THE WORLD READS WHITE PLAINS CITIZENETREPORTER — 8,324,077 VISITS IN ONE YEAR | 2,905,611 VISITORS VISIT 8,324,077 TIMES 3 TIMES EVERY DAY IN ONE YEAR. HIGHEST ACTIVITY IN WPCNR HISTORY.White PlainsCitizeNetReporter lifted its worldwide visits from unique visitors to wpcnr.com to 8,324,077,a 1,306,419 increase in visits in one year from 7,017,658 visits to the site last year which covers White Plains and Westchester County. The 8,324,077 visits were made by 2,005,611 unique visitors who visited wpcnr an average of 3 visits a day. ON JULY 20- -2026 visitors have accessed wpcnr and made 3,072 visits an average of 1.6 visits. In the last week 33,495 individual vistors made 54,458 visits, averaging 1.6 visits. In the last month, 152,940 visitors recorded 229,338 visits (1.5 visits)

Skyliners, Spitfires Intro NYC to Synchro at The Pond Spreading Holiday Cheer.

Posted on December 21, 2006 by John Bailey

WPCNR PRESS BOX. December 21, 2006: The Skyliners Junior Synchronized Skating Team of The Skating Club of New York and the Spitfires of the Springdale Skating Club in Stamford presented their synchronized skating programs at The Pond in Bryant Park last night at the spiffy rink before about 1,000 skater-spectactors, many seeing the sport for the first time. The girls from the Connecticut, Westchester and New Jersey and New York City took the train in with their parents to spread holiday cheer and the synchro “word,” by showcasing the fastest growing phenomena in skating — synchronized skating.

Skating in The City: The Skyliners Junior Team perform “Proud Mary” at The “fabulous” Pond in Bryant Park, Thursday night against the backdrop of, appropriately the New York Skyline and Empire State Building. Photo, WPCNR Sports

Both teams skated flawlessly, drawing ooh’s and applause for their intricate, barrier-challenging formations against the New York skyline — despite the short rink– showcasing and introducing their passion to many seeing it for the first time, the world’s only true team sport. The Skyliners have been honored by being invited to skate at Governor-Elect Eliot Spitzer’s Inauguration in Albany, January 1 on the Albany Mall.

The Spitfires from Stamford Twin Rinks in Synchro-Motion! Photo, WPCNR Sports

BID Proposes Tripling Budget (to $1.6M)–Seeks Partnership Expansion to Malls

Posted on December 21, 2006 by John Bailey

WPCNR DOWNTOWN NEWS. By John F. Bailey. December 21, 2006: The White Plains Downtown Business Improvement District, (“The BID”) proposed a tripling of its assessment budget Wednesday evening from its present budget of $575,000 to $1.65 Million Tuesday, to be accomplished by expanding the BID southward to Maple Avenue, West along Post Road to White Plains Hospital Center and West along Main Street to include The Galleria and and Eastward down Maple Avenue to include The Westchester, The White Plains Pavilion, Fortunoff and Bloomingdale’s.

NEW BUSINESS IMPROVEMENT DISTRICTS PROPOSED. Slide demonstrating expansion of the Downtown Business Improvement District to the West, South and East, extending South to the Bloomingdale Road, Mamaroneck Avenue intersection. The Districts would include malls not currently in the BID. Photo, WPCNR News

Rick Ammirato, the Executive Director of the BID made a presentation to the Common Council proposing their blessing of the BID expansion. The new $1.65 Million in assessments that would be generated by the expansion of the BID to 57,345 square feet that would be generated by the BID formula applied to the property owners in the West, South and East sides of the city where they are eying expansion. Slide above shows “assessment” impact on different-sized properties. “GFA” stands for Gross Footage Area and “LSF” stands for Linear Square Frontage (on street).

Hearing in February Perhaps.

Ammirato said that if the Council is amiable to the plan presented last night, that he hoped a public hearing on the proposed expansion would be held in February. At which time all property owners and interested parties could speak on their feelings about expanding the district. After the hearing, all property owners in the newly proposed BID Districts would be given the opportunity to vote on the plans or opt-out.

Ammirato noted that there are two ways the expansion of the districts would be defeated — if more than 50% of all property owners in the affected areas vote against it or if 50% of the largest Gross Footage Area owners voted against it. If that test is met, Ammiratto said the expansion plan goes to the New York State Comptroller for approval. Mr.Ammirato told WPCNR today that if any newly proposed districts defeated the proposal, the BID may redraw its plan to reconfigure to property owners who do wish to be in a BID District.

The new district would expand West along the South side of Main Street to the Train Station (including the Galleria), according to Ammirato, and West along East Post Road past White Plains Hospital Center, and South on Mamaroneck Road to the Bloomingdale Road intersection.

Would Enable BID to Expand Services

Ammirato aggressively outlined a new role for the BID which has limited its $675,000 budget to staging and managing city events to attract customers to the Central Business District such as parades, the New Year’s Eve celebration, a Taste of White Plains, and occasional events at Renaissance Plaza. as well as providing a 4-man sidewalk sweeping team to keep the downtown clean during daylight hours.

Ammirato said the expansion of the BID zone would enable the BID to hire 8 more street sweepers (a total of 12) to apply the BID clean streets campaign to the new areas the BID hopes to expand. Ammirato also said the new budget would enable the BID to buy diesel-powered “Green Machine” sidewalk sweeping machines that would triple the efficiency of the BID sidewalk sweeping team.

Jeffrey Sluman, of the BID said that Mr. Ammirato and members of the BID board would be approaching large property owners and small property owners in the new BID expansion areas if the Council approves, in January to convince the property owners of the advantages of extending the BID District for themselves as well as for the city.

Visions of the BID

According to Mr. Ammirato, the BID has great visions of what to do with the additional Million Dollars in budget generated by expanding the BID District.

He said the BID wants to program 14 weeks of events at Renaissance Plaza, plan a summer concert on Mamaroneck Avenue, hold a second Child Safety Day on East Post Road/ Lexington Avenue; generate a Holiday Shopping Promotion the day after Thanksgiving similar to that staged by Stamford. He also plans to continue the Small Business Seminar Series, recently initiated at the White Plains Performing Arts Center.

Paid Professional Ambassadors

Another initiative would be the creation of fulltime on-the-street, paid “Professional Ambassadors” for “High Pedestrian Traffic” areas in the city including the City Center, Renaissance Plaza, White Plains Hospital and the White Plains Metro Station, which he described as a very neglected area in terms of informing visitors to the city of what is going on in the city and where shopping, restaurants, and places to see.

Ammirato proposed the BID could also play a role marketing the city by “helping businesses move to White Plains, and serving as a “clearing house” for information on the city. He also wanted the BID to play a role in “Retail Recruitment” and to be “more aggressive recruiting quality retailers not yet represented in White Plains,” roles presumably traditionally centered in the Mayor’s Office.

Electric Signage

The BID also proposed electronic signage in the downtown area to promote daily events in the city, BID events, White Plains Performing Arts Center Events, even traffic flow information and public meetings.

Rita Malmud was the only councilmember to say this was a “good idea,” while the Mayor Joseph Delfino, dryly commented at one point, that the BID should ask him (the Mayor) for Free Parking, not Al Moroni the Director of Parking. The presentation was striking for the lack of questions asked by the council.

At the beginning of the administration, Mr. Ammirato explained that the assessment a property owner pays is determined by their gross square footage and their Linier frontage on the street added together.

He pointed out that by far the larger share is paid by the larger property owners siting the example below.

In seeking to expand the BID District, Ammirato said the goal was to bring the city’s major malls, The Westchester, Fortunoff, The Westchester Pavilion, and The Galleria into the BID assessment, as well as expand BID services to West Post Road, and southern Mamaroneck Avenue.

The plan apparently will be thought about by the Common Council, which is being asked to endorse the plan.

The involvement of the BID in marketing the city as proposed last night is a new role that would have to reconcile policies and responsibilities with the relatively low profile City Economic Development Department. The City Economic Development Department under the operation of Melissa Lopez operates on an interactive basis with commercial entities contacting the city, pursues strategies and creates events, and distributes brochures extolling the advantages of the city, and promotes the city in occasional one-shot campaigns. There is no overall city marketing campaign or direction such as “I love NY” for example.

Bookkeeping: Proton Beam off agenda. Bank St. Hearing Set. Bond Refinancing

Posted on December 21, 2006 by John Bailey

WPCNR Common Council Chronicle-Examiner. December 21, 2006: Rita Malmud questioned Mayor Joseph Delfino why the renewal of the New York Presbyterian Hospital special permit to build a proton accelerator/biotech lab complex was not on the agenda for January 2. . The Mayor testily said he was not going to put extension of the permit on agenda because he felt the New York Presbyterian Hospital needed some time to regroup after the council rebuffed the 6.5 acre park/subdivision Memorandum of Understanding by a 4-3 vote at the beginning of this month.

The Mayor challenged Ms. Malmud that she could put it on if she wanted to, but he was not going to do so. Ms. Malmud turned beetred, but did not challenge the Mayor and demand the renewal be put on the agenda, at least not last night.

**** The Common Council agreed to authorize the Commissioner of Finance to refinance the 2002 $16.7 Million remaining on the City Center garage loan last night. The move, should it be successful on the market in January would save the city, Commissioner Gina Cuneo-Harwood said $700,000.

**** The Council voted to set a public hearing on January 2 on the mysterious Bank Street Commons apartments project that would present a $16 Million windfall to the city in new funds for purchase of the commuter municipal parking lot on Bank Street in return for LCOR’s right to build two 23 story buildings and about 400 apartments. This story was leaked by City Hall to the Journal News by the Mayor’s Office last week, for which no details or designs have been publicly presented to this reporter’s knowledge. The sale of the municipal commuter parking lot privately, without putting it out for bid was not questioned by the council which considered the matter in the Mayor’s Conference Room before the press.

**** The Commissioner of Planning, Susan Habel briefed the Common Council on a zoning change that would bring a section along Old Mamaroneck Road into zoning conformity to the R1-7.5 zone, (7,500 square feet building) to avoid the future possibility of a string of properties being acquired to build a cluster of homes under 7,500 square feet that would be out of character with the neighborhood. Ms. Habel said the Planning Department is looking for anomalies in various zones to bring them into conformity.

Council Appoints Lloyd Tasch Acting Assessor. North Street Community Cuts Back

Posted on December 20, 2006 by John Bailey

WPCNR COMMON COUNCIL CHRONICLE-EXAMINER. By John F. Bailey. December 20, 2006: As reported by WPCNR this morning, in Executive Session this evening, the Common Council did indeed consider the appointment of Deputy City Assessor Lloyd Tasch to the position of Acting Assessor and approved it in resolutions offered at the conclusion of the Executive Session. Councilmembers would not comment on other matters discussed, or whether a search for an Assessor was continuing while Mr. Tasch filled in. Last week, the city choice for Assessor, a high profile candidate who had been offered the job, turned it down citing commuting issues.

North Street Community OLD Parameters in Red outline, New configuration of North Street Community in Dark, as outlined by Alfred Caiola of North Street Community Wednesday evening.

In other action this evening, the council heard a new proposal from North Street Community which trims the number of luxury condominium units from 390 down to 353, raising the minimum age of possible residents to 60, and eliminating 38,000 square feet of office rental in exchange for more “assisted living” units in the former St. Agnes Hospital building. The maximum heights of the four residential buildings have been trimmed from seven stories to a maximum of five stories and the four main residential buildings have been redesigned to be more “cornered” with multiple courtyards, and moved 75 feet farther away from the Wyndham Close property, substantially reducing the visibility of the project from the Bryant Avenue residential sites. All parking would be underground.

Alfred Caiola, one of the four principals in the North Street Community property, said his costs had escalated substantially, and that they were fast approaching the point where more scaling down of the senior luxury condominium project would make it not feasible. Mr. Caiola told WPCNR the luxury condominium senior living units would still be offered from $450,000 to $900,000.

Manelaos Rizoulis, the President of the Wyndham Close Association remained resolute in his opposition to the project, which though the new design was better, he told WPCNR “it’s still too big. Too dense.”

Rizoulis has maintained since September that Wyndham Close would be supportive of the project if it were scaled back by about half. “Half” to Mr. Rizoulis, he said, was defined as one half of the 390 independent condominium units proposed plus the 40 asssisted living units and 80 long-term care units proposed for the former St. Agnes Hospital building. Rizoulis told the CitizeNetReporter his idea of “half” of this figure would make for 230 units. Rizoulis said this would be acceptable to Wyndham Close.