Two Seats Up for Grabs in Mount Pleasant Board Election

By Joan Gaylord

With four candidates vying for two open seats on the Mount Pleasant Town Board, the Democrats are looking to retain a presence in town government.

This year, Laura DiVenere joins incumbent Francesca Hagadus-McHale on the Democratic slate. They face Jerry Schulman and Danielle Zaino, both of whom are running on the Republican, Conservative and Independent ballot lines.

Laura DiVenere

In her first run for public office, DiVenere, 58, said one of her priorities would be more effective communication and to involve as many residents as possible in decision-making.

“I’m a regular person. I’m a mom. I work,” said DiVenere, a realtor. “I can’t make decisions for everybody. I want them to be included.”

Though updates are regularly posted to the town’s website, DiVenere said many residents, especially seniors, don’t get their information online. Information needs to be more accessible including through newspaper postings, town bulletin boards and other historically traditional means, she said.

“Social media is important but sometimes being simple is better,” DiVinere said.

She cited the need for affordable housing, particularly for seniors so they may continue to live in the area after their children are grown. When exploring ways to revitalize the hamlets, DiVenere wants attention paid to businesses that would appeal to seniors, such as restaurants and mom and pop stores.

“We moved here for the charm of the town and I want to keep that,” she said.

Weighing impact when evaluating proposed development is critical, DiVenere said. For example, mixed-use proposals must be scrutinized for sufficient parking. DiVenere said the North 60 project, which appears good on paper, must be carefully vetted to ensure it’s beneficial to the town.

As for sharing services, it is a concept that DiVenere supports.

“I would do my due diligence for the town,” she said. “I’d ask questions and then bring it to the people. Everyone who lives here needs to know.”

Francesca Hagadus-McHale

When Hagadus-McHale won last year’s special election to fill the unexpired term of Mark Rubeo, who was appointed town justice, she became the first Democrat in 30 years to win a seat on the Mount Pleasant Town Board. This year, she returns to the campaign trail seeking a full four-year term.

“I’m bringing the change I promised,” said Hagadus-McHale, a Pleasantville resident.

Among the changes she has sought is to make the board’s activity more transparent and to be more responsive to residents. In addition to wanting to make all agendas public, including work sessions, Hagadus-McHale believes the first 20 to 30 minutes of work sessions that is available for presentations should include residents’ comments.

“There are real issues that need confronting,” she said. “But they don’t get discussed.”

Hagadus-McHale referred to the Comprehensive Plan update efforts as “a mystery.” She noted there had been much input and a contract with the Pace Land Use Law Center, but it has been about a year since meaningful progress has been made.

The need to revitalize Mount Pleasant’s hamlets is a priority for Hagadus-McHale, particularly filling empty storefronts. She supports efforts to bring mixed uses to buildings in the hamlets, zoning that would allow commercial or office on the ground floor and residential space upstairs. Sufficient parking, however, must be part of any plan.

She also supports the North 60 project, the proposed three million-square-foot multi-use development adjacent to Westchester Medical Center and New York Medical College.

While Hagadus-McHale notes that the town is doing well financially, she said it is vital to continue searching for cost-saving measures. This includes looking for opportunities to share services, such as the successful shared dispatching of the Pleasantville and Mount Pleasant police departments. Additional opportunities such as sharing municipal day camps should be explore, she said.

Hagadus-McHale has been a big proponent of bringing the hamlets and villages together. In one instance, she invited students from Sleepy Hollow High School to receive a proclamation from the board as recipients of the Metro Award, a recognition of their school theater work.

Hagadus-McHale spoke out against the activities of the Coalition for a Safe Mount Pleasant, an organization formed in response to safety concerns at Pleasantville Cottage School. The residential school, run by the JCCA, meets the child welfare and mental health needs of some of the area’s most vulnerable and troubled students, she said.

“The activities of the coalition imply we are not safe,” Hagadus-McHale said.

She said she has reached out to state Sen. Peter Harckham for help, including requests for funding to recruit and train personnel and retain a qualified supervisory staff. Hagadus-McHale pointed to recent security improvements on the campus and said she would like to see more community involvement on the issue.

Her perspective comes from not only being a Town Board member, but the parent of a special needs child and a teacher. Hagadus-McHale, 66, taught foreign languages in the Chappaqua School District for 32 years.

Jerry Schulman

Though a newcomer to town elections, Schulman, 62, is known to many residents from his years as a Westlake educator and administrator. He retired in 2015.

Schulman views serving on the Town Board as a way to give back to the community.

“You don’t really know what campaigning is like until you do it,” Schulman said. “I was a school administrator but now I’m meeting people in many other parts of our town.”

A 34-year Pleasantville resident, Shulman shares concern for Mount Pleasant’s hamlets. Changes should include improved sidewalks and lighting. He would also like to see rezoning that would allow landlords to have greater flexibility regarding their properties’ uses, including residential units above businesses within the hamlets. However, any mixed-use plan must have adequate parking.

“You can’t build without identifying parking,” he said.

Schulman also want to learn from other towns about how to effectively attract millennials. Many younger residents might prefer residences that would allow them to walk to the train station, he said.

The North 60 project now under review carries benefits for the town. He noted that the plan is to be implemented in phases, an approach he supports.

Traffic and efforts to mitigate its impact must be assessed, he said. Schulman wants to evaluate is town spending and avoiding tax increases is a priority. As a school administrator, Schulman said he was accustomed to a “zero-base budget,” justifying every expense. It is an approach he thinks would work well for the Town Board, especially since he does not see significant savings in shared services.

While Schulman is open to exploring alternative energy sources such as installation of more solar panels, those efforts should not be overdone and consume green space.

Improved town communication is a matter Schulman wants to address. The extensive road paving and the disruptions they have caused is one example where better communication between the town and its residents would have been beneficial.

“Put it in the water and tax bills,” Schulman said of the updates. “Alerts can go online. We also need an opportunity to give feedback.”

The town has been doing an excellent job with senior programming, which he called “phenomenal.” Still needed, however, are more affordable housing units for seniors. Schulman said he hopes to discuss the issue with local developers and explore options.

Danielle Zaino

A lifelong town resident, this is Zaino’s first run for elected office as well. Asked by local residents to run, it’s an opportunity to “help Mount Pleasant be what we want,” she said.

Maintaining Mount Pleasant’s suburban identity in one of Zaino’s priorities. She said she approves the Town Board’s handling of the Comprehensive Plan process, including holding a series of meetings with residents and the ongoing work on a draft update, which would be the first in nearly 50 years.

“We need to be with the times,” said Zaino, 42, a Valhalla resident, who has three children and works for a construction company. “The needs of people are very different now than they were in 1970.”

Zaino called North 60 an “exciting” project but welcomes the opportunity to assess each stage to ensure its impacts are properly managed, particularly traffic.

There should be opportunities for more service sharing. Zaino said she would support efforts for shared highway services and equipment with other municipalities, but that should not include police services. Zaino said the town maintaining its own department is a comfort to residents since Mount Pleasant covers a broad geographic area.

“You don’t want to combine departments and then have an emergency where it takes five or 10 minutes for them to get there,” Zaino said.

Improved communication in town is also a priority for Zaino. She cited social media as an effective tool but noted that many residents are not online regularly. Targeted mailings on key issues could be effective but said officials would have to regularly evaluate that strategy.

“There’s a fine line between letting people know but you don’t want to kill five forests to get the word out,” Zaino said.

The challenges to the community posed by safety and security issues at Pleasantville Cottage School, the residential treatment center for youhts, has been a focus for Zaino. She is a co-founder of Coalition for a Safe Mount Pleasant.

“Our goal when we started was to make the community safe and the campus safe for those kids,” said Zaino, who has been pleased with the progress made.

She noted changes in therapeutic models and staff retraining as two improvements the coalition has supported. She also noted upgraded on-campus security, including enhanced lighting and cameras.

“It is not fair to the taxpayers when the local police are there daily and [the facility] is tax-exempt,” Zaino said.