July 19, 2012
By James Skoufis
I, and many Orange County residents, have deep concerns regarding the recent annexation proposal by the Village of Kiryas Joel and a local developer. Specifically, KJ is seeking to annex land from the town and village of Woodbury. As a member of the Woodbury Town Board and candidate for State Assembly, I have many grave issues with this proposal.
I’ve always stood strongly in favor of municipal rights and believe that, like all people, all towns and villages are created equal. There should be no special treatment – period. This annexation proposal is a direct violation of that belief and, further, would place an avoidable and unjust financial burden on Woodbury’s already overtaxed families with the removal of taxable lands.
At the public hearing, the developer’s attorney suggested that the annexation should be allowed because the new boundaries would better conform with the natural ridges along the Monroe-Woodbury border. If the attorney were representing a topographer or a geographer, perhaps I would buy his argument. Instead, however, he represents a developer. It is highly unlikely that a Kiryas Joel developer has any interest in the natural ridges along our town borders. To the contrary, it is very likely he has a keen interest in zoning – the Monroe area where the lands are proposed to be annexed into, unsurprisingly, have a far higher density allowance than what is presently designated in Woodbury.
The current petitions brought by Kiryas Joel and this developer are to annex KJ’s water tanks and 13 acres of zoned residential land into the Town of Monroe. Though this may be seen as a relatively small amount of land, it is not the first attempt to expand and it certainly won’t be the last. In fact, this effort to annex is likely serving as the opening salvo in the fight for land at Ace Farms and other areas. Ace Farms, located in the Town of Woodbury, is a substantial tract of land and losing it would forever change our area’s landscape as we know it. At what point is enough, enough?
Our community has long given its residents the comfort of raising our families with open space. The inevitable expansive development brought by annexing land would fly in the face of why so many people live in or have moved to the beautiful Hudson Valley.
Our obligation as elected officials is to protect and preserve our area’s quality of life and the financial investments our residents have made. Anything short of that fails them.
At what cost to our community will Kiryas Joel be satisfied?
James Skoufis is a Woodbury Town Councilman and candidate for the 99th Assembly District
Comments:
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Well done Jim. In my opinion, it's all about them. The thought of 'our community' and 'Kiryas Joel' are seemingly two mutually exclusive interests. In addition, the acquisition of Ace Farms in itself was dirty.
posted by Robert Langston on 07/20/12 at 3:08 PM
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When you're talking about religious fanatics, enough is never enough.
Fight the good fight Woodbury. The Borg collective is at your door.
posted by Ted Warren on 07/25/12 at 11:21 AM
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Lets call it what it is, Kiryas Joel is using all kinds of tatics to take over the surrounding communities! the Kiryas Joel community as many other Hasidic communities are over populated and are in desperate need of property and land. Therefore they are slowly buying up properties and land in the surrounding communities. This is the first step in their take over. Once they have established themselves within the communities they take over the government and schools, etc. until they force non- Hadsidics out. Just read the Rockland Journal Newspaper to see what is happening to the East Ramapo community and School District. The mainly all Hadsidic School Board is closing and selling off the District's schools and in turn selling them to their own Yeshivas. In addition, many teachers and staff have been layed off and programs such as sports and band have been shut down. We need to wake up! This is already occurring in our community. Hadsidics have already started to purchase properties and land within our community. We must not let what is happening to the East Ramapo community, to our community.
posted by Madeline Johnston on 07/26/12 at 9:09 PM
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