Ass't. AG Loretta Simon, in open court, June 19th, 2008, states our civil action against the APA of June 26th, 2007, came 'on or about June 28th, 2007." Fact: our civil complaint against the APA was filed on June 26th, the day before the APA cease and desist order was issued on the 27th.
Jun 26, 2007 Lewis Family Farm's Index Number Application to Essex County Clerk
Jun 26, 2007 Lewis Family Farm's Request for Judicial Intervention
APA’s action follows farm’s by one critical day:
June 27, 2007 APA Cease & Desist Order
LFFI Counsel labels APA $10,000 fine “Extortive”:
Jul 3, 2007 Memorandum of Law in Support of Lewis Family Farm's Motion for Temporary Restraining Order against the APA
Jul 3, 2007 Affidavit of Barbara Lewis in Support of Motion for Temporary Restraining Order against the APA
Jul 3, 2007 Affidavit of Mark McKenna in Support of Motion for Temporary Restraining Order against the APA
Jul 3, 2007 Affirmation of Attorney Joseph Brennan in Support of Motion for Temporary Restraining Order against the APA
Jul 3, 2007 Lewis Family Farm's Amended Complaint in the declaratory judgment action against the APA
Fact: Mid summer 2007, Harvard law graduate John S. Banta, Esq., general counsel of the Adirondack Park Agency, called Anita Deming, executive director, Cornell Cooperative Extension, Westport, NY, specifically to declare that Sandy Lewis would be excluded from the referenced meeting—to which Farm Bureau president John Lincoln and Fred Monroe, executive director of the Adirondack Park Local Government Review Board, were invited, in writing. Mr. Monroe attended the meeting. The pretext to Banta's message, as passed to the rejected by Deming was simple: it was not a public meeting. Anthony "Tony" Leerkes, a Whallonsburg neighbor, attended with his brother, Bernard H. Leerkes Jr., president of the Essex Bureau, who was invited. In a recent call, Anita Deming offered the following: a short while after his first, APA general counsel John S. Banta again called to address the intent of his earlier call, to indicate that the meeting was indeed open - but he said - effectively - that I was not to come, none-the-less. We were in court on that day. At about the time of the first, Anita Deming called to state the essence of Banta's message without attributing the call to Banta: we would be excluded from what she then firmly characterized as a meeting that was NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Note: Anita Deming did not relay Banta’s 2nd call or his identity until October 2008. According to Deming, who has made efforts to comply with requests for information, Keith P. McKeever, APA public relations officer, rose at the (closed to the Lewises but) open meeting to represent, but without attribution, Town of Essex Supervisor Ronald E. Jackson’s calls to the APA, effectively to say the Lewis farm did not enjoy local support. I learned of McKeever's statements at the time - and confirmed their essence in a call to McKeever shortly after. McKeever was reluctant to confirm what he had said, but did so, and he refused to state that Jackson was not his source. I then confirmed with Jackson that he had made a call to the APA to express himself on us to McKeever. McKeever confirmed that he had only spoken with one individual in Essex on his declared subject. Supervisor Jackson's calls to Keith P. McKeever followed the farm's decision to ban him and Willsboro postman Danny Sweatt from the sugarbush, and to ban Jackson, his son and their friends from hunting, and to ban Jackson, Danny Sweatt and his friends from harvesting truckloads of hardwood at will from the farm's sugar bush. Prior to the ban, Jackson, Sweatt and a few others published our support of their farm activity in the local Press Republican. With our equipment and fuel provided to support wood cutting and transport, harvest of maple syrup, and unfettered access to the woods and fields for hunting, our farm was Jackson’s daily paradise, all seasons of the year. [The foregoing about the meeting at the APA was confirmed in recent conversations with Anita Deming who also supplied the documentation posted here - more than once.]
Aug 8, 2008 APA’s Mark Sengenberger calls private informal meeting, with Ag & Markets and Farm Bureau. See signup sheet on page 4.
Aug 16, 2007 Decision and Order of Acting Supreme Court Justice Kevin K. Ryan converting the declaratory judgment action into an Article 78 proceeding and dismissing it as premature and not ripe for judicial intervention. * This decision also improperly advises in dicta that the APA has jurisdiction over the construction of farm worker housing.
Aug 31, 2007 APA's Notice of Entry of Justice Ryan's Decision and Order
Sep 26, 2007 Lewis Family Farm's Notice of Appeal of Justice Ryan's Decision and Order
Motion practice re: Case #498-07 before Appellate Division Third Judicial Department
May 16, 2008 Affidavit of John Privitera in Opposition to the APA’s Cross-motion for a Conditional Order Dismissing the Appeal
Decision and Order of the Appellate Division, Third Judicial Department
"Love means never having to say you're sorry. "
A first: the Ass’t. AG Loretta Simon acknowledges the folly of her previous actions, without acknowledging the folly of her previous actions, saving us and the Appellate Division Third Judicial Department the obvious. For those who do not understand what’s going on here, part of the strategy of the AG and the APA is to crush. In close to 200 documents, they crush with the cost of defense. This is not about the law. They seek title impairment, jurisdictional mission creep and suffocation of the indigenous, pure and simple. Simon’s letter is an about face. Perhaps in recognition of the banality of the foregoing, she did not appeal what should have been superfluous. On every occasion thus far, government has appealed and lost. Perhaps the AG’s office is tired of losing. We kinda wonder what she’ll do with Judge Meyer’s decision, fingers crossed. We hope she must buy the transcript of June 19th, not we.
For a concise summary of the chronology of the cases, see text of motion, Case No. 504696, Appellate Division, Third Department.
Hon. Richard B. Meyer’s Decision & Order:
In which the Appellate Division Third Judicial Dept. speaks again: Loretta Simon fails again:
