Westchester Now

Retired social worker Jose Roman on Wednesday said he would challenge Westchester County Legis. Virginia Perez (D-Yonkers) in a Democratic primary in September.

Roman’s announcement puts a face on a long-expected challenge to Perez, who came under withering criticism from fellow Democrats last year after she cast a decisive vote in favor of Republican County Executive Rob Astorino’s budget.

Astorino’s...

Amid the hubbub last week about Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino’s dispute with the Department of Housing and Urban Development over affordable housing, it was easy to miss the other news in his State of the County address.

In the Tuesday speech in the county courthouse, Astorino pledged to submit a 2014 budget later this year that won’t contain tax increases.

The Republican...

An icon of the Democratic Party in the Hudson Valley, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., endorsed Board of Legislators chairman Ken Jenkins (D-Yonkers) for Westchester County executive on Tuesday.

“Ken has the moral fiber, administrative talent, idealism and beef jerky toughness to stand up to the big shots, end the corruption and restore Westchester as the Empire State’s paradigm of good government,”...

Did Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino act morally when he chose a local nonprofit organization to refurbish and manage Rye Playland, the county-owned amusement park?

Philosophers John Rawls and Immanuel Kant don’t think so.

Or, at least not according to Kelly Morque, who is the son of Kim Morque, the president of the nonprofit organization Sustainable Playland Inc.

In a...

Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino is urging Bee-Line riders to Bee-Aware.

Taking a page from the New York City Transit system's popular "If You See Something, Say Something" ads, the county has come up with its own ad campaign to get riders to report suspicious packages left unattended on buses.

The "Bee-Aware" ads were made possible by a $433,000 grant from...

Westchester County Board of Legislators chairman Ken Jenkins (D-Yonkers) picked up two more endorsements in his effort to win the Democratic Party’s nomination for county executive.

The Black Democrats of Westchester and the New York Hotel Trades Council, or HTC, recently gave Jenkins their support.

"Ken's candidacy will excite the Democratic and labor base in November like...

Westchester County’s political circles are still buzzing about the state’s decision last week to nix a plan to let Ferncliff, the Yonkers school for developmentally disabled children, move to county-owned land in Greenburgh.

“I was as shocked as all involved,” said Assemb. Amy Paulin (D-Scarsdale), who had been lobbying state officials to support the plan. “I was really shocked.”

A host...

The New York Post kicked a hornet’s nest in the Hudson Valley’s political establishment on Monday when the tabloid published a story that included Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino and Rep. Chris Gibson (R-Kinderhook) among a list of possible Republican challengers to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in November 2014.

Both Astorino and Gibson have been floated before as potential gubernatorial...

Members of Peekskill’s Democratic Committee threw their support behind Westchester County executive candidate Bill Ryan on March 28, a win that wasn’t a surprise but that illustrates how Ryan is still in the three-way race.

Ryan, a county legislator from White Plains, is running against New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson and Board of Legislators chairman Ken Jenkins (D-Yonkers) for the chance...

In the schoolyard, children argue over whose father is the toughest.

In Westchester County politics, adults argue about whose father is the most corrupt.

On Monday night, Kurt Colucci, a Tea Party enthusiast seeking to unseat Republican Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino, issued a news release that mentioned Astorino's father, a former Mount Vernon cop who served a brief stint...