Eastchester REVIEW THE
August 12, 2016 | Vol. 4, Number 33 | www.eastchesterreview.com
Area residents rally to protest DEC cleanup plan By COREY STOCKTON Staff Writer
Westchester’s Best
Lake Isle’s Claire Weinstein swims the 50-meter butterfly event on Aug. 4 at the Westchester County Swim Championships. Weinstein was the top point-scorer in the 10U girls’ division and helped Eastchester’s Lake Isle win the county championship. For story, see page 15. Photo/Mike Smith
DiNapoli: Mid-Hudson region economy shows strength By SIBYLLA CHIPAZIWA Editorial Assistant The mid-Hudson region is showing economic strength following the recession, but its high cost of living and doing business could obstruct future growth, according to an economic profile released by the Office of the New York State Comptroller. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said in a released statement that while the region’s
closeness to New York City has helped the economy, it “needs to carefully manage its ongoing need for services and infrastructure improvements given the already high cost of living.” The mid-Hudson region is made up of the counties of Westchester, Rockland, Putnam, Orange, Dutchess, Ulster and Sullivan, with a total of 198 municipalities. The biggest highlight of the report is the annual regionwide
unemployment rate dropping from 7.6 percent in 2012 to 4.7 percent in 2015. Further, according to the state Department of Labor, the unemployment rate for June 2016 has improved with the mid-Hudson region’s rate averaging out to just below 4 percent, which is lower than the state’s 4.7 percent for the same month. Major employers in the region include health care and social assistance, government, hospitality
and retail. Attracting other industries, such as biotechnology, entertainment and tourism, is also being encouraged as a way to take advantage of the region’s infrastructure and workforce. One way Westchester is attracting the biotechnology industry is with the construction of a $1.2 billion biotech and medical office complex on undeveloped land in Valhalla, ECONOMY continued on page 11
Residents of Tuckahoe and its neighboring communities gathered outside Village Hall on Monday, Aug. 8 to protest the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation’s approval of a cleanup plan of the former quarry and subsequent dumping ground on Marbledale Road. The site in question is the location where a developer plans on building a hotel. Dozens marched up and down Main Street carrying pickets and chanting “We care about our air” and “We want to know what’s down below,” before crowding into the village courtroom for the 8 p.m. Tuckahoe Board of Trustees meeting. More than 100 attendees filled the courtroom for the meeting, which lasted nearly four hours. The meeting was also attended by representatives from the Department of Environmental Conservation, DEC, the state Department of Health, and Bill Canavan, a hydrogeologist from HydroEnvironmental Solutions, the firm hired by the developer to analyze the site. Mayor Steve Ecklond, a Republican, said he invited the state representatives to speak after hearing plans of the rally. The protest was organized in response to a Decision Document released by the DEC in late July, which detailed the approved method by which the site’s owner must remedy the
area before building a Marriott hotel. In June 2014, Bilwin Development Affiliates LLC proposed a five-story, 163-room hotel with a 6,400-square-foot restaurant on the first floor and 208 parking spots. The site, labeled a State Brownfield Cleanup site, is a contaminated parcel of land that the developer will clean along DEC guidelines before he can build the hotel. The 3.5-acre Brownfield site, where the hotel is being proposed, is part of a larger 6.6-acre site which was once a marble quarry that became an industrial landfill in the 1960s and 1970s. Alongside the Decision Document, the DEC addressed 32 residents’ concerns posed to the department via letter and email. A letter accompanying the Decision Document explained that the north and south end of the landfill—which had not been included in the Brownfield cleanup—have been designated as a “P” site, a site that would require the DEC to pursue parties responsible for contamination to fund site cleaning and then use state money to cover the remainder of the remediation. The letter also introduced additions made to the original Remedial Action Work Plan, which was proposed in April. According to the letter, the DEC has added means to prevent the offsite migration of soil vapors and to monitor the flow and contamination of groundwater. PROTEST continued on page 9