Letters to the Editor - Westchester Guardian

Page 2 The WesTchesTer GuardIaN ThursdaY, JaNuarY 6, 2011
Of Significance
elections ......................................................................................2
Finance ........................................................................................3
Government ................................................................................4
Letters ..........................................................................................9
Movie reviews ..........................................................................10
Oped .........................................................................................11
radio ..........................................................................................13
religion ......................................................................................14
shifting Gears ...........................................................................14
show Prep ..................................................................................15
spoof ..........................................................................................16
sports .........................................................................................16
Telling: eclipsing the silence ....................................................17
Theatre .......................................................................................18
Legal Notices .............................................................................19
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ELECTIONS
2011 Election Year Questions for New
Rochelle Residents
By Peggy Godfrey
In November of this year
the city of New rochelle
will hold an election for
city council members and
Mayor. One way of assessing
whether the city is going
in the right direction is to look back on the
events of 2010, especially council decisions.
There are unresolved issues which each resident
needs to evaluate when deciding what the
future should hold for New rochelle. some
questions are presented to highlight some of
these issues.
1. Will the city of New rochelle be able to
regain its recently lost aa2 bond rating
which was attributed to a lower fund
balance in the city budget. how will the
city find the revenue to increase this fund
balance? Will the tax abatements granted
by the New rochelle Ida (Industrial
development corporation) as councilman
Lou Trangucci has suggested, now come
“back to hurt the taxpayers?”
2. Will there be changes in the proposed
GreeNr sustainability draft to make it
more equitable to the southern half of
New rochelle? This would include the
need brought up by robert cox, Founder
and editor of New rochelle Talk of the
sound, that the report should be translated
and circulated since l0% of the city
does not speak english, 20% do not have
internet and 50% do not have broadband.
The present plan anticipates a high percent
of housing units being placed near the train
station. There is no discussion of the greater
density that will be created for his already
overcrowded area and the intensifying of the
congestion, parking and pollution problems.
at Mayor Noam Bramson’s November 22
meeting, residents told him they had “had
enough.” It was suggested to him that
new buildings should not be located in the
densely populated southern part of the city.
3. downtown revitalization continues to be a
major topic as more buildings are proposed
with the prospect of more tax abatements.
Will the Lecount square development
be denied since cappelli has not made an
arrangement with the u.s. Post Office?
Will future development consider the best
interests of all the residents? certainly
it is a reasonable conclusion this has not
happened in the past as the city finds it
must use a high proportion of city services
for the downtown area which also has
heavily tax abated properties. Will Forest
city residential be allowed to continue,
especially if they do not produce a revised
downsized plan? If not, will the residents
be presented a rationale from council
members voting in favor of these two developments
on the newly proposed 17 Locust
avenue and the church-division project?
developers should understand the citizens
of New rochelle want their developments
to strengthen the city’s resources as well as
its finances. abatements should be short
term and reasonable.
4. Will the city council listen to the residents
and act on their concerns. even
council woman roxie stowe expressed
reservations about the the development fn
downtown New rochelle and questioned
whether it was helping the city. The 17
Locust avenue proposal is in councilman
al Tarantino’s district and he has said the
area is very densely populated. Many of the
residents in the area are faced with lack of
adequate parking now and there have been
requests to change the building code so that
each new apartment would have two or
three parking spaces. Will the city council
listen and act on this zoning request and
add more parking spaces? recently the city
council authorized charging for overnight
parking in downtown lots. Will the council
be able to figure out how to allocate parking
spaces and parking fees in lots and on the
streets to maximize business’ ability to profit
from the regulation.
5. When the city is redistricted, as mandated
by population changes, will they consider
strengthening neighborhoods as a top
priority, and not splitting them for political
gain? Will this looming redistricting of the
six districts be made through party politics
or by an independent committee? Will the
lines be drawn to not only respect those in a
minority district but also all the residents of
New rochelle?
6. an Ida audit showed projects had not
been properly documented when benefits
were given. The Ida was criticized for not
performing an analysis to see if the benefits
they gave would exceed the cost of providing
tax abatements. There was no monitoring of
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