Dear Supervisor Feiner,
I am writing in my capacity as President of the Edgemont Community Council (ECC). Since I’ve just learned there was a meeting last night of your Emergency Communications Task Force that I was excluded from despite your earlier invitation, I am writing to share directly my observations regarding communications around the recent major water main break that impacted much of the Edgemont neighborhood beginning at approximately 9:00 AM on Sunday, January 18, and continuing until roughly 7:00 PM on Monday, January 19. For nearly 36 hours, the majority of Edgemont residents were without running water.
First, on behalf of the Edgemont community, I want to recognize and sincerely thank the DPW, Water Department, Police Department and other personnel who worked tirelessly to locate and repair the break and ensure public safety throughout the situation. We are grateful for the dedication of the employees whose expertise and sustained effort ultimately led to the repair and restoration of service.
That said, the communication of timely and accurate information to residents was severely lacking. For those of us without water (and some without heat) for nearly 36 hours, it was a frustrating and upsetting experience. Information provided by you as the Supervisor on social media was inconsistent with other information disseminated over the News & Town Board Reports and General Alerts emails, and was not updated with appropriate frequency. It is understood that emergency situations like these require time for evaluation before clear instructions can be circulated to residents, but it is essential for status updates to be posted regularly, even if just to say that the situation is in progress, but without a resolution.
Residents in a town the size of Greenburgh should not have had to be at a loss to find out when water might return, or how to manage safety concerns afterwards. We had elderly and infirm residents left completely in the dark. An emergency of this magnitude demanded a well-developed, ready-to-launch communication plan, one that presumably would have been in place as a matter of standard operating procedures. This would include outreach to residents from a variety of platforms such as email, robocall and social media with consistent information on all three. The information provided should err on the side of caution, not overpromise quick fixes and fast solutions, which set unrealistic expectations and increase frustration levels. And perhaps most critically, when it was determined by Sunday afternoon/evening that water was not going to be restored by the morning, a water/warming center should have been set up at a Town facility not affected by the water main break – the Gerry Byrne Center at Anthony Veteran Park, in this instance.
I understand from recent conversations with Police Chief Kobie Powell and DPW Commissioner Rich Fon that the Town’s robocall system is being upgraded and is expected to relaunch in March. This is welcome news since the Town’s emergency notification system also fell short. While a robocall was eventually issued on Sunday evening, many residents, including myself, did not receive it. From conversations with neighbors, it appears that the call primarily reached longtime residents, largely via landlines, suggesting that an outdated or incomplete list was used. Compounding the issue, it remains unclear from the Town’s website how residents can sign up for robocall notifications at all.
This incident underscored how critical it is that emergency notification systems be fully functional, modern, and widely subscribed before an emergency occurs. We hope this new system will have texting capacity for emergency notifications; in 2026, that’s the best way to manage emergency information flow. The ECC stands ready to assist in encouraging residents to opt-in once the system is live.
More broadly, the Town’s email alert system requires a comprehensive audit and overhaul. There are too many options, some of which are rarely utilized (Public Works Alerts is a perfect case in point – nothing issued from this for the duration of the event). The Supervisor’s News & Town Board Reports list, while broader, suffers from low subscription rates in Edgemont because it mixes critical updates with routine or promotional announcements, making it an unreliable source during emergencies. By contrast, the General Alerts list — already used effectively for snow emergencies — is the most appropriate channel when used simultaneously with the broader GB list.
As the civic organization representing Edgemont, the ECC was also significantly underutilized. We maintain the most comprehensive email list in the community, with more than 4,500 subscribers, and are well-positioned to disseminate accurate information quickly. While I appreciated proactive outreach later in the weekend from Commissioner Fon, Councilwoman Haber, and others, and clarifications from Councilwomen Hendrickx and Haber regarding the boil water advisory, the ECC should have been looped in much earlier and more consistently. At times, it felt as though I was chasing information rather than being equipped to share it efficiently with residents. If there was an established chain of command intended to assess, confirm, and disseminate information, it clearly broke down in this instance.
In the absence of clear Town-led coordination, I stepped in to help serve as a conduit between the Town, the County, and the Edgemont School District so school leadership could make informed operational decisions. While I was willing and able to do so, this underscores a broader concern: coordination among key stakeholders — particularly the School District — should be led and structured by the Town, not assembled informally in real time through social media posts and personal outreach.
Given the scale and duration of the disruption, it would have been appropriate to formally declare a state of emergency and convene an emergency coordination meeting that included relevant commissioners and department heads, the Chief of Police, the Greenville Fire District, the Edgemont School District, and the ECC. Such a step would have improved alignment, clarified roles, and ensured that all stakeholders were operating from the same, current information.
While this letter is focused primarily on communication and coordination, it is also important to note that the Town should have been more proactive in its investment in infrastructure maintenance so that an incident of this magnitude was far less likely to occur in the first place.
Finally, I am concerned that the formation your new task force to evaluate the Town’s response risks delaying action or diffusing responsibility. The issues exposed during this incident were not novel, nor do they require months of study to diagnose. The Town already has experienced staff, existing emergency protocols, and long-established civic partners. What is needed now is not another task force, but leadership — clear decisions, accountability, and concrete improvements to emergency communication and coordination. What I would have welcomed instead was placing this topic on a Town Board work session agenda, along with an invitation to participate in a substantive debrief of the response and to contribute to identifying concrete improvements for the future.
I welcome the opportunity to continue this dialogue and to work collaboratively with the Town Board to strengthen emergency response and communication — not only for Edgemont, but for all of unincorporated Greenburgh.
Sincerely,
Dylan F. Pyne
President, The Edgemont Community Council
cc:
Greenburgh Town Council
Kobie Powell, Chief of the Town of Greenburgh Police Department
Richard Fon, Commissioner of the Town of Greenburgh Public Works Department
Frank Moribito, Deputy Commissioner of the Town of Greenburgh Public Works Department
Joseph Lucasey, Commissioner of the Town of Greenburgh Parks and Recreation
Peter Asp, Systems Manager of the Town of Greenburgh MIS Department
Costanzo (Gus) Spedaliere, Chief of Greenville Fire District
Greenville Fire District Board of Fire Commissioners