Town of Fishkill $50,000 in Arrears
By Michael Boyajian
My recollection of growing up on Long Island and living in Brooklyn and the Catskills was that when you moved into a new place you went around and met your neighbors or they called on you. In the summer everyone got together and had a block party.
Not so when I moved to Fishkill. I went up to shake my neighbors hand and he, knowing I was from the city but not knowing I had roots in the Catskills and Long Island, glared at me and snarled “why’d you move up here.”
So it’s an insular place where elected officials are put into office solely because they are lifelong residents. This mentality raised its ugly head at the annual 4th of July reading of the Declaration of Independence on the steps of village hall. A local school official introduced the student who was to read the Declaration by saying “he is a lifelong resident.”
And now Fishkill sources confirm that it’s has been discovered that the Town is $50,000 in the arrears to the City of Beacon over a water dispute. There is no accounting for these arrears but after a long dispute with Beacon the arrears have agreed to be paid. For a while it had a lot of people wondering if local courts and law enforcement were just going to wink and slap the town on the back or carry out justice as is their sworn duty under the law.
But this was all avoided because of mounting pressure and the desire to avoid public scrutiny at a time when the Town is suffering from a severe financial crisis having its ratings lowered by Moody’s, undergoing an investigation by the state comptroller and needing to issue $6.5 million in bonds to meet its operating expenses. It is also in a battle with preservationists who are fighting developers over New York’s Valley Forge, the Fishkill Supply Depot, and environmentalists who are trying to save New York’s last pure aquifer from development three feet above the water table leaving the water supply prone to run off from radiator fluid, motor oil, insecticide and fertilizer.
End