Woodbury do not understand the ramifications of creating a village and the potential costs associated with such. Town residents may not understand that even if a village is created a town government must still remain in place. This means that creating a village will add another layer of costly government bureaucracy onto the taxpayers of Woodbury.
I also find it quite interesting that Mr. Queenan of the Planning Board and Mr. Caruso and Mr. Siebold of the Zoning Board have not used their respective positions to lobby the Town Board to correct whatever it is that they feel the board is not doing on land use and zoning issues.
Most town residents have been led to believe that creating a village would give us increased powers in stopping any attempts by Kiryas Joel to annex land presently in Woodbury. Many have also apparently been led to believe that a village would have greater say or more power over issues of zoning then the present town has.
However, as has been reported in the Record, a village has no more powers than a town on matters of zoning. It has also been reported in this paper that another village could annex portions of a neighboring village. There is absolutely nothing a Village of Woodbury could do that the present Town of Woodbury would not have the power to do in any annexation issue or in strengthening its current laws on zoning.
So, in the end, if creating a townwide village would have no benefit in our fight to stop annexation or the expansion of Kiryas Joel in to the Town of Woodbury, then why are we wasting our time with this effort? It would be one thing if residents in sections of the town, which are closest to K.J., wanted to create a village so that they and they alone could make decisions on issues like annexation and zoning. However, why should people in Skyline, Central Valley or the Valley Forge sections of town have to expend more of their hard earned money to pay for a village that will not serve any purpose for them?
I believe the issue of creating a Village of Woodbury has little to do with Kiryas Joel and more to do with politics in Woodbury itself. I think the voters of Woodbury will need to carefully assess this situation. You will need to do your homework; you will need to ask people on both sides of this issue the hard and important questions. I implore the people of Woodbury, do not let your fears regarding K.J. cloud your judgment on this matter.
I know I'll probably be embarassed by my lack of local events. But I have to ask. Who bought the property?
Except the owner of the land, nobody spoke in facvor of the annexation.
Some of the speakers who were against were Sheila Conroy, Lorraine McNeil, Ralph Caruso, Jonathan Swiller, Carole Mullooly, Bo Haviland, George Sewitt, Robin Crouse, John Burke and Toby Shack
What exactly did a village do for the Town of Woodbury? The Village of KJ is 1.1 square-mile with about 18000 people located in The Town of Monroe. Maybe that's what we prevented in the Town of Woodbury. Please stop trying to confuse people.
Gotta love those Ralphlings:
What exactly did a village do for the Town of Woodbury? The Village of KJ is 1.1 square-mile with about 18000 people located in The Town of Monroe. Maybe that's what we prevented in the Town of Woodbury. Please stop trying to confuse people.
"Please stop trying to confuse people"????
What the hell does KJ have to do with it?
Do you still think that forming a village prevents annexation??
Have you heard anything that's been said about that, or have you been too busy performing an onsite examination of your own rectal polyps?
Creating a village has no effect whatsoever on annexation. None! Zip! Zilch! Nada!
Get it yet?
And if you think that Szegedin and Wieder's goal was to create a new village - consider this - the people who run things in KJ are control freaks who don't even want the people who live their to have any say. Do you think they want to hand over all the land they bought to someone else? They certainly can't be Mayor and Administrator to two villages. And these are not the most trusting guys.
The only thing creating the Village
of Woodbury did was create another layer of taxation and confusion. Uncle Betty was right when he said: "nada, zilch, etc"...
Question ?? can there be another village created in the town of Woodbury??? The answer is NO NEVER ! the residents have secured all the land in Woodbury from the creation of anymore villages by voting 4 1/2 to 1 for the village of Woodbury.!! The residents have spoken and now have control over how they want their lands to be developed ..
Question: was the craetion of more villages in Woodbury ever the primary concern?
Answer: No.
Queation: What was the primary concern?
Answer: Annexation.
Question: Has creating a village done anything to prevent annexation?
Answer: Nope, nyet, non, no way no how!
Question: But didn't the folks that wanted us to vote for a village lead us to believe that it would stop annexation?
Answer: Yep, that they did.
Question: Then what do they have to say now?
Answer: "Question ?? can there be another village created in the town of Woodbury??? The answer is NO NEVER ! the residents have secured all the land in Woodbury from the creation of anymore villages by voting 4 1/2 to 1 for the village of Woodbury.!! The residents have spoken and now have control over how they want their lands to be developed .. "
No one ever said creating a village would stop annexation. That was your story trying to confuse people with lies. Creating a village prevents us from having the problems Monroe has because they have 2 villages in one town. And one of their villages has out of control growth. The Town of Woodbury will never have the problem where 18000 people live on 1.1 square miles because we are the Village of Woodbury in the Town of Woodbury. And that is what a village did for us.
Yes..there can be no other Villages within the Village...but outlying property can be still purchased, eg: Ace Farm, and annexed out to another Village and developed anyway THAT Village chooses. So what did we gain? That was always the intent on creating the Village, to control zoning. If property is annexed out, we have no control.
There was never ever any talk of creating any little villages in Woodbury. The first preservation packet mentioned the village was to stop annexation...it mentioned nothing about little villages. This only became an issue when the truth was realized and the carusoites needed an excuse to counter the fact their lie had been found out. The people that keep saying this was about stopping little villages are the ones who are clouding the issue.
Previous blogger said:
"Yes..there can be no other Villages within the Village...but outlying property can be still purchased, eg: Ace Farm, and annexed out to another Village and developed anyway THAT Village chooses. So what did we gain? That was always the intent on creating the Village, to control zoning. If property is annexed out, we have no control."
And consider this: while another Village has control over the zoning, the land is still in the TOWN of Woodbury and the residents there will be a ble to vote in our town elections and have other benefits as well
you call 1.1 sq mile with 18000 people a little village.
20,000
It is fun to watch the liars,
who like to act like town criers,
but try as they might,
they don't have the fight,
to beat the ones who really put out the fires!
Let me get this straight. Jonathan Swiller held a forum where someone on his board said creating a village would stop annexation but 5 minutes later recanted. But several anonymous posters on this blog insisted that the preservation team wrote it on its early paperwork. I have After reading all the information on this board I beleive that the preservation team never wrote or said it. It appears to me this board just made that up. If it's true put a reprint on the board. Does anyone have any paperwork that can prove differently .
Yup- in writing and on tape!
PUY IT OUT THERE> The tape and the information in writing
Have patience dear....
hey Ralph you ass-hole. ar you also going to deny you said thered be no changes and that taxes would barely go up and that the fire district wouldn't be changed.
what a lying piece of shit
Dear Ralph
Some of us DO have your lies in print and when the time is right, not when you say, we WILL put it out there! Probably just about the tiime when you try to rear you ugly head again politically.
Just be happy you still have a job with Uncle Billy.
you are all boring me to death!
blah, blah, blah, Village, blah, blah, blah, will save you, not with these morons on the village board! 1 out of 5 will not help!
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