WHITE PLAINS CITIZENETREPORTER 3,374,995 VISITS IN ONE YEAR—65,000 VISITS A WEEK BY 985,281 VISITORS

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WPCNR PRESS BOX. By Fastpitch Johnny. August 13, 2004, UPDATED August 14, 2004 7:45 A.M.: Team USA Softball opened its Olympic softball competition early Saturday morning at 5 A.M E.D.T. (4 A.M. C.D.T.) from Athens winning the game 7-0.  At the Juggernaut game Wednesday night, WPCNR caught up with Alicia Smith, the former John Jay Cross River softball star, star Centerfielder for the two-time national ASA Champion Stratford Brakettes in 2002 and 2003. She talked with us about her summer in Italy playing with a team in the Italian fastpitch professional league and what to expect in the U.S.A.-Italy game. She turned out to be a great prognosticator.

THE STORY ON THE ITALIAN- USA MATCH UP: Alicia Smith, fleet, rangy, freckle-blessed cover-it-all centerfielder for the Brakettes is an Assistant Softball coach for Virginia Tech. Ms. Smith played the past three months for the Langhivano Softball Club in Nuoro, on the island of Sardinia in Italy in the Italian Federation.  Ms. Smith was in the stands for the final big series with the Texas Thunder supporting former Brakette stars on the Juggernaut, Germaine Fairchild, Kaci Clark and Jen Smith. She gave WPCNR a unique perspective on what to expect in the Team USA-Italy softball opener in Athens. And, as it turns out, she was absolutely correct. Team U.S.A. defeated Italy, 8-0 Saturday afternoon in Athens. Lisa Fernandez, Kelly Kretschmann, Jessica Mendoza and Natasha Whatly were the hitting stars. Jessica Finch won it. Cat Osterman, (former Brakette)  snuffed an Italian rally in relief in the fifth. Photo by WPCNR Sports.

.“I played for the Nuoro Softball program in the Italian Federation. I stayed  2-1/2 months on the island of Sardinia and we competed with 10 teams throughout the mainland of Italy, as well,” the former hard-hitting, slick fielding good-looking centerfielder for the Stratford Brakettes explained. She is home early from her European season due to an ankle injury.  “I pitched for them a little bit, unfortunately I had a little ankle injury, so I ended also having to contribute at shortstop for the first time, and I did a little outfield.”

Universal Language of the Ballfield.

WPCNR asked about the commitment the Federation expects and how it was for an American woman in Italy playing the game. “They (Longhivano) kind of rely on the foreign players to be pretty versatile, just come in and do what we need you to do. We play a couple of doubleheaders a week, practice all the time. It was probably the most unique experience I’ve ever had. Because not only your communication is a challenge to the utmost because I can’t even speak the language.”

“It was an amazing experience with how a group of about 15 girls, ranging in ages from 17 to 31, speaking three different languages on the team can come together and play with that barrier. I can’t recollect the record, but our job is to finish in the top 7 of 10 so they can keep the young squad in the division. They have the bottom two teams in the league drop a division every year.”

Experienced Players Brought in to Develop the Young Guns.

“We had a very young team, so they bring the foreign players in with the responsibility of kind of helping out fostering their program, helping out the youth programs with coaching and clinics and what not.  Just contributing our knowledge to their program.”

Italian Olympic Softball Team Players  have to Play in the Professional League in Italy.

Smith talked about the difference between ASA’s Team USA and the Italian Team the American players face in Athens today:

“Actually unlike the professional league in the U.S.A. (The National Pro Fastpitch League), the Italian National Team, their players have to play in this softball professional league, (the Italian Federation), as well. The top team, does have an abundance of the players (you will see today from Athens), but it’s great to be able to compete against other nation’s Olympics caliber athletes. You know, here playing with the Brakettes, and my experience in college, I’ve gotten a chance to play against our own as well as the Canada Cup.

The Italian Federation is a nice league. We really get to interact with other teams. When we play on the road it’s a very familial setting, despite the fact that it’s severely competitive out there (on the field). When the game’s over, it’s time for big dinners.”

Italians will Struggle Offensively.

Asked what she expected when Italy plays Whatly, Bustos, Nuveman, and the rest of the Team USA stars early Saturday morning, Smith said, “I think they’re going to struggle with the offense. (They did)The Italian team is not very strong offensively. (They weren’t.) They’re able to benefit because they have several Italian-Americans. So their pitching staff is loaded  with several Italian-Americans from the states here. They’re just going to be mismatched. (They were).”

“The USA’s Offense is definitely going to take it to them before they can get to our pitchers.”

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WPCNR COMMON COUNCIL CHRONICLE-EXAMINER. By John F. Bailey. August 13, 2004: The Common Council in a 5 minute meeting this morning voted 6-0, with Tom Roach in absentia (on vacation), to rollback the hours parking meters are enforced in the outlying neighborhoods outside the business district. The ordinance takes effect immediately. The Council also voted to approve valet parking for 60 feet of curb on the East Side of Mamaroneck Avenue in front of the City Center restaurants, Zanaro’s and Legal Seafood.

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WPCNR MAIN STREET JOURNAL. By John F. Bailey. August 12, 2004: Cappelli Enterpises announced to WPCNR Thursday that the firm will begin relining the Main Street sewer line in little more than two weeks. Bruce Berg, Vice President of Cappelli Enterprises said the firm is contracting with a private company within the next week to reline the sewer at Mr. Cappelli’s expense as agreed with the Department of Public Works. Berg said Cappelli Enterprises decided to hire their own firm rather than pay the city to execute the relining. He said work on the relining should begin very soon.

LOUIS CAPPELLI, The Super Developer Addressing the Common Council June 7, 2004 at approval of his 221 Main Street Cappelli Hotel-Condoplex. Photo by WPCNR News.

A sewer engineer told WPCNR the relining process, that consists of applying a plastic coating on the interior of the sewer pipe, has been found to improve sewer flow so much that it decreases the level of the sewer pipe by as much as 50%. He said that it prevents seepage from cracks in the sewer line, eliminates coagulations of grease and other sluggish contents that tend to slow the flow.

Louis Cappelli was very confident in the process in his appearance on White Plains Week on December 3, 2003, he explained the compromise he and the city had worked out to make sure the Main Street Sewer could handle the effluent from the City Center:

“The Department of Public Works came up with a very creative and ingenious idea that the pipe capacity could be increased substantially by lining the pipe, in effect making it smoother, and that cost of lining that pipe which is in very good shape, but could be lined is significantly less than in rebuilding the sewer because you don’t have to dig in the ground,” Cappelli said.

On that show, Cappelli explained the process: “You do it from inside. You actually get inside the pipe with special equipment, go down the pipe and you line it. It’s much cheaper.”

The Nicoletti RedLine and Nicoletti Bypass Solution.

The lining of the pipe was the suggestion of Joseph Nicoletti, Commissioner of Public Works, as a solution to the controversy over just how high the water in the pipe was running. Mr. Cappelli’s consultants said, based on flow meter tests, that it was averaging 25% tops and 15% at its lowest based on their flow meter tests.

Mr. Nicoletti doubted those results and purchased the exact same machine for the city of White Plains to check out the results  over objection by Mayor Delfino. Mr. Nicoletti’s flow readings showed the sewer was averaging less than 20% average capacity.

However, the meter used only measures flow rate, it does not measure volume.

Mr. Nicoletti, leary of his Sewer Stick  measurements (the standard way of measuring volume of sewer flow in cities and towns nationwide). His stick tests showed the sewer running at or near capacity. He wrote a memo to George Gretsas in September, 2001, (as the City Center approached approval), warning of “catastrophic results” if the City Center effluent from its two apartment towers were to be added to the Main Street sewer line.

The September 2001 memo surfaced by luck only last fall as a result of a Freedom of Information Act request filed by Susan Elan of The Journal News. What the memo confirmed was that Mr. Nicoletti had serious reservations about the sewer capacity that was surpressed by the City’s former Executive Officer from the Common Council.

All Council members told WPCNR they had never seen the memorandum, and did not take seriously, or did not noitce, or thought to be just “boilerplate” the paragraph written into the Site Plan Approval  in which Mr. Nicoletti noted his concerns about the sewer.

As a result of the surfacing of that memo by Ms. Elan’s brilliant and gutsy FOIA, producing the effluent memo,The Mayor,  Mr. Cappelli, Mr. Nicoletti and the Common Council agreed on relining the Main Street Sewer and building a separate “direct connect” sewer line, just to make sure for the Cappelli Hotel Condoplex would be safely effluented. That Hotel project (known more prosaicly as 221 Main Street) was just approved in June of 2004.

WPCNR has learned the city relined a portion of the sewer line south of  Main Street on Broadway within the last year which has substantially improved the flow on South Broadway and also required and had relined the Mamaroneck Avenue sewer line as a condition of the JPI 300 Mamaroneck Avenue Jefferson project.