The Mount Vernon Way: Breaking Ground at Memorial Field
Last week, my office held a Town Hall meeting. We opened the forum by showing an old home movie. In it, you can see a Pop Warner football game between Mount Vernon, and our fierce rivals, New Rochelle. The footage is a little grainy and the pixels slightly blurred as this tape shows a game from over twenty-five years ago. The video is a tense one. Mount Vernon is clinging to a one-point lead over New Rochelle who was comfortably positioned on the ten-yard line, in easy scoring distance, with less than a minute remaining on the clock. The ball is snapped, the quarterback spots his receiver and sends the ball spiraling towards him. Suddenly, a Mount Vernon Razorback, in bright maroon and gold, appears. He leaps and snatches the ball from the air, intercepting New Rochelle’s play, and leading to Mount Vernon’s victory.
Mean Joe Greene and those young people that played that game at Memorial Field twenty-five years ago wouldn’t recognize her today. We all know the story of illegal dumping and destruction; toxic politics and selfish elites who denied Mount Vernon a decent quality of life. Recent court victories and rising property values confirm we have intercepted this past downward spiral and are charging forward to take Mount Vernon back to the top!
The progress we are making at Memorial Field is real and the changes we are implementing are significant. For example, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the Department of Public Works began the work of digging test pits at “Davis’ Dirty Dirt Mountain,” which was left behind by the prior administration and their gang of obstructionists. Just as we are digging to discover the extent of the environmental damage, we are digging for the truth on why Comptroller Maureen Walker and Councilmembers like Marcus Griffith shirked back… obviously looking the other way when we were being dumped on by phantom organizations in plain sight.
The fact is the health of our community has worsened since Memorial Field shut around 2007 and it’s an urgent imperative we keep moving forward. I understand that our children and families have suffered nearly a decade of lost memories, lost opportunities, and lost time at Memorial Field. The “Wall of Legends” was constructed to strengthen our community identity, reminding ourselves that we are a City of Champions. This is why we are fighting to secure grant dollars and are close to obtaining millions in state resources from Assemblyman Gary Pretlow, Senators Jeff Klein and Jamaal Bailey to bring back Memorial Field! Like Legislator Lyndon Williams, they are on team Mount Vernon and helping our administration protect taxpayers from footing another betrayal-based bill.
As we reach new milestones in the restoration, we will be holding more meetings and making ourselves available for neighborhood gatherings (preferably BBQ’s) to involve you in the decision-making process. This will ensure the new Memorial Field is what you want. Whenever haters say things like, “we can’t afford it” or “it’s not possible”, think about those mighty Mount Vernon Razorbacks… in the red zone, backs against the goal line, time running out… but never giving up, digging deep to defy defeat! Excelsior.
— Originally published in Westchester County Press July 27, 2017
