Leo's Nomination Acceptance Remarks to kick off the campaign for Mayor

By Leo A.W. Wiegman

More at Croton Dems website. Leo made the remarks below on January 21, 2009.

As a country, we face uncertain times ahead. Our future as a small village is no different. The new, emerging economy will be different from the one that we have known and that created the challenges we face. But, I believe these challenges are a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to forge a better, more sustainable community.

As we heard from Sandy Galef and Tom Suozzi a few nights ago, we cannot expect the State to toss us a lifeline and we cannot remain passive until the national scene changes. Yet, that is essentially the plan of the board's Republican majority.

We are residents of the most heavily taxed region in the nation. The rising costs of Village services will continue to fall disproportionately on the homeowner.

We will drive away the young couples shopping for first homes and drive out the seniors who have long been the backbone of the village+unless we begin to shift that tax burden away from households. There are many potential opportunities to do something about this issue. But make no mistake about it. The current board majority is not interested in true innovation, and not capable of true cooperation and collaboration.

Did you know that--since 2004--the value of the property tax rolls in the town of Cortlandt--including Croton and Buchanan--has grown modestly, but definitely, by about 1%. That seems like good news. Now here is the kicker. In that same period, the value of Croton's tax rolls has shrunk by almost 3 %. If Croton had simply remained flat under the current mayor, the town's rolls would have increased half again as much as they did without Croton's dragging the town values down.

In other words, even as the town around is heading in the right direction on alleviating the tax burden for the homeowner, Croton has gone in the opposite and wrong direction.

Since the current mayor first took office, the village budgets have ballooned by 30%. The tax rates have climbed 25%+and would have been even higher, were it not for some internal budget shell games.

We are getting nickled-and-dimed to death on all kinds of other fees to make up for the property value decline. The value of tax rolls in Croton peaked in 2004 and has not recovered since. We have not done nearly enough to address that underlying reality.

That paralysis is why the village is on a collision course with the new economy--regardless of the rose-colored projections we will hear from our mayor during this campaign.

I do believe the village has done a pretty job of managing the small slice of costs over which it had some control. But the village has done a completely inadequate job of managing the revenue side of the ledger.

Two out of every three dollars used to run the village come from property taxes. And the vast majority of that comes from homeowners. You solve big problems by looking for solutions that are just as big or bigger.

For the past four years, the mayor has obsessed over that last dollar and not the first two dollars of income. The village raised water rates 33%, invented a new sewer rent under false pretenses, jacked up parking rates 20%+none of which was earmarked for parking lot improvements+and bumped up recreation fees 20%.

But service fee increases only get you so far. Sooner or later, our customers will decide to park elsewhere+or just recreation programs altogether.

We cannot nickel-and-dime our way of this. We can and must create great opportunities for Croton by helping our business community revitalize itself. The best way to do that is to push back some of the barriers that keep property value from rising¬especially if we can do that in ways the benefit all.

The triple win I am talking about is (1) relieving the home owner's tax burden, (2) revitalizing the business districts, and (3) rehabilitating the Village's reputation and fiscal footing.

My goal for our village is simple. Croton will emerge in the new economy, not only unscathed, but as a leader in creative thinking and problem solving in Westchester. It is a reputation we used to have and have squandered of late. The communities best situated to take advantage of the current opportunities are those that act early, that innovate as many ways as they can, that make full use of their intellectual capital, and that build bridges to other stakeholders.

For example, I will wager that we have several hundred small business owners in Croton--many more than you might think. My wife, Julie, and I run two of those small businesses from our home. Yet, the village has not even scratched the surface in exploring ways to help support and incubate small business here in Croton.

Imagine if we had small business spaces within walking distance in buildings that are so well designed and constructed that they don't even need an oil furnace with a utility bill half what you pay now.

Community leaders elsewhere, who have created such revitalizations, tell me we need just two things to get started: We need a willingness to experiment and innovate. And we need a capacity to cooperate and collaborate--with dot-gov, dot-org, and dot-com partners.

I do not claim to have all the answers. But I do intend to restore dignity to the office of the Mayor. I do intend to restore the capacity to generate practical ideas. I do intend to restore the compassion that brings respect for the opinions of all our citizens and volunteers. I will return civil discourse to the Board meetings and transparency to our local governance.

I was at a meeting in Washington last month at which Senator Whitehorse of Rhode Island summed up the theme pretty well, "Governance matters. Relying on the facts to make policy decisions is where we are headed." That is not yet true in Croton today, but can be after March 18th.

We are at a crossroads with a fundamental choice: Croton-on-Hudson can continue to bob on the tides, crippling our homeowners with additional taxes. Or we can all begin to paddle together to innovate and cooperate. We can aggressively promote economic development, increase tax revenue from new and expanded business spaces, and restore our underlying values. I believe the choice is clear: Croton can be a thriving and attractive village with a strong commercial sector, clean water, walkable streets, and wonderful parks. We can return to being the well-respected "little village that could." To paraphrase a fellow writer, Bill McKibben, "Change your leaders, not just your light bulbs."

This is a great time to be a Democrat. It seems like just yesterday that we celebrated the election of Rick Olver and Ann Gallelli. Ossining Supervisor Catherine Borgia, and Congressman John Hall were both recently sworn into their offices. Barack Obama is now our President. By April the economic stimulus package will begin to hit the nation's economy in a thousand different ways.

We cannot simply assume that the dice will roll our way on Tuesday, March 18, 2009. We face three incumbents and incumbents win 95% of the time. The last national election has taught us that if we work hard, speak from our hearts and listen to the people, we will prevail.

The opportunities that lie before us have enormous potential. If you agree that our community can grow and thrive, while improving our tax base and quality of life, I ask that you join me, Demetra, and Ian in making the change that we so badly need. Thank you for your support.
--Leo Wiegman, 1/21/2009, Croton Democratic Nominating Caucus.