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.

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WPCNR TALK OF TEATOWN. February 11, 2014:

Letter to the Editor:

Last weekend illustrated vividly some of the incredible juxtapositions of life in our community.

People from near and far traveled to Croton Point Park and nearby locations to attend Teatown’s 10^th Annual Hudson River EagleFest to celebrate the re-emergence of bald eagles in the Hudson Valley.

At the same time, the sponsor of that event, Teatown Lake Reservation, a 875-acre nature preserve in the towns of Yorktown and Cortlandt, was completing a three-week deer baiting program, and, the night before Eaglefest, began a program of hiring sharpshooters to kill 75 white tail deer.

Since the deer baiting/killing program had never been made public, visitors to Eaglefest were shocked and dismayed to learn of it there because of a rally by animal lovers at Croton Point Park during the event.

In a recent article in Psychology Today, Marc Bekoff, Ph.D.,  former Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder, and co-founder with Jane Goodall of Ethologists for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, writes about the problem and how it is being handled in a nearby village in the Hudson Valley, Hastings on Hudson:

“Urban deer have become a “problem” in many different communities across the United States because there are simply too many of them.

“Many communities have resorted to “humanely” killing deer but now there’s an option that I hope will be widely adopted. In a recent essay in the New York Times called, “A Kinder, Gentler Way to Thin the Deer Herd” by Lisa Foderaro, Hastings-on Hudson’s (New York) Mayor Peter Swiderski “has settled on a less violent approach: birth control. In an experiment to be undertaken with assistance from Tufts University’s Center for Animals and Public Policy, Hastings hopes to become the first suburb in the United States to control deer through immunocontraception, using the animal’s own immune system to prevent it from fertilizing offspring.”

“Dr. Alan Rutberg, the director of Tuft’s center, calls the idea “brilliant.” He has successfully used immunocontraception in self-contained areas such as Fire Island and elsewhere resulting in a 50% decrease in deer numbers over five years. Dr. Rutberg notes, “Deer have entered our backyards and essentially become unruly guests … We are bound by suburban rules in dealing with them, and violence is not how we deal with neighbors we don’t like.”

“…Peaceful coexistence needs to be the way in which we live with urban neighbors and birth control is a wonderful alternative to killing these magnificent animals.”

Teatown’s refusal to seek less violent alternatives, the lack of public information or opportunity for input casts a big shadow over their mission  and reputation going forward;   more than 1300 people have signed a petition to have the bait/kill  program stopped. ( http://chn.ge/1dzcmrV)

Linda Conte

Croton-on-Hudson, NY

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WPCNR THE POWER NEWS. February 10, 2014:

Local Con Edison customers got a rude shock Saturday when Con Edison electric bills arrived.

The charge per kilowatt hour went from 8.1 cents in December to 19.1 cents in January.

The explanation from Con Edison’s Elizabeth Matthews to WPCNR: the high cost of gas and cold weather. Delivery charges per kilowatt hour went down half a cent per kwh.

Ms. Matthews told WPCNR: “We are willing to work with customers (on spreading out  their bills over the course of a year)”:

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration,

“Natural gas supply into New York City remained constrained during colder-than-normal temperatures as evidenced by the price spikes in mid-December and early January. Spot natural gas prices reached as high as $47.80/MMBtu, higher than in New England—likely because New England was able to meet part of its natural gas demand with imported supplies of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and Canadian offshore natural gas production. Power prices hit $233.59/MWh on January 8.

Several major natural gas pipeline projects came in service ahead of the 2013-14 winter, including theNew Jersey to New York expansion of the Texas Eastern Transmission and the Algonquin Gas Transmission pipelines, which will deliver additional natural gas supplies, particularly from the Marcellus region, into the New York City area, the main demand center of the New York electric system. Despite these developments, natural gas supply into the New York region remains constrained during high demand periods.

An additional strain on the New York system came from the unplanned outage of Entergy’s Indian Point Unit 3 nuclear reactor located near New York City, which went offline on the evening of Monday, January 6. The loss of the 1,044-megawatt (MW) capacity baseload unit required additional higher-cost generators to be brought on line, which put further pressure on power prices.”  (Editor’s Note: Unit 3 was returned to service on January 8, according to the Entergy website.)”

According to a news release on the Con Edison website released January 29:

Con Edison is reminding customers that they can spread their energy costs out over 12 months to ease the impact of gas and electric supply prices, which shot higher in January due to the extreme cold weather.

The company also urges customers to take simple energy-saving steps to reduce their bills while staying comfortable.

Natural gas costs climbed in January, as the region has experienced colder-than-anticipated weather. The high gas prices are also driving up the cost of electricity, since gas is the fuel used in the generation of most electricity in New York.

Con Edison does not control the price of natural gas or electricity and makes no profit on either commodity. The company uses a variety of buying strategies to get the best price possible and then provides the energy to customers at cost.

Con Edison offers level-payment plans and other options to help customers manage their bills. For more information, go here: http://www.coned.com/customercentral/managemybill.asp

Under the level-payment plan, Con Edison will estimate the customer’s energy usage for a 12-month period and then spread those costs out over 12 months. After 12 months, the company will reconcile the estimates with the customer’s actual energy usage.

Con Edison estimates that a typical residential gas heating customer using 215 therms will have a February 2014 bill of about $388, which is $55, or 16.5 percent, higher than the February 2013 bill. Actual bills could be higher, depending on a customer’s usage.

The rise in gas prices is affecting the electric charges for customers who receive their bills in late January and early February.

A typical New York City residential customer who receives an electric bill this week for 300 kilowatt hours of usage will pay about $118, an increase of $21, or 21.6 percent, over the bill for the same period last year. Con Edison projects that bills sent in early February will include similar increases.

For a Westchester customer using 450 kilowatt hours, that late January bill is about $151, an increase of $27, or 21.8 percent, over last year. 

(Editor’s note: Where WPCNR is located, we used 718 KWH at 19.1 cents a kwh for a supply charge of $137.15  as opposed to $53.75 in December.)

Residential customers can save up to $1,000 and cut heating costs up to 30 percent with Con Edison Green Team rebates. The rebates encourage customers to do simple things like replace older equipment with efficient technology and seal leaks in their home heating systems. For energy tips and information on our Green Team programs visit: www.coned.com/greenteamor call 1-877-870-6118.

Customers also can save money with these tips:

• Set your thermostat at 68 degrees during the day and 60 degrees at night and when no one is home. Each degree over 68 can increase by 3 percent the amount of energy you use for heating.
• Install a programmable thermostat and set it to lower the heat at night and when no one is home.
• Inspect ducts to ensure adequate air flow and eliminate loss of heated air.
• Keep drapes and furniture away from radiators and baseboard heaters so heat can flow freely.

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Head for the Hills.

WPCNR ENVIRONMENTALIST. February 8, 2014:

The Journal News reported this morning that Judge Lester Adler has made a decision that allows Teatown Lake Reservation, the private teaching pereserve and nature center in the northwest part of Westchester County to proceed with a deer kill, allowing sharpshooters from the government to lure Teatown deer at night into an ambush and kill up to 75 deer in the month of February.

Westchester County Government does not have authority to stop the Teatown policy deer kill (adopted to cut back on deer destroying young seedlings in the Teatown forest by eating them), because Teatown is private property.

A group of neighbors and members of the Teatown are holding a protest against the kill in Croton Point Park this morning at the Eaglefest celebration. Linda Conte, a spokesperson for the group told WPCNR this morning, the group attorney David  Bernheim feels he will appeal the decision.

To date the leaders of Teatown have declined to address protests of hundreds of Reservation members who are against the Teatown kill policy.

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The White Hospital Medical Center design for its current expansion. The Hospital accounced Thursday the expansion would continue under their new proposed partnership with Montifiore Hospital

WPCNR  WELLNESS WATCH. From White Plains Hospital. February 7, 2014:

White Plains Hospital, a leading community Hospital in Westchester County and Montefiore Health System, a premier academic medical center and the University Hospital for Albert Einstein College of Medicine,  announced plans Thursday  to form a new healthcare partnership.

The Board of Directors of White Plains Hospital approved the signing of a letter of agreement to enter into a partnership with Montefiore at its February 5^th Board meeting.   This new affiliation enhances the missions of both hospitals as they continue to provide advanced, quality healthcare to their communities and an expanding service area of nearly 3 million people.

“Our Board of Directors established the qualities it sought in selecting a partner for the future, and Montefiore meets all of these criteria,”  said Jon Schandler, CEO, White Plains Hospital (Second from left, above with County Executive Robert P. Astorino)

“Our hospital provides an exceptional level of care through a close working relationship between our physicians, nurses and staff.  With Montefiore as our partner, we will be able to build upon and continue this remarkable culture and together deliver advanced health care to the entire community.”  Schandler continued.

Montefiore’s main campus is just 10 miles south of White Plains and has a growing network of practices in Westchester.

“We are excited to be embarking on this journey with White Plains Hospital.  There is tremendous synergy between our two institutions and our people and, importantly, we share fundamental values,” said Steven M. Safyer, MD, President and CEO of Montefiore. “As an academic health system, Montefiore brings to the relationship the best of science and a unique expertise in coordinated care.  Our vision is to build a regional network of hospitals and community physicians closely aligned in an integrated system of care. White Plains Hospital will serve as the center of that network to strengthen and expand our position as a healthcare leader in Westchester and the Hudson Valley.”

For more than 120 years, White Plains Hospital has been a leader in providing high-quality, sophisticated, patient-focused care to the Westchester Community.  The recipient of many prestigious awards, the Hospital has been repeatedly recognized for high performing excellence in several areas including  oncology, cardiology, stroke care, gynecology and geriatrics. In 2012, White Plains Hospital received Magnet® designation from the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), and in 2013 the hospital was recognized by the Joint Commission as a Top Performer on Key Quality Measures®.

“Over the past several years, White Plains Hospital has been actively re-defining community health care,” said Susan Fox, President, White Plains Hospital.   “Advances in technology and medicine, and recruitment of expert physicians have allowed us to increase our level of services and keep care local.”  Fox continued, “Montefiore is an academic medical center, with strong community values.   Our visions are aligned and we are excited about working closely with Montefiore and supporting the continued advancement of services provided close to home.”

Montefiore is nationally renowned for its clinical excellence, scientific discovery and innovative care. Ranked among the best in the nation, Montefiore has several notable Centers of Excellence including the Montefiore Einstein Center for Cancer Care, the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore, the Montefiore Einstein Center for Heart and Vascular Care, and the Montefiore Einstein Center for Transplantation.

The formalization of the new partnership will take several months to be finalized.  State applications will also need to be filed and approved.

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About Montefiore Health System

Montefiore Health System is a premier academic health system and the University Hospital for Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Combining nationally-recognized clinical excellence with a population health perspective that focuses on the health needs of communities, Montefiore delivers coordinated, compassionate, science-driven care where, when and how patients need it most. Montefiore consists of six hospitals and an extended care facility with a total of 2,059 beds, a School of Nursing, and state-of-the-art primary and specialty care provided through a network of more than 150 locations across the region, including the largest school health program in the nation and a home health program.

For more information please visit www.montefiorehealthsystem.org.

About White Plains Hospital (WPH)  WPH is a 292-bed voluntary, not-for-profit health care organization with the primary mission of offering high quality, acute health care and preventive medical care to all people who live in, work in or visit Westchester County and its surrounding areas.  Centers of Excellence include the, The William & Sylvia Silberstein Neonatal & Maternity Center and The Ruth and Jerome A. Siegel Stroke Center.  The hospital’s Flanzer Center is the busiest Emergency Department in Westchester County, seeing over 55,000 visits a year.  White Plains Hospital is the only community hospital in Westchester County licensed to perform emergency & elective angioplasty.  The Hospital is fully accredited by the Joint Commission and earned its recognition as a Top Performer for Key Quality Measures® in 2013.  The hospital is also an eleven-time winner of the Consumer Choice Award, an honor given to the nation’s top hospitals by the National Research Corporation, and received Magnet® designation in 2012 from the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC). For additional information, visit http://www.wphospital.org.

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White Plains Council of Neighborhood Associations (WPCNA)

Our next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, February 11, 2014, 7:30 pm, at Education House (downstairs Meeting Room), 5 Homeside Lane, WP (off North Street).

Commissioner David Chong supervising an investigation.

Our guest speaker will be WP Public Safety Commissioner David E. Chong. Commissioner Chong oversees police, fire, emergency medical services and all hazard-planning bureaus.  He will give us tips on home safety and will update us on current and future safety developments in our City.  A question and answer period will follow.

All our meetings are open to the public and start promptly at 7:30 pm.  Light refreshments will be served.