South Orangetown Central School District Budget Vote
The Annual Budget Vote and Board Election will be held Tuesday, May 19, from 7:00 am to 9:00 pm. Palisades residents vote at the Tappan Zee Elementary school on 561 Route 9W in Piermont. The 2015/2016 proposed budget of $85,969,882 is 0.49% less than last year’s budget. For more detailed information, visit the District’s website at www.SOCSD.org and click on Board of Education meeting presentations.

Blog post from Daniel: Chirpy looks like a stuffed animal.

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Response from Chirpy: Do you have a problem with that?

Daniel has a point. Chirpy really IS a stuffed animal, a little robin that sits on Ms. Christie-Blick’s desk in a 5th grade classroom of Cottage Lane School in Blauvelt….when he’s not traveling the world and blogging back to the children, that is.

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RCLS Institutes Six Month Trial Governing Hold Requests
The Palisades Free Library is a member of the Ramapo Catskill Library System, which is a cooperative that allows libraries throughout Rockland, Orange, and Sullivan Counties to share books, audio-books, and DVDs through inter-library loans. Nearly all the libraries, including Palisades, restrict their newest books from inter-library loans. Beginning May 1, there will be a six month trial lifting restrictions on new books.

Deferring to the many of us who expressed opposition, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory has withdrawn its proposal to clear-cut its woods and build a solar panel farm in their place. This was a case where the goals of conservation and green energy conflicted. After some debate, the preservation of the ecological habitat of the Hudson Palisades was recognized as more important than the generation of carbon dioxide (CO2) emission-free electrical power. Such tensions among the environmentally- conscious are on the rise, driven by the complex environmental problems of a world experiencing the enormous and still-growing impact of human beings. Few such problems have ideal solutions; solving one often exacerbates another.

For decades, environmental groups, politicians, and concerned citizens have called for closure of the aging nuclear facility in Buchanan, New York, citing safety and environmental issues. Recent federal approval of a 42-inch high-pressure natural gas pipeline within 200 feet of some of the plant’s vital structures has activists back on the warpath.

Palisades Community Center Board members:
Carol Baxter, President
Alice Buchanan, Vice President
C. Andrew Nelson
Carol Knudson, Secretary
Michele Balm, Mary Ann Brueckner, Lyn Fowler,
Dr. Leo Keegan and Dr. Jeffrey Levine
Honorary Board member: Dr. Virginia McCauley

Bell-ans Center for the Creative Arts
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After more than a century of industrial use the Bell-Ans pharmaceutical factory at the intersection of Route 303 and Kings Highway is being reborn as the Bell-Ans Center of Creative Arts. Last September dozens of visitors sipped wine and wandered through a maze of paint-spattered studios flooded with natural light at the center’s very first Open House. Phyllis Dodge, the woman spearheading the structure’s renaissance, couldn’t have been happier.

Desalination plant defeated. The NYS Public Service Commission ordered United Water not to pursue their plans for a desalination plant and to work with the community to come up with alternative solutions through conservation, reduced leakage and improved repairs. Massive public resistance - over 25,000 people signed petitions - played a major role in its defeat. The Commission ruled United Water was not entitled to seek recovery through a ratepayer surcharge for $50 million pre-construction costs but the company may pursue a surcharge of about $40 million later if the plant is built or plans are permanently scrapped.

More than a year ago the New York Department of Environmental Conservation announced that it planned to eradicate the tall common reed, also known as phragmites, from the Piermont Marsh using herbicides. DEC considers phragmites an invasive species that they say tends to suppress biological diversity.

An Artist's Rendering of the Proposed Office Tower
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The LG headquarters controversy continues. On August 13, 2014 the Englewood Cliffs Borough Council voted to reinstitute a building height limit of 35 feet for all of Englewood Cliffs. This reverses a 2012 decision by the borough’s now defunct Zoning Board to allow buildings up to 90 feet high on commercial lots between five to 25 acres, and up to 150 feet on lots larger than 25 acres. The increased height limits were instituted after the borough was sued for giving electronics giant LG a variance to build a 143-foot tower as part of its new U.S. headquarters.

The History of a Living Commiunity Hidden Away in the Palisades Cemetery
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After 65 years, ownership of the Palisades Cemetery has returned to the community. On December 12, 2014, David Englander and Michael Shapiro drove to the city, carrying a modest check, and returned with a deed to the Palisades Cemetery signed by the widow of Adolpho Luca, the last owner. The cemetery is now owned by a non-profit cemetery corporation administered by a Board of Directors: Carol Knudson, Joan Salomon, Lee Sneden, Michael Shapiro and Alice Gerard, all of whom have been associated with the efforts made in the last few years to preserve the cemetery and return its ownership to the hamlet of Palisades.

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Palisades Presbyterian Church
117 Washington Spring Road, PO Box 687
845-359-3147
ppc10964@gmail.com, www.palpresny.org

Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday 9:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m.
Please check out our facebook page!
www.facebook.com/ThePalisadesPresbyterianChurch

There is not a Division of Motor Vehicles in Nanuet but there is something that comes very close. Housed in an unobtrusive store front for the last 18 years, Wendy's Auto Express, owned by Suffern resident Wendy Winneck, can process things like registrations, duplicate titles and even license plates for a nominal cost with no lines or hassles.

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Palisades Free Library
Member of the Ramapo Catskill Library System and ANSER Network
19 Closter Road, Palisades, NY 10964
845-359-0136, Fax 845-359-6124
www.palisadeslibrary.org

Ribbon Cutting Ceremony for the New Sidewalk
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Joined by Orangetown Supervisor Andy Stewart, State Senator David Carlucci, and other dignitaries, Palisades resident Carol Baxter cuts the ribbon on the new Oak Tree Road sidewalk project at a ceremony held Sunday, October 26th at noon in front of the Palisades Community Center. The project, which began planning over six years ago, allows residents of Palisades to walk safely along busy Oak Tree Road and connects key community landmarks such as the post office, library, bus stop and community center. The approximately $235,000 project was funded in large part by $150,000 in state funds delivered by Senator Carlucci.

Walgreens built a $74 billion company by being in the right place at the right time, but a possible new location at the intersection of Oak Tree Road and NYS Route 303 might be a tough spot for “The Pharmacy America Trusts.”

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The Palisades Community Center Presents

The Palisades Community Directory 2015

This is our LAST CALL!!!!

We are in the FINAL stages of updating the popular Palisades phone directory. The last directory was compiled in 2008. The Absolute FINAL Deadline for listings is OCTOBER 31.

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Maki, my 13 and a half-year-old, wire-haired Dachshund died this August. He was born in January of 2001, the eight puppy of a litter from our dog Dandelion. After the dramatic birth of seven puppies over the course of 20 hours we thought Dandelion was finished and took her to the vet. On the way home my 10-year-old Noah, ex claimed from the back seat of the car, “Mommy, Mommy something strange is coming out of Dandelion! Itʼs another puppy!”

Palisades Presbyterian Church

117 Washington Spring Road
PO Box 687
Palisades, N.Y. 10964
Phone: 845-359-3147
Website: www.palpresny.org
e-mail: ppc10965@gmail.com
Please check out our new face- book page! www.facebook.com/ThePalisadesPresbyterianChurch

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As newspapers close up shop across America, the local publication Our Town is going strong. One likely reason is the dedication of its founder, publisher and editor Arthur Aldrich, who started the weekly 41 years ago.