The Dobbs Ferry (Pharmacy) Party Strikes Back !

Dobbs Ferry, January 28, 2007 – Smarting from its surprise defeat in the November election to the Democratic ticket, the Dobbs Ferry (Pharmacy) Party struck back with the only weapon left in their quiver – a referendum to move the election date back to March. 

By way of background, the Dobbs Ferry Party had dominated Village politics for the past ten years.  Its reign of power started with the election of renegade ‘Democratic’ Brian Monahan over Phil Jones, the candidate of the liberal – if not socialist – official Dobbs Ferry Democratic Committee.  Brian’s election was remarkable, in retrospective, in that he was opposed by Village celebrities like Meredith Vieira and the graphics of  his newspaper ads were second rate.  At first, the Dobbs Ferry Party presented itself as the voice of reason; a non-partisan group of public servants who were dedicated to the good of the Village, not the radical partisan agendas of the major parties. 

With this positioning, it triumphed in election after election until in 2004, it controlled the Mayor’s office and all six Trustee positions.   

The Dobbs Ferry Party looked so unbeatable that in the 2005 election only one Democrat, Paula Dambroff, dared to stand for the election of three Trustee positions.  To their surprise, Paula won, but we will get to that later. 

But with the passage of time, the Dobbs Ferry Party revealed itself to be a Republican front.  It is controlled by the Republican elite of the Ardsley Country Club and a prominent Republican village attorney, Kevin Plunkett.  Its platform was one of unchecked development and lavish patronage spending, especially to the interest groups that deliver the voters at each March election.  It allowed the construction of a high density condominium development called the Landing and two-family houses on lots zoned for commercial purposes.  Its greatest blunder was the construction of an expensive, yet unimpressive new library at the southern edge of the Village with inadequate parking – it is still unclear who benefited directly from this decision..  It then sold the old library building for cash at the bottom of the real estate market, when it should have preserved this landmark building for community purposes. 

Finally, in the 2006 election the electorate had had enough of their laissez-faire inaction, particularly the lack of progress at the so-called Gateway which is a collection of vacant lots in the center of the Village that had been an eyesore for years. 

The Dobbs Ferry Party attributes its defeat, not to its policies or lack of accomplishment, but to the fact that the Democratic Committee cleverly moved the election date from March to November in 2005.  This slight of hand had two effects on the DFP.  First, voter participation went up.  And, God knows there is nothing worse for the Republican cause than voter turnout.  Instead of attracting the usual 20% to 25% turnout to a ‘special’ election in the freezing rain of March that could be manipulated by the ‘interest groups”, for the first time, Dobbs Ferry actually had an open and fair election at the end of Indian Summer.  The voter turn out in the 2006 election was over 50%. 

But to the Dobbs Ferry Party this increase in voter involvement did not signal democracy in action but instead the pernicious effect of Federal and State partisan politics impinging on Village sensibilities.  Second, because the Dobbs Ferry Party represents a very small group of people it was put on the same row, Row H of the ballot, with the Rent Is Too High Party and Socialist Equality Party.  Oops. 

So the logical solution to its decline in relevance was to seek a return to its formula of success – move the election back to March and deny the uninformed, knee-jerk commuters from voting their party affiliation. 

The person most threatened by the resurgence of the Democratic Committee and the new election date is the incumbent Mayor Joe Bova.  Mr. Bova is rumored to be a closet Republican though he is registered as an independent. 

Almost immediately after the November election the Dobbs Ferry Party started to circulate petitions to hold a special referendum to move the election date back to March.  Mayor Bova led the petition campaign by gathering 197 signatures – no self-interest there – out of the 400 that are needed under State law.  Apparently, anyone who entered Mr. Bova pharmacy was solicited to sign the petition — hence, the new moniker for the party, the Dobbs Pharmacy Party.    Other luminaries who organized in this attempt to dampen voter turnout included prominent Republicans – Lyle Miller and Linda Leone, the remaining Republican Trustees, Frank Farrington, a defeated Republican Trustee, and Susan King, Chair of the Republican Committee.  Many of the DFP stalwarts also contributed to the effort: two-time, loser Hartley Connett, the Karl Rove of the DFP, David Mintzes, former ‘Democractic’ Trustee Marcia Hefler, appointed former Trustee Cliff Lifflander who mustered two signatures and infamous Village meddlers, Paddy Steinschnieder and Bettina Speyer. 

In 2003, the last time the Village was presented with petitions to move the election date, the Dobbs Ferry Party fought the effort with every legal device at its disposable.  It checked every signature.  It waited until the last possible day to enter a legal challenge and hence delayed the filing of the petitions with the Board of Elections. 

The DFP didn’t want this issue to go before voters in a presidential election in November where voter turnout would be high.  Through a series of delay tactics, the petitions arrived too late to make it on the November ballot.  The delay was challenged in Westchester County Supreme Court in White Plains, New York.   The self-proclaimed Republican judge and acquaintance of Kevin Plunkett decided that the petitioners were right and the Village was wrong on all legal points except one small procedural point under New York State Municipal Home Rule § 24 and hence, ruled that the Dobbs Ferry petitions arrived one-day too late for the November ballot.  The petitioners then appeal to the New York State Supreme Court in Brooklyn that ruled on October 30 – five days before the November election — that the County Supreme Court had ruled improperly based on Municipal Home Rule § 24 and that Village Law § 9-9 was the governing statue.  This statue permitted the Village Clerk to take her time inspecting the signatures even if it meant the petitions would be filed too late.  Since the petitioners could not prove that the delay was intentional, and it was now too late to reprint the absentee ballots in advance of the November election, the referendum was pushed to March 2004.  This legal process cost the Village more than $20,000 in legal fees which were paid to Kevin Plunkett’s law firm. 

The referendum was pushed to March 2004 where it won by a small margin to the surprise of the Dobbs Ferry Party.  The DFP was concerned especially by the referendum’s support in electoral districts that were normally loyal to the cause. 

In the November 2005 election -Trustees must serve a full term of one year so the 2004 election was skipped – another surprising event occurred.  The single Democratic candidate, Paula Dambroff, won by 13 votes defeating independent Hartley Connett. The DFP attributed this small victory to “bullet voting” – the stalwart Democrats had voted for only one Trustee candidate instead of the normal three and therefore given their candidate an unfair advantage.  Perhaps voter turnout was more important.  In this election almost 30% of the voters participated. 

This time around the petitions to the move the election date were treated differently.  First, they were filed by the Mayor himself and checked quickly by the Village Clerk in ‘secrecy’; only after a legal reprimand from the three Democratic Trustees who also happen to be trial lawyers were the petitions made public for inspection as required by State law.  This time around the petitions were filed expeditiously with the Board of Elections and a special election declared for March 20, 2007.  

So once again in the little Village of Dobbs Ferry the battle lines are forming; so much for bipartisanship and working together for the good of the community.  Politics is sadly all about getting and holding power.  Even if the power in question is about who gets to build what on a vacant lot.