Hudson Common Sense Editors today published an open letter to Mayor Joseph Ferris about his decision to extend the contract for the sale of the parcel on Mill Street without the knowledge of the Common Council or the community. To read that letter, click here.
Good on HCS for continuing to keep this issue in the public eye. With a quarter of his term behind him, the mayor has managed to accomplish one thing: reneging on his statements regarding the Mill Street project. Oh, and he got his picture taken. A lot. Dynamic.
ReplyDeleteThank you, JF.
DeleteThis was never just about Mill Street.
When this mayor, or future mayors, can quietly rewrite a deal the Council signed off on... no street, no neighborhood, is safe from the same treatment tomorrow.
That's why we wrote the letter, and that's why we're not letting it drop. We all live on Mill Street now.
And we stand with the Mill Street residents who did not ask for this fight but rose to the occasion with dignity and class.
That is totally not fair John.
ReplyDeleteIn February he also said no, to a no match, freebee grant, of $1,000,000. No strings attached. It was supposed to go to the public works board. They were going to spend it on new sidewalks and street crossings, possibly even a safety study for some of our dangerous intersections. The grant writers did a fantastic job of getting hudson the funds but our ceo thought we didn’t need it. I doubt the grant writers will think of us again when they are looking to dole out free cash.
Stop studying or hoping to study intersections, Safety Committee chairman. Try to do something about them, please.
DeleteMayor Joe also reneged on his promise do something about our kids terrible education at HCSD.
ReplyDeleteTo be fair, HCSD is not within the mayor’s authority…. But on Mill Street there was a very questionable and privately arranged property deal between HCSD and the City of Hudson (under mayor Johnson) to sell this park and try to get around the restrictions.
DeleteThis could have been such an easy win for a new mayor.
If he asked an independent lawyer or authority to look at this whole messy Mill Street ordeal and write a public report… we could make sure this doesn’t happen again, and we would know why they were so committed to using the worst possible site and ultimately delaying housing in NY.
Sooner or later HCR and others will notice that money granted to Hudson is likely delayed due to municipal capture and malfunction.
On June 16th at the primary debate, Joe stated in part, “One of the first things I would do as Mayor in City Hall is to convene a charter revision commission…”.
ReplyDeleteWell kids just what are we to do for housing so that Bliss Apt Bldg can be emptied and demolished?
ReplyDeleteThe low income and people of color must live out of sight and kept in the Northwest corner as always.
Additionally... who chose these Kearney people?
ReplyDeletehttps://highlandscurrent.org/2011/04/15/village-wins-court-case-against-marathon-site-developer-kearney/
They also had a separate settlement with Westchester for Fair Housing law violations.
Did Tullo select them or was this former Mayor Johnson?
Hat tip to one of our readers who prefers to stay anonymous for pointing this out.
It's no big secret who chose Kearney. Gossips has reported it more than once.
Delete"In early 2022, another plan emerged, this one initiated by the City of Hudson in the form of a committee made up of the mayor (Johnson), the mayor's aide (Michael Hofmann), Council president (Tom DePietro), a councilmember (Art Frick), and Housing Justice Director Michelle Tullo."
Of course the meetings of this committee were never open to the public so it is unclear exactly how they came to the decision to partner with Kearney.