Saddle Rock Incumbents Disqualified from March Election
Four Saddle Rock officials, including Mayor Dan Levy, were barred from the ballot after petition signatures failed to meet state election law requirements.
Four incumbent officials in the Village of Saddle Rock have been barred from appearing on the ballot in Wednesday’s March 18 election after a rival slate successfully challenged the validity of their nominating petitions.
Mayor Dan Levy, Village Justice Julia Gavriel, and trustees Dan Chadow and Alex Kishinevsky were all disqualified after the Nassau County Board of Elections determined that six of the eight pages of their petition signatures lacked a witness signature, as required under state election law. The Concerned Residents of Saddle Rock slate brought the challenge. Attempts to reach the four disqualified incumbents were unsuccessful.
The disqualifications have upended a small-village election that was already charged with frustration over what challengers describe as years of opacity and neglect inside village government.
Current Trustee Robert Kraus, appointed to the board in 2024, was the only incumbent not disqualified. He is now running for mayor under the Together for a Better Saddle Rock slate. Kraus has frequently been a dissenting voice on the board, and his candidacy has become a focal point for residents seeking change.
“There’s a village code, and I don’t think it’s being adhered to,” Kraus said.
Martine Alter and Vivian Kollenscher are seeking four-year trustee terms under the Concerned Residents of Saddle Rock banner. Sigalit Sanilevich is running under the Tree Keeper banner to complete the remaining two years of a four-year trustee term. Although the three women are running on separate slates, they are campaigning alongside Kraus.
A third group, the Friendly Neighbors Party, has also fielded candidates. Kambiz Akhavan is running for mayor, with Joshua Rabanipour and Kousha Askari seeking trustee seats. Because no candidate filed for village justice, a write-in campaign is expected to fill that position.
The contested election has strained village staff. “It’s been a very, very long month,” said Village Clerk Carmela Speciale.
The Kraus-aligned candidates have centered their campaign on transparency and basic governance. Under New York State’s Open Meetings Law, villages are required to post agendas, minutes, and public hearing notices on their websites. Saddle Rock has not consistently done so.
“There’s no transparency,” said Alter. “The way that things are going in this village is not OK.”
Kollenscher was more direct. “The government of Saddle Rock did not follow any of the codes of ethics that a municipality needs to,” she said.
Kraus has raised additional concerns, alleging that traffic cameras were illegally installed in the village, that buildings have been altered without proper permits, and that 33 trees were recently cut down without village approval. Tree preservation has become its own issue in the race. Sanilevich said encouraging new tree planting would be a priority if she wins her seat.
Underlying much of the community’s discontent is the reconstruction question surrounding the Saddle Rock Minyan, a synagogue that burned to the ground on the night of Yom Kippur in 2024. The congregation had operated out of a residential building for years without a special-use permit, a situation the village was aware of but did not address.
Sanilevich lived next door to the Minyan before the fire, which investigators determined was caused by unsupervised candles. The blaze came dangerously close to her home. She said the experience pulled her into local politics.
The reconstruction plans for the Minyan have stirred strong feelings across the village, raising questions about permitting, zoning, and how the village handles religious institutions operating in residential areas without proper approvals.
For many residents, the permit failures, the missing agendas, the unauthorized tree removal, and the camera installations are not separate grievances. They point to the same thing: a village board that operated without meaningful accountability.
Whether Wednesday’s election reshapes that dynamic will depend on voters in one of Nassau County’s smallest incorporated villages. What is clear is that the path to the ballot itself revealed just how loosely some officials treated the rules they were elected to uphold.