Download:

Links to related articles:
Few see big changes with Fidel Castro gone
Local Pakistanis take pride in ‘free and fair’ elections
Lowey says she’s ‘feeling great’
Teacher calls 911, saves woman
Spring Valley trustee wants police at meetings for safety

The County Legislature at last night’s meeting honored four of its members who won’t be returning next year: Legislators Patrick Withers, D-Suffern, Bruce Levine, D-Montebello, David Fried, D-Spring Valley, and Theodore Dusanenko, R-Valley Cottage.

While the contributions of Levine, Withers and Fried were appropriately noted, the farewell was notably geared toward Dusanenko, also fondly referred to as “Teddy” and “The Dus.”  As Chairwoman Harriet Cornell, D-West Nyack, said his name, the Legislature and audience responded by giving him a standing ovation, upon which Teddy waved and took a deep breath.

He also left the meeting with a lot more stuff than he came in with. In addition to the Legislature’s certificate and portrait, given to all four outgoing members, Dusanenko was also given a certificate of mert from Clarkstown — he was a supervisor there in the 1980s —  plaques from the county Democratic Party and the county Solid Waste Management Authority and the 2007 Ramapo Freedom Award for excellence in community service.

Dusanenko was first elected to the Legislature in 1969 and has served since save for a four year break in the late 1980s when he ran for county supervisor. (NOTE: That should read county executive, not county supervisor.) Fried was elected in 2003. Levine was first elected in 1985 and served for 10 years, including as chairman, and was re-elected in a mid-term election last year. Withers was appointed in January.

The new Legislature, with 12 returning members and four new faces, will be sworn in Jan. 3.

Three members of the Rockland County Legislature are celebrating a birthday today!

• Ed Day, R-New City, is the youngest of the three. He’s 56.

• VJ Pradhan, D-Nanuet, the “middle” child so to speak, is the big 6-0.

• Gerold Bierker, C-Bardonia, turns  68 today. No worries—you don’t look a day older than 67!! Ha!

Their birthdays aren’t all they share. Bierker and Day were quick to point out this week that they both graduated from Brooklyn Tech.

August is a popular month for Rockland County Legislature birthdays.

We’ve also got:

• Bruce Levine, D-Montebello: 8/1

• Phil Soskin, D-Monsey 8/10

• Connie Coker, D-South Nyack: 8/13

This morning, Rockland County Legislature candidate Alden Wolfe held a news conference to tie his opponent, Legislator Bruce Levine, to the Spring Valley mayor’s hiring of illegal immigrants for a government public works project.

Reporter Steve Lieberman attended the news conference. Here’s his account of the news conference and a discussion afterward with Levine:

Levine, the village attorney, called Wolfe’s accusation false, saying he had no role in the hiring of illegal immigrants and was on vacation when it happened.

During the news conference in front of Spring Valley Village Hall, Wolfe said Levine should explain what role, if any, he played as village attorney in Spring Valley Mayor George Darden’s decision to hire illegal immigrants and to discuss the advice he had given the mayor.

At one point, Wolfe asked, “What other advice did he give the mayor to cover up the illegal hiring?”

Wolfe denied that he was accusing Levine of committing a crime. He also said his demands that Levine explain himself were not political.

“This is about good government,” Wolfe said. “This is about accountability. … As an elected official [county legislator] … Mr. Levine needs to be held to a higher standard.”

Wolfe said Levine had been silent for more than a week since The Journal News reported that Darden had shelled out his own money to hire 10 people from Route 59 for a urban renewal job.

Wolfe also charged that Levine’s job as village attorney conflicted with his being a legislator — a charge he has made previously. He said Levine was voting on issues that might be good for the village but not necessarily good for the county and all his constituents.

Reached by telephone, Levine said when he learned about the illegal hirings, he told the village treasurer not to reimburse the mayor. When he was told that already had happened, Levine said he told Darden to return the money until he could resolve the issue.

“When someone in government makes a mistake like this,” Levine said, “it creates a complex legal situation.”

He called Wolfe’s accusations “Nixonian” in nature.

“It’s classic for people in political campaigns to make false accusations for the purpose of the trying to divert the people’s attention from the real issues,” Levine said, adding that he believed people were more interested in taxes, the county’s fiscal problems, affordable housing and environmental issues.

Wolfe said the key issue was that Levine couldn’t serve two masters—Spring Valley as village attorney and residents as a county legislator.

“This is not a political issue,” Wolfe said. “Rockland taxpayers deserve the highest level of service from their elected officials, but when scandal clouds the air, we need to know that our elected officials can stand above.”

This is the second campaign between Levine and Wolfe.

Wolfe was appointed to the Legislature in 2006 to replace Robert Berliner after the latter won election to the bench as Surrogate Court judge. Levine, a former legislator for 10 years, decided to seek the seat last year after an 11-year hiatus.

Wolfe won the party’s nomination for re-election with the support of Ramapo’s political leaders.

Levine forced a primary and soundly defeated Wolfe. Wolfe and Levine each gathered enough signatures to force a primary, during which Levine soundly defeated Wolfe. Levine won election in November for the remainder of the term, which expires at the end of this year.

Legislators Ilan Schoenberger, D-Wesley Hills, and Bruce Levine, D-Montebello, could have some thinking to do the Legislature approves a proposal to prohibit county legislators from being employed by the county or a Rockland town or village. Schoenberger is the Ramapo finance director and Levine is the Spring Valley village attorney.

The proposal, introduced by Legislator Patrick Withers, D-Suffern, isn’t aimed at any one legislator, but would eliminate the appearance of impropriety that comes with legislators holding both positions. The county already has a “two-hat” rule that prohibits legislators from also holding elective office in a Rockland town or village.

The proposal calls for the amendment of the “two-hat” rule to take effect in January 2008 so that anyone seeking election or re-election could make a decision before mounting a campaign.

Schoenberger, for one, agrees with Withers and is supportive of the idea. Levine, who had not heard of the proposal until he heard of it from The Journal News, said he thought Withers was proposing this on behalf of the political structure in Ramapo.

This structure, is said is threatened “because I present a challenge, a daily challenge to the system, to the way the county has operated,� he said.

Levine already has one person gunning for his spot next year—former Legislator Alden Wolfe. Levine soundly defeated Wolfe in last year’s primary. Wolfe recently announced his campaign to get his seat back and among his chief concerns was the fact that Levine is answerable to both the people of Rockland County and the village of Spring Valley.

I get so many of those campaign palm cards during election season that I could wallpaper my cubicle. You all know what I’m talking about — you get them in your mailbox or at the grocery store. You hit up a local festival anytime between May and November and you could likely fill a small pillowcase with literature from local politicians and their challengers.

Personally, I’ve never found much use for them, other than seeing who has the best design or who should have thought to comb his cowlick before smiling for the camera.

But County Legislator Bruce Levine keeps an entire file of them, his to be exact. They are his own version of a to-do list. Every politician tells voters what he or she will do for them, but Levine said recently that he keeps his file to make sure he keeps his word.

“What they’re really looking for is action and results,� he said of voters.

Back when Levine was a legislator in the 1980s and ‘90s, he’d keep his palm cards from each election and then check them later to see what promises he’d fulfilled and what else needed to be worked on. Now that he’s back in his old seat and facing opposition in a September primary from former Legislator Alden Wolfe, Levine said he’s back in the old file.

And he better make this year’s palm card good. After— he’ll be looking at it for years to come.