Did Alex Jamieson Hand The Town Of Chester To The Satmar On A Silver Platter?

Chester residents can thank Town Supervisor Alex Jamieson in six months when the Whispering Hills subdivision becomes the next Kiryas Joel. 

It’s either due to Alex Jamieson’s incompetence as a politician or being an arrogant bigot. 

First of all, Jamieson got involved with the cryptic Nazi group United Monroe. This was mistake number one. In addition, he also stuck his nose into Monroe politics with the bizarre idea that it would benefit the town of Chester. Big mistake.

He was also dumb enough to waste $25,000 of taxpayer money to help fund United Monroe’s frivolous lawsuit blocking Kiryas Joel expansion.

The Town of Chester dropped out of the litigation last year. This means taxpayers will never see a return on their investment. 

What does the Kiryas Joel annexation lawsuit have to do with Whispering Hills?

The annexation litigation made Whispering Hills attractive to Hasidic real estate investors. It had ready-made housing and infrastructure. It was an easy target for potential investors but I will get into the details later in this article. 

The vast majority of homeowners in the Whispering Hills fell victim to the great recession. Nearly 90% of the units went into foreclosure and property values in the subdivision plummetted. This also caught the attention of Satmar investors.

The plummeting values of Whispering Hills are not Jamieson’s fault. No one could have predicted the severity of the financial crisis. Besides, Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus was Town Supervisor of Chester when the financial crisis began. 

Jamieson should be held accountable for his actions over the past 18 months. He made Monroe’s problem Chester’s problem due to his meddling and incompetence.  

Alex Jamieson Conspires With Cryptic Nazis To Usurp The Will Of Monroe Voters

In 2015, the Monroe town board approved a deal to give Kiryas Joel 164 acres. Voters in the proposed annexed area voted wholeheartedly 76% to 24% to join Kiryas Joel.

This didn’t sit well with the cryptic Nazis at United Monroe. United Monroe through their faux non-profit Preserve Hudson Valley immediately filed a lawsuit to block the annexation. 

The lawsuit is based on United Monroe’s theory that a water study done by Kiryas Joel is flawed. Yet, the EPA, the state of New York and Orange County have all signed off on it.

United Monroe uses fear and intimidation to motivate politicians to do their bidding. If they refuse, United Monroe members have no issue smearing people on the internet and harassing their families. 

Convers convinced key leaders in Orange County government to help fund her lawsuit. She also convinced several Town supervisors to commit $25,000 toward the suit including Alex Jamieson. 

Jamieson had contributed money to United Monroe in 2014. So it was an easy sell for Emily Convers.

United Monroe used the $30,000 they raised in 2014 to smear Monroe Supervisor Harley Doles and harass his family. They also used it to fund Dan Castricone’s failed campaign to unseat Assemblyman Karl Brabenec. 

Alex Jamieson’s lifelong friend Walt Popailo also has a history with United Monroe. He has helped raise money for them by hosting nearly a half a dozen fundraisers at his comedy club.

Jamieson hired Popailo as Chester Parks Director in 2016. Popailo had no previous experience working in government. He owns a comedy club and is a former insurance agent.

Ironically, Jamieson made his boyhood pal Parks Director while he was publicly accusing Kiryas Joel Village Manager Gedalye Szegedin of cronyism. 

Alex Jamieson’s Support For United Monroe Comes Back To Bite Him

United Monroe managed to elect two of their candidates to the Monroe Town Board in 2015. Thanks in part to the media coverage of their annexation lawsuit three weeks before the election.

Three weeks after the election, Gedalye Szegedin warned Orange County politicians and the new Town Board in Monroe that Kiryas Joel was not waiting for a court decision regarding annexation.

With all the white suburbanite arrogance they could muster, the United Monroe board members passed a town-wide building moratorium as a “Fuck You! We’ll show you!” to the Hasidim in Kiryas Joel.

As a result, the lawsuit and the moratorium blew up in the face of the Orange County political elites who signed on to the lawsuit.

Consequently, members of the Hasidim began buying single-family homes in droves in places like Blooming Grove, Chester, Monroe, and Woodbury. They weren’t shy about why or how they were doing it.

As Gedalye Szegedin stated last month:

We in Orange County were lucky to have clearly established boundaries by having our own KJ Village and KJ School District. Not any longer, the KJ Overflow is in full bloom, the boundaries that served us all for 40 years were destroyed by the county’s fight against annexation.

Your policy of fighting the 164 acres annexation is working great. My estimate is that by five years at least 1,000 registered voters from KJ will reside in Woodbury and vote in the Woodbury Town/Village/School District elections.

The Overflow from KJ is in full bloom. Keep up the court appeal and KJ residents keep up the Overflow, just blame yourself. 

Whispering Hills: The Soon-To-Be Kiryas Joel of Chester

The Whispering Hills is a perfect area to create a Hasidic community. Property values and taxes are low due to the number of foreclosures in the development. Roads and sewer lines are also already in place. The infrastructure is also less than 15 years old. 

Whispering Hills can also accommodate 5,000 Hasidic families comfortably. The subdivision could hold 10,000 depending on if residents want to live in spartan conditions.

In addition, Whispering Hills also has vacant land nearby to build a temple that is easily accessible by foot. 

Apparently, I’m not the only who thought this.

Dozens of shell companies have been buying units in Whispering Hills since annexation litigation began in 2015. Of the 609 units in Whispering Hills, nearly 450 are owned by shell corporations. The majority of those are based in Kiryas Joel or Brooklyn. 

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what isgoing on. People have been using shell corporations to buy land for years. Walt Disney did it when he acquired the land in Florida for Disney World in the 1960s.