Edward Char

My wife, Meredith, and I live in Goshen with our three children, Sarah, Julia and Zachary. Goshen is our home where my wife and I will raise our children. I want to continue to a part of the solution to preserve the great qualities of Goshen that have sustained generations of families. My background in finance and the law has been a great asset to our village board as we have worked towards returning our Village to a fiscally responsible path so that it will be preserved for the future generations.

I am an attorney practicing in the Hudson Valley and New York City. Previously, I was the chief financial officer of a division of a Fortune 500 company in addition to being a graduate of the Culinary Institute of America. In 2012, I was recognized as one of Orange County’s “Rising Stars.”

It has been an honor to serve the wonderful and beautiful Village of Goshen over the past four years as trustee. I was first elected trustee in 2009. During my tenure on the village board, I have served as the village police commissioner from to the present time, village board liaison to the Joint Recreation Commission from 2011 to 2012 and have been the deputy mayor since 2011. Over the past several years, our village board has made tremendous strides towards correcting many of the village’s problems that had been ignored for so many years.

While I have been a member of the board, we have successfully implemented an aggressive infrastructure improvement plan to reduce sewer overflows and maximize the efficiency of the wastewater treatment plan and passed a budget under the 2 percent tax cap by cutting over $200,000 in costs while continuing to maintain the same great level of municipal services to the residents and businesses of our village. Our board removed the old village landfill, settled the sewer dispute with the Town of Goshen, supported our local businesses through legislative action, and most recently lowered the sewer assessment by over $100,000 annually. In addition, we have continued to maintain funding for our seniors, first responders, and the Joint Recreation Commission.

Despite these achievements, there is much more to be done. I have the proven experience and demonstrated leadership to continue to lead our village to be the best village in all of Orange County. We must focus on helping to promote our local businesses, encouraging new commerce to join the community and expand our tax base, continue to cut costs while providing the best services to our community at the lowest cost to taxpayers and continuously review, on a semi-annual basis, our sewer assessment so that we may be able to lower it again in the future. We must continue to work with our county legislature to ensure that action is taken and followed though upon for the re-opening of the Orange County Government Center. This is vital to the prosperity of our community.

Thank you for your support.