The Doctored Official transcript
In the early part of 2012, in the heat of a contested local election, the ruling group in the village of East Hills -- the Koblenz Team -- pretended (we can now conclude) to respond to citizen concerns about the environment by promising to consider a building-moratorium, to hold hearings, and to form a special committee to deal with frequent demolitions and large-scale rebuilding in the community, and the unexpectedly numerous removal of healthy mature trees, despite apparent laws intended to prevent both situations. The most consistent and high-profile critic was Richard Brummel (author of this website), a resident who grew up in East Hills and returned for an unexpectedly extended visit in 2010. He publicized his concerns in flyers and newspaper letters and articles, and testified in hearings the village scheduld to mollify concerned residents and to postpone any consideration of a moratorium on new construction. Our very sharp and detailed remarks at hearings in April and May were repeatedly interrupted and disputed by village officials during the hearings. But shockingly we discovered in June that our testimony had been completely removed surreptitiously from the official transcript of the April hearing on tree-protection as presented on front page of the village website -- along with comments by Republican opposition candidate Matt Weiss and those of a man who is an ally of Weiss's party, the East Hills Advocacy Group. Below are documents relating to that story.Village starts backtracking on what the 'transcript' actually constitutes
Beginning some days after the District Attorney's Office was approached on June 11 with a complaint about official-records tampering the village website started to carry cryptic clarifications about what residents were actually getting when they clicked on "transcript". The screen-shots below were taken on June 9,2012, when the doctored transcript was discovered, then on June 15, four days after the DA was notified and then June 23, the following week. Note that once the DA's office was notified, soon after which they presumably began making inquiries, the full version of the transcript (below) -- 43 pages, not 26 -- was posted without explanation. In fact to our knowledge there has never been any disclosure until now by the village -- or the DA -- about this story. If it was an innocent and regrettable error by an outside contractor, as the village supposedly said, the village would logically happily and explicitly correct as soon as it knew. But the fact it began making unexplained hedges and failed to disclose anything then or after makes an alternate theory much more persuasive.Link to Full transcript of East Hills tree-protection hearing Click Here.
Link to surreptitiously altered transcript of East Hills tree-protection hearing (missing pages 18 through 34) as originally posted on village website Click Here.
Link to transcript of East Hills building and design hearing; note interruptions of testimony critical of village government and practices regarding neighborhood preservation, pages 12, 15, etc. Click Here.
Learn about tragic the NY "ROADKILL" crisis and proposed legal reforms to stop it Click Here.
Porcupine Killed on Route 30, Adirondack Park, June 2011
Porcupine Killed on Route 30, Adirondack Park, June 2011.