Politics
Farewell To Rye Brook Mayor Paul Rosenberg Continued from page 1 didn’t want to move to Rye Brook because it was too difficult to renovate, so I wanted to change that and make it easier for the residents. So we immediately put together a task force to simplify the zoning code. There are things that go on in government behind the scenes that most people will never know about unless they go wrong or unless things break. One of those things was the construction of our new Public Works/Highway garage facility. It’s something that 99.9% of all the residents will never see, but if we didn’t have it roads would not get plowed, the parks wouldn’t be mowed, all the parks and the ball fields would not be groomed, all the things that make Rye Brook a nice place to live would never happen. The roof in the old facility was leaking all over our people and we rebuilt the building and that was a 17 million dollar project.” What do you want your legacy as Rye Brook Trustee/Mayor to be? “In addition to streamlining the zoning code, I would say the excellent relationships with our unions. We have three unions: fire, police and the teamsters that cover the highways, the public works guys. We have had tremendous, wonderful relationships with our unions. I want that to be a model for other boards in the future because when you’re honest with your staff, even when there’s news they may not like, but if you are just straight with them and treat them fairly, they will respect you and you may have to sometimes agree to disagree, but hopefully not very frequently.”
What surprised you the most about the job? “As a trustee we receive what we call our board packages from the village administrator every Friday and you read through any information that’s important, but when you are Mayor the volume of information that you have to retain is much larger than being a trustee. You have to know everything about everything, you have to be very familiar with all of the village staff, you have to be the one to disseminate information to the rest of the board and you have to be the one to share the good news as well as the bad news with the community, because you are the face of the community, and as a trustee yes you’re a leader in the community, but being the face of the community is a little bit different.” What is the Village’s relationship with the Blind Brook School District? “As you know, the school district has its own budget, they collect their own taxes, and there’s an unwritten kind of agreement that we stay out of their business and they stay out of ours. I think it works pretty well because we on the village board are not educators and I wouldn’t ever pretend to know how to educate people. Likewise school board members, they don’t really get involved in village board issues, when they have questions or comments they reach out, and when we have questions we will pick up the phone and ask them. Or village administrator has had a great working relationship with all of the superintendent’s over the last several years, and whether it’s doing some emergency plow-
Photo Courtesy of Paul Rosenberg
ing or something for them that they need, or giving them access to one of our fields that hadn’t been planned for, we always try to work closely with them, as their students are our residents.” Do you have future plans for public service? “I don’t think so, Rye Brook’s special in the sense that we are nonpartisan in terms of our village government, the members of the board can be Republicans, they can be Democrats, it does not come into play at the village government level, and it’s nice for the community. In other communities if the Republican council person or a village board member comes up with an idea, but if they don’t have the majority, then the Democrats will squash it, it’ll go nowhere just because it’s seen as a Republican vs. Democrat issue/idea. Working with my fellow trustees is a pleasure. When I look at any other type of elected office that I might want to seek, it’s all partisan politics and I just really don’t want to be involved in that type of party politics, it’s a hindrance to getting things done. For example, once when I was campaigning and I was
going door-to-door when I rang someone’s doorbell, I said ‘Hi, I’m Paul Rosenberg,’ and the person said ‘Very nice to meet you, what’s your stance on abortion?’ and I said ‘We’re nonpartisan’. My stance on abortion or any other matter of national interest really doesn’t apply to Rye Brook. We don’t have to worry about the other board members stance on anything unless it’s directly related to the Village of Rye Brook, and those national conversations and disagreements that people have don’t make their way into the way we run the village, and it keeps us focused on doing what’s best for the village, not doing what our party would like us to do.” Advice for future public servants? “Raise your hand and get involved in as much as you can when you live in a small village like this. I’ve seen over the last 18 years that I’ve been on the board that it’s become much harder to get people to donate their time doing public service, remember that it’s volunteer work, we’re not paid for this, we all have other jobs, but, it gives you a sense of fulfillment that you’ll never get anywhere else.” 6
