January 24, 2010: In the Media

Taghkanic Celebrates

Carole Osterink, ccSCOOP Editor

On Saturday night, the jubilant residents of Taghkanic gathered at the Tin Ballroom over Vince Mulford’s antiques shop in Hudson to celebrate two victories: the January 6 ruling by Judge Patrick McGrath granting a permanent injunction against the completion and use of Alam Wilzig’s controversial racetrack/sporting course; and the January 13 outcome—in Judge Jonathan Nichols’ courtroom—of the long legal battle over Taghkanic’s challenged absentee ballots.

Full article and slideshow: Taghkanic Celebrates [offsite link]

January 24, 2010: Souvenir

Last Night’s Party, Part 2

Photos from the Shindig

Sam Pratt has photos and a recap over at his blog. Thanks, Sam!

Visit his website: SamPratt.com [offsite link]

January 24, 2010: Souvenir

Last Night’s Party, Part 1

“BLACK IS BLACK” Video

Click (once!) on the link in the yellow bar below to view a five-minute video presented at our celebratory party last night. You’ll need the latest version of the Adobe Flash Player to view this in your web browser.

Older computer or slower connection? .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), and we can snail-mail you a DVD of this video (tell us who you are, and your mailing address).

Music credit: intros from the 1966 one-hit-wonder hit, “Black Is Black,” by Los Bravos, and their rather dreadful 2004 disco rehash.

View video: BLACK IS BLACK [requires Adobe Flash Player]

January 14, 2010: Editorial

Bad decisions cost town money

Parry Teasdale, The Columbia Paper editorial

NO WAY. UH UNH. F’RGETABOUDIT. In slightly more elegant legal language, that’s what a judge told Alan Wilzig about his hopes to pave and ride on the mile-long motorcycle track he’s built at his property in the Town of Taghkanic. The judge said Mr. Wilzig can’t use the track now or ever, and the town better not tell him he can.

Mr. Wilzig, who bought 240 acres near the Taconic State Parkway in 2005 and crowed online at the time about turning it into “Wilzig Racing Manor,” is a very wealthy man. He and his lawyer now say he plans to appeal the ruling by state Supreme Court Judge Patrick J. McGrath, even though Judge McGrath is the second state judge in the last three years to tell him in no uncertain terms that town law does not allow him to build and use a racetrack.

Full article: Bad decisions cost town money [offsite link]

January 14, 2010: In the Media

A road by any other name

Debora Gilbert, The Columbia Paper

State judge slams brakes on Wilzig motorcycle track in Taghkanic

TAGHKANIC—In a decision that minced no words state Supreme Court Justice Patrick J. McGrath has issued a permanent injunction forbidding not only Alan Wilzig and his wife from using their nearly complete, multi-million dollar motorcycle track, but also bars use of the track by any “agent, guest or invitee” of the Wilzigs.

The January 6 decision also singles out the Town Board, the Zoning Board of Appeals, Planning Board and employees, nullifying a series of recent decisions to approve the track and prohibiting town officials from issuing approvals for the track in the future.

Full article: A road by any other name [offsite link]

January 13, 2010: In the Media

Group is ‘cautiously celebrating’ decision

Molly Salisbury, Register-Star (Hudson, NY)

With the controversy surrounding Taghkanic resident and banking heir Alan Wilzig’s track, many have disputed Taghkanic’s claim, seen on green road signs throughout the town, that states “Zoning in Effect and Enforced.” The recent, strongly worded, clear and unambiguous decision passed down by Judge Patrick McGrath, and which the Granger Group’s Tony Gravett calls common sense, does what they argue the town failed to do.

Full article: Group is ‘cautiously celebrating’ decision [offsite link]

January 11, 2010: Press Release

CITIZEN GROUP WINS DECISIVE VICTORY

SUPREME COURT ISSUES PERMANENT INJUNCTION AGAINST WILZIG’S ILLEGAL RACETRACK

This press release is available as a PDF at:
  http://grangergroup.cc/presskit/100111/2010-01-11_GRANGER_GROUP.pdf

A styled text (RTF) version of this release is available at:
  http://grangergroup.cc/presskit/100111/2010-01-11_GRANGER_GROUP.rtf

A press photo is available at:
  http://www.grangergroup.cc/images/aw_racetrack_1200x809.jpg

January 11, 2010 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

TAGHKANIC, NEW YORK: Neighboring property owners working with The Granger Group, a citizens’ organization in the town of Taghkanic, won a decisive legal victory with Supreme Court Justice Patrick J. McGrath’s January 6 Decision and Order that permanently bars Alan Wilzig from paving or using his mile-long, forty-foot-wide professional grade racetrack.

Full press release: 2010-01-11_GRANGER_GROUP.pdf [Adobe Reader document]

January 9, 2010: In the Media

Court: Wilzig can’t pave, use track

Molly Salisbury, Register-Star (Hudson, NY)

It was not the fact that Alan Wilzig’ s neighbors would be “impacted profoundly, uniquely and negatively” by their proximity to the racetrack, as argued by Warren Replansky at the final Taghkanic Zoning Board of Appeals hearing on the Wilzig racetrack, but the dispassionate legal doctrine of res judicata that won the case for the Granger Group, et al.

Full article: Court: Wilzig can’t pave, use track [offsite link]

January 8, 2010: In the Media

Judge Rules Against Wilzig “Sporting Course”

Mike McCagg, ccScoop

A New York State Supreme Court Justice has issued an injunction barring the construction, completion, and use of the controversial Wilzig racetrack/sporting course in the Town of Taghkanic.

Justice Patrick McGrath’s ruling, handed down on January 7, states that the Granger Group’s “request for a permanent injunction is granted enjoining [town officials] . . . from issuing a Building Permit, Certificate of Compliance and/or a Certificate of Occupancy or Site Plan approval for the sporting course or track located on the Wilzig property.” The ruling also states that “Alan Wilzig and Karin Wilzig are permanently enjoined from using, constructing, or completing the sporting course or track in any way or manner as well as any agent, guest, or invitee of Alan or Karin Wilzig.”

Full article: Judge Rules Against Wilzig "Sporting Course" [offsite link]

January 7, 2010: Commentary

THE GRANGERS WIN!

JUDGE STOPS WILZIG RACETRACK

Sam Pratt reports in his blog (sampratt.com):

Big news breaking out of Taghkanic…  Judge Patrick McGrath has issued a ringing decision in the long-running Wilzig case. 

McGrath’s ruling grants the Granger Group’s petition for a permanent injunction against the mile-long, 40-foot-wide racetrack which Alan Wilzig began bulldozing (without seeking permits to do so) way back in the Summer of 2006 ...

Full article: THE GRANGERS WIN! [offsite link]

January 6, 2010: Legal Update

McGrath’s Decision and Order

Supreme Court Issues Permanent Injunction

The Granger Group has won a decisive legal victory with Supreme Court Justice Patrick J. McGrath’s January 6 Decision and Order that permanently bars Alan Wilzig from paving or using his mile-long, forty-foot-wide professional grade racetrack.

Full document: 2010-01-06_McGRATH_DECISION_AND_ORDER.pdf [Adobe Reader document]


Press photo: aw_racetrack_1200x809.jpg

DONATIONS STILL NEEDED: Our attorney has been very considerate with his fees, but our legal costs are very high. Please consider making a donation to help defray our legal expenses. You can mail your check to:

The Granger Group
P.O. Box 212
Craryville, NY 12521

 . . .  or you can donate securely online using your credit card or PayPal account:

Our heartfelt thanks!

From Parry Teasdale’s January 14 Editorial:

... Initially Mr. Wilzig claimed that his track was simply a common accessory to the house he was building—Hey, every new home has one of these, right? The town Zoning Board of Appeals disagreed, and a state judge upheld that decision. At that point, Mr. Wilzig could have accepted his failure to plan ahead by acknowledging that his project is incompatible with the zoning law. But this is all about his desires, not about what’s good for the town.

So he said, in effect: Wait a minute, did I say it was a motorcycle track? No, no, no. It’s actually a “sporting course,” which is permitted under the zoning law. To reasonable observers this sounded like such a transparent dodge that no one would treat it seriously. But, sadly, town officials practically tripped over themselves in their haste to approve his ridiculous ruse.

Fortunately, Judge McGrath wasn’t bamboozled. Unlike the town ZBA, Planning Board and code enforcement officer, the judge saw through the ploy and slapped Mr. Wilzig and the town with a permanent injunction on the track and on any further effort by town officials to hand Mr. Wilzig some sort of fig leaf of legality.

The town officials who abandoned common sense and good judgment enabled Mr. Wilzig to indulge himself once again in this latest courtroom go-around on the track. That was a huge disservice to their fellow taxpayers. Their actions forced the town to squander money on defending a pretext that was absurd from the outset.

These appointees owe the town an apology for encouraging Mr. Wilzig in his fruitless attempt to contort the law. And as a practical matter they owe the public an explanation: Did they make such bad decisions because they got flawed legal advice on the “sporting course” proposal or because they received good advice and ignored it.

Read the entire editorial at www.columbiapaper.com

From our latest press release:

“The judge’s decision is a huge relief,” said neighbor Diane Rodriguez, an adjoining property owner whose extended family also lives next to the Wilzig racetrack. “I just wish my father, a military veteran, was still alive to finally see this three-and-a-half-year-long nightmare come to an end. He passed away last October.”

Sali Wohlbach, another petitioner and close neighbor of Wilzig’s racetrack, said, “I’m proud to be part of the town’s citizens that stood up and were heard. Through all the years we battled this, with personal efforts, energy, and our own money, I was always disturbed to realize that the town I support with my property taxes had agreed to and would allow one person’s selfish endeavors to potentially wreak havoc with so many others’ property rights, values, and peace and quiet.”

[...]

“In effect, the judge’s ruling reminds Wilzig of a lesson that most people learn as kids: if Mom says no, you don’t try to get Dad to say yes,” said Sam Pratt, one of the four original Granger Group co-founders. “That’s what the principle of res judicata is all about. It’s one of the oldest, strictest and most common-sense principles of law — not some ‘arcane legalese thing’ as Wilzig has tried to spin it.”

“This controversy should have been over in 2006 or 2007; but Wilzig and certain Taghkanic officials chose instead to ignore the rules, jack up taxpayers’ costs, and prolong the ordeal for everyone,” Pratt added.

[...]

“It is truly shameful that private citizens were forced to pay out of their own pockets the legal expenses necessary to do the job that the Town of Taghkanic’s own officers should have done on their behalf” stated the group’s spokesperson.

Read the full press release