At a special meeting on Monday, December 21, the six members of the board present voted unanimously to amend HDC's bylaws to limit the ex officio members to two—the mayor and the Common Council president—thereby eliminating, as ex officio members, the Common Council majority leader and minority leader. The size of the HDC board will remain the same—from nine to fifteen members—thus allowing for a greater number of at large community members to serve on the HDC board. Currently members of the board are Duncan Calhoun, co-owner of The Barlow and Croff House; Brian Stickles, assistant vice president for commercial lending and business development at the Bank of Greene County; Eileen Halloran, former city treasurer; Christine Jones, caterer, food producer, and creative consultant for Olana Partnership events; and Carolyn Lawrence, realtor with Halstead Property and proprietor of Hudson B&B.
COPYRIGHT 2015 CAROLE OSTERINK
This is very welcome news.
ReplyDeletePreviously, with so many active members currently serving in City government, it functioned as a public/private hybrid organization. Too much public business was managed privately and out of sight, such as real estate deals which will forever stink to high heaven.
Existing beyond the reach of the Freedom of Information Law, before now the HDC was the most notorious local entity for generating cynicism and suspicion over public affairs.
Thankfully, someone finally figured out why the HDC has such a terrible reputation.
We believe in the HDC boards attempt to play petty politics they have single-handedly removed any voices from the minority community. The board only minorities has been the majority or minority leader for some time. We believe that direct action is necessary to highlight what has been done and we will be asking the City government to rectify this situation immediately.
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