Nov. 22, 2010 At the end of the summer, on August 24, the voters of Ramapo voted to end taxpayer funding for Christopher St. Lawrence’s baseball park. The vote was an overwhelming 70% to 30%. In effect, the voters erected a financial wall between St. Lawrence’s RLDC (Ramapo Local Development Corp.) and St. Lawrence’s Ramapo Town Board. About the vote, St. Lawrence told The Journal News that he had gotten the message, and going forward, he pledged "there will be no taxpayer dollars" tossed over that wall to the RLDC and its ballpark. An examination of the paper trail since that infamous declaration lays out a pattern of monumental deceit, some of it possibly prosecutable.

Note: The Ramapo Local Development Corp (RLDC) is a quasi-governmental agency that creates its own development projects. It’s supposed to work apart from but with cooperation from the Town of Ramapo. It can make its own loans and contracts, but it is responsible for its debts and obligations. Christopher St. Lawrence is the President and Chair of the Board of the RLDC. There are only two other officers: John Brunson and Moses Gross are listed as Directors. Only these three can vote on RLDC matters.

August 27, 2010
Three days later, at the Regular Meeting of St. Lawrence’s RLDC
The first item listed in the minutes is a Progress Update. The notes read:

"Mr. St. Lawrence summarized the August 24, 2010 vote concerning the Town’s decision to guarantee bonding undertaken by the RLDC in relation to Project Grand Slam. The public sent a clear message that they do not want the Town to take on debt for this project and they do not want to run the risk that their taxes may go up. A discussion was had whereby the board (St. Lawrence, Brunson, Gross) decided that the RLDC will oversee the project and seek private financing so as not to use any taxpayer money to construct the stadium."

A commendable sentiment and a commendable vote, but in the very next paragraph of the meeting notes, "Mr Troodler (attorney for the RLDC) noted that two bids were submitted for the field work for Project Grand Slam." The general recommendation was to accept the bid from Turco Golf of Suffern.

The next paragraph begins with this line: "Mr. Troodler informed the board that the RLDC received a request for a change order from Holt Construction that was submitted by W. Harris & Sons, Inc. in the amount of $108,496 in relation to clearing and grubbing work for Project Grand Slam."

Now, the RLDC does not have its own money. The money it has been using has been from the town (read taxpayers), but now the voters had spoken and St. Lawrence had just repeated the pledge he gave to The Journal News to the people sitting at this meeting: "the RLDC will oversee the project and seek private financing so as not to use any taxpayer money." The Turco bid and the Harris change order were about $1 million combined. Where was this money coming from?

Before the half-hour meeting adjourned at 10am, under New Business, the following votes were recorded:

"A motion was made to have Turco Golf of Suffern, New York perform the playing field work in conjunction with Project Grand Slam."

Unanimous approval

"A motion was made to approve a change order submitted by W. Harris & Sons, Inc., in the amount of $108,496."

Unanimous approval

At the beginning of the meeting, under Progress Update the notes read:

"Mr. St. Lawrence discussed the efforts to secure financing for the ballpark and said that several options were being explored. Several options being discussed, including working with Bergen Capital, an affiliate of BB&T Corp., which is one of the biggest financial services holding companies in the country, and Fishkind & Associates."

Bottom Line: No financing, no capital yet—they were proceeding without funds, and the taxpayer ban still in place.

Under new business:

"A motion was made to engage the services of Bergen Capital and Fishkind & Associates to pursue financing opportunities for Project Grand Slam."

Unanimous approval

Under Progress Update:

No mention of any funding or even of any progress made in securing private financing. The Wall Street style financial Chinese Wall separating the taxpayers and Project Grand Slam was still standing.

We will only look at those obligations and bills paid by or assumed by the Town of Ramapo (read taxpayers) after the August 24 institution of the wall and the promises by the Supervisor and his RLDC board "not to use any taxpayer money to construct the stadium."

The first warning flag went up at the October 13 Town Board meeting. A check for $8,700 to J.A. Greenwell for surveying services of Project Grand Slam—traffic improvements was voted on approved by the Town Board. See "Read my Lips" for an account of how an attempt was made to slip this past the public, unnoticed.

Exhibit One: Check written by the Town on September 9, 2010 for $883,717.55 to Morano Brothers Corp. It’s a partial payment for an eventual total payment of $4,342,500 for work on the ballpark. This check was dated more than two weeks after the referendum and the promise of no new taxpayer funding.

Exhibit Two: Turco Golf, Inc. was given a contract worth $796,510.63 to install a natural turf playing field system for the Ramapo Ballpark (Project Grand Slam) on October 26, just about two months to the day after St. Lawrence started his no new baseball taxes campaign.

Here’s the contract and the original bid sheet.

If there is any doubt as to who will pick up the tab for this work, here’s a paragraph from the second page of the contract that defines the Town’s (read taxpayer’s) agreement "to pay the contractor."

And the cost for this work was established in a bidding process completed just four days before the referendum. Here’s the bid sheet.

Exhibit Three: At the November 4 Town Board meeting, St. Lawrence, Fran Hunter, and Daniel Friedman voted to have the Ramapo taxpayers pay W. Harris & Son $336,296.00 for tree cleaning and grubbing on the Project Grand Slam site. Here’s the resolution, which, incidentally was not read aloud at the board meeting, nor was the amount made public at the time.

We’re not done yet, because we haven’t received all of our FOIL requests, but the running total of new debt taken on and/or paid since the Supervisor very sincerely promised not to invest any taxpayer dollars is $8,023,924.18. It breaks down this way:

Just to be clear, these are not the only loans that Ramapo residents will be paying over the next two or more decades for Project Grand Slam. A check of the County records on 8/6/2009 shows we are paying $15.7 million for the two lots on which the stadium will be builnd that he and his boards would "seek private financing so as not to use any taxpayer money to construct the stadium." t. The charges listed above are just the totals since we were guaranteed by the Supervisor that he "had gotten the message," a

A cynical old political wonk once said, "They’ll keep lyin’ as long as you keep buyin’." Well, it’s time for residents to speak up. This ballpark is going to accumulate probably more than $30 million in debt, and when you factor in the failure rate of the teams in this league, the debt will long outlive the presence of the league here in Ramapo.

Michael Castelluccio
Preserve Ramapo
www.PreserveRamapo.org 　

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