I went to the citizens to be heard portion of the May 15th Council Meeting to say a few words about City governance as well as to reach out to Noam and the Council to make a few points that were of personal importance to me. I was in good company; Bob McCaffrey intended to sign up and speak on issues of concern to him.

I prepared two documents; "The Courage to Be" and an unnamed document based on the simple management taxonomy of Planning, Organizing, Directing and Controlling. I indicated I would post both on TOTS as I presented copies of each to the Council, City Manager, and City Attorney. As it turned out, there were very few people in attendance in the audience and frankly, I am glad that turned out to be the case for personal reasons.

I am not very articulate in speech at this point and my thoughts come faster than my ability to speak them. So I fumbled, mumbled and it is painful to me to hear my presentation on Channel 75. Yet, I had to say what I felt on a personal basis knowing that my hand-outs would cover the content on my discomfort with the state of City governance.

I have been subjected to granola overload on Sustainability recently over the airways. The more I hear, the more I am convinced that few people have any perspective, or much knowledge on the subject. This is fine as an excuse to smack the kitchen table and scream out dumkopf or muttonhead, but it is serious business when it could well represent reduction in property owner equity or even political persperation. We are going through very, very difficult times and all we need are other reasons to shock the system and step all over any sense or sensibility that exists in governance.

Let's get a grip on Sustainability/GreeNR. Other communities are beginning to see the light and it is our turn.

There have been many other times during the evolution of civilization when we had to change based on natural causes (climate) or technological change (bronze age, iron age). It takes place as a natural process of evolution, of survival of the species. Recently, we have experienced these types of changes we can more readily identify with and these can be correctly define Sustainability and for our community GreeN.

Under advice from my physician, I am taking time off from my activities. I hope and expect this willl be temporary. I will continue to monitor TOTS as I consider this to be indispensible to the community and, in time, the rebirth of the City.

I am especially happy to sense that my last post on Noam's Legacy, should he choose it, would engender so many comments. Doing the math, it looks as if 277 reads led to close to 7% response rate. All of these were typical of TOTS, different voices, all who loved the City, and all who were willing to work to make it thrive.

I have tried to walk a road that few people walked. Whatever I offered came from the eyes, ears, and voices of citizens, the rests from the considerable experience as a business executive, senior consultant and educator.

I have not pulled any requests for information through Open Meeting and other channels; preferring to supplement my thoughts with those avaiable in other sources in the Internet.

Noam it has been hard for your recently but you can restore and rebuild your legacy while rebuilding and restoring your city. You are not alone; it may seem that way, but good people are a dime a dozen in these parts. What you can accomplish with the hands, hearts and minds of others here is more solid than the stone on marble plaques. It is more important than names from the past on plaques anywhere here: library Plaza, Train Station, City Hall.

You probably feel otherwise. Few remember the name of the astronaut who sat in the spacecraft when Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the moon. But, they remembered and so have many in NASA who know the mission would have likely failed without Michael Collins.

No comfort? You may not recall George C Marshall. Marshall was the head of military operations in Europe during WW II. But, most folks remember Dwight Eisenhower But, millions upon millions of survivors throughout Western Europe and their descendents will ever forget him.

I listened to the April 10 City Council meeting and it was a light in a dark room. There is much to do, many reasons for some to be suspicious, even angry. But every journey begins with the first step.

No one has been a more vocal critic of governance in New Rochelle than me and it has not come easy to me to come forward as I have. I will continue to come forward and I hope all people do. But, there is a need to build a community and that includes respectful debate, even strong action against the administration when and where needed. Yes, it is subjective often, but I continue to say without malice that I was close to Noam Bramson. Perhaps my disenchantment is stronger than most of yours. It was personal yet I still believe that there is a man of great intellect and substance behind this this current facade and I hope this shows up as it did somewhat tonight.

Why was this meeting so special? This will not be consistent with all of your views. While I think too much time is spent on some issues, I would rather have that than not enough time.

There is evidence that some members of the Harvard Faculty can critically think and then, there are the rest of them.

Intelligence is not necessarily an operant criteria in a 140 or less word society and surely, Harvard has not been successful enough to transform 21st Century greed and governance from its predessors in earlier times. But, although greed may be a lost cause there and elsewhere, there are those among the faculty, research base, and graduates who recognize the simple truth that, without a new paradigm for managing the massive changes brought about by globalization and the world wide web, just to mention two, nations will either suffer enormously in the economic world or look to overthrow existing governance in order to survive.

Today I read the most incredulous report I have read since Simpson Found Innocent. It appeared in the Mar.26/Apr.6 issue of The Report. The title of the page 1 story is.... "City's Major Crimes Up 21% and it encapsulates all I know from my past, learned from my experiences here, and portrays an image of our future in New Rochelle unless corrected either by Noam, the protagonist or the community.

Let me go over some highlights and then quote verbatim from Noam's narrative. Highlights inclde (1) larceny is up 14% over prior year, Aggravated assaults rose by 28%, arrests dropped by 13%. There is much more.

Noam begins innocently enough, "obviously I am not happy about the increae in crime." (attaboy). "But I also put these figures in the context of any overall safety record that remains very strong." (huh). While claiming a new method of calculating aggrvated assaults (brilliant during a year of atrrition), he adds, "it will be important to examine that the spike in 2011 is not the beginning of a trend." (huh). He goes on to cite we remain an safe community; best in the state, ranking only 8 spots below Carmel, Indiana.

Today is a good day for me; let me call it properly a day to celebrate life and remember what the New Rochelle I knew so well not that many years ago, exists though struggling to survive.

I turned up at our neighborhood health club, Retrofit, the beautiful managed and maintained facility that is dedicated to the community in terms of rates and quality. I picked my way through garbage, smiled benevolently at the beggars and street people, and entered the facility.

Marion Bordona (sic) was there working with a client and the facility had a fair representation of the true diversity of New Rochelle. People of both sexes, a range of ages, all ethnicities were there, working out and enjoying each others company, but working out.

This will be brief! I join John D and many others in denouncing any of our representives who cast a vote for Echo Bay with the proviso that Forest City/Ratner are the developers.

As a matter of fact, I see Forest City, from a layman's point of view, as unindicted co-conspirators at Ridge Hill in Yonkers although their legal grounds were carefully raked and covered with manure as well as dirt.

Any Council Man or Woman, any of the 7, Ceremonial Mayor/Councilman at Large and 6 District Representatives would be covered with this wicked mixture as well.

The integrity of our government, our beleaguered and divided City, cannot take another blow. We have much to clean up; from basic management, financial management, responsibilities, priorities, and so much more. Ridge Hill may be successful but even if there were nothing amiss, it is substantially different than Echo Bay. Many powerful enablers, entrenched politicians, kin of famed prosecutors, ex mayors, councilmen, etc were involved to their dishonor. But, Jereis and Annabi stand alone at the end of the day.

The menu of March 29, the absence of comments on the findings of the school budget situation with its sensible recommendations along with my recommendations on what is needed to turn the City around suggests only...

It is time to go!

Maria and I love this City and Lord knows we have fought for it. But, few people care enough for it to make a difference.

WE read about citizens protesting an arrest, high school cafeterias under assault, and, among other things in the school budget report, that something as elemental, as baic as comparing projected budget to prior yaar actual is not routine. I placed the report findings aside after this and thank the committee, Ms Petrone and especially Bob Cox for bringing this up.

I seem to be a minority of one citing the importance of understanding and adhering to the City Charter/Code.

Hopefully, there are readers who respect my efforts enough to examine my last blog on the issue arond enablers and will place the onus for change on the council and will literally cry out to them to return to some degree of normalcy concerning efforts like echo bay, armory, dpw yards. The list ins endless.