I have just checked in with one of the police officers up here who are monitoring developments in this matter ....
The word is that there is stone-walling going on right now ....
Run out the clock ....
And so ...
Full Version: WHAT IS A HATE CRIME?
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 10 2008, 03:08 PM) 
QUOTE(rla @ Aug 10 2008, 07:44 AM)
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 10 2008, 07:33 AM)
"Politicians do not have to steal to make a living because a crook is a fool and a politician can become a millionaire through 'honest graft."
GRAFT: the popular meaning is the fraudulent obtaining of public money unlawfully by the corruption of public officers ...
Advantage or personal gain received because of peciliar position or superior influence of one holding position of trust and confidence without rendering compensatory services, or dishonest transaction in relation to public or official acts, and sometimes implies theft, corruption, dishonesty, fraud, or swindle, and always want of integrity ...
CORRUPTION: An act done with an intent to give some advantage inconsistent with official duty and the rights of others.
The act of an official or fiduciary person who unlawfully and wrongly uses his station or character to procure some benefit for himself or for another person, contrary to duty and the rights of others ...
DUTY: a human action which is exactly conformable to laws which require us to obey them ...
Legal or moral obligation ...
An obligation that one has by law or contract ...
AN OBLIGATION, RECOGNIZED BY LAW, REQUIRING ACTOR TO CONFORM TO CERTAIN STANDARD OF CONDUCT FOR PROTECTION OF OTHERS AGAINST UNREASONABLE RISKS ...
Those obligations of performance, care or observance which rest upon a person in an official or fiduciary capacity ...
The word "duty" is used throughout the Restatement of Torts to denote the fact that the actor is required to conduct himself in a particular manner at the risk that if he does not do so he becomes subject to liability to another to whom the duty is owed for any injury sustained by such other, of which that actor's conduct is a legal cause ....
In its use in jurisprudence, this word is the correlative of right.
Thus, wherever there exists a right in any person, there also rests a corresponding duty upon some other person or upon all persons generally ....
- Black's Law Dictionary
Livyjr, this appears to be a good enough to start with, Operational Definition, at a more concrete & specific level, for the phrase (Term), I have been refering to in several Threads as, the "Rights and Obligations of a Person in a Soverign Nation", accross all Nations, through Time,
throughtout the Total Human Social System.
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 10 2008, 12:24 PM)
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 9 2008, 12:36 PM)
There is of course a very obvious set of problems here with regard to OUR sovereignty as citizens in an alleged REPUBLIC when the "government" can take repressive actions against us for UPHOLDING THE LAW AS PUBLIC SERVANTS in OUR OWN GOVERNMENT, instead of being corrupt ....
SOVEREIGN PEOPLE: The political body, consisting of the entire number of citizens and qualified electors, who, in their collective capacity, possess the powers of sovereignty and exercise them through their chosen representatives ....
- Black's Law Dictionary
As was made incandescently clear in a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the situation in Rensselaer County as I encountered it in June of 1986 was as follows, to wit:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
end quotes
The Rensselaer County Department of Health exists in the first place because the people of Rensselaer County voted in 1946, the year I was born, to have Rensselaer County be a HEALTH DISTRICT pursuant to the New York State Public Health Law.
There is a New York State Public Health Law because in 1938, I believe it was, the people of New York State voted to amend the New York State Constitution to make the public's health a matter of state concern ....
The New York State Public Health Law was subsequently amended to allow for creation of county health districts and county health departments in rural counties in New York State, and in 1946, the people of Rensselaer County became the first people in the State of New York to so create a county health department ....
THE ISSUE IS ONE OF HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES ....
By 1986, it was apparent that WE SOVEREIGN CITIZENS of Rensselaer County WERE NOT GETTING honest delivery of government services from the Rensselaer County Department of Health ...
As an associate level public health engineer in New York State, I documented that exact corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health as was subsequently stated above in the FBI Report ...
Those were my findings based on my evidence from my investigation pursuant to the NYS Public Health Law ....
And by October 11, 1988, I was getting ready to prepare a summary of my findings for the New York State Health Commissioner, Dr. David Axelrod ....
The following day, October 12, 1988, I was called into the office of the Rensselaer County Public Health Director at 4:45 P.M., and I was told that I had upset some of the most powerful men in Rensselaer County, and that he could no longer protect me ....
He told me to not go home, to leave Rensselaer County and to keep driving .....
To get as far away as I could before nightfall ....
And I was to make no attempt to go around him to the New York State Department of Health ...
The following day, he sent that letter above here to Dr. Ian Loudon of the New York State Department of Health confirming that he had gotten rid of me as a threat to the STATUS QUO, which is described above here in the FBI records .....
"DON'T MAKE THEM HAVE TO HURT YOU, FOR THEY WILL!"
They can, because the courts allow them too ....
We are no longer sovereign citizens here where I am ....
The government is not ours .....
We are no longer entitled to HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES UP HERE where I am ....
WE ARE SUBJECT TO REPRESSION IF WE TRY TO PROVIDE THEM IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAW AS IT IS WRITTEN ...
And so ...
PERSON: in general usage, a human being, though by statute term may include labor organizations, partherships, associations, corporations, legal representatives, trustees, trustees in bankruptcy, or receivers ....
Scope and delineation of term is necessary for determining those to whom Fourteenth Amendment of Constitution affords protection since this Amendment expressly applies to "person" .....
- Black's Law Dictionary
NEW YORK STATE PUBLIC HEALTH LAW SECTION 603 OF TITLE I OF ARTICLE 6
§ 603. Municipal public health services plan; implementation.
1. In order to be eligible for state aid under this title, each municipality shall administer its public health programs in accordance with its approved municipal public health services plan and standards of performance established by the commissioner through rules and regulations and shall, in particular, ensure that public health services are provided in an efficient and effective manner to all persons in the municipality.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE ALBANY, NEW YORK TIMES UNION:
IF the laws of the State of New York pertaining to comprehensive reviews of development in Rensselaer County had been followed as written, this mess in Rensselaer WOULD NOT have happened ...
BUT THE LAWS WERE NOT FOLLOWED!
So it did ....
In a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation that is a matter of public record in Rensselaer County and the State of New York, as well, it was stated as follows with respect to Rensselaer County's abject and intentional failure to uphold the law in Rensselaer County with respect to land development:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
end quotes
There it is in a nutshell, folks ...
There is no mystery here ...
And Rensselaer County Executive Kathleen Jimino is very well aware of this ...
And this mess in Rensselaer is how all of that combined negligence over the years plays out in reality ...
Twenty years ago, I predicted this would take place, and I documented it with facts and evidence ....
For that, I was fired ...
After I was hung in effigy off the back of a big truck right in front of East Greenbush Town Hall in the summer of 1988 by a group of land developers doing business in East Greenbush who wanted me "out of their way" ...
And here we now are today ...
With everybody wondering how this could all have happened ...
BIG SURPRISE, isn't it?
Livyjr
WHY IT IS DESIRABLE TO NOT HAVE CORRUPT ENGINEERS IN OUR COMMUNITIES HERE IN AMERICA ....
"Ala. county faces biggest US municipal bankruptcy - Alabama county facing biggest municipal bankruptcy in US history; sewer project created a mess"
By JAY REEVES, Associated Press
Last updated: 3:22 p.m., Friday, August 15, 2008
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- Alabama's largest county appears headed for the biggest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, a $3.2 billion mess created by the nation's credit crunch and a colossal, corruption-riddled sewer project.
Politicians in Jefferson County -- which has 658,000 residents and includes the state's biggest city, Birmingham -- are struggling to find a way out of the jam, but they have mostly abandoned talk of raising taxes and fees after running into fierce opposition at raucous public meetings.
On Thursday, with their options running out, the county commissioners all but threw up their hands and decided to let the voters weigh in on Election Day with a nonbinding referendum on whether to file for bankruptcy.
"The entire nation is watching to see how we handle this," said Jeff Sewell, an assistant county attorney.
"This is a question of character as well as one of finance."
A bankruptcy filing by Jefferson County would shatter the previous record of $1.7 billion, set by Orange County, Calif., in 1994.
A Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing would put interest payments and lawsuits against the county on hold, giving it time to put its finances in order and negotiate more favorable terms with its creditors.
But it could also lead to tax increases, spending cuts and layoffs among the county's 4,000 employees.
And it could damage the county's credit rating for years to come, making it more expensive to borrow money and more difficult to finance the infrastructure improvements that can draw industries to Birmingham, a banking and medical-research center once known as the Pittsburgh of the South, back when it was a steelmaking powerhouse.
The county got into trouble after it was forced by the courts to undertake a huge upgrade of its sewage system to meet federal water standards and stop raw and partially treated waste from being dumped into streams.
Acting at the suggestion of outside advisers, the county borrowed money for the project on the bond market in a complex and risky series of transactions.
When the mortgage crisis hit and banks began tightening up on their lending, the interest rates on the debt ballooned.
The nearly completed sewer project, under construction since 1996, is now burdened with a debt of $3.2 billion.
The crisis has come amid a federal bribery-and-kickback scandal involving contracts awarded on the project.
Twenty-one people have been convicted in the still-unfolding case, including contractors, engineers and two former county commissioners.
Federal investigators say some of the deals by which the project was financed were corrupt, with politicians suspected of steering investment business to friends for kickbacks.
But they say the corruption didn't directly lead to the runaway debt.
Because of the project's costs, water rates have gone up 329 percent since 1997, with the average customer now paying about $65 a month.
Those increases, combined with the investigation of possible sweetheart deals, have left taxpayers angry and distrustful.
"I'm just really disgusted with the incompetency of these officials," said resident Frank Denney, an engineering consultant.
The graft investigation reached a shocking point last year with the bribery conviction of former Commissioner Chris McNair, whose daughter was one of the four black girls killed in an infamous racist church bombing in Birmingham in 1963.
McNair, who oversaw the sewer work from 1996 until he resigned in 2001, was sentenced to five years in prison.
Among those still under suspicion is former Commissioner Larry Langford, who was elected mayor of Birmingham last year in a landslide.
He has denied any wrongdoing.
The county has won repeated extensions from its creditors since March, with the latest one running through mid-November.
After that, it is unclear how long the crisis can go on.
Jefferson County isn't alone with money problems.
Leaders in Vallejo, Calif., voted to file for bankruptcy in May, citing a $16 million deficit blamed on declining tax revenue linked to a large number of foreclosures.
A decade ago, Orange County cut its budget and workforce to help it climb out of bankruptcy, and Vallejo wants to void its labor contracts to save money, a move that is being fought by the unions in court.
A majority of the Jefferson County Commission has come out against filing for bankruptcy.
"I am firmly convinced that bankruptcy or default would irreparably harm this county," said chairwoman Bettye Fine Collins.
The head of the state pension system, David Bronner, has instead proposed that it buy the sewer system for as much as $1.4 billion to give the county an immediate infusion of cash so that it can put its affairs in order.
Then, after a few years, the sewer system would be sold back to the county.
"It's a nice, safe utility."
"But it has to be clean."
"It can't have $3.2 billion in debt on it," Bronner said.
"Ala. county faces biggest US municipal bankruptcy - Alabama county facing biggest municipal bankruptcy in US history; sewer project created a mess"
By JAY REEVES, Associated Press
Last updated: 3:22 p.m., Friday, August 15, 2008
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. -- Alabama's largest county appears headed for the biggest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history, a $3.2 billion mess created by the nation's credit crunch and a colossal, corruption-riddled sewer project.
Politicians in Jefferson County -- which has 658,000 residents and includes the state's biggest city, Birmingham -- are struggling to find a way out of the jam, but they have mostly abandoned talk of raising taxes and fees after running into fierce opposition at raucous public meetings.
On Thursday, with their options running out, the county commissioners all but threw up their hands and decided to let the voters weigh in on Election Day with a nonbinding referendum on whether to file for bankruptcy.
"The entire nation is watching to see how we handle this," said Jeff Sewell, an assistant county attorney.
"This is a question of character as well as one of finance."
A bankruptcy filing by Jefferson County would shatter the previous record of $1.7 billion, set by Orange County, Calif., in 1994.
A Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing would put interest payments and lawsuits against the county on hold, giving it time to put its finances in order and negotiate more favorable terms with its creditors.
But it could also lead to tax increases, spending cuts and layoffs among the county's 4,000 employees.
And it could damage the county's credit rating for years to come, making it more expensive to borrow money and more difficult to finance the infrastructure improvements that can draw industries to Birmingham, a banking and medical-research center once known as the Pittsburgh of the South, back when it was a steelmaking powerhouse.
The county got into trouble after it was forced by the courts to undertake a huge upgrade of its sewage system to meet federal water standards and stop raw and partially treated waste from being dumped into streams.
Acting at the suggestion of outside advisers, the county borrowed money for the project on the bond market in a complex and risky series of transactions.
When the mortgage crisis hit and banks began tightening up on their lending, the interest rates on the debt ballooned.
The nearly completed sewer project, under construction since 1996, is now burdened with a debt of $3.2 billion.
The crisis has come amid a federal bribery-and-kickback scandal involving contracts awarded on the project.
Twenty-one people have been convicted in the still-unfolding case, including contractors, engineers and two former county commissioners.
Federal investigators say some of the deals by which the project was financed were corrupt, with politicians suspected of steering investment business to friends for kickbacks.
But they say the corruption didn't directly lead to the runaway debt.
Because of the project's costs, water rates have gone up 329 percent since 1997, with the average customer now paying about $65 a month.
Those increases, combined with the investigation of possible sweetheart deals, have left taxpayers angry and distrustful.
"I'm just really disgusted with the incompetency of these officials," said resident Frank Denney, an engineering consultant.
The graft investigation reached a shocking point last year with the bribery conviction of former Commissioner Chris McNair, whose daughter was one of the four black girls killed in an infamous racist church bombing in Birmingham in 1963.
McNair, who oversaw the sewer work from 1996 until he resigned in 2001, was sentenced to five years in prison.
Among those still under suspicion is former Commissioner Larry Langford, who was elected mayor of Birmingham last year in a landslide.
He has denied any wrongdoing.
The county has won repeated extensions from its creditors since March, with the latest one running through mid-November.
After that, it is unclear how long the crisis can go on.
Jefferson County isn't alone with money problems.
Leaders in Vallejo, Calif., voted to file for bankruptcy in May, citing a $16 million deficit blamed on declining tax revenue linked to a large number of foreclosures.
A decade ago, Orange County cut its budget and workforce to help it climb out of bankruptcy, and Vallejo wants to void its labor contracts to save money, a move that is being fought by the unions in court.
A majority of the Jefferson County Commission has come out against filing for bankruptcy.
"I am firmly convinced that bankruptcy or default would irreparably harm this county," said chairwoman Bettye Fine Collins.
The head of the state pension system, David Bronner, has instead proposed that it buy the sewer system for as much as $1.4 billion to give the county an immediate infusion of cash so that it can put its affairs in order.
Then, after a few years, the sewer system would be sold back to the county.
"It's a nice, safe utility."
"But it has to be clean."
"It can't have $3.2 billion in debt on it," Bronner said.
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 15 2008, 01:48 PM)
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 10 2008, 03:08 PM)
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 10 2008, 07:33 AM)
GRAFT: the popular meaning is the fraudulent obtaining of public money unlawfully by the corruption of public officers ...
Advantage or personal gain received because of peciliar position or superior influence of one holding position of trust and confidence without rendering compensatory services, or dishonest transaction in relation to public or official acts, and sometimes implies theft, corruption, dishonesty, fraud, or swindle, and always want of integrity ...
CORRUPTION: An act done with an intent to give some advantage inconsistent with official duty and the rights of others.
The act of an official or fiduciary person who unlawfully and wrongly uses his station or character to procure some benefit for himself or for another person, contrary to duty and the rights of others ...
DUTY: a human action which is exactly conformable to laws which require us to obey them ...
Legal or moral obligation ...
An obligation that one has by law or contract ...
AN OBLIGATION, RECOGNIZED BY LAW, REQUIRING ACTOR TO CONFORM TO CERTAIN STANDARD OF CONDUCT FOR PROTECTION OF OTHERS AGAINST UNREASONABLE RISKS ...
Those obligations of performance, care or observance which rest upon a person in an official or fiduciary capacity ...
The word "duty" is used throughout the Restatement of Torts to denote the fact that the actor is required to conduct himself in a particular manner at the risk that if he does not do so he becomes subject to liability to another to whom the duty is owed for any injury sustained by such other, of which that actor's conduct is a legal cause ....
In its use in jurisprudence, this word is the correlative of right.
Thus, wherever there exists a right in any person, there also rests a corresponding duty upon some other person or upon all persons generally ....
- Black's Law Dictionary
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 9 2008, 12:36 PM)
There is of course a very obvious set of problems here with regard to OUR sovereignty as citizens in an alleged REPUBLIC when the "government" can take repressive actions against us for UPHOLDING THE LAW AS PUBLIC SERVANTS in OUR OWN GOVERNMENT, instead of being corrupt ....
SOVEREIGN PEOPLE: The political body, consisting of the entire number of citizens and qualified electors, who, in their collective capacity, possess the powers of sovereignty and exercise them through their chosen representatives ....
- Black's Law Dictionary
As was made incandescently clear in a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the situation in Rensselaer County as I encountered it in June of 1986 was as follows, to wit:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
end quotes
The Rensselaer County Department of Health exists in the first place because the people of Rensselaer County voted in 1946, the year I was born, to have Rensselaer County be a HEALTH DISTRICT pursuant to the New York State Public Health Law.
There is a New York State Public Health Law because in 1938, I believe it was, the people of New York State voted to amend the New York State Constitution to make the public's health a matter of state concern ....
The New York State Public Health Law was subsequently amended to allow for creation of county health districts and county health departments in rural counties in New York State, and in 1946, the people of Rensselaer County became the first people in the State of New York to so create a county health department ....
THE ISSUE IS ONE OF HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES ....
By 1986, it was apparent that WE SOVEREIGN CITIZENS of Rensselaer County WERE NOT GETTING honest delivery of government services from the Rensselaer County Department of Health ...
As an associate level public health engineer in New York State, I documented that exact corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health as was subsequently stated above in the FBI Report ...
Those were my findings based on my evidence from my investigation pursuant to the NYS Public Health Law ....
And by October 11, 1988, I was getting ready to prepare a summary of my findings for the New York State Health Commissioner, Dr. David Axelrod ....
The following day, October 12, 1988, I was called into the office of the Rensselaer County Public Health Director at 4:45 P.M., and I was told that I had upset some of the most powerful men in Rensselaer County, and that he could no longer protect me ....
He told me to not go home, to leave Rensselaer County and to keep driving .....
To get as far away as I could before nightfall ....
And I was to make no attempt to go around him to the New York State Department of Health ...
The following day, he sent that letter above here to Dr. Ian Loudon of the New York State Department of Health confirming that he had gotten rid of me as a threat to the STATUS QUO, which is described above here in the FBI records .....
"DON'T MAKE THEM HAVE TO HURT YOU, FOR THEY WILL!"
They can, because the courts allow them too ....
We are no longer sovereign citizens here where I am ....
The government is not ours .....
We are no longer entitled to HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES UP HERE where I am ....
WE ARE SUBJECT TO REPRESSION IF WE TRY TO PROVIDE THEM IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAW AS IT IS WRITTEN ...
And so ...
SOVEREIGN PEOPLE: The political body, consisting of the entire number of citizens and qualified electors, who, in their collective capacity, possess the powers of sovereignty and exercise them through their chosen representatives ....
- Black's Law Dictionary
As was made incandescently clear in a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the situation in Rensselaer County as I encountered it in June of 1986 was as follows, to wit:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
end quotes
The Rensselaer County Department of Health exists in the first place because the people of Rensselaer County voted in 1946, the year I was born, to have Rensselaer County be a HEALTH DISTRICT pursuant to the New York State Public Health Law.
There is a New York State Public Health Law because in 1938, I believe it was, the people of New York State voted to amend the New York State Constitution to make the public's health a matter of state concern ....
The New York State Public Health Law was subsequently amended to allow for creation of county health districts and county health departments in rural counties in New York State, and in 1946, the people of Rensselaer County became the first people in the State of New York to so create a county health department ....
THE ISSUE IS ONE OF HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES ....
By 1986, it was apparent that WE SOVEREIGN CITIZENS of Rensselaer County WERE NOT GETTING honest delivery of government services from the Rensselaer County Department of Health ...
As an associate level public health engineer in New York State, I documented that exact corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health as was subsequently stated above in the FBI Report ...
Those were my findings based on my evidence from my investigation pursuant to the NYS Public Health Law ....
And by October 11, 1988, I was getting ready to prepare a summary of my findings for the New York State Health Commissioner, Dr. David Axelrod ....
The following day, October 12, 1988, I was called into the office of the Rensselaer County Public Health Director at 4:45 P.M., and I was told that I had upset some of the most powerful men in Rensselaer County, and that he could no longer protect me ....
He told me to not go home, to leave Rensselaer County and to keep driving .....
To get as far away as I could before nightfall ....
And I was to make no attempt to go around him to the New York State Department of Health ...
The following day, he sent that letter above here to Dr. Ian Loudon of the New York State Department of Health confirming that he had gotten rid of me as a threat to the STATUS QUO, which is described above here in the FBI records .....
"DON'T MAKE THEM HAVE TO HURT YOU, FOR THEY WILL!"
They can, because the courts allow them too ....
We are no longer sovereign citizens here where I am ....
The government is not ours .....
We are no longer entitled to HONEST DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT SERVICES UP HERE where I am ....
WE ARE SUBJECT TO REPRESSION IF WE TRY TO PROVIDE THEM IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAW AS IT IS WRITTEN ...
And so ...
NEW YORK STATE PUBLIC HEALTH LAW SECTION 603 OF TITLE I OF ARTICLE 6
§ 603. Municipal public health services plan; implementation.
1. In order to be eligible for state aid under this title, each municipality shall administer its public health programs in accordance with its approved municipal public health services plan and standards of performance established by the commissioner through rules and regulations and shall, in particular, ensure that public health services are provided in an efficient and effective manner to all persons in the municipality.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE ALBANY, NEW YORK TIMES UNION:
IF the laws of the State of New York pertaining to comprehensive reviews of development in Rensselaer County had been followed as written, this mess in Rensselaer WOULD NOT have happened ...
BUT THE LAWS WERE NOT FOLLOWED!
So it did ....
In a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation that is a matter of public record in Rensselaer County and the State of New York, as well, it was stated as follows with respect to Rensselaer County's abject and intentional failure to uphold the law in Rensselaer County with respect to land development:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
end quotes
There it is in a nutshell, folks ...
There is no mystery here ...
And Rensselaer County Executive Kathleen Jimino is very well aware of this ...
And this mess in Rensselaer is how all of that combined negligence over the years plays out in reality ...
Twenty years ago, I predicted this would take place, and I documented it with facts and evidence ....
For that, I was fired ...
After I was hung in effigy off the back of a big truck right in front of East Greenbush Town Hall in the summer of 1988 by a group of land developers doing business in East Greenbush who wanted me "out of their way" ...
And here we now are today ...
With everybody wondering how this could all have happened ...
BIG SURPRISE, isn't it?
Livyjr
From pp.45-47, PLANNING THE SUBDIVISION AS PART OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT, Division of General Engineering and Radiological Health, New York State Department of Health, Hollis S. Ingraham, Commissioner - 1974
SECTION V - DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL
Every realty subdivision (five or more lots of under five acres each) must provide adequate facilities for the proper drainage of natural waters from the land, the prompt drainage of storm and thaw waters from the site, and the prevention of inundation and flooding conditions caused by rising waters in the flood plain of surface streams and other bodies of water.
In short, the subdivision must be located on relatively high and dry ground or preparation of the site must provide this protection.
In addition to protection against surface waters, the area must be located where the ground water level is sufficiently low to assure freedom from difficult structural conditions for homes and other buildings and for private and public subsurface utilities and facilities such as on-site sewage treatment plants.
The availability of ground water for water supply purposes must not be affected, either in terms of quantity or quality.
OBJECTIVES OF DRAINAGE AND FLOODING CONTROL FOR SUBDIVISIONS
No subdivision will be approved if the soil and the general geological and terrain conditions fail to give assurance that the site is dry and capable of being kept dry and free from unwanted standing water and swampy areas.
Dwelling sites shall not be subject to partial or complete inundation or flooding by rising waters in streams, lakes or other bodies of surface water.
Approval or disapproval of subdivision development plans must be based on firm knowledge of local geological and topographic conditions, the effect of artificial grading and other topographic modifications on drainage, soil erosion and percolation conditions.
Consulting engineers, planners and developers must recognize that the conversion of open land into an urbanized community will result in the replacement of permeable land areas with impervious buildings and roofs, paved streets and parking lots.
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS AFFECTING DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL FACILITIES
The effects of draining of the land and of flood control are not limited to the area being utilized for the subdivision.
Site conditions are affected by the total environment of the entire region.
Similarly, the methods used to assure "high and dry" conditions in the subdivision can and often do affect part or all of the entire region of which the residential development is a part.
Water drained from one area, such as from swamps, quarries, pits or other low-lying land, will flow into nearby waters or onto adjoining land areas.
The creation of new impervious areas can result in the shedding or rain water or freshet waters to low points off the development site.
Changes in topography caused by massive earth movements in developing a subdivision site can affect natural flows in other sections of the same water basin, just as such practices in neighboring areas can affect the subdivision site.
********
In similar manner, the development of re-charge basins and impoundment areas, off-site, adjacent to the subdivision or upstream on the same watershed, may impair the flow of surface waters from the subdivision site or may raise the groundwater level and affect basements of structures or subsurface utilities and facilities.
Such off-site and on-site facilities must be planned and operated in the manner that will assure proper environmental conditions in the total region.
The location of subdivision housing in known flood plains will be prohibited.
Long-range regional water resources plans will show whether lands now free from flooding will become subject to such conditions because of future water resources developments in the watershed.
*********
These and other factors must be weighed in planning and developing subdivisions.
DESIGN GUIDELINES FOR DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL ACTIVITIES
The points of discharge of surface waters must be chosen with care to prevent inundation or other damage to nearby lands.
Changes in land contour should be discussed with local planning agencies, public works officials or other involved authorities.
Hey Junior. Did you ever figure out who put the turd on your car? I was wondering if that's why you started this thread about hate crimes too.
I never did this when I was a kid but I knew a couple a kids who did. They'd take a brown paper lunch bag and fill it up with turds, take it to one of their "favorite" teacher's house, put it on the front porch, light it, ring the doorbell, and run. A person's natural instinct when they see a little fire like that is to stomp it out.
Was that a hate crime?
I never did this when I was a kid but I knew a couple a kids who did. They'd take a brown paper lunch bag and fill it up with turds, take it to one of their "favorite" teacher's house, put it on the front porch, light it, ring the doorbell, and run. A person's natural instinct when they see a little fire like that is to stomp it out.
Was that a hate crime?
QUOTE(Marine @ Aug 17 2008, 09:01 PM)
Hey Junior.
Did you ever figure out who put the turd on your car?
I was wondering if that's why you started this thread about hate crimes too.
I never did this when I was a kid but I knew a couple a kids who did.
They'd take a brown paper lunch bag and fill it up with turds, take it to one of their "favorite" teacher's house, put it on the front porch, light it, ring the doorbell, and run.
A person's natural instinct when they see a little fire like that is to stomp it out.
Was that a hate crime?
Did you ever figure out who put the turd on your car?
I was wondering if that's why you started this thread about hate crimes too.
I never did this when I was a kid but I knew a couple a kids who did.
They'd take a brown paper lunch bag and fill it up with turds, take it to one of their "favorite" teacher's house, put it on the front porch, light it, ring the doorbell, and run.
A person's natural instinct when they see a little fire like that is to stomp it out.
Was that a hate crime?
Well, Marine, as to the PERP, the answer is largely yes ....
It is fairly well known who climbed up on the hood of my truck and crushed it down, and then took a **** on it like some kind of wild animal would ....
And what is fairly well known as well is that this individual is POLITICALLY-PROTECTED up here ....
They allegedly have the county DA and the local judge in their pocket through political connections their family has up here where I am ...
Which makes that person an UNTOUCHABLE in the eyes of the law ...
They will never be prosecuted ....
And what is fairly well known up here as well is the fact that in New York State, I am outside the protection of the law up here, because I chose to go after political corruption up here by taking the "state" to court and beating them there, thereby exposing the corruption and who was corrupt to public scrutiny ....
At the same time, I caused some "deals" to be undone, and that in its turn upset some of the most powerful men in politics up here ...
So I became a MARKED MAN, Marine ....
Which means that the person who damaged my truck by climbing up on the hood to take a **** is going to get a FREEBIE out of it .....
Which means this harassment and intimidation of myself is likely going to continue, and may well escalate ....
Because this will embolden this individual to try something further ....
In the meantime, to get the hood of my truck restored to the condition that it was in before this damage was done to it, I have to pay for that myself ....
IS IT A HATE CRIME, Marine?
Or like the politicians up here say, DID I BRING THIS DOWN ON MYSELF BY TRYING TO ENFORCE THE LAWS AS WERE WRITTEN IN ACCORDANCE WITH MY DUTIES AS A LICENSED PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER IN NEW YORK STATE?
How do you see it, Marine?
And so ....
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 17 2008, 05:31 PM)
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 12 2008, 11:30 AM)
THIS FOLLOWING IS A STORY THAT I HAVE A PERSONAL CONNECTION WITH AS A NEW YORK STATE RESIDENT AND ALSO AS AN ENGINEER IN NEW YORK STATE ....
BY THE LAWS ON ADVERSE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACTS IN NEW YORK STATE WHICH HAVE BEEN LAWS SINCE THE 1970's, THIS STORY SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN ....
THE LAWS AS THEY ARE WRITTEN WOULD HAVE PREVENTED THIS FROM HAPPENING ....
BUT TO ENCOURAGE MORE AND MORE DEVELOPMENT, THE PROTECTIVE LAWS WERE SCRAPPED ....
I PREDICTED EXACTLY THIS HAPPENING TWENTY YEARS AGO IN 1988 AS A RESULT OF THE NEGLIGENT SCRAPPING OF THOSE LAWS WHEN IT WAS MY DUTY AS A PUBLIC OFFICIAL IN RENSSELAER COUNTY WHERE THIS JUST HAPPENED TO PREVENT THIS FROM HAPPENING BY APPLYING ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES AND OVERSIGHT TO DEVELOPMENT IN NEW YORK STATE ......
TO PREVENT THIS FROM HAPPENING, IT WAS NECESSARY TO SAY NO ....
NO WAS UNACCEPTABLE, HOWEVER ....
NO GOT IN THE WAY OF BIG MONEY IN PLAY ....
FOR SAYING NO AND MEANING IT, I WAS LOCKED OUT OF MY OFFICE .....
THE BULK OF MY RECORDS AND EVIDENCE WERE DESTROYED ....
AND I HAD A CAMPAIGN OF VIOLENCE UNLEASHED AGAINST ME WHICH LASTS RIGHT TO THIS DAY ....
AND NOW AS PREDICTED, THE CHICKENS COME HOME TO ROOST ....
AND THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING ...
And so ...
"Rensselaer mayor blames development for flooding - Homes and business must be inspected before National Grid restores service"
By KENNETH C. CROWE II, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
Last updated: 10:53 a.m., Tuesday, August 12, 2008
RENSSELAER -- Mayor Dan Dwyer blamed rapid development in East Greenbush and North Greenbush for adding to the storm runoff that spilled into tributaries of the Hudson River Monday and flooded low-lying sections of the city.
"There is a lot of growth going on up there."
"It's more than can be handled," Dwyer said at a news conference this morning where he assessed damage from a storm that left more than 30 flood victims looking for help from the Red Cross.
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 15 2008, 06:18 AM)
"Flood damage eclipses $20M - Rensselaer mayor says city will pursue government funds to pay for cleanup after Monday deluge"
By KENNETH C. CROWE II, Staff writer, Albany,New York Times Union
First published: Friday, August 15, 2008
RENSSELAER - The city suffered more than $20 million in damage Monday when floodwaters rushed down Quackenderry Creek, through the Hollow neighborhood and into downtown, Mayor Dan Dwyer said Thursday afternoon.
The exact amount hasn't been calculated yet, but the tally is growing, Dwyer said.
"It's over $20 million," Dwyer said.
The estimate includes damage to the city's new public works garage on Willow Street, city highway equipment caught in the flood, the cost of clearing creek of debris and silt, repairs to city streets and other infrastructure, replacement of destroyed culverts and other problems caused by the high water Monday afternoon.
"We're going to have to get the help from the government," Dwyer said referring to state and federal assistance.
By KENNETH C. CROWE II, Staff writer, Albany,New York Times Union
First published: Friday, August 15, 2008
RENSSELAER - The city suffered more than $20 million in damage Monday when floodwaters rushed down Quackenderry Creek, through the Hollow neighborhood and into downtown, Mayor Dan Dwyer said Thursday afternoon.
The exact amount hasn't been calculated yet, but the tally is growing, Dwyer said.
"It's over $20 million," Dwyer said.
The estimate includes damage to the city's new public works garage on Willow Street, city highway equipment caught in the flood, the cost of clearing creek of debris and silt, repairs to city streets and other infrastructure, replacement of destroyed culverts and other problems caused by the high water Monday afternoon.
"We're going to have to get the help from the government," Dwyer said referring to state and federal assistance.
From pp.45-47, PLANNING THE SUBDIVISION AS PART OF THE TOTAL ENVIRONMENT, Division of General Engineering and Radiological Health, New York State Department of Health, Hollis S. Ingraham, Commissioner - 1974
SECTION V - DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL
Every realty subdivision (five or more lots of under five acres each) must provide adequate facilities for the proper drainage of natural waters from the land, the prompt drainage of storm and thaw waters from the site, and the prevention of inundation and flooding conditions caused by rising waters in the flood plain of surface streams and other bodies of water.
In short, the subdivision must be located on relatively high and dry ground or preparation of the site must provide this protection.
In addition to protection against surface waters, the area must be located where the ground water level is sufficiently low to assure freedom from difficult structural conditions for homes and other buildings and for private and public subsurface utilities and facilities such as on-site sewage treatment plants.
The availability of ground water for water supply purposes must not be affected, either in terms of quantity or quality.
OBJECTIVES OF DRAINAGE AND FLOODING CONTROL FOR SUBDIVISIONS
No subdivision will be approved if the soil and the general geological and terrain conditions fail to give assurance that the site is dry and capable of being kept dry and free from unwanted standing water and swampy areas.
Dwelling sites shall not be subject to partial or complete inundation or flooding by rising waters in streams, lakes or other bodies of surface water.
Approval or disapproval of subdivision development plans must be based on firm knowledge of local geological and topographic conditions, the effect of artificial grading and other topographic modifications on drainage, soil erosion and percolation conditions.
Consulting engineers, planners and developers must recognize that the conversion of open land into an urbanized community will result in the replacement of permeable land areas with impervious buildings and roofs, paved streets and parking lots.
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS AFFECTING DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL FACILITIES
The effects of draining of the land and of flood control are not limited to the area being utilized for the subdivision.
Site conditions are affected by the total environment of the entire region.
Similarly, the methods used to assure "high and dry" conditions in the subdivision can and often do affect part or all of the entire region of which the residential development is a part.
Water drained from one area, such as from swamps, quarries, pits or other low-lying land, will flow into nearby waters or onto adjoining land areas.
The creation of new impervious areas can result in the shedding or rain water or freshet waters to low points off the development site.
Changes in topography caused by massive earth movements in developing a subdivision site can affect natural flows in other sections of the same water basin, just as such practices in neighboring areas can affect the subdivision site.
********
In similar manner, the development of re-charge basins and impoundment areas, off-site, adjacent to the subdivision or upstream on the same watershed, may impair the flow of surface waters from the subdivision site or may raise the groundwater level and affect basements of structures or subsurface utilities and facilities.
Such off-site and on-site facilities must be planned and operated in the manner that will assure proper environmental conditions in the total region.
The location of subdivision housing in known flood plains will be prohibited.
Long-range regional water resources plans will show whether lands now free from flooding will become subject to such conditions because of future water resources developments in the watershed.
*********
These and other factors must be weighed in planning and developing subdivisions.
DESIGN GUIDELINES FOR DRAINAGE AND FLOOD CONTROL ACTIVITIES
The points of discharge of surface waters must be chosen with care to prevent inundation or other damage to nearby lands.
Changes in land contour should be discussed with local planning agencies, public works officials or other involved authorities.
"We're going to have to get the help from the government," Dwyer said referring to state and federal assistance.
This above recent news story, Marine, is a prime example of what I call the CORRUPTION TAX on us American citizens up here .....
The citizens of the United States of America, including yourself on your ranch down there in Texas, should now have to divvy up some more money on top of all the other money you have to kick in to the federal government to make the City of Rensselaer in Rensselaer County in CORRUPT New York State whole, notwithstanding that New York State has had in place regulations since at least 1974 to prevent exactly this from happening in the first place ....
It did happen because of alleged GROSS NEGLIGENCE, MISFEASANCE and MALFEASANCE on the part of the public officials "entrusted" with keeping this from happening, as is spelled out in detail in this New York State Department of Health ENGINEERING DESIGN MANUAL above here ....
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
It was MY DUTY, Marine, to enforce and uphold those regulations ....
TO PREVENT DEVELOPMENT INVESTMENTS IN AREAS THAT DID NOT ASSURE OPTIMUM ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK STATE ...
To do my duty, of course, I had to step right directly into the path of people with a lot of money that they needed to move "through the system" ....
RETURN ON INVESTMENT, Marine ...
ROI ....
I called it for what I saw it as - LAND FRAUD .....
A SCAM ....
Get a COMPLIANT ENGINEER to falsely certify the land as meeting all applicable laws,rules and regulations, sell it to some sucker, often sight unseen, the sucker gets a mortgage which is "bundled" and sold as a "security" to some other sucker who hasn't a clue as to what he or she bought into ....
And the GAME goes on, Marine ....
MANNA FROM HEAVEN!
MONEY FOR NOTHING!
And a real good laundry for dirty money, to boot!
EXCEPT FOR ME ....
But I wasn't even much of a bump in the road, in the end ....
And so .....
PONY UP, Marine!
IT'S YOUR CIVIC DUTY TO REWARD CORRUPTION UP HERE IN NEW YORK STATE!
DON'T THAT MAKE YOU PROUD TO BE A MURRIKAN, Marine?
GREATEST COUNTRY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, I AM TOLD!
Because here, CORRUPTION is government-sponsored and protected ....
WHICH MEANS, Marine, THAT IT WASN'T A HATE CRIME UP HERE WHAT WAS DONE TO ME ...
BY PROVOKING THE WRONG PEOPLE UP HERE, I BROUGHT POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION DOWN ON MYSELF ...
AND POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION AREN'T CRIMES HERE IN NEW YORK STATE ....
ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ITS DEPARTMENT OF NO-JUSTICE FOR HONEST AMERICANS WITHOUT POLITICAL PROTECTION ...
And so ....
You're a CPA, Marine ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ....
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ....
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 18 2008, 05:19 AM)
"We're going to have to get the help from the government," Dwyer said referring to state and federal assistance.
This above recent news story, Marine, is a prime example of what I call the CORRUPTION TAX on us American citizens up here .....
The citizens of the United States of America, including yourself on your ranch down there in Texas, should now have to divvy up some more money on top of all the other money you have to kick in to the federal government to make the City of Rensselaer in Rensselaer County in CORRUPT New York State whole, notwithstanding that New York State has had in place regulations since at least 1974 to prevent exactly this from happening in the first place ....
It did happen because of alleged GROSS NEGLIGENCE, MISFEASANCE and MALFEASANCE on the part of the public officials "entrusted" with keeping this from happening, as is spelled out in detail in this New York State Department of Health ENGINEERING DESIGN MANUAL above here ....
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
It was MY DUTY, Marine, to enforce and uphold those regulations ....
TO PREVENT DEVELOPMENT INVESTMENTS IN AREAS THAT DID NOT ASSURE OPTIMUM ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK STATE ...
To do my duty, of course, I had to step right directly into the path of people with a lot of money that they needed to move "through the system" ....
RETURN ON INVESTMENT, Marine ...
ROI ....
I called it for what I saw it as - LAND FRAUD .....
A SCAM ....
Get a COMPLIANT ENGINEER to falsely certify the land as meeting all applicable laws,rules and regulations, sell it to some sucker, often sight unseen, the sucker gets a mortgage which is "bundled" and sold as a "security" to some other sucker who hasn't a clue as to what he or she bought into ....
And the GAME goes on, Marine ....
MANNA FROM HEAVEN!
MONEY FOR NOTHING!
And a real good laundry for dirty money, to boot!
EXCEPT FOR ME ....
But I wasn't even much of a bump in the road, in the end ....
And so .....
PONY UP, Marine!
IT'S YOUR CIVIC DUTY TO REWARD CORRUPTION UP HERE IN NEW YORK STATE!
DON'T THAT MAKE YOU PROUD TO BE A MURRIKAN, Marine?
GREATEST COUNTRY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, I AM TOLD!
Because here, CORRUPTION is government-sponsored and protected ....
WHICH MEANS, Marine, THAT IT WASN'T A HATE CRIME UP HERE WHAT WAS DONE TO ME ...
BY PROVOKING THE WRONG PEOPLE UP HERE, I BROUGHT POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION DOWN ON MYSELF ...
AND POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION AREN'T CRIMES HERE IN NEW YORK STATE ....
ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ITS DEPARTMENT OF NO-JUSTICE FOR HONEST AMERICANS WITHOUT POLITICAL PROTECTION ...
And so ....
This above recent news story, Marine, is a prime example of what I call the CORRUPTION TAX on us American citizens up here .....
The citizens of the United States of America, including yourself on your ranch down there in Texas, should now have to divvy up some more money on top of all the other money you have to kick in to the federal government to make the City of Rensselaer in Rensselaer County in CORRUPT New York State whole, notwithstanding that New York State has had in place regulations since at least 1974 to prevent exactly this from happening in the first place ....
It did happen because of alleged GROSS NEGLIGENCE, MISFEASANCE and MALFEASANCE on the part of the public officials "entrusted" with keeping this from happening, as is spelled out in detail in this New York State Department of Health ENGINEERING DESIGN MANUAL above here ....
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
It was MY DUTY, Marine, to enforce and uphold those regulations ....
TO PREVENT DEVELOPMENT INVESTMENTS IN AREAS THAT DID NOT ASSURE OPTIMUM ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK STATE ...
To do my duty, of course, I had to step right directly into the path of people with a lot of money that they needed to move "through the system" ....
RETURN ON INVESTMENT, Marine ...
ROI ....
I called it for what I saw it as - LAND FRAUD .....
A SCAM ....
Get a COMPLIANT ENGINEER to falsely certify the land as meeting all applicable laws,rules and regulations, sell it to some sucker, often sight unseen, the sucker gets a mortgage which is "bundled" and sold as a "security" to some other sucker who hasn't a clue as to what he or she bought into ....
And the GAME goes on, Marine ....
MANNA FROM HEAVEN!
MONEY FOR NOTHING!
And a real good laundry for dirty money, to boot!
EXCEPT FOR ME ....
But I wasn't even much of a bump in the road, in the end ....
And so .....
PONY UP, Marine!
IT'S YOUR CIVIC DUTY TO REWARD CORRUPTION UP HERE IN NEW YORK STATE!
DON'T THAT MAKE YOU PROUD TO BE A MURRIKAN, Marine?
GREATEST COUNTRY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, I AM TOLD!
Because here, CORRUPTION is government-sponsored and protected ....
WHICH MEANS, Marine, THAT IT WASN'T A HATE CRIME UP HERE WHAT WAS DONE TO ME ...
BY PROVOKING THE WRONG PEOPLE UP HERE, I BROUGHT POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION DOWN ON MYSELF ...
AND POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION AREN'T CRIMES HERE IN NEW YORK STATE ....
ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ITS DEPARTMENT OF NO-JUSTICE FOR HONEST AMERICANS WITHOUT POLITICAL PROTECTION ...
And so ....
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 18 2008, 05:31 AM)
You're a CPA, Marine ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ...
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ...
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
"AP IMPACT: Weak rules cripple appraiser oversight - Toothless rules, bumbling regulators cripple oversight of real estate appraisers"
By MITCH WEISS, Associated Press
Last updated: 12:13 a.m., Monday, August 18, 2008
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- As soaring home prices set the stage for America's great housing meltdown, a critical step in making sure those home sales were a fair deal -- the real estate appraisal -- was undermined from within.
After the nation's last major banking disaster, Congress set up a system to catch rogue appraisers.
Their game: inflating the value of homes at the direction of equally unscrupulous real estate agents and mortgage brokers, whose commissions are determined by the size of the deals.
But a six-month Associated Press investigation found that the system is crippled by both the bumbling of its policemen and their inability to effectively punish those caught committing fraud.
And despite ample evidence appraisers are pressured into inflating home values -- sometimes to prices in support of loans that are more than buyers can afford -- the federal regulators charged with protecting consumers have thus far made a conscious choice not to act.
"The system is completely broken," Marc Weinberg, the former acting director at the federal agency charged with monitoring the appraisal industry, told the AP before he retired earlier this year.
"It's amazing that the system ever worked at all."
The AP conducted dozens of interviews and reviewed thousands of state and federal documents, and found:
-- Since 2005, at the height of the housing boom, more than two dozen states and U.S. territories have violated federal rules by failing to investigate and resolve complaints about appraisers within a year.
Some complaints sat uninvestigated for as long as four years.
As a result, hundreds of appraisers accused of wrongdoing remained in business.
-- The only tool federal regulators have to force states into compliance is so draconian -- it would effectively halt all mortgage lending in a state -- that it has never been used.
-- Both state appraisal boards and the federal agency charged with overseeing them are chronically understaffed, many with only one full-time investigator to handle the hundreds of complaints that arrive each year.
Some don't even have an investigator.
"The appraisal reforms of the late 1980s were good reforms," said Susan Wachter, a real estate professor at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business.
"But they were not sufficient to prevent what we have seen ... because regulation without teeth is not regulation."
To be sure, there are many causes of the housing crisis -- lenders who allowed people with spotty credit to buy homes with little or no money down, mortgage brokers who focused on selling loans without regard to the borrowers' ability to repay, investment bankers who bought and sold risky mortgage-backed securities.
A few of the worst offenders -- appraisers included -- have been put behind bars.
But experts and industry insiders, including appraisers who feel betrayed by colleagues who don't follow the rules, believe the failure to effectively monitor the real estate appraisal industry contributed to housing's collapse.
There is no doubt, Wachter said, "that fraud has increased and appraisal fraud has increased in a way to exacerbate the problems."
This is the way the system is supposed to work:
Typically, an appraiser receives an order from a real estate agent, lender or mortgage broker to inspect a property.
Based on a physical inspection of the home and comparable sales in the area, they develop an estimated value for the property.
That figure is used by banks to set the home's value as collateral for the mortgage loan.
Appraisers are supposed to come up with a value free of any outside pressure.
But more than three dozen appraisers nationwide interviewed by the AP said they often felt pushed by a real estate agent or mortgage broker to fraudulently inflate a property's value.
They supplied the AP with documents from lenders asking them to "hit a number."
"The higher the loan amount, the more money brokers and lenders make in the deal," said Ray Haynes, an appraiser from Cherryville, N.C.
"And they threaten you."
"They say, 'If you don't play ball with us, we'll go somewhere else.'"
"And they do."
"I've seen my business shrink."
"They're all doing it."
"It's hard to stay honest."
Documents obtained by the AP also show that hundreds of appraisers complained to federal and state agencies about such fraudulent inflation of property values.
The appraisal system has broken down before.
In 1989, Congress concluded that "faulty and fraudulent appraisals were an important contributor to the losses that the federal government suffered during the saving and loan crisis."
And it passed the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act.
Under the law's reforms, a private group known as the Appraisal Foundation wrote the rules governing appraisers.
The law also recommended that states begin licensing appraisers and disciplining those who break the rules.
A federal agency called the Appraisal Subcommittee, an independent federal agency that answers to Congress, would conduct field reviews and audits, and maintain a national registry of appraisers -- including dossiers on those who break the rules.
But problems plagued the system from the start.
It took years for some states to set up the independent review boards to supervise appraisers or hire personnel to investigate complaints.
Even today, eight states still do not require appraisers to obtain a license or certification.
"We got to this point by a lack of enforcement."
"... The public has the right to expect the appraisal boards are taking care of that problem," said Bob Ipock, an appraiser from Gastonia, N.C., who is a critic of the current system.
"And they are not."
"They're looking the other way."
The Appraisal Subcommittee is supposed to help states remove from the system those appraisers who agree to "hit a number."
But it has only four employees to conduct field reviews and audits of 50 states and four U.S. territories, and hasn't even had a permanent director since the agency's former chief retired at the end of last year.
Following Weinberg's subsequent departure in February as acting director, none of the agency's current employees -- including interim director Vicki Ledbetter -- returned more than a dozen messages left by the AP over a period of several months seeking comment.
When the agency does find a state failing to follow the law, the only tool available to force compliance is a death sentence known as "non-recognition" -- a penalty that would ban all appraisers in that state from handling deals involving a federal agency.
"Do you know what that would have meant?"
"The net effect is it would have effectively shut down mortgage lending in that state," former subcommittee director Ben Henson, who retired in December, told the AP.
"To take that action would have been an unbelievable disruption to the economy."
"I wasn't going to do that."
When field reviews began in the 1990s, states were repeatedly warned they were failing to comply with the law -- warnings that continue to this day.
But without the ability to issue fines or impose a less destructive punishment, the Appraisal Subcommittee is powerless.
It has never taken any action against a state for not obeying the law.
"Either you shut it off completely in a state, or you just send letters," said Gary Taylor, an appraiser from New York who sits on the Appraisal Foundation board that writes qualification guidelines.
"The threat of the atomic bomb is the only thing."
And so, the violations stack up year after year, largely without consequence.
In the last three years alone, as the nation's housing market went from boom to bust, 27 states or territories failed to investigate and resolve complaints within a year.
In Washington, D.C., the agency found last August that 32 of the district's 35 pending cases were older than two years.
In Florida, almost 50 percent of 169 cases older than a year concerned appraisers involved in "fraud and flipping."
Faced with such backlogs, some states just give up.
In New Hampshire, the state appraisal board decided in July 2006 to close all outstanding files dating to 2002 -- some of which included allegation of fraud -- because they "were too old to investigate."
In Ohio, the Appraisal Subcommittee found in 2005 that 40 percent of the state's 199 outstanding cases were older than a year, many older than two.
To help clear the backlog, Ohio began allowing appraisers to sign consent orders -- a deal similar to a plea bargain in which an appraiser agrees to the facts of a case in exchange for a reduced punishment.
That could be a short-term suspension, for example, instead of a license revocation.
In 2006, 11 appraisers signed such consent orders in Ohio.
That figure swelled to 148 the following year.
"They know they can keep doing what they're doing because they can get away with it," said Carl Schneider, an appraiser who serves on the Oklahoma appraisal board's disciplinary procedures committee.
"They're not getting punished."
"And states aren't doing more because they know regulators won't do a thing."
By law, the Appraisal Subcommittee must maintain a registry of appraisers that includes a disciplinary history.
But a disciplinary action stays on the Web site only as long as it's current -- once the suspension is over, the action is removed, making it appear as if the appraiser has never been in trouble.
The flaws in the system also allow appraisers to stay in business while complaints against them are under investigation.
North Carolina appraiser Jerry Gooden had eight complaints filed against him between 2001 and 2003, all related to a trainee who performed dozens of appraisals under his supervision and later pleaded guilty to mortgage fraud.
All the while, Gooden remained listed in good standing on the Appraisal Subcommittee's Web registry of appraisers.
His license was suspended in 2005 for nine months because of the complaints.
But even today, his entry shows he's never been disciplined.
When contacted recently by telephone, Gooden said he was busy and didn't have time to talk.
When Illinois appraiser Donald Martin wrote to the Appraisal Subcommittee in December 2000, he told of how lenders, mortgage brokers and real estate agents withheld business from appraisers who refused to inflate values, guarantee a predetermined value or ignore deficiencies in a property.
Honest appraisers, he wrote, were blacklisted in favor of those with a "rubber stamp."
He begged the agency to take action.
But as it would say in response to nearly a dozen such letters, the subcommittee answered that it didn't have the statutory authority to investigate such complaints.
It promised to forward the complaint to the appropriate federal agencies, such as the Federal Reserve, which could have acted out of concerns for the health of the appraisal industry.
There is no evidence that ever happened.
"They just blew me off," Martin said.
"I wasn't alone."
"We had appraisers from all over the nation writing in and urging them to take action."
That same month, subcommittee board member Thomas Watson Jr. -- then the national bank examiner at the federal Office of the Comptroller of the Currency -- did propose action.
In a letter to appraiser groups and banking regulators, he called a meeting to discuss concerns "resulting from inappropriate pressure being placed on real estate property appraisers to 'hit a certain value.'"
Henson, the subcommittee's director at the time, attended the meeting and remembers hearing story after story about appraisers being pressured.
But he called the information "mostly anecdotal," never forwarded the information to the full board and never followed up to see if any federal regulator looked into the complaints.
"People who say we should have done more don't understand how the system works," Henson said.
"Agencies just don't lobby to change things."
"We had no interest in doing anything like that."
"It just wasn't our area."
The American Society of Appraisers formally asked the Appraisal Subcommittee to act in January 2001, noting the agency was in a "good position to work with bank regulators and others on the problem."
Again, the agency responded by saying it did not have the authority to examine the issue.
"It didn't surprise me they didn't do anything," said Richard Amoling, the society's former president.
"Everything related to the issue went into a black hole."
"Why, I just don't know."
Weinberg, who worked at the Securities and Exchange Commission before he was hired as the Appraisal Subcommittee's attorney in 1991, said the agency could have pushed more.
"I tried to push, but nobody wanted to hear what I was saying," he said.
That included Congress.
When serving as president of a national appraisers trade association in June 2004, Taylor -- the Appraisal Foundation committee member -- told a House subcommittee field hearing that "problem appraisals are being allowed, and in some ways even encouraged, by a regulatory structure that promotes lax enforcement and ineffective oversight."
Taylor, president of Rogers & Taylor Appraisers Inc. in Hauppauge, N.Y., pleaded for help:
"We are here to alert Congress that the licensing system it created for appraisers is broken ... and needs to be fixed."
It wasn't.
Records obtained by the AP also show that complaints about individual appraisers filed at the state level are left unresolved for months -- and often for years -- but for a different reason: Many states have only one full-time inspector.
Some appraisal boards also are rolled into bigger regulatory agencies, where inspectors with little or no experience are assigned to investigate complaints.
"I think the design of the system is excellent," said Philip Humphries, the current director of the North Carolina Appraisal Board.
"But states don't have the money to hire personnel to carry out what the system was designed to do."
Henson said most of the complaints are frivolous, involving consumers upset because an appraiser "may have been rude or said my house wasn't worth as much as I thought."
He said few of the complaints have anything to do with inflated appraisals.
"That was just not a problem," he said.
Filed complaints are considered private and are not open to public inspection.
But consent orders are public, and the AP's investigation found that Henson's assessment that most complaints are frivolous is simply wrong.
In North Carolina, for example, of the more than 300 consent orders filed since 1994, 65 percent involved mistakes that inflated a home's value.
Even when states do investigate and find problems, rogue appraisers are rarely disciplined.
Since 1994, only 13 appraisers -- there are currently about 3,500 licenesed appraisers in the state -- have had their licenses taken away by North Carolina's appraisal board.
During the same period, California, the nation's most populous state, revoked 89 licenses; Tennessee, West Virginia and Wyoming did not revoke any, according to Appraisal Subcommittee records.
Violators are usually only reprimanded or, if their licenses are suspended, the suspension often is reduced if they agree to take remedial education classes.
Since 1994, consumers have filed 23 complaints against Richard Chapman, an appraiser from Emerald Isle, N.C.
His license was suspended for five years in a case in which he was accused of submitting appraisals with "misleading information" and "inaccurate data."
Since his license was reinstated in 2000, 11 new complaints have arrived.
"Just because you're disciplined, that doesn't make you a bad appraiser," said Chapman, who estimated he's been involved in 80,000 appraisals since 1980 and trained about 60 appraisers.
"I may have done some technical things wrong, but I've done a good job."
"I'm proud of my work."
The North Carolina board dismissed two of the 11 recent complaints outright, while two others were dismissed with warnings to be more careful.
Six were dismissed on the condition that Chapman complete appraiser education classes, and he was reprimanded for one complaint.
"There no habitual felon law for appraisers," said board attorney Roberta Ouellette, defending the agency's action.
"Why should he get super-zapped for doing a lot of little things that a lot of other appraisers are doing every day but haven't had complaints turned in on them?"
The failings of the appraisal regulatory system and its impact on the nation's housing market led Andrew Cuomo, the New York attorney general, to reach a deal in March with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which purchase mortgages from other financial institutions.
Cuomo's deal requires Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to buy mortgages only from lenders who use independent appraisers.
The new rules also prevent lenders who want to sell loans to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac from using in-house appraisers to do the first evaluation.
The agreement, which will take effect in 2009, will create a watchdog to monitor the appraisal business: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will spend $24 million to create the Independent Valuation Protection Institute, which will accept complaints from consumers and appraisers.
It will also monitor the enforcement and report to Cuomo's office.
But such a system duplicates the regulations already in place, including the same lack of enforcement tools that led the existing system to failure.
And it's already under fire.
John Dugan, the U.S. comptroller of the currency, wants the deal scrapped, arguing it would increase the cost of home loans for borrowers without strengthening consumer protections.
Cuomo didn't return repeated requests for comment.
But Taylor, the Appraiser Foundation board member who asked Congress for action in 2004, doesn't see much hope for his success.
"There has to be effective enforcement of some sort."
"There has to be reality to it," Taylor said.
"What are you going to do if there is pressure on appraisers?"
" How are you going to penalize someone who puts that pressure on appraisers?"
"Who's going to do it?"
"Who's going to enforce it?"
"They need to have that or it won't work."
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 18 2008, 06:31 AM)
You're a CPA, Marine ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ....
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
Do you ever get asked to "do a fiddle" with people's books, so that they can hide some money here and there?
Do you help people to launder dirty money through the system to get it clean?
I could have been a rich man my own self if I had been gaited that way ....
Make false certifications for the land developers with BIG BUCKS to "invest" up here ....
I would have had the "arm" of the state and federal government wrapped firmly around me to keep the SCAM going, because the SCAM puts money into the coffers of the government, and they never have enough money, do they, Marine?
I have to put the blame for my "misery" and "trouble" on my parents and teachers, Marine ....
If they hadn't of brought me up to be honest and responsible for MY ACTIONS, I could have been a rich man ....
And this politically-protected punk up here then would have been one of my "buddies", instead of an enemy ....
And if he was my buddy, he never would have damaged the hood of my truck by climbing up on it to take a **** on it ....
And this thread wouldn't be running in here .....
BECAUSE I WOULD BE "LOVED" UP HERE, INSTEAD OF HATED ...
Which means that you would have been denied the opportunity to chortle at my discomfort at being **** on in here ....
And so ....
Funny how it all goes, isn't it, Marine?
IN AMERICA, DISHONESTY REALLY IS THE BEST POLICY - YOU DON'T STAND OUT OF THE CROWD THAT WAY ....
So you don't become MARKED as a TARGET for elimination and removal ...
And so ...
Well Junior, one of the first things I tell a new client,especially ones who have a reputation for shady dealings (in a small town everyone knows who the weasels are) is if they want to do something crooked they better not tell me about it cause that will sever my relationship with them. Also if I run across something less than kosher in their books I'll tell them if a country bumpkin CPA like me can find this what makes them think an auditor from the IRS who is trained to find such shenannigans will miss it?
Sometimes shortcomings in local government require a little patience Junior. We had a cabal of county commissioners who were just about worthless unless you'd supported them to get elected and if you or your family hadn't lived in this county for about the last 150 years. They done some real off the wall crap too, they got the notion Waxahachie needed a JetPort so we could attract all these corporate headquarters here and expand our tax base. Well most of the inhabitants of the county really did not want that but it made no difference, those commissioners new better than a bunch of us dumb taxpayers what was good for us so they went ahead with their plans to build it. They thought they couldn't be stopped since they all had two years until the next election.
Well us dumb taxpayers figured out that to build that damned boondoogle they'd need money and lots of it and the Texas Constitution provides for if the citizens of a county can collect enough signatures we could call for a "Tax Rollback" election. That meant the funding they'd approved and hiked everyones taxes to build this JetPort would have to be returned to us taxpayers. Well we collected the signatures and we held the election and we stymied those hot shots plans.
We're only about half way though the story so bear with me.
These Jack Asses weren't to be out done though. They called the TV stations from Dallas and Fort Worth so they'd have news coverage, then they called together all the county's employees. In front of the rolling cameras they started calling out names for an employee to come forward and publicly fired them with the explaination since the tax roll back they could no longer afford them. They took out about a quarter of the County's workforce so they could continue with their plan to build this JetPort.
Well, that made about 95% of the voters in the county absolutely livid. There is another provision in the Texas Constitution were folks can petition for a recall election. We didn't have to hold the election cause when these jerks saw about 95% of the registered voters in the county had sign a petition for their recall they resigned. The county employees got their jobs back and we don't have a JetPort.
See Junior, if you are patient and have the will of the people on your side the story has a happy ending.
QUOTE(Marine @ Aug 18 2008, 05:54 PM)
See Junior, if you are patient and have the will of the people on your side the story has a happy ending.
The will of the people up here is for the corruption, Marine ....
That is the only real economy that there is up here ....
If it wasn't for the corruption, there wouldn't be nothing at all ...
Corruption is what puts food on people's tables ....
They aren't afraid to use violence to keep it that way ....
Honest young folks get the hell out while they can, in part based on what has been done to me publicly up here to make an example out of me as to what happens to those who get in the way of corruption ...
Glad to hear it might be different down your way, Marine ....
If I hadn't of been born in this ****-hole of a corrupt state up here, I wouldn't be here on a bet ....
But since I was, I'll be damned if I'll be run out for standing up for the law as it is written ....
And so ...
QUOTE(Marine @ Aug 18 2008, 05:54 PM)
Well us dumb taxpayers figured out that to build that damned boondoogle they'd need money and lots of it and the Texas Constitution provides for if the citizens of a county can collect enough signatures we could call for a "Tax Rollback" election.
There is another provision in the Texas Constitution were folks can petition for a recall election.
There is another provision in the Texas Constitution were folks can petition for a recall election.
Well, Marine ....
That was an interesting and inspiring story ....
And it points out what I think is a HUGE difference between down there where you are and up here where I am ....
And that is this - YOU as a citizen are cognizant of the fact that you have a constitution in your state, and further, you know what is in there, and further beyond that, you believe that what the constitution in your state says is what it means ....
And on top of that, you are apparently surrounded by people down there who also have some personal courage, and who, like yourself believe in your state constitution as having value in your lives to protect you from government waste, incompetence and excess ....
IF those same kind of people were to be found up here, life indeed would be different ....
And it sounds like in some respects, anyway, you have a better state constitution than we do ....
BUT ....
The best constitution in the world, Marine, is absolutely worthless when people don't know it even exists, and when they don't believe in it, when told that it does exist ...
And the best constitution in the world is totally worthless if it is not enforceable ....
To enforce the provisions of the constitution, you have to be able to make it to court, if and when necessary ....
If you can't get to court to enforce the constitution, then for all practical purposes, it does not exist ....
Thanks for sharing that story, Marine ....
I would say that stories like that are one strong reason that young people leave New York State in droves ....
Why stay here in this corrupt, repressive lawless ****-hole when freedom and RULE OF LAW and opportunity beckon elsewhere ....
And so ....
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 18 2008, 05:19 AM)
"We're going to have to get the help from the government," Dwyer said referring to state and federal assistance.
This above recent news story, Marine, is a prime example of what I call the CORRUPTION TAX on us American citizens up here .....
The citizens of the United States of America, including yourself on your ranch down there in Texas, should now have to divvy up some more money on top of all the other money you have to kick in to the federal government to make the City of Rensselaer in Rensselaer County in CORRUPT New York State whole, notwithstanding that New York State has had in place regulations since at least 1974 to prevent exactly this from happening in the first place ....
It did happen because of alleged GROSS NEGLIGENCE, MISFEASANCE and MALFEASANCE on the part of the public officials "entrusted" with keeping this from happening, as is spelled out in detail in this New York State Department of Health ENGINEERING DESIGN MANUAL above here ....
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
It was MY DUTY, Marine, to enforce and uphold those regulations ....
TO PREVENT DEVELOPMENT INVESTMENTS IN AREAS THAT DID NOT ASSURE OPTIMUM ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK STATE ...
To do my duty, of course, I had to step right directly into the path of people with a lot of money that they needed to move "through the system" ....
RETURN ON INVESTMENT, Marine ...
ROI ....
I called it for what I saw it as - LAND FRAUD .....
A SCAM ....
Get a COMPLIANT ENGINEER to falsely certify the land as meeting all applicable laws,rules and regulations, sell it to some sucker, often sight unseen, the sucker gets a mortgage which is "bundled" and sold as a "security" to some other sucker who hasn't a clue as to what he or she bought into ....
And the GAME goes on, Marine ....
MANNA FROM HEAVEN!
MONEY FOR NOTHING!
And a real good laundry for dirty money, to boot!
EXCEPT FOR ME ....
But I wasn't even much of a bump in the road, in the end ....
And so .....
PONY UP, Marine!
IT'S YOUR CIVIC DUTY TO REWARD CORRUPTION UP HERE IN NEW YORK STATE!
DON'T THAT MAKE YOU PROUD TO BE A MURRIKAN, Marine?
GREATEST COUNTRY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, I AM TOLD!
Because here, CORRUPTION is government-sponsored and protected ....
WHICH MEANS, Marine, THAT IT WASN'T A HATE CRIME UP HERE WHAT WAS DONE TO ME ...
BY PROVOKING THE WRONG PEOPLE UP HERE, I BROUGHT POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION DOWN ON MYSELF ...
AND POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION AREN'T CRIMES HERE IN NEW YORK STATE ....
ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ITS DEPARTMENT OF NO-JUSTICE FOR HONEST AMERICANS WITHOUT POLITICAL PROTECTION ...
And so ....
This above recent news story, Marine, is a prime example of what I call the CORRUPTION TAX on us American citizens up here .....
The citizens of the United States of America, including yourself on your ranch down there in Texas, should now have to divvy up some more money on top of all the other money you have to kick in to the federal government to make the City of Rensselaer in Rensselaer County in CORRUPT New York State whole, notwithstanding that New York State has had in place regulations since at least 1974 to prevent exactly this from happening in the first place ....
It did happen because of alleged GROSS NEGLIGENCE, MISFEASANCE and MALFEASANCE on the part of the public officials "entrusted" with keeping this from happening, as is spelled out in detail in this New York State Department of Health ENGINEERING DESIGN MANUAL above here ....
Inspection of sites and ground water conditions by developers, followed by similar on-site inspections by local public health engineers and other officials are intended to prevent development investments in areas that do not assure optimum environmental conditions.
It was MY DUTY, Marine, to enforce and uphold those regulations ....
TO PREVENT DEVELOPMENT INVESTMENTS IN AREAS THAT DID NOT ASSURE OPTIMUM ENVIRONMENTAL CONDITIONS IN NEW YORK STATE ...
To do my duty, of course, I had to step right directly into the path of people with a lot of money that they needed to move "through the system" ....
RETURN ON INVESTMENT, Marine ...
ROI ....
I called it for what I saw it as - LAND FRAUD .....
A SCAM ....
Get a COMPLIANT ENGINEER to falsely certify the land as meeting all applicable laws,rules and regulations, sell it to some sucker, often sight unseen, the sucker gets a mortgage which is "bundled" and sold as a "security" to some other sucker who hasn't a clue as to what he or she bought into ....
And the GAME goes on, Marine ....
MANNA FROM HEAVEN!
MONEY FOR NOTHING!
And a real good laundry for dirty money, to boot!
EXCEPT FOR ME ....
But I wasn't even much of a bump in the road, in the end ....
And so .....
PONY UP, Marine!
IT'S YOUR CIVIC DUTY TO REWARD CORRUPTION UP HERE IN NEW YORK STATE!
DON'T THAT MAKE YOU PROUD TO BE A MURRIKAN, Marine?
GREATEST COUNTRY ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH, I AM TOLD!
Because here, CORRUPTION is government-sponsored and protected ....
WHICH MEANS, Marine, THAT IT WASN'T A HATE CRIME UP HERE WHAT WAS DONE TO ME ...
BY PROVOKING THE WRONG PEOPLE UP HERE, I BROUGHT POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION DOWN ON MYSELF ...
AND POLITICAL RETRIBUTION AND RETALIATION AREN'T CRIMES HERE IN NEW YORK STATE ....
ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND ITS DEPARTMENT OF NO-JUSTICE FOR HONEST AMERICANS WITHOUT POLITICAL PROTECTION ...
And so ....
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Apr 2 2005, 06:06 PM)
In a just-released March 31, 2005 Decision of Federal Court for the Northern District of New York, with grave consequences to the common citizen in the Northern District of New York who must have the certification of an expert witness in order to file certain Petitions for Redress of Grievance in the Courts of the State of New York, where negligence or malfeasance by the state or one of its political subdivisions is alleged, a recently-appointed Federal District Court Judge has refused to grant injunctive relief to the Plaintiff therein, a New York State licensed professional engineer and certified associate public health engineer, that would have given him protection of law in the State of New York while giving testimony in court ON BEHALF OF the citizens of the State of New York, against the State of New York, or one of its political subdivisions.
The issue before the Court in that matter, Case No. 1:03-CV-753, Matter of Plante, P.E. v. State of New York, KATHLEEN JIMINO, et al., requiring injunctive relief from the Federal District Court is a retaliatory practice in the Northern District of New York employed against an expert witness against the State of New York, BY THE STATE, where it simply removes the expert witness, as a witness against itself, by the expedient of having one of its doctors issue a signed declaration, SIGHT UNSEEN, that the witness in fact is an alleged dangerous mental patient who requires immediate incarceration in a secure mental health facility in the State of New York!
That order, known as a "9.45", then goes to the New York State Police, who capture the person, the intended victim, as it were, and take him to a designated secure mental health facility, for incarceration!
The "PSYCHIATRIC TAKEDOWN", it is called, and it is illegal, in that a doctor in the State of New York, BY FEDERAL and STATE LAW, both, cannot issue one of these orders IF he has never even seen the person, let alone examined him or her in person, as happened in this just-dismissed case involving this expert witness on behalf of the people of the State of New York, where the state's doctor issued a fraudulent "9.45" order for this expert witness, SIGHT UNSEEN, just days before this expert witness was going to file an affidavit on behalf of the citizens of Rensselaer County documenting continuing corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health having an adverse impact on the public health, safety, and well-being in the Town of Poestenkill, County of Rensselaer, State of New York!
In this case at bar, which was dismissed Sua Sponte by Bush-appointee Hon. Gary L. Sharpe on March 31, 2005, an illegal "9.45" order was issued against the Plaintiff on August 22, 2001, to intimidate and deter the Plaintiff from giving further evidence of corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health in a court of law!
Before the Federal District Court in support of a Motion for Injunctive Relief against the State of New York, the County of Rensselaer and the Town of Poestenkill in this matter was a July 13, 2004 letter from Rensselaer County Criminal Court Justice Patrick J. McGrath, wherein Justice McGrath, the chief criminal court judge in the County of Rensselaer, informed Federal Court Justice Sharpe that he, McGrath, had reviewed the evidence in the case as Rensselaer County's chief criminal court justice, and that he was concerned because that evidence supported a conclusion of violation of federal and state criminal codes, in addition to the civil charges contained in the Complaint in the matter.
Among the evidence which Judge McGrath relied upon in forming his conclusion of violation of federal and state criminal codes was a graphic video tape wherein one of the defendants can be seen physically assaulting and threatening the Plaintiff, and causing him bodily harm, to deter him from performing the duties of a licensed professional engineer in the State of New York, and a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation which is at the very heart of this matter of OUR right to dissent, and to petition for redress of grievance, which apparently has just been stripped from us common citizens in the Northern District of New York by Bush-appointee Sharpe on March 31, 2005.
In that March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which was before Judge Sharpe in the Plaintiff's Motion for Injunctive Relief as Exhibit J, a Special Agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, based upon a review of substantial evidence, concluded:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
It was that last statement by this F.B.I. Special Agent in March of 1989 that set in motion the very chain of causality which has brought us up to this present moment in time in the Northern District of New York, where this Sua Sponte Dismissal of this Federal Civil Rights lawsuit and Plaintiff's Motion for Injunctive Relief by Federal District Court on March 31, 2005, now seriously jeopardizes the rights of all citizens in the Northern District of New York by removing from them the services of the licensed professional engineer whose expert witness testimony they would need to file a Petition for Redress of Grievance with the courts of the State of New York alleging a continuation of this same negligence by the State of New York and Rensselaer County Department of Health to this day.
In the State of New York, for a common citizen to file a Petition for Redress of Grievance with the courts of the state, where negligence by the state, or one of its political subdivisions is alleged, it is necessary to have expert witness testimony which supports the claim, otherwise the petition will be dismissed as frivolous, which can then result in sanctions being issued by the court.
By intimidating those few licensed engineers in the State of New York who are qualified to serve as expert witnesses in court against the State of New York, and its political subdivisions, through this illegal device of the "PSYCHIATRIC TAKE-DOWN", the State of New York has effectively muzzled each and every one of us common citizens here in the Northern District of New York, since without this expert witness testimony, we are simply OUT OF COURT, forever, with no way back in, and the government corruption in the County of Rensselaer and the State of New York that was outlined in that series of F.B.I Reports annexed to the now-dismissed Motion for Injunctive Relief can now flourish with impunity!
The apparent sanctioning of this alleged illegal activity by the State of New York, and its political subdivisions, the County of Rensselaer, and the Town of Poestenkill, by the Federal District Court for the Northern District of New York as of March 31, 2005 now sends a very chilling message indeed to the residents of the Northern District of New York, to wit: "KEEP YOUR MOUTHS SHUT, OR YOU WILL BE NEXT!"
And so, that sucking sound we hear up here is the protection of law going right out the window, and that clanging sound we hear is the massive door of the Federal District Court for the Northern District of New York slamming shut in OUR faces!
And so it goes, here in the Northern District of New York, for the constitutional right of the common man, and woman in the State of New York to redress of grievance, and the right to dissent against corrupt governmental activities in the State of New York, and its political subdivisions that adversely impact the public health, safety, and well-being of those of us in the State of New York who also reside in the Northern District as it is defined by the United States government!
Going, going, gone!
As of March 31, 2005!
The issue before the Court in that matter, Case No. 1:03-CV-753, Matter of Plante, P.E. v. State of New York, KATHLEEN JIMINO, et al., requiring injunctive relief from the Federal District Court is a retaliatory practice in the Northern District of New York employed against an expert witness against the State of New York, BY THE STATE, where it simply removes the expert witness, as a witness against itself, by the expedient of having one of its doctors issue a signed declaration, SIGHT UNSEEN, that the witness in fact is an alleged dangerous mental patient who requires immediate incarceration in a secure mental health facility in the State of New York!
That order, known as a "9.45", then goes to the New York State Police, who capture the person, the intended victim, as it were, and take him to a designated secure mental health facility, for incarceration!
The "PSYCHIATRIC TAKEDOWN", it is called, and it is illegal, in that a doctor in the State of New York, BY FEDERAL and STATE LAW, both, cannot issue one of these orders IF he has never even seen the person, let alone examined him or her in person, as happened in this just-dismissed case involving this expert witness on behalf of the people of the State of New York, where the state's doctor issued a fraudulent "9.45" order for this expert witness, SIGHT UNSEEN, just days before this expert witness was going to file an affidavit on behalf of the citizens of Rensselaer County documenting continuing corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health having an adverse impact on the public health, safety, and well-being in the Town of Poestenkill, County of Rensselaer, State of New York!
In this case at bar, which was dismissed Sua Sponte by Bush-appointee Hon. Gary L. Sharpe on March 31, 2005, an illegal "9.45" order was issued against the Plaintiff on August 22, 2001, to intimidate and deter the Plaintiff from giving further evidence of corruption in the Rensselaer County Department of Health in a court of law!
Before the Federal District Court in support of a Motion for Injunctive Relief against the State of New York, the County of Rensselaer and the Town of Poestenkill in this matter was a July 13, 2004 letter from Rensselaer County Criminal Court Justice Patrick J. McGrath, wherein Justice McGrath, the chief criminal court judge in the County of Rensselaer, informed Federal Court Justice Sharpe that he, McGrath, had reviewed the evidence in the case as Rensselaer County's chief criminal court justice, and that he was concerned because that evidence supported a conclusion of violation of federal and state criminal codes, in addition to the civil charges contained in the Complaint in the matter.
Among the evidence which Judge McGrath relied upon in forming his conclusion of violation of federal and state criminal codes was a graphic video tape wherein one of the defendants can be seen physically assaulting and threatening the Plaintiff, and causing him bodily harm, to deter him from performing the duties of a licensed professional engineer in the State of New York, and a March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation which is at the very heart of this matter of OUR right to dissent, and to petition for redress of grievance, which apparently has just been stripped from us common citizens in the Northern District of New York by Bush-appointee Sharpe on March 31, 2005.
In that March 16, 1989 Report of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which was before Judge Sharpe in the Plaintiff's Motion for Injunctive Relief as Exhibit J, a Special Agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, based upon a review of substantial evidence, concluded:
"According to [name deleted], the results of the State's investigation were that New York State laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, Rensselaer County laws were not being followed by the Rensselaer County Health Department, and there was very little 'enforcement activity' even in the face of illegal sales."
"According to [name deleted], the object of any county health department (in the state of New York) is to protect the public, and not to facilitate developers, or development."
"In the case of Rensselaer County, it appears that the Rensselaer County Health Department was in business to facilitate developers and development rather than to protect the public!"
It was that last statement by this F.B.I. Special Agent in March of 1989 that set in motion the very chain of causality which has brought us up to this present moment in time in the Northern District of New York, where this Sua Sponte Dismissal of this Federal Civil Rights lawsuit and Plaintiff's Motion for Injunctive Relief by Federal District Court on March 31, 2005, now seriously jeopardizes the rights of all citizens in the Northern District of New York by removing from them the services of the licensed professional engineer whose expert witness testimony they would need to file a Petition for Redress of Grievance with the courts of the State of New York alleging a continuation of this same negligence by the State of New York and Rensselaer County Department of Health to this day.
In the State of New York, for a common citizen to file a Petition for Redress of Grievance with the courts of the state, where negligence by the state, or one of its political subdivisions is alleged, it is necessary to have expert witness testimony which supports the claim, otherwise the petition will be dismissed as frivolous, which can then result in sanctions being issued by the court.
By intimidating those few licensed engineers in the State of New York who are qualified to serve as expert witnesses in court against the State of New York, and its political subdivisions, through this illegal device of the "PSYCHIATRIC TAKE-DOWN", the State of New York has effectively muzzled each and every one of us common citizens here in the Northern District of New York, since without this expert witness testimony, we are simply OUT OF COURT, forever, with no way back in, and the government corruption in the County of Rensselaer and the State of New York that was outlined in that series of F.B.I Reports annexed to the now-dismissed Motion for Injunctive Relief can now flourish with impunity!
The apparent sanctioning of this alleged illegal activity by the State of New York, and its political subdivisions, the County of Rensselaer, and the Town of Poestenkill, by the Federal District Court for the Northern District of New York as of March 31, 2005 now sends a very chilling message indeed to the residents of the Northern District of New York, to wit: "KEEP YOUR MOUTHS SHUT, OR YOU WILL BE NEXT!"
And so, that sucking sound we hear up here is the protection of law going right out the window, and that clanging sound we hear is the massive door of the Federal District Court for the Northern District of New York slamming shut in OUR faces!
And so it goes, here in the Northern District of New York, for the constitutional right of the common man, and woman in the State of New York to redress of grievance, and the right to dissent against corrupt governmental activities in the State of New York, and its political subdivisions that adversely impact the public health, safety, and well-being of those of us in the State of New York who also reside in the Northern District as it is defined by the United States government!
Going, going, gone!
As of March 31, 2005!
AND AS THE COST TO US TAXPAYERS OF YEARS OF MISFEASANCE, MALFEASANCE AND GROS NEGLIGENCE BY PUBLIC OFFICIALS IN NEW YORK STATE AND RENSSELAER COUNTY CONTINUES TO MOUNT UP, WE HAVE ...
"State, federal officials to survey flood damage - Rensselaer County estimates cost at $21.75 million"
By KENNETH C. CROWE II, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Tuesday, August 19, 2008
RENSSELAER -- Federal and state emergency management officials will assess the damage caused by the Aug. 11 floods during an inspection Wednesday, state and county officials said Monday.
Rensselaer County submitted to the State Emergency Management Office damage estimates of $21.75 million.
Of that amount, 93 percent -- $20.29 million -- occurred in the city of Rensselaer after the Quackenderry Creek overflowed its banks.
Based on the information provided by Rensselaer County, SEMO formally requested the Federal Emergency Management Agency to perform a Joint Preliminary Damage Assessment, County Executive Kathleen Jimino said.
"The state and federal governments will be working with our local municipalities to survey the damage to see what is eligible for federal assistance through existing federal programs," Jimino said.
State and federal officials will work with local representatives to ascertain the extent of the damage and then make recommendations on obtaining financial help, said SEMO spokesman Dennis Michalski.
"The state's job is to get any dollars we can" from FEMA, Michalski said.
Mayor Dan Dwyer said, "We need federal help. We need state help."
The city lifted its state of emergency at 5 p.m. Monday.
The Rensselaer Little League, which suffered more than $100,000 of damage to its Fedelli Field and facilities behind the city public works garage on Willow Street, received a $5,000 check from Hannaford Supermarkets on Monday.
"We wanted to do something to help the local residents," said Anthony Bottillo, manager of the Hannaford West Sand Lake store.
"It doesn't take a grand slam to win the battle," Bottillo said.
"All we want is businesses and organizations to step up to the plate."
Little League officials said they've also received donations and offers of assistance from individuals.
Anyone seeking to assist with tools, equipment or labor is asked to contact league President Thomas Burgess at 488-9922.
The city will hold a fundraiser on Aug. 28 at Casey's Banquet House, 301 Washington Ave., to help residents whose homes were damaged in the flooding, Dwyer said.
The city also has established a fund to assist residents.
Donations may be made through Key Bank.
C. Crowe II can be reached at 581-8438 or by e-mail at kcrowe@timesunion.com.
AND AS WE CONTINUE TO TRACK THE FRUITS OF INTENTIONAL GOVERNMENT NEGLIGENCE AND MISFEASANCE AND MALFEASANCE IN HERE, ALONG WITH THE INTENTIONAL INTIMIDATION OF THOSE WHO WOULD CHALLENGE THIS INTENTIONAL NEGLIGENCE, WE HAVE ...
"Rensselaer citizens demand flood aid - Officials say they are seeking state help, but federal funds are unlikely"
By BRIAN NEARING, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Thursday, August 21, 2008
RENSSELAER -- Mayor Dan Dwyer had no easy answers to a deluge of questions Wednesday night from residents demanding help after flash flooding this month.
The mayor engaged in heated debate on the steps of City Hall during a break in a Common Council meeting after saying it was doubtful that private homeowners could get federal aid.
Dwyer said the city would help through private fundraisers.
"Everyone here is at the breaking point," Dwyer said after clashing with Fifth Street resident Tom Zulick and others who want help now.
"We are working day and night on this."
"I am tired, too."
Dwyer said he asked Gov. David Paterson to declare parts of the city a state disaster area, which would produce state assistance.
On Aug. 11, the Quackenderry Creek -- swelled by six inches of rain in a few hours -- barreled into the Hollow neighborhood, leaving about 60 homeowners with damage.
Water ripped out culverts between Fifth and Sixth streets near Partition Street, which backed up the waters even more, said Fifth Street resident Mary Lou DelRio.
"We want the cost of damages from whoever is responsible," she said.
Dwyer said a "second surge" caused most damage.
"We don't know where it came from."
In meeting with officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Wednesday, Dwyer said estimated damage was $21.2 million.
"We elected this Council and we can take it out," Zulick told Dwyer before both men pointed fingers at each other.
Zulick asked whether the new Rensselaer Middle/High School campus upstream on the Quackenderry made flooding worse.
The Department of Environmental Conservation said excessive rain, not upstream construction, was responsible.
Dwyer said a $100-a-ticket fundraiser for flood assistance is planned Aug. 28 at Casey's Restaurant on Washington Avenue, with a goal of raising $50,000.
"I am telling people to save their receipts for repairs."
"We will cover as much as possible."
Brian Nearing can be reached at 454-5094 or by e-mail at bnearing@timesunion.com.
"Rensselaer citizens demand flood aid - Officials say they are seeking state help, but federal funds are unlikely"
By BRIAN NEARING, Staff writer, Albany, New York Times Union
First published: Thursday, August 21, 2008
RENSSELAER -- Mayor Dan Dwyer had no easy answers to a deluge of questions Wednesday night from residents demanding help after flash flooding this month.
The mayor engaged in heated debate on the steps of City Hall during a break in a Common Council meeting after saying it was doubtful that private homeowners could get federal aid.
Dwyer said the city would help through private fundraisers.
"Everyone here is at the breaking point," Dwyer said after clashing with Fifth Street resident Tom Zulick and others who want help now.
"We are working day and night on this."
"I am tired, too."
Dwyer said he asked Gov. David Paterson to declare parts of the city a state disaster area, which would produce state assistance.
On Aug. 11, the Quackenderry Creek -- swelled by six inches of rain in a few hours -- barreled into the Hollow neighborhood, leaving about 60 homeowners with damage.
Water ripped out culverts between Fifth and Sixth streets near Partition Street, which backed up the waters even more, said Fifth Street resident Mary Lou DelRio.
"We want the cost of damages from whoever is responsible," she said.
Dwyer said a "second surge" caused most damage.
"We don't know where it came from."
In meeting with officials from the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Wednesday, Dwyer said estimated damage was $21.2 million.
"We elected this Council and we can take it out," Zulick told Dwyer before both men pointed fingers at each other.
Zulick asked whether the new Rensselaer Middle/High School campus upstream on the Quackenderry made flooding worse.
The Department of Environmental Conservation said excessive rain, not upstream construction, was responsible.
Dwyer said a $100-a-ticket fundraiser for flood assistance is planned Aug. 28 at Casey's Restaurant on Washington Avenue, with a goal of raising $50,000.
"I am telling people to save their receipts for repairs."
"We will cover as much as possible."
Brian Nearing can be reached at 454-5094 or by e-mail at bnearing@timesunion.com.
QUOTE(Livyjr @ Aug 21 2008, 06:18 AM)
AND AS WE CONTINUE TO TRACK THE FRUITS OF INTENTIONAL GOVERNMENT NEGLIGENCE AND MISFEASANCE AND MALFEASANCE IN HERE, ALONG WITH THE INTENTIONAL INTIMIDATION OF THOSE WHO WOULD CHALLENGE THIS INTENTIONAL NEGLIGENCE, WE HAVE ...
WHAT IS THE REAL COST TO AMERICA OF A HUGE STACK OF LIES?
"Freddie Mac courts investors, Buffett passes - Freddie Mac tries to get investors to buy its stock to raise capital, but Buffett passes"
By J.W. ELPHINSTONE, Associated Press
Last updated: 6:12 p.m., Friday, August 22, 2008