Friday, March 4: Last day to register with Westchester County Board of Elections to be eligible to vote in the Village Election. Here is the form to register to vote. You must be a registered voter at your current address in the Village of Scarsdale to vote in the Village Election. If you have any questions about your voter registration status, please call the Westchester County Board of Elections at (914) 995-2000 or check the website. You may also check the the website of the New York State Board of Elections.

Tuesday, March 8: Last day for the Village Clerk to receive applications for absentee ballots to be mailed to qualified voters. Voters can get an absentee ballot application online from the Village's website, request one by phone or mail from the Village Clerk, or obtain one at the Village Clerk’s Office in Village Hall. Note: All voters can still apply to vote by absentee ballot using the temporary illness clause if there is a risk of contracting a disease (such as COVID-19). 

Monday, March 14: Last day for the Village Clerk to receive in-person applications for an absentee ballot from an applicant or applicant’s agent. 

Tuesday, March 15: Date of Village Election - Last day to drop off absentee ballots in-person (1) in the drop box at the Scarsdale Public Library any time before polls close at 9pm, or (2) in the drop box at Village Hall any time before it closes at 5pm. Also, this is the last day that absentee ballots sent via mail may be received by Village Hall. 

For additional information, you may visit the Village’s Local Election Information Page. 

The LWVS has been busy with local civic engagement during the past month. We held our Annual Program Consensus meeting to devise a Proposed Local Program 2022-23 on which we will vote at our annual meeting on May 6. We also made recommendations to the LWVW and LWVUS on their programming for the upcoming year. In addition, the 2021-22 LWVS SBNC Election Consensus Statement was finalized, released and sent to the SBNC Administrative Committee.

March will continue to be another active month. On March 14, we will consider whether to concur on an LWVNYS position on Voting for Incarcerated Individuals. In addition, we will hold information and consensus meetings on the School and Village Budgets. The School Budget Information and Consensus meeting will be on March 24, and the Village Budget Information and Consensus meeting will be on March 29. Please join us for all of these important meetings.

The League of Women Voters of NYS is hosting in-person Regional Training Meetings across the state in March and early April, including one at the Scarsdale Woman’s Club on April 2. All members are invited to attend any or all of the workshops. To attend, you must register in advance by completing this form.

On April 3, we look forward to our first in-person event of 2022, an author visit at the Scarsdale Public Library with Dorothy Wickenden who will be discussing her recent book, The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women’ Rights.  

After New York State’s newly-created Independent Redistricting Commission failed to propose one set of US Congressional, NY Senate and NY Assembly maps to the NY State Legislature, the Legislature, within days, passed bills proposing its own maps, without any public hearing or opportunity for public comment or questions. Governor Hochul signed the bills into law on Feb 3. The Scarsdale League shares in the disappointment of the New York State League with this process and, in particular, with the Legislature’s failure to allow for public input. 

County redistricting is a separate process from state and federal redistricting. In Westchester County, redistricting is required only “if necessary.” The Westchester County Board of Legislators has announced that they plan to draw new maps this year, but they do not yet have any definitive or detailed redistricting plan. The current Westchester County district lines may be viewed on the Westchester County Board of Legislators website. Westchester County Legislator Benjamin Boykin currently represents Scarsdale in District 5.

 Thursday, March 24, 2022

10:00 a.m. via Zoom

Follow this link to the LWVS Budget Questions and District Responses.

9:00 a.m. via Zoom

The LWVS will convene a General Membership Information Session followed by a Consensus Meeting on the 2022-23 Proposed Village Budget on Tuesday, March 29 at 9:00 a.m. via Zoom. 

Village Administration and the Board of Trustees held several working meetings from December through late February. In the "first pass" meeting, Village Trustees reviewed all of the departmental budget requests, attempting to envision needs for the next three to five years. This resulted in a funding gap of $6,424,000. In subsequent meetings, the Village categorized individual budget items as high, medium, and low priority in order to determine which items are funded in this year’s budget and which should be deferred to future years’ budgets.   

Join us for a book talk with the author Dorothy Wickenden to hear about her book, The Agitators: Three Friends Who Fought for Abolition and Women’s Rights. This book examines the lives of three women – Frances Seward, Harriet Tubman, and Martha Coffin Wright – whose paths converged in the town of Auburn, New York, where they became collaborators in the fight for abolition and women’s suffrage as well as devoted friends.

Dorothy Wickenden is the author of Nothing Daunted and The Agitators and has been the executive editor of The New Yorker since January 1996. She also writes for the magazine and is the moderator of its weekly podcast The Political Scene. A former Nieman Fellow at Harvard, Wickenden was national affairs editor at Newsweek from 1993-1995, and before that was the longtime executive editor at The New Republic. 

Links:

What makes our country so strong is the diversity of people with differences, religious, political, and cultural, who can work together. He reminded us that this is not the first time in our history that the US was in turmoil, but out of challenging times, we become better and stronger. Khan ended the evening with words of inspiration for our country: We are a beacon of hope for others in the world – it is our destiny.

On Monday, February 7, 2022, the LWVS held a General Membership and Consensus meeting about our LWVS Proposed Program for 2022-23. Our proposed program will be voted on at our Annual Membership Meeting on Friday, May 6, 2022. 

The LWVS also worked on a letter offering input to LWVW on their 2022-23 Program Planning.  

The LWVS reached a consensus of YES to support including the following items for discussion and voting at the Convention:

Comments from the LWVS have been sent to the LWVUS. For more information, please contact Alissa Baum at [email protected]. 

The Scarsdale Village Board of Trustees is currently evaluating whether to repair or renovate the Scarsdale Pool Complex. The LWVS is forming a Pool Study Committee to follow this process and needs members to be a part of this new committee. The Pool Study Committee will be interesting, intellectually engaging, and critical to our League’s work in the Scarsdale community. If you have any interest or just have questions, please contact Alissa Baum at [email protected].

If successful, this pilot will be expanded to many other school districts as an enduring, annual event. For more information, please contact Alissa Baum at [email protected].

In January, the LWVW co-sponsored an excellent program on Electric School Buses. And, on April 13, the LWVW will be co-sponsoring a virtual forum on The Perils of Plastic with Erica Cirino, author of Thicker Than Water, and Jim Vallette, the lead researcher and author of Beyond Plastics, a new report which details how plastic production is set to overtake coal in greenhouse gas emissions. 

To find out more information on these and other programs and legislative positions, contact Susan Schwarz at [email protected].

Thanks to Suzie Hahn for her work on the School Budget portfolio. Thanks as well to Tracy Tang for her continued work on the Village Budget portfolio. Thanks to Jyoti Ruta for her thoughtful work on the SBNC Consensus Statement. Thanks to Elissa Ruback for her wise counsel and supportive work. 

Thanks to Lauren Hertzog Fields, Beatrice Sevcik, and Jessica Zellner for their work on Voter Service and for keeping the community informed about redistricting. Thanks to Lauren Tetenbaum Dorman and Cindy Yau for organizing Students Inside Albany and attracting a record number of student applicants.

Thanks to Dana Matsushita for her careful, thoughtful and detailed work on the LWVS Bulletin and for issuing timely eblasts to inform our membership of important events. Thanks to Joan Bowen for advertising our events as well as voter service information on social media.  

Thanks to Diane Baylor for taking such careful minutes at our meetings and for acting swiftly to ensure our website remains up-to-date.  

Thanks to Erika Rublin for her precise and detailed work as Treasurer. Thanks to Heedan Chung, Lauren Tetenbaum Dorman, and Jenny Tabak for their work on membership. Thanks to Sara Pinto and Cindy Yau for their work on programming. 

Thanks to Anne Lyons for her work on the LWVS winter finance drive and for her sage advice. Thanks to Kitt Rosenthal for being our liaison to the LWVW and for her important Board work.

Thank you to Janice Starr and the LWVS nominating committee, Kerry Hayes, Dalya Khan, Heedan Chung, and Elissa Ruback, for their work on the 2022-23 Board slate. 

Thanks to Nancy Michaels and the LWVS budget committee, Leah Dembitzer, Diane Baylor, Anne Lyons, Debbie Miller, and Erica Rublin.

Thanks to Evelyn Stock for her help with the Students Inside Albany program and to the 21 impressive and accomplished Scarsdale High School Students who applied. You make all of us confident that the future is in good hands.

If you would like to nominate yourself or someone you know to be considered for the 2022-23 League Board or Nominating Committee, kindly contact 2021-22 Nominating Committee Chair Janice Starr at [email protected].

Bulletins will be sent via eblast and posted on our website, Facebook page, and Twitter feed.

Contact us at [email protected] with any questions about your membership status or to change/update your contact information.

The TRY brochure, the directory of elected and appointed government officials published by the LWVS, is available on our website.