More News from the Planning Board Meeting

Although it wasn't mentioned in the agenda that appeared on the City website, the Planning Board held a public hearing on Thursday night on an amendment to the site plan for 78 Green Street. The building is currently being used as a wholesale bakery; the amendment would permit retail sales to walk-in customers. What is being proposed is a sales counter inside the building and (in warmer weather) two patio tables with umbrellas in front. No members of the public were present to comment on the proposal, and the public hearing was closed minutes after it was opened. Later in the meeting, the five members of the Planning Board present--chair, Tom DePietro, Laura Margolis, Rob Bujan, Cleveland Samuels, and Carmine Pierro--unanimously approved the amendment.

The Planning Board also unanimously approved the plan for an outdoor venue at Rivertown Lodge, 731 Warren Street.

Another item not on the published agenda was a new proposal to open a cafe, catering mostly to takeout business, and a space for games at 750 Columbia, presumably next to the laundromat and two doors away from our local Subway. The applicant explained that she wanted to target the "under 18 crowd" as well as hospital workers "at shift change." The Planning Board intends to hold a public hearing on the proposal at its next meeting on December 8, provided that the applicant submits a seating plan, indicating the maximum number of seats in the cafe, ten days prior to that date.

Another project introduced at Thursday night's meeting was a plan to build a new headquarters for Greater Hudson Promise Neighborhood on three lots in the 200 block of Columbia Street: 209, 211, and 213. Two of the lots (209 and 211) currently belong to Warren Hudson LLC; one of the lots (213) belongs to HCPDA (Hudson Community Planning & Development Agency). The plan involves demolishing the building that currently stands at 209 Columbia Street and constructing a new three-story building in its place. The following drawings were among the preliminary plans presented to the Planning Board.

The Planning Board will hold a public hearing on this proposal at its next meeting on December 8.

The final project presented to the Planning Board on Thursday was the next iteration of 214-216 Warren Street, now the Savoia. The plan is to bring the building back to an earlier use and even resurrect an earlier name: Howard Hotel.

 

The part of the building behind and above what is now the Savoia will be transformed into a nine-room hotel and event space. The eastern half of what is now the Savoia (the ground floor of 216 Warren Street) will become the lobby of the hotel, and western half will continue to be a bar and lounge, primarily for hotel guests.

Kristina Dousharm Architecture + FDesign.co

As  do so many projects before the Planning Board, this one encountered a stumbling block with parking. The code requires hotels to provide an off-street parking space for every room--that's nine parking spaces--and the current plan provides for only three. The applicant is exploring options to provide the six additional parking spaces--acquiring land along Prison Alley, leasing an existing parking lot, purchasing permits from the City for guests to park in the nearest municipal lot. The Planning Board requested that ten days prior to their next meeting the applicant submit a narrative outlining exactly how the space will be used and explaining how the parking issue will be resolved.
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On Veterans Day

On the ninety-eighth anniversary of the end of World War I, the war to end all wars, Gossips salutes, with gratitude, all our veterans.

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The State of the Haul Road

Last night, at the Planning Board meeting, the board got an update on the status of the permitting process for the proposed Colarusso haul road, from Colarusso's headquarters on Newman Road to the Hudson waterfront.

The discussion began with Planning Board chair Tom DePietro announcing that the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) had designated the Greenport Planning Board the lead agency in the State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR) "because more of the project is in Greenport." This means that Greenport will be deciding whether to make a negative or positive declaration about the environmental impacts of the project. In addition to participating in the coordinated review with Greenport, the Hudson Planning Board must also review the project for consistency with the City's LWRP (Local Waterfront Revitalization Program).

Pat Prendergast, the engineer employed now by Colarusso and formerly by O&G/Holcim, began his presentation by reminding the board that the "whole purpose" of the haul road is to "shorten the route and keep trucks out of Greenport and off the city truck route." He reported that a revised storm water pollution prevention plan had been submitted to the DEC and that the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation had reviewed the plan and determined that no archaeological or historic resources would be negatively impacted. 

Prendergast reported that the Department of Transportation (DOT) had requested changes to the course of the haul road as it approaches Route 9G. DOT wants the haul road to be perpendicular to the state highway and curbing installed to discourage trucks exiting the haul road from turning north into Hudson. DOT also requested signage: "No Left Turn" on the west side of 9G; "No Right Turn" on the east side of 9G.

Ray Jurkowski, the engineer from Morris Associates retained to advise the Planning Board on this project, asked Prendergast, not for the first time, how many trucks trips through Hudson would be eliminated by the haul road. He also noted that the permitting process for this project has been going on for several years, through different applicants and owners of the property, and requested, on behalf of the Planning Board, a chronology of the process—what applications had been submitted, what permits had been obtained—as well as copies of all the correspondence between the applicants and the state regulatory agencies. He urged the members of the Planning Board to review the plans submitted (not long before the meeting) "as quickly as possible" to identify "Hudson concerns." These, he advised, should be outlined in a letter to the Greenport Planning Board "to put them on notice that Hudson has concerns."

At the end of the discussion, audience member Timothy O'Connor objected that the EAF (Environmental Assessment Form) that had been completed for this project was incorrect, and that the municipal boundaries on the map accompanying the site plan for the project were incorrect. Reacting to the second objection, Prendergast asked, "Are you a surveyor?" Judging by a comment made on Gossips, it wouldn't take a surveyor to recognize the error. The map allegedly puts the Dr. Oliver Bronson House and grounds not in Hudson but in the Town of Greenport.

The next Greenport Planning Board meeting takes place on Tuesday, November 22, at 7:30 p.m., at Greenport Town Hall. The Colarusso haul road is the second item on the agenda for that meeting.
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Of Interest Tonight at the Library

Tonight, from 6 to 8 p.m. in the Community Room of the Hudson Area Library, students from Columbia-Greene Community College will present the Gotsch Papers, a research project focusing on the social and cultural history of Hudson in the 19th century. The project, led by C-GCC assistant professor of history Nicole Childrose, was inspired by the local history research done in the 1970s by former C-GCC academic dean Charles Gotsch. In their presentation, students will present their research, carried out in the History Room at the library with the support of History Room volunteers, and provide an analysis of the society and culture of Hudson and the surrounding area in the early 19th century. A question-and-answer session will conclude the presentation.
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Of Interest Tonight at City Hall

The agenda for tonight's Planning Board meeting is on the City website. Among the things that will happen at the meeting are a vote on approving a seasonal outdoor venue at Rivertown Lodge; consideration of a site plan application for 214-216 Warren Street, the building that is now the Savoia but has been purchased by the owners of Ca' Mea; consideration of a site plan for 209 Columbia Street, a property purchased in 2013 in tax foreclosure auction. Also, there promises to be an update about Colarusso haul road application. 

The Planning Board meeting begins at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall.
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The Fears Many Harbor Expressed

"Farewell, America," by Neal Gabler, on Moyers & Company, billmoyers.com.

Some Things Stay the Same . . . Almost

For more than two decades, the First Presbyterian Church has been the place where folks who, for whatever reason, don't have Norman Rockwellesque plans for the holiday can go to enjoy a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. With the holiday just two weeks away, and the church closed because of structural problems with the roof, it was unclear if there would be such a Thanksgiving dinner this year. 

On Tuesday, Reverend Kathryn Beilke, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, announced that the church's annual Thanksgiving dinner would take place at Christ Church Episcopal, from noon to 2 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. In making the announcement, Beilke said:

We are deeply grateful to Christ Church for its hospitality, making it possible for this cherished tradition to continue while we work to re-stabilize our roof. For over twenty-five years, the First Presbyterian Church of Hudson has offered this free Thanksgiving dinner to the whole community. The dinner is available for anyone that is looking to connect deeper with their neighbors, who is without a place to eat, or cannot afford to have a Thanksgiving at their home. Every year this delicious feast brings together the diverse communities in our beloved city--from volunteers to guests, to recent Hudson transplants, to tourists and locals alike. We also deliver around 100 meals to the homebound.

We rely greatly on the support of our friends in Hudson to help feed the 200+ guests and homebound who receive and rely upon this ministry.

Anyone wishing to help prepare and serve the Thanksgiving meal can volunter by calling 518 267-9322 or sending an email to Reverend Beilke. You can also help by making a donation at GoFundMe.

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Clinton Color Symbolism

There are differing theories about why Hillary Clinton wore a black pantsuit with purple lapels yesterday to give her concession speech and why Bill Clinton wore a purple tie with his black suit and Anne Holton wore a long purple vest over her black costume. 

Photo: Reuters|Carlos Barria

Some have pointed out that black and purple are the colors of mourning, or that purple is the color of royalty and black is the color of mourning. Others have noted that purple combines Democratic blue with Republican red and is hence the color of unity and bipartisanship. 

There is yet another theory. Purple and black are the colors of anarcha-feminism. Wikipedia traces the history of anarcha-feminism from its origins in the 1890s until the beginning of this century, when anarcha-feminists coined the term manarchist to describe "male anarchists who are dismissive of feminist concerns, who are overtly antifeminist, or who behave in ways regarded as patriarchal and misogynistic."

Photo: LWV Media Library

Considering how conscious of symbolism the Clinton campaign has been--Hillary Clinton wore white, the color associated with suffragists, to accept the Democratic nomination, at the third presidential debate, and on election night; her supporters were encouraged to wear white on election day; the Javits Center, with its glass ceiling, was chosen as the place to await election results--the idea that purple and black were chosen because of the association with anarcha-feminism and its opposition to traditional concepts of gender roles seems most persuasive.
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Gratitude to Susan Rubin for bringing this to our attention

Seen at the Polls

MICROPOLITAN DIARY

Dear Diary,

I seem to be the only person left in the world who believes that wearing campaign buttons and other political paraphernalia while voting constitutes electioneering and is thus prohibited. My belief is based on my memory of a story I read as child, probably in "Life in These United States" in Reader's Digest. As I recall it, a woman showed up to vote in 1957 wearing a skirt covered with "I Like Ike" buttons, and she was required to remove her skirt and stand in line at the voting machine clad only, from the waist down, in her slip.

So on Monday, when a man got in line at the voting machine where I was stationed wearing a jacket bearing a crest with the initials HRC, I was, in my capacity as an official poll worker, about to inform him that wearing campaign gear at the polls was verboten. Then I saw the sleeve of the jacket and realized that in this case HRC did not stand for Hillary Rodman Clinton but for Harley Rendezvous Classic.

"Micropolitan Diary" is Gossips' homage to and blatant imitation of "Metropolitan Diary" in the New York Times. The term micropolitan was coined (by Gossips) because Hudson is a metropolis in microcosm.
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Hudson Budget for 2017

On Monday, at a special meeting of the Common Council, Mayor Tiffany Martin Hamilton presented the 2017 budget proposed by the Board of Estimate and Apportionment. She told the aldermen that she was proud of budget, saying that she and the other members of the BEA (Common Council president Claudia DeStefao and city treasurer Heather Campbell) were able to "identify opportunities for increased efficiency and cost saving, while increasing programming." The proposed 2017 budget represents a 1.8 percent increase over the budget for 2016. Total expenditures are increasing by $260,229--from $10,328,376 to $10,588,605.

In her presentation, the mayor outlined the following "significant improvements."

Police Department  By transitioning to leasing vehicles instead of purchasing them, the Hudson Police Department will have four new patrol cars, fully equipped with the latest technology. The mayor's budget memo explains that the transition to leasing "will allow us to consistently maintain a new fleet and reduce maintenance costs." The HPD will also hire a fourth dispatcher, "which will significantly reduce the use of officers and a per diem resource to cover dispatch duties."

Senior Center  The budget for the Senior Center will be increased by 21 percent, which will provide for 27.5 hours a week of staffing "to oversee, manage, and develop afternoon programming." There will also be increased funding for programming.

Youth Department  The budget for the Youth Department will be increased by 6.1 percent. The summer program, which was the primary reason the Youth Department ran out of money in September of this year, is being restructured. Instead of moving the entire operation to Oakdale for the summer, the (air-conditioned) Youth Center at Third and Union streets will be the primary location for summer programming, "using city parks and other area resources to broaden options and using Oakdale for swimming lessons and open swim." A part-time Youth Director will be hired "to focus on management and fiscal oversight, including budgeting, grant writing, and the further development and expansion of partnerships with local agencies and organizations to provide more comprehensive programming for youth."

Fire Department  For the first time in years, there will be a modest increase to the budget for the Hudson Fire Department "to allow for increased training opportunities." In addition, $100,000 will be added to the fire truck reserve fund. The money required to fund the Service Award Program for Hudson's volunteer fire fighters, which was approved by referendum on Tuesday, will not be part of the budget until 2018.

The mayor indicated that the 2017 budget establishes a position of counsel to the Council, an city attorney who works exclusively with the Common Council. This is an interesting bit of history repeating itself. Back in 2003, it was believed that a referendum was required to make the job of mayor a full-time position. That referendum failed. So, the next year the BEA, with the Council's approval, raised the mayor's annual salary to $60,000, effectively making the position full time on the assumption that someone making $60,000 as the mayor of Hudson wouldn't need to have another job. (The mayor's salary has since been reduced to $45,000 a year.) Similarly, in 2006, it was believed that a referendum was required to have a city attorney who worked exclusively with the Common Council. There was such referendum, and it failed. Now it seems, like the redefinition of the mayor's position, this can be accomplished by simply writing it into the budget.

Among the contingencies included in the 2017 budget is $100,000 for legal fees needed to defend the City against a possible lawsuit over the weighted voting system, but since the Fair & Equal proposition passed on Tuesday, that $100,000 won't be needed. The mayor also indicated that the contract with Viridian, entered into with much fanfare by Mayor William Hallenbeck in May 2013, had been terminated in July 2016, "resulting in significant savings for the remainder of the year and going forward." The contract originally had a "teaser rate," but the rates have since jumped significantly, and the City has been overpaying. 

The 2017 budget includes the following anticipated revenue increases, based on trends:

• 4.5 percent ($60,000) increase in sales tax revenue
• $10,000 increase in utility tax revenue
• $10,000 increase in Amtrak parking lot permit fees
• $35,000 increase in building permit fees
• $90,000 increase in mortgage fees

The complete proposed budget for 2017 can be viewed here.

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A Compelling Read for the Morning After

At 2:40 this morning, minutes after Donald Trump made his acceptance speech, this commentary by David Remnick appeared in The New Yorker: "An American Tragedy."

Gratitude to TMH for bringing this to our attention

Some Good Election News

The Fair and Equal proposition won by a wide margin: 67 percent (1,436) to 33 percent (693). And it won in every one of the current wards, including the both parts of the Fifth Ward. Here are the unofficial results from the Board of Elections.

For the next local election in November 2017, this is the ward map of Hudson.

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Election Day Is Finally Here

National Photo|Skorpy

SEE YOU AT THE POLLS!

Making Plans Beyond Election Day

Autumn is a favorite season for lectures, and, between now and the winter solstice, there are a number of lectures of interest.

Next week, on Tuesday, November 15, architectural historian and Historic Hudson board member Peter Watson will speak about the Dr. Oliver Bronson House for the Society of Architectural Historians at the University Club of Albany. The Dr. Oliver Bronson House is, of course, Hudson's own National Historic Landmark, designated such for its association with renowned 19th-century architect Alexander Jackson Davis and its distinction as the earliest surviving example of the picturesque Hudson River bracketed style. The lecture begins at 6 p.m., preceded by a reception at 5:30 p.m. The University Club is located at 141 Washington Avenue in Albany.

Historic Hudson and the Columbia County Historical Society are partnering again this fall to present a pair of lectures. The first takes place this coming Saturday, November 12. Peter Cipkowski will explore the early turnpike system in Columbia County in a lecture entitled "All Roads to the River: The 1799 Columbia Turn Pike and Historic Toll Houses." The lecture takes place at 4 p.m. at the Village Hall, 6 Chatham Street in Kinderhook.

In a companion lecture on Sunday, December 11, Dr. David William Voorhees will speak about Hudson before the arrival of Thomas and Seth Jenkins and the founding of the City of Hudson in a lecture entitled "Before the Proprietors: The Dutch Port of Claverack Landing." This lecture takes place in Hudson, at 4 p.m., at Stair Galleries, 549 Warren Street.

For more information and to purchase tickets for these two lectures, visit the website of either the Columbia County Historical Society or Historic Hudson.

On Thursday, December 1, as part of the Local History Speaker Series at the Hudson Area Library, Walter G. Ritchie will present his research on 59 Allen Street in a lecture entitled "The Hudson Residence of Charles C. Alger and His Patronage of Alexander Jackson Davis." Alger was the designer of the Hudson Iron Works and also the original owner of Gothic Revival brick house at the corner of Allen and Second streets, which overlooked the blast furnaces. The house, built in 1851, "embellished with wood bargeboards, finials, and eared drip moldings . . . was a well-known landmark for many years, situated on a large property that extended down a slope to Cross Street." Ritchie's lecture will discuss "Alger’s elegant Gothic Revival residence in Hudson and illustrate many of the original architectural details that survive inside the house . . . and will also address his Newburgh and New York City residences remodeled by A. J. Davis and detail his extensive art collection, which encompassed works by significant 19th-century American painters and sculptors, including Hudson’s own Sanford R. Gifford (1823-1880)."

This lecture takes place at 6 p.m. on Thursday, December 1, in the Community Room of the Hudson Area Library.
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On the Waterfront This Afternoon

A year ago, Gossips told the story of the Apollonia and followed its journey by water from Buzzards Bay to the Hudson River. 

The plan is to transform the Apollonia into the Hudson Valley region's largest carbon-neutral merchant vessel. The Apollonia website describes the goal: "Powered by wind and used vegetable oil, the Apollonia will transport her cargo to and from New York City sustainably. This is not a living-history project trying to make the past 'come alive.' Instead, we are part of a growing sail-freight movement committed to proving cargo vessels are not only still relevant, but are in fact intelligent solutions. Our goal is in sight, so join us on the adventure."

This afternoon, the Apollonia is docked at Henry Hudson Riverfront Park, and from 2 until 6 p.m., everyone is invited to come down to the river to see the boat, meet the crew, check out the progress made in the past year, and learn about the plans for the next season. The sail plan will be on display, and food and drink will be on offer.
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A Little Background

On Wednesday, Gossips reported on the comments from the Hudson Planning Board and the Columbia County Planning Board about the proposed zoning amendment that would change the zoning for three parcels on the west side of Hudson Avenue from I-1 (Industrial) to R-S-C (Residential Special Commercial). Although acknowledging that it had no jurisdiction in the action, since the amendment had no "significant county-wide or intercommunity impacts associated with it," Columbia County Planning Board made a few comments, one of them being a caution that in making this zoning amendment the City would be giving up some of its "land available for job creation and/or retention."

The letter, which was signed by CCPB chair, Timothy Stalker, inspired curiosity about the Columbia County Planning Board and who served on it. The information is not available on the Columbia County website. It seems the only way to find out who serves on the CCPB is look at the minutes of board meetings, the most recent available being from August 2016. The members--present and absent--are listed at the top.

The only board member readily recognized as being someone from Hudson is vice chair Arthur Koweek. Koweek has a long history with planning for Hudson. Koweek was chair of the Hudson Planning Commission in the 1960s and '70s, during urban renewal days. In 1984, Koweek was chair of the Hudson Community Development Office, which was spearheading the effort to site an oil refinery on the Hudson waterfront. Koweek considered the refinery "a matter of economic survival for Hudson," and was famously quoted in an article in Hudson Valley magazine for December 1984 as saying of our waterfront and the Hudson River, "It's an industrial area. Let them go out of town to get access to the river. How much access is there now? There haven't been 50 people down there. . . It's not a recreational river. It's to move raw materials."

To put things in context, these comments were made in 1984. Almost twenty years earlier, in 1966, Pete Seeger founded the organization Clearwater, and in 1969 the replica Hudson river sloop Clearwater was launched, to "bring people to the river where they could experience its beauty and be moved to preserve it."
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It Happens Tonight

Tonight's the night! Get ready for sunset at four in the afternoon.

Photo courtesy Casa Urbana

The gloom and dolor of Standard Time returns overnight, at 2 a.m.
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Of The Falls and Garden Follies

There's another open house at The Falls today. From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., you can view the model apartments and tour the luxurious common rooms and other amenities at the new apartment complex on Route 66 in Greenport. If you are unable to visit today, you can schedule a tour at another time on the JMS Collection website by clicking here. 

This afternoon at 3 p.m. at Olana, Therese O'Malley will present a lecture entitled "The American Summerhouse: 'Amusing, Instructive & Friendly.'" O'Malley, the author of Keywords in American Landscape Design, is associate dean at the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. The lecture is an opportunity to learn the history of the 19th-century American landscape architecture form known as the "summer house," as well as one last chance to explore the exhibition Follies, Function & Form: Imagining Olana's Summer House. The lecture takes place at the Visitor Center at Olana. The exhibition is at the Coachman's House Gallery. Click here for more information. 

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Never Make a Typo in Cast Iron

It's been more than a month since Gossips reported the appearance of a New York Folklore Society marker on Route 29 in Greenport, recounting the legend of Spook Rock.

Soon after the marker was dedicated on September 18, a typo was discovered--one that created a subject-verb agreement error. The typo was not in the copy submitted by the Greenport Historical Society, so the foundry that created the marker has taken responsibility for the error and is correcting it. On Monday (Halloween, the perfect time for spooky legends), the marker was taken down and shipped back to the foundry. When the typo has been corrected, the marker will be returned to its place on Spook Rock Road.
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Know Your Ballot

By now, you all know that on Tuesday when you mark your ballot, you must remember to turn the ballot over and vote on Proposal One, which will establish voting districts of equal population and do away with the weighted vote in the Common Council, and Proposal Two, which will create a Service Award Program for our volunteer fire fighters. 

A query from a reader yesterday suggests that two columns on the front of the ballot require some comment: Columns 3 and 4, Justice of the Supreme Court, 3rd Judicial District. Two men are running: Andrew G. Ceresia and Michael Mackey. 

Both men are sure to win, because there are two vacancies on the Supreme Court, and they are the only two running. Although both are Democrats, they are both running on four party lines: Democrat, Republican, Conservative, and Independence.

If you are curious to know more about these men who will be elected to fourteen-year terms on the bench, you can visit their campaign websites--Ceresia and Mackey--or read about them in the Daily Freeman and Poughkeepsie Journal. 
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How Much Is Too Much of a Good Thing?

Hudson's fourteen-year-old Comprehensive Plan recommends festivals as a way to polish the city's reputation. The following is quoted from the Executive Summary (page vi).

Promote Image of City Through Festivals

Many regional residents never visit downtown Hudson, assuming the City is unsafe and unpleasant. For Hudson to continue to renew itself, it must overcome these stereotypes and encourage people to visit and explore the city. Hudson should build on this efforts to attract visitors with well-organized events like the Winter Walk, Firemen's Parade, Flag Day, the Fourth Down Block Party, and the Art Walk. Others the City might consider include a Garden Walk, Community Clean-Up Day, an Antiques Festival, and ethnic festivals that celebrate the diversity of Hudson.

Hudson has changed a lot since 2002. Some of the events mentioned--Winter Walk and Flag Day--are still going strong; the Firemen's Parade continues, although Inspection Day, of which the parade is a part, has lost some of its charm since the fire companies consolidated in 2004; for the first time since 1995, Arts Walk didn't happen this year; and the Fourth Down Block Party is no more. But there are new events: the Black Arts & Cultural Festival, the Bangladeshi Festival, the Pride Parade (now the OutHudson Parade), the Halloween Parade, and more. No longer perceived as essential to attracting people to Hudson, the many festivals are now seen as interfering with people's reasons for visiting Hudson.

The revival of the legendary Hudson Bed Races in September seemed to be the straw that broke the camel's back, festival wise--or at least the most recent straw that taxed the tolerance of Warren Street merchants. At last month's Common Council Arts, Entertainment & Tourism Committee meeting, the aldermen on the committee discussed a petition signed by the proprietors of all the businesses in the 500 block of Warren Street protesting the fact that the bed races had shut down two blocks of Warren Street at midday on a Saturday. At this month's AET meeting, Karen Montone, owner of Hudson City Books and initiator of the petition, was there to present the results of a Warren Street Merchant Survey she had conducted. Among the comments were these:

Parades are a "community" building experience, we would hate to see them disappear.

Parades and events on a retail street are bad for business, especially in the summer, which is the retailer's best time for sales.

Even though the parades & events are sometimes an inconvenience, they do help make Hudson a unique place.

Saturday events increase bodies on the street, but decrease the number of people coming into the store.

Among the recommendations were: parades and events that require street closure should be staged on other streets; parades should be scheduled in the morning or in the late afternoon or early evening--before or after shopping hours; communication about upcoming events and parades should be improved.

In  2014, in response to complaints from business owners about car shows organized by American Glory that shut down the 300 block of Warren Street on a spring Saturday, two years in a row, with little or no warning to the other merchants, the Common Council amended the mass gathering permit process, requiring applications to be filed at City Hall 120 days before the event and notice of the event to appear in the Register-Star. It should be noted that the Hudson Bed Races, which inspired the current wave of complaint, followed those requirements to the letter. In addition, there was lots of publicity about the event. Still, the feeling among merchants was that they were blindsided by the Saturday street closure.

Winter Walk, the early holiday festival presented by the Hudson Opera House each year on the first Saturday in December, emerged as the one event about which the merchants had no complaints. Montone called it "the one positive community building event that closes the streets and brings customers into the stores." But before the meeting was over, even Winter Walk was a target of complaint.

Alderman John Friedman (Third Ward), who is a member of the AET Committee, read aloud a letter, signed by Joe Fierro of American Glory and Lyle Lentz of Wunderbar, which had been sent to all the aldermen and all the other restaurant owners in Hudson. The letter, with both dismay and outrage, shared the news that "multiple food trucks," described as "NON HUDSON BUSINESSES," were going to be permitted to sell food along Warren Street during Winter Walk. The letter called this action "an injustice to the businesses in Hudson who work day to day to build the fabric of this wonderful community and continue to 'keep it on the map'" and concluded, "If this Winter Walk transgression is allowed to occur, all of our businesses will be adversely impacted."

Alexandre Petraglia, now development and marketing coordinator for the Hudson Opera House, was present to respond to the allegations. He confirmed that there would be food trucks at Winter Walk--four of them--but they will not be positioned on Warren Street. They will be around Seventh Street Park and on side streets. He defended the action by saying that Winter Walk, which happens from 5 to 8 p.m., is expected to attract 20,000 people this year, all of whom will likely be seeking food during those hours and immediately after, and the restaurants of Hudson cannot accommodate that many people. 

The letter from Fierro and Lentz called on fellow restaurant owners to "demonstrate your solidarity" at the informal Common Council meeting on Monday, November 7, so it's likely there will be another contentious meeting in City Hall on the eve of Election Day.
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Fair & Equal in the Second and Fourth Wards

Last night, Gossips published a flyer being sent to residents in the Fifth Ward by an entity calling itself "Friends of the Fifth Ward." This morning, a reader who lives in the Fourth Ward provided a copy of a flyer that was left, anonymously, on her doorstep. (Click on image to enlarge.)

The back, to which the reader is directed, merely reproduces the language of the proposition as it appears on the ballot, with a giant check mark over the circle under NO, which, of course, you should fill in completely rather than marking with a check if you want the voting machine to scan it properly.

This flyer is not as slick as the Fifth Ward flyer, which shows hands tearing at the giant Fifth Ward and carries the rallying cry "Let's keep our 'Ward'! Let's keep our 'Voice'!" Instead it raises the specter of the minority community and the low to moderate income community losing their representation in city government--a claim that is simply not supported by a comparative analysis of the demographics of the current wards and the proposed wards. 

In particular, the flyer bemoans that fact that the proposed boundaries place Crosswinds "in the more affluent 5th Ward, stifling the voice of those living at Crosswinds." The truth is the Crosswinds is part of the Fifth Ward right now, and although the residents there have been voting as if they were in the Fourth Ward, their numbers have gone to increase the weighted vote of the aldermen from the Fifth Ward, for whom they did not vote. Based on the graphic below, which shows the current state of things, it could be said that the voices of everyone in the First, Second, Third, and Fourth wards are currently stifled by "the more affluent 5th Ward."

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The Empire Strikes Back

In the final week before Election Day, an entity calling itself "Friends of the Fifth Ward" has launched a campaign against Proposition 1, the Fair & Equal initiative. Proposition 1 would do away with the weighted vote in the Common Council and establish in Hudson the constitutional principle of one person, one vote by redrawing ward boundaries to create voting districts of equal population. In recent days, these flyers have been distributed, apparently selectively, to residents of the Fifth Ward.

 

  
The flyers arrived in an envelope with this return address:

The tax rolls reveal that 13 Michael Court is the home of longtime mayor and current Fifth Ward supervisor Richard Scalera, who has claimed in the past that the 2003 referendum to eliminate the weighted voted by changing ward boundaries was "soundly defeated" when in fact it failed by only 68 votes.
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Watching Hudson Avenue

At the last Common Council meeting, it was decided that there would be a special meeting to take up the issue of the zoning amendment needed to build a block of four row houses on Hudson Avenue.

That special meeting never happened. Instead, the Common Council has scheduled a public hearing on the request for a zoning change for Monday, November 7--the eve of Election Day--at 5:45 p.m., preceding a special meeting about the 2017 budget at 6:30 p.m. and the informal Common Council meeting at 7:00 p.m.

It will be recalled that the zoning amendment had been sent to both the Hudson Planning Board and the Columbia County Planning Board for recommendations. In preparation for the public hearing, the responses from both boards are now available on the City of Hudson website. The response from the Hudson Planning Board makes the following comments:

Interestingly, although a legal opinion from Virginia Benedict, of the law firm Rapport Meyer, stated "The fact that rezoning . . . benefits a specific person is not determinative" in deciding if a zoning change is an example of "spot zoning," and Tom DePietro, who chairs the Planning Board, told the Common Council on October 18 that the board's recommendation "did not hinge on spot zoning," item 2 in the Planning Board's "report" seems to make it pretty clear that the possibility that "some members of the public" might perceive the zoning change as spot zoning is the reason for the board's recommendation.

The response from the Columbia County Planning Board is also interesting. After noting that "this proposed action does not appear to have any significant county-wide or intercommunity impacts associated with it," which means the county planning board has no say in the matter, the county planning board makes a few comments: one being that the parcels should be rezoned R-3 instead of R-S-C to create "a more cohesive neighborhood and . . . minimize the potential for conflict between existing residential uses and future commercial uses"; the other being a concern that in changing the zoning for these three parcels, Hudson is giving up part of its limited "land available for job creation and/or retention." To support the latter, the county planning board quotes from page 31 of Hudson's 2002 Comprehensive Plan.

In 2002, the Comprehensive Plan seemed to cling to the notion that job creation can only happen in an industrial zone. Fourteen years later, when this particular industrial site has been vacant and abandoned for ten years and Hudson is witnessing the growth of a creative economy, the need to maintain every bit of our industrial zones certainly doesn't seem as great.
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK

Watching 400 State Street

The venerable stone building at the north end of Fourth Street, which is only two years short of being 200 years old, is a cause for some concern. Even though it is individually listed in the National Register of Historic Places and has been designated a local landmark, ever since the Trustees of the Hudson Area Library sold the building to Galvan Partners in 2011, its future has been uncertain. For this reason--and the fact that it is on the route to so many places--Gossips keeps an eye on the building.

Photo: Virginia Martin

This morning, there was a lift and some activity going on at the site. Some investigation yielded the information that the building was being power washed.
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK

Of Interest

Yesterday, Marina Abramovic's recently published memoir Walk Through Walls was reviewed in the New York Times: "Marina Abramovic's 'Walk Though Walls,' a Memoir of Masochism and Pretension."

Thanks to Byrne Fone for bringing this to our attention.

Tracking Down an Arsonist in 1889

On November 8, 1889, the Hudson Daily Evening Register reported that the culprit who had made "an incendiary attempt to burn the lumber yard and buildings connected with the carpenter shop of Harry S. Moul located at No. 318 Union Street, running through to Cherry Alley," had been apprehended. The incident occurred at 11 o'clock on a Sunday night, October 20, and was discovered and extinguished before it could cause much damage.

The story is interesting for a few reasons. First, the owner of the targeted property was Henry S. Moul, who in 1889 was still a carpenter but who in the next decade or so would make a name as an architect and move his business to 443 Warren Street.

Moul was the architect who designed the fourth Columbia County courthouse, which was destroyed by fire seven years after it was completed, the Synagogue Anshe Ammes, now Shiloh Baptist Church, and many homes around town, notably several on McKinstry Place.

Also of interest is the person charged with the crime: William Casey, Jr., whom the newspaper described as "a young man of 18 years of age of highly respectable parentage." Casey told the police that he was intoxicated when he tried to set fire to the lumber yard and affirmed that he had had "no confederates." He admitted to drinking with others during the evening but said the others were "too drunk to take a hand in this crime."

What is most interesting about the story is the clue that led the police to young Casey. Newspapers soaked in kerosene had been placed, as accelerants, throughout the buildings. Because the fire had been promptly discovered and extinguished, some of these newspapers were untouched by the fire, and it was the newspapers that led the police to the culprit. The report in the Hudson Daily Evening Register explains how.

After twenty witnesses came forward to provide evidence against him, Casey finally "admitted his guilt, confessing the whole."

The press today may sometimes play a role in solving crimes but never quite in this way.
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK

Saving Our City's Most Beloved Church

On Saturday, the First Presbyterian Church announced on its Facebook page that the Sunday worship service would take place at the Reformed Dutch Church in Claverack. On Monday morning, the word started circulating that the iconic church at the corner of Fourth and Warren streets had been "condemned."

Thank goodness the true state of affairs, although dire enough, is not quite so damning.

Photo: Dan Region

After last year's successful and much celebrated restoration of the building's major stained glass window, the Friends of the First Presbyterian Church turned their attention to the roof, which needed replacement. Before this task was undertaken, an engineering firm was hired to study the underlying structure of the roof--the beams and trusses that support the weight of the roof. That study, which was received on Saturday, October 29, discovered that some of the mortise and tenon joints had separated, other elements had shifted, and the weight of the roof was now being concentrated on only a few members. Reverend Kathryn Beilke told Gossips this morning, "The engineers concluded that the situation is not safe and that it would not be prudent to allow anyone in the building for the time being."

This news, although disturbing, is not a death knell for the church. Beilke states: "We understand that so many of our friends and neighbors depend upon this building as a part of their weekly or daily lives. We want to assure them of our confidence that there is a way forward and that this damage is repairable. We are unsure of a timeline as of now. But we are working diligently to ensure that the building is functional and approachable as soon as possible."
COPYRIGHT 2016 CAROLE OSTERINK