Opinion Exchange » Laurie Nikolski

Some powerful guests on tap

Laurie Nikolski — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:46:58 +0000

This coming Wednesday, our Editorial Board will be sitting down in two separate meetings with some of the most influential people in the state. The interviews will be streamed LIVE on LoHud.com.

First, at 11 a.m. the new SUNY Chancellorm Nancy L. Zimpher, and Purchase College President Tom Schwarz will join us. Zimpher, formerly president of the University of Cincinnati, became the State University of New York’s ninth chancellor, and its first woman chancellor. She took the position effective June 1 and has made an ambitious start, pledging to visit all 64 SUNY campuses, including Purchase College, where Schwarz presides.

SUNY, with more than 427,000 students, is the largest university system in the nation under a single governing board. Zimpher’s leadership will have enormous impact on higher education in the state—and on the communities where these campuses are located and in themselves are economic engines for employment and research.

In the afternoon, at 3 p.m., state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli will be here in our White Plains offices. He is the chief fiscal officer for the state, with huge responsibilities, including managing the state’s pension fund; auditing the spending practices of all state agencies and local governments; and overseeing the New York State and Local Retirement System, which serves more than 1 million members and retirees.

DiNapoli, who holds an elected position, recently shared the gloomy news that the state pension fund lost 26 percent of its assets as of March 31, falling to $109.9 billion. The implications? State and local governments will need to make up the difference. Their contribution rate to the fund will need to jump to about 11 percent, up from 7.5 percent, by 2011, according to his office.

And who is on tap for that? Taxpayers, who here in New York have the highest combined state and local tax burden is highest in the nation. We’re sure that will be the main topic of interest for us, and viewers and readers.

Join us.

Painful stories that unite us

Laurie Nikolski — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 16:28:19 +0000

I returned to the office after being away most of the last three weeks to find not only the usual mounds of newspapers and paperwork to catch up with, but several dramatic, tragic local stories.

They include the deaths of a mother and child in front of a dance studio in Brewster — an illegal immigrant whom police said was drunk has been charged — the tears of a Garrison family flowing anew after the recent arrest of an 18-year-old man in connection with the death of their beloved husband, father and community member who was killed on the last day of last year; the fatal hit-and-run of a 36-year-old Garnerville man, “the kind of guy who had 300 best friends,’’ his sister said; and yet another apparent suicide death off the Tappan Zee Bridge, a 33-year-old Massachusetts woman.

Certainly, there were hundreds more memorable stories in the newspaper and on our Web site. But these—along with the heroics of a Rockland schools superintendent confronted in his office by a gunman yesterday—are some of the real heart-stoppers. They give us pause to reflect on the randomness of crime, on despair and heartbreak, on the fragility of life.

As a 30-year journalist, I’ve heard over and over throughout my career — and often been asked directly — about why we love “sensationalism,’’ why we “only” publish bad news, and on and on. Generally, unless there’s time for some good give-and-take, I don’t answer because the questions are based on falsehoods or, at the very least, misconceptions.

But I will take a moment to answer this question, less frequently asked: What is it about such stories that makes us read them? For we do read them, we editors and reporters. So do readers of the paper and the Web site. We know that through conversations, phone calls, letters, Web “hits” and what we hear in our communities.

And we do read them, not just “watch’’ or “listen” through other media or via word-of-mouth. We undertake the act of reading to understand, to let our minds and hearts grasp facts and their implications. Reading helps us breathe.

We read these stories because they move us. They frighten us. They hurt us. They can anger us. But most of all, they connect us. We all have families, we all have friends, we all have loved ones, we all care about somebody. And when we read about tragedies and real-life drama, we are instantly connected through our humanity.

Trillions? Makes my personal debt look like a flea on a dog

Laurie Nikolski — Fri, 29 May 2009 19:20:30 +0000

USA Today’s lead story today basically tells us that, just by being on the planet last year, each of us in taxpaying households went into debt $55,000. That was just in 2008. It is all due to “an explosion of federal borrowing during the recession,’’ the paper reported, “plus an aging population driving up the costs of Medicare and Social Security.’’

Here’s the real stinger: According to the newspaper’s analysis, using federal data, our federal obligations are $546,668 per household as of last year. “That’s quadruple what the average U.S. household owes for all mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other debt combined,’’ USA Today reports.

You can read the whole story at http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2009-05-28-debt_N.htm

It gets into more detail, but here’s a warning: When the word “trillion’’ starts to appear, don’t be too hard on yourself if you find your eyes wobbling and you start to rock in your chair trying to imagine what the following means in “real life” — or at least to your life: “The government took on $6.8 trillion in new obligations in 2008, pushing the total owed to a record $63.8 trillion.’’

Trillions? Sheesh. I’ve gotten proud of myself for getting my mind wrapped around the concept of a billion. Like, as our paper reported today on its page one that the assets of former North Salem Supervisor Paul Greenwood — who is facing felony charges related to massive fraud — have been traced and total $893 million.

See? $893 million. Got it. Almost a billion dollars. Wow.

But trillions? That must be something like the “gazillions’’ we used to cite as kids, when we thought we had too many chores to do.

Meanwhile, all the big money-watchers — Forbes, CNN, Money magazine — are reporting that the average individual’s credit card debt is a lot more than the $8,000 figure that was thrown about for a while; it’s now closer to $11,000 each.

Of course that, and higher amounts, need to be paid off as steadily as we can. And we have to stop charging so much.

After all, there is that $546,668 in federal obligations to face.

School votes, by the numbers

Laurie Nikolski — Tue, 26 May 2009 20:04:21 +0000

Here on the Editorial Board, our school election season ends the day before Election Day; this year, that was May 19, last Tuesday. That’s because our views on whom we endorsed in contested school board races are published in a wrap-up the day before the ballot-casting to remind voters to do two things: 1) Vote on candidates for their boards of education and on proposed school budgets, in this case for the 2009-10 school year, and on an assortment of propositions; and 2) To share our views on those candidates we thought would make the best choices for board trustees in the races that are contested.

This year, of the 53 school districts in the Lower Hudson Valley that have elected school boards and public budget votes — 45 in Westchester and Putnam, and eight in Rockland — 31 districts had contests.

People sometimes needle us when it’s all over about how “wrong’’ we were — voters ignore our recommendations and “our guys’’ don’t always win.

Truth is, our job is not to call the winners — I think we could do a pretty good job at that — but it is to endorse candidates we think would do the better job among the pack running in each school district. Sometimes that means choosing among a slew of good candidates; other times, it means holding our noses and recommending the best among the weak. And, yes, the weak can include incumbents who really only have their familiarity with their districts going for them while their opponents are too ill-informed to recommend themselves for serious consideration.

That said, there were many solid school board candidates who ran this year for an often thankless — and by the way, unpaid — job.

The results? They are available on this Web site under www.lohud.com/schoolelections. Only two of the budgets “went down,’’ with voters saying “No’’ in Mahopac and Clarkstown.

As for candidates, well, we endorsed 71 of them. Of those, 16 lost out to other candidates. That’s a more than 77 percent success rate — high, for us, in any year.

School board elections: Hot and heavy

Laurie Nikolski — Fri, 08 May 2009 20:23:01 +0000

Every year around this time, our Editorial Board is in the throes of interviewing candidates for boards of education across the Lower Hudson Valley. In my 22 years here, I have never seen such interest in school races. Some facts:

There are a total of 53 school districts in Westchester, Rockland and Putnam with school board seats that are filled by voters at the polls on a given Tuesday in mid-May. (This year, it’s May 19.) Generally each year, of those 53, less than half are contested—meaning that there are more people interested in serving than there are seats to fill in a given district. This year, there are 31 contested races. That’s 31, far more than half.
We, meaning our Editorial Board, invite all the candidates who are running in those contested races to interviews. We have less than three weeks to do that: The “campaign’’ from the time would-be candidates file their petitions with district clerks until school election day is four weeks; for city candidates, it’s shorter—three weeks, since under the law, they have a later filing date. In less than a month, we interview, evaluate, endorse and make room for non-endorsed candidates to reply with letters to the editor on The Journal News Opinion page and this Web site.
Typically, we try to get in touch with about 100 candidates. This year, we reached out to all candidates, just about 200. We asked them to contact us and are giving each one a chance to post on our site a profile of themselves and their views. The results can be found at www.lohud.com/schoolelections
On our Web site, we also streamed live our candidate interviews. Voters can still watch them, and make their own judgments about who would best represent them, by going to www.lohud.com/editorialspotlight. Click the “On Demand’’ box that will appear under the large screen. A menu will come up listing the various school districts.
In the meantime, our Editorial Board does our homework and makes recommendations to voters in endorsements that started running on our pages and on line this past Wednesday. We can tell interest is high given the numerous “hits” on those Web items, letters to the editor and phone calls to our offices.

Why the interest? I could go into hours of explanation, but here are the basics: School budgets are the only municipal ones on which voters directly decide. Property taxes comprise most of the revenue in those budgets. And property taxes here are high, high, high. So are expectations for the public schools, which generally deliver. Yet there is a grim recession hanging over all of us like the grim reaper. And tensions are growing between two newly defined groups of “haves’ and “have-nots’’—the “haves’’ are public employees who have pretty good health and pension benefits that the “have-nots,’’ those in the private sector, feel have turned to dust, along with their futures.

So the interest in who will be elected May 19 to be among the policy-makers for local school districts in the years ahead is hot and heavy. Will incumbents be tossed out? Or will voters want experienced people at the helm? Will proposed budgets for the coming school year—most of which actually have very low increases—be defeated? Will pro-teacher, pro-union candidates get elected over angry tax-cutters—or vice versa? Or will there be a mix?

We’ll know May 20.

Sometimes, the ‘little guy’ makes progress

Laurie Nikolski — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 13:28:10 +0000

It has been three years since Jim Amico’s 10-year-old son, Jarrid, was killed by a van after being struck as he pedaled across the street near his Rye home on his bike. Police said that the 82-year-old man who was at the van’s wheel was driving below the speed the limit and was not charged.

It has been three years since Jim Amico has been trying to get a stop sign at the site in hopes that his heartbreak will never be shared by another.

Amico said that the two-lane corridor, in a school zone, is prone to fast cars, making it dangerous for pedestrians. He wants a stop sign there to slow down traffic. City city officials, though, have said a stop sign in the middle of the block would make the road more dangerous because drivers would not be expecting it.
Nevertheless, as our Editorial Board said in an April 2006 editorial: “City officials are obliged to take seriously the fear that speeding could contribute to other accidents, and the suggestion that stop signs and crosswalks could protect young lives. The road should be observed, further traffic control considered and prospects for improvements discussed with a community that is now mourning with one of its families.”

This month we learned that the city has indeed launched a study at the accident site to find out how drivers’ sight lines can be improved.

That’s called responsive govenrment. Even though it has been three years. Amico’s consistent advocacy, born out of grief, has been a fight against “city hall’’ — that euphamism for all levels of government that belongs to us but sometimes doesn’t listen. Good for him. Good for him and the neighborhood.

Photo: Jim Amico of Rye holds a portrait of his son Jarrid April 17, 2009. Jarrid was hit and killed by a van on Midland Avenue while riding his bike three years ago. ( Matthew Brown / The Journal News )

Surely, someone could use the space

Laurie Nikolski — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 20:15:48 +0000

The Performing Arts Center in downtown White Plains at the top of the City Center mall is in trouble financially, its future murky. It’s a shame but not a surprise. The 410-seat performing arts center opened downtown in 2003, near the more popular movie multiplex. It has struggled to find its niche all along, offering performance and comedy acts that I, as a former White Plains resident, found to be, well, ho-hum.

Then the center’s Board of Trustees hired Jack W. Batman as the artistic director in 2007 to, as my colleague Keith Eddings reported earlier this month, “re-imagine the space as an Equity house for classic musicals.’’ That sounded great, and I really did want to try to get to such a show right in my backyard. But, like too many folks, time, family, job and money were pressing, and opportunities slipped by. Yes, I feel a little guilty. I believe strongly in supporting the arts, and community-based enterprises and businesses.

The center had been supported by a $100,000 annual subsidy from the City of White Plains — and the enthusiasm of Mayor Joseph Delfino, who has controlled a lot of the seats on the center’s board. Yet Delfino has announced he will be stepping down, the city has a multi-million-dollar deficit, and there has been too much political intrigue associated with the center. For example, John Ioris, whom Eddings cites as a “top political operative’’ for the mayor, was appointed by him to the theater’s board in 2006; soon after Ioris became its chairman and president. Meanwhile, the Democrats on the City Council generally aren’t too enthused about Republican Delfino and are hardly jumping forward with a rescue for “his’’ Performing Arts Center.

Like I said, a shame. Put the politics aside. And, yes, times are tough, but it’s hard to believe that a center with 400-plus seats wouldn’t be attractive to everyone from local (and generally excellent) high school theater performers, to administrators planning high school and college graduations, to nonprofits, business groups and industries looking to book seminars, to the larger, and immensely influential, arts community in Westchester and beyond. Look at how popular the Westchester County Center, just across town, is for events, graduations, coin shows and the like.

Here’s hoping that the center survives and thrives. I promise to attend just about anything to show my support. Although I will skip any reptile shows.

Photo: Members of the Allegra Junior Ballet Elite Company perform Granada during “Journey of Hope” the 3rd Annual Dance Benefit for African Children helpd at the White Plains Performing Arts Center in White Plains Jan. 26, 2007. Proceeds from the performance went to the Esther’s Aid For Needy & Abandoned Children Inc. which brings aid to youth in Rwanda and other parts of the world. ( Rory Glaeseman / The Journal News )

How much do they make?

Laurie Nikolski — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 15:39:10 +0000

Lazying about with nothing to do? Not too interested in going over the bills on your desk or finishing up that 2008 income tax return? Take a gander at what the people we elect, and those who are appointed to run state government, earn.

Thanks to the Empire Center for New York State Policy, “a project of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research,’’ a conservative and fiscal think-tank, there is a Web site with data bases on all kinds of information — including payrolls for local school districts, villages, towns, cities, counties and public authorities throughout New York state.

Let’s hear it for transparency.

Today, the center announced it posted the payrolls for the state’s executive, legislative and judicial branches for 2008.

Visit www.seethroughny.net and poke around a bit. It’s educational — after all, these are our local and state tax dollars at work. And cruising the site sure beats doing your own financial paperwork.

Revolution at the village level

Laurie Nikolski — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 19:34:07 +0000

Wow. The Democratic tsunami and voter demand for change of last November roll on, reaching all the way into local villages in the Lower Hudson Valley. Yesterday’s election for mayors, village board trustees and, in some places, village justices, certainly was not the same-old, same-old.

In Croton-on-Hudson, Democrats swept back into power by a thin margin on a theme of economic redevelopment. In unofficial results, Democratic challenger Leo Wiegman beat by 20 votes current Mayor Greg Schmidt, who was seeking a third term. Wiegman’s running mates, Demetra Restuccia and Ian Murtaugh, narrowly beat Republican incumbents Trustees Thomas Brennan and Susan Konig for seats on the village board.

For the first time in 22 years, Sleepy Hollow Democrats gained complete control of village government, as current Trustee Kenneth Wray, a Democrat, beat Republican candidate Alan Singer for the mayor’s post. Likewise, for trustees, political newcomers Evelyn Stupel, Bruce Campbell and Barbara Carr swept the election, defeating Republican Trustee Maria Rose DeMilia, and candidates Robert Higle and Bruce Lozito.

In Port Chester’s mayoral race, Democratic incumbent Dennis Pilla held on to the top post, beating Republican challenger Bill Villanova.

Of course, not all was lost for Republicans; likable Republican newcomer Brian C. Smith, for example, beat Democratic appointee Terence J. Masterson by 37 votes for a one-year unexpired term on Irvington’s village board dominated by Democrats — until now.

In the “change’’ category, Pleasantville Trustee Peter Scherer, on the Village Party line, defeated by 200 votes two-term Mayor Bernard Gordon, backed by the New Pleasantville Party.

In Putnam’s Cold Spring, 16-year incumbent Mayor Anthony Phillips was defeated by challenger Seth Gallagher, a sitting trustee. Another incumbent, Trustee Edward Mancari, also lost his bid for re-election. Bruce Campbell, who had previously served two terms as village trustee and currently sits on the Haldane school board, and newcomer John Ralph Falloon, a firefighter with deep roots in the village, will become new trustees. Phillips and Mancari ran together on the Action Party; the other candidates ran separately on their own independent lines.

These were all fascinating races, among those you can still get a glimpse into by going to LoHud.com/editorialspotlight and clicking “On Demand’’ under the screen and selecting videos of recent interviews with the candidates by the Editorial Board. You also can learn more about the candidates — and their promises — at www.LoHud.com/villageelex09.

The natives — er, voters — clearly were restless this village election season. And numbers aren’t all in yet, but voter turnout does seem to have been higher than in many previous years. You have to wonder what this portends for school trustee elections May 19 — and those local school district budgets that taxpayers so very much love.

Villagers, vote your interests

Laurie Nikolski — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:12:48 +0000

It may be the day after St. Patrick’s Day but it is the day for village elections.

Need some guidance before you head to the polls today? Check out our Editorial Board’s endorsements in contested mayoral and village trustee elections in Rockland, Putnam and Westchester counties at LoHud.com/villageleections09. (Some voters also will elect village justices at this time.)

Want to hear straight from the horses’ mouths? Westchester, Rockland and Putnam voters can tune into this month’s Editorial Board interviews with the candidates; go to www.LoHud.com/editorialspotlight, click “On Demand” and select the video from the menu.

All races can have write-in challengers. Yet there are no formal contested campaigns for such posts in Rockland this year in Chestnut Ridge, Kaser, New Square, Grand View, Hillburn, South Nyack and Upper Nyack. The villages of Wesley Hills and New Hempstead, which hold spring elections, have no village board seats up this year. The following Rockland villages hold November elections: Haverstraw, Nyack, Piermont, Sloatsburg, Spring Valley, Suffern and West Haverstraw.
Neither are there contested races in the Westchester villages of Briarcliff Manor, Bronxville, Elmsford, Hastings-on-Hudson, Larchmont, Pelham, Pelham Manor, Rye Brook, Scarsdale, Tarrytown and Tuckahoe. The following villages in Westchester County hold November elections: Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, Mamaroneck, Mount Kisco and Ossining.
Of Putnam’s three villages, Brewster holds elections in November; races in Nelsonville that are before village voters tomorrow are uncontested.
Some Westchester village elections — for example, Elmsford, Irvington, Pelham and Sleepy Hollow — are run by the county Board of Elections; otherwise the villages themselves run them. For more information, contact your village clerk. Hours for the vote generally are 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.

Vote! It’s your right, and responsibility.