who are these clowns kidding?
suffolk county and suffolk otb and suffolk county legislator kevin mccaffrey do not understand or care what ny const art 1 sec 3 says
I-
Thanks for the help. The item’s below. I’d be happy to mail you a copy, if you give me a mailing address.
Claude Solnik
Long Island Business News
2150 Smithtown Ave.
Ronkonkoma, NY 11779-7348
Home > LI Confidential > Stop scratching on holidays
Stop scratching on holidays
Published: June 1, 2012
Off Track Betting in New York State has been racing into a crisis called shrinking revenue. Some people have spitballed a solution: Don’t close on holidays.
New York State Racing Law bars racing on Christmas, Easter and Palm Sunday, and the state has ruled OTBs can’t handle action on those days, even though they could easily broadcast races from out of state.
“You should be able to bet whenever you want,” said Jackson Leeds, a Nassau OTB employee who makes an occasional bet. He added some irrefutable logic: “How is the business going to make money if you’re not open to take people’s bets?”
Elias Tsekerides, president of the Federation of Hellenic Societies of Greater New York, said OTB is open on Greek Orthodox Easter and Palm Sunday.
“I don’t want discrimination,” Tsekerides said. “They close for the Catholics, but open for the Greek Orthodox? It’s either open for all or not open.”
OTB officials have said they lose millions by closing on Palm Sunday alone, with tracks such as Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Turf Paradise and Hawthorne running.
One option: OTBs could just stay open and face the consequences. New York City OTB did just that back in 2003. The handle was about $1.5 million – and OTB was fined $5,000.
Easy money.
Riverhead Town Board debates keeping invocations to open meetings
Incoming Town Supervisor Laura Jens-Smith says she is not in favor of opening meetings with the nondenominational prayers, but board members support the policy.
The Riverhead Town Board is debating a policy on opening meetings with a prayer. March 22, 2011. Photo Credit: Newsday / Erin Geismar
To pray or not to pray.
Incoming Riverhead Town Board members are debating the practice of starting town board meetings with a prayer.
Board members are to vote at their regular meeting Tuesday on whether to adopt a written policy continuing the practice of opening town board meetings with invocations, which became a regular practice under Town Supervisor Sean Walter.
The board first voted 5-0 on March 18, 2015, to adopt a policy allowing the invocations.
However, Walter said Friday, Supervisor-elect Laura Jens-Smith, who defeated him in the November election, recently told him she was not in favor of continuing the prayers to open meetings. Her decision made him “really, really upset,” Walter said.
“It breaks my heart that the incoming town board doesn’t want to continue it,” Walter said.
He said the invocation policy was consistent with past U.S. Supreme Court rulings on opening town meetings with prayers, including the 2014 Town of Greece v. Galloway case, where the court ruled that upstate Greece officials could allow volunteer chaplains to lead prayer sessions to open town board meetings.
Riverhead’s invocation policy states it is nondenominational and open to participation by all faiths. In the past, the board has extended invitations to several different local faith groups to lead the prayers, Walter said.
“I don’t think that it’s something that is necessary prior to every single board meeting,” Jens-Smith said Friday. “I think there should be a separation between church and state, and I don’t know if everyone in the audience is comfortable with standing for a prayer before attending a government meeting.”
Most of the current board members said they supported starting meetings with the invocations.
“To me, it’s benign,” said Town Councilman Jim Wooten, who requested the resolution in part as a way to have the board decide the issue. “We’re not pushing any particular faith. . . . I don’t think it’s disrespectful to take a moment to have an invocation.”
Councilman Tim Hubbard cited the court rulings, adding the invocations “tend to temper the mood of a meeting, so in that respect, I think they make sense.” Councilwoman Jodi Giglio called the invocations “a very civil way to start the meetings.”
Jens-Smith said she will wait to see if the resolution passes, and if it does, she would continue to discuss the matter with the board after she is sworn into office.
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