By far the most pernicious form of corruption in New Rochelle is the policy of “selective enforcement”. Mayor Noam Bramson and City Manager City Manager Charles B. Strome embrace, as a policy, the idea that various elements of the Municipal Code should be enforced selectively, at their discretion. Not only do they not view selective enforcement as corruption but advocate for it as an unalloyed good.
Many residents love Selective Enforcement. I cannot keep count of how many times I have been told about some issue — zoning variances, potholes, parking tickets, etc. — where Noam or Chuck or Jimmy made the problem go away after a phone call or email. For the majority, however, who are not part of the little cliques that run New Rochelle, Selective Enforcement is a way to discriminate in an insidious way; not by breaking the law but simply applying the law as written to a particular person while letting many other people off the hook for the exact same sort of violation.
While selective enforcement can be made to sound reasonable it is, in fact, the “gateway drug” of corruption in New Rochelle. Under selective enforcement the law is for suckers, a written code to be used as a cudgel against those who are not connected to local officials, who are not part of the friends-and-family network who do not participate in the pay-to-play culture endemic to New Rochelle.
A vehicle collision on Webster and Bon Air last June brought an arcane issue to the fore here at Talk of the Sound. Several readers contacted Talk of the Sound to point our various intersections made exceedingly dangerous due to violations of the municipal code ordinance on Clear-Sight Triangles.
The law is pretty simple: if you own property on a street corner you cannot block the view of oncoming traffic based on certain dimensions. A quick drive around New Rochelle that this ordinance is being violated with impunity by many property owners who have planted trees, installed large hedges, built high walls or otherwise made it near impossible to see oncoming traffic without pulling out into the road on their corners.
ARTICLE I Clear-Sight Triangles (§ 301-1 — § 301-2)
[Adopted as Sec. 13-12 of the 1965 General Ordinances]
§ 301-1 Height and location restrictions.No person in possession of property as either owner or tenant thereof shall erect, construct, install, plant, grow or maintain on any property located at the intersection of rights-of-way of avenues, streets or alleys any fence, sign, post, hedge, shrubbery or trees that exceed three feet in height above the nearest ledge of such intersecting corner of said rights-of-way of said avenue, street or alley, or any tree of which any branch shall be lower at any point than seven feet above said level of such corner of said rights-of-way of said avenue, street or alley to the end that persons driving vehicles upon either of such intersecting corner of said rights-of-way of said avenues, streets or alleys shall have an unobstructed view across the corner part of said premises to the other corner of said avenues, streets or alleys for a distance of at least 20 feet measured from the intersecting corner of said rights-of-way of said avenues, streets or alleys in either direction.
The penalty is relatively minor, a $250 fine which may explain why property owners ignore the ordinance.
§ 301-2 Penalties for offenses.
[Added 10-18-1988 by L.L. No. 1-1988]
An offense against the provisions of this article shall be punishable by a fine of not more than $250 or by imprisonment for not more than 15 days, or both.
In the coming days, we will provide some examples of how this law is ignored or applied in an arbitrary and capricious manner to the benefit or detriment of New Rochelle residents.
We will rock you!
The city council of New Rochelle loves to give citations. One day you are minding your own business and then they knock on your door. Make sure not to answer it and do not to let them in at any cost. Then get yourself a lawyer – preferably from Manhattan, since you can no longer trust the locals. This is the way the city council likes to scare residents into doing what they want, no matter what it may be that they decide in the next meeting – like kids playing a game. When they can no longer play this game because they themselves are caught, they resign. Impunity cannot continue.
This is your home. You don’t want people playing with your home. Enough of what people of this town do to keep their properties and put food on the table through recession times. The city will take your home if they wish. No matter what you do, they will do it to you out of pure and simple pleasure – through selective enforcement they entertain themselves every day.
Just take a drive around town. One can clearly see an enormous array of irregularities. Go East and West, North and South to see these irregularities all over the city, every single day. Take pictures with your cell phones. Send it to this blog.
New Rochelle now has a residents’ committee to fight city council. They plan to check every city rule, expose the city council and take its members to court if they don’t comply. We will be releasing their addresses for everyone to check if city members have any irregularities at their own properties. They will turn over every record going back years to investigate on behalf of the people of New Rochelle.
You should be aware that members of the city council have many times instructed their employees to oversee renovations done at their own homes. They don’t want their own properties inspected. Where is justice and honesty here? We know that Chuck Strome, the present City Manager, built an illegal kitchen extension in his house. Now they bring this real estate agent guy from Connecticut, Alex Tergis, to rule our town through city public works. We’ll be scrutinizing his every move.
Are these the people you are voting for? Wake up before they knock on your door. Believe me, they will, because this association will expose every illegal site in New Rochelle until we see these people removed from office. That’s what the Media is all about.
Common sense should be exercised
I understand the safety issue and it is on the books but maybe this is better left alone.There are a few things on the books that are lightly if at all enforced and frankly some rules make no sense (remember the basket ball hoop in the driveway or the boat in the driveway controversys)If homeowners used their head and exercised common sense and responsibility,these would be no issues.Maybe a knock on the door of a codes officer or a neighbor would make this a no issue.I like this site and do appreciate the balls you show Mr Cox but sometimes its better to talk instead of blowing someone up right away.We are supposed to be community,and I believe it is tougher today but lets all work together to accomplish a common goal that would benefit everyone.Thanks for allowing me to express myself.
ps. while were on it remember the hydrants in front of your house,keep shrubs from obscuring them and in the winter shovel them out.I was raised like that and always did it.Again, this is for the benefit of all.
Wheres the debate schedule? This isn’t news worthy.
Well said Ralph. Commonsense should rule here as not all intersections are the same with some busy and others not.
However at the same time, the law is the law and we shouldn’t rely on selective enforcement to govern. Maybe in this case its the law that should be changed?
Isn’t there any real news out there, where’s the debate schedule?
Selective Enforcement
I think both Ralph and Fifth Avenue Guy are on the money. Selective enforcement is, unfortunately, a political fact of life and, in the best of worlds and times, should not exist. It does and it will regardless of who is in what role in government and it would be hypocritical to deny we all don’t practice it in our personal lives as well albeit to a smaller degree I would think.
But, the major point here is one of common sense. Situations vary as different locations and streetscapes vary. Sometimes it is simple, other times, more difficult. But, it has also been my experience in the community that most people are reasonable and if there is a blockage, a safety hazard and so forth, a one on one can often make it right.
A professor at Harvard B School once introduced a class by saying “policy is no substitute for good judgement.” Hard to argue with and we see it in other aspects. How often have you seen the City traffic patrols hovering over a commercial area salivating for the next car whose owner dashes in for a cup of coffee heading for work or wherever.
Not good common sense. I noticed another posting concerning filty bathrooms in the school district. That should be unacceptable for any reason and you can be sympathetic with staff who deal with kids who don’t get the proper training or discipline at home. Yet, that is not enforceable at schools for the most part. Behavior, not attitude is the guideline, so the bathrooms need to be clean, sanitary and not used for avoiding class or any other purpose which they ofen are.
It is not a case of hero vs. villain. It is policy, but policy coupled with judgement. I am sympathetic and in substantive agreement with Ms. Taggert’s point. If the district claims they cannot afford to staff up or the existing policies are not enforced, or if the violators are beyond discipline — enforce, suspend, and if you cannot hire, ask some pointed questions of the school officials and school board. If that doesn’t work, a parent’s committee should be convened outside of the PTA to address this and demand action. I really have a concern that the Health Department is going to do much. It requires more.
I like the positive tone and specifics set up by Ralph and Fifth Avenue Guy and hope this continues. The community citizen has a lot to offer and these comments represent that
Well, derp-de-doo, this is
Well, derp-de-doo, this is one high quality blog post. Where do I begin?
I, personally, just get WET over the use of inflammatory bullshit rhetoric lacking even the most anecdotal piece of evidence to support it. Unsubstantiated claims are the hallmark of the legitimate blog poster.
And man, how lucky do you have to be to be a City Manager whose NAME is actually CITY MANAGER? That there is just serendipity. Although I suppose when City Manager City Manager manages any form of promotion, he’ll have to truncate his name. After all, it could potentially be confusing…
I’m led to believe by the quality of this article that the reason you can’t keep count of how many people complain about these issues (other than the potential that they are your imaginary friends) is not so much a matter of their quantity as much as it is a matter of nobody has taught you how to count.
Seriously, you couldn’t provide one photograph? One “guy on the street” interview snippet? One solid case in this entire rambling miasma you call an article to support any of the wild accusations you throw around like so much feces?
And come on, the “stay tuned for the story” approach to ratcheting up your page hits? Do you possess even the slightest amount of respect for… whatever it is you actually do here (I suspect this site mostly consists of nonsense small-town conspiracy theories, but maybe you cover the weather or something)?
What exactly is this site considered the source OF since 2008?
Stranger in the… dirt
It’s unbelievable how an adult can hide behind a blog to waste reader’s time with such foul comments. I can see he is the one spreading feces and obviously identifiable. Sadly for him this is the web and we stay stain free, as long as we fight for a cause with dignity. FYI there’s such a thing as your IP address, and though it may not be used against you publicly over here, it can be used behind doors to attack you in a more subtle way. Beware! Godfather is watching! Have no doubts.
Wait…
So… are you talking TO me or ABOUT me? Because in this reply you started in the third-person but slipped into the second person. Unless the “he” you refer to in the beginning is Cox, but then that makes your comment even more difficult to understand.
But, hell, I’ll bite. Let’s pretend that you’re actually capable of conveying rational thought in a coherent manner, and you on some level attempted to imply with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer that broadcasting my IP addy actually somehow puts me in very real and immediate danger of some sort:
An IP address isn’t a fucking street address. It’s a vaguely-defined tag that TCP/IP stacks use to catalog one’s place in a network, or in this case, the internet. Through tracing my IP address one could possibly, say, find my general location and likely my ISP. That’s pretty much where the trail ends until someone with actual clout who isn’t some (I’m going to just assume now) housebound sociopath belching all over his blog about how every minor infraction his fragile mind imagines seeing is some ominous harbinger of the apocalypse calls up my ISP with a court order in tow to force them to give up any personal information.
Of course, this all presupposes that I have even the slightest shred of fear of what could happen if my secret identity is revealed. If that were the case I’d just use a proxy address anyway.
Also, while we’re on the subject of pissing on your reply, who is “Godfather?” Are you implying this site is run by the mob? Is that the name of the deity that you offer up your annual virgin sacrifices to?
Stranger, you write very
Stranger, you write very eloquently, but do you have a point or are you just rambling?
The story is on Selective Enforcement. If you have nothing to say about it, then please don’t post and waste anyones time.
Stranger, you write very
Stranger, you write very eloquently, but do you have a point or are you just rambling?
The story is on Selective Enforcement. If you have nothing to say about it, then please don’t post and waste anyones time.
Twice the post with half the reading comprehension!
Really? Given the quality of the article in question, I thought this website catered to longwinded, ill-advised ranting. But if I must reiterate my point, so be it:
You see, my double-posting friend, I honestly wandered onto this site by chance. This article is the first I’ve read of this site, and it is positively terrible. In fact, it’s a well-crafted example of why news from a blog isn’t really news at all: the author makes bold, aggressive claims, specifically names whomsoever he believes to be the culprits of these criminal activities, and then offers no evidence to back up any of the nonsense that spews from his keyboard-hole. The sole photograph he posts demonstrates none of the problems that he complains about. He attempts to establish this selective enforcement problem as enthememic by illustrating it as a commonly discussed issue, and yet does not name one circumstance in which this actually happens. As such, why even post this as news? If he intends to back up his ludicrous statements, why not wait until he actually offers up even a shred of credible evidence?
I mean, Jesus, the only link in this entire article isn’t to any kind of source material, it’s to the same fucking article. If this is simply some sort of op-ed article, so be it, but then it’s just the nonsense ranting of some belligerent fruit loop who lacks the wherewithal to support his sporting suppositions. If this is an article meant to be some manner of news post, then betwixt the pejorative monologuing, atrocious editing, and altogether journalistic integrity-free lack of sources, this is quite possibly one of the worst things ever committed to a computer screen.
So there’s the point you should’ve inferred from my first post: that this is a bad article and quite possibly a libelous one at that. Sure, selective enforcement is bad. But it has to, you know, EXIST to be a problem. And I’m not convinced that it does based on the… “quality” of this article.
I stopped reading after the
I stopped reading after the 1st paragraph.
If you don’t have a point, why bother?
If you have a point, great but I stopped after paragraph 1 because you’re going around and around! Nobody has all day to read this stuff so get to the point.
Also this isn’t English class so nobody loses credit for spelling/punctuation mistakes or double postings. So get off your high horse and go over to Patch. They have the feel good stories that you’re looking for. http://newrochelle.patch.com/
Yeah, I can see how basic
Yeah, I can see how basic literacy skills are in very little demand on here. Let me try and truncate for you:
(CITATION NEEDED)
Oh wait, that’s right, we don’t spell or use scary words like “citation” here. Let me try again:
Dood, back dat shit up!
be carefull
Be carefull Stranger in the … The man doesn’t like pseudonyms!!! LOL
Well…
I WAS gonna go with “Handsome B. Wonderful,” initially, but sometimes you just gotta go with Sinatra, you know?
Non enforcement of traffic signs
An unbelievable amount of illegal U-turns are taking place at Webster and Disbrow Lane/Circle daily. Speed limit is hardly enforced on Webster Avenue. What about an island at this intersection and traffic lights just off the Hutch, similar to what was done on exit 26 of the Hutch to Harrison. This has to end! It’s been rolling for over 10 years. When is someone going to actually do something about it?
Let me try to explain why
Let me try to explain why nothing gets done about it. If you read the srticle about economic development on the Mayor’s website, it will give you a clue. Here’s what is going on:
NR has limited financial resources and cannot afford to staff it’s PD or Building Department fully. Hence, it can only take care of issues that it receives complaints on and even those may take a while to address. This is all thanks to the last 15 years of economic development policies touted by the Mayor. Since they began, we have higher taxes, fewer personnel in City Hall, a library tax, garbage fee, limited parking in the downtown, more congestion, and broken parking meters at the library. The Mayor, on the other hand, had the gall to write a story that shows pictures of NR before and after over the last 15 years and tell everybody how wonderful it is. This essentially is a ploy for him to convince voters to give him another 15 years to make his failing economic development policies work so he has a feather in his cap when he runs for Congress. The solution is to vote for change in NR this November. Let someone else try to better the City. Fifteen years of the same nonsense has been long enough.
Dangerous corner
Look at the corner of Webster and Stratford road during rush ours.Left turn into one way street against the traffic,illegal U turns, illegal no right turn, cars into my front lawn many times when exiting the Hutch at high speed.
Dangerous Corners
The corner of Bon Aire And Webster Is still dangerous, The property owner refuses to cut the trees blocking the view.
The city has been called several times, To no avail!
If the City came and inspected the intersections, intersecting Webster they Could give out Dozens of tickets. And maybe save someones life.
I have witnessed dozens of violet accidents over the years on these corners. Made dozens of calls over the years. NOTHING happens ever!
Just last week there was another. Webster and Rose Hill Ave.
Earth to New Rochelle anyone there!