East Ramapo trustee accused of using phony address

Calls for the resignation of a newly-appointed member of the East Ramapo School Board are mounting amid accusations that the trustee does not live at his reported address.

Since Joe Chajmovicz's appointment to a vacant seat in July, the school board has been criticized for naming someone not widely known to the public school community, and district parents have demanded he step down to allow for someone with ties to local education be named.

One of those parents, Romel Alvarez, said this past weekend, a group of about 15 people went to an address in Airmont, on Fawn Hill Drive, that Chajmovicz claims is his home, but discovered a family was renting it out.

"We went there to protest for him to resign his seat," said Alvarez, who has been vocal at recent school board meetings on the matter. "We're going to keep visiting there, each week, until he resigns. We're not going away."

A district spokesman insisted Chajmovicz has lived at the address in Airmont for the last seven years. Requests to the spokesman to be put in touch with Chajmovicz or to receive a statement for further comment were refused.

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It's unclear if Chajmovicz ever actually lived at the home on Fawn Hill Drive, though public records list it as his address starting in 2010, and a phone number was once listed under a Lisa Lefkovich at the address. Lisa Lefkovich is listed in other public records as Lisa Chajmovicz.

The home on Fawn Hill Drive is owned by a man named Moshe Solinsky as of March 2015, according to records.

A call to the number listed for the home was not returned. When a reporter visited the house Wednesday afternoon, no one answered the door. The landscaping was not well maintained, a trash can sat on the stoop, partially blocking the front door, and the aluminum siding was dirty.

Chajmovicz, 41, has two daughters, both of whom attend private schools, and works in the real estate business. He has also been involved in the development of affordable housing, according to another district spokesman, Darren Dopp.

After he was picked for the seat, the district touted Chajmovicz’s skills with finances and communications. However, the new trustee declined a request for an interview at the time.

Local education advocates, as well as the Spring Valley NAACP, are continuing to question why Jean Fields, a retired Ramapo High School principal and co-chair of the chapter's education committee, was not selected to serve the balance of Engel's term. They have asked Chajmovicz to forfeit his seat to allow for someone else, such as Fields, to be appointed.

Fields, along with Sabrina Charles-Pierre, Kim Foskew and Natasha Morales, campaigned together in advance of the May school board elections on a platform of trying to bring the interests of public school parents to the nine-member board, which is largely comprised of Orthodox Jewish men.

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