I just attended 3 days of Training and Discussion Sessions sponsored by The Association of Towns at The NY Hilton in NYC. It was most informative and thought provoking. There were over 100 possible sessions during Monday and Tuesday that one could attend.

The most interesting, for me anyway, was the one given by The Department of State and Ben Syden of the LaBerge Group along with Steve Neuhaus, Supervisor, Town of Chester (Orange County.) It dealt with Shared Services: Does it make Cents or Sense? My big "takeaway" was that you need to involve all the stakeholders very early in the process for it to have a chance of being accepted and successful. I'll be discussing the matter further with my fellow Council people and hopefully have more to report. It seems to me, the more we can learn from the experiences of others, the better and more effective a job we can do for our constituents. We all want, and need, to do more with less and this area, I think, potentially has fruits to bear.

I also attended sessions on how The Town might lower Health Care Costs and how we might utilize Worker Safety Training Programs to help lower Workmen's Compensation expenses.

There was an excellent, lively presentation given by Robert Freeman, the executive Director of The Committee on Open Government which discussed the requirements and ramifications of The Freedom of Information and Open Meetings Law. Several topics were raised by the audience and opinions offered by Mr. Freeman.

A very informative presentation was made on The Proposed Tax Caps and their possible impacts on Local Governments. Proposed modifications to pending legislation in Albany were explained along with predictions of dire consequences, for Town Budgets, should there be no relief, or exemptions granted, from the mandates imposed on Towns by The State and Federal Governments.

Several hundred elected and appointed Town representatives were in attendance and those of us that had been selected by our Towns to be "official delegates," voted this morning (Wed. Feb. 23, 2011) on The Associations legislative agenda for 2011.

I felt it was time well spent. I would hope that next year some of my fellow Town Board members might be able to attend as well. I made some good contacts and obtained offers from some of the presenters to come to one of our "Work Sessions" or televised Town Board Meetings to share their thoughts with our Board or, in some cases, with our "public."

Ernie

Some of you may have heard, on CBS radio, yesterday the brief interview I gave regarding the discussion about having a "School Zone" on The Boston Post Road between The Hommocks Middle School and Mamaroneck High School. Here is a link, in case you missed it:

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/02/12/mamaroneck-officials-seeking-to-lower-school-zone-speed-limit/

I further discussed my position in a note I sent to The Loop. Look for it there. http://theloopny.com/

The gist of my comments were, while it would be nice if we could control the kids and keep them off cell phones while crossing and paying attention to traffic, we should do our part by getting vehicular traffic to slow down, all over, but particularly around the schools. A pedestrian hit by a car doing 40mph is in much worse shape than one hit at 20mph. Getting more kids walking or biking is a good thing. It reduces traffic, cuts pollution, relieves parking problems and is good exercise for the kids. Another issue is the Left Turns currently permitted onto The Post Road from the Gap, the Stop & Shop and the Trader Joe parking lots. They seem like accidents waiting to happen.

So far the DOT has said "No" to the request for a "School Zone" but our Assemblyman, George Latimer, is willing to take the matter further if it is supported by the three involved municipalities.

Don't give me credit, but a meeting, at least, has just been set up by Congresswomen Nita Lowey to be joined by The two Mayors, The Town Supervisor, the Village Trustees and The Town Council to discuss, among other things, The Metro North problems. We will also get into how the severe weather has impacted the Town and Villages.

This is not intended to be a public meeting but rather a briefing for elected officials. It will take place on Friday, March 4th. at the Town Center.

I also intend to discuss the issue with Assemblyman George Latimer and County Legislator Judy Myers at their Nautilus Diner "get together" this, Feb. 12th, Sat. afternoon, 2:00-3:30pm.

Ernie

Poor service on Metro-North is a subject affecting many of our local residents. While I'm not a daily commuter, having ridden the rails and subways for lots of years, I know how frustrating poor service can be. I have no "magic bullet" to make things instantly better, but I will certainly raise the flag and see what can be done.

I would appreciate hearing from riders as to what is bugging them the most, this way I can be as specific as possible in my endeavors to help the situation improve.

I can certainly reach out to my fellow local elected officials and my contacts at Metro-North to see what can be done now and what we have to look forward to in the near and distant future. This could be a perfect example of "The Squeaking Wheel" getting the most attention. I appreciate the subject having been brought to my attention.

Ernie

Well, we had our Town Board meeting last night and, during our work session, prior to the televised portion of the meeting, I tried to introduce a motion that would have permitted the public to address us at the beginning of our meetings rather than have to wait for the end in order to speak. I was proposing a 1-3 minute time limit, depending on the number of speakers that wanted to address us prior to the meeting, and no limit for those at the end of the meeting. No other Town Board member was willing to second my motion so that "ended" the discussion. The Town Supervisor indicated that if anyone requested speaking time before one of our meetings, she was inclined to grant them permission. She would grant them time after any already scheduled Public Hearings. To further enhance public communication with The Board she also suggested that The Council, as part of their Council Remarks, at the end of the meeting could report any e-mail correspondence they might have received since our last meeting. Of course, by that time it's usually close to 11:00pm and since we usually start our work sessions at 5:00 we are all pretty tired and anxious to conclude the meeting. Not likely to embark on any kind of in-depth discussion.

Regarding the Tree Law revision, we decided to take it back to the drawing board and see if we couldn't come up with something more workable and less restrictive, while still protecting valuable species. Hopefully we'll come up with something we can all live with. No one wants to adopt unenforceable "feel good" laws but I still feel strongly that we can and should do something to protect the character of our neighborhoods and help our tree population thrive. I think there is a consensus on The Board for us to do this.

Just back from a nice vacation week in Cabo, Mexico.

Ready for our Town Board meeting tonight (Wed. Feb. 2, 2011.) The Blog comments have given me lots of food for thought on many different subjects. I wish somehow we could differentiate between our "anonymous" commentators so I could figure out if it just one person with lots of ideas, thoughts and frustrations or a number of different people.

I intend to try, this evening, during our work session, to come up with an acceptable way for our residents to address The Board at the start of our meetings, rather than at the end. Perhaps we could have a 2-3 minute, per speaker, speaking limit for "before the meeting" comments and no limit for "at the end of the meeting comments." I intend to suggest we do this on a "trial" basis, say for 6 months, and see how it works out. If no body shows up, we will not have spent any time. If too many show up to speak, maybe we will need to cut down on the alloted time for each speaker.

Tonight's the night of our Tree Law discussion. The Town Board has been talking about it during our work sessions and some new ideas are emerging that might make sense relating to the kind of tree, and perhaps the size and number of trees involved. I have been arguing for years about how smart our citizenry is and how much they could contribute to our deliberations. While it looks to be a crumby evening for going out to a meeting, I hope we can make some progress on the law.