Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino announced today that thanks to the help of financial inducements from the County's Industrial Development Agency and the state, Pepsi Beverages Company (PBC), the bottling division of PepsiCo Inc., will remain at its headquarters in Somers.

Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone paid a visit to Albany today along with Yonkers Schools Superintendent Bernard Pierorazio and Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino calling on state legislative leaders to restore severe school funding cuts to Yonkers. They had a series of meetings with Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, Senator Jeff Klein, Senate Finance Committee staff and others.

Education funding for the state's fourth largest city  was cut more than $20 million in the Governor's proposed budget. The budget adopted by the NY State Senate last week cut an additional $15 million in education funding which was taken from VLT(Video Lottery Terminals) revenue from the Empire City Cacino at Yonkers Raceway.

Yonkers Mayor Phil Amicone was encouraged by the meeting, "Today we took some very important steps toward restoring the deep cuts made to Yonkers' education funding in the state budget. Although we are not all the way there yet, we gained commitments from key legislative leaders and have an agreement to work together to restore as much school funding as possible."

Said Amicone, "Specifically, our meetings with Majority Leader Dean Skelos and his staff were very productive and promising. Senator Skelos has a clear understanding of our city's and school district's needs and has agreed to work closely with us over the next couple of weeks to restore education funding cuts to Yonkers, mainly the much-needed VLT revenue we collect from Yonkers Raceway."

Last year, the Yonkers City School District was forced to cut 234 teachers. Another 439 were given an early retirement incentive. Amicone says unless changes are made with regard to state madates and the current cut in aid to the City, additional cuts in personnel and programs will be necessary.

State lawmakers have until April 1 to get a new budget approved.

Westchester County's Crime Stoppers Program is back.

The program is being revived thanks to  support from the county's business community and members of the public.

It was the wearing of the green in NYC today, as hundreds thousands of people lined up along 5th Avenue to the bagpipe players and drums as well as the traditional marching bands and Irish dancers.  Mother Nature dished out a picture perfect day for spectators and participants alike.
Among those on hand for the 250th Annual St. Patrick's Day parade were Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino and his wife, Sheila.

Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino says he and other County officials, including Commissioner of Emergency Services, Anthony Sutton, are on top of the latest happenings in Japan following last week's devastating earthquake and tsunami.

Authorities, he says, have also been in constant touch with Entergy, the company that owns and operates Indian Point, as well as repesentatives of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Nuclear Regulatory Commision(NRC), the State Office of Emergency Management and the County's congressional delegation.

The County Executive warned that while it is important to follow the unfolding nuclear crisis in Japan, it's equally important not to rush to judgement concerning Indian Point. "With regard to Indian Point, it is always safety first. The most important thing we can do right now is gather the facts and do it in a steady,comprehensive way so that we have the best information possible available to us," said Astorino.

Funeral services were held this morning for 23 year old Army Specialist David Fahey Jr. at St. Patrick's Church in Yorktown.

Hundreds of people were in attendance including local veterans, police, EMS and fire officials to say farewell to the fallen local hero.

Fahey was killed in Afghanistan February 28 by an improvised explosive device. He was born in Norwalk and raised by his adoptive parents in Yorktown Heights.

Westchester County Executive Rob Astorino and Ossining Supervisor Catherine Borgia today made it official, signing an Inter-Municipal Agreement (IMA) which will allow the Town to share police services with Westchester County, a move that will save taxpayers about $600,000 a year to start.

The signing was a symbolic one, the IMA actually went into effect on January 1 when 10 officers from Ossining were sworn in as Westchester County Police officers. Negotiations for the IMA began in June 2010.

Under the new agreement, Westchester County Police are providing patrol and investigative services to the Town of Ossining. In November 2010, County Police took over all dispatching and communications functions from the Town of Ossining Police. The move allowed Town police officers to participate in cross-training with County police officers.

In addition, the Town's Police Chief, Mark Busche was sworn in as a Captain in the County Police Department, a move Borgia says "Amounted to a demotion for him in order to make the entire agreement work."