Questions All Residents of South Blooming Grove Should Be Asking This Week
What's the EPA doing in South Blooming Grove? Is the Orange County Sewer District releasing contaminated water into the Ramapo? All this and dates you should remember in today's post.
Above: This photo was taken outside of 7 San Marcos in South Blooming Grove. The neighboring homes are scheduled to be demolished for multifamily housing in the near future.
This is just a short post today, since I spent a couple of hours filming something I hope to share with you soon. (Thank you to Simon and Adrianna for their time today.)
I wanted to inform you of two upcoming meetings in the Village of South Blooming Grove.
The first is a Planning Board meeting THIS Thursday, August 15th, at 8 pm at Village Hall.
The second is on Monday, August 26th, at 8 pm, also at Village Hall.
Village Hall is located at 811 Route 208, just behind the Rapid Care building that Mr. Joel Stern and Isaac Ekstein own or co-own.
Nobody ever got a straight answer on that one since the dispute was moved from Orange County Court to Rabbinical Court.
And yes, there will be public comment available at both meetings, although you will likely be restricted to no more than three minutes.
So, I recommend writing down anything you might like to say just so you're prepared to speak.
3 minutes usually works out to about 330 words. So you can even write out what you want to say, count the words, and if you're under 330, you'll be in good shape.
The Planning Board will discuss 1-3-5 San Marcos, which we previously covered in these two feature-length posts here and here.
Hopefully, you can make it to both meetings. You are encouraged to bring a friend. The more people that come out to these things, the better.
Now, you might be wondering what you should bring up to both boards and so I'm going to share with you something. Below is a copy of an email that was sent to Orange County Legislator Chairwoman — and South Blooming Grove's County representative — Katie Bonelli.
This email was also provided to Assemblyman Brian Maher's office, and it was also provided to the one person in Senator Skoufis's office that has actually showed up in South Blooming Grove to speak with residents.
(You'll notice that the Senator himself is still noticeably absent himself from these meetings, despite receiving requests from residents to attend and speak on their behalf. I guess he has better things to do like argue with people on Facebook.)
Any of the following are things you can bring up at the Planning Board and Village Board meetings:
Hello Chairwoman Bonelli,
I am writing in the hopes that you might be able to help residents of South Blooming Grove — and members of the press such as myself — get a few questions answered by Orange County.
Unfortunately, as of this writing, answers are not forthcoming from the county.
Specifically:
1. The Department of Health will not clarify if South Blooming Grove is in compliance with the numerous violations that the DOH issued to them in September of 2023. When asked, they referred me to the County executive's press contact, who then did not respond to requests for clarification.
Do you know if South Blooming Grove is currently in compliance with the Department of Health's notice of violations that were issued in September of 2023?
The Department of Health reported to the Village that they do not have enough water for the current residents. FOIL-ed documents revealed that, at the earliest, a new well would not be operational until 2027. And that's assuming the four wells identified prove to be viable. (At this time, it's not clear that they are.)
2. Orange County Sewer District 1 is at capacity for South Blooming Grove. Changing weather patterns and extreme events have detrimental effects on wastewater treatment plants. Heavy rainfall can overwhelm the capacity of treatment facilities, leading to the release of untreated sewage into water bodies. Rising temperatures also affect the efficiency of treatment processes.
While I know a new Sewer treatment plant (and upgrades) are forthcoming, what is the current status of OCSD 1 as it relates to managing the storm water we're currently receiving, and how much untreated sewage is being released (if any) due to the increasing amounts of water and rising temperatures?
3. Finally, Satterly Creek continues to be brown, most likely from runoff due to continued unpermitted and unauthorized construction in both the Town of Blooming Grove and the Village of South Blooming Grove. DEC stop work orders have been ignored. Most of these projects are being built without prior approval by the Village of South Blooming Grove. [This includes the home behind 7 San Marcos that we previously reported on here at The Monroe Gazette.]
Given that Orange County is out of sewage capacity with OCSD1 for Blooming Grove, does the County plan any sort of enforcement action to stop the continued unpermitted building which will exacberate the sewage and flooding issues mentioned above as it relates to OCSD 1?
In addition, there are two other things you can also bring up at these meetings: The Blooming Grove Report and the EPA.
Let's start with the EPA real quick.
As of this morning, an EPA spokesperson confirmed to The Monroe Gazette that there is an active investigation looking into what's going on in South Blooming Grove. What that means, or if we'll see any actual action taken by them, is to be determined.
But given that the EPA is investigating the Village and the unpermitted construction polluting Satterly Creek—the EPA really only has jurisdiction when it comes to pollution to our area's waterways; the rest falls on the DEC—you can and should ask the Village to explain what they're doing about the unpermitted construction.
You can also ask the Village whether the EPA investigation, coupled with the situation at Orange County Sewer District 1 and the non-compliance with the Orange County Department of Health, should be more than enough to issue a village-wide moratorium on any building. (It should be. So why isn’t there one?)
That brings us to The Blooming Grove Report.
The Blooming Grove Report is a publication we've covered extensively here at The Monroe Gazette.
The really short version of what you can ask is this:
It's a violation of both the NYS and Federal Establishment Clause to use the government to favor a religious group, especially when it comes at the expense of secular residents who are also represented by that same government.
The Blooming Grove Report is something the Village will not answer questions about, nor will they respond to any FOIL requests about it.
Despite this, the BGR continues to be made and distributed exclusively to Yiddish-speaking residents (almost all of the same religious group), with no English-language equivalent. Go ahead and see if you can find an English-language edition of The Blooming Grove Report right now.
The BGR has also provided false information to Yiddish-speaking residents on issues such as the village's water supply. Most recently, the BGR said the water situation is under control, everything is fine, and plenty of new water is on the way.
FOIL'ed documents from Orange County's Department of Health say otherwise.
So there's a few things going on here:
1. Why is the Village of South Blooming Grove actively misleading its Yiddish-speaking residents about the water situation?
2. Why is the Village of South Blooming Grove not making the BGR available in English and on its website for everyone to access? (Currently, the BGR can only be found on private WhatsApp channels and on Yiddish language message boards such as Ivelt.com)
3. Why is the Village using government resources to provide preferential treatment to a religious group at the expense of the non-religious residents and contributing to the disharmony in the community?
One thing you'll find in the story of South Blooming Grove is that everyone, Haredi and non-Haredi alike, is being misled.
They are being misled by a small group of wealthy developers who just so happen to be Satmar. Those developers are pitting residents against each other, abusing government funds—which has resulted in an active Comptroller investigation—and otherwise using the government to provide services for developers and their related companies (like the construction companies).
I'll be back with more soon. For the last couple of days, I've been chasing government officials and other parties around to get as much information as I can about the flooding situation in our region.
More on that tomorrow.