Senator Skoufis has a Stack of Scathing Evidence of Village of South Blooming Grove's 'Alleged Sham' of an Election

Today, Senator James Skoufis announced a collection of scathing documentation about the Village of South Blooming Grove’s improper and likely illegal October election, which was rescheduled from last March, without notifying most of the village's residents. This is the 2nd round of documents he requested, and threatened to subpoena if they were not received in a timely manner. And THIS time many of the Hasidic residents are just as incensed as everyone else. They too, just as much as anyone else, want their votes to count!

And the proof has all been sent to NY Attorney General’s Office. So,what’s next? Will they be required to hold another election within a reasonable time? And with strict expert oversight? The most appalling part is how far they were willing to go to blatantly try to deceive their public. One report said that an unnamed VSBG official enticed someone to pick up a stack of absentee ballots, and then the official(s)? filled them out themselves.

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SKOUFIS ANNOUNCEMENT TEXT

Over the past month, my office has investigated complaints from South Blooming Grove residents, many of whom were completely unaware of the October 22, 2025, village election. Several have alleged voter suppression and intimidation by local officials. These reports led me to issue an investigative information and document request – under threat of subpoena – to the village on October 27. After reviewing responses received on October 31, I followed up with a second solicitation on November 10 seeking additional documentation.

The picture that continues to emerge is alarming: mounting violations of Village Law, Municipal Home Rule Law, Elections Law, Open Meetings Law, and more, unequivocally pointing to South Blooming Grove officials undermining free and fair elections on October 22.

A special meeting to initiate an election date change from March to October was unnecessarily called and done so with one hour's public notice consisting of a flyer physically posted to village hall.

The current mayor and trustees are operating under legally suspect, altered term durations. Additionally, elections that were required to be held in recent years were not administered.

A change to the village's designated official newspaper was made under false pretenses -- to a weekly newspaper with readership on the other side of the county -- in order to publish state-required election notices that would not be read in South Blooming Grove. Further, state law requires a notice be published at least four months prior to an election; their notice was not published in a timely manner, a clear violation of law.

Village Board meeting minutes were omitted from their website for five months -- starting exactly with the meeting at which the Board began the process to change election dates. Only after an investigative inquiry from my office did the village begin back-posting minutes.

My office received reports of village officials making calls to residents identified as supporters, encouraging them to request absentee ballots and subsequently hand over blank ballots for said officials to fill in.

No mention of the referendum or election was made on the village's website, social media accounts, emails, text messages, automated calls, or mailers.

State law requires a recording of the meeting whereby results are canvassed and certified. Despite repeated attempts to procure a recording, it appears none exists.

In an October 24, 2025, phone call, a village official revealed the true motivation behind the date change: “the short answer to why we changed from March to October: There was a lot of people on the outside trying to do a lot of shit…we did everything that we had to do…we made our research and it [October 22, 2025] was less time for anyone to organize to bring in a yeshiva here...the main reason why is all the yeshivas are still closed in October. And I want to keep it at that.” It is well known in the village that a significant portion of the Jewish community is oppositional to current leadership. The admission reveals the election date was changed because yeshivas in the community were closed, shutting off an avenue for rivals to communicate about the election and thereby suppressing voter turnout.

We have referred all documents to the Attorney General’s office and I am urging her to initiate a quo warranto proceeding to invalidate the election.

Residents of South Blooming Grove have had enough. Despite officials’ efforts to the contrary, this village cannot be allowed to operate as the Wild West any longer. We are a nation – and a state – of laws. Robbing voters of their most fundamental democratic right is an unacceptable act, and village residents deserve nothing less than the truth alongside free and fair elections.

Senator James Skoufis

Senate District #42

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If the AG's office requires there to be a new election where all residents have a chance to examine both the expertise and integrity of candidates, we may have a chance to see how much corruption and environmental damage might have a chance to be corrected. The Town has tried and tried to rein in their land and water misuses and finally resorted to suing the DEC for repeated failure to enforce legal compliance. So, if a new election is held, it's not only election procedures that need to be monitored. We will see how the Attorney General deals with this matter. Meanwhile this is NOT the time to give up... more residents should start to attend meetings, and learn some basic municipal codes so they can speak out knowledgeably when corruption rears its ugly head. And then search for appropriate honest and knowledgeable candidates, and get t;he public out there to VOTE!

Edie Johnson

Executive Editor