Auerbach, 62, has not publicly expressed interest in running for county executive, even if it means a $31,000 boost in annual salary and an exponential increase in power and influence. “I have no desire to have the worries and troubles of a county executive on my pillow at night,” he told me shortly after a Monday-morning meeting with Hein to discuss recent headlines.
But can Auerbach sleep snugly while the county exec is stalking him like a 10-point buck in deer season?
Happy trails
Sheriff Paul VanBlarcum has confirmed that his chief assistant, Undersheriff Frank Faluotico, will retire in January. Faluotico, the son of a Kingston barber, began his 25-year career as a Kingston police officer. As head of the sheriff’s URGENT task force, he led the local war on drugs and gangs. The line will be long for successors to “the under’s” $94,000-a-year job.
Frank Faluotico. (Photo: Dan Barton)
Onward Christian soldiers
Most of the stuff SUNY New Paltz President Don Christian told a Kingston-area chamber breakfast session on Tuesday could be gleaned from the college’s website, though he did make a point of reiterating his position on the controversial Park Point student housing project near its main campus.
Munching on a nearby tray of addictive mini-sausages, I had thought that subject might have arisen in the form of a grenade from some outraged New Paltz town official in the audience. But Christian raised it during his prepared remarks. The New Paltz town government opposes Park Point because of a tax-abatement deal with the county that will have developers paying about half the going property taxes. Park Point is “good for the college and good for the community,” Christian said. He said that the developers, currently embroiled with the town in court, will pay “three times the taxes per unit than any existing [housing] development” in the town or village.
The audience seemed more interested in the future of the college, student debt, efforts to encourage its graduates to take up residence in the Hudson Valley and sausage.
Here comes the judge
It’s hard to criticize Democrat candidate for Family Court judge Gilda Riccardi for withholding a concession statement after being down by only about 1,700 votes to Republican Keri Savona on election night, with about 3,000 absentee votes to be counted.
The odds were long, of course. Riccardi would have needed to take something like 80 percent to catch up. According to the county Board of Elections, which began counting absentees last week, votes were almost equally divided between the candidates. With fewer than 1,200 votes left to be counted, Savona still leads by almost 1,600.
Savona, who withheld a victory speech, will no doubt include lavish praise of family and friends, especially her campaign manager, former Republican county legislator Rich Croce of New Paltz, to whom I owe a correction.
I wrote last week that Savona’s apparent win was Croce’s “breakthrough” victory. In fact, as numerous readers pointed out, Croce has in the past seven years twice managed successful campaigns by Holley Carnright for district attorney and Don Williams for county judge. Croce, a New Paltz businessman, also had served two terms as a New Paltz county legislator.
