Last night, I did not attend the public gathering to discuss the charter change being proposed, even though I encouraged my readers to do so. I wasn't there because my dog Freddy is suffering from old dog vestibular disease, and I needed to stay home with him. The meeting was well attended, as evidenced by the pictures below, provided to Gossips by HudsonCharterChange.com.
Tiffany Greenwaldt-Simon was there, and her report on the meeting will eventually appear in the Register-Star. When it does, I will link to it. A video was made of the meeting, and when that becomes available, I will provide the link to that as well.
Hope Freddy is feeling better. Dogs are properly more important than politics.
ReplyDeleteI hope Freddy is doing better.
ReplyDeleteThe only group that was conspicuously absent was the mayor and his cheerleaders. He didn't even send his aide which I guess tells you a lot about his view on civic participation.
ReplyDeleteFor a Hudson civic meeting I think it went very well. All types of opinions were made and people were generally polite, civil and listening. The cookies were good, although not as filling as the free pizza the city provides at the Comprehensive Plan visioning sessions. Even though my mind is mostly made up in support of this, the meeting did answer some of my questions and concerns:
ReplyDelete- Why not also make the treasurer a hired position? Because, as our current competent treasurer has demonstrated, professional experience is crucial. Well, it was explained that state law requires that the treasurer must be an elected official.
- The city manager would appoint board seats (planning, etc) and commissioners. This has given me and others some pause, but maybe it would be better that these volunteer roles be recruited and applied for in a less politically motivated manner. But, if the council sees that as a problem they can… (which is my last point)
- the Council could take this up (they always could with (3?) members sponsoring) write their own charter reform, or take the current proposal as is and send that to the voters in fall. Or, they can modify this one, which if I understand correctly the reform group could choose to support in public before the election, or get more signatures and send their original version to the ballot in November. There seems to be interest in this by the present (at the meeting) council members - so this is becoming a larger process and debate, despite the criticisms of those who benefit from the status quo.
One last thing to point out. During the meeting, many random general criticisms of the status quo were voiced, and it was asked more than once what could charter reform do to help deny the costly handouts/tax breaks to entities like Galvan. As correctly answered, the city cannot do much to change exemptions for 501 (c)(3) organizations. BUT, for these organizations’ for-profit arms, the city, through the mayors office, assessor, council, and their ex offico seats on the IDA hold much sway over Pilots (like the ones awarded to Galvan’s Depot “luxury” lofts), or the tax breaks similarly given by the council to Spark’s Hudson Dots, or the decision to sell city land cheap to developers (like what’s proposed for Mill St.). So there is MUCH that a fiscally responsible city manager and council can do in this area.
The IDA should be restructured with local business leaders taking the seats at the table. Most IDAs in the State are organized as such. The conversation on charter reform is long overdue. There are SO many areas for improvement. A city manager could be just the first step!
DeleteGreat read out, thank you Jack
ReplyDeleteAgree 100%
DeleteWhat group did you identify and thought was missing?
ReplyDeleteI guess the mayor would count as non-white folk. Did you know that he got a personal invite to the event?
ReplyDeleteDid he show up? Did he pass it on to his people?
"His people"?
ReplyDeleteJFerris215, correct. His people are the ones that graduated from Hudson Sr. High School, just as he did. That's the majority of his base.
ReplyDeleteA number of them happen to be non-white, but not all of them.
I'll state it again, this time more clearly: Invites were sent out to every member of the Common Council, every Ward Supervisor, the Mayor and the Common Council President.
ReplyDeleteI am of the opinion that these officials have the ex-officio responsibility to pass this on to the voters they represent. Some did, others didn't. Some decided to show up in person, others didn't.
Ignoring offerings like these is to the detriment of everyone. The organizers of course would have liked to see members of other communities at the meeting. But blaming the outreach is unfair because it now places judgement over whether it was done well or poorly firmly at those that decided not to show up.
They didn't show up not because they weren't invited or because they didn't know about it. They didn't show up because in their eyes it discredits the initiative.
It doesn't. All it achieves is that they remain uninformed and unheard.
Hi Native Son -
ReplyDeleteI am curious... do you only care about racial diversity?
I notice you mainly query one particular Immutable Trait (race) and not age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation etc.
You also don't highlight or query Mutable Traits (education, religion, nationality, language, occupation etc.).
That is of course totally your right and your decision. But I am curious, if you care mainly about racial composition….
- have you queried the racial composition of the leadership of the Friends of 7th Street Park?
- have you queried the racial composition of the "youth" served by the Hudson Youth Center?
Neither are representative of the communities they serve but I am sure they try...
~
Of course everyone was invited to last week's event, and of course the Charter Reform group reached out to everyone they could, and will do so even more.
Of course the room could have been more racially diverse, but critically, the room was diverse in so many other ways;
- young and old (average age in Hudson is 41)
- renters and owners
- Democrats and Republicans
- Gay and Straight and in between
- High-school diploma up to PhDs
- AMERICANS, some foreign born, of Native American, African, European, Jewish, South American ancestry.
The last time a room in Hudson was more diverse was on a Tuesday morning in Cascades. RIP, or a good day at one of the OG coffee shops in town.
Most importantly, there was a genuine and respectful exchange between neighbors, some who agree and some who disagree.
It was also standing room only on one of the coldest nights of the year.
💡 Native Son - Do you have any constructive ideas on how to get the word out to more communities and families?
Bob and team - I wonder if you guys could hold the next meeting in other Wards and other public buildings?
Why not ask the HHA to have a meeting in Bliss's Common/Community Room? Why not have one in City Hall? (Shorter walk for Kamal 😜).
Why not have a meeting in one of the Firehouses?
Native Son — we spoke with all the members of the Council who would accept our invitation to speak and invited them. We sent a press release to the RS and this blog. We posted on our website and I believe we have a social media presence on FB and Instagram that promoted it. The color of the attendees’ skin might have been paler than you’d like or think it would be but that’s who came out. And among those folks were a very diverse set of backgrounds and circumstances.
ReplyDeleteDiversity is in fact diverse.
Curious though — were you there or did you only learn about it after the fact?
Thinking about you and hoping Freddie is comfortable and doing better. You are so good to him!
ReplyDeleteNative Son, what I described was roughly how the outreach was done. Emails were sent to the aforementioned elected officials but also to Tiffany from the Register Star and Roger from the Times Union.
ReplyDeleteThe recipients were picked based on how much of an amplifying effect they could have.
What the initiative does not have is a bunch of fancy consultants to do this work. It's an unfunded project run by private citizens on a voluntary basis.
As much as I would like to, I cannot just waltz into the Hudson Islamic Center and expect anyone to trust me. To get the word out there, we would have needed the help from someone like Abdus Miah or Dewan. In general, all communities informally tend to have leaders.
Bob Rasner reached out to most of them. It's only an offer to join a conversation, however. They are free to turn it down.
There is currently talk over having another one of these public meetings but in a different location, somewhere in the second ward.
Hi @ Native Son -
ReplyDelete1️⃣ You critique alleged vagueness with vagueness.
2️⃣ You make false assumptions about people (other commenters) you don't know.
3️⃣ And how we educate the youth (and Hudson's total failure for several decades) is perhaps the most important issue in any society. Not a "whataboutism".
After all; "Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world." ~ Mandela
I miss stimulating repartee.... can you up the game a bit.
Let's change topic; Is "Native Son", your chosen moniker, a reference to you being born and raised in Hudson, or to the Richard Wright's groundbreaking 1940s novel about justice and inequality in America... wherein a young man from Chicago's South Side who kills two women (one by accident, and the other, his girlfriend, intentionally, and after raping her) is sentenced to death after a lengthy trial?
I am more of a To Kill a Mockingbird fan myself, but I am all for more literary references in life and on Gossips.
@ Native Son
ReplyDeleteOooh🌶. Though sadly yet another false assumption re: The Crimson.
I would love to engage with the substance of your comments… just need the substance first.
Your retort proves (again) that you see the world only through race-colored glasses. Exactly - albeit sadly - what I was expecting you would prove with the bait you so gleefully took.
Ok Native Son …. I know you guys don't like this… but what is your idea for making Hudson better for its residents?
Are you just gong to be a slightly wittier reply guy nitpicking photos from 1 of a dozen events…. or can you offer up original ideas, lead by example, or move the town forward in some other way?
Maybe you already have and we just don't know it?
I believe Charter Reform can make Hudson more apolitical and more efficient. I believe Hudson should focus on sustainable growth, not grants. And Hudson, like America, would be better off if we focus on people's character, choices, and culture, and not just their skin color.
What do you believe will make Hudson better?
Native Son, it wasn't conjecture when I described to you how the outreach worked. The charter initiative spun up before my time. While I had no involvement in crafting the revised charter I have been with the project ever since it went public.
ReplyDeleteYou may well criticize how we went about it - criticism is cheap after all. I've explained to you what little resources are at our disposal and given these constraints, I can assure you that we're on track for this type of initiative.
We did our due diligence by carrying the message to numerous community leaders covering pretty much the whole canvas. What happens then is out of our reach.
You may be losing track of what matters here: What we are after is the requisite number of signatures and votes. We may get there even if our public meetings don't meet your personal standard for diversity.
This isn't an exercise in DEI. We want to change Hudson's system of governance for the better. We extended an invite to everyone to have that dialogue but we are not butthurt if some folks decided not to have it.
Native Son -- You spend time and effort writing pointless and senseless demands and looking for argumentative wedges to somehow turn a constitutional citizen movement into something sinister or backhanded. And then you claim you have no interest in the matter? Why, if you were any more full of shit you'd have to be Tom DiPietro. Are you irrationally violent as well? I mean, I can tell you, like Tom, lack in a certain amount of intestinal fortitude by hiding behind a pseudonym. But I guess "Native Son" is easier to type than Dorothy? Or is it Thomas?
ReplyDeleteHi Thomas R-
ReplyDeleteHope you are well and surviving the cold.
We really should start blogging elsewhere more since these comment threads can get long and hard to follow on mobile devices. And I am flattered that I have so many close readers like you looking for one misplaced comma or inconsistency, and not all of them are Tom/Dorothy anon accounts 😉
But of course I write out some thinking for the majority of reasonable residents, who believe in reason. For the self-reliant business builders, home builders, and tax payers who grow the pie instead of dividing the pie.
➡️ re: grants. Super multi-faceted and complex issue. But fascinating.
⚠️ Spoiler alert: Moral hazard and maintenance.
Grants can lead to budget volatility and lack of self-sufficiency. You can also get misalignment of priorities and lots of donor and compliance overhead. And what do you do when the grants dry up…
Donor-driven grants for example can be undemocratic. Public grants attract career politicians like bees to honey. The Governor looks great handing out money, small town mayor looks great in the press release "winning" money… but rarely do we see the press release talking about an increase in taxes on entrepreneurs and working families to pay for the grant in the first place, or the additional unbudgeted burden on the city when the grant may not be enough, which will then come out of someone else's budget allocation. This happens in small towns like Hudson all the time.
🏊♀️ Most recently (I believe) the City applied for and won a grant to build a swimming pool. But we already have a pool, we just can't afford to staff the life guards for pool 1, let alone pool 2. It is also freezing half the year, we are next to an estuary that was cleaned up at great expense, and there is an inland lake and pool 1 is indoors and working. But now I guess a new open-air pool will be built next to the gravel road… increasing maintenance costs (pump will break more) and liability etc. Was the grant even enough for a complete pool? But now if we don't add money, then we look like anti-pool people.
[If the city was well functioning with a fair tax system and limited liabilities I would be all for a bottoms up effort to build a public swimming pool, in the right location, if the majority wanted said pool and was willing to either pay more taxes across the board or forego other public goods. See Zurich public pools for state of the art].
🏓 Another example… The Spark of Hudson (well intentioned) offered to donate/grant a Pickle Ball / Basketball court and stand alone outhouse / public bathroom structure on Mill Street. Sounds good right?
But is that the best place to spend $2m plus, in that already fraught street, very close to an existing basketball court? Has the city budgeted for the ongoing maintenance of the bathroom? If the public bathroom breaks, who pays to fix it? Right now, on information and belief, the gentleman who takes care of the public bathroom by the river has to use his own vehicle and pay for his own petrol/gas to get back and forth… so if we can't even fully fund maintenance of that public bathroom… why do we think we will do well with a 2nd or 3rd?
To Spark's credit, they were receptive to this feedback and I believe are looking into getting another public entity to help cover the maintenance. (But ask Caitie/Spark).
⛲️ The 7th Street Park… it was there a long time ago… it used to work and then fell into disrepair… a central park is a classic "public good" (non-excludability and non-rivalry), with many social benefits and it will appreciate property value and attract private investment, and whether it is fixed up or not… it is there… so if private grants can be secured to make one-time upgrades… terrific.. and I believe I cautioned the group to budget for maintenance. I am not too familiar with that project apart from the weird goats head fiasco…. see Hudson Wail meme.
But what grants can be good for a small town?
💧I believe grants that A) serve ALL residents, not select voting blocks or individuals and B) help solve large capital intensive problems and C) do not create long-term maintenance overhead that cannot be accurately predicted, could be good if executed well.
ReplyDeleteRecently DPW won a massive $10m plus grant for a water infrastructure project. "The City of Hudson has been awarded a NYS Water Infrastructure Improvement (WIIA) grant of more than $14 million ($14,150,000 to be exact) to improve stormwater separation and mitigate combined sewer overflows (CSOs) into the Hudson River during major rain events" - Gossips Archive
I believe that is a good use of State funds since Hudson will have a hard time financing it alone, everyone in town benefits regardless of ward, owner/renter status, earned income etc. and DPW is already staffed to maintain the project afterwards. Water is a public utility and storm resilience is a necessity, not a luxury.
📚 For a general write up on the dangers of small towns and grants read more here on what the Strong Towns movement calls "America's Growth Ponzi Scheme";
https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2020/5/14/americas-growth-ponzi-scheme-md2020
- “We abandoned thousands of years of history, knowledge and tradition in building cities and towns in order to try this new — and completely untested — approach.”
- “Cities routinely trade near-term cash advantages associated with new growth for long-term financial obligations associated with maintenance of infrastructure.”
What is a better approach overall?
- Saving and investing is better than borrowing and spending.
- Bottom up evolution is better than top down randomness.
- Earned money spent directly is better than taxed money spent via intermediaries.
Just compare the cost of Hudson's sidewalk when the work is done via public contractor bid rules and paid by the City of Hudson vs. a competitive private local market and paid by the owner. Is 10% or 40% more expensive?
So I believe there can be a limited role for grants to expand and protect public goods and services… but reasonable people and certainly historians would caution against grant dependency and haphazard urban planning.
⚖️ Now I admit that there is a type of moral hazard and winner takes/loses all problem (especially in high tax blue states) when the national and state taxes are already high… and if a small city does not compete for those funds on (virtuous) principle, then it just misses out, since taxes are not lowered for non grant recipients. And that problem is arguably beyond the scope of this blog and must be solved at a national level… say by an enterprising friendly national immigrant…
💲🤔 What I do find curious is that some Hudsonians think very differently about their:
A) own money
B) neighbors money
C) City of Hudson money
D) Philanthropic money
E) NY State money
F) USA Fed money
Imagine if we all saved, invested, and spent A, B, C, D, E, and F equally carefully.
If we did... we may wake up one day and have a lot more of "A". And not just due to reduced inflation.
Thomas -
DeleteDon't you find it suboptimal to play gotcha and make false assumptions…. here are some comments to add perspective and to highlight where it is perfectly ok to "agree to disagree".
If you are sincere I am happy to meet offline and have a genuine conversation over coffee about how to improve Hudson. Reddit is more fun than Gossips for repartee…
"Thanks for a straightforward and illuminating answer."
✍️ You are welcome.
"Grants for homeowners to rehabilitate or preserve their property DO benefit the entire community. To use one of your own rhetorical devices, see "positive externality"."
✍️ Referring to "positive (or negative) externalities", core concepts in political economy (see Marshal and Pigouvian taxes), as a "rhetorical device", betrays your political leanings and demonstrates that you may not actually appreciate the underlying principles of the policies you advise. Or you value ideology over pragmatism.
Furthermore, if a public grant pays for a private staircase in a home to be fixed…. it is nice and helpful for that single family… but it does not "benefit the entire community". Unless if the entire community uses that staircase. And my point was that the family may need another grant in the future to repair the staircase. Who decides which family gets the repair grant? That leads to more politics.
Also, if privately owned buildings are repaired with public funds… what is the dividing line between private and public property?
"There's a difference between Project Grants and Program Grants; the former (like the housing grants) "run out" by definition. The "overhead" for these grants is baked directly into … or else nobody would apply for them."
✍️ You prove my point. More dollars going into overhead. Also I never queried "Project" vs. "Program" grants. My distinction is between public and private grants/money. And residents who first seek out grants (dependency) vs. self-reliance (independence).
Soon Hudson will need a grant manager… for a town the size of a large African high school.
All things equal, why live on grants when you can just pay for what you consume? If towns or individuals survive on grants… then the government (or benefactor) becomes the arbiter and could play favorites.
And just to pre-empt you attacking "can just pay" as being privileged or naive, or insensitive to the high cost of living in Hudson… if America and Hudson were so bad, why do immigrants from all over the world take risks to come here. The American poor are richer than middle class Europeans: https://fee.org/articles/the-poorest-20-of-americans-are-richer-than-most-nations-of-europe/
"There are a number of local organizations doing much needed good work who rely on grant funds to accomplish that work."
Delete✍️ Sure. And some of the work is no doubt helpful. But wouldn't their work be even better if the recipient of the service paid directly. See Principle Agent problem… the problem with many 501c3s or government programs is that if they underperform nothing happens, if anything they just get more money. See HCSD.
If a small or medium business underperforms it dies and a new one takes its place, hopefully incorporating lessons from its predecessor and market input. And if not, public funds aren't wasted.
"They've been doing so for a hell of a lot longer than you've been here."
✍️ Tenure does not guarantee efficacy. See for example Tom DePietro's work at CC President or the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). And you have no idea how many decades I have worked with grant making and grant receiving institutions.
"Perhaps you could acquaint yourself with them and become educated about the public services they provide "to select individuals"."
✍️ I have… sadly… and now I cannot unsee it. I also see their lack of transparency and in some cases ideological programming. And I also support the better functioning and apolitical one. There is a place for NGOs, government, and non-profits for sure, but they should not drive the local economy.
NGOs do a lot more good in a really resource poor and lawless environment where markets can't function… say… food or education in Burundi… Hudson is the opposite.
If you genuinely cared about social welfare wouldn't you advocate for people who cannot help themselves due to the country they were born in, war, famine etc. Disadvantaged people in Hudson and in America are better off than the global median.
Again, my point was not to abolish all grants over night. Simply to query why Hudson often leans "grant first"... and to highlight some of the downsides to grant-dependency in a small town with bad finances.
"Or not, but do know that these organizations, the people who work there and the residents they serve are also your neighbors."
✍️ What is your point? Should we hold our neighbors to a lower standard because we know them?
You may not realize that Hudson is home to at least half a dozen residents who lead national grant making endowments or pioneered education reform movements. None of them support HCSD, the Youth Center, and related overlapping not-for-profits…
"Your description of "reasonable residents" and reference to "the grants problem" being solved at a national level by an enterprising friendly national immigrant says all that is needed to say, I think."
✍️ See this exactly why Hudson politics is suboptimal...
I make one tongue-in-cheek reference to a nationally active immigrant (and I did not even express support or opposition) working to make government more fiscally responsible (knowing it would trigger your woke sensibilities) and you seem to assume I am referring to Musk/DOGE, when it could just as easily be CA Governor Arnold or Soros and his Civil Society (transparency) push, or countless others.
"It's always refreshing when someone finally says the quiet part out loud. Cheers."
✍️ And now you think you were so smart…. "outing" me as some verboten X or Y. Just like Kamal or Tom and their minions label their foes "Republican" or "racist". These sorts of purity tests and lack of practical common sense is why NY is losing population and why Hudson's school and town governance is broken.
—
Thomas, there is no 'gotcha' in being pro-America, pro-independence, pro-liberty, pro-fiscal responsibility, and pro-self-reliance. These principles echo loudly not from me, but from the United States Constitution. And I, along with the majority of Americans, hold these beliefs regardless of who occupies the White House or controls Congress.
the intersection of trumps freeze on fed grants and your ersatz neoliberal dreck (with some cheap patriotism, chauvinism, and fondness for authority) isn't lost on anyone, FNI.
DeleteBut isn't that Trump freeze a stark example of why the over-reliance on grant money can be perilous?
DeleteAs I read it, that's the point he was making.
I do want this government gone — it’s non-performing, non-responsive and wasteful of both time and physical resources. I also don’t suffer fools very gladly and that comes out when faced with, well, foolishness. But it’s not about the personalities. I don’t know Kamal except to nod to. My experience as both a citizen of and elected official of the city of Hudson is that municipal governance in NYS requires more than a desire to serve. It requires a working knowledge of public finance and management. As contractual obligations mount, discretionary spending becomes increasingly difficult to manage and professional management that much more necessary.
ReplyDeleteNow, if you are offended when I call out Chris McManus for hiding behind a pseudonym while he demands explanations and documentation in a manner that calls in to question the motivation of his neighbors who’ve volunteered over three years of their time to solve a perceived and real public problem I apologize. But, like Popeye, I yam what I yam - and I’m a fighter.
Native Son — not the third person, the third pseudonymous handle by someone without the self respect or personal strength to stand by their words. One coward or three, it’s irrelevant. A coward is just that.
ReplyDeleteDavid -
ReplyDelete1️⃣ I know it can be challenging to meet people who do not outsource their political views wholesale to one of two political parties... but just breath deeply and it will all be ok.
2️⃣ why not make an original argument for a set of policies for Hudson rather than attempt some sort of lazy labelling. Surely you are smart and thoughtful and can add an original idea or argument to a zinger.
3️⃣ I am not sure if you have lived in Hudson for long time, still live in Hudson, or served on local political committees...
But the scorecard is in and you can't deny the reality:
- Hudson population down
- taxes up
- grants/liabilities up
- school results and outcomes down and below NY State average.
NY State #1 in greatest proportional population decline.
You can try to shoot the messenger(s)... but it won't change the facts.