Politics & Government

Supporters for DeBar's Last-Minute Supervisor Campaign 'Encouraged'

The following comes from Meaddows Ryan, Trustee of the Ossining Boat and Canoe Club:

Members of the embattled Ossining Boat and Canoe Club were encouraged by early reports from the Ossining polls this morning that there has been considerable support for the last- minute write in candidate for Ossining Town Supervisor, Don DeBar.

DeBar, a supporter of the Ossining Boat and Canoe Club who has actively been involved in efforts to support and engage the Ossining community in decision-making by local government officials for over 20 years, announced his candidacy publicly on Saturday.  “Members of the community had approached me because up until now, Supervisor Donnelly had been running unopposed. In a healthy political climate, she would face opposition in Tuesday's election, which would give voters a choice, and an opportunity to express their dissatisfaction by voting for her opponent,” DeBar states, "Last night my opponent told the press that 'DeBar's campaign will not change anything we are doing today, tomorrow, or after that.'  This kind of disregard for the community's input is exactly the problem."

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Members of the Ossining Boat and Canoe Club have been working feverishly since their club’s doors were padlocked on Halloween to call upon the Ossining Town Supervisor and Board to provide them access and permission to repair necessary alleged violations.  The building was unexpectedly shut down and padlocked by the Ossining Building Department, following a period of sudden and unprecedented official scrutiny which included an unreasonable number of repeated inspections of the premises (four inspections over the last three weeks of October alone), ultimately culminating in a determination to shut down the building for 'post-Sandy electrical safety issues' - 366 days after the storm. 

Tom Earle, Commodore of the Ossining Boat and Canoe Club has said, “We look forward to working with the town to remedy these violations as soon as possible and to continuing our long-standing tradition of providing access to the Hudson River for the community.  We hope to resume normal club activities immediately, especially our Toys for Tots program, which was well underway when the building was locked. It's critical that we move forward in order to provide our annual collection of toys for families that need them."  

Find out what's happening in Ossining-Croton-On-Hudsonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

In the meantime, many OBCC members and supporters are working towards, and hoping for, an upset in today’s race for Ossining Town Supervisor.


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