Thursday, May 1, 2025

When Lilliputians Attack.

A lot happened at Piermont Village Hall during this past month of April, 2025.

The bottom line is that the collective will of Piermont residents may have defeated the gruesome Frank DeCarlo 447-77 Piermont Avenue over-development, a few nights ago at the Tuesday, April 29, 2025 Piermont Board of Trustees meeting. At this meeting, the Piermont Comprehensive Plan was otherwise conditionally approved, albeit still in draft and uncorrected form at the time:
These actions were presaged in the antecedent Tuesday, April 15, 2025 Board of Trustees Meeting:

I say “may have defeated” above, because continued zoning-related skirmishes may occur pursuant to SEQR (see below) in connection with the same loathsome 447-77 Piermont Avenue project (herein, "447") in the coming months. The fight is not over. In fact, the fight will not be over until failed embattled Piermont Mayor Bruce Edward Tucker finally departs his mayoral office in rightful well-deserved disgrace at the end of this 2025 calendar year.
 
Jeff Gordon, Esq. is an attorney running for Piermont Trustee. Gordon attended the Tuesday, April 29, 2025 Board of Trustees Meeting and informally described on Facebook what happened:
 
“[T]he ‘[T]oxic [D.6] [L]anguage’ that would have opened the door to future over-development of the downtown was stricken [from the Piermont Comprehensive Plan] by the strategic 11th-hour resolution by [Piermont Board of Trustees] member and [Piermont’s] next mayor Nate Mitchell. When [the Comprehensive Plan] was passed unanimously by the [B]oard[,] the developer of the triangular lot [at 447-77 Piermont Avenue] got up in a huff obviously extremely angered seeing his hopes dashed with a single vote. But the fight isn’t over. Although [the Comprehensive Plan] was passed with override against certain [Rockland] County recommendations[,] there’s a lot of work yet to do[,] not the least of which is dealing with [Piermont’s] downtown.” [Emphasis added].
 
It is believed that the “extremely angered” developer who “got up in a huff” and departed the Tuesday, April 29, 2025 meeting would have been Frank DeCarlo, as opposed to his colleague Craig Weis, Esq. The theatrical exit wasn’t captured on video to my knowledge, although it should have been.
 
But just what was this “Toxic D.6 Language” that Jeff Gordon spoke of, above? Well, you can find that text in so-called “Volume 1” of the Piermont Comprehensive Plan documents. That "D.6" text was Bruce Tucker's lame attempt to attack the "Business B" characterization of Piermont's pre-existing downtown zoning. "Business B" pre-dated the vile "CBM Zone" which Tucker and his cohorts tried to cram-down last year in 2024 when trying to sneak-through DeCarlo's destructive 447 eyesore.

In other words, D.6 was Bruce Tucker’s 2025 Trojan Horse. D.6 was the backdoor plan of Tucker and the Piermont DisTrustees. If the D.6 text had been approved within the Piermont Comprehensive Plan this past Tuesday night, DeCarlo’s heinous 447 over-development could have been in turn approved on greased skids thereafter, by majority vote of greasy Mayor Tucker and yes-men DisTrustees Wright and Blomquist alone. The “Toxic D.6 Language” thankfully purged from the Piermont Comprehensive Plan. is re-printed here. Within it, you can read Tucker and crew's hapless attack on "Business B". They even added a sweet Piermont landscape photograph at the end to make it all look so sweet and nice, the miserable trolls:




So, what really happened on Tuesday night? If you were there, you witnessed the passing of the torch. The hand-over of the baton. Nate Mitchell was to Bruce Tucker, as Boris Yeltsin was to Mikhail Gorbachev's birthmark.


And if you think that the whole pathetic little one-act Tuesday night Piermont drama wasn’t pre-scripted, you would be fooling yourself. For that matter, Bruce Tucker couldn’t distinguish the Open Meetings Law from a Dram Shop Act.
 
When you screen the video of this past Tuesday night's meeting, it is clear that Trustee Nate Mitchell had leverage:
Why? Because the five-person Piermont Village Board needed a “super-majority” to override the written recommendations to the Piermont Comprehensive Plan recently made by the Rockland County Department of Planning (“County Planning”). That means that the usual "Tucker+Wright+Blomquist" numerical sycophant majority alone, wouldn't suffice. That three-man Axis of Evil would need one more vote, from either Trustee Christine McAndrews, or from Trustee Nate Mitchell.
 
Now, it is reasonably clear that Christine McAndrews is Nate Mitchell’s friend. We can infer that McAndrews likely intended to vote along with Mitchell this past Tuesday evening. Why would she want to go down with the Tucker ship?
 
Moreover, Trustee Nate Mitchell had no intention of voting to approve the Piermont Comprehensive Plan, unless the “Toxic D.6 Language” was first stipulated by Piermont Mayor Bruce Tucker and his Board hack cronies to be deleted from the Piermont Comprehensive Plan. Therefore, unless Piermont Mayor Bruce Tucker himself stipulated on record in his own words to remove the “Toxic D.6 Language”, Nate Mitchell and Christine McAndrews were going to vote “No” on the Comprehensive Plan. You can watch the whole Oscar-worthy performance unfold here. It was vaudeville rehearsed just for you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPRpiePQSEA
 
Bruce Tucker blinked. He was helpless. A garmento deer in headlights. After all, Bruce Tucker already announced to News12 that he is not running for mayoral re-election in Piermont:

Moreover, Trustee Nate Mitchell now appears to be running unopposed for Piermont Mayor. Yay. The torch has been passed. Long live the new king. Meet the new boss. And with any luck, this past Tuesday, April 29, 2025 marked the death of the ill-conceived, sleazy 447-77 Piermont Avenue over-development that Mayor Bruce Tucker had “championed” for Frank DeCarlo and his Jersey "associates" for so long. 

Now, Bruce Tucker is a confirmed loser.


In related news:
 
1. Overriding The County. The Piermont Board of Trustees made the mistake of overriding Rockland County recommendations when approving the Piermont Comprehensive Plan this past Tuesday night. Max Stach is from the Village of Piermont’s de facto publicist "planning" firm of Nelson, Pope & Voorhis, LLC. 

You remember Nelson, Pope & Voorhis, right? They are the same jackalopes that inserted the “No NIMBY” clause into their Town of Southold contract:
https://suffolktimes.timesreview.com/2022/09/consulting-agency-frequently-hired-by-southold-town-faces-criticism-following-nimby-clause-in-recent-southampton-town-contract/
Max Stach actually had the audacity to suggest this month in open session at Piermont Village Hall, that he personally needed to educate and “train” the professionals at County Planning as to how a Comprehensive Plan should be written. This will likely not sit well with Rockland County generally, particularly once County Planning receives the "Notice of Final Action" from the Piermont Village Board of Trustees. 

Expect blow-back.

2. “Neg Dec”. The Piermont Board of Trustees made the compounded further mistake of issuing a “Negative Declaration” or “Neg Dec” on Tuesday night. They thereby certified en masse that the Piermont Comprehensive Plan as approved has no significant SEQR adverse environmental impacts - and that includes both Mitchell and McAndrews. “SEQR” is an acronym for “New York State Environmental Quality Review”. Its counterpart “SEQRA” is an acronym for the “New York State Environmental Quality Review Act".
 
In any event, this “Neg Dec” certification by the five-person Piermont Village Board - as supported by Max Stach and the Nelson, Pope & Voorhis anti-NIMBYs - is preposterous.
 
As Stach himself noted in this month’s Village Hall meetings, the Village of Piermont is the oldest village in Rockland County dating back to the mid-1800s, yet did not effect zoning controls until 1977. Moreover, Piermont has never had a Comprehensive Plan previously. The cumulative impact of all the manifold recommendations in Piermont's first-ever Comprehensive Plan approved by the Village Board on Tuesday night - even as partially-sanitized more recently for their admittedly-defensive purposes - will have profound impacts on the Piermont environment. By definition. Some number of those impacts will be adverse. By definition. It would be impossible for any reasonable mind to read the Piermont Comprehensive Plan as approved on Tuesday night, and not see that. Thankfully, white-knight litigators and New York State Supreme Court justices are reasonable minds.
 
3. Avoiding The EIS. The Piermont Comprehensive Plan was a dilettantish endeavor rushed by amateurs at the behest of failed Piermont Mayor Bruce Tucker. Read it. It is the work of rookies. Tucker was trying to rush the Piermont Comprehensive Plan through before anyone woke up to his 447-motivated Trojan Horseplay. Tucker and his Piermont Village Hall toadies sought to manipulate the result through use of the “Toxic D.6 Language”. They sought to bootstrap-in the hideous Frank DeCarlo 447-77 Piermont Avenue over-development, by doing so. Tucker was also rushing to keep his grubby hands on Comp Plan grant money from one or more government agencies. (See below).
 
But the real reason why the Piermont Board of Trustees rushed a “Neg Dec” and falsely certified to no significant adverse SEQR environmental impacts on Tuesday night, was Bruce Tucker’s and the Board’s desperate attempt to circumvent the need for an Environmental Impact Statement or “EIS”. Without a "Neg Dec", the Village of Piermont would be force to undertake an EIS. An EIS is exactly what Tucker and Piermont should be doing - right now.

Tucker knew that an EIS would take, even by his own anti-NIMBY firm’s estimation, six to eight months to complete. Yet in eight months from now, Tucker will have exited Piermont Village Hall and presumably escaped to Bay Head – back to New Jersey where he belongs. Until Tuesday night and Trustee Nate Mitchell’s squeeze-play, Bruce Tucker was desperate to try to ram-through the foul 447 over-development through the guise of the Comprehensive Plan while he could still claim to be Mayor of Piermont. Tucker is a vindictive little man who wanted the scalp.
 
Yet that Bruce Tucker “strategy” failed last Tuesday night. Just like Tucker’s counterfeit Rainbow Linens sheets failed. Just like Tucker’s second mortgage business failed. Just like Tucker’s “Smokehouse” failed. Just like Tucker’s “Lava Lounge” failed. Just like Piermont’s finances failed during Tucker's bilious mayoral reign. Just like the Piermont Pier tip failed late last year. Just like Tucker's Piermont mayoral regime failed in toto.
 
4. The Clay Pigeon. Because the Piermont Comprehensive Plan was the work of rank amateurs, because it was rushed in desperation, and because the Piermont Village Board falsely certified on Tuesday night that there were no adverse SEQR environmental impacts resulting therefrom, this Piermont Comprehensive Plan is absolutely overripe for an Article 78 take-down in the New York State Supreme Court in New City. With any luck, the filing of one or more of those Article 78 actions will yield an assignment to Honorable Justice Hal Greenwald again – particularly because Judge Greenwald is already wise to Bruce Tucker’s shenanigans, ever since Bruce Tucker and his minions flamed-out in that same tribunal before Judge Greenwald last October:
https://unhandpiermont.blogspot.com/2024/10/the-courts-decision-in-young-v-village.html
 
In fact, this Piermont Comprehensive Plan is so vulnerable to Article 78 elimination right now, that if it were a clay pigeon, you wouldn’t even need to aim when shooting it out of the sky.

5. Fair Warning. Here’s another interesting development. Although I have yet to obtain a copy of it, some mention was made during this month’s meetings at Piermont Village Hall about some circa “April 8” letter apparently issued by the 447 developer’s counsel Zarin & Steinmetz. Something about seeking additional time to appeal – perhaps to appeal Justice Greenwald’s October 2024 decision holding the Piermont “CBM Zone” to be jurisdictionally invalid and therefore in effect non-existent:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPRpiePQSEA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYpJIEuOb5w
If this account is accurate, then that would suggest that developer Frank DeCarlo knew that the Piermont Village Hall tide was turning against him well in advance of the Tuesday, April 29, 2025 excision of the “Toxic D.6 Language”.
 
6. Give It Back. Finally, this teaser. 

Max Stach, from Village of Piermont’s anti-NIMBY firm of Nelson, Pope & Voorhis, stumbled over a number of his words during April’s meetings at Piermont Village Hall:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HPRpiePQSEA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYpJIEuOb5w
There was one particular Max Stach gaffe, though, that really would have made Mayor Bruce Tucker blanche - that is, if Tucker wasn’t already so cold-blooded reptilian.
 
When pressed on the point, Stach admitted that not only did the Village of Piermont need to rush the Comprehensive Plan through to obtain grant money - but that the Village of Piermont was already in some sort of jeopardy and therefore needed to rush the Comprehensive Plan through in order to not be forced to give grant money back.
 
Wait a minute. What?
 
Could that mean that the Village of Piermont already made off (Madoff) with grant money, paid over to the Village by one or more other government entities - perhaps predicated upon a Village representation that the Comprehensive Plan had already been approved, or was already in effect?
 
Think about it.
 
Why would a New York State or federal agency confer Comp Plan grant money to a village, but only if subject to a naked promise of a full or partial after-occurring "rebate" if the Comp Plan was later unapproved? A condition subsequent? That makes no sense. Something stinks like Hell.
 
Sylvia Welch of Piermont writes the grant paperwork for the Village of Piermont as the "Grant Writer". She serves on the Piermont Comprehensive Plan Committee as a "Member" thereof. She even has a third title, as "Commissioner For Funding And Development". She's famous:

Maybe Sylvia Welch wants to post to Facebook and the Internet, each of the Piermont grant applications that she may have worked on since Bruce Tucker took Piermont mayoral office in 2018. You know. In the interests of "transparency". Better yet, Sylvia can fax them all to me at (212) 410-2380, and I will upload them to this Blog. My fax machine is on, it has paper in it, and it is ready to receive.

In any event, once all the Piermont grant paperwork has been coughed-up, we can then determine the extent to which lame-duck outgoing Piermont Mayor Bruce Tucker and perhaps other Piermont DisTrustees, Village Hall minions, and non-profits may have approved any solicitation of grant funds from New York State and federal government agencies. Ultimately, it's Bruce Tucker who is accountable for any misstatements or misrepresentations - and that's the kind of thing that makes the New York State Comptroller, the New York State Attorney General, the Rockland County DA, and the FBI go absolutely nuts.

It is therefore really too bad that we can’t FOIL and FOIA the obvious state and federal agencies to seek out what Village of Piermont representatives may have possibly misrepresented to those agencies in writing when Piermont grant monies were solicited.
 
Oh.
 
Wait a minute.
 
We CAN.
at
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