No Cameras, No Rules: Monroe Mayor's Cover-Up
Sources claim the mayor ordered building inspectors to stop recording inspections and ignore violations on a developer's properties—then allegedly retaliated against a whistleblower.
Forgive me for the repetition, but there’s new people joining us every day, and I believe what Stan Lee used to say about comics is true for most forms of news and entertainment:
Always treat every comic like it’s someone’s first.
So. If you are just joining us, The Monroe Gazette was, and remains temporarily, a local news website covering Southern Orange County in New York.
Once our last two court cases are finished with the Village of South Blooming Grove (SBG), we’re going to turn our attention exclusively toward the creation, filing, and process of a federal lawsuit against the Village of South Blooming Grove.
One charging Joel Stern and Isaac Ekstein, the un-elected “co-mayors,” with conspiracy to subvert the electoral process under the Ku Klux Klan act.
If you’d like to follow along, the “Little Foil” lawsuit against SBG is case index # EF003954-2026.
The “Big Foil” (which deals directly with the phantom election last year, that the New York State Senate Investigations and Government Operations Committee sent Attorney General Letitia James’s way to “investigate”) is case index # EF012691-2025.
Because of the complexity of “Big Foil,” it’s going to be a while until we switch gears. So the word temporary is doing some heavy lifting here.
All I can do is ask for patience on that front. FOIL is slow. Article 78s—the kind of lawsuit you file when municipalities and state departments don’t cooperate—are even slower.
This pro se federal lawsuit is going to be the subject of my next book. So don’t go thinking I’m going to lose interest in this and move on.
The good news is that the “Little Foil” appears to be moving along in court.
The bad news is that “Big Foil” hasn’t even been heard yet.
So that’s where we’re at right now.
Honestly, and like I said yesterday, I figured “Big Foil” was going to be the most complicated thing we ever did at The Monroe Gazette.
I was wrong.
So today, I’m going to show you the FOIL request that we just sent to the Village of Monroe.
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This Is What A Complicated FOIL Request Looks Like
Let’s show you the actual FOIL first, and then I’ll explain, briefly, what’s going on.
By the way, you can copy and paste this FOIL and use it as a template for your own.
Just make sure to replace the “To” and “Via Email” fields with whatever contact information you have for your clerk of choice.
Then replace everything after “Records Requested” but before the section that says “If any of the requested records are withheld or redacted…”
You can leave the rest of the template intact. (If you’re only requesting a few documents and not, thousands of pages like this one is, you can simply remove where it says, “Due to the volume of records requested, we are amendable to receiving records on a rolling basis.”
The Foil
8.5.26
To: FOIL Records Access Officer, Village Clerk Kim Zahra
Via email: clerk@villageofmonroe.org
RE: Freedom of Information Law Request
Dear Kim
The following records are hereby requested pursuant to the New York State Freedom of Information Law (Public Officers Law §§ 84-90):
Records Requested:
Statistical Data & Records from the Village of Monroe Building Department including:
Complaint totals and breakdowns – Last 12 months and from 2023-2026
Violation totals – For 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026
Violation types and classifications – For 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026
Code enforcement court cases – All documentation, totals, and monetary recoveries for 2023, 2024, 2025, 2026
Building Department staffing records – Employment status and personnel assignments over time
For each of the identified addresses: 1444 Orange Turnpike, 42 Maple Avenue, 330 Stage Road, 261 Spring Street ,12 Stage Road, 3 Forshee, 4 Half Hollow Road, we request the following:
All violations, stop work orders, permits, correspondence, inspection reports, construction documents, and relevant court cases
All body camera footage from investigations at these identified addresses
Body camera policy documentation – Current and historical policies
Records concerning body camera discontinuation – When discontinued, why, and by whose authority
All correspondence between Building Inspectors and Mayor Melchiorrie pertaining to employment, job duties, hours, and staffing
All correspondence between Code Enforcement Officers and Mayor Melchiorrie pertaining to employment, job duties, and staffing
Email exchange between Mayor regarding hours changes for former Inspector Ron Svrchek
Building Inspector hiring records – Job postings, applications, interview notes, hiring decisions
Building Department staff personnel files – Current and recent departures
All court files related to Building Department code enforcement cases
Records of non-compliance – Cases where violations were not pursued or dismissed
Building permits issued or denied – 2023-2026
Proposed and Finalized Inter municipal agreements, if any, between Village of Monroe and South Blooming Grove or Blooming Grove regarding Building Department operations
If any of the requested records are withheld or redacted, in whole or in part, please specify with particularity the statutory basis for each such claimed exemption and the reasons why each such record or portion thereof is claimed to be exempt from disclosure.
Please provide electronic copies of the requested records via email attachment.
We are also requesting a signed POL89(3)(a) certification to accompany this request and an explanation from your office to describe, in detail, how you define a “diligent search” and what steps were taken to search for these records.
Due to the volume of records requested, we are amendable to receiving records on a rolling basis.
We kindly ask that you reply to this email to confirm receipt.
-BJ Mendelson
The Monroe Gazette
What Are We Looking For?
Yesterdays story dealt with whether or not Monroe Village Mayor, Alex Melchiorrie, is letting local landlord and real estate developer, Lipa Deutsch, pick and choose the new building inspectors for the Village’s Building Department. This is something two sources with direct knowledge on the matter have confirmed to The Monroe Gazette.
The other part of this story is that Mayor Alex Melchiorrie is accused of telling the Building Department, its inspectors and code enforcement officers, to specifically avoid and drop any charges involving the properties of Avrohm Flohr and Lipa Deutsch. The two men responsible for getting Melchiorrie elected mayor. All of the properties mentioned in the above FOIL belong to Deutsch and Flohr.
Melchiorrie is also alleged to have instructed Building Inspectors to no longer take body camera footage when they go out on inspection, and to have taken direct action against a whistleblower in the Village by manipulating their hours and forcing them out of their job. (This would be illegal, by the way, since New York State has protections for municipal employees who are penalized for being whistleblowers.)
Finally, Alex Melchiorrie is being accused of approaching the Village of South Blooming Grove, home of do-nothing Fusco Engineering. Where Al Fusco Jr. appears to have a no-show job—see the lack of enforcement action against the helipad that nobody in the Village approved, among many, many other things—about providing their services to the Village of Monroe. Hiring Al Fusco Jr. would mean little to no code enforcement and building inspections at all within the Village of Monroe.
The following are the charges Alex Melchiorre would face if we had a District Attorney who actually prosecuted crimes against his fellow Orange County Republicans:
Official Misconduct (PL § 195.00)
Official misconduct occurs when a public servant commits an act constituting an offense while acting in an official capacity and knows their conduct is unlawful. The selective enforcement, body camera destruction, and whistleblower retaliation all appear to meet this standard.
Bribery and Corruption (PL § 180.00)
If Melchiorrie accepted or solicited anything of value from Deutsch and Flohr in exchange for favorable Building Department treatment, this constitutes bribery under New York Penal Law § 180.00. In this case, a quid pro quo arrangement—the election support from Deutsch and Flohr in exchange for selective enforcement.
Whistleblower Retaliation (Labor Law § 740)
New York Labor Law § 740 explicitly protects municipal employees from retaliation when they report violations of law. Alex Melchiorrie’s alleged manipulation of Rob Svrchek’s hours and forced departure would violate this statute. This is potentially a felony, by the way.
If Melchiorrie ordered the discontinuation of body camera footage, that raises serious questions about destruction of official records as well. (Especially now that The Monroe Gazette has just FOIL’ed for everything. If anything vanishes now, it’s definitely a crime.)
And finally, everyone’s favorite…
Conspiracy (PL § 105.00)
If Alex Melchiorrie coordinated with Deutsch and Flohr to systematically exclude their properties from code enforcement, conspiracy charges may apply.
All of these are misdemeanors except, possibly, New York Labor Law § 740
Now. All that said … You know, and I know, Orange County District Attorney David Hoovler only seems to enforce the law around these parts if you’re not white. Then he’s all, “Yeah. Look at all these criminals I locked up!”
Infamously, Hoovler posed for a photo alongside Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus , Joel Stern and Isaac Ekstein during Neuhau’s victory party in November 2025. So, Mr. Hoovler is going to look into what’s happening in South Blooming Grove any day now, guys.
Any day now.
If we had a functioning District Attorney, these laws I mentioned is what he would be investigating right now concerning Alex Melchiorrie and Lipa Deutsch.
Hell, Attorney General Letitia James would be too, if not for the fact that she was just in Orange County palling around with friends of Mr. Deutsch and Flohr.
We’ve reached out to Mr. Hoovler to see if he intends to investigate what’s going on here.
Don’t hold your breath.