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Three Questions For North Salem Board Candidate Monti

NORTH SALEM, N.Y. - Election Day is on November 8 this year. In North Salem, there are four contenders for the two open Town Board seats. They are incumbent Amy Rosmarin (D-IN-Ind), Bruce Buchholtz (R-C-Ind), William Monti (R) and John White (IN). 

The Daily North Salem has asked each of the Town Board candidates to provide a brief biography and answer the same three questions. 

Responses from each candidate will be published over the next week. William Monti’s biography and responses follow.

William A. Monti (R) graduated from Columbia University’s EPBA program. He is currently vice chairman of the Zoning Board of Appeals, an alternate member of the Board of Assessment Review and a member of the Housing Board.

He has served as co-chairman of the Westchester Walk to Defeat ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease). Monti’s older son, William, suffered from ALS.

Since 2001, he has been a member of the Columbia University Medical Advisory Council. Before retirement, he worked in the Naval Nuclear submarine program. 

He managed the Waterside Steam-Electric Generating Stations and he was the site manager of Indian Point Electric Stations. He is also retired from the United States Naval Reserve.

Monti and his family have lived in North Salem for 21 years and attend St. Joseph’s Church in Croton Falls.

1. What is your position on the Westchester Affordable Housing Settlement and how it will affect North Salem?

I think the Settlement, regardless of one’s feelings about whether or not it should have been done in the first place, affords us here in North Salem an opportunity to look for the positives, e.g. expanding the "melting pot." It is a concept I grew up with and helps people out of insular conditions; this works both ways.

2. How would you feel about a “Property Transfer Tax” in North Salem?

I do not support any new tax schemes. We need to use current property tax methods to achieve what the citizens of North Salem wish to have accomplished. New schemes create confusion with special "pots" that can be abused at great cost to the citizens.

3. How do you think Governor Cuomo’s 2% tax cap on town and school district budgets will affect North Salem?

From what I have been able to learn about the "2% Tax Cap" so far it is not the panacea that our Governor has claimed it to be. It will possibly subject our elected officials to unwarranted criticisms for matters over which they have no control. 

The Governor and the Legislature have not presented a clear set of guide lines as to what is or is not included in the "2% Tax Cap.”

Are capital projects, such as sewer district installations for selected residents excluded? Are pre-existing municipal employee contract wages included? Are municipal employees pension payments included? 

These are but a few examples of expenditures over which others set or have set requirements and over which local officials have no control. Does it include State mandated items that school boards must comply with without commensurate funding?

I do not think that the "2% Tax Cap" was well thought out. It seems to be the old Albany trick - "it’s not me" who raised your taxes.

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