Fabbro Fails Upward In Woodbury & The FBI Needs a Hug in SBG

Updates on South Blooming Grove, Monroe, Woodbury, why you shouldn't get Starbucks, and what's Congressman Mike Lawler doing? All this and more in today's post.

Pictured Above: Your new Town of Monroe Board members, Luis Rivera and Beth Stephens, watch as the outgoing ones — Tony Cardone and Dorey Houle — exact revenge on Monroe residents by slashing the 2026 budget. Houle and Cardone’s revenge was aided and abetted by returning Town Councilman, Sal Scancarello.

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Howdy.

There is no shortage of things to talk about:

- Our brothers and sisters working their asses off to make you overpriced luxury coffee at Starbucks are on strike. We encourage you not to cross the picket line; and enjoy coffee from local businesses in your area until the baristas get the contract they are asking for. You can learn more about the strike at nocontractnocoffee.org.

- There are additional economic boycotts happening from Nov. 27 to Dec. 1 involving Target, Home Depot and Amazon, among others. To learn more, visit the We Ain’t Buying It campaign at weaintbuyingit.com

- Congressman AIPAC Ryan (better known to you as Pat Ryan, friend of Joel Stern), and his staff, continue to inform Orange County residents that they are “deeply concerned” about the potential abuse and detention of ICE detainees at Orange County Jail. Despite this, according to his staffers, Ryan has no plans to exercise his congressional oversight ability to review what’s going on at OCJ. If you have a problem with that, like I do, you can call the congressman’s office at (202) 225-5614 and use the following script:

“Hello, I am a constituent of Rep. Pat Ryan from [city or town]. I am deeply concerned about the ongoing situation at Orange County Jail involving the use of the facility to imprison and detain our Latino brothers and sisters, often in a process that violates the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments, according to the Legal Aid Society and New York City ACLU.

I am greatly disappointed that the congressman has made no mention of this situation in his weekly email newsletters or frequent media appearances. I am requesting he schedule a visit to OCJ in December and use his congressional oversight ability to make sure our friends and neighbors are being treated properly and given full access to their attorneys. If this is something the congressman ‘truly cares about,’ then he will make it a priority to visit Orange County Jail. Thank you.”

- State Sen. James Skoufis put out another weekly email in which he failed to mention the most recent case of voter fraud in South Blooming Grove and also removed from his collection of links the previous case of election fraud that occurred in South Blooming Grove.

So I guess that “investigation” he claims to be running isn’t much of an investigation at all. (Remember: you can’t really FOIL much from the Assembly or state Senate. So you have to trust Sen. Skoufis when he tells you he’s doing something. To that I have to ask, how many of you reading this still take this man at his word?)

By the way, Skoufis has also not responded to our challenge to donate all the money he raised this year from PACs and LLCs to local Orange County food pantries, which the New York State Board of Elections says he is legally allowed to do.

Mr. Skoufis, despite not being up for election in 2025, took in $144,750 from political action committees and another $14,000 from LLCs. Call me crazy, but a donation of $158,750 could go a long way to helping our friends and neighbors in need right now.

- The U.S. Border Patrol is now stepping in to assist ICE with illegal detentions of our Latino brothers and sisters. They are, according to the Associated Press, using a mass surveillance system to identify and detain people based in part on how they drive. That’s not a joke. So far neither Rep. Ryan nor Sen. Skoufis (nor our local assembly members) have said anything about this. In the latter case, our State reps could take the New York Privacy Act out of mothballs and use it to shield New Yorkers from this kind of program, or at least limit how that data is used, processed and how long it’s held without legal justification. In New York state, you have little to no protection for your personal information. I FOILed the entire New York voter roll — including phone numbers, email addresses and other contact information — and the state provided it. This is not okay.

In Local News

- Over in Monroe, the pitchforks are coming for Sal Scancarello.

Remember that the defective 2026 town of Monroe budget that was just passed required his assistance to do so. Had Mr. Scancarello decided to vote with Councilwoman Bingham and Supervisor-Elect Richardson, town residents would not be stuck with a budget that cuts valuable services and hampers the town’s ability to deliver what residents have said they wanted. Namely police coverage in the Town provided by the village police. If you’re mad as hell at the man responsible for the original dinosaur theme-park fiasco, this budget — and, not to mention, pretty much everything Tony Cardone and Dorey Houle got away with during their reign of corrupt ineptitude — you’re invited to attend the last Monroe town board meeting of the year at 7 p.m. on Dec. 1.

Every Monroe resident who wanted village police services expanded to cover the town should come to this meeting and demand Mr. Scancarello’s resignation for his role in passing this budget. Not to mention, he has not apologized to the Jewish community for his son, Anthony Scancarello, threatening to murder two men at the local Target to get views for his TikTok account, and for striking Councilwoman Richardson at his food truck festival. Given that Councilwoman Richardson is about to become his boss, one would think Mr. Scancarello would apologize to her, but hey. What do I know?

- In Woodbury, Rhonda Fabbro — soon to be unemployed as the unelected Woodbury village trustee — was given a job out of the blue by outgoing Supervisor Kathryn Luciani.

This job was not advertised, as far as we can tell, and it’s not clear how, when or why Mrs. Fabbro was selected for this un-budgeted position.

The Monroe Gazette has put in a FOIL request. Given that Mrs. Rhonda Fabbro called everyone in Woodbury anti-Semitic who questioned South Blooming Grove, refused to apologize for doing so, and is still breaking the law by not filing contributions or expenditures for her Committee to Elect Woodbury Democrats, we believe Mrs. Fabbro shouldn’t be rewarded with taxpayer money.

Oh — I forgot the best part: Mrs. Fabbro’s job was created out of thin air. It’s not in the budget. That means Rhonda Fabbro is being rewarded by the Calore‑Luciani regime for her efforts in boosting the mayoral campaign of a man (Brandon Calore) accused of assaulting a disabled teenager in an ice cream‑shop parking lot, spreading actual anti‑Semitic conspiracy theories, threatening to murder someone for not being MAGA enough, telling the mother accompanying two young teenagers to “get that n***er off my lawn”, and losing his job in the Town of Cornwall for threatening and harassing co‑workers. You know, that guy.

(Mr. Calore is now employed by CIOFFI, which became the subject of an Orange County Board of Ethics investigation, since the Town of Woodbury does not have an Ethics Board of its own.)

Not to be outdone, Supervisor Luciani then appointed fellow alleged lawbreaker Ellie Pastel to the Woodbury Beautification Committee without consultation with its head, Maria Hunter.

Mrs. Pastel, after taking over for the outgoing Woodbury Public Library director Sarah Johnson — Who’s sudden resignation has still gone unexplained — was responsible for processing FOIL requests and did not respond to any them.

Mrs. Pastel is also the signatory on the disputed Town of Woodbury–Woodbury Public Library MOU (memorandum of understanding) as it relates to FOIL processing. Her husband, Michael Pastel, has refused to provide an EIN or related tax documents for his Friends of the Library nonprofit. If the Friends of the Library not-for-profit is a tax exempt organization registered with the IRS, this is something they are required to provide you with by law.

And yes: the Woodbury Public Library budget is also currently ground zero for your next round of tax hikes in the Town of Woodbury, because — despite a complete lack of transparency in their financial management — Supervisor Luciani claims the library could go under without another funding increase.

We’ll remind you here that this is the same Woodbury Public Library that spent over $12,000 defending Board President Cathy Schmidt, whom we’ve talked about extensively here, from an investigation involving her harassment of now Town Board member elect, Martha Lopez some years back.

Remember friends: I don’t write about people to write about them. We got a lot of shit from people for talking as much as we did about the Woodbury Public Library, and … I’m not going to sit here and say “I warned you about them” but … Maybe next time consider that we only write about people for a damn good reason. And now Woodbury taxpayers are on the hook for yet another tax hike because of it.

- In South Blooming Grove, the FBI gave the following statement about the most recent round of election fraud:

“Good afternoon,

Thank you for your inquiry. If members of the public have information about suspected criminal activity, we advise them to contact local police or their closest FBI field office. They can also call the FBI tip line at 1-800-CALL-FBI.

Other than that, per longstanding DOJ policy, we cannot confirm or deny the existence or nonexistence of any investigation.

Sincerely,

Office of Public Affairs

FBI New York”

If you want to contact the FBI at 1-800-CALL-FBI you can use the following script:

Steps for calling 1-800-CALL-FBI

1. Press 1 for English.

2. When it asks what kind of crime you’re calling about, say “election fraud.”

3. Press 8 for “any other issue.”

4. Give them your phone number; confirm by saying yes.

5. Give them your first name; confirm by saying yes.

6. Give them your last name; confirm by saying yes.

7. Give them your birthday; confirm by saying yes.

8. Give them your ZIP code; confirm by saying yes.

9. Confirm the state abbreviation is NY.

10. Confirm the spelling of your town’s name.

11. Give them your street address; confirm by saying yes.

You will then be directed to an operator. Tell them you’re calling about an open case involving voter fraud in the Village of South Blooming Grove. It was opened in 2021 concerning the address of 2 Arlington Drive. You are calling to report that the same crime by the same people may have happened again. Then provide them with the information concerning 17 Sleepy Hollow and 1233 Route 208.

Specifically:

1. Town of Blooming Grove board member and South Blooming Grove Village Planning Board member Simon Schwartz is alleged, along with “Village Executive” Joel Stern and other Village Planning Board members, to provide building permits to the yeshiva’s owners at 17 Sleepy Hollow Road in exchange for blank absentee ballots that are filled out by the students at the school. Yeshiva Bnos Ahvra Israel is the reported owner of the 17 Sleepy Hollow Road yeshiva, with its main address listed as 2 Lee Ave., Brooklyn. This is alleged to have been happening since 2017 at this and other properties connected to Stern.

2. According to a lawsuit filed by former Orange County Executive candidate Mike Sussman, on behalf of Democratic challenger Stephanie Powell against Republican Mike Essig and people claiming to live at both addresses, 64 people claimed to be living at 17 Sleepy Hollow Road. One hundred three voters cast absentee ballots using the address of 1233 Route 208. Both of these are yeshivas, not residential homes.

I’ll have more information on the South Blooming Grove front soon. We’re about to file another lawsuit against them; once it’s filed, I’ll post about it. I can’t say too much before it’s filed because some of them read this stuff.

Elsewhere …

- In Rockland County, Rep. Mike Lawler may be engaged in a scheme to suppress protests within his district. We are currently investigating whether this is the case in Mount Kisco (Westchester), where restrictions were placed on the size of protests and other gatherings, and in the Town of Clarkstown. We have a sizable FOIL request in at Clarkstown that is due for a response today. We will be covering Lawler (and Rep. Ryan) as they both vie for re-election next November. Lawler is especially interesting because it’s a hotly contested race with national implications.

- In Sullivan County, a situation much like Clovewood is playing out in Bethel. The number of similarities is striking enough that The Monroe Gazette will take an in‑depth look at what’s going on with The Swan in Swan Lake development. This is likely going to turn into a big project for 2026.

- For those concerned about ICE and who want to be proactive about filming them across Rockland, Sullivan and Orange counties, I have some tips here. We remain focused on what’s going on at Orange County Jail and have a number of FOILs in with the county concerning its partnership with ICE. And I suspect we’re going to be talking a lot more about ICE activity across all of Orange County in 2026 as well.

-Finally, I might still be running for office. I don’t know. I’m waiting to hear on something. If it happens, I can’t and won’t run. If it doesn’t happen, I will run.

I honestly had very different plans for 2026. This is not something I’m dying to do. I don’t want to be like Skoufis or Ryan, where they make politics their life and career.

However, specifically in the case of Mr. Skoufis, too many people across Orange County are suffering, and he’s said and done nothing for them. It’s not good enough to mumble in private that you support the New York For All Act, for example. Not when people are being kidnapped in Newburgh, Middletown, and Monroe. Mr. Skoufis should have womanup’ed, held a press conference calling for an emergency session of the legislature, and demanded the New York For All Act be passed. Instead he did nothing. He said nothing.

We are living through a national emergency. This isn’t politics as usual. And given the opportunity to lead us in that moment, Skoufis repeatedly failed to do so. Instead spending over $100,000 on vanity projects like running to be the chair of the Democratic National Committee, and nearly $20,000 propping up the campaign of a Far Right MAGA bigot in order to further a real estate deal that benefits some of his largest donors.

And don’t get us started on his complete and total failure to make sure the people of South Blooming Grove got justice for the white collar crime spree currently being inflicted upon them.

I have a very clear, specific goal: I believe health care is a human right, and every New York state resident should be able to get the medicine and medical care they need, regardless of how much money they have, and regardless of whether they have insurance.

We can do that by passing the New York Health Act.

Instead of paying an insurance company, you’d pay New York state based on how much you earn, and if you have Medicare, the New York Health Act would cover things Medicare does not, like vision and dental. Giving you the best of both worlds.(Not to mention, if Trump goes through with his plan to have an algorithm decide who gets what procedure covered with Medicare, the New York Health Act would cover what Medicare does not.)

It’s not going to happen overnight. It will be expensive to implement, but in the long run we’ll save billions of dollars and countless lives by doing it.

If I were to run for office, it would be for one reason only: to pass the New York Health Act and see it implemented without insurance companies and other wealthy business interests watering it down. The second that’s done? I’m out of there.

Why? Because over a million New Yorkers are about to lose their health insurance, while millions more are crushed under the weight of skyrocketing medical premiums, co-pays, and the cost of medicine. It doesn’t have to be this way. Our elected leaders, Skoufis included, choose to let it be this way.

I’m just offering you another choice.

And finally …

Honestly, I thought after the 2025 election was over, that’d be the end for The Monroe Gazette and The Finley would replace it. But a lot is happening.

It also feels irresponsible to pull the plug on a media outlet that is now regularly breaking stories that other outlets (Mid-Hudson News, News 12) then pick up — especially with the 2026 election looming, which I feel will be the most consequential election in our lifetime.

So, if that thing happens that I’m waiting to hear on, I’ll be hiring a new reporter to keep things rolling here.

And if that thing doesn’t happen, I’ll be here doing my thing for at least another year while running for office. (Part of me, since I’m basically pulling a Hunter S. Thompson, wants to finish the story by doing what Hunter did. He ran for Sheriff in Aspen and then wrote about it for Rolling Stone.)

That said, I’m taking a short break. I’ll be back on Tuesday, Dec. 2 with updates to all of these stories and more.

As always, send us news anonymously. Use the Signal app and message 646-331-8341 or use our P.O. box — just make sure not to put a return address — P.O. Box 5, 996 Route 17, Stop 2, Arden, N.Y. 10910.

I hope you all have an excellent Thanksgiving.

— BJ