Village elections shift focus to contests

Annual village elections, slated for March 15, have drawn special attention in recent weeks - less for who might win or lose than for how the balloting will be conducted.

Last week, the State Legislature sent Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo an emergency bill to allow many villages to use their old-fashioned lever voting machines for one more year.

Assemb. Michelle Schimel (D-Great Neck) - who sponsored the legislation along with Sen. Jack Martins (R-Mineola) - said she's received anxious calls about it from as far away as Aurora, on Cayuga Lake, 250 miles northwest of Long Island.

Now more attention is shifting to the contests themselves.

"There are a lot of challenges . . . depending on the issue," said Schimel, who cites spirited challenges in the region.

"It's very similar to a general election, with smaller numbers."

One instance of a hot spot close by: East Hills in Nassau County, where Mayor Michael Koblenz, a 16-year incumbent, faces a fiery challenge.

The rhetoric of the race features the special intensity that a neighborhood dispute can generate.

Matthew Weiss, an attorney running on the ad-hoc East Hills Advocacy Group ticket, has sent a missive to fellow residents charging that Koblenz "steered roughly $160,000 of our Village legal business to his son's law firm."

Adam Koblenz also is one of the village's four part-time prosecutors - a point proclaimed by Weiss.

Reached for response, Mayor Koblenz - citing numerous gains for the community under his watch - said Weiss is concocting issues.

He indignantly denied any nepotism. He says the firm his son had worked for, Rivkin Radler, was retained for labor talks and to defend a lawsuit against the village.

And he said the younger Koblenz had proven quite qualified in the enforcement role, for which Weiss applied and was rejected.

In this context, Koblenz cited Weiss' defense work in traffic court.

Weiss is involved in litigation that has been publicized before.

Flooding on the property of a couple's home was attributed to construction of an adjacent park; the village took actions that included a retaining wall, which the homeowners say in their court papers failed to resolve the problem.

Plaintiffs are demanding $1 million. That park, on the former site of Roslyn Air National Guard, has been a centerpiece of Koblenz's legacy.

Weiss also cites other litigation that involves the actions of the village's Building Department.

"I've never run before," Weiss says. "I never thought I'd do it. I was outraged by a series of things."

He called Koblenz "a prime example of a stagnant leader who now has a major accomplishment under his belt, a lot of praise . . . and feels in my village a sense of entitlement."

Koblenz, also an attorney, calls Weiss' criticism of his leadership "pathetic.

"All you have to do is look at his record. This guy has never done a thing. It's personal," Koblenz says.

"He throws out the same rhetoric over and over. There's no basis to it."

Sounds indeed like the stuff of a November election - in the microcosm of a March contest.