Eight months after the incident occurred, the partially sunken barge is still there, tied up to a tree on the shore.
To be reminded what T. J. Ruane, attorney for Colarusso, and JR Heffner, Colarusso's vice president for operations, had to say about the barge incident when questioned by Randall Martin at a Planning Board meeting last year, see this post: "About That Barge."
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It would be really nice to hear what ACS has to say about why it's still there.
ReplyDeleteI obviously cannot speak for Colarusso, but based on what Ruane and Heffner told the Planning Board soon after the incident occurred, I would hazard a guess they would say the barge is not theirs and hence its removal is not their responsibility.
Delete"It's not our responsibility" would be an incredibly lame excuse. One would think that if Colarusso intends to operate here in the coming decades, they would start being a better neighbor, The City of Hudson has an amazing capacity for taking abuse and doing nothing about it.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe the City's laws extend in to a navigable channel.
DeleteOne of the most unfortunate consequences of the weak and pathetic Planning Board review of the Colarusso application is that the company is now assured that the City lacks the will to impose ANY discipline on their activities. They can proceed without regard for their impact on the community, and the City will stand by, cowering and afraid.
ReplyDeleteACS does not own the barge and cannot remove someone else’s property, nor do they have any authority over the river.
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to explore the legal angle here. I would think the barge company is a sub-contractor to Colarusso. If that is the case, one would think that Colarusso indeed has a legal obligation.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, this situation illustrates why some of us were so intent on stopping this unfortunate project. If Colarusso doesn't understand that it would behoove them to deal with this mess in a responsible manner, then we don't need them in our community.
And further, anyone who lives in the Hudson Valley can see that the most run-down, miserable, economically depressed towns are the ones hosting the cement and aggregate industries. Take a drive thru Smith's Landing and Coeymans, and it's obvious that those places are dead in the water because of their proximity to noxious industry, Why in the world would Hudson want to follow that model?
I continue to wait for someone to articulate the case for rocks and gravel and trucks on our waterfront-- what is the upside for the citizens and taxpayers of Hudson?
I agree. Peter sets it straight.
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