The grants keep rolling in for Aishes Chayil, a postpartum rest home built in Kiryas Joel with $10.5 million in state and federal funds.

State Sen. Malcolm Smith, the Democratic majority leader, has just handed the village another $250,000 for the 55-bed facility, which charges Jewish mothers up to $185 a night to stay there with their babies after giving birth in a hospital.

According to Smith’s spokesman, the Queens senator awarded the pork-barrel funding at the request of Sen. Daniel Squadron, a Democratic freshman who won his seat last year with the support of the Satmar voting bloc in Brooklyn aligned with the leaders of Kiryas Joel.

Smith spokesman Austin Shafran claims Senate Republicans promised Kiryas Joel $1 million for the building last year, and Democrats decided to honor that commitment.

Democrats toppled the Republicans as majority party this year and have taken control of the Senate’s pork.

“Sen. Squadron spoke with Sen. Smith about keeping this promise going,” Shafran said. “Sen. Smith was just trying to continue funding for a very successful program.”

The $250,000 is the 11th grant Kiryas Joel has gotten since officials began soliciting funds in 2001 for what they described as a $3.5 million project. Politicians kept sending more money as cost estimates climbed to $11.4 million, with then-Gov. George Pataki and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver as the most generous benefactors.

Senate Republicans contributed $500,000 last year, in what Shafran described as the first installment of a $1 million pledge. Democrats kicked in $250,000 more and plan to award the remaining $250,000 later, Shafran said.

Sen. William Larkin Jr., R-C-Cornwall-on-Hudson, who represents Kiryas Joel, said Wednesday that neither he nor Sen. Dean Skelos, the former Republican majority leader, promised the village $1 million or gave it the $500,000 capital grant last year.

“Nobody said to me we’re giving KJ $1 million,” Larkin said. “If they did, I would have had some harsh words for them.”

(Source: Recordonline.com)