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When I was in the Mayan jungle I sampled a shaman I heard performing a ceremony. The rhythm of his voice was so fascinating. I like to collect little things from my day-to-day life and use them in the recordings. |
Were music and spirituality always married for you? |
My first record was called Despertar, which means to awaken. I've been fascinated with dreams and Eastern philosophy and marrying that with the West. I guess that's why George Harrison is one of my favorite Beatles. To me, music and spiritually are one and the same. That's why I do music, to reach my consciousness to a... |
Is that something that you also hope listeners will take on? |
I like for people to have their own interpretation. With the video for "Want" there are interpretations that the director and I have. There are these mandalas, shapes that are between myself and the viewer that start to form. I know what it means to me but somebody else might see it and have a completely different inte... |
Taxes on state parks and prisons exposes New York's patchwork tax policy system that is rooted in political juice. |
You’d think New York State would not pay property taxes on the 4 million acres of public land it owns. |
Yet it does on almost 90 percent of its property. It's the remaining 10 percent that exposes the state's patchwork system of tax deals forged in regions with political juice in Albany. |
No more pronounced is the inequitable system for property taxation than in the world of state parks and prisons, a USA Today Network investigation has learned. |
For instance, New York taxpayers cough up school taxes on land for 19 state prisons, including close to $1 million to the Ossining schools for the Sing Sing Correctional Facility. Yet it pays nothing for 34 others, including the Elmira and Rochester correctional facilities. |
The state has long paid property taxes on its vast park holdings in the Catskills and Adirondacks. But elsewhere, it's a mishmash. |
The Lower Hudson Valley could be considered the epicenter for property-tax inequities. |
Except for 84 acres that are taxed in Ossining, about 7,000 acres of state land in Westchester County reaps no tax payments from the state. |
That includes almost 600 acres at Franklin D. Roosevelt State Park in Yorktown, more than 1,000 acres at the Rockefeller State Preserve in Mount Pleasant and 154 acres at the French Hill section of the Donald J. Trump State Park in Yorktown. |
But 5 miles north, in neighboring Putnam County, Trump Park’s Indian Hill section on close to 300 acres is fully taxed — school, town, fire, and county. |
In fact, all of New York state’s land in Putnam gets taxed, including 18 underwater acres in the Hudson River off Philipstown and 425 acres along the Taconic State Parkway in Putnam Valley. |
And in Carmel, the state pays about $160,000 a year in property taxes on land under three lakes — Kirk Lake, Lake Mahopac and Wixon Pond — that have no public access. |
All totaled, Putnam county governments will reap more than $4 million a year in property taxes paid by state taxpayers. |
Across the Hudson River, Rockland County has enjoyed the state’s property-tax bounty for a century, with its state parks and land taxed since their establishment. |
In 2016, Rockland school districts and its county and municipal governments will receive an estimated $37 million in state tax payments on about 37,000 acres of state land. |
Details of the state's ad hoc policy were gleaned from a 1996 state report conducted during Gov. George Pataki’s first term, when he was looking to enact a statewide system. He failed to find consensus on a statewide plan. |
The issue had yet to register on the agenda of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. But that may change. |
"This is an issue that evolved over decades of one-offs and piecemeal actions, and it warrants a comprehensive look," Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi said in an email statement when presented with details uncovered in the investigation. |
Those "one-offs" mentioned by Azzopardi are legislative deals brokered in Albany to bring annual streams of revenue that ease the tax burden on local taxpayers. |
Westchester County, however, finds itself on the short end of that stick. This despite that fact that three of New York’s last eight governors lived here, and Pataki was a Westchester state assemblyman before moving to Putnam in the early 1990s. He later signed the bill to make the Putnam state lands taxable by 2007. |
Westchester has about 7,000 acres of state land — about 2.5 percent of its land area. It’s located primarily in northern Westchester, with the Camp Smith military reservation, about 1,900 acres in the town of Cortlandt (and the Lakeland school district). There are about 1,000 acres in Yorktown, in the Yorktown school d... |
The high value of land in the Lower Hudson Valley means state taxation here provides substantial financial benefits. Under state law, New York pays on the value of the land, but not on improvements made to the real estate. For example, at Great Meadow prison in Fort Ann, near Lake George, the state pays school taxes on... |
At Sing Sing prison in Ossining, the state pays taxes on land valued at almost $600,000 per acre. |
It also pays on state land at the Old Croton Aqueduct State Park in Ossining, valued at $60,000 per acre. |
Meanwhile, in the Rockland County town of Ramapo, the state pays taxes on 9,300 acres, valued at almost $14,000 per acre. Putnam's state land is valued at about $4,500 per acre. |
The unfairness in the state land system is glaring when you consider the fate of towns that host state prisons. The USA TODAY Network investigation found that taxes were paid to school districts hosting 19 prisons, including ones in Dutchess, Ulster, Orleans and Clinton counties. |
But taxes were not paid on prison land in 34 other municipalities, including the city of Elmira and the town Bedford, which hosts two women's prisons in Westchester County. |
The investigation was done by examining assessment records in 36 Lower Hudson Valley municipalities as well as records in every municipality that hosts a state prison. |
Westchester again finds itself the poster-child for the random nature of state tax policy. |
The Ossining school district receives about $1 million a year from Sing Sing and the old aqueduct linear park. Just 15 miles northeast of Sing Sing sprawls the Taconic and Bedford Hills prisons on 160 acres on Harris Road in Bedford. There’s an additional 32 acres of state land in Bedford, including the 23-acre parklan... |
The state pays no property taxes to the Bedford schools. |
Bedford schools Superintendent Christopher Manno, who took office in July, said he would look into the issue. |
Carol Conklin-Spillane, schools chief in Pocantico Hills, home to the 1,500-acre Rockefeller State Park Preserve, said she wants to discuss it further with state legislators. |
“It’s my responsibility to advocate for my taxpayers and make sure any state aid that’s available is flown back to our district,” she said. |
In Dutchess County, the random nature of state taxation reveals itself along the Interstate 84 corridor. |
The state pays about $750,000 a year in property taxes to the Beacon city schools on almost 3,000 acres in the town of Fishkill, including 339 acres at Downstate Correction Facility, on the north side of the interstate. |
But on the other side of the highway, in Beacon, the state pays nothing to the schools on 467 acres, including 270 acres at the Fishkill Correctional Facility. |
"The state is exempt from taxation, except where it decides it isn’t,” said Eric Alexsen, director of Dutchess County’s Office of Real Property Services. “It boils down to: ‘In this circumstance, do this; in that circumstance, do that.’" |
In Elmira, where a state prison sprawls over more than 200 acres, schools Superintendent Hillary Austin said she will contact state lawmakers to craft legislation to bring parity in her city. |
"Money is money, especially is these especially trying economic times," she said. |
Why has Westchester been left out of the tax deal that has benefited Rockland for more than a century, and Putnam for the past decade? No one has ever asked. |
Interviews with state legislators found most of them were in the dark about taxation policy on state lands. They didn’t know that Westchester was the poor step-sibling to Putnam and Rockland. |
Among those who didn’t know was Assemblyman Tom Abinanti, D-Mount Pleasant, who served in the Westchester County legislature from 1991 to 2010. He said the issue never came up in public policy discussions in White Plains or Albany. |
Assemblyman David Buchwald, D-White Plains, whose district includes Bedford, said it was news to him that the state treated Westchester differently. |
Assemblywoman Sandy Galef, D-Ossining, who chairs the Assembly Committee on Real Property Taxation, co-sponsored the Putnam bill in 2004. She said she was still waiting for someone in Westchester to ask her to take action to bring tax equity there. |
State Sen.Terrence Murphy, R-Yorktown, whose district includes more than half of Westchester’s untaxed state land, declined comment. |
A look back at how Putnam piggy-backed on Rockland County’s century-old deal with the state reveals how political clout plays an important role in putting state land on the tax rolls. |
It began in the mid-1990's when then-Gov. George Pataki, who lives on a 6-acre estate in the Putnam town of Philipstown, ordered a state study of taxation policy. His goal was to come up with a uniform policy. |
He also won approval of a payment-in-lieu-of-taxes deal for Putnam, which provided $400,000 a year in state payments to help relieve the tax burden in the county, where about 10 percent of the land is state-owned. |
Pataki failed to find consensus. Meanwhile, Putnam remained restive. Then Philipstown Assessor Brian Kenny, who is also assessor in Orangetown in Rockland, suggested that Putnam piggy-back on Rockland’s law. |
By 2004, Galef and then-state Sen. Vincent Leibell, R-Patterson, crafted the bill that passed the Legislature and was signed by Pataki that September, a day before he announced an additional 2,000 acres of state parkland in Putnam County. |
The push for Putnam's taxation of state land caught the attention of Long Island's Riverhead assessor, Laverne Tennenberg, who oversees a town with 2,800 acres of state parkland. She sprang to action, mobilizing Suffolk County's Albany delegation to put Riverhead on par with Putnam. |
Her town made some progress by 2006, winning approval to put that property under the state law that pays school taxes on state land. The town's schools received $1.6 million this year, Tennenberg said. |
When informed in early October that state lands in Putnam and Rockland also yield state property-tax payments for the county and towns, she vowed to organize once more. |
"I'm going to make this a mission of mine," she said. "There's still a disparity." |
The USA Today Network reached out to Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino, who lives in Mount Pleasant, which has almost 1,700 acres of untaxed state land, about whether he thought the state should pay taxes there. |
The Republican who lost to Cuomo in 2014 and is contemplating another run in 2018, did not respond to a request for a comment. |
Cuomo, New York’s 56th governor, used to live in Bedford and still lives in Westchester. He wants to take a comprehensive look at state policy. |
If he fails, like Pataki, to find a statewide solution, will he help do for Westchester what Pataki did for Putnam? |
David McKay Wilson is an opinion columnist for The Journal News/lohud.com, part of the USA Today Network, and writes the weekly Tax Watch column. |
April 15, 2019, 7:08 a.m. |
Come what may, the PML-N Government is determined to end the darkness in the country once and for all, the Federal Minister of State for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali told Pakistan’s Perspective keeping in view the ongoing political developments that have virtually jolted the country. |
The ministry is upbeat to complete by December 2017 the projects relating to transmitting the electricity to end consumers and transmission and distribution system will be made strong enough to carry the 27,000 MW of electricity ensuring the country free of the menace of load-shedding. |
The working on the projects aiming to upgrade the ongoing transmission and distribution system enough to carry the load of new electricity generation have alarmingly slowed down as the top man of the government and his ministers are badly entrenched in war for their survival and to this effect they are not able to pay ... |
So far, the government has managed to succeed in injecting 5576 MW in the system erasing the power deficit during the peak hours despite the political expeditions followed by 126 days Dharna undertaken by PAT of Dr Tahirul Qadri and PTI headed by Imran khan. The credit of doing away with the existing power deficit of o... |
The government is facing the tough time in SC. However, still it would be able to jack up the electricity generation to 8962 MW by end of the current calendar year as the new power plants, according to the latest documents available with this scribe, will add 3386 MW more in the system by December this year. “Hats off ... |
The documents show that in 2013, the projects that add 473 MW in 2014 include New Bong Escape (84 MW), Allai Khwar (121 MW), Khan Khwar (72MW), Jinnah Hydel units 4,5 (24 MW), FFCL (50 MW), Gomal Zam (17MW), DEVIS (13 MW), ZEPL (56 MW), Jinnah Hydel Unit 8 (12 MW) and Jinnah Hydel units 6,7 (24 MW). And in 2017 the pro... |
In addition, there are more new plants to come and will add more electricity of 3386 MW in the system by December this year. The projects will come on stream by the end of the ongoing calendar year include Chashma Nuclear power plant-IV (325 MW), Balloki power plant 1200 MW, Bhikki (400 MW), Port Qaim power plant (660 ... |
And by June 2018, Neelum Jehlum hydro power project will be operational which will add 969 MW and Tarbela-IV will be fully functional with 1450 MW ending the darkness once for all. But it is highly linked with the success in up-gradating the transmission and distribution system by the government which is in legal fight... |
In the current month of July, the NTDC chairman Dr Fayyaz Chaudhry, has been removed from his post for not laying down the 500 kv transmission line for the evacuation of 1320 MW of coal based Port Qasim power plant, 220 kv transmission line for 400 MW from Gharo (coastal area) and 500 kv another transmission line from ... |
However, the spokesman said that the government is on toes to complete the said projects within the deadline as the next election campaign will hinge on the fulfillments of the promise made in 2013 elections that if voted to power, it would make the country load-shedding free by 2018. |
Interestingly, the State of Industry Report 2016 prepared by NEPRA mentions the alarming fact that the overloading in DISCOs’ system coupled with other constraints on NTDC (National Transmission Distribution Company) system has been resulting in power supply constraints. The regulator in the report has observed that du... |
DISCO (Electric Power Distribution Companies) are emphasized to deliver a reliable electric power to end consumers while maintaining performance standards set by NEPRA. Three main components are monitored by the regulator for gauging the performance of DISCOS as constraints in these components would limit DISCOS’ abili... |
The problems of the system constraints have increased because of the fact that DISCOs remained unable to make investments to upgrade the distribution systems. In 2013-14, the DISCOs were allowed to invest Rs52.006 billion to improve the system, but they just spent Rs43.88 billion showing that it failed to spend the amo... |
Celebrations turned into darkness for family members of co-pilot of the missing Indian Air Force's AN-32 aircraft with 29 people on board Pankaj Nandel, as he was supposed to tie the knot soon. Father of Pankaj, Krishna Nandel said they are hopeful that their son will safely return home. |
Celebrations turned into darkness for family members of co-pilot of the missing Indian Air Force’s AN-32 aircraft with 29 people on board Pankaj Nandel, as he was supposed to tie the knot soon. Father of Pankaj, Krishna Nandel said they are hopeful that their son will safely return home. |
“I have been in contact with his seniors and his colleagues. Till now there has been no information about him. I am sure he will come back. Anything can happen anytime. We are hopeful, and we know he will come back safe,” he told the media here. Meanwhile, the search operation for the missing AN32 aircraft of Indian Ai... |
An international safety network has been activated to alert the merchant ships passing by the zone of search operation to look out for any survivors or the debris. The Andaman and Nicobar Command of the defence forces are keeping a watch for it even beyond the search zone. As part of the procedure, a formal complaint a... |
India’s largest ever search operation over the sea to trace the missing twin-engined AN32 aircraft is getting imageries of the search area from the ISRO through its radar imaging satellite RISAT. |
The Indian Mission Control Centre of the space agency responsible for Satellite Aided Search and Rescue in the region is supplementing the Operation Talash by offering its services. |
Seventeen naval and coast guard ships are mounting day and night watch and various military aircraft have made 28 sorties till last evening over the search zone. However, no clues on the whereabouts of the aircraft are yet known and the sharp look out continues unabated. |
A small, unusually-named agency set out to do work on climate change that needed to be done. |
Visible under ultraviolet light, Weather (Un)Control highlights often overlooked indoor air contaminants. |
Artist highlights the vulnerability of countries and the importance of being ready when disaster strikes with new project. |
#SANDY is a book of photographs of Hurricane Sandy which aims to support the rebuilding efforts. |
The Big Apple prepares itself for the storms that are likely to impact the city over the next few decades. |
New York ad agency Mother, develops interactive experience that uses game mechanics to raise funds. |
Smaller Galaxy Smartphone coming out, Instagram more popular than ever and Google considering music streaming...links to start your day with. |
Innovation Which Brands Used Social Media Best During Hurricane Sandy? |
Companies discussed how information was effectively shared online during the storm at a SMW event in NYC. |
With nearly a billion people going hungry each day how can we spend another dollar on war? Food Not Bombs is an all-volunteer movement that recovers and shares free vegan or vegetarian food with the public without restriction in over 1,000 cities in 65 countries around the world to protest war, poverty and the destruct... |
During the past 39 years, Food Not Bombs volunteers have demonstrated their dedication to nonviolent direct action in many creative ways. Activist shared vegan meals with prisoners inside jails in the Philippines, fed units of the Burmese military in Yangon, provided meals to the First Responders in New York after 9/11... |
Food Not Bombs has provided food and material relief to the survivors of the Loma Prieta Earthquake in San Francisco and Northridge Earthquake in San Fernando Valley, Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy as well as Typhoon Yolanda, the Christmas Tsunami and many other disasters during its 39-year history. |
Food Not Bombs activist have been recognized as Prisoners of Conscience by Amnesty International and called on their unconditional release after having been jailed for sharing food with the hungry. |
Volunteers fed the Peace Camp at Mas-ha Palestine, Camp Casey in Crawford, Texas, weeklong protests against Exercise Talisman Saber in Australia, WTO protests in Seattle, Genova, and Cancun, and Occupy camps in cities across the United States. |
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