LWV Candidates Forum
Good evening. Welcome to the candidate forum for the league... For Croton On Hudson Village trustee hosted by the League of Women Voters of Northwest Westchester. I'm Teri Lukin, co chair of the Voter Services Committee of the Northwest Westchester League. Since 1920, the League of Women Voters has been a nonpartisan grassroots organization working to protect and expand voting rights and ensure everyone is represented in our democracy. Our mission is simple, to empower voters and defend democracy. We do this through advocacy, education, and litigation at the local, state, and national level. The league does not support or oppose candidates or political parties, and we are committed to ensure compliance with our national organization's diversity, equity, and inclusion policy. Membership is open to everyone, male or female, 16 years of age and older, and please consider joining the league. In tonight's candidate forum, you will have the opportunity to listen to the candidate's views about significant issues in the community so you may make an informed decision, on November 3. Early voting begins October 24 and ends November 1 at over 25 locations in Westchester. You can find the locations and times on our website, lwv-nww.org, or the Westchester County Board of Elections web... Website. Before we begin, I welcome the candidates in alphabetical order, Maria Lynn Debola, Len Simon, and Maria Slippen. Our moderator for this evening is Susan Weisfeld, and we are delighted to have Croton-Harmon students, Bonnie Howe and Nikki McKierzy. Sorry, Nikki. I mess that up every time as our timekeepers. They're good with the technology. The form will be recorded, so I'll take a moment to review the league's recording policy. Only the videographer authorized by the league, in this case, it's the village, may record this forum. Under no circumstances may candidates or attendees record the proceedings.
Any use of the recording requires advance approval of the league. Only licensed media, including TV, radio, and newspapers, are entitled by FCC regulations to air portions of this recording. Anyone else who broadcast this must do so in its entirety. Please allow me to introduce Susan Weisfeld. She's a thirty year member of the League of Women Voters, first with Bronxville, and then for the past ten years with League of Women Voters of River Towns. She lives... She is a former adjunctive instructor of communications at Iona University and lives in East Yonkers. She is not in our voting district, and we thank her for being here this evening. Thank you, Susan. I'm delighted.
As you heard, my name is Susan Weisfeld, and I am pleased to moderate on behalf of the League of Women Voters. And I am not a member of this community, and so I apologize if I mispronounce anyone's name. At this time, I ask the candidates in the audience to make sure to put your cell phones on vibrate as they cannot be used during the forum. No photographs can be taken by the audience, and please do not display any campaign materials in this room. I will be asking questions submitted in advance to me by email by members of this community. All questions have been submitted by the public prior to the event and were reviewed by the League of Women Voters of Northwest Westchester County. The candidates have not seen these questions, and no questions will be submitted during the forum. And we thank those who have taken the time to submit the questions because this is an important way we can learn the views of your candidates. And now the ground rules for this evening's event are as follows. The candidates have drawn lots for order of speaking. And throughout the debate, I will rotate the order of candidate response. For all statements by each time... With... By each candidate, the timekeeper will indicate thirty seconds remaining and then a stop sign when time is up. Candidates must stop speaking but can finish their sentence. There will be no questions addressed to only one candidate. All questions will be answered by each candidate and please know that throughout the debate no comments of a personal nature will be permitted And also please note that candidates will speak to the audience and not to each other. Each candidate will have up to two minutes for an opening statement with no rebuttal.
The order of closing statements will be in the reverse order as the opening statements. And at the conclusion of the opening statements, I will ask questions submitted via email from members of this community. Each candidate will have up to one and a half minutes to answer. There will be no rebuttal except during the entire debate. Each candidate is allowed two rebuttals of thirty seconds. If you wish to rebut, please raise your hand and request a rebuttal after all the candidates have finished answering a question. After we are finished with the audience questions, candidates will have up to two minutes for closing statement related to this forum. There are no rebuttals to closing statements. And now, I would like to introduce in alphabetical order the candidates for Croton On Hudson Village trustee Mary Lynn Debola, Len Simon, and Maria Slippen. Okay. So we are ready for opening statements. And as I told you, the candidates have drawn lots. So, Mary Lynn Debola will start with your opening statement.
Thank you. Before I make an opening statement, I would like to thank the municipal staff for livestreaming tonight's debate and the League of Women Voters for championing civic engagement. Good evening. My name is Mary Lynn Debola, and I am running for village trustee in the village of Croton On Hudson on the voice of Croton ballot for the November third election. I'm running as a nonpartisan Community First candidate to represent the residence of Croton On Hudson on the on the voice of Croton ballot line for the November third election. I am running as a nonpartisan, community first candidate to represent the village... The the the residents. My family has called Croton home for over nineteen years. I chose this village intentionally, leaving Long Island to escape overdevelopment and traffic congestion. My priorities for Croton and Hudson are to preserve what makes Croton special, such as our rich history, artistic achievement, and the village's naturally beautiful environment, which includes our beautiful rivers. I will work to ensure that our local government remains transparent, responsive, and accountable. I support keeping the village court in Croton and maintaining strong community oriented approach to governance. I am also an attorney. Prior to my retirement in 2025, I was chief court attorney and special referee in Bronx County Supreme Court civil term for forty four years. In that position, I gave the litigants an opportunity to be heard and worked with them to resolve their issues. Drawing on that experience, I will work to simplify our ever expanding village code and pledge to serve with humility, openness, and a willingness to listen, learn, and evolve.
Excuse me. I would like to know what that material is. Is that campaign material? What? Alright. I'm gonna ask you to leave. You you just... I'm not saying you have to take it out. I just don't want you to display it, and it's being displayed because there's a camera here. Problem.
I don't know what it is. I can't see it. You're you're extremely rude, and this is a very polite place. It's not my problem. Okay. I want you to know that you're you're being recorded as being rude. Okay. Fine. Okay. Mister mister Simon,
can you make your... I'm I'm asking everyone not to look at those signs. Right. Well, thank you and welcome everybody and and thank you league. You're the gold standard for civic involvement for your sponsorship tonight. I appreciate everyone attending and those watching electronically. I know Mary Maria, Mary Lynn and I will do our best to try to make it interesting. I'm so happy to talk about Croton tonight, both our accomplishments together and our hopes for the future. I've spent my life helping America's municipalities working for Republicans, Independents, and Democrats. If you spoke to them individually, you wouldn't know their party. One common goal drove them, improving their community and ensuring its future success. These men and women were my teachers. Their example guides me in Croton. I spend much of my time at the Franklin Roosevelt Presidential Library where I am a docent. What mattered to FDR was not partisanship and ideology, but finding what works and doing that, including course corrections as you learn more. I've taken that lesson to heart. I'm proud of our work in Croton on a team with elected officials, talented professionals, and dedicated committee volunteers. For example, Croton had the lowest tax growth of any Westchester village between 2016 and 2025. Our infrastructure projects, our sustainability initiatives, our work with businesses, improvements in our transportation, and efforts to increase all types of housing are success stories. Many have received awards and are models for other communities. I know we'll talk about these tonight. We can do better and I hope we will. I always try to keep this in mind, we are public servants not perfect servants. A mayor I worked for described what we do in three ways, regular work, continuous improvement, and breakthrough efforts. In Croton, we've strived for continuous improvements and breakthrough efforts and have met these marks regularly.
With everyone's help, I hope that's our North Star for the future. Thank you Croton for the opportunity to do the most meaningful and satisfying work of my life. I look forward to everyone's questions.
Thank you. Good evening. Thank you to the League of Women Voters, to our moderator, to my fellow candidates, to everyone who is here, and to everyone who sent in a question tonight. I'm Maria Slippen. Croton has been my home for twenty years. I raised my family here, and I know Croton because I'm an active part of it. A trustee's most important work rarely makes headlines. It's reading every page before a vote, listening to our neighbors until their concerns are truly heard, and showing up for committees where so much of the village's real work gets done. I'm a communications professional, and I believe residents deserve to know what's happening before decisions are made, not after. That belief has guided my work for the past two years on this board. We've hosted community forums on everything from neighborhood traffic and Kaplan's Pond to New York Forward, and we've expanded tax exemptions for seniors to... Seniors, deployed service members, and surviving spouses of first responders. We have a lot to be proud of. Our train station solar canopies earned a statewide award and are projected to bring in lease revenue that will not come from your tax bill. We also face real questions about growth, our environment, our finances, and village services, and those deserve careful, honest conversations. My approach is simple, strengthen Croton from the inside out. Let's support the staff and volunteers who make this village work, communicate clearly, and keep making steady project on... Progress on the projects that matter. It might not be flashy, but that's how we build trust. I'm looking forward to tonight's conversation, and I'm honored to keep doing this work for you. Thank you.
Thank you. And now we come to the candidate questions, and we start with mister Simon. How do you define the role of village trustee?
Well, you are you are elected to be part of the policy making and the management of what really amounts to be a a $23,000,000 operating budget with a substantial capital budget as well. We have the responsibility of of looking at the issues that are that are before us today, but also trying to prepare the village for tomorrow. So much of our work is is done in a granular way through the through the annual budget, and that helps to develop our priorities and and make sure that we're meeting the the needs whether it be environment or public works or or public safety. We we have to make the determination about how many officers we need. How is our fire department doing? How is our EMS doing in terms of in terms of their needs? But then we also have to look down the road a little bit. It's what I call the Croton of tomorrow and and bring in initiatives that help define the the Croton that's... That our children and our grandchildren hopefully will have the opportunity to live in. The Croton of 2026 is very different from the quote from the Croton of 1946. Graceful evolution is what we're always looking for. I think it's the job of the trustees to try to get a sense of where the community is going in the future and help prepare it for that. Thank
Thank you for the question. The way I look at it is there are, you know, 8,000 people that live in this village, and there are only five of us who can sit up here. And our role is really to ensure that those many thousands of voices are reflected. There are so many diverse opinions and positions and priorities in the village, and I think that the trustee needs to take the role very seriously to do research and to be open to changing his or her mind about what is important. You know, we set priorities as a board. We set goals, and those need to be based on feedback from our residents. I think that the role of the trustee is really to listen. We really need to come in having some strong opinions and ideas from our work here or in other places or our professional lives, but really to listen and be responsive to what is happening in the community, and that takes patience and teamwork. Thank you. Thank you. Miss Debiola,
Well, I... At its core, I think the, role of a village trustee is to represent the people. We're elected by the people. I think we have a a obligation to represent the people. That being said, my prior experiences was as a court attorney and a special referee. And during that tenure, of over forty years, it was my responsibility to listen to the people who brought their grievances to the court and to help them resolve their issues. I gave them all an opportunity to be heard. And the high point of my career were days when I was able to resolve the issues and and the parties would actually go away... Go out and have lunch together or... And and thank me for it even when they lost. So I think the most important thing for the trustees to do is to listen to the people and represent the people and do what the people want in this village.
Thank you. Now I'm going to ask a question, that has two parts. Over the last year, there have been several instances where the public and the media have criticized the village officials for lack of transparency and candor regarding issues of importance to village residents. So first, we'll start miss Slippen. What specific steps would you take to return public confidence and trust with regard to board level decisions?
We'll do the first and then the second. So I have up the whole... I'm sorry. To ask the clarifying question. I seconds to respond have to that part. Yes. Okay. Can you... I was expecting a second part. Do you mind repeating just the question? No. I don't I don't I don't...
Throughout this debate, if ever you want me to repeat anything, I'm happy to do that. Okay. So what specific steps would you take to return public confidence and trust with regard to board level decisions?
Okay. I appreciate the question. You know, obviously, just in the past few weeks, we've had some opportunities to have some very public discussions about transparency and, how to trust how to trust each other and how to make sure that the residents trust what we are doing. So I think what we really need to do is the board needs to work together on our trust with each other so that we can share information equally among all the trustees, and then this group of people, regardless of their opinion or their background or the party they're with, can work together in good faith to be making these decisions. You know, I made a specific ask, I don't even remember. Within the last, you know, few weeks about, you know, putting together... Us putting together a policy, working together with the attorney to figure out what that policy is. I think that it's very aspirational to say that we trust each other and we're gonna work together, but I think that we have... I have found that if we work together on a statement and write it down and commit to it, that's gonna help us move forward. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Miss Debola,
what specific steps would you take to return public confidence and trust with regard to board level decisions?
I I I think we would have to start off in in in a grassroots type of situation and start from scratch. My understanding from what I've heard from other lit... From constituents and other... And members of the public is that, with the recent events in in Croton, they have pretty much... They're pretty much disgusted with how the village handles things. It's pretty bad when you have a, village government when the trustees aren't even aware of what's going of what's going on, or at least some of the trustees are not aware of what's going on. So I think that we have to start almost from scratch, and and talk to the people and and as again, be representatives to... Of the people. They wanna know what's going on. We need to tell them.
Okay. Do you want me to repeat the question, mister? Okay. What specific steps would you take to return public confidence and trust
with regard to board level decisions? Well, I would begin by, respectfully disagreeing with the premise of the of the question that, public confidence needs to be restored. Now having said that, we can always do better. I said in my opening comments, we are public servants not perfect servants. So there could be a disagreement from time to time on how the board has handled specific issues and and when that's the case, improvement and reform I think are necessary. I also said in my in my opening comments that one of our goals that we try to meet all the time is continuous improvement. So I welcome the public telling us when they feel that we've fallen short, but I think overall our our board and our professional government which is both award winning and high performing has has done an incredible job in providing services and in in delivering an excellent quality of life for the village in all four seasons regardless of the weather and and that that's something that we can we can be very proud of. Should we should we strive to improve? Absolutely, and I'll be the first one to to say that's an improvement. Just like when I came on the board, we didn't have a planner, we didn't have a grant writer, we didn't have a business liaison, Croton didn't have an association for its businesses. I worked with my colleagues to make all those things happen. Those are improvements, those are things that help to restore excellence and provide excellence government, and I wanna continue to try to do those things as well as improving our performance. Thank you.
Thank you. Okay. This is part two, and I will start with miss Debola. What would you do to ensure that residents can better understand how decisions are made? Who is responsible and whether policies are being followed?
Okay. I I think as a start, we have to, be more accountable to the residents of the village. We need to stop doing things, behind closed doors. We need to be open and honest with our constituents. They need... They have a right to know what's going on in the government. Again, it's it's about accountability. It's it's about letting the the the public know what's going on, not doing things behind closed doors.
Okay. Thank you. Mister Simon, do you want me to repeat the question? Yes, please. What would you do to ensure that residents can better understand how decisions are made, who is responsible,
and whether policies are being followed? Well, I I would say, and I mean this with with great seriousness, give us a call. This is a small village. We are we are accessible. In most cases, our phone numbers and our emails are are all over the place. One of the things that I find, I won't say frustrating but at least disconcerting from time to time is when we we get a fair amount of criticism on a particular issue, but no one has has bothered to contact us to to talk about that issue. So I would encourage folks to a, come to this room when when they can, take a look at our deliberations on on any any given Wednesday, get involved in our committees. You know, we don't have enough people volunteering for our committees. I I'll be talking a little bit later about how we don't have a Croton resident to spare. So I think if we... If if folks will will engage a little bit more with our with our with our governmental activities, particularly where they have a concern, I think that'll go a long way towards towards dealing with with either unknown questions or or concerns that people have.
Thank you. Miss Slippen, what would you do to ensure that residents can better understand how decisions are made, who is responsible, and whether policies are being followed?
Okay. So I would just like to take a step back and say that I wholeheartedly believe that the onus to communicate what is happening at the... At our meetings, whether it's a village board meeting or one of our committee meetings or, in other activities that are happening, that lays solely on the trustees and the village staff. And we really need to find a way to work together to be getting our messages out better. I have been a communications professional my entire career. I've worked with organizations that are struggling and organizations that are thriving. People want to be communicated with. So I think what we... We've taken some positive steps. I pushed to hire a communications firm, which, you know, is is a decision about spending tax dollars to communicate with people, but I think that sometimes you do need to engage professionals. The village manager's job is huge, and he is skilled in so many ways, but I think an area of... I think that communications is an area where he can... Could use some help, and so we've gotten him communications firm. The new... For a while, we were lacking because we did not have an assistant village manager, and now that we do, in spite of the controversy around the situation with that role, I do think that adding that person to the team is going to increase the communication, but I'll just go back and repeat that it is our job to get it out through our website, through our Facebook page, through our newsletters, through whatever other channels that we have available.
Thank you. Okay. Now we're going to switch to housing. Again, we have a general general statement and then several questions based on this. We're In recent years, residents have been actively engaged in village meetings regarding the development of new housing. The village trustees are charged with balancing the development of multi dwelling housing with private homes while retaining the small town feel current residents want to maintain. So I'm going to start with mister Simon. Yes. How can we expand available housing in the village of Croton while maintaining the small town quality?
Well, I think that's a great question and I think, you know, my view is we wanna do it very carefully. One of the best things we did as a board, in the last couple of years was adopt the 1% rule so that, our our housing supply is not gonna grow more than 1% per year or 10% over a ten year period. Then we have to look at the reality of, of what we've actually done. We've added, 33 units through Maple Commons affordable. We've added 33 units through the Hudson 25 South Riverside, mostly market rate with with four affordable. There are there are affordable condominiums coming at what we call Lot A, our our transit oriented development project. But the fact of the matter is, although we approved it a year ago, we're not close to the actual construction being started maybe sometime next year. So that's gonna be three or four years before that... Before people actually start moving in there. So I think if we if we go on a on a deliberative path, if we're guided by standards of of of how how quickly we wanna grow and and and how how fast we wanna proceed in this area, I I think we can we can do both. Our obligation is to is to help create a Croton where all of the above is possible, which means we wanna have market rate housing, rental market rate housing, condo, ADUs, affordable condo, affordable affordable rental. But if we if we do it if we do it in a proportional way, I think it's possible.
Okay. Thank you. Miss Slippen, how can we expand available housing in the village of Croton while maintaining the small town quad... Quality?
I think something else that the board did this year that has been really beneficial is hiring a planner because we get proposals, and we need to figure out how to... The... How best to assess and assess them and give feedback to them to figure out what is going to be the right size. The people on the board have come from all different backgrounds and have a lot of professional strengths, but this is a sophisticated formula that we need to figure out what works, what our what our infrastructure is able to manage, and, you know, what is reasonable for, you know, for the village. By working with the planner, she is able to help us take a project, evaluate it, take for the the proposal at 425 South Riverside. This is a project that came in and had... It looked like a fully formed project, but what it had... What there were were a lot of holes in the project. There were a lot of questions that need to be asked. And by working with her, we were able to say, we know this land has been sold. We know something is gonna be built here, but what makes sense? She's helping us make sure we're asking all the right questions about that so we can decide what buildings in what places fit the the environment of our town, fit the... And we can sustain.
Thank you, miss Debola. Should I repeat the question? Yes, please. How can we expand available housing in the village of Croton while maintaining the small town quality?
Thank you. First off, I would I would say that the first thing we need to do... And and I hope that... I'm I'm very happy to hear about the planner. The first thing we need to do is to assess how the recent housing developments have impacted the village. And going forward with expanding the housing, I think we we definitely need to look at the type of housing we're addressing. I'm a proponent of affordable housing. I think it... Especially when it's ownership... When it's in the form of ownership. So I'm happy to hear about the condominiums that are are planned. But I also have certain concerns because although we're planning on on adding these condominiums, condominiums are are taxed differently than the individual homeowners. The condominiums are taxed as rental... As a rental property would be taxed, and the home... And an individual homeowner is taxed as we all know those of us with single family homes. So how are we gonna adjust for that? We can't keep putting the burden on the single family homes. We need to have some kind of
some kind... We we need to work on some kind of compromise and to move forward and... With the housing. Perfect. So it doesn't impact everybody, you know, separately.
Okay. Thank you. Miss Slippen, do you support a moratorium on further housing development until recently approved projects are completed and their impact can be thoroughly assessed? If so, what would that assessment entail and how would you involve village residents in the process?
Okay. So I do not support a moratorium. I think that we need to... I don't wanna ever put the village in a place where we have tied our own hands. I wanna be able to... You know, good projects survive scrutiny. And I think that being able to look at all the projects that are that are presented to the village, Croton is an amazing place. Of course, people wanna build here and move here and try to find other ways to get more people to come here. It it just makes our community better. You can see that by the the new businesses that have just popped... You know, a new business popped up just this week in town. I think that's really exciting, and when we do something extreme like a moratorium, we we close ourselves off from opportunities. But I do think we need to go back to process. We need to make sure that we are having conversations as soon as we are able to have a community conversation. We saw it work in so many different ways. You know, the... When we when we had the conversation around New York forward, which isn't specifically about housing, but it was so many people with so many ideas that were able to come forward and sit in this room and have a conversation. It's about creating those mechanisms so that we can get feedback and assess a project, and we have to be not afraid to say no. We're not afraid to say this is too big or this doesn't feel right. We need to we need to really be very critical of when we say yes, but not create a situation where we can't say yes to a project that we really want to.
Thank you. Miss Debiola, do you support a moratorium on further housing development until recently approved projects are completed and their impact can be thoroughly assessed? If so, what would that assessment entail and how would you involve village residents in the process?
Do you support a moratorium on further housing development until recently approved projects are completed and their impact can be thoroughly assessed? If so, what would that assessment entail, and how would you involve village residents in the process?
Okay. Well, I I don't know about supporting a moratorium on on further projects, but I think that before we consider that, we have to consider what our already completed projects have and how our already completed projects have impacted the village. And despite my attempts to find out, I've been unsuccessful. So, you know, we don't know what... That... That's my start. I don't know that we need a moratorium. I think we need to just be more cautious going forward. And and and I think we need to be very cautious going forward. As as it's been said, we're a very small village, of over... Of a little more than 8,000 people, and I'm I'm concerned about overdevelopment in the village.
Thank you. Mister Simon, do you support a moratorium on further housing development until recently approved projects are completed and their impact can be thoroughly assessed? If so,
what would that assessment entail and how would you involve village residents in the process? Thank you for the question. I don't support a moratorium. In fact, I I think the 1% that we've adopted is, is much better than a moratorium. By the way, I give, Nora Nicholson, great credit for being the, the person who came up with the concept of the 1%. I think the 1% will guide us and and and give us the ability to move forward as a community far more than a blunt instrument of a moratorium would be. Now, by the way, we're we're we're in a period that is very slow, despite what some may think in terms of housing. Maple Commons has been built. I think the impact there has been relatively modest. Same thing with the Hudson at 25 South Riverside both in terms of traffic and in terms of of education. As Maria said earlier, there's big question marks with respect to the 425 South Riverside project. Keep in mind by the way, Maple Commons became possible and lot a became possible because in both cases we were deploying public property. We have no more public property to deploy for those kinds of purposes. So I think we're going to be working with the with the development community to the extent that they come up with proposals, but our 1% will guide us and we're we're... We are going to, watch the impacts very closely, but I think going slowly being guided by the 1% far superior to the blunt instrument of a moratorium.
Thank you. Okay. Mister Bola, the village board put a cap on accessory dwelling unit development at 50 units and they are nearing that number, should the cap be removed, retained, or expanded? Why or why not? Well,
as I said on on the previous on a previous question, I think we need to ascertain what the effect of those, ADUs are before we go forward. I I don't think I can universally answer the the question because we don't know what impact the ADRs have... ADUs have had.
Oh, okay. Thanks. Mister Simon, should I repeat the question? No. I think I think that's fine. I happen to have been, a a strong advocate of of ADUs from both observing communities in the Westchester area but also others that I'd worked with around the country. Keep in mind that when we talked about the 50 global maximum of ADUs, we started with 17. They were all apartments but those those 17 were included in the 50. And a number of the ADUs that have been approved by our planning board, which I think is doing a great job on ADUs have also been apartments. So we we... The planning board has proceeded I think in a very effective way in analyzing each one, keeping them more with within the boundaries established by by the code that we set up. It's our job to look at at the impact of laws that we've enacted. So we should definitely take a look at, at the ADUs and that's something that I I think we we plan to do later this year, early next year. I I wouldn't, I I wouldn't put out of the question the possibility of expanding the number. It's not the priority that it needs to be right now because we're actually not that close to the 50. We're in the mid thirties and we're approving roughly I'd say maybe one every three or four months you judge it by the planning board agendas. So it's something to keep in mind. I've been incredibly moved by the ADU stories that have come before the planning board. ADUs particularly accessory units but Thank you. Detached units but apartments as well are about moms and dads and uncles and aunts and children who are looking for a place to live and and keep the family together. Thank you. Okay. Miss Slippen, should I repeat that? If you don't mind. Sure. The village board put a cap on accessory dwelling units
development at 50 units, and they are nearing that number. Should the cap be removed, retained, or expanded? Why or why not?
Well, you know, I'll answer this question a little bit the way I've answered a couple of other questions, which is this is another opportune... You know, another reason that I'm grateful we have a planner. I think there is a way to look at this and assess this and see... You know, really take a look at where we started and how far... How fast it's grown, what have been the impacts of those, ADUs that have been put in had on the neighborhoods they're in because our neighborhoods are a lot different. If you're putting an ADU, you know, in in Harmon or if you're putting an ADU somewhere where the lot sizes are much bigger, you know, I think a lot a lot depends on where the ADUs are, not just the number. But I do think that leaning on the expertise of our planner and the planning firm about how this has rolled out in other communities, what the impacts have been, and really figuring out what the criteria is and what the metrics are we should be looking at about how we assess what the impact on the overall community is of those 50 and what another 25 or 50 would be. So, I don't I think that there's some study to be done before we can figure out what the right number is and if we've hit it or if there's still capacity.
Thank you. Thank you. There's one more part to the housing and we're going to start with mister Simon. Mhmm. How could you ensure private developers incur the cost of off-site infrastructure upgrades such as sewer line expansions or traffic signals rather than passing those costs on to local taxpayers?
Good question. We make them do it. That's that's how you do it. And we have we have a good team that negotiates these these contracts with developers as as the case may be. And it actually starts with when a developer brings a project to our to our currently now to our planning board because they're handling these at the first stage. We require them to put tens of thousands of dollars in escrow so that they can... We can we can hire the technical expertise to look at at their plans and make sure that there's... That all of the the things that they're promoting in terms of traffic or education or things of that nature are accurate. But but then all of those things are... And I think we have a great track record in making sure that it's the developers that are paying for the infrastructure and for the for the safety. We've required them to put amenities in there as well. So we we have we have the upper hand in that relationship and I think we've used it very effectively. One last point by the way, a footnote just on ADUs. I'm one of the liaisons to the planning board and I can say that having I don't think missed any ADU work before the planning board, virtually every ADU that's come to the planning board has come with strong neighborhood support. And to me that's the best that's the best barometer of of what the impact is gonna be. So I look forward to that continuing that ADA discussion in the future.
Thank you. Miss Slippen, how could you ensure private developments incur the cost of off-site infrastructure upgrades such as sewer line expansions or traffic signals rather than passing those costs onto local taxpayers?
Well, as mister Simon said, you know, we do... Developers are required to put money into escrow to pay... To to offset some of these costs and to pay for, you know, to cover the costs of the upgrades that are needed. But I think what we also need to do is... You know, looking forward is important and planning ahead is important, but also I'd like to be a little bit more mindful about looking back and saying, you know, we did we did this... We we allowed this development. This development is completed, but now what are the impacts of it really? How is how is Maple Commons? You know, this was the criteria for when they came in, and this is what they said they were gonna cover, and this is how it was gonna roll out. You know, what were those benchmarks, and how are we looking at them now and seeing if our predictions, you know, are are well educated predictions, but were they correct? And then, you know, the the other developments that happened. And then really assessing if whatever metrics we have put in place and whatever we're asking for makes sense because the way we're doing it might be perfect. But I think a little bit of that reflection on what we asked for and what the reality of the situation was would go a long way.
Thank you. Miss Tibola, do you want me to repeat the question? Please. How would you ensure private developers incur the cost of off-site infrastructure upgrades such as sewer line expansions or traffic signals rather than passing those costs onto local taxpayers?
I I have some I have some concerns with that. I I I know that, for a very, one of the common complaints I get from... When I speak to residents is that they've been requesting a, community center for a long time. And every time a project comes up and they ask if it's gonna include a community center, they're told no. So I don't exactly... I I... I'm I'm I'm impressed to hear that we do ask things of the developers, but I don't think we ask enough. I think that we... Again, we need to consider our residents and what our residents want when we are taking on these projects. And I don't think that the current administration is doing that. I think we can do a much better job. And and the residents are very vocal about this because I've been going around talking to residents since I'm I'm kinda new at this, and, they're very vocal about what they want. And if you just ask them, they'll tell you. And, I think that's one of the things that we need to be very concerned about.
Thank you. Okay. Now we're gonna change the topic. Okay. We're gonna start with miss Slippen. What is your position on cannabis shops in the village? Would you support a cap on the number of shops?
Well, I think as everyone who's been following this is aware, many years ago when we... So we have opted in. So we are go... We are going to have cannabis shops in Croton. You know, the board is in the process of discussing right now. Because we opted into legislation, there are rules that we we can't just decide now that we don't want to have them because the opportunity to make that decision has passed. But what we can do is be very thoughtful about where we want them to be and and how we want them to look and how including this new type of business, which is going to add tax revenue to the village as any new business would, how we can do it in a thoughtful way that is responsive and and and reflective of the of the Croton community, you know, we're... We can't say that they can't come here, but we really do have an opportunity right now to figure out where it makes sense to to welcome these businesses so that they can have a positive impact,
as a new business in our village. Thank you. Miss Debiola, what is your position on cannabis shops in the village? Would you support a cap on the number of shops?
I I I I think that a cap would probably be a a good idea. I know that there are some restrictions because there are regulations that govern the cannabis shops, and we opted in. So I'm not familiar with what parameters we have to work with, with respect to a cap. I will say this, though, that we definitely could use better judgment as to where we put the shop. The current shop that we have, pending is, across the street from a day care center, down the road from a church, and, also in the same vicinity of a music school that children attend. So I think that was a little bit poor planning on the part of the, the people who decided where it should go.
Oh, thank you, mister Simon. Yes. And, last word on housing, if I if I may, from my time. I just wanna point out that one of the things that we were able to do with Maple Commons and eventually Lot A is return them to the property tax rolls. Maple Commons in that that land did not pay property tax for generations because it was public property. Same thing with the parking lot at Lot A eventually that will be paying property tax. We are gonna get a cannabis shop. By the way, I did personal research at their location, same ownership in Tarrytown. It looks much more like an Apple store than than what people might imagine a a cannabis shop should look like. It is the law of the state. We we decided on a five zero vote to to not opt out. We did opt out of lounges. We didn't want people, you know, sitting in lounges late at night consuming this stuff, but the way the way it's it's sold in in shops today, I don't I don't think we have much to fear in terms of what that impact is gonna be on Croton. Having said that though, I'm I'm not eager for more than the one shop as I think both my friends up here have indicated, there are limitations to what you can do once those licenses are obtained from Albany to a particular vendor. So we'll we'll deal with the zoning and the location particularly on the question of churches and schools at at that time. But I'm I'm certainly not eager for a village the size of Croton to have more than one shop. Thank you.
Okay. Miss Debola, many health experts believe that gas powered leaf blowers negatively impact quality of life and health due to their generation of air polluted air pollutants and excessive noise. The village board has asked the conservation advisory council to review the existing laws effectiveness and consider updates or a stricter year round restriction. What is your position?
Well, I'm very interested to see what they they determine. Personally, I'm not personally, I'm not a fan of leaf blowers. And, we're... In my... In our household, we're more likely to just cut the lawn and let everything fallow. We don't do much of anything. I can understand that, people with a big prop... Bigger... Much bigger properties and perhaps different ideas as to what their property should look like might differ with me, but, I'm I'm not I'm not a big fan.
Do you want me to repeat the question? It's long. I'm good. I happen to have been, on the board back several years ago when we adopted, the the partial ban, the six month ban on gasoline powered leaf blowers, I think it's one of the best things that we did. It took three years of working with our conservation advisory committee and and others to get to that point. Like many things that we do in Croton, it was a compromise. We always knew that we would return to to it after a couple of years of implementation. We're at that point now. I happen to be also the representative to... Of the village to the Westchester Municipal Elected Officials Association. And I I meet with our colleague, officials there all the time. A number of them have done the full ban and and report, no no difficulties in implementing that. I I think the the email and the and the I have with folks around town, you know, suggests that there would be some difficulty. So I think we're gonna have to, you know, figure out how to how to do that. But I... We're very much looking forward to the recommendations of of the conservation committee. We've got a fantastic new chair of that, Eva Thaddeus. I'm I'm confident that given given enough time, the membership there is working with some pretty good experts. We're going to have a public forum on that, you know, coming up. I think, November 10 is is the date, and, we'll have that community wide conversation.
You. I think we do need to strengthen what we did three years ago and the question is, what's the best way to do it? Thank you.
Okay. Miss Slippen, should I repeat the Okay. Many health experts believe that gas powered leaf blowers negatively impact quality of life and health due to their generation of air pollutants and excessive noise. The village board has asked the conservation advisory council to review the existing laws effectiveness and consider updates or a stricter year round restriction. What is your position?
So we actually end up talking about gas powered leaf blowers a lot because we have a resident that comes to almost every public meeting and gives us new and... It's not new, but it's, you know, additional data around, the negative health impacts of gas leaf blowers. So, I was not on the board when the law was passed previously, but I will say that this person's advocacy has taught me a lot about the situation, and I'm grateful for it. When we first started talking about it, as mister Simon said, we we gave this project over to the CAC to have a conversation about it. They have scheduled a meeting, due to part... I hope, due to the advocacy of the gentleman that comes to our meetings, he specifically requested that as part of the upcoming conversation, we add a health expert because we had experts in a lot of different areas, but that particular area is, now gonna be addressed on this forum on the tenth. I want to... I believe in our committee... The commit... The work of our committees that are following the guidelines that are laid out for them, that are bringing their expertise back to the board, and I really want to respect the fact that we asked them to do this, and they're gonna come back to us with a recommendation. And, hopefully, we'll be able to follow it because I think giving jobs to the board... To committees that they... And then not following through on their recommendations is Thank you. Dicey. Thanks. Sorry.
No. That's fine. I I appreciate that all of you are respecting the time limits. Trying. That's very good. Okay. Next question. We start with mister Simon. The village board approved the purchase existing license plate reader cameras. Residents have expressed concern about mass surveillance, lack of privacy, and potential database misuse. Looking ahead, how would you support a public policy that protects the privacy of Croton residents?
Right. And it's important to understand that, you'll see in the daily newspapers and media lots of talk about flock cameras. We do not have flock cameras. We have a a system that's called RECOR. It's a closed system. It goes between the the village and the county. And frankly, if you look at the details of the police water, we we should be so grateful that we've had these license plate readers because they've helped to solve some terribly highness crimes that that that... And I I give complete credit to our police department for using them. I think we need constant vigilance on whether there could be any crack in the system. We have a substantial portion of our police department working on this every day. They are down at the county working with the real time crime reporting system that the county has. And and so we'll continue to to examine and evaluate this technology. But a, it's not flock. B, is our our complete understanding and assurance is that it's closed. C, you know, whether it's, whether it's this or other technologies that, folks are concerned with. You know, we we want them involved. We wanna hear more about this. We'll we'll definitely take everyone's everyone's views, but we also have to be evidence based. And also, as I said, don't forget these... The the LPRs, the license plate readers are are are solving some terrible crimes, in in our community.
Thank you. Miss Slippen, do you want me to repeat? Okay. The village board approved the purchase of Croton's existing license plate reader cameras. Residents have expressed concern about mass surveillance, lack of privacy, and potential database database misuse. Looking ahead, how would you support a public policy that protects the privacy of Croton residents?
So I I wanna start by saying that I wanna make sure that our police department has the tools in every way that they need to do their job to keep us safe. We invest a lot of money and a lot of support in our police department, and they serve us extremely well. I have so many concerns about all the cameras that I see everywhere. It's... To me, it's alphabet soup. Is it an LPR? Is it an ALP? Is it a flock? It all... I understand that there are differences. I I understand that RECORE is not FLAC, but it all just makes me really nervous. I'm nervous that we have a contract. The the county has our data, but our contract is not with the county. Our contract is directly with the camera company. I just have a lot of questions about it, and I'm not even exactly sure how we get our arms around it. We had a work session with the police where we started to have this conversation, and I felt... I honestly felt a little more nervous even after we had it. I I think that before we can be ready to support a policy, we need to understand much better what our cameras are and what's happening with the data and where it's going. The county is in a... In the midst of a lawsuit with the ACLU as a result of the... You know, directly related to the cameras, and there's... They still haven't been able to finish an FAQ for all of us on it. So I just think there are lot more questions. I'm not really policy ready on this one. Okay.
I checked you off. Sorry. Okay. Do you want me to read the question? Yes, please. Okay. I'm sorry. The village board approved the purchase of Croton's existing license plate reader cameras. Residents have expressed concern about mass surveillance, lack of privacy, and potential database misuse. Looking ahead, how would you support a public policy that protects the privacy of Croton residents?
Thank you. Well, for one, I I I agree with, the fact that we absolutely need a policy. As I go... I've I've noticed more more and more as I go through the village that there are cameras pretty much everywhere. Almost every interest... It it it... It's very disconcerting to me. I'm also very concerned that a a private company is, the one who's holding on to our data. I'd be... I'd feel much better if it was, for example, with the county or something like that. But I have very serious concerns with a private company having it.
okay. Okay. Now we're gonna start with miss Slippen. Affordability is at the top of people's minds. What would you do to help residents address this pain point?
Well, you know, every time you go to the gas station, it costs me $70 to fill my car up. And so we made the difficult decision recently that we were gonna purchase an electric vehicle so that getting around was going to be easier for us. And what I realized in doing that was that there are not... There's not a lot of places in the village for electric cars to be charged. I know that we're adding more electric charging stations in the village, and we... And, you know, and and there is the opportunity to charge here. But I think we need to be thinking about how are our residents... What what changes are residents making because of the pain point of how expensive things are right now? You know, I think we do a very good job of supporting the org... Our organizations like Croton Caring Committee and the Food Pantry and those types of organizations. And I think we're gonna... It's gonna get even more so. I think we are we are the winter is going to be very difficult for people. They're gonna have to make choices about heating their home and doing other things, and I think we really need to be working with our legislators. You know, I know that Dana Levenberg is doing some... And and Pete Harcom are doing some very important advocacy work regarding getting some relief for residents. You know, unfortunately, as the village, we just have to... We have to try to keep our expenses down so we're not passing them on to residents. Thank you. Miss Debola,
affordability is at the top of people's minds. What would you do to help residents address this pain point?
I I I think it's a very serious it's a very serious issue. I also think that, you know, I I like the ideas that Maria has suggested, but I think that a lot of it is out of our control. A lot of it is due to the global economic... Global economics that that we're currently finding ourselves in. I I... It's... I think... I I don't know that there... As a village, we can give the people that much relief.
K. Thank you, mister Simon. Well, I think the the number one thing that we can do is keep everyone's taxes low. If we keep your taxes low, your your sense of affordability, your true affordability in other areas is gonna be much better. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, we have the lowest tax growth of any village in Westchester County over the last ten years. And frankly, when we sit around this table in April doing the budget, you have five fiscal hawks that are that are working on this. There's a 2% state cap on on increases in taxes and we haven't violated that not once in the in the modern era. So so so we're doing that. Also, we're bringing in revenue to the village so that so that taxes can stay low. Our solar array, I don't know how many people realize that. We are getting essentially for being in the landlord at the train station, we're getting 470,000 a year for thirty years, which is pretty decent on a $23,000,000 operating budget. And by the way, I give complete credit to our sustainability committee for that. And we are a village of committees. And and if if we were a bigger place, many of these committees would actually be functioning as departments. But that was an initiative that they started backed by the board. And so we'll we'll look at things as well as deploying public property like we have with Maple Commons and Lotte, which gets us millions of dollars. So hope... Hopefully, all of that together can can increase affordability for for everyone, less taxes to pay.
Thank you. The next question, we start with miss Debola. This year has seen several instances of uneven enforcement of village rules. How could you guarantee that all residents are treated fairly? And what oversight should be in place to prevent misuse or politicalization of enforcement authority?
I think that's a a a various... A very serious issue. I think it's a very good question. I think the the thing that we could best do is make sure that those that we we have running the village, make sure that they avoid any appearance of impropriety. I I understand that that's not always the case, and I understand that that a village needs to function and have have some leeway with how it does. But I think the biggest problem we have is the lack of transparency. And the... When you have a lack of transparency, it it erodes the public's faith in in government. And I think we have to start from there and go forward.
Thank you. Mister Simon, this year has seen several instances of uneven enforcement of village rules. How could you guarantee that all residents are treated fairly, and what oversight should be in place to prevent misuse or politicalization of enforcement authority?
Well, you know, candidly, if you're if you're referring to, the signage, you know, issue that we had like, which is really more of last year. As I said in my, in my opening comments, it it happens that we often or at least from time to time don't get things right the first time. That was I think far less malintent on on our part than a very ambiguous signage statute that even our own lawyers had difficulty interpreting. I think it's the it's the obligation of the board to say from time to time, not too often, but to say from time to time, we didn't get that right. We gotta start from scratch. That's why in this very room for the last year, we've been rewriting our signage statute so that so that we have protections to make sure that the difficulties that we that we saw last year don't occur again. Same thing with other with other statutes. You know, we are we are always doing the best we can the first time, but then finding you know that you need to improve, you need to bring in new ideas, you need to test what's your your your approaches with the public and hopefully over time that we can do better. Know, but but we when when we feel that we haven't, achieved the standard, what I think should be a high standard that we've set for ourself, we roll up our sleeves in this room and we do the work with our staff and our lawyers to try to get it right. Figuratively Figuratively speaking, just like you see, the sign on the highway that says men at work, we are men and women at work here trying to do the best job that we can and and hopefully getting it right eventually.
Thank you. Do you want me to repeat the question? No. It's okay. You know, I'm actually great. I was going to... What I was gonna say before, mister Simon spoke was, I wish the person who wrote that question would have been specific because I it it wasn't immediately obvious to me that we were... That that was in reference to the signage situation, which was... You know, I mean, it was just a disaster. Right? Like, I think that if we were just being blunt, like, it was handled poorly in a lot of ways. And I do think it is important to say when something doesn't go well, that didn't go well. We need to go back to the drawing board. We need to figure out a a way, you know, we need to figure out a way to, to fix a mistake that we made. I also think that... And in in almost every case, we have great staff. We have great consultants. We have people who are helping us to... And, you know, guiding us to make the decisions that are right. But I do think that a lot of it comes back to trust. I think that when the community trusts that we're making decisions that
are in the best interest of the whole community and not for some other unspoken reason, then there can be more support of the decisions that are made.
Thank you. We have two more questions, and then we'll go to closing statements. Okay. We'll start with mister Simon. How would you prioritize infrastructure improvements in Croton?
You know, I I would say, you know, that in terms of my own career, it's it's probably the top thing that I've worked on whether it's been public transportation, roads, or or the the the built environment. And I think we're doing a very good job. If someone looked at some of our documents from last week's board meeting, we are going to repave four miles of streets in Croton in the coming year. We completely continuously I should say get plaudits from people when we when we do a repaving like like Cleveland Drive last year. There are more sidewalks in our future. Some of that comes from our own budget. Some of that we'll be seeking, funding for, from from the state or the county. We're putting in sidewalks at Municipal And South Riverside. For years people have said, those are the missing sidewalks. And working with our planner who also is our very effective grant writer, we were able to develop a stream of funding to get those sidewalks there. So I don't I don't put anything higher than that. There's also you know I won't... It gets very technical, but there's some water and sewer projects that that we're working on that I think will will help us... Help sustain us for the future. So in terms of the dollars that the folks in in in the audience are are paying for this village to do to to run their government. There isn't anything higher, than public safety and infrastructure. Those are the basics and and I think we we've been doing an excellent job in both those areas and I wanna continue to do that.
Thank you. Miss Slippen, how would you prioritize infrastructure improvements in Croton?
Well, I think what we need to do is really... We need to trust our staff and believe what the the staff are saying because I think that all the trustees have projects that are... We all come to this dais with projects that are important to us, but I think what we need to do is we have brilliant, highly trained staff that are out there every day with far better knowledge than than we have about what the needs of the village are. So I think that, you know, I would really like to... You know, and we check-in with the departments. We hear from the departments through the village manager, but I think that... You know, last week, had this situation where, there was... There are residents on one street who were having a water discoloration situation. And I sort of vaguely knew that it was going on, but I had no idea what the what the scope and severity of the project was. And I... It really just made me think that, you know, if we could have a more regular channel or mechanism for hearing from the departments about things that we should be paying attention to, then something wouldn't get that severe. So I think that I would defer to our staff, but I I am interested in putting together a mechanism where we can... There are some big grant funded projects that we need to be going after, but also getting an idea of what some of those smaller projects are that we should really be, being able to focus on. Thank you, miss Debiola.
Can you please repeat your question? How would you prioritize infrastructure improvements in Croton?
Okay. I I think maintaining our infrastructure, of course, is one of our high priorities, but I agree with Maria that the, the staff, the DPW are wonderful. But but, it's also my understanding that there are people who are complaining about brown water and have been complaining for debt... For years practically. And, they are acknowledged, but nothing's being done. So I think we could always do a better job, but I'm confident in our in our DPW staff and staff.
Thank you. This is the last question. Miss Slippen, Croton residents have voiced concerns about bicycle pedestrian safety, especially with the increased use of ebikes. What would you do to increase safety?
So this is a topic that is near and dear to my heart because our daughter was hit riding her bike while driving to school in what I consider was a dangerous intersection and still is a dangerous intersection. And since that happened probably six or seven years ago, there are only now more cars and more bicycles on the road. I'm grateful to the work that the bicycle pedestrian committee has done. I know they have a master plan. They were one of the first places... Or not the first, but there was a... It was a place I went when I was in a better headspace after her accident. And I do think that that is a committee that does important work, but I think that they have made strides in a lot of areas, but I... We really need to dig into safety. I think that teaching kids how to ride bikes is really important, but also riding the bike and having the right helmet is important, but it's just one component of it. I think it's a much bigger conversation that we need to be having about how we how we share the roads. You know, ebikes are here in Croton in a big way, And, you know, I know the company that we engage with has a robust outreach plan. I think that we could be utilizing that a little bit more, but, you know, we just have to... We need to learn to respect each each other on the roads. I don't want anybody else to go through what I went through getting a phone call that their kid has gotten hit by a bike... By a car... On a bike. Thank you. Thank you.
Okay. I'm aware of of the, proliferation of of e bikes. I think it's at a point where I think we need some form of regulation for the, motorized vehicles. I also think that I see a lot more children using the... These vehicles. The other day, saw a child, that was probably in grammar school, you know, riding a motorized scooter. I think that we need to look into some kind of safety course for older older children to utilize these vehicles. I think it should be something similar to, the power of boat safety courses that we take if we have to, if we have children that wanna operate a boat. I think there should be age restrictions on some of the vehicles and and possibly insurance on on vehicles if they have the capability to go over a certain, limit.
Thank you, mister Simon. Well, first of all, you know, we're... I think we're very fortunate in Croton to have an e bike store with an enlightened owner who who emphasizes safety with with the e bikes that he sells, the e bikes that he rents, and of course the demonstrations that we do, number one. Number two, I'm very proud of our Project Mover innovation that we that we had last summer. It's going extremely well. If you look at any of literature for Project Mover, it's got the safety stuff all over the place including the the fact that we've had three bicycle skills training sessions connected to Project Mover targeted at both parents and their and their children to to teach both e bike and regular bike safety. Know, I I see as many... I see far more regular bikes and e bikes on the street and I think we we need to be concerned especially in a in a in a small village with older streets, not as many bike lanes as we'd like. We need we need to be... We need to ensure that we're teaching bike safety overall to everyone. So I'm I I I I'm very pleased also that we have an outstanding bicycle and pedestrian committee that actually spends most of its time on safety. You know, Maria mentioned the master plan. The master plan is about, 50, 60% safety, which means how do you how do you make sure that you've got enough sidewalks? Can we have some future bike lanes that, that help to ensure safety? So there's all sorts of New York City Thank you. Last week looked at 52 pieces of regulation. We don't need 52 pieces of regulation. We may need some regulation and we'll look to our bike bike committee and everyone else to see what what what makes the most sense.
Thank you. Now we're going to go to two minute final statements and and we're we're going going... The the opposite opposite order order of of opening opening statements. Statements. So, miss Slippen, you have two minutes for a closing statement. Great.
Thank you again to the League of Women Voters, to our moderator, to my fellow candidates, and thank you to all of you. Tonight was about questions. In less than four weeks, it's about answers, and the answer that's gonna count most is how you fill out your ballot. I'm asking for you to vote for me on November 4. Local elections are November 3. Please don't vote for me on November 4. Local elections are often decided by a handful of votes. The people on this board decide how your streets are paved, how your water is managed, how your neighborhood grows, and how your tax dollars are spent. Every one of those decisions will start with who shows up to vote. I worked very hard to bring early voting to Croton. So from Saturday... I'll get the dates right now. From Saturday, October 24 to Sunday, November 1, you can vote right here in this building and on whatever day works for you. On election day, this build... You you can vote at your regular voting location from six to nine. When you get to the ballot for Croton, please make sure you turn it over. On the back this year is a proposition to create a service award for our for our volunteer EMS. These are our neighbors who answer the calls at any hour. A yes vote helps us to recruit them and keep them at a modest cost to the village. So please vote. Vote early if you can and flip the vote... Flip the ballot over. I would be honored to have your vote, but whatever happens, I will keep listening to you all. Thank you.
Thank you, mister Simon. Once again, thank you League for your sponsorship. Thank you audience and viewers for being here and to everyone for all the great discussion. I spend a lot of time with Croton residents drinking coffee, listening to their concerns, hearing their good ideas, and getting some positive thoughts on our work along with constructive criticism, which is always valuable. Your good questions tonight remind me of those coffee conversations. Tonight will stick with me for a long time as I actually bike around the village in the weeks to come. I truly believe in Croton, we are the sum of our parts. We make progress when we are all working together and that includes elected officials, professional managers, committee volunteers, our civic organizations, our friends and neighbors. That's why I'm all... I'm so glad you all took time to listen to us tonight because as we look to the future, we don't have a Croton resident to spare. Disagreements are normal among us. Mayor Ed Koch used to say, if you agree with me on nine of 12 issues, vote for me. If you agree with me on 12 of 12 issues, go see a psychiatrist. Our collaboration and goodwill narrows those differences and is always worth a try. Our board of trustees regularly works to find the right approach for projects, problems, and priorities. Despite strong views, we almost always end up somewhere in the middle trying to forge a community consensus. One last thanks tonight to my wife Linda in the audience. I'm lucky she's a journalist and a teacher. A journalist will tell you the truth about what you're doing, a teacher will tell you how to do it better. So thank you for helping me with this trustee job and making all other things possible
and also I should note that my wife and I have decided that the signs that say thirty seconds and stop would be very helpful in our house. So I'm happy to come back for another two year stint as one of your trustees if you'd like. So I'd appreciate your consideration, Thanks so much, and have a good night. Thank you, miss Debola.
Thank you. First, I'd like to thank the League of Women Voters and my colleagues for participating in this forum. I am not a career politician. I have spoken to and I've listened to the residents of the village, and I'm sincere in what I have to say. I pledge to work tirelessly to ensure our local government remains transparent, responsive, and accountable. I support keeping the village court in Croton and maintaining a strong community community oriented approach to governance. I support development that is thoughtful, resident oriented, and consistent with the village's character and comprehensive plan and call for assessing the cumulative impacts of approved and proposed projects before additional developments proceed. I favor evaluating projects collectively, including their effects on traffic, infrastructure, environmental health, and social resources. I would advocate that the village agenda items be communicated timely and clearly so that the residents are given a meaningful opportunity to be heard. My vote will reflect what best serves the village, not outside or competing interests. I would also encourage the board of trustees to actively engage in its advisory boards and use thoughtful, strategic community planning to guide long term decisions. Finally, drawing on my experience as an attorney, I would work to simplify the village code and promote transparent, accountable government government and pledge to serve with humility, openness, and a willingness to listen, learn, and evolve.
Very good. Thank you. I thank the candidates very much, and I really appreciate those who submitted these questions. They were amazing. And... Yeah. They were.
Oh. Thank you. You're welcome. I would encourage everyone to vote. You can vote October 24 through November 1, and Tuesday, November 3 is election day. Please encourage everyone to vote because your vote is your voice. It really is. Don't let other people make decisions.