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Veteran Counselor Keith Berman to Speak at Briarcliff Manor Public Library on May 29

Briarcliff Manor, NY – Westchester County families navigating the high-stakes world of college admissions are invited to an urgent and hopeful event at the Briarcliff Manor Public Library on Monday, May 29 at 7:00 PM, featuring nationally respected college admissions counselor Keith Berman of Options for College, a resident of Hastings-on-Hudson and graduate of Irvington High School.

In what has become the most competitive and costly college admissions season in U.S. history, Berman will address the intense pressure students and families are facing and offer a proven path through the chaos. His talk, titled “How to Approach College Admissions in 2025,” aims to replace fear with clarity, while equipping attendees with real-world strategies that work.

“In my over twenty years of working with families privately, I have never seen anything like it,” said Berman. “Dozens of schools rejected 80% of their applicants or more. Many students applied to 20 colleges or more.”

The process has also become a social spectacle, with platforms like Instagram and TikTok adding new layers of stress.

“Virtually every senior’s Instagram page has a college tag,” Berman noted. “The majority in the area also post on ‘commits pages’—complete with educational bios, baby photos, and soundtracks—to announce where they’re going.”

Drawing from his experience in the admissions offices of Harvard and Yale, as well as his work in schools and with private clients across the country, Berman will share actionable advice and uplifting stories of students who beat the odds. He will also speak candidly as a parent who navigated the 2025 process himself this year.

“Surprisingly, much of the work was convincing talented kids that they could get in—before helping them actually do it,” he said.

With elite universities like Northeastern, MIT, Yale, Vanderbilt, Duke, Johns Hopkins posting record-low acceptance rates around 5%, the numbers alone can feel defeating.

“When I attended Yale, the acceptance rate was 18.3%,” Berman added. “The competition has skyrocketed—even compared to just a few years ago.”

The program will include time for Q&A with both parents and students. The BMPL website describes the goal of the talk as providing “tips for success, how to support your child, and info on the state of admissions today.”

Admission is free, and space may be limited. Families are encouraged to arrive early. For more information, please visit https://briarcliffmanorlibrary....

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BRIARCLIFF MANOR — The village is considering the possibility of converting the former Pace University campus for residential use after a lawsuit accusing the village of religious discrimination was dismissed.

The federal lawsuit filed by Yeshivath Viznitz Dkhal Torath Chaim and Khal Torath Chaim of Rockland in 2023 claimed village officials were changing zoning laws and making other administrative decisions that had denied a Hasidic Jewish congregation a special educational use permit on a property at 235 Elm Road.

The litigation was suspended Dec. 6 after the plaintiffs had reached an agreement with Briarcliff Manor, according to a statement issued by the village.

The plan now is to sell the property to new owners who are interested in developing a residential project. The village of Briarcliff Manor declined to comment on details about the redevelopment.

Located within walking distance of the village’s central business district, the property is considered suitable for residential use that “will more harmoniously sync with neighboring homes.”

“The village has agreed to study our current zoning, review potential site plans, and consider the associated impacts and benefits such redevelopment might offer our village,” the statement says.

Lawsuit against Briarcliff Manor alleged anti-Hasidic sentiment

In 2021, Yeshivath Viznitz Dkhal Torath Chaim proposed using three of the nine buildings on the 37-acre campus for a religious school and shul after it bought the property for $11.75 million.

The lawsuit argued the village not only changed the zoning on the property to stymie the congregation, but the building inspector issued violation notices to the congregation for fire, safety and zoning issues. The village law doesn’t allow special permits for properties with such violations.

"When the village defendants learned of plaintiffs’ intended use of the campus, they purposefully, and motivated by anti-Hasidic prejudice, set out to bar plaintiffs from establishing a religious school and place of worship," the lawsuit says.

Yeshivath Viznitz Dkhal Torath Chaim also owns the former Nyack College's 107-acre campus in what was formerly South Nyack, whose citizens voted to abolish the village in December 2020.

Geoff Thompson, spokesperson for Briarcliff Manor, said the village has spent $48,000 on attorney fees and the rest of the legal costs were covered through legal insurance.

“The settlement of this matter prevents the costly expense of federal litigation. The Board of Trustees is pleased with this positive outcome for our community,” Briarcliff Manor mayor Steven Vescio said in the statement.

Yeshivath Viznitz Dkhal Torath Chaim has not returned requests for comment as of Dec. 13.

Helu Wang covers real estate, economic growth and development for The Journal News/lohud and USA Today Network. Reach her at hwang@gannett.com.

A former NYPD detective convicted of sexually abusing a 5-year-old girl in his Briarcliff Manor home was sentenced Friday to five years in state prison.

Wilson Frias showed no emotion as Westchester County Judge Maurice Dean Williams imposed the prison term that will be followed by 10 years of post-release supervision.

Frias failed to convince jurors this fall that his admissions to village detectives weeks after the March 11, 2023, incident amounted to a false confession, and that he had just been trying to get the girl out of his son's room when she wrapped her legs around his waist.

Jurors believed the girl's account that Frias thrust himself against her as she straddled him while they were clothed on the boy's bed.

The trial was notable for the proposition that a detective well versed in interrogation techniques would claim he fell prey to them when he confessed. But also because it marked the first time in Westchester — and second time statewide — that a child was allowed to be accompanied in court by a support animal when they testified, in the girl's case a 2-year-old Labrador retriever named Eddie.

In a victim impact statement read in court by Assistant District Attorney Charlotte Gudis, the girl's mother excoriated Frias for taking advantage of her family at a particularly vulnerable time: when her husband was dying of cancer.

"I can’t believe that God could have created a person like Wilson Frias," she wrote.

Girl's mother of Wilson Frias: 'I trusted him because he was a detective, a friend, a neighbor'

Gudis called Frias' criminal conduct "undoubtedly repugnant," but said it was equally disturbing how he came to have access to the child.

The families lived blocks from each other and Frias and his wife began hosting the girl and her brother — a friend of the Frias' sons — once their father was diagnosed.

The mother blamed herself for being "naive" by allowing her daughter to be there when Frias' wife was not home. "I think in the back of my mind I trusted him because he was a detective, a friend, a neighbor and a father," she wrote.

Gudis and the judge spoke of the girl's courage in reporting what happened to her and facing Frias in court when she testified. But the mother said the girl has suffered with nightmares and stomach aches that a doctor linked to the trauma of the abuse.

"Wil has changed our lives and my view of people forever. I am always questioning my own judgment and won’t trust my children with anyone," she wrote.

Frias has been at the county jail since Oct. 28, when jurors found him guilty of first-degree sexual abuse and endangering the welfare of a child.

The felony conviction cost Frias his job as a cop. An 18-year veteran of the NYPD, he had worked in the Manhattan Robbery Squad before his arrest in June 2023.

Defense lawyer Peter Brill said Frias' appellate lawyer advised the defendant not to speak at sentencing. The defense instead relied on letters from more than two dozen relatives and friends attesting to Frias' years of hard work, his helping his parents' business, his devotion as a father and husband, and his commitment to the care of a disabled older sister.

Williams did not impose the maximum 7-year term requested by Gudis, a request Brill called "beyond the pale" for a first-time, 52-year-old offender. He urged the judge to focus not on the single incident but on the sum total of Frias' life.

The judge emphasized that the true toll of Frias' actions may not be known until the girl is older. He noted that the abuse she suffered, along with her father dying, would be "inextricably tied" for her and her family.

Afterwards, Brill said Frias' relatives declined to comment and he bemoaned what he considered a harsh sentence.

"While we respect the jury's verdict, we believe the Court failed to fully consider the entirety of Wilson Frias' life and imposed a penalty that was drastically more than he deserved," Brill said.