Meetings and Events in the Week Ahead

Last week at this time, we were wondering if the temperatures would ever struggle out of the 60s, and today, for most of the day, it was 90 degrees. Tomorrow is expected to be a tad warmer, and Tuesday warmer still. In the meantime, here is what's happening.

• On Monday, May 18, the Common Council holds its informal meeting at 6:00 p.m. There is a lot of interest on the agenda for the meeting, including a resolution authorizing the sale of the Dunn warehouse to Hudson Brewing Co. The meeting is a hybrid, taking place in person at City Hall and on Teams. Click here for the link to join the meeting remotely.

• On Tuesday, May 19, the Hudson City School District holds its annual budget vote and board member election. The budget voters are being asked to approve involves a 5.8 percent increase in the tax levy. There will also be an exit poll to gauge community support or opposition to adding pickleball striping to the historic tennis courts at M. C. Smith. The polls are open from 11:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. The polling place for residents of the City of Hudson is the Central Fire Station, 77 North Seventh Street.

• On Wednesday, May 20, the Hudson Housing Authority Board of Commissioners meets at 6:00 p.m. At the meeting, it will no doubt be announced that the Planning Board will hold a special meeting on Thursday, May 28, to review the design for HHA's proposed redevelopment. The meeting of the HHA board is a hybrid, taking place in person in the Community Room at Bliss Towers and on Zoom. Click here to join the meeting remotely.

• Also on Wednesday, May 20, at 6:00 p.m., the Zoning Board of Appeals holds its regular monthly meeting. On the agenda for the meeting is a public hearing on the area variances required to build the new structures proposed for 309-311 Union Street--a two-family house facing Union Street and a garage with an apartment above facing Partition Street. The meeting takes place in person only at City Hall.

• On Friday, May 22, the Historic Preservation Commission meets at 10:00 a.m. The meeting is a hybrid, taking place in person at City Hall and on Teams. Click here for the link to join the meeting remotely.
• On Saturday, May 23, Memorial Day Weekend begins. The weekend ends with the parade and ceremony on Monday, May 25. The event begins, as it always does, around 9:oo a.m. at Seventh Street Park. The parade down Warren Street to the Columbia County courthouse steps off at 10:00 a.m. The ceremony takes place immediately after the parade arrives at the courthouse.

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About 11 Warren Street

The parking lot at 11 Warren Street is currently fenced off, with signs indicating access is restricted to construction vehicles only.  

Last week, Matt Murell, chair of the Columbia County Board of Supervisors, issued this update:

"We're making very good progress--I'm very pleased with the renovations and construction work that's been going on," reports Ron Knott, Stuyvesant town supervisor and chairman of the Columbia County Board of Supervisors Department of Public Works committee, on the steps being taken to turn 11 Warren Street into a building housing county offices.

Shortly, 11 Warren Street will become the new home of the Board of Elections, the Probation Department, the Public Defender's Office, and the Conflict Defender's Office.

The Board of Elections will be moving from 401 State Street to 11 Warren, while the others move from 610 State Street. The latter building has [been] deemed surplus by the Board of Supervisors and will be up for sale in the near future. . . .

The plan is to hold off on relocating the Board of Elections until after the primary on June 23, which also includes early voting from June 13-21. . . .

Following the primary, the "equipment that's out for it will be moved to 11 Warren, so we don't have to move it twice. The staff will move down probably that last week of June or the first week of July," [said Ray Jurkowski, Public Works Commissioner]. . . .

Looking ahead, Commissioner Jurkowski pointed out, "there's also a second portion to 11 Warren, which is the exterior. That's been on a parallel path to the construction phase. A couple months back the county entered into contract with LaBella Associates, and we've started programming the vision for the building's exterior."

Plans are to have the architects prepare three separate concepts, followed by meetings at which the public will be invited to critique those concepts. "We're trying to figure out what the public is looking for," said Commissioner Jurkowski. "By creating these charrettes, we feel we'll be able to get the input we've been looking for."

"This is a great project for the county," said Austerlitz Town Supervisor and Count Deputy Chairman [Robert Lagonia]. "For one, the Board of Education [sic] will finally have a great working space. I'm very excited to see it's all coming to fruition."

There is no indication if the plans for the exterior renovation will go before the Historic Preservation Commission for a certificate of appropriateness, which they should since the building is in a locally designated historic district. If the project does not go before the HPC, it will be just another example of the disdain county government has for the City of Hudson, its laws, and its concerns.

On another 11 Warren Street-related topic, at the Common Council Legal Committee meeting last Thursday, an "Intermunicipal Agreement" between the City of Hudson and Columbia County was introduced for on-street parking for county employees at 11 Warren Street. There are 27 parking spaces in the parking lot in front of the building, which readers will recall was originally designed to be a strip mall, but the County is seeking 18 more parking spots for the exclusive use of county employees from 8:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. Of those 18 spaces, 14 would be on Warren Street and 4 on South First Street, adjacent to the building. Not only would the spaces be dedicated to county employees, but those employees would not be expected to pay parking fee. For this, the County would pay the City $18,006.30 in the first year. The agreement is for five years. Here is how the amount was calculated. (The following is quoted from the proposed agreement.)

• The annual parking fee paid to the City by the County shall be 90% of the current standard rate ($0.50) per hour x the number of annual County Working days: $0.50 per hour x 90% x 9 hours x (52 weeks x 5 days per week - 13 annual County holidays) = $1,000.35 per parking pass = $18,006.30 Total for the first year.
• In the event the City parking hourly rate changes, the County rate shall be 90% of any new rate applied to metered parking in the City.

Council president Margaret Morris, who chairs the Legal Committee, defended the proposed agreement, arguing that if county employees had to pay for parking on Warren Street they would seek parking in adjacent neighborhoods, on Union Street and Columbia Street, which would impact residents of those streets. She also said the County would allow neighborhood residents to use the off-street parking spaces in front of the building overnight and on weekends, when the offices in the building were closed. This is not mentioned in the proposed agreement. Morris cited Helsinki Hudson, back when it existed before the pandemic, using the county parking lot at Columbia and North Fourth, and maintained it was county policy to allow their parking lots to be used by the public during off-hours. It was pointed out (by Gossips) that Helsinki had an agreement with the County for the use of the lot, which was worked out during its Planning Board review, and not all county parking lots are open to the public during off-hours. For example, this sign appears in the lot at Sixth and Columbia.

Councilmember Claire Cousin (Fifth Ward) expressed concern about parking for Shiloh Baptist Church when there was an event or a funeral on a weekday. Councilmember Jennifer Belton (Fourth Ward) brought up the solution she had proposed, which was to have the county finance the creation of a parking lot on Water Street, on the other side of the Ferry Street Bridge, across from Hudson Power Boat Association, more than four blocks from 11 Warren Street. Councilmember Jason Foster (Third Ward) questioned the plan, which is part of the agreement, to relocate the designated handicapped parking space now on Warren Street into the parking lot in front of 11 Warren Street.

One little consolation: The County has agreed to allow the City to review the design for the signage to be installed to identify the designated on-street parking. Exactly who, representing "the City," will be reviewing and approving that signage is not known.

The proposed agreement, which can be found here, will be introduced to the full Council at its informal meeting on Monday, May 18.

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Another Reason to Vote on Tuesday

On Tuesday, May 19, voters in the Hudson City School District will be asked to vote on the proposed $59.2 million 2026-2027 school budget (and a 5.8 percent increase in the tax levy) and for two members of the Board of Education. On Tuesday, too, voter input will be sought on whether or not to add pickleball striping on the historic tennis courts at Montgomery C. Smith School, which is part of the grand design originally known as the Chancellor Robert R. Livingston Educational Center. 

The venerable history of these tennis courts has been told here on Gossips by Ken Sheffer. Along with the rest of the campus, the tennis courts were built during the Great Depression and opened for the first time in 1935. 

It is not clear where the idea of adding pickleball striping to the tennis courts originated or why the suggestion is being seriously considered, but it is. Aside from the issue of the appropriateness of altering the historic tennis courts in this way and mingling what may be a just passing fad with a serious sport whose history dates back to the sixteenth century, there are problems associated with pickleball, especially when pickleball courts are introduced into residential neighborhoods. This article, published last year, explains the issue: "These Communities Pulled the Plug on Pickleball." Our choices should be informed by the experience of other communities.

The polling places for Tuesday's vote are:

• Hudson  Central Fire Station, 77 North Seventh Street
• Greenport, Stottville/Stockport, Ghent  Greenport Community Center, 500 Town Hall Drive, Greenport
• Claverack, Livingston, Taghkanic  A. B. Shaw Fire House, 67 NY-23, Claverack

The polls are open from 11 a.m. to 8 p.m.

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When Seventh Street Park Was Jurassic Park

More the sixty years ago, nine replica dinosaurs were created at Jonas Studios in Claverack for Dinoland, Sinclair Oil Corporation's exhibition at the 1964 World's Fair in New York City. 

Before the dinosaurs were loaded onto a barge and floated down the river to their destination in Flushing Meadows, they were exhibited in Seventh Street Park, the public square here in Hudson. 

Photo by Gibson

Photo by Gibson

The History Room at the Hudson Area Library is currently working on an exhibition about the the dinosaurs of Dinoland and their time in Hudson which will be mounted sometime next year. Organizers of the exhibition are seeking images, documents, models, and other memorabilia relating the dinosaurs for inclusion in the exhibition. Anyone with materials they are willing to contribute or loan should contact Brenda Shufelt at brenda.shufelt@hudsonarealibrary.org. 

The organizers of the exhibit are also looking to confirm that the stories about the brontosaurus breaking the barge and ending up in the river are actually true. The incident is mentioned in The Spirit of the Place, a book written by native son Stephen Bergman, a.k.a. Samuel Shem, set in a thinly fictionalized Hudson called Columbia. The mishap of the brontosaurus is referenced at the end of this paragraph from the book, which tells how Columbia, a.k.a. Hudson, is a "town of breakage."

At public events things would unerringly break. School microphones would consistently give out just after someone said, "Testing, testing." On Memorial Days in Columbian cemeteries, just as the Gettysburg began, viewing stands would collapse. In deep summer at public tennis courts, water fountains were always going dry so that if, after a hot game of tennis on the asphalt courts, when your feet felt like grill-side-down burgers and your tongue like a bun, you went to the water fountain and turned the handle, the one thing you could be sure would not come out was water. Columbians learned to talk affectionately about past breakages, such as "the Great Breakage of '37," when, in the Thanksgiving Day parade, a massive five-axle Universal Atlas cement truck disguised as a turkey exploded in front of the Niagara Mohawk power station, knocking out lights and heat for weeks. Or "the Dinosaur Breakage of '52," when the Paul Jonas life-sized sculpture of the brontosaurus bound for the New York World's Fair broke the back of its barge and sank, its neck poking out of the Hudson River in the most lifelike way.

Any evidence or recollection that this in fact happened should also be shared at brenda.shufelt@hudsonarealibrary.org.  

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Get Ready to Vote on Tuesday, May 19

With the school district election just five days away, Hudson Common Sense has an editorial about the vote: "Hudson's School Vote Has Been Captured." It is recommended reading as voter prep.

Another "Transformative" Project

Jeffery Dodson, executive director of the Hudson Housing Authority, regularly describes HHA's proposed redevelopment as "transformative." On Tuesday, a new project was presented to the Planning Board that was also described as "transformative." The project, which has the working title "Waterfront Village," was presented by Ben Fain, who brought us Kitty's, The Caboose, and Mr. Cat Brasserie and owns the The Wick Hotel and the historic Robert Taylor House, the former which is being renovated and the latter meticulously restored. The new project will cover a 6.82-acre site at the end of South Second Street, which, until thirty or so years ago, was the location of a factory that made humidifiers and similar products. 

The project will be carried out in three phases. Phase 1 involves a grocery store, parking, landscaping, and the creation of a street grid that extends the street pattern of the rest of the city to this site.

Every proposed street on the site would have sidewalks on both sides. In the center, there would be a large open space, "almost like a central park." 

Phase 2 of the project involves the construction of a retail building, "intentionally angled toward the train station."

Phase 3 of the project is an apartment building, which is currently proposed to have 150 units.

The project was described as "an extension of Hudson," a "walkable, mixed-use neighborhood," "incorporating a lot of landscaping to make the pedestrian experience enjoyable." Fain, who told the Planning Board he "really drank the Kool-Aid on believing what Hudson can be," predicted the district "could become the most welcoming section of Hudson." It was also said that, with the development, there would be "a real destination for the Second Street stairs," which lead down to the site from Allen Street.

Members of the Planning Board raised a number of issues. Sara Black wanted to know how this project differed from the Kearney project proposed for Mill Street, maintaining they were both on dead-end streets and in a flood plain. She also asked about the intended market for the residential units. Someone else raised concerns about the project interfering with the views from Deer Alley. Ron Bogle, who chairs the Planning Board, opined, "You are disturbing the lives of the people on Tanners Lane in way they cannot even imagine." Concern was expressed about possible exclusivity in programming for the open space.

A surprising concern was expressed by Veronica Conca, who maintained that Hudson "has never had a big supermarket" and seemed to imply that, in the divine order of things, Hudson residents were meant go to Greenport if they wanted to buy paper towels or toilet paper or anything that went beyond simply the ingredients needed to prepare a meal. She seemed to have forgotten, if she ever knew, that Sam's Supermarket operated at 310 Warren Street (now the gymnasium of The Maker Hotel) until 1994, and reopened briefly as the Hudson Supermarket a few years later. 

Her comment also revealed that she had no idea that Hudson once had several supermarkets. There was an A&P at the corner of Seventh and Columbia streets, where Proprietors Hall now stands.

Photo by Gibson

There was a First National Store (the chain now known as Finast) at 751 Warren Street, in the building that currently houses the Social Security Administration office.

Photo courtesy Bob Tomaso

The building at 713 Union Street, which now houses the Mental Health Association of Columbia & Greene Counties, was originally a Grand Union.

 

Photo by Gibson

And there were others, as folks who grew up in Hudson in the '50s, '60s, and '70s will likely recall. 

According to the materials submitted to the Planning Board, the grocery store/supermarket is proposed to be 15,915 square feet. A Google search yielded this information about the average size of supermarkets in the United States:

The average conventional grocery store in the United States is approximately 38,000 to 42,000 square feet. While traditional supermarkets hover around 40,000 square feet, the industry is seeing a shift toward smaller, more urban formats (12,000-25,000 sq ft), while large, suburban supercenters can exceed 187,000 square feet.

Of interest, back in 2018, at a DRI public workshop, a retail specialist on the planning team assigned to Hudson reported that Hudson residents spent $5 million annually at the supermarkets of Greenport. She suggested that Hudson could support a 10,000 square foot grocery store. Gossips research at the time found that the only supermarket chain with stores as small as 10,000 square feet was Trader Joe's. That information is eight years old, and there is no indication that the grocery store proposed as part of this project will be part of a chain.

At the meeting on Tuesday, the Planning Board determined the project to be an unlisted action under SEQR (State Environmental Quality Review) and declared itself lead agency in the SEQR process.

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More on the Fate of the White Pine

This morning, I published a communication from Lloyd Koedding regarding his rescue of the white pine that was ceremoniously planted on Promenade Hill and unceremoniously uprooted by vandals. I reproduce that missive again here:

Since publishing that post, I received from a reader this picture of Koedding, taken on Tuesday morning, May 12, when he was on his way to rescue the tree.

Photo: Peter Spear

I also received from DPW Superintendent Rob Perry, who located the tree after it was discovered that it had been uprooted, this picture, which was taken at the time the tree was found. Its location on the steep slope below Promenade Hill is circled in blue.

It has been reported that last night Koedding had the tree with him when he attended the Planning Board meeting, although he left it outside, on the sidewalk across the street from City Hall.

This morning, the tree was spotted on the street in front of Supernatural Coffee.

At this point, the survival of the white pine seems iffy at best.

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UPDATE: According to an article that appeared in the Register-Star today, Friday, May 15, Koedding has given the tree to Marilyn Cederoth of Cedar Farm, a regular vendor at the Hudson Farmers' Market, who has agreed to care for it at her 25-acre garden in Ghent.

The High Cost of Getting It Wrong

The Hudson City School District Board of Education is now in the process of selecting a new Superintendent of Schools. While that process is ongoing, it is useful to review the outcome of the board's last effort at hiring a superintendent.

Dr. Juliette Pennyman, who was selected in August 2023, resigned in August 2025, after serving as superintendent for just two years. 

Pennyman had a contract to serve as HCSD Superintendent of Schools from September 7, 2023, to August 31, 2026. Although it appeared that Pennyman had resigned, Gossips recently learned that the Board of Education may have bought Pennyman out of her contract. According to the Separation Agreement between Pennyman and the BOE, upon her departure, she received a lump sum payment of $197,107.72 and a $35,000 contribution to her tax-sheltered annuity account.

Our message to the BOE: This time, please choose wisely.

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The Fate of the White Pine

Gossips has twice reported about the ceremonial white pine that was planted on Promenade Hill in October and was recently discovered uprooted and tossed over the fence.

Today, I received this communication from Lloyd Koedding, former mayoral candidate and ubiquitous attendee of public meetings and events, announcing that he has rescued the tree and is caring for it in an unknown location.

Take the Survey

The City of Hudson is looking to improve safety at intersections throughout the city.  

Toward that end, the City is asking residents and frequent visitors to the city to complete a survey to help prioritize the intersections most in need of safety improvements. That survey can be found here.

UPDATE: Mayor Joe Ferris shared the following statement "for clarification purposes," no doubt in response to comments suggesting that government by survey is akin to abdication of leadership:

Making the much-needed long-term changes to dangerous intersections in our city requires money. These kind of projects typically require grant funding from either New York State or the federal government. When applications are being considered at the state or federal level, community engagement is one of the determining factors for who does and does not receive funding. As much as I wish that the City could cover the cost of these improvements today, we cannot. Community engagement efforts like this survey and follow-up studies are a required first step in permanently fixing dangerous roads and intersections.

More Vandalism

Last week, Gossips reported that the white pine planted on Promenade Hill last October during the observance of the bicentennial of the opening of the Erie Canal, as a symbolic tribute to the Haudenosaunee and a commitment to a sustainable future, had been uprooted and tossed over the fence and down the bluff.

Tonight, at the Common Council Code and Infrastructure Committee meeting, Rob Perry, Superintendent of Public Works, reported about two more instances of vandalism on the waterfront. A window was smashed in the restroom at Henry Hudson Riverfront Park, and someone broke into the Dunn warehouse and damaged the replica of The Hudson, which is stored there, by snapping off the dolphins at its base.   

The Hudson, a whaling ship, was the first ship to be built in the City of Hudson. According to Anna Bradbury's History of the City of Hudson, New York (1908), The Hudson was completed in 1785, the same year Hudson was incorporated as a city. The replica ship was built as a parade float in 1985 by DPW employees for the celebration of the city's bicentennial.

The Hudson carrying the Common Council in the 2009 Flag Day parade, the year of the Quadricentennial Celebration

The Hudson in the 2018 OutHudson Parade

Perry reported that the culprit(s) who smashed the window in the park restroom have been identified. but the perpetrator(s) of the damage to the replica ship/parade float have not.

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Another Round of Town Hall Meetings

The following announcement came this morning from City Hall: 

The Ferris Administration announced the next round of the City's community town halls. Starting later this month, City Hall will host these events in each of the city's five wards. Town Halls will start at 6:30 p.m. and are scheduled for an hour and a half.

• Monday, May 18, Ward Four--Hudson Area Library Community Room, 51 North Fifth Street
• Thursday, May 28, Ward One--Christ Church Episcopal, 431 Union Street
• Tuesday, June 2, Ward Three--Park Theater, 723 Warren Street
• Tuesday, June 9, Ward Five--Hudson Central Fire Station, 77 North Seventh Street
• Wednesday, June 10, Ward Two--Bliss Towers, 41 North Second Street

"Following the success of this winter's meetings, I am excited to announce the next round of events," said Mayor Joseph Ferris. "More than 150 people across all five wards attended a town hall. These meetings represent what city government aspires to on a daily basis--transparent, engaged, and responsive. Listening to the questions, concerns, and ideas of my constituents and neighbors is a fundamental part of what it means to be mayor. I invite everyone to attend these meetings and not just be listened to, but heard."

The next "Meet the Mayor" open office hours will be held at City Hall on Thursday, May 21, from 3 to 5 p.m.

For more information about these community outreach efforts, please email Mayoral Aide Tiffany Martin at mayoralaide@cityofhudson.org.

About School Funding in New York

As the entire state approaches the day when taxpayers vote to approve or reject their school districts' proposed budgets, The Community Journalism Fund, created by the Gazette News Group, the current owners of the Register-Star, shares a report: "New York public schools lead nation in per-pupil spending--again." The article describes the the Hudson City School District as a "large urban district" and describes our per pupil spending as "more moderate":

Other large urban districts in the area, including Hudson in Columbia County and Schenectady in the immediate Capital Region, operate with more moderate averages of $34,000 and $31,000, respectively.

Given the current reported enrollment of 1,557 and the proposed budget of $59,171,704, the cost per pupil is $38,000.

New York State Report Card: HCSD

For those interested in the academic performance of the Hudson City School District, you can explore the data for the 2024-2025 school year here on the New York State Department of Education website.