I ran for the Assembly in NY’s 98th district because voters deserved a choice and a chance to support the only candidate willing to oppose Kiryas Joel’s (KJ) plan to annex a large portion of the Town of Monroe. Evidently a lot of voters appreciated having a choice. Running on the United Monroe line, and buried in an obscure place on the ballot, I received nearly 30% of the Orange County vote in a three-way race. But for the block vote, I would have been the highest vote getter in Orange.

Had at least one of the two other candidates, Republican Karl Brabenec or Democrat Elisa Tutini, been willing to oppose KJ, I would have bowed out after the Republican primary. But both Brabenec and Tutini owed their primary victories to KJ, and neither dared utter a word in opposition to annexation.

Why is annexation the seminal issue of our time?

KJ wants to annex more than 500 acres of land in the Town of Monroe. Once KJ has control of the land, another square mile of high-density housing will be built. KJ’s inevitable growth in population will place an unbearable strain on local neighbors and Southern Orange County, overwhelming the capacity of sewage treatment plants, water supplies and local schools. Because 93% of KJ’s population is on Medicaid, and because Medicaid is partially paid for by property taxpayers, taxes will skyrocket.

Our political system sits upon a cliff at the edge of an abyss. Currently, KJ’s leadership commands a bloc vote of approximately 7,000 votes, enough to swing the outcome of races in the Town of Monroe and the local Assembly seat.

But past is prologue. KJ’s growth has skyrocketed since 1990, growing from 7,400 to more than 21,000, an increase of nearly 300%. Its population density is 12,000 people per square mile, compared to 418 people per square mile for all of Orange County. The average couple in KJ often produces more than eight children. Young girls are routinely wed not long after they reach puberty. Thousands more wait in Brooklyn for the opportunity to move to KJ. Another square mile of high-density housing and within 15 years KJ’s population will triple.

The day is fast approaching when KJ’s block will determine the county executive, district attorney, county clerk, the sheriff, our county judges and who represents the county in the state Senate and the United States Congress. Candidates for those offices will no longer need to appeal to a broad swath of the electorate. They will need only the nod of KJ’s Grand Rabbi. At that point we will have a government of KJ, by KJ, for KJ.

My success at the ballot box started a movement that will not die.

I or some other candidate will carry on the fight because it is right and just. Indeed, in the neighboring Assembly district, both candidates advertised their opposition to annexation. As voters become more cognizant of KJ’s impact on all of us, including environmental pollution, a depleted water table, over-taxed schools and the burdens KJ places on property taxpayers, they will also become more sensitive to allowing KJ to pick our elected officials.

People move to and live in Orange County because they cherish our culture, rural character and the bucolic beauty of our surroundings. Allowing KJ to run roughshod over local zoning laws will destroy the very thing that brought people here to begin with. I will continue doing all in my power to make sure that does not happen even if it means bucking the leadership of the local political elite.

[Dan Castricone is a former member of the Tuxedo Town Board, a former Orange County legislator and candidate for state Assembly. He is president of Castricone Enterprises, a Hudson Valley insurance and financial services firm.]