Mayor Rosenberg Thanks The Rye Brook Residents

Rye Brook Residents:

I am pleased to report that following the outpouring of residents that attended the Westchester County Board of Legislators meeting last evening, and the hard work of many local officials working together, the County Board did not act on proposed legislation that could have led to the loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars to the Rye Brook taxpayers.

Last night the Village Administrator and I, along with elected officials from the Town of Rye and the Blind Brook School District, attended a special meeting of the Westchester County Board of Legislators (BOL).  We were there to strongly state the Village’s opposition to a proposed local law that curiously omitted the original local law language which would have successfully prevented Signature Flight Support Corporation (an operator at the Westchester County airport) from continuing to seek to become tax exempt.  If successful, this action would result in costing Rye Brook taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars in the repayment of tax payments to Signature as well as the loss of future tax payments.

I am proud to report to you that the village, working collaboratively with County Legislator David Gelfarb, Rye Town Supervisor Joe Carvin, and President of the Blind Brook School Board Nancy Barr, successfully demonstrated that we will not submit to such a disastrous outcome without making our feelings known.  The local law that we opposed was “re-committed” by the BOL, effectively killing it for the present time.

While the issue of the action taken by Signature to become tax exempt is not over, we will again be working with the other elected officials and the leadership at the BOL in 2014 to ensure that the taxpayers are protected until this matter is resolved.

Thank you to the entire Rye Brook community for your outpouring of support over the past week.  Your Board of Trustees certainly appreciates your involvement and we will keep you updated on our progress with this very import issue.

Sincerely,

Paul S. Rosenberg
Mayor, Village of Rye Brook 

mayor@ryebrook.org
Twitter: @paulrosenberg