Cortlandt’s 9-11 Memorial Donation Lowered
A long-delayed, seemingly fraught plan to build a tri-municipal memorial to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 on the Croton-on-Hudson waterfront may have suffered another setback.
Despite joint work from Cortlandt Supervisor Linda Puglisi and Janet Mainiero, the Croton woman chairing the volunteer committee pushing for the memorial, in lowering the municipal contribution of Cortlandt and the villages of Buchanan and Croton-on-Hudson to the project, some members of the Cortlandt Town Board continued to express their skepticism.
Under the new plan, Cortlandt’s contribution would be lowered from about $15,000 to about $10,000, thanks to the addition of in-kind services and pro bono construction work, Puglisi said.
But Cortlandt Town Board Member Ann Lindau said she’s still upset the board was initially told the project would require no taxpayer contributions.
“It’s more philosophical,” Lindau said of her objections. “Our position in one way is yes, maybe we would give them some money provided that this was the end, that there would be no phase one and two, there would be just phase one.”
But Lindau said she’s not confident the project, originally budgeted at about $200,000 and scaled down significantly to its current $60,000 version, will stay at its current budget.
“They haven’t been able to raise the money for this and so then when they say, ‘Oh the commitment is really only 10,’ I say, ‘First it was nothing, now it’s 10 [thousand],” she said.
But to Puglisi, $10,000 is a small price to pay to honor the six Town ofCortlandtresidents who lost their lives on 9/11.
“To give the benefit of the doubt to my colleagues, we are all cognizant and aware of spending taxpayers’ money,” she said. “But it’s been a reduced amount of money and it’s even reduced further to the $10,000, so I think it warrants the contribution for this significant memorial.”
Puglisi cautioned against reading too much into the difference of opinion between her and some members of the Cortlandt Town Board.
“It’s just a little disagreement on how to proceed,” she said.
But Lindau said it’s not even crucial that the region has its own memorial to the terrorist attacks, citing nearby commemorations inPeekskilland at theHolySpiritChurch.
“When this came, it was no taxpayer money. It was supposed to cost over $200,000. Now all of a sudden it’s 60 or something like that and they haven’t been able to raise the money,” she said. “That tells me that the people in the town, this isn’t a major issue because otherwise they would have contributed.”
Mainiero said she didn’t feel comfortable speaking about the developments until after the Town ofCortlandtwork session held Monday night.
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.
