Eastchester REVIEW THE
July 14, 2017 | Vol. 5, Number 28 | www.eastchesterreview.com
Backlash reroutes Hudson anchorage proposal By JAMES PERO Staff Writer
REACHING OUT
Project REACH held its first annual REACH at the Beach event to help raise awareness for drug addiction and raise money for organizations helping those with substance abuse problems. For story, see page 6. Photo courtesy DanaSimonePhotography.com
County to approve $500K for police body cameras By JAMES PERO Staff Writer An initiative to outfit the Westchester County Police Department with hundreds of body cameras will likely be approved at an approaching Board of Legislators meeting. According to county Legislator Benjamin Boykin, a White Plains Democrat and chairman of the Public Safety Committee, a $500,000 bond, which was discussed at a committee meeting for the first time on July 10, will likely be approved with unanimous support from lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle. The cameras, which would be numerous enough to equip each of the county Police Department’s patrol officers—in addition to about 20 stocked as backups—are being purchased in an
effort to ensure safety for police and non-police alike, according to Boykin. “If something happens, it’s usually my word against the police’s word,” Boykin said. “But now you have a visual and audio record of what takes place.” The cameras, Boykin said, can be turned on or off at the officer’s discretion and footage from them can be uploaded to a database held at police headquarters. Discussions and adoption of police body cameras have risen dramatically throughout the past several years as the public eye zeroes in on high-profile instances of alleged excessive force, some of which—like the cases of Eric Garner, Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown—have been fatal. “They’re another tool that will protect our officers and also protect the public,” Boykin said.
In addition to public emphasis, federal subsidies have also bolstered the adoption of police body cameras. In 2015, President Barack Obama, a Democrat, devoted $20 million to a body camera pilot program and $75 million altogether to purchase 50,000 police body cameras for police across the country. Since their adoption by many departments across the country, however, debate has sprung up over the ability of officers to turn their cameras on or off. While continuously recording cameras have been scrutinized by advocacy groups like the American Civil Liberties Union for potentially jeopardizing the anonymity of police sources and informants, in addition to victims of sexual assault or other sensitive crimes, discretionary camer-
as have been criticized for giving officers too much control over what is or isn’t recorded. Boykin said, while the acquisition of body cameras has enjoyed bipartisan support in Westchester, the tools have also further stoked an ongoing debate of filling nearly a dozen police vacancies. “Some officers are wondering why we can spend $500,000 on cameras but can’t fill the vacancies,” he said. According to Joe Sgammato, spokesman for the Board of Legislators’ Democratic Caucus, despite 10 county police positions having been included in the 2017 county budget, the spots have yet to be filled and that shortfall is expected to grow to 11 with an upcoming retirement. CONTACT: james@hometwn.com
After an outpouring of negative commentary and bipartisan backlash from elected officials, a proposal from the U.S. Coast Guard to add dozens of anchorages across the Hudson River has been suspended, but may not be fully dead in the water. According to a statement made by the Coast Guard following their decision to halt the process on June 28, the suspension of a rule-making process to install 43 additional anchorages across the Hudson will coincide with a study of the waterway’s safety. Concern over the safe passage of barges traversing the Hudson has been frequently cited as the agency’s impetus for floating the anchorage proposal in the first place. The study, called a Ports and Waterways Safety Assessment, PAWSA, will assess “safety hazards, estimate risk levels, evaluate potential mitigation measures, and set the stage for implementation of selected measures to reduce risk,” according to the Coast Guard. In addition to political opposition, including Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino, a Republican, who described the Coast Guard plan as a “parking lot” for large oil barges, public comments against the anchorage proposal, which totaled more than 10,000 before the comment period closed, were overwhelmingly negative. In December last year, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Democrat, also called for more scrutiny of the Coast Guard’s proposal. The plan aims to add anchorages spanning miles along the Hudson from Kingston to Yon-
kers, which was set to see the largest expansion; 16 in total and covering more than 700 acres. According to John Lipscomb, vice president of Hudson Riverkeeper, an environmental advocacy group devoted to protecting the Hudson waterways, despite the suspension of the action, the anchorages aren’t necessarily nixed for good. “This decision by the Coast Guard does not necessarily mean that the anchorages will not one day be authorized,” Lipscomb said. “We at Riverkeeper will not relax our vigilance in the least in the coming year and we hope that the public, the environmental community and the elected officials representing the [Hudson] valley and the [Hudson] river will do the same.” One of the county Board of Legislators’ most adamant opponents of the proposal, Legislator Mary Jane Shimsky, a Hastings-on-Hudson Democrat, said a revival of the proposal would not come as a surprise. “In office, when someone suspends their campaign, that usually means ‘I’m dropping out but I don’t want to say that,’” Shimsky said. “In the jargon of the federal government, I’m not sure it means the same thing.” Both county lawmakers and environmental watchdogs have viewed the proposal with skepticism, warning that the basis for installing more commercial anchorages is being put forth in order to increase the number of oil barges passing through the corridor. Riverkeeper fears that with the addition of new anchorage sites, the waterway could become a transit line for barges shipping oil extracted from North Dakota, where the controversial process BARGE continued on page 9
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