WHITE PLAINS CITIZENETREPORTER SETS RECORD VISITS FOR YEAR 7,017,658 VISITS! 2,098,003 VISITORS MADE 6 VISITS A DAY EVERY DAY. 63,330 UNIQUE VISITORS MADE 133,730 VISITS IN DECEMBER. WPCNR AVERAGED 17,284 VISITORS A WEEK, VISITING 31,270 TIMES.

Hits: 3430

379 NEW CASES A DAY FIRST 4 DAYS OF WEEK, 1,516 TOTAL SUNDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY

WPCNR COVID DAILY. Statistics from NY State Covid Tracker. Observations & Analysis by John F. Bailey. May 5, 2022:

Westchester County experienced its largest day of positives Wednesday since January 27 of this year when it was coming off the covid 4^th and largest wave  and it reported  569 new infections that day.

Sadly, the number of 513 infections of new persons with covid, also matched up with the 548 new positives Westchester had December 14, 2001 when that fourth wave was just beginning. That is very ominous as we enter an “Anything Goes” behavior mode.

If the 569 infection level a day continues through Saturday, Westchester will hit 2,653 infections through Saturday well above the 2,649 experienced through April 30. However the pattern of these last five weeks indicates that Thursday, Friday and Saturday escalates infections. Last week we had 1,214  infections the last three days of last week If we hit that level or exceed it Westchester could conceivably hit 3,867 infections for this week.

All the counties in the Mid-Hudson Region are experiencing high daily growth rates. Covid is spreading strongly in Orange,. Rockland., Dutchess and Ulster County, averaging 291 new positives yesterday. The infection rates on the low number of tests done in Orange, Rockland, Dutchess and Ulster are an average 7-1/4 % positives of the low numbers of tests.

The Mid-Hudson Region WPCNR COVIDSTOPPERS NOTE BOOK shows the Mid-Hudson region of  1,252 infections over  our 7 counties is dwarfed by Nassau County with 906 new positives Wednesday  and Suffolk County new positives of  742 – 1,648 in a day, 400 more than the Mid-Hudson counties. Nassau & Suffolk have been the leaders in infections for months proportionately ahead of the 7 Mid-Hud counties.

New York City Wednesday reached 3,476 new positives across the 5 boroughs, when on Sunday NYC reported only 1,971. Wednesday was  the second straight day that all 5 boroughs totaled 3,000 new positives.  As of the end of testing Wednesday, NYC had 11,043 new cases. This week at 3,000 new infections the next three days, NYC can report as many as  20,000 new positives. The media, our political leaders, are whistling past the graveyard, crossing their fingers and betting your health.

The irresponsible mantra repeated by the media that covid is in retreat is simply not true. What data is there to prove that? It’s not there. This is the sixth consecutive week in Westchester where we are going to increase in infections.

It is not spreading less. It is spreading more. Who does not see that? The infections by my observations are infecting others more quickly, within 2 days!

The rush to public gatherings under the guise of getting “back to normal,” should be called “getting back to making money at the people’s peril.”

Hits: 938

WPCNR STAGE DOOR. By John F. Bailey. May 5, 2022:

Bill Stutler’s Westchester Theatre is opening Million Dollar Quartet this week at the Chappaqua Performing Arts Center on the Reader’s Digest former headquarters campus.

The ovations for the Gershwin Entertainment production preparing to take Tony Award winning and nominated Quartet have filled the classic CPAC. Following Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins of Quartet through May 22 is is the musical comedy, Menopause The Musical behind the footlights June 16 through 25.

They are the first two productions in the debut effort Mr. Stutler, former empressario for 46 years of the Westchester Broadway Theatre is undertaking to bring back Equity productions of outstanding Broadway classics, new Broadway hits and one-night superstands back to the discerning Westchester County theatre crowd

WPCNR caught up with Mr. Stutler by the virtual “Stage Door” of Zoom today to discuss this effort its promise of the future to be. Here is my interview with Bill,from this afternoon.

Hits: 259

Hits: 473

WPCNR COVID DAILY. Statistics from the NY Covid Tracker. Observations & Analysis by John F. Bailey. May 4, 2022:

Sunday and Monday produced 251 and 281 new covid cases of 6,218 tests conducted in Westchester County (266 NEW CASES A day) indicating a pattern of increasingly growing infections now at the beginning of weeks.

The infections then as the pattern of the WPCNR COVID LOG BOOK FOR APRIL shows over the last three weeks grow  swiftly Wednesday Thursday and Friday as more persons test and discover they have covid.

Why the public choosees to self-test, or come in for a test is unclear.

Do they have symptoms? Are they going to travel? Go to a party? Why test? Are they unvaccinated? Are they vaccinated with one dose? Or if you are fully vaccinated plus a booster, why test at all? When I felt I was exposed to persons who got covid,  I got tested and crossed our fingers.

The assumption I make, and it is strictly my opinion is those who have symptoms from activity on weekends with persons , perhaps this means a fast fast fast ability of covid variants to spread and infect.

But let us not kid ourselves. I am not a doctor and I do not have the statistics that should be being kept on every positive-reported person daily. The question is does the medical leaders in counties across NY really want to know what can shed light on this spread. Privacy laws applying to health matters cannot take precedence, here. Information must be gathered to see if the incubation period of the posse of covid variants is the same (10 to 14 days) or is faster.

Where are the answers to the obvious questions we need to know about persons testing positive.

Those questions are, in my opinion, and I am not a doctor,  just a reporter trying to help.

The only way to fight the obviously growing spread is to know how people are getting infected, why people think they might be positive, what their activities were, their ages, especially school children 5 to 18, and we know the infections in the schools are growing rapidly the last two weeks, and how sick did all persons get. In the matter of growing hospitalizations, obviously the covid infections for those hospitalized were serious. I would say the public needs to know who is getting really sick from this disease now being touted by officials as “people are not getting as sick from it.”

Questions we need to know about the new positives, I believe should be:

1. What were your activities the last few days?
2. When did you first experience symptoms, if you did ?
3. Why did you think you needed to be tested?
4. How many people did you encounter and where did you encounter them? (So contact tracing can be resumed, if no longer being done, in fact we do not know if contract tracing of the new positives the last 5 weeks of which there have been 9,632 in Westchester County alone.
5. Were you vaccinated? How many doses? Fully vaccinated? Fully vaccinated with one booster? No vaccinations? If child were they fully vaccinated, one shot, or no vaccinations at all.
6. Hospitalized, how serious and why?
7. Is this the second time you have caught covid?

That way you can establish a pattern of what is causing this spread. We the public need to told the truth about what is happening to cause 2,000 new infections a week in this county.

 Since most persons testing are doing it at home with a more reliable test,  or at a pharmacy or pop-up spot should be being closely monitored to answer questions like the ones that come to my mind as a rational reporter, if these questions are asked and info being collected we should be told the patterns.

If this information is known and is being collected and analyzed the intelligence and patterns that can be determined from these infections should not be suppressed. Medical experts  information to public officials on the state of the disease effects on various segments and demographics of the now 5^th Wave rolling in for a month should not be held back.

Let us assume that it is not being held back.

That would mean these questions I as a complete amateur are not being asked.

If this pandemic is now being judged over and we are opening up everything: restaurants, concerts, parades, beaches, and promoting and this is the effort of political leaders to promote that it is safe out there, let us hope 10,000 in a month in this county alone is just due persons refusing to vaccinate.

But if the leaders and health officials are wrong.

So far the laissez faire approach to socializing, masking mingling and staging giant events is not working. 10,000 cases in 5 weeks tells you that.

Through yesterday 19 Westchester Towns and Cities has over 100 cases the last two weeks and averaged 398 new cases daily, roughly paralleling the 4,615 new cases in Westchester the last two weeks. The spread of the infections are in the North, South East and West sections of the county. The highest infections are in the cities, but Peekskill and Port Chester each have less than 100 cases, 80 each while White Plains has  312 cases, Mount Vernon, 287, New Rochelle 399 and Yonkers, 692.

AROUND THE COUNTY, TOWN BY TOWN, CITY BY CITY  TWO WEEKS  OF OVER 100 ACTIVE CASES RANKED MAY 2, 2022

1. YONKERS  692 ACTIVE CASES  43 DAILY CASES

• NEW ROCHELLE  399

• GREENBURGH 318 ACTIVE CASES 26 DAILY CASES

• WHITE PLAINS  312 ACTIVE CASES  24 NEW A DAY

• MOUNT VERNON  287 ACTIVE CASES  12 NEW A DAY

• NORTH CASTLE & NEW CASTLE  249 ACTIVE CASES   24 NEW CASES DAILY

• YORKTOWN  241 ACTIVE CASES   12 NEW CASES A DAY

• MOUNT PLEASANT  211 ACTIVE CASES,  23 NEW CASES DAILY

• CORTLANDT  203 ACTIVE CASES, 27 NEW DAILY CASES

1. MAMARONECK TOWN, VILLAGE, LARCHMONT   197 ACTIVE CASES   11 NEW DAILY

1. HARRISON   149  ACTIVE CASES, 6 DAILY

1. SCARSDALE 134 ACTIVE CASES   15 DAILY NEW CASES

1. SLEEPY HOLLOW AND TARRYTOWN   138 ACTIVE CASES   10 DAILY

1. SOMERS   120 ACTIVE CASES, 10  A DAY

1. BEDFORD   129 ACTIVE CASES   11 NEW CASES DAILY

Hits: 315

Governor Kathy Hochul today announced that she is appointing Representative Antonio Delgado to serve as Lieutenant Governor of New York.

Representative Delgado currently represents New York’s 19th Congressional District, which includes the Hudson Valley and Catskills. Delgado is Afro-Latino, the first person of color to represent Upstate New York in Congress and a member of both the Black and Hispanic Congressional Caucuses.   

EDITOR’S NOTE: THE WAY TO THE NEW NOMINATION WAS MADE POSSIBLE BY THE NEW YORK STATE SENATE VOTING 34-29 AND THE NY ASSEMBLY FOLLOWING SUIT VOTING 82-57 TO PASS GOVERNOR HOCHUL-REQUESTED NEW LEGISLATION TO ALLOW REMOVAL OF A CANDIDATE FROM THE BALLOT. BRIAN BENJAMIN, THE ERSTWHILE LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR CANDIDATE RUNNING WITH GOVERNOR HOCHUL FOR THE DEMOCRATIC NOMINATION FOR GOVERNOR RESIGNED WHEN ARRESTED ON BRIBERY CHARGES. ON TWITTER LAST NIGHT BENJAMIN SAID HE WOULD SIGN FORMS REMOVING HIS NAME FROM THE BALLOT. THE QUOTE FROM TWITTER: “I WOULD BE UNABLE TO SERVE UNDER THESE CIRCUMSTANCES.”

“I am proud to appoint Antonio Delgado, an outstanding leader and public servant, as Lieutenant Governor of New York, and I look forward to working with him to usher in a new era of fairness, equity, and prosperity for communities across the State,” Governor Hochul said. “We share a belief in working together to get things done for New Yorkers, and Representative Delgado has an incredible record of doing just that in Congress. With Antonio Delgado by my side serving as Lieutenant Governor, we will both make history – and make a difference.” 

“New Yorkers deserve a Lieutenant Governor who’s working day and night to make lives better for working people and their families,” Representative Delgado said. “Upstate, downstate, doesn’t matter. We all want the same things, security, family, and opportunity. The key is to listen to New Yorkers from all walks of life and then be their voice to get the job done.”  

A native of Upstate New York, Representative Delgado grew up in Schenectady and lives in Rhinebeck with his wife, Lacey, and their twin eight-year-old sons, Maxwell and Coltrane. He attended Colgate University and earned a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford. Then, he received a law degree from Harvard Law School, where he met Lacey. He lived in New York City for several years as a young lawyer.

In Congress he has led the fight to deliver for his constituents – providing relief for family farms, helping small businesses rebuild and thrive, creating clean energy jobs, increasing access to broadband, and supporting our veterans.

In Congress, he’s worked with both parties to get things done for New Yorkers. He’s had 18 bills signed into law by Presidents of both parties. He passed critical reforms including the  Strengthening Financial Aid for Students Act, and the Improving Benefits for Underserved Veterans Act, Direct Support for Communities Act and the Small Business Relief Accessibility Act. 

Representative Delgado has held more than 65 town halls over his two terms in office across all 11 counties in the 19th District. Representative Delgado is also committed to ensuring transparency and accessibility, and he created four bipartisan, locally-based advisory committees on the priorities important to NY-19, including Small Business, Agriculture, Health Care and Veterans.  

He was first elected to Congress in 2018. Representative Delgado is the Chairman of the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Commodity Exchanges, Energy, and Credit, and he serves on the House Small Business and Transportation and Infrastructure Committees.