Section: Editorial

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Crotonblog Endorses Gallelli, Odland and Wiegman

March 19, 2007

Much is at stake and riding on tomorrow’s election in Croton. It represents a golden opportunity for citizens of good will in Croton to restore reason and decorum to village government. To this end, Crotonblog endorses the team of Ann Gallelli, Sally Odland and Leo Wiegman. Here are only two of our reasons for making this endorsement:

The Case Against the Alliance Party: Blatant Lies and Misrepresentation of Facts. Croton voters can strike a blow for truth and reason by rejecting the small group that calls itself the Alliance Party and whose specialty has been purveying groundless fears. By spreading outright lies and distortions as reasons for concern for the public health and welfare and without citing any scientific evidence, these rabble rousers have created a veritable universe of lies, even enlisting citizens of other states to put pressure on Croton voters in support of their fabrications.

Some of their mean-spirited falsehoods have reached astronomical proportions. For example, in presentations at public meetings and in its printed materials, the Alliance Party claims that any return of a C&D materials-handling operation to 1A Croton Point Avenue will bring 30,000 trucks a year to Croton. During the election campaign, this number mysteriously jumped from a previously widely touted 20,000 trucks a year.

Let’s examine the arithmetic behind this number: If we assume that the site operates 8 hours a day, 5 days a week for 52 weeks of the year and subtracting 10 days of closure for legal holidays, this yields 124,200 minutes of annual operation. To accommodate 30,000 trucks a year, which is to say 120 trucks a day, would require one truck to enter the facility, unload and exit every four minutes—a miracle of scheduling and a physical impossibility. Yet the Alliance Party insists that 30,000 trucks a year will beset Croton. Alliance Party Mathematical Accuracy Score: Zero.

The Case Against the Alliance Party: Harassment of Village Board Members. This same small group has not hesitated to impugn the motives of trustees and citizens who do not agree with them, going so far as to make libelous charges of graft and accusing certain board members of being “on the take.” This crowd complains about the honest criticism leveled at them on Crotonblog—yet they applaud crudely drawn cartoons depicting their opponents as low forms of life. An anagram of ALLIANCE is ALL NICE. Don’t you believe it.

By voting for candidates who offer a rational and reasonable level of discourse in local government, you will signal to the irresponsible rabble-rousers that you are tired of their semi-monthly harangues that monopolize village board meetings. You know who they are—the usual suspects: The officious individual who flounces in like a call house madam and proceeds to lecture the board. Her prolix performance over, she gathers up her legal pads and exits; the nitty-gritty of village business is not her concern. Then there’s the unctuous individual who only lacks the standard green eyeshade and sleeve-garters of the mousy bookkeeper; his specialty is to seek clarification of the obvious. Then there’s the adenoidal former village trustee who manages to mangle the English language even more than Prof. Irwin Corey. And there’s the professional mom whose schtick is saying in her “widdle girl” voice, “I’m just a housewife who doesn’t understand how government works.” We must not forget Croton’s scenery-chewing male prima donna who alternates between threatening bodily harm to trustees and threatening to move from the village. And, last but not least, with luck we might even discourage the sour-tasting dyspeptic effusions of our tiresome, cud-chewing, self-appointed village scold with a distorted sense of village geography. One interesting demographic statistic: Many of the usual suspects are comparatively recent arrivals from elsewhere. Crotonblog wonders whether the Bronx and Brooklyn have fobbed off their malcontents on Croton?

Twice a month, village board members are subjected to insults in two successive nightly sessions labeled “Citizen Participation” in which the participants exhibit the anger and unreason of a lynch mob. Even more damaging, the venomous vituperation of this group tends to discourage other citizens from speaking out in meetings or in the pages of local newspapers out of fear of being verbally attacked or of having the paint on their automobiles “keyed” in retaliation. Crotonblog knows whereof it speaks. Alliance Party Good Citizenship Score: Zero.

For these cogent reasons, Crotonblog urges all citizens of goodwill who care about Croton and its public face to put a stop to the growing influence of this know-nothing band of rabble-rousers. We urge a vote for the team of Ann Gallelli, Sally Odland and Leo Wiegman. Vote, vote as if the quality of your life and the life of this village depended on it. Because, when the chips are down, that’s really what’s at stake in this election.

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Candidate Schmidt Dummies Up Under Crotonblog's Barrage of Questions

In the past year Crotonblog politely posed a series of 16 questions to Mayor Dr. Gregory Schmidt in our regular column titled “What’s up, Doc?”. Here are the questions we asked Mayor Schmidt and his considerably less-than-eloquent answers.

OUR QUESTIONS	HIS RESPONSE
1. Why do Croton Republican lawn signs include a website address that doesn’t exist?	nothing
2. Why does the Croton Republican’s website include a purloined copy of the village’s $20,000 logo?	zip
3. Now that Croton Republican Committee Chairman Rob DiFrancesco has been fired, who’s in charge of your party?	zilch
4. When news of Croton’s “fake water bill” scam made national and international news, you said nothing. Why?	zippo
5. Is Croton really going to spend millions on a new community center based on your survey initiative that yielded paltry results?	zero
6. When your single-issue supporters misuse the privilege of addressing the board of trustees, how come you never call the meeting to order?	blank
7. Why did your hand-picked village attorney remain on the payroll after she chose not to renew her contract with the village?	diddly squat
8. Why did it take you and Trustee Brennan two years to send out a simple community center survey that still has not been tabulated?	goose egg
9. Why did you invite Regus Industries’ principal to meet with the board in July 2006, and rebuff him ever since?	naught
10. Your supporter Richard Pellicci went ballistic and demanded that the he not be photographed when addressing the board. Why did you allow his request to stand?	cipher
11. Croton has spent over $1.4 million in legal fees related to the waste transfer station located at 1A Croton Point Avenue. How do you expect the village to keep paying for your “no negotiate” stance?	nichts
12. Each year the Croton Rotary Club, of which you are a member, holds an annual car show at the train station parking lot. No one is ever asked to pay for parking during the event. So, why did you want to charge parkers who attend Clearwater?	rien
13. The village assessor forgot to extend property tax credits to seniors in 2006. Why did you refuse to offer them tax credits for their overpayment?	nada
14. Why did you vote against a resolution to retain an attorney who specialized in eminent domain law in connection with 1A Croton Point Avenue?	niente
15. You voted to authorize $175,000 in spending to build a skatepark in Croton. Why did you decide to attach a fee for use by Croton residents?	nihil
16. Why was nothing done about the suggestion to bottle Croton water and sell it?	nullity

Based on this unresponsive record, who could possibly think that the Sphinxlike Gregory Schmidt, who doesn’t even answer citizens’ emails, deserves to be re-elected mayor of the Village of Croton-on-Hudson?

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Shooting Off Your Mouth and Shooting Yourself in the Foot: The Case Against Candidates Schmidt and Brennan

March 15, 2007

Any first-year law student could spot the fatal flaw in the Schmidt-Brennan position on 1A Croton Point Avenue. It can be summed up with the “P word”—Prejudice, spelled with a capital P and illuminated by flashing red lights. Simply stated, both incumbent candidates have violated the precept that public officials must remain impartial and free of prejudice in all matters they rule on.

One monumental problem evolving from Schmidt and Brennan’s hardnosed position was hinted at in the recent Journal News article on the Village’s appeal of Judge Nicolai’s ruling in state supreme court. In that article, datelined Feb. 25 and titled “Croton appeals transfer station ruling,” Mayor Schmidt is quoted as saying he was awaiting a favorable ruling in federal court that would tell Regus that they must apply for a special permit. Left unstated was the obvious inference that such an application would summarily be denied by Croton.

Unfortunately for the citizens of Village of Croton-on-Hudson, from the get-go Mayor Gregory Schmidt and the Deputy Mayor he appointed, Tom Brennan, have been both loud and intemperate in their condemnation of Regus Industries. Given the years of outspoken prejudice by Schmidt and Brennan against the site and against Regus, the likelihood that Regus would receive a fair and impartial hearing under a Republican majority range from zero to none.

If Mayor Schmidt and Deputy Mayor Brennan should be re-elected and should Susan Konig ride in on their coat tails, the resulting Republican majority would reject a permit application by Regus. Regus most certainly would then sue the village, citing overt prejudice. Regus could place into evidence Republican campaign promises and abundant film clips clearly demonstrating the Mayor’s and Deputy Mayor’s prejudgment of a Regus permit application.

Paradoxically, the only way Croton can now forestall a continuation of the never-ending parade of onerous, expensive lawsuits would be for the Village to grant Regus a special permit. If Messrs Schmidt and Brennan were honest with voters, they would acknowledge their prejudicial actions and admit that the Village now faces a classic case of what has been called “Hobson’s choice,” which is no choice at all. Thomas Hobson (1544-1631) of Cambridge, England, rented horses and gave his customers only one choice: “Take the horse nearest the stable door.”

In the face of such easily demonstrable partiality and prejudice on the part of Messrs. Schmidt and Brennan, the village would likely lose any suit and consequent appeal. In fact, the court itself would probably impose a special permit allowing waste transfer activities at 1A Croton Point Avenue, in effect holding a legal gun to the Village’s head and telling it, “Grant the permit now, or else!” A clear case of shooting yourself in the foot.

Listen carefully, voters! Every time Messrs. Schmidt and Brennan speak out publicly against this enterprise in a cheap ploy to win votes, they add fuel to the forthcoming legal conflagration, consigning the village to future lawsuits. At the very least, their behavior leaves the village wide open to an Article 78 lawsuit for having made arbitrary and capricious decisions. Thanks to Messrs. Schmidt’s and Brennan’s propensity for shooting off their mouths, Croton’s depleted coffers will continue to be drained by the mounting expenses of defending itself against needless, self-inflicted legal actions.

As for the implications for voters in this election, Crotonblog would call to mind the sage proverb attributed to Ben Franklin: “He who lies down with dogs should not complain if he rises up with fleas.”

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Seven Goofs in 90 Minutes Set New Record in LWV Debate

March 13, 2007

Croton Republican candidates for mayor and trustee played fast and loose with their presentations during Tuesday night’s League of Women Voters debate at the Stanley H. Kellerhouse Municipal Building. Try these on for size:

1. It may be an effective sales tactic for Susan Konig while on the air at Sirius Radio with husband Dave, but to plug her book during a candidate debate was shameful—not funny.

2. When Neil Haber asked the trustee candidates “What specific ideas or proposals do you have to increase the non-residential tax base of the village of Croton?”€, candidate Konig said “Well, that’s a good question. Um, I don’t know, Neil, just to be perfectly honest with you if I have um, plans to increase that tax base.”€ Candidate Brennan said, “That’s a very good question, Mr. Haber. Okay? And there isn’t a lot of answers to that question. Okay? But I can give you a couple synopses about the way I feel about that. I think our candidates probably have some good answers to that question. And one of them would probably be maybe some type of ah, situation down at the train station where maybe some type of low income housing or some kind of shops would be put in down there for some type of tax base.”

3. Mayor Dr. Gregory Schmidt, it was Elmer Fudd not Bugs Bunny who would have said “Wailwoads of Mass Destwuction”€. Your punishment is to watch 24 hours of Loony Tunes without a bathroom break.

4. Mayor Dr. Gregory Schmidt, repeat after me. Say it again and again. Crotonblog is not a chat room. If you call Crotonblog a chatroom again, we’ll make you write “A blog is a blog” one hundred times on the blackboard.

5. You lied when you predicted that 30,000 trucks would clog the streets of Croton—that would be one truck every 4 minutes of every work day. No facility could handle that many trucks. We challenge you to show the public how you came up with that phony number.

6. Paralleling the Bush administration’s use of Weapons of Mass Destruction to justify an unprovoked attack on Iraq, local Republican candidates have stolen a page from the party’s playbook and continue to harp on a single issue, 1A Croton Point Avenue. Sorry, folks. It worked once—but we’re not falling for this tactic a second time. Go peddle your lies elsewhere.

7. It was stupid of you mayor to expect both Metro North and Hudson National Golf Course to pay sewer rents when their water usage doesn’t wind up in Croton’s sewers.

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The Insidious Campaign to Spread Fear and Loathing in Croton

March 6, 2007

Beginning in 2001, a cabal of neoconservatives in a cleverly orchestrated campaign of fear and lies led the people of the United States to believe their safety was threatened by Iraq. The result was that this great nation engaged in a costly and disastrous war in the Middle East in which no national interest was at stake. Proof of this statement is abundantly available in your daily newspaper or on the evening TV news.

For several years, a cabal with hidden motives—but masquerading behind concern for public health and safety—has been conducting a similar campaign of fear and lies directed at the voters of Croton and intended to sow seeds of distrust in local government. They have even enlisted residents of faraway communities to participate in their cleverly orchestrated campaign by using their form letters created at 84 Grand Street.

Want proof of the second statement? Crotonblog has privately obtained copies of two letters intended for the editor of The Gazette that were widely circulated to voters in Croton by Croton Republican Committee Secretary and Carrie E. Tompkins Elementary School employee Joann Minett on Sunday, March 4. The reason advanced by Ms. Minett for the failure to publish them was that too many local letter writers had already flooded the paper’s pages with letters. Crotonblog would like to think that The Gazette did not publish them because the base motives of their writers were only too flagrantly obvious.

Crotonblog is not at liberty to disclose how we obtained copies of these letters. We are happy to publish them here, however. We ask readers to examine them carefully. The Russians have an expression, “Kak stranna” that fits this situation wonderfully. It means “How strange.” How strange that two persons in communities 600 miles apart should write letters virtually identical in structure and message.

How strange that two persons in communities 600 miles apart should write letters with identical salutations: “My name is Deb Roth…” and “My name is Linda Richmond…”

How strange that two persons in communities 600 miles apart should write letters concluding with instructions to Croton voters about how to vote, and with veiled threats to Croton officials. Ms. Roth: “I know that if I were a Croton resident I would support only those candidates who put their children’s health first over profit from trash. You know who you are.” Ms. Richmond: “We hope all of Croton officials will get on board or in the absence of that, that you will consider electing officials who have rejected negotiation.”

Conveniently omitted from each letter were some salient facts—namely that these communities and their problems do not remotely resemble Croton. Ms. Roth lives in a section of northeastern Ohio so heavily polluted that in 1969 the Cuyahoga River, which empties into Lake Erie, actually caught fire. Ms. Roth’s community, Leavittsburg, is on the Mahoning River, a river polluted by steel mills in the 19th and 20th centuries and also by human waste; Leavittsburg did not get a water treatment plant until the 1960s. Since 1988, the Ohio Department of Health has advised against swimming or even wading in the Mahoning River and against eating fish caught there. The pollutants in the Mahoning are trapped behind the ten dams used by mills to cool newly forged steel. As a result, its water was so perpetually warm it was known as “the river that never froze.” The Army Corps of Engineers has estimated that it would take 15 years to clean up the polluted Mahoning River.

Ms. Richmond lives in Woburn, Massachusetts, the town featured in the book titled A Civil Action, later made into a movie of that name starring John Travolta. Book and movie told the story of the families of eight leukemia victims who sued Beatrice Foods and W.R. Grace and Company in 1981. Their plants were accused of dumping industrial solvents and polluting wells used as sources of drinking water, thus causing cancer in the victims.

Readers will draw their own conclusions from the two letters, shown here as Exhibit A and Exhibit B. These may constitute the first known instance of carpetbagging by e-mail.

Exhibit A: “BRING TO GAZETTE PLEASE February 5, 2007 Dear Editor: My name is Deb Roth, president of Our Lives Count in Ohio. I have previously written about our problems with the Warren Landfill and Regus. Despite this and the warnings of your local Drs. Cosentino, Kleinman and Kochanowitz, some Croton officials still continue negotiations for a deal. I believe it is time to repeat only some of my July 2006 Gazette letter. This information is also in Croton’s legal documents: 1) As a result of illegal dumping violations the Ohio EPA, entered into a negotiated consent agreement with Warren Recycling/Warren Hills signed by Gordon Reger of Regus Industries. Failure to comply resulted in a contempt charge with a large fine that is still not resolved in 2007. Another contempt charge is still in process. 2) Not only did Regus fail to meet the agreed upon negotiated consent order, they repeatedly violated state and federal environmental laws, including the discharge of surface runoff and leachate into the Mahoning River (under Regus Manager Barley). Our river is just as important as the Hudson. Their failure to comply resulted in action by USEPA (superfund) to remediate H2S health emergency issues and shut the site down. I know that if I were a Croton resident, I would support only those candidates who put their children’s health first over profit from trash. You know who they are. Sincerely Dr6761@aol.com Deb Roth President, Our Lives Count 330/553-0045 P.O. Box 196 Leavittsburg, OH 44430”

Exhibit B: “Feb. 24, 2007 Letter to the Editor My name is Linda Raymond. In the past, I have written to you about our community, which is facing a similar unregulated rail situation as Croton. Indeed, despite repeated claims by some former village officials that Croton is all alone, nothing could be further from the truth. All over the country communities are facing similar potentially unregulated rail wastes operations by rail. As I wrote previously in 2006, the Woburn Neighborhood Association, Inc. of Woburn, MA has been fighting for environmental justice in a similar unregulated regional waste facility here on the Woburn/Wilmington MA line. Once again, we applaud citizen’s efforts to do what is right for the community of Croton-on-the Hudson, NY—and those officials who choose not to negotiate at the same time they are allegedly fighting for their rights with the STB. By continuing to negotiate in 2007, some Croton officials are once again setting a dangerous example for the rest of the country. It is most remarkable to see only some of the following states coming on board in commenting in rejection to the proposed rail facility New England Transrail similar to Croton: Maine, New Jersey, New York, Illinois, Colorado, Massachusetts, etc. We hope all of Croton officials will get on board or in the absence of that, that you will consider electing officials who have rejected negotiation. Not only for Croton, but for any other community facing similar issues Linda Raymond, Chairwoman, Woburn Neighborhood Assoc., Inc.—Woburn, MA 01801”

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Monica Sabia Attacks Crotonblog, We Respond

March 3, 2007

The following letter to the editor appeared in The Gazette this week:

“To the Editor,

I’ve known Greg Schmidt for 17 years and he is a nice guy. So nice that I was shocked that he wanted to enter the political arena. Still surprised all the time that he has been mayor, that he suffers the local slings and arrows and is still nice. Wants to help, wants to fix things. Believes in fighting the good fight, and believes in his community. Asks opinions, and listens to answers. Listens.

I cannot pretend to speak to the biggest issues of this campaign; I don’t go to the meetings and I hardly hang around the village much these days. I tried to read the Croton Blog but such was the vitriol and inanity that my computer resigned in protest.

So for me it’s a matter of trust, of someone I believe in to represent me and to consider my issues. Here’s my personal rubric: Were I rendered incapable of driving, and had to choose our mayor and some of the Powers That Be in the Democratic Party, geez, Greg would win. I have seen the PTB’s hunched over the wheels of their not-so-small, energy-inefficient autos, so hell bent on their destination that heaven help anything or anyone in their way. In all the years I’ve lived in Croton (23) I don’t think I have ever seen Greg Schmidt behind the wheel of a car, yet he is the one I trust to ask for directions.

— Monica Sabia, Croton-on-Hudson”

Crotonblog’s comments: Ms. Monica Sabia’s letter compares the lot of Croton’’s mayor, in office less than two years, to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune endured by Hamlet, Shakespeare’s long-suffering Danish prince. She also admits that she doesn’t understand the issues of the campaign, so she devised a new yardstick by which to evaluate candidates: She will vote for them on the basis of the fuel efficiency of the vehicles they drive.

By her own admission, Ms Sabia also says she doesn’t get around much anymore, and she has never seen the Mayor behind the wheel of a car. The logic of this escapes us. The home of her hero, Mr. Nice Guy Gregory Schmidt, is strategically located between his chiropractic office and the Stanley H. Kellerhouse Municipal Building, so Ms. Sabia on Finney Farm Road isn’t likely to see him behind the wheel of his Ford pickup truck. Nevertheless, Crotonblog can assure her that the Mayor has been spotted locally in precincts he cannot possibly have reached on shanks’ mare.

And if her computer gave up the ghost because it couldn’t handle the bitter truths Crotonblog dispenses, we suggest that she contact a reputable PC diagnostic and repair service like Computers on Hudson.

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Mardi Gras—A Night of Surprises at Croton's Village Board Meeting

February 23, 2007

The day before Ash Wednesday is celebrated in New Orleans and elsewhere as Mardi Gras—Fat Tuesday—a day of celebration and gluttony before the forty-day Lenten season sets in. Croton’s Village Board meeting was held last Tuesday, Feb. 20, a day late, displaced by the almost meaningless Presidents Day. The latter is a holiday not given over to celebration of this nation’s presidential heritage but devoted to the promotion of white sales by suburban department stores.

Croton’s Mardi Gras board meeting turned out to be a succession of surprises. Surprise No. 1 was the welcome absence of any phony William Rooney letter on the agenda intended to serve as a laughably obvious excuse for comment by so-called “concerned citizens” too lazy to wait for the period given over to citizen participation. Apparently Crotonblog’s harsh light of exposure nipped in the bud plans cooked up by this noisy group of tiresome rabble-rousers for packing future board meetings (see: “Croton Republicans Conspired to Hijack Village Board Meeting”).

Surprise No. 2 was the revelation that the Village had concluded an agreement to purchase the so-called “Katz property,” thus dooming any likelihood that it might be developed commercially. Although the resolution to buy this property was unanimous, taxpayers may wonder at the precipitousness of the decision to purchase and remove from the tax rolls a sizable parcel for which the Village has no plans for present or future use.

Surely Croton is not going to acquire every piece of real estate that comes on the market. To help pay for the 2.5 newly acquired acres, why doesn’t Croton sell the site of the former skate park? That property, close to the Route 129 exit ramp of the Route 9 Expressway, would make an excellent site for a professional building.

Surprise No. 3 was another threat by Richard Pellicci (see: “An Out-of-Control Richard Pellicci Rages Over ‘Listening Session’”), perennial foe of any development of the property known as 1A Croton Point Avenue, made against Democratic members of the Board. Mr. Pellicci intoned ominously, “If my property decreases in value [as a result of Board actions in negotiating and striking a deal similar to the Katz agreement], I’m going to come after you.”

Such foolish attempts at bravado and bogeyman intimidation are ludicrous in a volatile and inflated real estate market subject to many outside forces. For years the County’s dump on Croton Point had no effect on Croton’s real estate values, nor did the village’s proximity to the New York Central’s rail yards and shops make it any less attractive to home seekers—but then Mr. Pellicci has lived here for only a comparatively short time.

Mr. Pellicci’s house on Radnor Avenue, formerly owned by the gentle and well-liked dentist Dr. Charles E. Jurka, is nowhere near 1A Croton Point Avenue. Complainant Pellicci would have a difficult time convincing a court that Board actions were in any way responsible for his not achieving his desired selling price. Crotonblog’s advice to the perpetually unhappy Mr. Pellicci is to sell now near the top of the market and get out of town. We’ll even help you pack.

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The Plot Thickens: The Cabal Against Crotonblog

January 30, 2007

Crotonblog seems to have acquired its own axis of evil. Our response to Marie Yurchuk's attack on Crotonblog in the pages of The Gazette (see: "Marie Yurchuk Takes a Swipe at Crotonblog. We Respond") has elicited three orchestrated responses from three nattering nabobs of negativism, Joann Minett, Richard Pellicci and Marie Yurchuk. Although they disdain Crotonblog and become annoyed when their names appear in it, we are nevertheless taking the liberty of publishing their three letters responding to our response to Mrs. Yurchuk's original attack.

First up, Marie Yurchuk...

To the editor,

This is in response to Mr. Weale's comments about my recent letter to the Gazette.

1) Mr. Weale claims that the Croton Democratic website does not refer residents to the Crotonblog. It doesn't now but it did. A Google cached copy shows that village residents were advised to "sign up for daily email updates of new items posted" on the blog throughout 2006.

2) Mr. Weale claims that my letter was filled with "misinformation" and was non-specific. Here's what traditional media like the Journal News and the Gazette have to say specifically:

a) The blog did post that resident Bob Wintermeier used the "n word" implying the racial slur. He did not. (Journal News, March 16, 2006: Anonymous accusation draws fire.)

b) The blog did post and anonymous and false claim that a former trustee "stole soda." (Same Journal article. In that article, Mr. Weale said that the blog "generally does not censor comments, cannot verify their truth and allows for anonymity.")

c) The blog did post the claims of a former trustee who stated that residents fighting Regus or pre-emption issues were engaged in "half truths and rumors." Those residents set the record straight in three recent letters to the Gazette (Brady, Roth and Raymond). There's more but I'll stop here.

Mr. Weale tells us that many comments fall under "political satire" and are not subject to libel laws. He says that blogging is in the future. God help us all if this is the future where you can say online anonymously what you would not say out loud about your neighbors at a meeting or a signed letter to the paper.

The truth is that people all over are fighting those bloggers who do commit libel or defame and that they are winning. In Yonkers, a court has ordered a blog to turn over the IP addresses and related information of certain posters. In Putnam, an official won a $25,000 judgment a poster who claimed that she had altered records (Journal News Oct. 28, 2006: Libel verdict in Southeast).

Dan Gillmor, director of the Center for Citizen Media, said this in the March 2006 Journal article: "People who read anonymous postings should give then zero credence in most cases."

Citizens who believe that what they have to say is important sign their own names. That's what it all boils down to. I am not alone in my respect for Mayor Schmidt and Trustee Brennan who by Mr. Weale's own admission, have refused invitations to post in such places.

— Marie Yurchuk, Croton-on-Hudson

Followed by Richard Pellicci...

To the editor,

This is in response to Mr. Weale's letter to the Gazette defending the Crotonblog stating it is not a chat-room. At a recent board meeting I quoted from an article in the Wall Street Journal of December 20, 2006 by Joseph Rago entitled "The Blog Mob, written by fools to be read by imbeciles."

"The blogs are not as significant as their self-endeared curators would like to think. Journalism requires journalists who are at last fitfully confronting the digital age. The bloggers for their part produce minimal reportage. Instead, they ride along with the Main Stream Media like remora fish on the bellies of sharks, picking at the scraps."

My opinion concerning the Croton "blahblah" blog could not have been stated better. Fact, there was a link from the Croton Democratic website to the Crotonblog. It has now been taken off. (I have a saved screen shot of it in case anyone is interested.) Maybe because of the recently won libel lawsuits, maybe because our Croton Democratic candidates Gallelli, Kane and Wiegman do not want to be guilty by association to Crotonblog's commentaries concerning residents by its illustrious anonymous posters this close to election time, who knows.

So, Mr. Weale, you wonder why Mayor Schmidt and Trustee Brennan will not post on Crotonblog. Please!

As a democrat, I advise the majority of Croton's tunnel vision democratic voters, as always, to get the facts folks, get the facts.

— Richard Pellicci, Croton-on-Hudson

And finally, from Joann Minett...

To the editor,

I'm writing in response to a letter written by Mr. Weale in last week's Gazette.

Yes, Mr. Weale this is the 21st century. And with that comes all new forms of communications over the net, new dangers, risks and crimes. As responsible people we must be careful of what the internet can do. We must adjust our life styles to many forms of angers.....sexual predators, thieves and liars.

I find the Croton Blog, as I do any blog or chat room to be a black hole of evil in Cyberspace. In regard to the Croton Blog, I have come to the conclusion that it is a nasty forum of life, deception and division. It has been a site that has festered very poor commentary and behavior. The people who visit the site and write lies and defamations against their neighbors hide behind anonymous names. I just prefer to call them cowards. Despite all that is "free speech," which is the foundation of our country.

People should take the Croton Blog for what it really is.....entertainment, and not take it as a source of accurate information.

Everyone knows that a major source of lies and defamation came from our own x-trustee Georgianna Grant who accidentally wrote her name on her entry. She has a long history of Wee-Will entries in which she found the need to write misinformation (proven misinformation) under a false name as to not be accountable for it and to better her party. Sorry Mr. Weale, but it is she, and her friends, that have helped to peg the Croton Blog site as a political one.

I'm glad that Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Brennan chose not to visit this black hole for comments. I commend them for that. It shows that they are men of good character. Should anyone want to find correct information in regard to our village, its policies, or should anyone like to express their opinions and concerns, they should attend the village board meetings, call the offices, or visit the village website. Otherwise you will get misinformation, lies and deception on the Croton Blog site.

— Joann Minett, Croton-on-Hudson

We won't bore readers with refutations to their long-winded complaints, except to say that we did purposely refer to Robert Wintermeier's use of the "N" word in the headline of a news story. The reference, of course, was to his single-minded objection to negotiations of any kind over the former Metro Enviro property at 1A Croton Point Avenue. Our use of the phrase "N word" in the headline is known journalistically as a "teaser" to prompt viewers to read the piece. But such subtleties are beyond these pathetic people, who will create issues that don't exist to further their desperate, small-minded causes. What is more, these people are apparently not aware that in any legal action the first question asked of both parties by the presiding judge is, "Have efforts been made to resolve the matter amicably through negotiation before resorting to legal action?"

We shall probably use the "N word" again, applying it to Joann Minett for her nutty concept of Croton geography, to Richard Pellicci for his no-talent cartoons depicting people he dislikes, and to Marie Yurchuk for her longstanding negativism dating back to the time when her children were in Croton schools and she was regarded as a thorn in the side of the school administrators.

The anti-Crotonblog crowd makes much of our provision of anonymity to those making comments, an almost universal practice in the blogging world. The vehemence of their attacks on Crotonblog demonstrates why some readers will not comment without the protective cloak of anonymity. Interestingly, those who are now so opposed to anonymous comments on Crotonblog had no objection to anonymity when Crotonblog began. In fact, they were so enamored of anonymity they became frequent anonymous commenters on Crotonblog (see: "Maria Cudequest Forgetting Her Own Experience with Croton's 'Local Internet Chat Room'"). Frequent, that is, until we discovered they were abusing the privilege. Comments signed with a half-dozen different pen names were appended to the same article. We discovered that these emanated from a single computer user located at 84 Grand Street and quickly put a stop to this deceitful practice (see: "A Penal Process Known as Banishment... Explained"). So much for their mealy-mouthed objections to anonymity.

What these three nattering nabobs of negativism need is a theme song. Crotonblog suggests that the perfect one for them would be "Whatever It Is I'm Against It," the song Groucho Marx sang in the movie "Horse Feathers." Here's how it goes: "Whatever it is I'm against it. No matter what it is or who commenced it, I'm against it. And even when you've changed it or condensed it, I'm against it."

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CORRECTION

January 8, 2007

Crotonblog erred in our Editorial titled “What Were Croton Officials Thinking When They Faked Residents’ Water Bills?” We ascribed the first publication of the story to Robert Marchant and The Journal News. Mr. Marchant apparently got wind of his story from The Associated Press news wire.

Crotonblog has recieved the following email from David Bauder, who was mentioned in the false water bill story.

“I have a small correction on the piece I just happened to see on the water bill controversy. It was my colleague, Jim Fitzgerald of The Associated Press, who broke the story—not the Journal News.

— David Bauder”

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Marie Yurchuk Takes a Swipe at Crotonblog. We Respond

January 5, 2007

In a letter to the editor published in The Gazette on January 4, 2007, Ms. Marie Yurchuk expresses the hope that the Croton Democratic Committee website will no longer advise residents to seek information about the village from “a local internet chat-room” and cites a link on that site that “takes residents to this chat-room where Democratic officials post commentary and where misinformation and other strangeness are abundant.”

Ms. Yurchuk’s letter is itself so full of “misinformation and strangeness,” Crotonblog hardly knows where to begin. Crotonblog has visited the Croton Democratic website and can find no place on the Democratic site where such a link appears. After signed informational comments were posted by Democratic trustees on Crotonblog, Crotonblog specifically addressed e-mails to Messrs. Schmidt and Brennan inviting them to post similar comments and messages for the edification of residents. Twice Messrs. Schmidt and Brennan did not respond to these invitations.

In her letter, Ms. Yurchuk makes several references to Crotonblog as a chat-room. Ms. Yurchuk and other critics, including Maria Cudequest and Richard Pellicci, persist in mischaracterizing Crotonblog and making similar wild charges about the content of its postings. They need to come into the 21st century and familiarize themselves with blogging practices and with blogging’s vocabulary.

Crotonblog is not, we repeat, not a chat room. A chat room is, by definition, a site on the Internet where a number of users can communicate in real time. A blog, on the other hand, is an online chronological log that makes provision for readers to make online comments anonymously and outside the control of the blog operator. Like it or not, anonymity is a feature of the blogging universe

Because Ms. Yurchuk’s other charges are so wild and nonspecific, Crotonblog will not even dignify them with a defense or a rebuttal—except to say that Crotonblog cannot be held responsible for anonymous letters sent to political candidates through the mails. Many of the comments to which she takes exception were part of satirical postings, an accepted form of expression in political commentary and, incidentally, outside the reach of libel laws.

If Ms.Yurchuk’s letter is intended to be the Croton Republicans’ first salvo on behalf of Messrs. Schmidt and Brennan in the upcoming political campaign for mayor and trustee, Crotonblog respectfully suggests that next time the Republicans get a bigger gun than a peashooter.

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