Haverstraw has made it to the championship game of the Journal News Little League Tournament of Champions 22 times and Stony point has made 14 appearances.

But only twice, in the tournament’s first year in 1961 and again in 1964, have they faced each other.

It happens again tomorrow, when Stony Point’s Giants face the Haverstraw Cardinals in the 48th championship game, at 11:30 a.m. The action begins earlier, with an exhibition game by players from the District 18 Challenger Little League, for children with disabilities at 10 a.m. and the finals of the tournament’s skills competition at 10:30 a.m.

The Tournament has been played since 1961, when a partnership formed between The Journal News and Haverstraw Little League to benefit Jawonio, the Rockland affiliate of the Cerebral Palsy Associations of New York State. In almost a half-century, the tournament has raised about $350,000 for the Summer Education Program at Jawonio, a New City agency that provides a variety of services to individuals with disabilities.

Tomorrow’s clash, at Haverstraw’s Leo Laders American Legion Post 130 Memorial Field, is one the players will never forget. Although they will be opponents tomorrow and perhaps throughout their Little League careers, some no doubt will grow up to be teammates at North Rockland High School, which serves both towns.

It’s one of those clashes that bestows bragging rights for a lifetime.

Don’t tell the Cardinals, but back in the 1960s, Stony Point won both championships.

No matter the outcome, this year’s tournament will be memorable for a come from behind walk-off home run that won a first-round game for East Ramapo and for the no-hitter by Anthony Riello that vaulted Stony Point to the final game. There were other great games and memorable moments, but perhaps will measure up to tomorrow’s outcome—at least for two teams that both have their eye on the same prize.

Credit the Greater Haverstraw Chamber of commerce for a good idea—a good way to get village residents face-to-face with their mayors.

They’ve sensed that people may be reluctant to just waltz into their respective village halls to meet the mayor, so the chamber has come up with a more low-key, constituent-friendly approach.

Residents can have a buffet supper and beverage with Haverstraw Mayor Michael Kohut or West Haverstraw Mayor John Ramundo this evening at 7 at the Haverstraw Elks Lodge. Pomona Mayor Nick Sanderson has been invited to take part, but whether he’ll be there remains uncertain.

Both Kohut and Ramundo say they are available almost anytime residents want to speak with them, but they still welcome this opportunity because it connects them with constituents in a different, more comfortable setting.

Tickets, which are available at the door, are $25.

These are tough times for Rockland financially, so it’s natural enough for there to be concern about spending, especially dipping into money set aside for emergencies.

But it’s also tough to turn away veteran groups that ask for money for parades, Memorial Day or Veterans Day observances or to fund their efforts to reach out and help veterans of Afghanistan or Iraq.

It’s also easy to say that the veterans groups should raise the money they need for such activities. To a degree, that’s right, but the reality is that some American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars posts are made up mostly of elderly members who can’t stand in traffic or outside supermarkets trying to collect what they need.

County Executive C. Scott Vanderhoef could come off looking like Scrooge, saying he’ll veto the next batch of funding requests for veterans sent to him by the County Legislature.

It may be a little late in the game to make that firm stand this year.

But Vanderhoef is right to suggest that veterans groups should have to follow the same procedure as the so-called contract agencies—groups that get funding included in the county budget to help them perform services or activities vital to the community.

After all, veterans know when they hold activities and observances—Memorial Day, Veterans Day, Flag Day and the like—and they know how much money they need and when. If fact, that gives them a bit of an advantage over other contract agencies, whose needs may fluctuate or be more unpredictable.

So, let’s not turn them aside blindly this year, but reach out to all the groups, perhaps through the Veterans Coordinating Council, to let them know how the process works and get them ready to get in line like everyone else.

George Carlin, who died of heart failure on Sunday, was controversial. He could offend just about everyone, even when he was agreeing with them (remember the routine on feminists?) But I remember some of his greatest routines that had nothing to do with dirty words you can’t say on radio or television, or why white people shouldn’t play the blues, or any number of subjects that sound too controversial to even mention (but they are still funny).

My favorite, though, was his discussion of baseball vs. football, especially enjoyable because I heard it when I was was with my dad, who was a huge football fan. Me, I prefer baseball. But we both got the routine. And, my kids knew who he was because he wason the TV show, “Shining Time Station,” playing it straight as the miniature Mr. Conductor. My kids didn’t know my dad, but the same guy made them laugh, in very different ways.

Rockland came of age (with the TZ Bridge) when one-acre zoning was the holy grail for homeowners. Suburbs were the thing. Now, suburban sprawl is the bane of land-use wonks, who see it as an inefficient, isolating lifestyle that puts people in their cars for even the smallest errands.

One of the salves for the ills of sprawl is the “Transit Village” concept, or Transit-Oriented Development, TOD. The “transit village” idea is quite a trend among community planners. (Here’s another transit village look.)

The “transit village” idea (and its complementary buzzword “smart growth”) has been mentioned during the glut of meetings about the Tappan Zee Bridge/Interstate 287 Corridor Project.

We are expecting to hear this month (maybe) about the preferred alternative for phase 1 of the massive TZ/I-287 project. That announcement will give the transportation mode, and whether the Tappan Zee Bridge would be rehabbed or built anew, plans that would then undergo a thorough environmental review. As that study goes on, phase 2 will determine where any public transportation stations would connect to the corridor. That’s where the “transit village” buzzword is heard. These multi-use commercial-retail-residential areas that are expected to crop up around transit stations (either commuter rail or bus rapid transit in Rockland, or possibly both or maybe neither, depending on what the TZ/I-287 Project portends.)

I’ve heard and read several comments about the “reurbanization” trend lately, including this article today in this Wall Street Journal article.

Thoughts about living, working, shopping in such a transit village, or having it built in your hometown? What about other projects, like Riverspace Arts’ plans for downtown Nyack? How should public transportation fit there? Should Spring Valley’s downtown revitalization incorporate more of the transit village concept?

There’s little question we need to pay close attention to the issues of substance abuse (including alcohol) and for DWI (driving while intoxicated) prevention in Lower Hudson Valley. We have had more than our share (and more than enough) of people killed in drunk-driving accidents. We have seen parents charged with DWI with their kids in the car, young people killed in drunken driving crashes and even a couple of wrong-way drivers charged with DWI (including one this morning on I-287). SADD (Students Against Destructive Decisions) and local schools have teamed up to stage the pre-prom crash scene, or the “grim reaper” who taps students during the day who then “play dead,” all in the name of alcohol- and substance-abuse awareness.
But the DWI prevention program at El Camino High in Oceanside, CA (northern San Diego County) went a little too far, I think. School officials and police led students to believe that some of their classmates had been killed in DWI accidents. They let them mourn their peers’ passing for several hours. Students recall screaming and crying, nausea from that terrible wave of emotion as they mourned a friend. Officials said it was justified if it saved one life.

Hmm. It seems rather cruel. And, this is a pretty big school. No one there, no beloved teacher, fellow student, administrator could give a first-hand account of what it is like to lose a loved one? There was no program that could be effective short of shocking the living daylights out of these kids, and toying with their emotions? Yes, teens feel invincible, and it’s a hard lesson to get to sink in. But faking death? Seems too much to me. Thoughts?

I now know a lot about “potty parity” after talking with Robert Brubaker of the American Restroom Association about Rockland’s Board of Health decision to deliniate a toilet ratio for restaurants with over 51 seats. And, for the record, Brubaker, who knows more about bathroom use, length of time spent, types of facilities, traffic flow for toilets, that just about anyone, said that the 51-patron number seems to be the tipping point everywhere. Once you hit that capacity, he says, you start seeing lines at the loo.

Onto potty language: It seems that those agencies that deal with restrooms use terms very specifically. In plumbing regulation-speak, the room is the “toilet” and the commode is the “water closet” and the sink is the “lavatory.” So, even in the big department store, the actual room is the toilet, though there are 20 toilets in there.

ADA adds space: Also, the Americans with Disabilities Act regulates the amount of accessible stalls. But if there’s only one stall, it has to be accessible (makes sense.) That means many smaller restaurants just take down the stall and leave an open room. Problem is, that means only one person can be in there at a time. That shuts out “multi-use” moments of one person washing up as another uses the facilities. Everything’s a tradeoff.

More potty info: Public restrooms with timers  record length of stay information. Muncipalities have found that the timers (which trigger doors unlocking and/or lights switching off when the time’s up) have to be set to 15 or even 20 minutes. That’s hardly the average stay, but such a visit happens enough to make the length of time have to change.

Today, Keep Rockland Beautiful announced it had received its 100th report to its “litterbug hotline.” The hotline, 845-708-9164, allows “litter witnesses” to call and report offenders (like the one spotted today on New Hempstead Road). Callers, who remain anonymous, give the time and location of the trash tossing, along with the vehicle’s license plate number and vehicle’s description. KRB takes the information and turns it over to the Rockland County Sheriff’s Department. The sheriff then uses the plate to track down the vehicle owner and send a letter notifying the owner about the incident. There’s no fine, no permanent record, so even an errant report (or prank) won’t cause a stir. The letter has a friendly tone with assurances that it is confidential. But it also reminds recipients that if the littering “had been observed by a law enforcement officer the driver of your vehicle could have been cited to court, fined, required to pick up your litter and perform community service work picking up other people’s litter.”

The litter letter program officially launched in November of 2007. “We’re proud,” KRB Executive Director Andy Stewart said of the three-digit milestone. “I think it fulfills an essential community need, which is people have to communicate the rules of the game to people who aren’t playing by the rules.

“We’re giving people an opportunity to communicate expectations of responsible behavior to other individuals who need to hear that, becuase, they, too are members of the community,” Stewart said. “That’s how community works. … Litterbugs are not bad people. The goal here is to reach out with a reminder and a little slap on the wrist. There’s plenty of slobs out there, when they get the letter, they really do hear it. most people know they shouldn’t litter … but if there’s pushback, they’re going to think twice about it.

Stewart noted that the vehicle owner who receives the letter may not be the driver who was seen tossing a wrapper out the window. “It could be the parent of a driver, or owner of a roofing company.” And that’s OK, he notes. Business owners would likely appreciate the headsup about littering workers. They don’t want their employees, especially if they’re driving a truck with the company’s logo on the side, performing such an environmentally damaging deed.

Stewart noted that the litter-calling brigade is one thing, and law enforcement of the litter laws (it’s a violation with fines that reach into the hundreds of dollars in some areas) is another. The litter letters, he said are”not intended to be a substitute for police writing litter tickets.”

You’ve gotta love young, fertile minds.

It was a pretty cool idea to use just about every desk students could get their hands on to spell out 2008 on the Nyack High School football field.

But from what we hear, they got more than the whole nine yards.

Seems someone came up with a way to create a little excitement and morph the 2008 into that certain part of the male anatony that’s subject of late night infomercials for herbal supplements.

Sure, people are going to be upset. Some people, any way.

But to their credit, school officials who granted permission for the 2008 display kept everything in perspective when they found someone had out-pranked the pranksters.

Truly, no one was hurt, there was no destruction of property and all it took to set things right was a lot of  hustle by the school’s senior class.

For sure, there probably were some red faces, but you can bet the tale of the 2008 senior prank will  replace fish stories  at reunions for  decades  to come.

The folks at Mirant, the energy company that has bedeviled north Rockland taxpayers with their tax challenges, is upset that Stony Point isn’t content to depend on New York State to set the standards for an environmental cleanup at the company’s Lovett generating station.

Tisk, Tisk.

Seems like the tight shoe taxpayers have been forced to wear isn’t feeling comfortable to Mirant. They think it’s inconvenient and illegal for Stony Point to add another level of scrutiny.

Considering that the company has forgotten at times to track its emissions, why should anyone believe they’ll have more concern for the environment than they’ve had for local homeowners, some of whom have been pushed to the brink of financial ruin by the fallout from Mirant’s property tax challenges.

The towns of Haverstraw and Stony Point, the villages of Haverstraw and West Haverstraw, the North Rockland School District and Rockland County have paid plenty having to fight Mirant’s greed. Let Mirant spend some time and money fighting what they see as another level of interference in the way they do business.