The good bye is for me. This is my final post on Inside Rockland and my last day at The Journal News. Thanks everyone for reading. I’ll look forward to checking back to see what kind of shenanigans are captivating Rockland.

The look back is for a certain elected official in Rockland. Not too long ago, [...]

Legislator Ed Day told me recently that he’s expecting his eldest son to be deployed to Iraq within the next month.Christopher Day, a 2003 graduate of Clarkstown North, is now stationed at Fort Bragg, N.C. He’s a member of the elite Army Airborne Rangers. His unit is already overseas and Day said he expects him [...]

Rockland County has announced the opening of cooling centers this weekend in the following locations:

SATURDAY, JULY 19

Town of Clarkstown
• Pascack Community Center: 11 a.m. – 6 p.m.
• Congers Community Center: 11 a.m. – 6 p.m.
• Central Nyack Community Center: 11 a.m. – 6 p.m.
• Palisades Center Mall Community Center: 10 a.m. – 9 p.m.

Town of [...]

The July periodic campaign finance disclosure forms were due yesterday for any person or committee with an active account.

So while we focused primarily on this year’s candidates I took a peek at the statements of County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef and some of his rumored 2009 opponents.

Vanderhoef, a Republican now serving his fourth term [...]

But Legislators Gerold Bierker, C-Bardonia, and Doug Jobson, R-Stony Point, did a good job of leading the audience at Tuesday’s Legislature meeting in a rendition of “God Bless America.”

The Legislature failed last night to override the county executive’s veto of a local law that called for all major facility projects in Rockland to be “designed, constructed and certified” to the standard of the U.S. Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design rating system.

Bill sponsor Alden Wolfe, D-Suffern, knew the demise of [...]

The County Legislature Tuesday will formally pull a proposal to ban metal bats from all pre-high school baseball games at the request of its sponsor, Legislator VJ Pradhan, D-Nanuet.

The proposal had been vehemently opposed by local Little League organizations, with officials coming to a recent committee meeting on the subject.

“I’m pulling it out for one [...]

The Rockland County Legislature has now entered its summer schedule, with scaled back meetings.

There will be only two more Legislature meetings this summer, on July 1 and Aug. 5, as well as committee meetings.

Next week, legislators will host a public hearing on the 2008-2009 Rockland Community College budget with a vote to follow in August.

Legislators [...]

It was fairly typical as far as conventions go, although I noted a few oddities:
—While he was in the audience, Ramapo Town Supervisor Christopher St. Lawrence did not make an obligatory short, heavy joke at Chairman Vince Monte’s expense as in previous years.
—I got told I looked like one of the Zebrowski kids. (Note to [...]

Rockland’s county executive couldn’t resist a little gloating today at a county executives forum at Dominican College in Orangeburg.

When someone from the audience asked how the state could clean up politics in Albany, C. Scott Vanderhoef deadpanned “Well, if they elected another governor last time, I would have been helpful.”

Vanderhoef, who then broke into a [...]

With temperatures in the upper 90s or higher, the county has opened up cooling centers in several towns in villages for today and tomorrow.

They are:

Town of Clarkstown

• Central Nyack, Congers and Pascack community centers: 7:30 a.m. – 10 p.m.

•Town Hall Auditorium: 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.

•Adler Center, 4th floor, Palisades Mall: noon – 10 p.m

Town [...]

Legislator Gerold Bierker said his current third term on the Rockland County Legislature will be his last.

The Bardonia Conservative said he’s looking forward to time spent fishing, playing with the grandchildren and getting back into his target shooting hobby.

“At the end of this term, I’m going to be 72 years old,” he said.

Bierker, a former [...]

It’s a boy for Sean Mathews, Rockland’s senior assistant county executive.

His wife gave birth this morning to their third child, Thomas Dominic, who weighed in at 9 pounds, 6 ounces.

Edited to add: I’ve been informed that the new dad’s official title is chief of staff.

Typically the county clerk’s office holds naturalization ceremonies in local schools or the Fire Training Center in Ramapo—sometimes even the courthouse if it’s a smaller crowd.

So I was surprised to see that June’s ceremony will be held at the Orange & Rockland Utilities Operations Center auditorium in Spring Valley.

Debbie Vobroucek, the county clerk’s confidential assistant, [...]

County Legislature Vice Chairman William Darden, D-Hillcrest, announced today that he would not seek election to the 95th Assembly District against incumbent Ellen Jaffee, D-Suffern.

“I thought about it for a period of time. I had supporters over there and I truly treasure their support,” Darden said this afternoon.

Even though he knows it’s cliche, Darden said [...]

Normally when I go to County Legislature meetings I am given a full arm workout in the form of a hefty stack of papers that make up the agenda and the packet of background paperwork for each item.

Okay—they weren’t that heavy. But the Legislature must have needed some pretty intense staplers for those things. They [...]

Working for a morning paper, the Rockland County Legislature meeting lasted long after my deadline last night. When I left around 9:30 p.m. or so, the Legislature was only halfway down a long list of people who had signed up to speak on the so-called “flow control” proposal that would give the Solid Waste [...]

Legislator Ed Day’s proposal to request the State Legislature suspend state and county taxes on gasoline during the summer hasn’t been referred to the full Legislature.

The proposal died in committee last week with four “ayes” and three “nays.” Proposals need six “ayes” to make it out of committee.

Day, R-New City, also the Legislature’s minority leader, [...]

The battle continues… Dum, dum DUM!

Okay, not it’s not that bad. But there has been a running theme this year of the Legislature complaining that County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef has been less than forthcoming with information, something his office says just isn’t true.

Last month, at the April 30 Government Operations Committee meeting Legislator Ed [...]

Legislation has passed both state chambers to declare Friday as Thurgood Marshall Day in the state.

The measure was sponsored by State Sen. Thomas Morahan,  R-New City, and Assemblywoman Ellen Jaffee, D-Suffern, to honor the Supreme Court justice for his contributions to the civil rights movement.

Marshall visited Rockland in 1943 to call for desegregation of a [...]

Ramapo Town Clerk Chris Sampson has formally announced that he will challenge Assemblywoman Ellen Jaffee, D-Suffern, in the Democratic primary for Jaffee’s seat this fall.

Sampson was one of several area Democrats who said this winter they were interested in the seat. The others were County Legislature Vice Chairman William Darden, Suffern Mayor John Keegan, [...]

Legislator Gerold Bierker, C-Bardonia, has a penchant for really going to bat for causes he feels are not only worthy, but not getting the attention they deserve.

During budget season you often hear him trying to wrangle more money out of the budget for certain organizations, most notably the Hi-Tor Animal Care Center and Project Turning [...]

My daily commute to The Journal News’ Rockland office takes me down Route 17 in Orange County. For the past few days road crews have been working on an overpass near Monroe.

I was driving along, cursing getting stuck in construction traffic during an already long commute, when I saw one of Patrick Withers’ campaign signs. [...]

I attend most of the County Legislature’s meetings, held the first and third Tuesday’s each month. They are interesting for the most part, but can get a little dry.

Well last night was anything but. A simple public hearing and subsequent vote on a law to mandate recycling programs for plastic bags turned into an all [...]

County officials are holding a meeting from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. on Monday to get input from the public on the county’s initiative to create a free wireless network.  The meeting will be held in the Raso Room on the fourth floor of the Palisades Center in West Nyack.Rockland has already contract with Civitium, [...]