News of What's to Come

Soon after today's "Ear to the Ground" was published, a reader referred me to the Capital Region Economic Development Council 2016 Progress Report, which was released early last month. There, on page 71, in a section entitled "2016 Proposed Priority Projects," was the description of a five-year capital plan for Columbia Memorial Hospital, or Columbia Memorial Health, which seems to be what the H in CMH now stands for.

The text on this page is too small to be legible as it is reproduced here, but this is what it says of the "Columbia Memorial Hospital Service and Employment Expansion Catalyst Project":

The project will enable a 12,000-square-foot renovation in a newly purchased building to accommodate 91 employees as well as rental space for a child-care provider. The plan will relocate this staff to a secure building to allow for future planned campus expansion and the addition of key services and infrastructure. The project serves as the critical initial project in a planned campus expansion. The five-year plan consists of three major capital elements: a new patient pavilion with up to 90 new patient rooms; a new medical office building that will house a Cancer Treatment Center with technology unique to the area; and a new parking garage that will remove 444 automobiles per day from local streets. By serving as a catalyst for Columbia Memorial Hospital’s five-year capital plan, this project will increase capacity for potential employees, including hundreds of students in nursing and other programs that Columbia Memorial Hospital's Education Department works with annually.

The "newly purchased building" is the one pictured on the page. There is no clue where they intend to build the "new patient pavilion" or the "new medical office building that will house a Cancer Treatment Center," or what will happen to Cavell House, currently the location of New York Oncology and Hematology, when that new building has been constructed. Cavell House, named for the heroic British nurse Edith Louisa Cavell, was constructed as a private residence at the beginning of the 19th century. In 1918, its owner at the time, Dr. John Conover Smock, donated the house to Hudson City Hospital for convalescing World War I soldiers and sailors. Twenty years ago, CMH wanted to demolish Cavell House to expand a parking lot. The entire history of the house can be read in the documents nominating the house for local landmark status.

For the curious, the CREDC 2016 Progress Report makes interesting reading. Page 40, in a section called "Implementation of 2016 State Priorities," is devoted to The Wick, the 55-room hotel being created at 41 Cross Street.

  
The most intriguing item appears on page 83, also in the section devoted to "2016 Proposed Priority Projects." It is a project called "HV Farm Enterprise Expansion."

The text, too small to be legible here, reads in part:

Phase 1 of the HV Farm Enterprise Expansion includes the acquisition, renovation and equipment outfitting of a 10,000-square-foot facility for sauerkraut production in Hudson’s Ward 2; it will include a sauerkraut filler, label applicator, capper, heat tunnel for shrink seals, case sealer, conveyor, and cabbage shredder and juicer. It will also include the opening of a small retail storefront and the creation of culinary and food production job training programs. 

The question is: What building with 10,000 square feet in the Second Ward is Hawthorne Valley Farm planning to acquire, renovate, and equip for the purpose of producing sauerkraut and create therein a small retail storefront?
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK

Thanks to Chad Weckler for bringing the CREDC 2016 Progress Report to our attention