Letter to the Editor: Grace's Campaign Letter is Misleading

To the Editor -

A recent mailing from Supervisor Grace seeking re-election is one of the most misleading pieces of political mail I’ve seen in a long time. Touting himself as “pro-business”, the mailing stated: “Look at all the job creating projects that have been approved on his watch”, followed by a long list of stores, businesses, and projects that the Supervisor would like voters to believe he was responsible for in some way.

Truth is he had little or nothing to do with any of these projects other than to have been sitting in Town Hall when they happened. He certainly didn’t attract or initiate them any more than he was responsible for all of the businesses that have closed or failed during his tenure – a list that, judging by the many empty storefronts and offices in Yorktown, may be equally as long. Of course his “look at what I did” mailing didn’t list any of those businesses. Oh wait – in fact it did mention a few: the Margeliz Center for Adult Day Care has already closed, and the Field Home Expansion and Lake Osceola Square never happened.

Of course it’s not Supervisor Grace’s fault that businesses like Finnegans, Yorktown Beer & Soda, and half of the JV Mall have closed their doors recently, but just like his list, it happened “on his watch”. So if he wants to take credit for the good, he should also accept blame for the bad.

The truth is he’s totally misleading voters by taking credit for any of these businesses just because they opened their doors while he was in office. (Some of them didn’t even do that – Costco hasn’t broken ground yet, and Stateland hasn’t even come forward with a proposal). Off the top of my head, a good third of the businesses on his list were initiated before Grace even took office: the JV Mall expansion, Crompond Crossing, Navajo Fields, St. George’s Winery, Costco, Fieldhome, Underhill Crossing, Mohegan Lake Motors, Mt. Kisco Medical Group, and the Yorktown Senior Nutrition Center Renovation were all proposed or already in the works during his predecessors’ terms. I know this for a fact because I worked for Supervisor Siegel while many of these meetings took place. And a few of these projects may even date back to Don Peters or Linda Cooper’s tenure.

Bottom line, it’s wrong for Grace to be taking any kind of credit for these businesses, and it’s extremely misleading to list them on his campaign literature as proof of his so-called “pro-business” credentials. It’s a hollow, false claim.

David Humphrey

Yorktown Heights, NY