WPCNR THE HOMELESS NEWS. February 7, 2007: The County Executive's plan to build a new $1.2 Million Homeless shelter at Westchester County Police Headquarters  and close 85 Court Street in White Plains to move the hardcare homeless  there has been withdrawn.

The reason, according to the County Executive Andy Spano is that the county official's responsible for checking something out misinterpreted the county's own agreement with the Town of Greenburgh.

The announcement of the shelter project that was told to White Plains Councilpersons and County Legislator Bill Ryan Saturday and was leaked to The Journal News in order that a story could appear Monday before the official news release sent to other media.

The quck kill of the project was just as mysteriously leaked yesterday, obviously coincidentally following a snarling chorus of public reaction against the new shelter location from the Town of Mount Pleasant. The County Executive or his spokespersons apparently called in their buddies at The Journal News  to  tell them that constructing the new facility on the Westchester County Police Headquarters violated a county promise to the Town of Greenburgh that there would be no building of more shelter facilities within two miles of the center of the Grasslands complex.

Executive Spano said the distance measurement was made in error from the Westhelp facility 2.05 miles from the Police Headquarters site, and not from the center of the campus which is 1.74 miles from the Police Headquarters.

The Journal News did not disclose in its report how the county executive suddenly discovered this mistake.

 Going strictly on the timing, the "mistake" was discovered (blamed on an inaccurate measurement)  after the Town of Mount Pleasant Supervisor Robert Swanson and County Legislator Suzanne Swanson held a news conference denouncing the new shelter location and vowing to fight it, after an angry denunciation of it appeared in The Journal News Tuesday morning..

The County Executive said he might ask Paul Feiner, Supervisor of the Town of Greenburgh to waive the ban, however Mr. Feiner is quoted as saying  he'd be reluctant to do that because it would mean people could not trust the government to live up to its aggreements.

To WPCNR knowledge no other media were notified by the county on the whole scenario except The Journal News.

WPCNR has asked the Department of Communications how this measuring mistake was made, who was responsible for it, and how it was discovered a full 72 hours after it was agreed upon with County Legislator Bill Ryan, Councilpersons Rita Malmud, Tom Roach and Benjamin Boykin.

As of 3:15 P.M no official press release was issued describing this abrupt change in plan by the County Executive.