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Amy Vernon joined The Journal News in 2000 as education editor for the Westchester and Putnam editions. She came to Rockand as metro editor in 2001. Raised on Long Island, Amy is a graduate of Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., and has worked in South Florida and the Phoenix metro area. She lives in New Jersey with her husband, two sons and very understanding mother-in-law. She watches entirely too much television, but is trying hard not to let her children do the same. She is as big a fan of Curious George on PBS as she is of many of her favorite "grown-up" shows. Reach her at avernon@lohud.com or 845-578-2425.
E-mail Amy Vernon at avernon@lohud.com
An e-mail this afternoon from Assemblywoman Nancy Calhoun reminded me that Grievance Day is a week from tomorrow.
No, it's not a day where you get to just complain about anything and everything; it's the deadline for folks to file formal grievances on their property tax bills.
Calhoun included a link to a helpful pamplhet: "Fair Assessments: [...]
Our Data Desk has posted two new databases with all sorts of info useful to Rockland residents.
First off, relating to today's story about how many schools and districts in the Lower Hudson Valley, including some in Rockland, received high marks from the state Education Department for their academic performance and for closing the achievement gap.
Here's [...]
The other day, The Journal News and LoHud.com ran an article on how much money various state Senators and Assembly members had gotten in what are technically called member items, but more colloquially called pork.
Our data desk has put together a searchable database that you can access here.
Rockland's lone state senator, Thomas Morahan (R-New City), [...]
In case you missed it, Rockland Editorial Page Editor Nancy Cutler has an interesting look at the politics underlying the case of Avrum David Friesel, a fugitive for 11 years before the London Metropolitan Police captured him earlier this week.
Friesel, the former New Square village clerk and a son of the village's only mayor, fled [...]
Our Data Desk today updated LoHud's database with March's existing home sales for most New York counties, as reported by the state association of Realtors.
You can find the database here.
Basically, as has already been reported in The Journal News and on LoHud.com, existing home sales dropped 38.6 percent in Rockland from a year earlier, while [...]
All together now: Awwww!
Meet Nyack, the new lion cub at the San Diego Wild Animal Park (totally cool place — go if you're ever out that way!):
This photo, shot by Ken Bohn for the San Diego Wild Animal Park, is of four-month-old Nyack (to the right). That's his cousin, Ingozi, he's saying hi to.
A boy, Nyack [...]
I reminded you this morning that work to move a gas main under Route 59 in Central Nyack was starting today and would continue for a couple weeks.
Guess what? Once Orange & Rockland Utilities tore up the road to get to its gas main that was supposed to have been causing drainage problems in the [...]
Starting at 8:30 this morning, two westbound lanes on Route 59 will be closed near the Mountainview Avenue entrance to the New York State Thruway in Central Nyack. As a result, traffic will be down to one lane in each direction for a half-mile stretch daily for two or three weeks. Work each weekday will [...]
To commemorate Earth Day, the Great American Cleanup starts this weekend and other events will be held through the week next week.
You can read this article by staff writer Laura Incalcaterra about the events, but here's a quick list:
Saturday
• The Palisades Community Center, 675 Oak Tree Road, holds an Earth Day Fair from 10 a.m. [...]
My colleague, Cathey O'Donnell of the Data Desk, put together this cool map showing where all the Catholic schools are located in the Lower Hudson Valley, in commemoration of Pope Benedict's imminent arrival in our region.
Click on one of the markers to find out details about each school, such as its location, enrollment or website.
Interesting [...]
The annual community-wide chometz burning will take place from 6:30 to 11:47 a.m. Friday, April 18, according to the Chabad of Greater Monsey blog.
For the uninitiated, chometz (also spelled chametz) is leavened food you're not allowed to eat during Passover. Observant Jews rid their homes of all chometz before the eight-day holiday begins, this year [...]
OK, not me, given my phobia of deep water, but maybe you?
The Palisades Region of New York State Parks is holding Lifeguard Qualifying Exams for seasonal employment this year.
About 120 lifeguards are hired to work at pools and beaches in Rockland, Orange and Ulster counties each year.
The exams will be at 9 a.m. April [...]
Here's the latest Week in Review podcast. Beneath the video are links to the related stories, as well as links to downloadable PDFs of each article (the links expire once our articles move into the paid archives) and video, where available. Thanks for stopping by.
Download:
Fleetwood Elementary cheating: link here, pdf here.
Immigration forum: link here, pdf [...]
Unhappy with your property tax assessment?
The state has released a packet that explains all the criteria for challenging your assessment, as well as the forms you need to fill out to do that. You can download the pdf here. (Hat tip to the town of Ramapo for disseminating this info.)
As promised earlier, here's a full list of Rockland's recipients of 2008 Community Development Block Grant funds:
• Spring Valley: $250,000 for the reconstruction of a park at Jay Street and Kennedy Drive.
• Ramapo: $150,000 to construct a handicapped-accessible pavilion and restrooms at Manny Welder Park.
• West Haverstraw: $100,000 for sidewalk replacement, lighting installation and landscaping [...]
This morning, county officials are announcing which programs throughout Rockland will receive money through the Community Development Block Grant program.
Commonly known as CDBG (hey, it's a lot shorter!), the grants are from the federal government's Department of Housing and Urban Development and distributed through the county Office of Community Development. HUD established the program in [...]
The Rockland Coalition for Peace and Justice is holding an extra vigil tonight, marking the 4,000th death of in the U.S. military since the war in Iraq began.
The vigil will run from 7 to 8 tonight at the corner of Cedar and Main streets in downtown Nyack, next to the Riverspace Theatre. (It's suggested that [...]
New York state is relatively unusual in that you, the voter, get to have a say in school budgets.
Enough people turn out and say no to the budget, and the school district has to go back to the drawing board or adopt what is called an "austerity" budget. I put that word in quotes because, [...]
In the coming days, we will be moving this and other LoHud blogs to a dedicated server that will provide more stability and better troubleshooting capabilities than what we currently have. Please bear with us during this transition. Some features may not be available during this time. We will reincorporate them as soon as possible. [...]
You've seen the "Images of America" books, I assure you. Probably every time you've ever walked into a big-box bookstore like Barnes & Noble or Borders.
They're those books with sepia-toned images on the cover meant to evoke a time, long ago, when all was well with the world and things were great and hunky-dory [...]
Don't get me wrong, I understand that the March village elections generally lack much drama. Often several are uncontested and with the staggered terms and several other villages holding their election contests in the fall, just a few villages hold an election each March.
But, really, this was a bit much: Of the six villages running [...]
The good folks on our data desk put together PDFs of the vote totals for each candidate in the Super Tuesday primary by town and Congressional district. You can download Rockland's here.
In addition, you can see how things went Tuesday in both Westchester and Putnam.
Photo by Peter Carr/The Journal News.
Over in the right-hand sidebar, under our coverage of the 35th annual March for Life, we have a new poll.
New York state, it sometimes feels, has elections every five minutes.
Here's a look:
Feb. 5Â —Â Presidential primary
March 18Â —Village elections (though some villages have fall elections)
May 20Â —Â School board and budget elections
Sept. 16Â —Â Primaries for the November general [...]
Staff writer Christina Jeng was tied up this week, so her colleague and fellow blogger, Sarah Netter, stepped up to bring you the Week in Review podcast.
Download:
And, as usual, here are links to the appropriate stories:
Monsey group fined for mess after chicken ritual
Schumer visits cadets at West Point
Special Report: Our Schools, Our Money
Haverstraw resident charged [...]
It's December, and that means we're gearing up for the annual Year in Review, a look at the 10 biggest news stories in Rockland in 2007.
The main criteria we look at is that the news has to be Rockland-specific, so the war in Iraq would not qualify, but news regarding the criminal military case stemming [...]
