GRASSROOTS FOR GREENBURGH
http://grassrootsforgreenburgh.home.att.net
FEINER'S
CAMPAIGN COFFERS
LINKED TO
SWEETHEART DEALS−ETHICS
PROBE LIKELY
| Contact: | Robert B. Bernstein, Esq. E-mail: robertbrucebernstein@yahoo.com |
| Carol A. Wielk, Grassroots
for Greenburgh E-mail: grassrootsforgreenburgh@worldnet.att.net |
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Greenburgh, NY (August 20, 2007) Today, Robert B. Bernstein, Edgemont attorney, civic leader and long-time Greenburgh resident, filed a citizen complaint before Greenburgh’s newly constituted ethics board, charging Paul J. Feiner, Supervisor, with multiple violations. The complaint, contained in a 21-page sworn statement, states that Feiner violated the New York State Penal Code barring “official misconduct,” NYS General Municipal Law and the Code of Ethics of the Town of Greenburgh.
These serious charges link Feiner’s acceptance of “staggering” amounts of campaign contributions dating back to 1998 to some of the most controversial development projects in Greenburgh. Contributions from the Town’s largest residential and commercial developers and their representatives are clearly connected to active applications before the Town.
Since 1998 and continuing to the present day, Feiner has solicited and accepted over $30,000 from these sources with pending projects before the Town. Some examples:
- Stone
Ridge Manor, a 40-unit luxury apartment complex behind Central Avenue in the
Edgemont section, faced strong community and school board opposition because
of its impact on the school and continuing congestion in the area. Feiner
accepted $10,000 over a two-year period from the developers and voted to
allow a re-zoning of the property from single to multifamily, without
disclosing the financial support he received from the developers. The
developers recently sold the project for just under $30 million.
- From January 1998 to April 2003, Feiner accepted another $10,000 from a Mayfair Knollwood lawyer, his family and an employee. This lawyer represented the Valhalla School District and worked out an arrangement which resulted in Greenburgh taxpayers almost losing out on $1.2 million in revenues from the WestHELP contract with Westchester County to support a homeless shelter near the Mayfair Knollwood neighborhood. The sweetheart deal was intended to give the Valhalla School District some $650,000 each year for ten years. In 2007 the NYS Comptroller found the gift to Valhalla to be illegal
Before the final state comptroller’s report on Valhalla, Feiner was aware back in 2006 of the state’s concerns regarding the legality of the Valhalla deal. Despite this, Feiner retained the Mayfair Knollwood lawyer to represent the Town and the Supervisor, pro bono, in the WestHELP matter and to ensure that Feiner’s “commitments” to the Mayfair community were honored. Feiner acted unilaterally, without the required Town Board approval, in retaining the attorney. In January, 2007 this lawyer, who had given Feiner $10,000, was arrested, and charged with grand larceny for stealing from elderly clients. He pleaded guilty to a felony, was disbarred, and faces up to six years in prison.
- Other “pay for play” deals which benefited Feiner handsomely in campaign contributions include, among others, $4,750 from a developer with an application to rezone a 86-unit subdivision near Glenville Woods, $6,950 from Avalon II developers seeking approval for 800 garden apartments off of Taxter Ridge and Route 119, $3,250 from developers with a controversial application before the Town to expand a strip mall, etc.
These and many other developer-funded campaign contributions to Feiner are detailed in the Verified Citizen Complaint and extensive supporting documents/exhibits filed by Bernstein with the Greenburgh Ethics Board.
In filing the complaint, Mr. Bernstein stated: “I am hopeful that the Ethics Board will carefully review the facts I have assembled regarding Paul Feiner’s deeply disturbing and illegal manner of soliciting and accepting money from those seeking land use approval from the Town. Mr. Feiner’s audacious campaign fund-raising machine is harmful to the interests of the Greenburgh taxpayer, and fails to provide a level-playing field for other businesses which operate outside these influence-peddling schemes. Greenburgh deserves better leadership and much more open, honest and ethical government.”
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Robert B. Bernstein has been an attorney for more than 25 years. He works for an international law firm in New York and was recently named a "Superlawyer" for the metro New York area by Superlawyer Magazine, a publication that uses surveys of lawyers to select the top 5% of lawyers in regions throughout the United States.
Grassroots for Greenburgh is a web-based vehicle for the dissemination of information and news about Greenburgh and its environs. The text of the Bernstein verified complaint can be found on the Press Releases page at: http://grassrootsforgreenburgh.home.att.net