The Valley Alliance Reacts

Yesterday, Gossips remarked on the the bizarre new greenwashing title and description of Colarusso's business before the Planning Board that appeared in the agenda for tonight's meeting. Today, The Valley Alliance sent this statement to the members of the Planning Board.

We’re writing regarding the agenda for tonight’s meeting. . . . It appears that Colarusso will be discussed publicly for the first time in more than a year. 

The portion of Colarusso’s controversial ambitions apparently up for discussion tonight involve an exponential increase in truck traffic to and from the Waterfront—generating fugitive dust, diesel pollution, traffic snarls, visual and noise impacts, et al. An approval could allow vast quantities of gravel to be hauled, dumped, stockpiled and loaded right next to Hudson’s only riverfront park. This would also have harsh negative impacts on three major entrances to the city, neighboring business and homes, as well as the South Bay, which was protected a decade ago by New York State as a rare and fragile ecosystem. 

Dozens of previous Planning Board public notices, agendas and minutes for the company’s applications have correctly listed Colarusso’s proposal in standard, neutral legal terms. This has been consistent across many different chairs and sets of board members. 

So we were surprised and concerned to see tonight’s Colarusso agenda item described in non-legal, irregular terms—promotional language seeming to originate with and biased toward the applicant. . . . 

Your June 2021 minutes appropriately stated that “The board took up continued review of applications for conditional use permits with site plan components from A. Colarusso and Son Inc. for a replacement bulkhead and haul road improvements.” Your November 2021 records show the Colarusso agenda items as “175 South Front Street (Tax ID #109.15-1-1) Conditional Use Permit applications and site plans from A. Colarusso and Son Inc. for road improvements and commercial dock operations.” Your March 2019 minutes quote Board Attorney Howard that “the applications were for conditional use permits with a site plan.” Similar language was used as well by Columbia County Planning. 

Even Colarusso’s attorney Mr. Privitera in a February 2021 memo to your agency acknowledged their “applications to the City of Hudson Planning Board for conditional use permits for 175 South Front Street (the ‘Dock Application’) and the adjacent haul road (the ‘Haul Road Application’)…. [T]he Haul Road Application, seeks a conditional use approval for the proposed improvements to the haul road within the City limits.”

But oddly, the Colarusso agenda item for tonight’s meeting reads completely differently: 

Here, all references to the actual applications for Conditional Use Permits and Site Plan review have disappeared, replaced by language minimizing its impacts. The agenda item spins the project entirely using the applicant’s preferred lens of minor “improvements.” We hope this was a clerical error, and that future agendas will revert to your prior neutral practices.

We once again note, as we and our legal counsel have many times before, that the shallow SEQR ruling by Greenport in no way prevents Hudson from upholding its own separate codes and planning goals via Conditional Use and Site Plan review. Indeed, in his 2016 resolution of a dispute between Hudson and Greenport, NYSDEC Commissioner Seggos specifically stated that while he granted Greenport lead agency status solely for SEQRA review of the haul road, “This decision in no way limits the jurisdiction or responsibilities of the other involved and interested agencies — particularly the City Planning Board.” The City retains the right and obligation to uphold its own local code provisions, which are far more rigorous than Greenport’s.

We again note that the legislative intent of the LWRP code revisions was clearly stated by NYS Department of State lead attorney William Sharpe—and seconded by the City Attorney—on the night that it was enacted by the Common Council.

“They would not be able to enlarge or expand under the City’s zoning. The existing zoning that you have does not permit expansions of nonconforming uses… So it would be at the point where something happens on the property, where the paving of the road, or the road needs to be regraded. If that’s regraded, they’re going to have to get a conditional use permit for the entire property.

This standoff was caused by Colarusso’s own reckless actions—making unpermitted changes to the property, while subjecting downtown to truck traffic as a means of pressuring your Board to accept the unacceptable. The company brought full reviews down upon its entire Hudson operation under the known terms of the LWRP. The project has been ungrandfathered. Colarusso’s claims to be generously “diverting” trucks from downtown streets are self-serving, much like its crocodile tears about “delays” caused by its own lawsuits.

This review cannot properly be framed either as some minor change, nor as a false Hobson’s choice between City streets and the South Bay. It is a crucial struggle between the broad goals of the citizens of Hudson vs. the narrow interest of a single Greenport corporation. The win-win solution to the problem Colarusso itself has created is to deny its permits—freeing the streets of trucks, allowing the Waterfront to be developed to benefit the people, and sparing the Bay from further degradation.