Orange County Has Had ENOUGH of Your Hydrogen Sulfide Questions
The blame game for the Village of Monroe's poisonous gas problem takes a turn thanks to the appearance of a wild Orange County legislator.
Above: The Village of South Blooming Grove “Mayor,” George Kalaj, makes a face moments after telling Village residents, “It was a disaster” about yet another sewer failure. Speaking about a second, additional, sewer system failure near Village Hall, Kalaj said, “It’s just bad. It is bad. It is bad.” The crumbling municipal infrastructure, worsened by Kalaj, Stern, Ekstein, Fusco, and Tom Shepstone’s ongoing white-collar crime spree, is directly responsible for the hydrogen sulfide situation impacting the Village of Monroe residents.
Al Fusco Jr., Village Engineer, Building Inspector, and Code Enforcement official, also present at this February 10th, 2025, meeting, said absolutely nothing about the state of the sewer system and what’s being done to address these problems.
You might have noticed that President Elon Musk is deleting many government websites, documents, and other records. Authoritarian regimes thrive by controlling the flow of information, and one way we fight back is by thoroughly documenting their actions.
So today, I will update you on The Monroe Gazette’s efforts to document what our local authoritarian regime is up to in South Blooming Grove and how Crooked Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus is helping to cover it all up.
In 2009, the “rotten egg smell” was first detected in the Village of Monroe’s Airplane Park. The details of that reported incident, involving poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas, are unknown. But it’s the earliest date we can find when Orange County was made aware of the issue. Sixteen years later, the problem is worse, and two parties are to blame: Orange County and the Village of South Blooming Grove.
Let’s Talk South Blooming Grove First
Like many things involving the Monroe playground’s dangerous levels of a known poisonous gas, Orange County, the Town of Monroe, the Moodna Basin Commission, and the Village of South Blooming Grove are covering up the details. The Monroe Gazette took South Blooming Grove to court — and won — concerning documents the Village wanted to hide from the public concerning their contribution to the issue.
South Blooming Grove, typical of “Village Executive” Joel Stern’s administration, only presented half of the information we requested on the hydrogen sulfide issue. The rest was blacked out or otherwise missing.
In a future post, we’ll discuss Mr. Stern’s title inflation to “Village Executive” and the potential for fraud surrounding doing business as the “Village Executive.” Mr. Joel Stern, Mr. Yitzchok “Isaac” Ekstein, and “Mayor” George Kalaj, at the time of this writing, have not responded to requests by The Monroe Gazette to explain when or why Mr. Stern started referring to himself as Village Executive, whether or not Mr. Stern got an increase in pay to go with the new title, and when Mr. Ekstein’s job title was also changed from Legislative Aide to Assistant to the Mayor, which was Joel Stern’s previous title.
Notably, Mr. Joel Stern started to call himself “Village Executive” around the same time South Blooming Grove failed to hold their village election in March of 2024.
Pictured above: An email we asked Crooked County Executive Steve Neuhaus for that his FOIL Officer, Mary Pat Smith, said did not exist. We are currently appealing this decision to County Attorney Rick Golden, whom we’re going to revisit later in this post.
As you can see in the first email above, Mr. Stern’s title change was found as part of our research into the ongoing feud between the Blooming Grove EMS and Joel Stern’s South Blooming Grove EMS. A story that’s been held up repeatedly by the New York State Department of Health’s refusal to hand over information, via FOIL, detailing their role in providing Mr. Stern’s South Blooming Grove EMS permission to operate despite all the concerns shared with them. (So, if you’re wondering why we haven’t covered that story yet, it’s because we need the documents from the Department of Health to do so correctly.)
We expect we’ll get an answer from South Blooming Grove on Mr. Stern calling himself “Village Executive” around the same time Convicted Felon Tim Mitts comes clean about the aid provided to him by State Senator James G. Skoufis. This assistance began during Mitt’s winning bid for the Conservative Party Line in last year’s State Senate primary against Soft on Crime Dorey Houle. Something confirmed to The Monroe Gazette by people with direct knowledge of Mr. Tim Mitt’s primary campaign operations and Mr. Skoufis’s help.
While continuing to cry about The Monroe Gazette’s coverage of him, Mr. Timothy Mitts has blocked The Monroe Gazette from communicating with him, much like Mr. Skoufis. Therefore, we have been unable to ask Mr. Mitts for clarification about the nature of his relationship with Senator Skoufis, whether that relationship is still ongoing, and what compensation Mr. Mitts received in exchange for his services last year. (We’ve also been unable to speak with State Senator James G. Skoufis about his confirmed partnership with a convicted felon.) Anyone looking to buy Tim Mitt’s story of being some “political outsider” independent of party politics should consider our generous offer to buy the Newburgh-Beacon Bridge.
Currently, South Blooming Grove is reviewing our FOIL appeal, which you can read here. Given the shortcomings of Mr. Joel Stern's administration—like not holding an election in March 2024 as they were required by law to do so—we don’t expect them to comply with the law.
Despite losing The Monroe Gazette’s lawsuit, South Blooming Grove continues to respond to FOIL requests inappropriately. They also refuse to answer questions by Village residents about the FOIL lawsuit. You can see “Mayor” Kalaj, after a five-minute Village Board meeting — with public comment intentionally removed — blow off Preserve Blooming Grove’s Bonnie Rum when asked in the video below at 4:26. Note that Village of South Blooming Grove residents have a legal right to request time to speak on the agenda. Thus far, South Blooming Grove has denied — and in many cases — outright ignored these requests. (They also haven’t responded to our FOIL request for all of the emails from Village residents asking to speak at meetings, and the deliberations by the Village Board members and “Village Executive” Joel Stern, about those requests.)
This continued obstruction by The Village of Monroe’s next-door neighbor means we will likely have to take South Blooming Grove to court again to get the rest of the information about the hydrogen sulfide problem. That’s not something we want to do. But here’s our rationale:
- 1. The hydrogen sulfide levels are still dangerously high. High enough to compel the DEC to pressure Orange County to act sixteen years later in January of 2025 (see the letter from Orange County, which “Mayor” George Kalaj and Al Fusco Jr. were copied on here, explaining the current County response and the DEC’s role in it.) We don’t think Kalaj, or most of the people we write about, are all that bright, but if Kalaj had a brain, one could assume he’s talking about how bad the sewer is to absolve South Blooming Grove of having to address the hydrogen sulfide problem. A point we’ll return to below with Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy.
- 2. While it’s true MidHudsonNews.com publisher Mike Martucci has been named head of the EPA’s Region 2 office (which covers New York), we have no confidence in the Trump Administration or Trump’s version of the EPA completing their investigation into South Blooming Grove. Or, for that matter, taking any other kind of enforcement action in Orange and Rockland County to protect the Hudson River and Ramapo Rivers from numerous bad actors.
We tried to warn local Trump voters about this with the EPA, but they dismissed our warning, saying their God King wouldn’t gut the EPA. Well, guess what? You were wrong. Now, it’s up to you to either own the consequences of your vote — and join the majority of us in addressing the problems created by the Trump Administration — or to shut up and step aside.
Don’t argue with people defending Trump’s coup. They are a tiny fraction of Americans. They do not represent the majority of Republicans, Democrats, and independents. Supporting President Musk and Trump is un-american. This fall, everyone has one job: Don’t vote for any member of Team Coup.
-3. Mr. Joel Stern has shown no sign of slowing down his plan to turn South Blooming Grove, Washingtonville, and the Town of Blooming Grove into a combined city that the local infrastructure and environment cannot sustain. Since EPA intervention seems unlikely, we will do what we must to protect the Southern Orange County community from Joel Stern. That includes taking Mr. Stern back to court.
We spent a lot of time talking about South Blooming Grove just now, so we’re going to turn our attention here to Orange County’s role in covering up the hydrogen sulfide issue. That brings us to Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy's impression of the beloved Saturday Night Live character Drunk Uncle at the February 3rd, 2025, Town of Monroe Board meeting.
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Drunk Uncle Ruins Town of Monroe Board Meeting For Everyone
Today’s headline is based on the Orange County government's response, via Legislator Peter Tuohy and Orange County Attorney Rick Golden, to questions about the hydrogen sulfide problem in the Village of Monroe.
We’ll start with Peter Tuohy first.
Despite Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy’s best efforts to deflect all the blame from South Blooming Grove — you can see Peter Tuohy throw the Town and Village of Chester under the bus in the video below at 51:11, we want to reiterate that the Village of South Blooming Grove and Orange County — NOT Chester — is responsible for the ongoing hydrogen sulfide issue in the Village of Monroe.
In a statement provided to The Monroe Gazette from Town of Chester Supervisor Brandon Holdridge, he said:
The Deputy Supervisor and I reviewed all of this. This situation is definitely not caused by the Town of Chester. We have documentation of everything we did to fix the situation at Pump Station 1. It seems as though Tuohy is including us in this speech of his so it doesn't appear that he is singling out the municipality that is actually at fault here. According to the Moodna Basin Commission, we have been and still are not at fault for any smell coming from Blooming Grove or Monroe.
Here’s the short, simplified version of events:
When the rotten egg smell (hydrogen sulfide) was first detected in 2009, the Town of Chester, the Village of Chester, and South Blooming Grove contributed to the problem. Basically, all of their sewage travels via Orange County’s infrastructure to Orange County Sewer District 1 in Harriman. The Village of Monroe is sort of like the last bus stop on that transit route. So, the sewage from Chester and South Blooming Grove was collected there.
The thing is, that collection point also happens to be the home of a popular children’s playground.
So for sixteen years, Orange County has been lackadaisical about managing this situation. We can’t say they haven’t addressed the situation at all. Some work has been done. But we can absolutely say Orange County hasn’t addressed this problem with the seriousness it deserves. And now the County, in the form of Legislator Peter Tuohy and County Attorney Rick Golden, are getting pretty pissed about people asking them questions about it.
During those sixteen years, the Town and Village of Chester received hardware to treat their contribution to the hydrogen sulfide problem. The Village of South Blooming Grove has refused to utilize this same hardware despite the cost savings it would bring to residents.
In 2022, for example, the Village of South Blooming Grove spent $96,000 on a chemical solution to treat their sewage. We have submitted a FOIL request for the 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025 approved budgets to track how much South Blooming Grove has spent treating their sewage, as well as what they have allegedly put aside to spend on the ANUE Water Technologies hardware. (That’s what the County installed in Chester to resolve their end of the problem. So everyone knows this hardware works.)
During his unhinged presentation, Legislator Tuohy told many lies. We’ll start with the funniest one. Tuohy said he didn’t use social media, and Councilwoman Maureen Richardson corrected him. She stated he was a member of Richardson’s Preserve Monroe Facebook group. Tuohy denied this, and then said, “If I am I was hacked.” I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty sure Orange County would have investigated whether or not one of their legislators was hacked, given the amount of proprietary information they may have on their phones and laptops. (Remember that word proprietary; we’ll circle back to that when we get to Rick Golden.)
The truth is, Tuohy has been a part of the Preserve Monroe Facebook group for over a year. In fact, I have personally witnessed him responding to posts on there. And if you search for group members, you’ll find …
Above: We can factually state that Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy is a lying dumbass.
But now let’s turn to something Tuohy lied about that is a lot more serious …
At the February 3rd, 2025 Town of Monroe Board meeting, Legislator Peter Tuohy tried to downplay the severity of the hydrogen sulfide gas situation on the popular children’s playground.
A problem he has been repeatedly reminded of the severity of in records obtained by The Monroe Gazette dating back to 2021. These warnings came from both members of Orange County’s Environmental Facilities and Services department — where Tuohy was copied on an email saying the levels of hydrogen sulfide were “very high” — and by the Village of Monroe Mayor, Neil Dwyer, and Village Trustee John Karl. Dwyer would later warn Tuohy that the hydrogen sulfide was corrosive. Meaning the possibility existed for the pipe in the Village of Monroe to fail, leading to a much larger problem.
At the Town Board meeting, Peter Tuohy said that the rotten egg odor comes and goes, and indicated it was because of the hardware failure in Chester. (In 2024, there was a hardware issue that occurred with Orange County’s equipment at Pump Station 3A in Chester. A new control board needed to be ordered, and so their treatment system was not operational for a few months.) This is not a Chester problem, this is an Orange County problem.
However, as any Monroe resident can tell you, the hydrogen sulfide smell does not “come and go.” It’s been documented to exist persistently as far back as 2009. Tax Hike Tony (Monroe Town Supervisor Tony Cardone) was first made aware of the hydrogen sulfide issue seven years ago in 2018 by the Moodna Basin Commission.
And not to put too fine a point on this: Since Joel Stern took over as “Village Executive” in 2021, the hydrogen sulfide situation has only worsened. Mr. Tuohy knows this, because Mr. Tuohy attended a meeting with Stern and Ekstein to discuss the severity of the problem.
During the Town Board meeting, Peter Tuohy marveled that the DEC does not require Orange County to report the hydrogen sulfide levels to them, but he has been asked, multiple times, by Village of Monroe officials to report the situation to the DEC. (We have submitted a FOIL request to both the New York State DEC and Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy to see if Tuohy ever reached out to the DEC to inform them of what he was told, repeatedly by both Orange County employees and Village of Monroe officials, were “very high” levels of hydrogen sulfide.)
In the documents obtained so far by The Monroe Gazette, not a single representative from the DEC appears on any emails sent to and from the Town of Monroe, Orange County, South Blooming Grove, and the Moodna Basin Sewer Commission. This includes all of the emails we have from Peter Tuohy that he has sent on the hydrogen sulfide issue. So while Orange County was not required to provide this information to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, Tuohy was certainly asked to do so.
At the Town Board meeting, Mr. Tuohy then blamed a lack of chemical treatment products for the hydrogen sulfide’s “rotten egg smell” coming and going. In 2022, Mr. Joel Stern’s second year of running the Village, South Blooming Grove spent $96,000 on these chemicals. It’s not clear if, how, or when, South Blooming Grove “ran out” as Mr. Tuohy implies. Given that “Village Executive” Joel Stern repeatedly lies — we can say this factually, just look at the title of “Village Executive” — it’s possible he told Tuohy this. But whether or not the Village actually ran out of the chemicals at any point is unknown.
The Monroe Gazette has FOIL’ed for the 2023, 2024, and 2025 approved South Blooming Grove budgets to examine how much they have spent on the chemical. We are also investigating what happened with the money that was budgeted for purchasing the ANUE Water Technologies hardware, which then vanished from subsequent budgets. As mentioned, much of the information provided to The Monroe Gazette from South Blooming Grove has been blacked out. (Tuohy would claim at this meeting that no tax payer money was spent on the ANUE test in South Blooming Grove, but this wasn’t true either. The Village approved a bond to pay for the test. We asked if Mr. Tuohy understood what a bond was, but he did not reply to our request for comment.)
Mr. Tuohy then claimed that ANUE reported that its hardware pilot in South Blooming Grove worked. There is, in fact, a letter from ANUE Water Technologies to South Blooming Grove’s “Mayor”, Village Engineer Al Fusco Jr., and others stating that their test was successful. The thing is, during the pilot test of the ANUE hardware in 2022, a sewer emergency occurred in South Blooming Grove that Alfred Fusco Jr., Joel Stern, and Isaac Ekstein immediately blamed on the ANUE pilot.
Given that Mayor Kalaj spent most of the Village Board meeting on February 10th, 2025 talking about problems with the sewer system, this could just be a coincidence. It could also just be that the Village of South Blooming Grove simply does not have the infrastructure to support all of the building Joel Stern, Isaac Ekstein, and Tom Shepstone have rapidly approved since Stern took over the village.
Remember: The Village of South Blooming Grove Planning Board, according to its own attorney, has never issued a positive SEQRA declaration (meaning negative environmental impact) since Joel Stern and Tom Shepstone took over the Planning Board. Orange County’s Planning Board has also (mostly) been nowhere to be found when it comes to providing any oversight or guidance into what’s being approved by Tom Shepstone in South Blooming Grove. One would think they would be more proactive, since Orange County is currently in court with South Blooming Grove over “Village Executive” Joel Stern’s attempt to build a road through Orange County owned park land.
Either way, the problem does not appear to be with the ANUE Hardware, but with South Blooming Grove’s failing sewer infrastructure.
There’s another problem here: It’s not clear how ANUE got the contract to provide this work for Orange County. Based on the documents received so far, the County simply presented ANUE as the solution to the problem. So whether or not there was a contract, and if the County explored other bids from companies interested in solving this problem is unknown. (If you’re thinking, “Hey. That sounds familiar. Didn’t Orange County commit a crime exactly like that one? You’re right to think that.) Mr. Peter Tuohy has not responded to request for comment on this specific subject. A new FOIL request by The Monroe Gazette has been filed with Orange County to see what, if any, process occurred to award ANUE with this contract.
Tuohy claims in the video above to have met again with Joel Stern and Yitzchok “Isaac” Ekstein on February 2nd, 2025. Mr. Tuohy, at the time of this writing, has not replied to questions about this meeting, and has not yet responded to our FOIL request for records (emails) concerning this meeting and its subsequent discussions. He claims in the video above not to know or understand Stern and Ekstein’s intentions, but that they shared with him that there was a separate issue preventing them from ordering the ANUE system. When asked directly about the issue experienced by South Blooming Grove’s sewer system during the ANUE test by Councilwoman Richardson, Tuohy said that was “false.” Once again, Mr. Tuohy lied to the public.
The fact is: There is no separate, other issue like the one Mr. Tuohy said during the Monroe Town Board meeting. The issues is one and the same: South Blooming Grove’s sewer infrastructure is falling apart, and the ANUE hardware — working as advertised — treated the sewage and pushed it properly, which highlighted the fact that the infrastructure was falling apart. Tuohy claims Stern and Ekstein told him they would buy the ANUE hardware as soon as this problem was solved. But here’s the thing: As you saw in “Mayor” Kalaj’s comments during his Village Board meeting above, no solution is forthcoming. That means Tuohy basically came to this meeting to say everything was fine, and that the hydrogen sulfide situation would be resolved, when in fact, he knew that it wouldn’t be.
That Brings Us to Rick Golden
During Orange County Legislator Peter Tuohy’s presentation, he repeated a lie he made during his previous appearance before the Monroe Town Board. Councilwoman Richardson asked Tuohy to provide the hydrogen sulfide data obtained by the county. Under New York State FOIL law, data and statistical tabulations are not something you can exempt when claiming interagency/intraagency. (Meaning, a local government can sometimes withhold public information if its between one or more local governments. But they can’t exempt statistical data.)
Mr. Tuohy was told this, and then, at this next Town Board meeting, again claimed he was advised by council (he didn’t say who) that he could not release the hydrogen sulfide data. Now, being journalists, we thought Tuohy was referring to Rick Golden. We’ve previously tried to get answers from Mr. Golden on the hydrogen sulfide problem, and specifically about the County’s attempts to not comply with our FOIL requests. Mr. Golden made it a point to suggest there was no “conspiracy” involving the withholding of these documents. So we asked him:
Hi Mr. Golden,
While not the County legal ombudsman, I'm sure you can understand that — when Legislator Tuohy blames an unknown attorney at Orange County for not being allowed to release hydrogen sulfide levels at Airplane Park to Councilwoman Richardson — it would be reasonable for a member of the press to reach out to you for comment about it.
You can see Mr. Tuohy go off the rails and suggest, in his back and forth with Councilwoman Richardson, that he was provided legal guidance not to provide this information beginning at 51:22.
And just so you know, it's not just The Monroe Gazette who picked up Mr. Tuohy claiming he couldn't release the hydrogen sulfide issue because of legal guidance. As it says here from The Photo-News in today's story:
"Tuohy responded that he was working off the guidance of legal counsel and determined that the information was proprietary and would not release it, as this could cost the taxpayers more money if “the county was sued for letting some SEC trade secret out.” (See: https://www.thephoto-news.com/news/local-news/local-twins-lauded-for-helping-neighbors-in-need-AM4178266 )
I've also copied my friend Blaise Gomez at News 12 as well. Perhaps you'd be more willing to talk to her about this public safety emergency that Mr. Tuohy and Orange County has done close to nothing about since first becoming aware of it as far back as 2021. (If not much, much earlier, according to Village of Monroe Mayor Dwyer.)
So, I'd like to ask:
-Did you inform Mr. Tuohy that the hydrogen sulfide levels, which Orange County officials remarked as being "very high" in 2021, and triggered a DEC investigation at the end of 2024, could not be shared with Councilwoman Richardson because it was proprietary?
-If not, who at Orange County's esteemed law offices did so? (Mr. Tuohy said it was a "legislative attorney.")
-Did you, at any point, guide Mr. Tuohy not to release or otherwise share the hydrogen sulfide levels with anyone? (Statistical results and data tabulations, as you know, are not exempt from interagency/intra-agency exemptions to NYS FOIL law.)
-Mr. Tuohy claimed releasing this hydrogen sulfide data would somehow "cost the taxpayers more money when we get sued for letting some trade secret get out." Does Orange County believe their hydrogen sulfide level data to be proprietary?
- And finally, as the county attorney, when did you first become aware of the DEC investigation into the hydrogen sulfide levels in the Village of Monroe at Airplane Park and at the Shortline Millpond bus stop?
Mr. Golden proceeded to reply like a rat in a trap …
Mr. Mendelson,
I disagree with you that it would be reasonable for you to reach out to me when the matter referenced (as you note) a “legislative attorney.” It is clearly not reasonable for you to contact me as to such a communication. For anyone who should be even superficially cognizant of County government, you should know that the County’s Charter (essentially its constitution) specifically provides that the County Attorney “is the sole legal advisor for the County and its executive units, including its officers, other than the Legislature and its officers.” (Emphasis added). Further, it is also not reasonable for you to inquire of any attorney as to advice given to their client, as such is privileged and not subject to disclosure under FOIL or any other law.
Finally, although I was not part of the colloquy (and am not invested enough in responding to your inquiry to review the links you provided), I imagine that there was a miscommunication regarding Mr. Tuohy’s objection. I assume Mr. Tuohy was indicating that no documents can be released that would infringe on proprietary information of the underlying treatment process being used by an outside vendor (which is correct) until by a review of the specific data requested. Until such a review it cannot be known whether or not the data’s release would infringe on proprietary information. (Emphasis added, Mr. Tuohy has not responded to The Monroe Gazette’s request to confirm Mr. Golden’s interpretation of events.)
As always, the County will respond to all FOIL demands and release documents that are not otherwise exempt from disclosure by the FOIL statute. I have no desire to otherwise engage with you or to field your questions or to correct your misstatements and unprofessional and snide remarks regarding the County’s involvement with this issue.
Rick
Our new friend Rick Golden is currently reviewing a number of FOIL Appeals concerning the hydrogen sulfide situation and other matters. We expect he’ll find some excuse to deny them, likely triggering an Article 78 proceeding against the County. In our experience thus far, very few of our FOILs have been handled appropriately by Orange County, making this a necessary measure.
In a few instances (like an email you saw earlier in this post to Crooked County Executive Steve Neuhaus from Joel Stern), we have proof that the County decided to lie about having responsive records. In other instances, like the hydrogen sulfide issue, the county delayed responding to our inquiries for months. For example, some of our earliest FOILs on the hydrogen sulfide situation are over five months old. And some of those have not been responded to.
In fact, we had to take additional measures such as directly reaching out to the County’s FOIL officer, on multiple occasions, to make sure these FOILS were being handled properly and not simply ignored. Some FOIL requests were responded adequately, although in our review we found some serious flaws in how the County processed and released these documents. A couple of examples:
1. Another major issue: Mary Pat Smith, the FOIL officer for Steve Neuhaus, repeatedly refused requests to sign a POL89(3)(a) certification, as she is required by law to do so. Mr. Golden has been made aware of these issues and — as far as we know — has yet to instruct Mrs. Pat Smith of her legal obligations.
2. Peter Tuohy seems to have been left to his own devices to provide responsive records on the hydrogen sulfide issue, without there being what’s supposed to be a “diligent search” for those records. For example, it appears Mr. Tuohy just forwarded emails he thought were responsive, as opposed to the County having an IT professional find a true and correct copy of the original emails that were sent. So we don’t know if Mr. Tuohy selectively left something out.
In our experience, and I’ve been working as a journalist for twenty years now, nobody responds to an email the way Mr. Golden did unless there’s something to hide.
That got us thinking about the procurement of services by Orange County, which Mr. Golden is supposed to oversee.
What could it be?
One of the County Attorney's (Mr. Golden) functions is to review contracts and ensure they comply with all the appropriate requirements. Mr. Golden, around the same time Orange County became aware of the seriousness of the hydrogen sulfide situation in South Blooming Grove, made a major change to that system. Specifically, Orange County farmed out its procurement system to The Gordian Group, Inc.
We are investigating what procurements Godian has done for the county — whether or not they took competitive bidders, for example, involving Orange County Sewer District 1’s infrastructure problems — and what role Mr. Golden then played in this process. If any.
It could be that, like the rest of Orange County’s government, Mr. Golden was asleep at the wheel in managing the hydrogen sulfide situation, delaying a possible solution to a problem the DEC is now involved in.
We’ll have more to share with you soon. The deadline for Mr. Rick Golden to apply to our FOIL appeals is fast approaching.