Josh Wojehowski can talk about his record. He can point to grants secured, projects initiated, and budgets passed. When things are comfortable, he does. But when a race tightens, when he feels the ground shifting, a different version shows up. That version does not talk about policy. That version reaches for manufactured scandal, manufactured fear, and attacks designed to put an opponent on defense before they ever make their case.
We are publishing this now, before the 2026 campaign heats up, because we have seen this playbook before and we are confident we will see it again. What follows is the pattern, documented in his own words, from the public record. When it resurfaces this fall — and it will — Cornwall voters will already know what they are looking at.
Step 1: Identify a topic that makes people emotional.
Step 2: Attach a technical sounding claim most voters cannot evaluate.
Step 3: Frame the opponent as responsible for the problem.
Step 4: Make the election about the manufactured crisis, not policy.
Step 5: Once in office, quietly abandon the position.
Act I: The SWPPP Deception (2021)
Roughly 200 trees had been cleared at the Storm King Golf Course during site work for a redesign project. Residents were angry. But Wojehowski did not push for better protections or question the planning board process. He used it to destroy an opponent.
At a town board meeting, Councilman Wojehowski claimed the project's Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan proved Supervisor Dick Randazzo knew about the tree removal. The exchange is on video:
"You signed off on the SWPPP plan, which approved the construction plan. It says right here: clearing and construction activity, clearing and grubbing. ... Clearing and grubbing is a standard plan where you remove all vegetation from a construction area and then remove the stumps. It says right here. You ask any expert. And that is what you signed off on."
— Josh Wojehowski, Town Board Meeting (video, 17:48)
He then attacked the town's engineering firm:
"Either you didn't know, or the consultants didn't know. So then we have a real problem, where if the consultants didn't know, we shouldn't be retaining them anymore."
— Same meeting (video, 18:58)
The problem: "clearing and grubbing" is boilerplate construction language that appears in virtually every SWPPP in New York State. It describes a category of site preparation — removing vegetation and stumps within a project's limit of disturbance. It says nothing about the scope, scale, or location of tree removal. Those details belong in a tree preservation plan.
The approved site plan for Storm King Golf Course did not include a tree plan. A tree plan was only produced later, at Supervisor Randazzo's request, after the trees had already been removed. Randazzo requesting a tree plan was the supervisor doing his job — not evidence of a cover up.
Wojehowski publicly declared the town's engineers were too incompetent to be retained. He won the primary 76 to 24. He took office in January 2022. The town is still using that same engineering firm today. The attack was a campaign tactic, discarded the moment the election was over.
Act II: The Fear Letter (March 2026)
In early March 2026, Wojehowski mailed a signed letter to Cornwall on Hudson village residents on his personal letterhead. The village was holding a trustee election and a referendum to move future elections from March to November. Wojehowski inserted himself into both.
The letter framed the village board as "one party rule — unchallenged and unaccountable." He endorsed two trustee candidates, calling them "independent voices" against "a national party machine that has made chaos its calling card." Then came the fear: ICE activity had increased "in towns near ours," and residents needed "leadership" that would not be "beholden to the MAGA agenda coming out of Washington."
This was a village trustee race. Village trustees have no role in federal immigration enforcement. The letter did not identify a single policy position held by either endorsed candidate. It did not name a single harmful action the village board had taken. It manufactured a sense of emergency out of national anxieties that have nothing to do with village governance.
The referendum failed. The voters saw through it.
Act III: Two Letters, Two Weeks Apart
Now place these two documents side by side. They were sent approximately two weeks apart.
Village letter (early March 2026): Wojehowski invokes ICE raids and MAGA in a village trustee race. He uses national politics to drown out local issues and scare voters into supporting his candidates.
Fundraiser email (March 26, 2026): Wojehowski warns donors that the fall ballot will be "packed with high-profile statewide and federal races," creating "more noise" so that "our local priorities risk getting drowned out." He asks for money to defend against the exact tactic he deployed two weeks earlier.
Same person. Opposite arguments. The only variable is whose election is at stake.
The fundraiser email also reveals that even in a message to his own supporters, Wojehowski does not lead with a single accomplishment. No project completed, no tax rate held, no service improved. The entire pitch is organized around the threat of "opponents" and the danger of being "drowned out." His instinct, even when talking to allies, is to lead with fear.
The Forecast
We are not guessing. We are calling it now.
Wojehowski will face a challenger in November 2026. At some point this fall, the race will tighten or a poll will worry him or a crowd will feel smaller than expected. When that happens, the record will disappear from his messaging. The grants, the budgets, the projects — gone. What will replace them is an attack. It will be emotional. It will sound urgent. It will be aimed squarely at his opponent. And it will have nothing to do with how Cornwall is actually governed.
We do not know what the topic will be. But we know the structure. We have watched it work twice. We are putting it on the record now so that when it happens, no one can say they were not warned.
Is this about an issue, or is this about an opponent? If the conversation has shifted from policy to personal attacks, from substance to scandal, from Cornwall's future to someone's past — you are watching the playbook. You have seen it before. Now you know what it looks like.
Cornwall deserves an election fought on real issues: infrastructure, taxes, zoning, transparency, the Comprehensive Plan. Those are the questions that matter. They are also the questions that disappear the moment Josh Wojehowski feels behind.
Remember the construction term that became a campaign. Remember the fear letter that invoked ICE raids in a village trustee race. Remember the fundraiser two weeks later that warned against the exact tactic he had just used. And when the next one arrives — because it is coming — remember that you read about it here first.
Just watch.