Retiring White Plains Councilpersons Review Their Tenures

They have spent many nights at city hall, reviewed and voted on numerous pieces of legislation and seen changes in White Plains.

Retiring White Plains Councilpersons Dennis Krolian and Milagros Lecuona discussed their combined 20 years of service on the Common Council last week.

Lecuona, who has been on the Common Council for the past 12 years, said she was politically active long before she ran for the council. “I had been politically involved when I lived in Spain,” she recalled.

When she moved to White Plains Lecuona had a cable television show in Spanish. She was very active in the city, including serving as president of the White Plains High School PTA and on many other boards.

“I started inviting politicians to the show as well as professionals,” Lecuona said. “I wanted to show that we had all kinds of professionals in the Latino/Hispanic community. Also there were a lot of people that started learning Spanish. And so I tried to put those two worlds together.”

She currently has a radio show on WVOX in New Rochelle called “Livable Cities,” which is broadcast on Fridays from 2 to 3 p.m.

As her involvement with politicians through her show began to increase Lecuona said she became more involved with the Democratic Party in White Plains.

Professionally, Lecuona is an architect urban planner and she defined issues that needed to be addressed in the city, Lecuona said, adding she was approached by the Democratic Part to run for office. In her first run for the Common Council Lecuona campaigned on the need for balanced development and the importance of environmental protection, Lecuona said.

Since she was first elected a dozen years ago, with more development traffic has increased in the city and more people are living in the city, Lecuona said. “I am not against development,” she said. “But we need to bring development that fits the city.”

“There is a lot of action at the (White Plains) train station” but many residents just sleep in the city and work and do their recreational activities elsewhere, Lecuona said.

“I have seen that White Plains has grown in many ways but the growth hasn’t been balanced enough,” she said. “We don’t have a real downtown.” The Common Council does not have a vision for the city, she said.

Lecuona said she was also concerned about the city’s budget, which has significant increased borrowing. For past few years she has voted against the city budget, she said. The city needs an economic development office and director, she said.

Lecuona said she was disappointed that the city did not do an updated Comprehensive Plan in the recent past. The update in the mid-2000’s was rushed, she said. The current Comprehensive Plan does not have plans for environmental sustainability, for example, she said.

Lecuona said she ran for a third term because “there were certain projects on the table or were coming and I was very concerned that this was going to be another rubber stamping situation.”

Over the past four years Lecuona said things were not changing in city government to her satisfaction. Lecuona ran for mayor two years ago, but lost to Mayor Tom Roach in the Democratic primary. She decided to run for mayor rather than seek another term on the Common Council.

Lecuona said her accomplishments as a member of the Common Council have included creating better affordable housing policies, which was “something I was fighting for.” Lecuona said she has sought to bring affordable housing to areas throughout the city not just to certain locations and the new policies has made that happen.

Another achievement she helped to make was to not allow the original proposal for the French American School to be approved, Lecuona said. Approval of the original plan would have been “a terrible thing” not just for the neighborhood but for the city as a whole because the significant increase in traffic it would have generated, she said.

The most important contribution she has made on the council “is to bring transparency, to bring dignity, to bring honesty” to the board, Lecuona said.

Lecuona offered some advice for the incoming Common Council members. “Don’t rubber stamp. Have courage. Do your homework,” she said. “If you don’t have that knowledge on certain things find a way to get advice from many sources.”

“It’s residents first,” Lecuona said. “I am a public servant.”

During her last regularly scheduled Common Council meeting on Dec. 2, Lecuona thanked several city officials she worked with and city residents “for their trust and support.”

“I got to the Common Council through my lifelong community advocacy efforts,” Lecuona said. “That’s my nature and that will never change. I will be as always, one call away, one e-mail, or a stop in the street.”

Like Lecuona, Krolian declined to seek reelection after twice winning four-year terms.

“I served the people of the City of White Plains as a councilman for eight years. My wife Ellie and I have lived in White Plains since 1983 and raised our three children here,” Krolian said.

“Most importantly, I fought to preserve our neighborhoods from thoughtless developers,” Krolian said. “For example, Milagros and I saved Gedney from the French School for these past eight years. We saved Carhart from Sunrise Rehab and the fight continues to preserve Good Council and Prospect Park.”

Krolian said he was most disappointed by what he described as lost opportunities to improve the city, “Much to the detriment of our population, due to short sighted views of my colleagues and lack of leadership.”

Krolian offered advice for the incoming councilwomen. “Our new council members each have their own votes to cast and I hope they have the fortitude to honorably fight for the people who elected them,” he said. “Make your vote mean something. Just doesn’t be a rubber stamper.”