Scarsdale 10583

The following letter was submitted by Bob Cohen, a former Scarsdale resident and candidate for the NYS Senate in the 37th District: Dear Scarsdalians: Two years ago, a large plurality of you voted to elect me to the New York State Senate. That race continued until mid-December 2010, when I conceded to incumbent state senator Suzi Oppenheimer, who is retiring after her current term. The race was a wonderful experience, and I was grateful for all the support I received throughout it, including from Mayor Mike Bloomberg and The New York Times.

Running for political office was the last thing I ever expected to do. I had been semi-active in Scarsdale civic life for years -- I am still a Scarsdale volunteer firefighter -- but running for elected office was, in my estimation, something only politicians do. I am a lifelong businessman.

Property taxes and Albany dysfunction changed all that for me.

Like you, I began to see close friends moving out of Westchester, one by one, because of totally unreasonable property taxes. At the same time, I saw the children of friends moving to other states to settle down because Westchester had become unaffordable. Seniors -- people I had known for 20 years -- began packing up and leaving because their property taxes had become like second mortgages, doubling and in some cases tripling in a little more than a decade.

I saw the same politicians running for office year after year, virtually unchallenged. They had become more concerned, it seemed, with the special interests and union bosses in Albany than with their own constituents -- to wit, the insane property tax hikes and years of irresponsible pension giveaways.

Something needed to be done.

Working with like-minded fiscal reformers, I became one of Westchester’s chief advocates for a property tax cap, which in 2011 Governor Cuomo signed into law. It was a strong step forward, and it saved Westchester taxpayers more than $102 million in the first year that it’s been in effect.

Coupled with mandate relief, the Cuomo Tax Cap will bring fiscal sanity back to an area rapidly losing its middle class, which was once the backbone of this county. Governor Cuomo then bravely passed pension reform -- the Tier 6 Pension Bill -- to lower pension costs on counties like Westchester and municipalities like Scarsdale. The Cuomo bill will save taxpayers upwards of $80 billion over the next three decades!

I decided to run for state senate this year to help Governor Cuomo and other bipartisan fiscal reformers continue the tax relief agenda. I am now living across the street in New Rochelle -- Scarsdale is sadly in another district -- and running against a 20-year politician who voted against Governor Cuomo’s property tax cap, and he voted absent on the Governor’s crucial pension reform bill.

This elected official -- I’ll be polite and not name him -- has walked in lockstep with the state unions for many years, which is fine, but unaffordable. The state teacher’s union, which is going to court to try to block the Cuomo Tax Cap, is his biggest contributor, reportedly handing him hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign cash according to the Journal News.

Barbara and I moved to Scarsdale because of its schools. We loved Scarsdale’s teachers and are grateful for the superb education our three children received. We were willing to pay higher taxes rates for those schools, but not the type of taxes that have pillaged the budgets of Scarsdale families in recent years -- and which have made so many move away.

These crazy-high property taxes exist not from necessity but from unfunded mandates, mismanagement, and profligacy in Albany. On top of that, Scarsdale students are badly shortchanged by the state school aid formula every year. Indeed, we receive less school aid per student than any district in America. We pay these usurious tax rates to compensate for that funding shortfall.

I am sorry I will miss you at the voting booth this year, but I trust I will see you in town or by the firehouse. Barbara and I miss you all.

In the meantime, if you have friends in my senate district (SD37) that agree with me on these tax and reform issues, please feel free to send them my way! My campaign website is www.bobcohen2012.com .

All my best wishes,

Bob Cohen

Comments (8)

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written by Student, October 24, 2012

It is about time a man like you stood up to the corruption in this state. You have my vote, Mr. Cohen, as you did in 2010 as well. Don't let the "slumlord" ruling fool anyone. If a resident of this district feels entitled to use that name I advise they check back two years ago to see the ruling from the Fair Campaign Committee then, where it was said to be complete and utter falsehood.

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written by Letsbehonest, October 21, 2012

Latimer kept his mouth shut to protect his party. Even another fifty comments by democrat shills won't get me to vote for such a spineless person.

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written by Aesthetically Correct, October 21, 2012

PUt a monkey in a suit and under democrat ticket and 90% of Scarsdale Democrats will vote for it over another party. sad. democrats and most Scarsdale residents have become monkeys, zombies, and followers to their own demise and doom.

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written by Jamie NYC, October 21, 2012

Before the last election cycle, I had the opportunity to meet with Suzy Oppenheimer at one of her Town Hall sessions. I was fairly new to Westchester at the time and wanted to get to meet my State Senator. I'm a life long liberal and a registered Democrat who cherishes social values, but don't ever mistake me for a fiscal pushover. At my meeting with the Senator, she told me verbatim that she opposed the Tax Cap. A few months later as election day neared I studied the Senator's website to review her positions and learned she had changed her mind and had become an advocate of the Tax Cap. I studied Bob Cohen's website as well, and learned the two opponents were campaigning on the same political positions. Since the Senator had changed her mind, so did I, and for the first time I voted for a Republican. Apparently I was not alone, as we all witnessed when the votes were counted, and recounted, and a victor was delayed for quite some time in a very close election.

I sincerely wish Mr. Cohen good luck. I am glad the Tax Cap passed. I am glad Suzy Oppenheimer voted for it, and fall all her hard work. I am glad Mr. Cohen gave her a run for her money and showed that no elected official should get too comfortable and take their incumbency for granted. I do not agree with the lack of social values that Republican national party choose to favor, but I do appreciate a conservative position on fiscal responsibility and accountability, namely towards taxes and unionized entitlements. Most of all, my point being, I have no loyalty to any one political party -- I expect bipartisan cooperation, and if I don't see it, I am willing to vote for a better choice because I am independent at heart, and I appreciate a political figure that represents the best interests of all their constituants for today and the long term.

If I lived in New Rochelle, I might just vote for Mr. Cohen again, as I expect many will.

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written by Way to go, Bob! (sarcasm), October 20, 2012

There can't be too many political candidates who, thanks to their own ineptitude, get an official ruling that they are slumlords, but Bob Cohen has managed. I wonder why his letter didn't talk about this: http://www.salon.com/2012/10/1..._accurate/

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written by Sick of it, October 20, 2012

Albany Republicans consistently attempt to direct state tax money, largely collected downstate, to rural upstate interests. They have gerrymandered the state to give greater influence to upstate rural districts than their population demands (barely skirting one-man, one-vote laws by, for example, counting residents of prisons as residents of upstate counties). Why anyone in Westchester would vote for the anti-democracy forces of the Republican state senate is beyond me.

And if I get one more big-money mailer slamming George Latimer I may be ill. I hope Scarsdale10583.com will be soliciting and publishing a letter from Mr. Latimer in the interests of equal time. I, for one, will not be casting my vote for a tool of upstate special interests.

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written by answer to "Political Maven", October 19, 2012

A person who can not see the positives and negatives of each of our two major political parties is no "Political Maven". All I see here is a politically colored attack that casts grave doubt on its basis or legitimacy.

I don't know Mr. Cohen's positions very well, but his apparent agreement with a Republican mayor and Democratic governor is far more noble than the kindergarten partisanship to which we have become accustomed.

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written by Scarsdale Political Maven, October 18, 2012

Too bad you've become a carpet bagging political hack beholden to the Republican machine. The ads you are allowing attacking George Latimer are simply disgraceful. Moreover, moving out of Scarsdale to New Rochelle simply to run in a more favorable district gerrymandered by the Republicans directly to help you try to win this election shows that you have become another machine politician. Good luck George.

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