Meanwhile, in Woodbury: What Do We Do If There's a Board Takeover?
Village Trustee James Freiband once again demonstrates what Democracy looks like when it's taken over by bad actors and authoritarians. And he's the Democrat!
I know. I’ve said this before. I try very hard not to bother you with national politics unless it has a specific connection to a local news story. Otherwise, I keep my views to myself. Some of you like Trump. Some of you like Biden. Everyone is welcome here.
But if you saw yesterday’s Woodbury Village Board Meeting (below), you’ll see a very Trump-like action taken by Trustee James Freiband. You’ll also hear Woodbury resident, Jimmy Ng, ask a question that’s not only relevant to all residents of Southern Orange County, but to every American nationally: What happens when bad actors take over their local government?
So, we’re going to touch on that today.
Let’s start with something we can all get behind: There is a Memorial Day parade coming up on May 26th.
If you have a convertible, or know someone who does, the parade organizers are in desperate need of them.
Make sure to reach out to Woodbury Beautification Chair, Maria Hunter, if you might be able to lend one for the purposes of the parade. If you don’t know how to reach Maria, just let me know and I’ll connect you.
We’ll get to Mr. Gargano’s story soon. I have all the documentation he sent me on the issue and I need to review it first and speak with him, and then the Village, before I can run that story. So I’m going to skip it for now.
If you watch the video above, Mr. Gargano’s discussion of the flooding caused by nearby construction at his residence of 82 Oakland Avenue takes up a huge chunk of the public comment period.
I have been told a few things off the record concerning Oakland Avenue’s flooding situation in general. So all I can say (for now) is that both the Town and Village are aware of the issue, and there is the potential for an arrangement to be made between the two municipalities that may alleviate the flooding on Oakland.
Obviously, I’ll tell you more as soon as I can. Bottom line here is that the Town needs to, once again, cooperate with the Village to get things done. However, the Town of Woodbury continues to do its own thing, like provide extra garbage services to specific neighborhoods and then reward the garbage company who provided those “free” services with a new contract. (See item B on the Agenda from May 2nd)
Speaking of the Woodbury Town Board, despite being a Republican, Councilman Brandon Calore is currently walking petitions to get Tyler Etzel Jr. and John Kelemen (both Democrats) registered to run for Village Trustee this Fall.
We’ve previously covered the very corrupt syrup proprietor, Mr. Etzel Jr., here.
Mr. Kelemen is a career Republican who only recently switched parties. When I asked Orange County Democratic Committee Chairman, Zak Constantine, why the OC Democrats are endorsing Mr. Kelemen despite his career affiliation with the Republicans, I did not get an answer.
Once again proving that the New York State Democratic Party works for hanhallah, which is why I encourage my fellow local Democrats to register with the Working Families Party instead and leave the Dems in the dust.
(Fun fact: If you see a Democrat running on both the Democratic line and the Working Families Line, like say James Skoufis this Fall, you can still hold your nose and vote for Skoufis, but vote for him on the Working Families line instead of the Democratic line. This is a nice little fuck you to the NYS Democrats and makes New York State provide more support in the following election cycle to the Working Families Party. It’s little things like this that will add up to (we hope) force the Democrats in New York to clean up their act when it comes to being in the pocket of the real estate industry.)
Get A Load Of This Schmuck
That brings us back to Mr. Freiband, a Democrat.
One of the nice things about the Village of Woodbury Board of Trustees meetings is that there’s no enforcement of the five minute rule for public comment.
As mentioned before, Monroe, South Blooming Grove, and Woodbury (Town) are outliers in the State of New York. Most municipalities do not limit public comment to three minutes. Woodbury (Town) and the Village of Monroe don’t often enforce this rule often, to their credit.
Monroe (Town) and South Blooming Grove are militant about the three minute rule. You have three minutes, and that’s all you get, and you’re lucky to even get those three minutes before someone shouts at you, or in the case of Supervisor Tony Cardone, throws a big fit and closes public comment completely.
Did you just sit through an excruciating three hour Town of Monroe Board meeting to share something important? Well guess what? You’re shit out of luck because that last speaker hurt Little Tony’s big feelings.
Now, that’s not to say things are perfect down here in Southern Orange County. People should have a maximum of ten minutes to speak and public comment on any item (agenda or otherwise) should be the first thing on the agenda, not the last. That’s the gold standard for how these meetings should operate.
Mr. Etzel Jr., a Democrat, when he was on the Woodbury Town Board moved to obstruct and otherwise restrict the public’s ability to speak.
Mr. Freiband, also a Democrat and currently trying to secure signatures for Mr. Etzel Jr. and Mr. Kelemen, also wants strict enforcement of how much time you have to speak.
We know this because Mr. Freiband has been timing Mr. Jimmy Ng’s public comments, and at last night’s board meeting, Trustee Freiband simply got up and left after three minutes had expired. All while Mr. Ng was still speaking.
This is a preview of what the Village of Woodbury will look like with Kelemen, Etzel Jr., and Mr. Freiband running the show. (The jury is still out on Mr. Fabbro, although he is trending in the right direction. Good for him.)
This is also the reality for residents of South Blooming Grove, where the Village Trustees rather look at their phone while residents practically beg them to be open and transparent about their intentions. (This, by the way, is something to take note of for other members of the media. Because when the Board of Trustees doesn’t get what it wants in South Blooming Grove, it immediately cries antisemitism, all while spending the rest of their meetings ignoring pleas for cooperation from the same people they’re labelling as antisemites. Looking at you, national media outlets.)
So, What Can You Do About It?
A lot, actually.
There is, buried in the Woodbury Village Code, a mechanism for removal of Village Board Members. It states:
In addition to any penalty contained in any other provision of law, any board member, Village officer or Village consultant who shall knowingly and intentionally violate any of the provisions of this code may be fined, reprimanded, suspended or removed from office or employment in the manner provided by law. (Source)
There is also guidance in that same Village Code about when a Trustee crosses the line. Let me share some examples of this:
1. Misuse of privilege. No board member, Village employee or Village consultant shall by his conduct give reasonable basis for the impression that another can improperly influence him or unduly enjoy his favor in the performance of his official duties or that he is affected by kinship, rank, position or influence of any party or person.
I’ve laid out this case before.
But I think it’s more than evident that Trustee Freiband has created the impression that he is improperly influenced by hanhallah given his voting pattern. For a more recent example, when the Village of Kiryas Joel asked for a tax break on property it owns within the Village of Woodbury, only Mr. Freiband supported the measure. It was otherwise unanimously voted down (as it was in years past) by both the Town and VIllage.
Discrimination. No board member, Village employee or consultant of the Village or of any service or other organization chartered by or directly or indirectly sponsored or supported by the Village shall:
Discriminate or cause involuntary segregation, directly or indirectly, based upon creed, color, national origin, sex or disability or allow the preceding to be factors affecting the recruitment, selection, placement, assignment, compensation or promotion of any Village officer, Village Board member, Planning Board member, Zoning Board of Appeals member, Village employee or member of such service or other organization.
Hanhallah discriminates. We know this because the housing it endorses can only be sold and made available to their followers. And while there are legitimate reasons for this (followers need to live with other followers and be close to the Rebbe, in short), those legitimate reasons are outweighed by a national housing crisis and the ongoing climate emergency which forces all of us to be mindful of what gets built, where, and whether or not there will be resources available to support it.
So, yes. By supporting hanhallah over the other members of the Woodbury community, Mr. Freiband is engaged in a campaign of discrimination based on religion.
This means that there are grounds to remove Mr. Freiband from office, but the rest of the Village Board MUST act, and they MUST be pressured by you, the public, to do so.
Otherwise …
This Is What Happens
This brings us back to national politics. Because what we’ve seen, again and again, is that if you’re Donald Trump, the rules don’t apply to you. For one example, if you or I stole classified documents, kept them in our bathroom, and maybe sold them, we’d be dragged out into the street and shot for treason.
Instead, Mr. Trump’s court case on that specific matter has been delayed indefinitely.
Congressman Matt Gaetz is credibly accused of having sex with a minor who was involved in a larger sex trafficking ring, is still in Congress.
Democratic Senator Menendez is as corrupt as they come. He’s still in office.
I can spend the rest of today and all of this weekend rattling off the list of Democrats, Republicans, and numerous others, who break the law and face zero consequences for having done so.
The point is, the United States routinely fails at holding the wealthy and the well-connected accountable for anything. (I’ll remind you that the CEOs of Boeing, who presided over the construction of the faulty 737s, are not in prison.)
It’s easy to shrug our shoulders and say, “Same shit. Different Century.” But a lot has changed.
For one thing, it’s never been easier or faster for people to organize.
And while it’s true that late stage capitalism has ground most of us down into a fine paste with no time for any civic activity, let alone life, there’s still hope.
But it starts with you. Because I can tell you from the attendance of local government meetings in Orange County, as long as there’s few members of the public, this stuff will keep happening.
If you want it to change, and I know you do because you’re reading this and sending me emails, then you need to take five minutes out of your day and tell your friends and neighbors what’s going on around them.
And then, time permitting, you need to get real loud. That means going to meetings and writing to your elected officials.
Because the truth is, most politicians are spineless. The second there’s a loud noise, they’re going to run from it.
Good.
Let’s get real loud.
Otherwise, there’s nothing to protect you from when a board gets taken over.
And that includes South Blooming Grove. If nine people are at a Board meeting, nothing is going to change.
If 30 of them show up though, it gets on the news.
You see what I’m saying?
So let’s start with an easy one. Tell the Village Board, especially the two members up for re-election this Fall, to ask the Ethics Committee to investigate Mr. Freiband. And then ask for him to be removed.