Ellenville, NY – Ellenville is suing the Nevele Grande for unpaid water bills and taxes, but the village’s mayor is also working as a defense lawyer for the hotel’s owner.
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“I’ve disclosed that relationship and disqualified myself from all talks of the Nevele at village meetings,” Mayor Jeff Kaplan told the Times Herald-Record.
The potential conflict of interest started last fall, when Nevele owner Joel Hoffman was dropped by a Kingston law firm because he failed to pay more than $76,000 in fees. Kaplan’s law practice — Kalter, Kaplan, Zeiger & Forman — picked up Hoffman’s case as the embattled hotel owner tried to fend off dozens of debtors and his former partner, Mitchell Wolff, who wants to yank ownership of the Nevele away from Hoffman.
Kaplan himself represented Hoffman on at least one occasion, during a Jan. 13 settlement conference with the Department of Environmental Conservation.
We went there for over 20 years for Pesach & it has gotten so bad. the owners just don’t care anymore. they need to condemn the whole hotel.
when I was a child it was a major major, hotel it was the pride from ellenvile and area, but since the mid 1990 all major hotels and landmark went down, nyc got more safer, so peaple will rather spend a night in nyc lux hotel
This legal representation reeks and is so typical of these borscht belt lawsuits and backroom deals. Even if he diqualifies himself from any dealings on behalf of the city he will be negotiating and litigating against city employees and lawyers so how can that not be conflict. They should all be in jail for this kind of farce.
You think that is a conflict?!! Kaplan is also the attorney representing (and law partner of) the owner of the property where the proposed Walmart is to be built two miles north of Ellenville. In any other similar situation, the mayor of a village or city that is threatened by a Walmart being built just outside that municipality (hence, providing no taxes for it, but decimating its downtown business district, increasing crime, lowering property values, reducing the tax base) would be leading the charge to prevent it or mitigate the impact, but in this case he is leading the charge to get it built, and bubbling how good it will be for the village!
Dallas, Texas – Small towns are not the only ones reporting problems. A memo from the Police Department said a new Wal-Mart store would dramatically increase the workload for officers and result in longer response times for calls. (The Dallas Morning News, Jun. 5, 2002)
Harrisville, Utah – Calls to the local police department climbed by one-third following the opening of a Wal-Mart supercenter, forcing the town to hire two more officers. (Associated Press, May 22, 2004)
Woodstock, Virginia – The chief of police reported that one-quarter of the town’s police calls in 2001-127 calls in all-were for Wal-Mart. He described it as a “nightmare.” (Memo from the Front Royal, Virginia, Chief of Police, 2003)
East Lampeter, Pennsylvania – District Judge Ronald Savage has had to add more days to his monthly court calendar just to deal with crimes at Wal-Mart, which generates almost one-third of his non-traffic criminal violations, criminal misdemeanors, and felony complaints — a number the judge described as “astronomical.” (Intelligencer Journal, Aug. 18, 2003)
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I could go on and on, but the point is clear: WMs increase local crime and police and court costs.