Big news today:

Today, Entergy announced that it plans to sell Indian Point after it fully closes in 2021 to a decommissioning company called Holtec International rather than the Northstar (the New York company that Entergy sold its Vermont Yankee plant to) and that Entergy is planning to sell off all of its remaining market nuclear reactors to decommissioning firms. Holtec is a New Jersey company that after the deal will have six nuclear reactors on four sites in New Jersey, Michigan, New York and Massachusetts. The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission will need to approve the deal.

The Town Supervisor and the Town Board have been working hard to minimize the impact of the closure regardless of who was planning to take over the decommissioning activities (an announcement we expected later this year). There have been many moving parts, including economic studies, lobbying, tax planning and shared services discussions among so much more. Tonight, in fact, we will be voting on a measure to continue our mitigation of the $800,000 per year tax loss to the Town by authorizing the Comptroller to designate $100,000 annually of our unreserved fund balance per year to a designated fund balance account to help cushion the tax loss we will feel in Cortlandt when the PILOT agreement diminishes and before any NYS closure funds kick in and afterwards. Supervisor Puglisi and the Town Board took that action immediately after the announcement of the closure in 2017 and has been continuing to find ways to mitigate the impacts of the closure through our local Indian Point task force as well as the State Task Force. Much has been learned in the Task Forces and much more needs to be done.

This is, of course, huge. While it was not unexpected, the announcement came much earlier than any of us were led to believe. Among the Easter eggs in the press release from Entergy and Holtec was the hopeful news that the nuclear rods that were expected to remain on the site for several decades could possibly be moved in the future to a Holtec-owned proposed Consolidated Interim Storage (CIS) facility in New Mexico. This facility, called a HI-STORE CIS, would be set up to accept used fuel from across the country. That will be a great possibility for our community if we can get rid of all the spent fuel rather than keeping it here (hindering growth and reuse of the entire site). Naturally, details matter on anything of this magnitude, and we will push to ensure that every step of the decommissioning is done safely.

Supervisor Puglisi has already mentioned that she plans to meet with Holtec at their earliest opportunity, and we are very interested in seeing just what kind of a neighbor they have been elsewhere and what their workforce looks like. They have apparently committed to keeping the Entergy workforce to the extent those workers can be used in decommissioning. Since Holtec has been involved in the decommissioning of the Pilgrim site in Massachusetts, we will be doing our homework on the impacts to that community and how well the company worked with the community.

At this point, it is unclear whether there is any different tax impact to Cortlandt and the Hendrick Hudson school district beyond what was already anticipated. There has been mention of the "unutilized deferred tax balances" in the press report, so we will need to know what this means and if there is money set aside for our communities. The decommissioning trust fund currently has about $1.85 billion in the account, and the trust fund must have enough money set aside to fund the decommissioning activities or Holtec will need to wait to do the work so the fund investments can grow to the required amount necessary to finish the work. Their vested interest is in doing this as inexpensively as possible so that they can decommission well within the trust fund parameters as they would like to pocket any unused funds; our primary interest is to ensure that the decommissioning is done safely while minimizing impacts to our communities.

There are lots of unknowns, and maybe some positives with this announcement. We are hopeful more details will be shared at next week’s Indian Point Joint Task Force meeting on Thursday April 25th at 5pm. Supervisor Puglisi and Councilman Rich Becker will be representing us on the Task Force and a Citizens Advisory Panel has recently been set up to ensure that our community is not forgotten in the decommissioning process. Today’s statement looks very positive, but there is much to be unpacked, and the regardless of how great a neighbor Holtec will be, the tax effect will be huge for Buchanan, HenHud and the library and fire district there. Let’s hope they are able to do the work well and quickly (hopefully within 15-20 years rather than the 60 years as allowed by the NRC) so that the properties can be released for productive taxable reuse. Most importantly, we now have an entity we can negotiate with to try to get portions of the site released early for appropriate business development in the area.

The Citizens Advisory Panel that was recently announced by Supervisor Puglisi and Mayor Knickerbocker will ensure representation of our communities in this critical decommissioning process. The panel will be advisory and will communicate and encourage public involvement and education of Indian Point as it begins to shut down. As the host communities, it is critical that the decommissioning is done safely and that all impacts to our community are properly addressed and mitigated. The Citizens Advisory Panel is an important step for our community to have a say in the decommissioning process, and will work collaboratively with federal and state regulators as well as any future oversight boards and other state agencies like the NYS DEC, the NYS OEM, the NRC, the Dept of Energy and others.

I and the rest of the Town Board and Supervisor Puglisi will, of course, continue to keep you advised as we receive updates on this important issue. ... See more

Good tips in how to react to propaganda.

Important new article that documents the chief propaganda technique being employed both Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump called “asymmetric polarization”:

“It is hard to imagine how we can preserve our democracy unless we come to terms with the corrosive effects that the onslaught of propaganda has had on our public discourse. The partisan divide that has deepened over the last few decades has been infinitely dissected. But the truth is that it wouldn’t be so destructive were it not for the constant stream of lies and distortions that lead to “asymmetric polarization.”

Since Donald Trump was elected with an obvious assist from Vladimir Putin, there has been a lot of talk about how he incorporates the new methods of “information warfare” coming from Moscow. Here’s a summary of those methods from Peter Pomerantsev.

[Information warfare] reinvents reality, creating mass hallucinations that then translate into political action…In today’s Russia…the idea of truth is irrelevant…

The point of this new propaganda is not to persuade anyone, but to keep the viewer hooked and distracted—to disrupt Western narratives rather than provide a counternarrative…This is why it’s so important for Moscow to do away with truth. If nothing is true, then anything is possible.” ... See more

Thank you Councilman James F. Creighton for representing us the State of the County! #allpoliticsarelocal

Women making history!

Please join the County Executive and me for coffee and conversation on April 13th! We'd love to know what's on your mind.

Please get vaccinated!!!

The Westchester County Department of Health has scheduled three free Measles vaccination clinics over the next week. Please see the below for more details.

Some states have used authority under the Clean Water Act to delay construction of infrastructure tied to fossil fuels.

From a science-based standpoint, only medical exemptions from vaccines make sense. The current outbreak of measles in Bedford and Mt. Kisco has been traced to unvaccinated children who were exempted for their family’s religious or personal beliefs. We have a duty to keep our kids safe from easily preventable diseases that can maim and kill, like measles, that we once thought were eradicated thanks to vaccines. It’s time to strengthen our laws to protect our children.

http://westchester.news12.com/story/40284697/8-children-confirmed-with-measles-in-westchester ... See more

Wow!

Measles Confirmed in Eight Unvaccinated Westchester County Children. County Executive George Latimer and Health Commissioner Sherlita Amler, MD Hold Media Availability.

Westchester County Department of Health ... See more