Take back County Parks in N. Hempstead

In the current brou-ha-ha over the new and increased fees of the 2011 county parks budget, an interesting fact came to light. Included in that budget were fee increases for Hempstead Harbor Beach Park and Whitney Pond Park pool. On September 20th, while testifying before the county legislature on the budget, PARCnassau mentioned both parks had been given to North Hempstead in 2007. Someone wasn’t paying attention and a discussion broke out in the legislature over the status of the 9 county parks that were transferred to the town.

It appears that “the deal” was never finalized. Whether the county legislature did or didn’t submit a Home Rule Message to the State Legislature to support the transfers, apparently the State did not approve them as required in accordance with Alienation of Parkland case laws. While the Suozzi administration turned over the keys to those parks in 2007, the true ownership may never have changed!

In 2007, PARCnassau and others fought the transfers as being detrimental to all county residents who had paid through their property taxes for the acquisition, development and maintenance of those parks. North Hempstead residents would bear the full cost of those facilities, increasing their property taxes. All others would lose any voice in how those parks would operate and could be charged up to double the entrance fees and we believe, would eventually lose all access.

The previous administration announced the deal was done and gave North Hempstead $5,000,000 dollars to “sweeten the deal”. Indicative of how politics in Nassau works, that was not true and those 9 parks may still belong to the county.

If that is correct, the new administration should move immediately to retake those parks on behalf of all county taxpayers. A new Home Rule Message from the legislature should be sent to Albany demanding the cancellation of the first message and of any process to transfer those parks to North Hempstead.

Anyone who has visited Hempstead Harbor, Manhasset Hills and Whitney Pond parks will notice their conditions have not changed since 2007. Deplorable! Take them back and use monies from the county’s $150 million dollar Environmental Bond Fund to restore all of those parks. Hempstead Harbor has the potential to be one of the finest parks on Long Island. Now it is just a commuter parking lot and an eyesore.

The Mangano Administration is becoming expert in correcting the transgressions of its predecessor; so correcting this one should be a piece of cake.

Another Friday Surprise from Parks, More Fees

Well its Friday afternoon and Nassau Parks did a last minute submission to increase more parks fees. Does anyone see a pattern here? Fortunately, unlike parks administration, not all civil servants leave early on Fridays and they continue to process and distribute these submissions in a timely manner allowing us to pass them on to you.

Parks is updating their 2011 budget proposal includes the following:

An Alcohol Beverage permit will go from $45 to $50. (Enforcement will probably remain at zero)
The Eisenhower batting cage will go from $3 a token to $5 (a 66% increase)
Nickerson Entry Fee will go from $8 per vehicle to $10. (a 25% increase)
Nickerson seasonal sticker will go from $80 per vehicle to $90. ( a 12.5% increase)
Nickerson Cabanas will go from $2,100 per season to $2,520 (a $420 increase)
Nickerson Cabinette will go from $700 to $765 per season ( a 13% increase)
Rifle & Pistol Range will go from $7 to $10 per entry (a 30% increase)
Leisure Passes will go from $25 to $30 per person ( a 20% increase)
Eisenhower miniature golf will go from $7 to $9 (a 22% incease)

By the way, since we told the legislature this past Monday, that parks was including fees for Hempstead Harbor Beach Park and Whitney Pond Park and that those parks were given to the Town of North Hempstead in 2007, they wisely deleted them with this amendment. Who is in charge?

Have your fees been increased yet? Hang on, let's see what next Friday's surprise will be. If your fees have increased, feel free to let your legislator know you aren't happy about it.

Note: The Legislative Financial Committee will meet on October 8, 2010 at 10:00 am to discuss the proposed county budget including the unjustified camouflage taxes disguised as fee increases submitted by parks. It wouldn't hurt to use that committee to practice for the final hearing on October 18th.

Final (?) Hearing on County Budget set

As per a legal notice in today's Newsday, the county legislature will hold hearings Monday, October 18, 2010 at 10:00 AM on the proposed county budget for 2011. This will be at the legislative chamber, 1550 Franklin Avenue, MIneola. We are checking to se if here will be committee meetings on specific portions of he budget before hand. If so, we will let you know.

We have almost a month's lead time to marshall support to stop the fee increases in the parks budget. Certainly all the ball teams that will be adversely affected should make a showing and have representatives testify. Once again, emails, letters, phone calls and petitions should be generated opposing these camouflage taxes and sent to the legislators . Dog owners might want to protest the $25 dog run fee, etc. etc.

Increased Fee Proposal Temporarily Stopped

The county administration's attempt to covertly muscle through an ordinance to assess increased fees (camouflage tax) on every ball player in Nassau was stopped this past Monday, September 20th , when the county legislature agreed to table the measure. It will next be addressed along with the entire 2011 county budget in the near future after full investigation and public comment.

The justifications tendered by the county were filled with misconceptions, misrepresentations, exaggerations and outright falsifications. Thanks go to each league that testified Monday, each league, team and player that sent letters, emails and made phone calls to the legislators. Ultimately that is what cut this bill off at the pass.

The battle is not over. Whatever is motivating the county and park administrations to attack the ball players who are county residents and taxpayers is known only to them and the almighty. Inviting private leagues into becoming public leagues is fine, destroying private leagues is not! The latest tactics being used include:

"For profit" leagues should pay more to use county fields.
All 38 private leagues using county fields in 2010 are technically "for profit" even if their sponsoring entity is not. A church may be a 501(C) 3 but a ball team providing recreation and fellowship is not. Not should it be. Even the largest independent leagues only pay a living wage to their "owners", virtually all of which are involved for the love of the game. No George Steinbrenners here, Nassau. No ticket sales, no concessions stands, parking fees, TV contracts or product endorsements, just the minimum player fees to provide scheduling, referees or umpires, web sites and office support.

Non-residents should play more to play on county fields.
What non-residents? While the rules mandate at least 80% of the players must be residents, the actual number is in the upper nineties. It is much more likely that a Nassau resident would be playing on a company team in NYC where he works than a city resident would be playing out here.

The proposed bill would allow eliminating field fees for Little Leagues.
The Parks commissioner has always had the authority to "waive any fees which he believes would be in the public interest." If they want to eliminate Little League fees, do it! We have no objection.

Every league, team and player that opposes these unjustified increases should call his county legislator and request being notified the next time this measure is up for discussion and public comment. When that occurs they should make every effort to make their opposition known via letters, emails, phone calls and by testifying before the legislative committees and the full legislature itself. Tell the county that Nassau taxpayers deserve better!

Increased Park Fees AKA Hidden Taxation

Monday, September 13th, the County Administration advanced their agenda of increasing most park fees by misstatements and misrepresentations and glaring omissions. Through a last minute addition to the agenda of the legislative DPW / Parks committee, they received a preliminary approval of the increases that now will go before the full legislature next Monday, September 20th at 10AM. Our thanks to those few citizens that managed to show up at the 1:30 PM meeting and waited over 3 hours to be heard.

Next Monday, PARCnassau expects to be there to testify against taxing our already overtaxed citizenry thru fees and pretending this is for our own good. The bogeyman this time around are the private ball leagues, most of whom have been around providing organized sports for Nassau taxpayers (and voters) for over twenty years.They not only provide the extra services ballplayers wanted and still want but allowed the top teams to compete regionally and nationally if they wished.

The County admits abandoning their own leagues in 2002 leaving only private leagues for ball players to join. Now if the county leagues belly up in the future there will be no leagues for our friends and neighbors. The county administration states they are "taking back" their ball fields. Its is apparent the Parks Department never shared the fact that they never lost them. Private leagues never controlled the county fields. They were always offered for game registration by the county who permitted the teams, scheduled the games and resolved any conflicts and collected a fee based on the cost of that service. For years that was one employee without a computer.

When the County stated they were starting county leagues, we were delighted, believing they would address under-served markets such as women's sports, disabled sports and senior sports. Unfortunately this was not the case. Instead they are pushing out private leagues or worse buying out certain private leagues and hiring their owners high paying county jobs to run them on behalf of the county. Hello?? Is anyone paying attention?

The method is to increase the fees for private leagues forcing them to pass on that cost to their players while reducing player fees for "new"county leagues to lure the players to switch. That is stacking the deck! What they should be doing is offering the same costs and benefits to the ball players and allow market forces to prevail. This has not been the history of County Government. They are bullying us and only we the people stop them.

Next Monday, it is time for every private league owner, manager, player to make it to the hearing at before the full legislature. Bring your families and friends. Invite everyone who cares about fairness in government.
Is the time and date inconvenient for most of us? Yes! Will you have to wait for no apparent reason? Yes!
Is good, representative government worth it? Yes! Yes!

Increasing park fees is camouflage taxation.

Bruce Piel
Chairman
Park Advocacy & Recreation Council of Nassau
246 Twin Lane East
Wantagh, NY 11793
(516) 783-8378

http://parcnassau.blogspot.com/

Dog Runs in County Parks

In the late 90's the Bay Park Civic Association, tired of pet owners ignoring the No Dog rules in county parks suggested that the county open enclosed dog runs where those pets could run leash free and socialize with others. The intent was to keep dogs from the rest of the parks.

Nassau County opened dog runs at Bay Park, Cedar Creek Park, Nickerson Beach Park, Wantagh Park, Christopher Morley Park and the latest at Old Bethpage Restoration Village. When these were initially opened, dog owners were delighted and vowed to self-police the facilities. They are required to have licenses for each dog which are issued by the towns upon proof of rabies inoculations. They must clean up after their dogs, monitor all activity and separate the dogs by size into one of the two pens, large and small. Dogs must be on leash outside the dog run and may not be walked in any other area of the park. Aggressive dogs are prohibited.

The county stated they would maintain the dog runs including putting down lime about every three weeks to help break down urine, reduce communicable diseases, both dog to dog and dog to humans, and finally to dispose of dog feces collected by the owners.

Well folks, there is trouble in canine paradise, most of it attributable to unsocial actions by a few owners and county inattention to its responsibilities and blatant violations. For the safety of the dogs and their owners, the county must assume oversight of all dog runs.

First the county must request that the towns, who are charged with enforcement of NYS Dog Licensing Laws, check the county dog runs in their areas, periodically, to insure all dogs have a license and rabies shots. Secondly the county must fulfill their obligation of keeping the dog runs clean by putting down lime and raking out the areas. All dog owners should be required to show proof that their pet has been checked and found free of communicable diseases by a licensed veterinarian at least once a year.

Finally, dog owners who bring old dilapidated and damaged furniture to the runs for their own comfort, should remove same when they leave. Currently these items are left leaving the dog runs looking like hobo camps. Park personnel should monitor the runs daily to insure all rules and regulations are being followed.( A few owners just toss the feces over the fences, Ugh!)

Do not allow a great program for pet owners to degrade into a great problem for everyone.

Wantagh Marina Thieves strike again

The Nassau County parks Department still haven't found a way to protect the marina and the park itself from thieves, vandals and other ne'er-do-wells who prowl in the dark. Despite periodic drive throughs by Public Security Vehicles and occasionally a police vehicle, groups of youths roam the park at will most nights without being challenged or investigated. Overnight Wednesday, September 8th, at least 3 boats on "F" Dock were broken into and contents stolen. That is twice in 11 days and should be intolerable to the county administration as well as to the boater victims.

Would you think the Parks Department and Police Department would be proactive in addressing this problem. Wantagh Park is officially closed from dusk to dawn except for boat owners, guests and lighted activities, ie ball games. Why isn't Nassau County enforcing the law? Is your county park safe?