Candidate Profile: Alison Biddle For Lewisboro Town Council

LEWISBORO, NY — In 2021's general election, residents of the Hudson Valley will be voting for local officials. In anticipation, Patch asked candidates in the contested races to answer questions about their campaigns and will be publishing candidate profiles as Election Day draws near.

Alison Biddle is seeking election to the Lewisboro Town Council in November. The 44-year-old is running on the Republican, Conservative and Neighbors United tickets.

Learn more about Biddle on alisonbiddle.com

Check out Patch's full Q&A with Alison Biddle:

Position Sought

Lewisboro Town Council

Party Affiliation

Republican, Conservative, Neighbors United

Family

My husband Marc and I live in Cross River with our children Georgi (4) and Nico (16 months) and our 3 dogs, Sasha (12), Stella (5), and Gypsy (3). My in-laws John and Kathy Biddle live on Lake Truesdale for the past 20 years.

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

My sister, Nicole Sullivan, is a trustee in Dobbs Ferry.

Education

I graduated from Fox Lane High School and then went on to receive a Bachelors of Science in Computer Science and Mathematics.

Occupation

I spent twenty years on Wall Street working in financial software where I built the trading systems used globally by the banks and broker dealers for their equity, options, and futures desks. Eventually I moved into a sales and account management role. I currently work in sales with a health and wellness company as well as help my husband run his construction business, Pink Shirt Construction.

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office

N/A

Why are you seeking elective office?

I never, ever thought about running for office until a year ago, when I walked out my front door and saw the world’s ugliest cell tower being built at the edge of my property. I had no idea it was being built, and neither did any of my neighbors. I am running because I believe in transparency. The controversy over the recent land deal involving lake accessible property, being sold without public auction to an employee of the town board was a wake up call. I believe our town board should establish public meeting rules and stick to them. I believe that posting town news solely on Facebook is a disservice to the public. Being a new mom with two young children, I began to think more about the future of our town, and so, a year later, here I am running to be your next board member.

The single most pressing issue facing our (board, district, etc.) is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it.

The single most pressing issue facing our board is clean drinking water for every town resident. It is ridiculous that 21st century New Yorkers should have to worry about their tap water. It’s always about listening and I plan to work with all town and community water districts to ensure that we understand their current issues and can work together on solutions that mean the least amount of cost to the residents. I am a computer scientist by training and approach all issues logically. I like to fully understand something before thinking of a solution, but once I do I tend to think outside of the box. While Oakridge gets the most press because they are Town owned, many communities have unclean water like the colony, the meadows, and wild oaks. The town needs to listen to everyone and work for each resident to ensure they always have clean drinkable water. Clean water in Oakridge requires a new approach, a creative solution, with funding that is likely to be found through grants and low or interest free loans. It is important to obtain an independent engineering plan to either prove the current plan is right or correct the current plan so the residents who live in the water district can trust that they will have clean drinking water for years to come. We need to be tenacious in searching for alternative funding, like grants - hiring someone whose sole responsibility is finding, applying for, and winning grants for local Lewisboro projects.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

My life experiences give me a different insight into problem-solving. I studied computer science and mathematics, and wrote financial software for the largest firms on the planet. I am a businesswoman. I am also a wife and mom of two young children. All those things combine to give me a background and perspective that are unique and powerful.

If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community (or district or constituency)

Accessibility starts with affordability. Our current town board talks a great game about making Lewisboro more accessible and inclusive; yet what good is any of that if people cannot afford to live here?

The town board has busted the tax cap two out of the last three years. They are poised to do so again, with a double-digit tax increase baked into this year’s preliminary budget.

It’s a recipe for disaster.

These very same board members are running for re-election, spinning a typical political yarn about having secured millions in grants; when in truth, they have only applied for these monies and very few of the grants are actually in hand.

The situation is even more egregious when you consider that the town did not even bother applying for the grants until this year.

What have they been doing for the last four years?

The town board must stop governing on Facebook. They may perceive it as offering some form of political advantage, but it does a disservice to all residents.

When our board members go around intentionally misstating something as simple as what constitutes an inland waterway, which they themselves recently promoted, it’s time for a change.

The “soft costs” of mismanagement are compounded with hard truths that will place even more fiscal stress on the wallets of taxpayers.

In Lewisboro, we do not even have accessible drinking water, and there are clean water issues throughout all the hamlets. Clean drinking water for every town resident is the most important issue we face. It is ridiculous that 21st century New Yorkers should have to worry about their tap water.

While Oakridge gets the most press because it is a town water district, there are water issues in Wild Oaks, the Colony, the Meadows, the Meadow Pond sub-watershed and in many of our private wells.

Unlike our neighbors, our town has no environmentally preferable products purchasing program, to green our procurement and save money on ecofriendly options. There is no director of sustainability to monitor application and spreader rates to keep salts and pesticides and foams out of our wells. There is no local waterfront revitalization plan to guide development and create consistency review so that NYDECP, federal, county and state land use decisions conform with what we in Lewisboro decide is best.

All people in Lewisboro have the right to feel safe, respected, and listened to. All people have a right to clean air and clean water.

We need to understand there are differences in culture and we need to respect and uplift each other.

We need to push to ensure underrepresented minority candidates are considered for all open town roles and consider their qualifications and leverage people’s existing skillsets.

We should also do an audit of current suppliers and set goals to work with more minority, women, veteran, and local owned businesses.

Each of these options would have saved money over the last several years while creating new sustainable revenue streams. I for one do not believe Lewisboro should be a town that is “accessible” only to very wealthy people who can afford to live here. I come from a blue collar background. I want my in laws to continue to reside here and watch my children create their families here someday.

That will never happen if we continue in the direction of the current town board and their annual tax madness.

I’m Alison Biddle, I’m a mom, entrepreneur, and candidate for town board who wants to make our town more accessible by making it more affordable. I hope you agree.

How do you think local officials performed in responding to the coronavirus? What if anything would you have done differently?

Our town officials were reactionary vs. proactive. We have an emergency management committee, whom we do not leverage enough. And unlike our current town council members. I would follow the recommendations of the WDOH including when to institute a mask mandate. Our kids go to school with kids from a town without a mask mandate — which means we are not getting any added protection from the mandate.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform.

Affordable housing policies were put in place by the federal government to provide fair and equitable distribution of housing. One of it’s goals is to put an end to exclusionary zoning which our town is filled with. Our local government needs to do better for our community to ensure the young and the old can live here and that is not done by allowing housing to be built that isn’t quite accessible or inclusive. The town board would do better by our residents to engage in a public/private partnership, which makes the most sense if you get the details right. We’ve all heard of developers stories, where key aspects of a development to benefit residents send community were never made, and government failed to impose claw backs to address the broken agreements. Likewise, every private company has stories of dealing with government agencies. With an oversight board like a non-profit entity, we could keep both the developer and the government in check. Then we wouldn’t be fighting with the current developer to get the full $50k that was promised, which they now say they can’t afford and we can get new developers to give back by providing a park for example.

All people in Lewisboro have the right to feel safe, respected, and listened to. We need to understand there are differences in culture and we need to respect and uplift each other. We need to push to ensure under represented minority candidates are considered for all open town roles and consider their qualifications and leveraging people’s existing skillsets. We should also do an audit of current suppliers and set goals to works with more minority, women, and local owned businesses.

In addition the key to diversity and tolerance is promoting all groups and interests, and being even handed in recognizing and honoring them. Support events for pride month and veterans. Promote celebrations for Juneteenth and July 4th. Celebrate the contributions of every groups, not just the ones you are a member of or just your supporters. You stop fights between us by fighting for everyone.

We must protect our planet, but the town should lead by example. We should ensure our town's procurement process is green, that there are requirements to buy environmentally preferable products when they are available (such as eco-friendly deicing agents). I am always amazed that at all the community events and most public spaces there are limited to no recycling bins. I cringe every time after a festival when I see so many water bottles mixed in with the regular garbage. We need to give people little changes, things they can do to make progress instead if throwing out the big Herculean task of fighting climate change. For starters we can ask all residents to switch to LED lights, while the upfront cost may be a bit more the lights last longer and are burning a lot less energy. In the five years since we have had LED lights in our home, only 5% of the LED bulbs need to be changed. We can continue to build from there by working closely with our sustainability committee and the NY state climate smart committee. Lewisboro was designated a climate smart community 10 years ago, but we still have no certification level. Our neighbors in Bedford have been Bronze since 2019 (159 points) and Pound Ridge have been Bronze since 2020 (149 points). If I am elected I will work hard to ensure as quickly as possible we are bronze certified and than continue until we are the highest certification available by looking to work with a sustainbility director to help meet the climate smart community goals

We need to enhance our infrastructure throughout the town. Not only to ensure no more ugly cell towers are erected, but that we provide residents with another option besides Optimum. I would look to explore smaller franchises that may be willing to come to Lewisboro and municipal broadband as a start to getting rid of Optimum’s monopoly that has been a thorn in all our sides for far too long.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

As a private citizen I collected hundreds of signatures to stop the town board from entering into a highly questionable land deal where they were selling lakefront property to their own employee, without public bidding. The town board was forced to revisit the policies and put into place a policy that involves public notice and auction when selling town land.

I have pushed for more board transparency, encouraged civility, and I would like to end excessive partisanship.

I attend and support every community event held in Town this year with my children. I was able to volunteer at many of the events and work hard for the organizers to ensure the event was a success. In fact for the Salla event in May I was able to work closely with Jessica Foglio and assist in finding sponsors for the event raising thousands of dollars.

When I learned that a chair was needed for the silent auction at the library fair, I immediately volunteered, Through hard work and determination I raised thousands of dollars to support the library. Without my volunteering, the silent auction may not have happened.

The best advice ever shared with me was:

My father always quoted Mark Twain to me, “If you tell the truth you don’t have to remember anything.” I have lived my life by this and am now teaching it to my children.

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

When I decided to run for the Town Council, it was important to me that my campaign be about bringing people together.

I want a Town Council where we are all in this together, not us vs. them, like it is in Washington these days.

Because the last thing we need in Lewisboro is to bring Washington DC down to the local level.
We need a Town Council with fewer Republicans and Democrats and more civility and good neighbors.

We need a Town Council that is always transparent in its actions, not just when they get caught.

We need a Town Council that sets rules for its own meetings, and follows them, week in and week out.

We need a Town Council where everyone is respected, and all voices are heard.

But we need a Town Council that recognizes that we exist to serve the people of Lewisboro.

I'm Alison Biddle, and if you elect me to the Town Council, I'll work to make that happen. Thank you.

Find information about absentee and early voting here: Election 2021: New Systems For Early Voting In Westchester. To find all your candidates, as well as statewide, county and local propositions, follow the links offered by the Board of Elections:

• View the 2021 General Election Candidates List.
• View the 2021 General Election State Propositions.
• View the 2021 General Election County and Local Propositions.