While Everyone Was Focused on the Parade

On Saturday morning, while people were going about their weekend chores and doing things related to Flag Day, work on the windows began at 400 State Street, the 200-year-old limestone structure, designated a local landmark and individually listed in the National Register of Historic Places, that started its long life as the Hudson Almshouse. 

The tall windows in the central part of the building appear still to be in place, though the panes of glass have been removed and the muntins and stiles are being stripped of paint. Windows in the east wing of the building have been removed altogether. 

The project has not come before the Historic Preservation Commission for a certificate of appropriateness, so we have to trust that it has been reviewed by code enforcement officer Craig Haigh, and he is satisfied that what is being done is simply the repair of the building's existing historic fabric. 
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Of Interest

Photo: Ralph Gardner, Jr.

Ralph Gardner, Jr., seems to be spending a lot of time in Hudson these days, or at least paying a lot of attention to Hudson things in his Saturday commentaries on WAMC. Last week, it was the opening reception for Design Hudson at the Dr. Oliver Bronson House. This week, it's the panel discussion on guns and school safety that took place at Hudson High School last Monday: "No Hostility Allowed." 
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

HDC and the Kaz Redevelopment Project

I've been agonizing about how best to report on yesterday's special Hudson Development Corporation (HDC) meeting to discuss the redevelopment of the Kaz site--how to summarize the board's account of their due diligence, the public's misgivings, expressions of suspicion and mistrust, and claims they knew nothing about what was being contemplated until Melissa Auf der Maur and Tony Stone raised the alarm in late April (Gossips has been following the story since the first RFP was issued in the fall of 2016, publishing fourteen posts on the subject in 2018 alone), and what the path forward may be--but now I don't have to. Dan Udell's video is available on YouTube. Click here to watch.

COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Valuing and Revitalizing Oakdale

Oakdale Lake is an artificial lake created in 1915 as an enhancement to the "beautiful suburb" then being established by the Oakdale Park Improvement Company. Gossips has reported about the original plans for the lake and how those plans have worked out in the present. On Tuesday night, Tamar Adler came to the Conservation Advisory Council meeting to share her hopes for the future of Oakdale Lake.

The possible improvements to Oakdale Lake identified by Adler involve design (new docks and platforms), landscaping (eliminating the buckthorn and other invasive species and rethinking parts of the trail), water ecology (finding ways to help the lake clean itself), and updating the benches and tables, the beach house, and the playground.

During the recent Fishing Derby, Adler identified people interested in improving Oakdale Lake and possibly forming a Friends of Oakdale Lake group. Adler approached the CAC looking for "an organization or committee" that could be "an umbrella under which the Friends of Oakdale Lake can organize, strategize, plan, and seek funds." Adler explained that the School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation Department at Columbia University has a Hudson Valley Initiative, and there is interest in sending current students or recent graduates to Hudson to research, do feasibility studies, and conduct community workshops about Oakdale Lake to build community consensus, make design recommendations, and help to identify funding sources. CAC chair, Jonathan Lerner suggested that the nascent Hudson Parks Conservancy might be the organization that could be an umbrella for the Friends of Oakdale Lake and assist in moving the effort forward.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

The Twain Shall Meet

Since 2010, Hudson has had two parades in June, on consecutive weekends: The Flag Day parade, on the Saturday closest to June 14, and the Pride parade, on the following Saturday. The events have been quite separate and distinct. People who participated in the Flag Day parade didn't march in the Pride parade, and people who marched in the Pride parade were rarely part of the Flag Day parade. The exceptions were the Columbia County Democrats and the Hudson Fire Department. This year will be different. 

OutHudson released this statement this morning: "In the spirit of unity, OutHudson's Pride marchers will have a contingent in the Flag Day Parade, and the Flag Day Committee will march in the Pride parade."

Photo: Holly Northrop

Commenting on the new development, Rich Volo, a.k.a. Trixie Starr, who organized the first Hudson Pride parade in 2010 and is now the chair of OutHudson, said: "This is a time for unity; a time that the City of Hudson comes together. I'm happy to march in the Flag Day Parade this year with the OutHudson banner!"

Charlie Ferrusi, who had a featured role in the 2010 Pride Parade and is now a director of OutHudson, commented: "Flag Day and the American flag have always represented freedom and equality for all. The flag represents the unity of America, our common cause, and the hope for a better tomorrow. LGBTQ people have always been a part of America and the City of Hudson. We deserve to have a visible and vibrant presence at Hudson's Flag Day Parade."

The Flag Day parade takes place this Saturday, June 9. The parade steps off at 2:oo p.m. The OutHudson parade is next Saturday, June 16. It, too, begins at 2:00 p.m. Both parades go down Warren Street, from the Public Square to Front Street.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Of Interest

HudsonValley360 has a brief video by Lance Wheeler from Democratic candidates debate on Monday night. Wheeler goes behind the scenes, before the debate begins, and has each of the candidates state what he or she thinks is the biggest issue for the people the 19th Congressional District. Click here to watch.

COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

The Great War: June 4, 1918

Last June, when telling the story of Helen M. Hall, the Hudson girl who went to aviation school and hoped to be commissioned as a pilot in the Army Signal Corps, Gossips touched on the topic of women as ambulance drivers during World War I. While she was waiting for the U.S. military to begin admitting women, Hall organized a Cornell Women's Ambulance Corps for service in France. I wasn't able to discover if Hall and the Cornell Women's Ambulance Corps ever made it to France. Adequate records of the American women who served as ambulance drivers during World War I do not exist. Today's story is related to the story of Helen Hall. 

On June 4, 1918, the Columbia Republican reported that eight Columbia County women applied to be part of an ambulance unit being organized by the New York State Guard.

 

Unfortunately, I have so far been unable to discover if the ambulance unit was ever formed in Columbia County, nor have I discovered much about the two women mentioned in the article. 

Marion Jeane Van de Carr appears to have been from Stockport. An article that appeared in the Chatham Courier in July 1917 reveals that she was an alumna of the Hudson City Hospital Training School, which is appropriate for someone who wants to be part of an ambulance unit. 

Frances Lillian Atwood seems to gone by the name Lillian not Frances. She was the daughter of Barbara Atwood, a widow, and lived with her mother and two siblings at 29 Worth Avenue. Her name appears in the newspapers a few times: in April 1916, the Columbia Republican reported that she was among those nominated in something called "the Republican's $2,000 Voting Contest"; in September 1916, the Albany Times-Union reported that she, wearing "black and peach taffeta," was one of the guests at an engagement party; and in April 1914, the Columbia Republican published this announcement: "Miss Lillian Atwood, of this city, has several very clever oil paintings on exhibition at the jewelry store of George F. Clow on Warren street. The paintings are attracting much attention." George F. Clow's jewelry store was located at 532 Warren Street, now the location of Mane Street.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Political Perennials

A few hours ago, Register-Star reporter Amanda Purcell posted on her Facebook page a press release she had apparently received from CEDC (Columbia Economic Development Corporation) announcing that Cappy Pierro, now of Taghkanic, has been elected chair of the Columbia County Industrial Development Agency (IDA) and the Capital Resource Corporation (CRC).

Pierro, who was Rick Scalera's longtime mayor's aide, has been serving on both those boards since June 2016. The other members of the IDA and CRC are Sidney Richter, Sarah Sterling, Robert Galluscio, Bill Gerlach, and Brian Keeler.  
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

The Magnificent Seven

On Sunday, Sam Pratt offered his analysis of the unusual situation Democrats in the 19th Congressional District find themselves: "NY-19 Dem Primary: Can anyone get a mandate?" Later on Sunday, at an event for Gareth Rhodes at Vincent Mulford Antiques, Mayor Rick Rector asked Rhodes when the candidates might start trying to distinguish themselves by criticizing the positions of others. Rhodes responded by saying, in effect, that was unlikely to happen, because whoever won in the primary on June 26 would need the support of everyone who had supported every other candidate to beat John Faso in November.

If the people who flocked to hear the candidates debate at Montgomery C. Smith last night expected to come away knowing which of the seven candidates they should vote for, it's more likely they left more confused than they were going in. All the candidates said what we want to hear about such things as protecting the environment, health care, gun control, immigration reform, income inequality--and any one of them would be a welcome alternative to John Faso. Listening to their answers to questions posed by the League of Women Voters and from the audience, it was hard to distinguish one candidate from the other or to discern if it was policy or presentation that impressed you. 

The segment of the debate Gossips found most illuminating was the "Challenge Round," or, as League of Women Voters moderator Barbara Bartoletti called it, "Secret Santa." Before the debate began, the seven candidates drew each other's names out of a hat. In the Challenge Round, each candidate could ask a question of the candidate whose name he or she had drawn. That person would have one minute to respond to the question. Then the candidate asking the question would have one minute to address the issue. The candidates asking the questions went in alphabetical order, and the questions they chose to ask their fellow candidates were interesting.

Jeff Beals asked Gareth Rhodes if he intended to vote for Andrew Cuomo or Cynthia Nixon in the gubernatorial primary. In responding, Rhodes mentioned reports that Nixon opposed the cap on property taxes (Nixon has recently denied that she opposes the tax cap) and then said he had been proud to work for the governor, first in an entry-level communications job and then as his traveling press secretary, and would vote for him. In his rebuttal, Beals spoke of the need for change, asserting, "Big money rules our politics."

Dave Clegg then asked Erin Collier about domestic violence and guns. In responding, Collier spoke of systemic gender inequality and the need to get NRA money out of politics. Clegg, in his rebuttal, declared his commitment to making sure guns are seized from anyone who commits an act of domestic violence.

Collier asked Antonio Delgado why he supported universal coverage rather than Medicare for all. Delgado essentially said he thought a plan that included a public option was more achievable. In her rebuttal, Collier spoke of the complication and added cost of having multiple options for health care coverage rather than single payer and argued that Medicare for all would be simpler to deal with and would lower costs.

Delgado asked Brian Flynn about criminal justice reform. In response, Flynn spoke of the legalization of marijuana and eliminating private prisons. In his rebuttal, Delgado spoke of the need for public defenders to be properly funded and for the makeup of police forces to reflect the communities they are policing and called for bail reform.

Flynn made the exercise a little egocentric when he asked Clegg what advice he would give him when he Flynn won the primary. In his advice, Clegg stressed the importance of campaign finance reform and asked Flynn what he would do about that. Flynn responded by saying that the candidates could refuse to take money from PACs and refuse to accept money from sources whose interests did not reflect the interests of the people of the 19th Congressional District. "When we go to Washington, we only work for you."

Rhodes asked Pat Ryan to name the top three issues facing the City of Hudson. Ryan cited only one, and one, despite the experience of last summer, that didn't seem to be all that Hudson specific: "the epidemic of gun violence." Rhodes had a different take, identifying as an important issue in Hudson the need for affordable housing at all income levels and concerns about gentrification.

In the final question of the "Challenge Round," Ryan, taking his cue from Flynn, asked Beals how he would make the case for Pat Ryan against John Faso. Beals used the question as an opportunity to talk about how they had both been in Mosul--Beals as a diplomat, Ryan as a soldier--and urged Ryan to stand up for that experience and what he witnessed in Iraq. In his response, Ryan urged the audience to "stand up for taking this country back from Donald Trump."

Dan Udell's video of the entire debate is now available on YouTube and can be viewed by clicking here.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

There's Gotta Be a Better Way

We've probably all witnessed tractor-trailers trying to make the turn at Warren Street and Park Place following Route 9 through the city, but today may have been the first time a truck pulling part of a pre-fab house has ever attempted it. You have to wonder why the driver's GPS didn't route this oversize load another way.

Thanks to Marie Balle, who took these pictures from the vantage point of LOOK's new location at 703 Warren Street.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

It Happened on Saturday

The Fishing Derby is an annual event in Hudson that may not be on everyone's radar, but it took place this past Saturday morning at Oakdale Lake. Nick Zachos, director of the Youth Department, provided Gossips with photographs and this report about the event:

The Annual Fishing Derby . . . was a truly great event. Several community members helped organize the event after hearing that the fishing derby might not happen this year. Wayne Williams, an employee of the Hudson City School District, and Hudson fire fighter Justin Elliot devoted countless hours over the past two months, planning and preparing for the derby. The results of this collaboration between the Youth Department and these wonderful community members were a clear success: 52 youth participated, catching a total of 71 fish, more than 60 prizes were handed out, and 7 youth went home with their first fishing rod and tackle box.

The Grand Prize winner was Hudson's very own Shaun Terry, age 11, who reeled in a 15-inch long rainbow trout that weighed a whopping 2 pounds 4 ounces. Shaun learned to fish over the past three weeks as a participant in the Youth Department's afternoon fishing program.

The Hudson Youth Department is looking at this event as an exciting model for future collaborations with local volunteers. The Youth Department is grateful to be a part of such an amazing and generous community. A full list of sponsors who made this event possible will be acknowledged at the June Common Council meeting.

 

COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Meetings of Interest in the Week Ahead

Tonight, Monday, June 4, the CD19 Candidate Debate takes place at Montgomery C. Smith Intermediate School, 102 Harry Howard Avenue, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Tickets to the event were free, but they are no longer available. If you don't have a ticket, you can email ccnydems@gmail.com to be put on the waiting list. 

Tuesday, June 5, the Conservation Advisory Council holds its monthly meeting at 6 p.m. at City Hall. Much of the agenda has to do with the Open Space and Natural Resources Inventory that the CAC has been working on since its inception, but there is one final agenda item that's intriguing: "Proposal regarding Oakdale Lake by Tamar Adler." I'm assuming that's the chef and food writer Tamar Adler.

Thursday, June 7, the beleaguered HDC (Hudson Development Corporation) board will hold a special meeting at 5:30 p.m., at 1 North Front Street. The subject of the meeting will be the redevelopment of the Kaz site. For anyone not up to speed on this issue, in April, community members raised a hue and cry that the project, which Gossips has been following since 2010, was moving too fast. In May, Common Council president Tom DePietro, who is ex officio a member of the HDC board, called the redevelopment of the Kaz site "a disconcerting process," alleged that the HDC board "called executive sessions with reckless abandon," and asked the city attorney to "look into how does one get rid of an LDC (local development corporation)." As a result of these demonstrations of no confidence, the project was "stalled" and three board members, as well as the board's attorney, resigned. Thursday's meeting promises to be both interesting and important.

Friday, June 8, the Historic Preservation Commission holds the first of its two monthly meetings at 10 a.m. at City Hall. No agenda is as yet available for the meeting, but it is likely that Jason O'Toole, representing the Galvan Foundation, will return with the proposals for a facade renovation at 364 Warren Street and for the exterior restoration of 356 Union Street.        
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Faso on Guns, School Safety, and Mental Health

Not long after I published a post announcing the panel discussion on gun laws, school safety, and mental health to take place on Friday, June 1, I got an email from a reader predicting that John Faso would be a no-show. That wasn't the case. Faso was there. Absent from the publicized lineup of panelists was Malcolm Nance, and added was Hudson High School senior Siddique Ahmed. The discussion was moderated by Glenn Geher, a professor of psychology at SUNY New Paltz. Dan Udell and Randall Martin were both there videotaping, and soon those interested will be able to watch the entire two hours, so this account will only touch upon some highlights.

Before the panelists were asked to respond to questions, each was asked to speak for four minutes. Faso used his time to mention he was a co-sponsor of House Bill 38, the "Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act"; point out that bump stocks were effectively outlawed after the Las Vegas shooting and automatic weapons had been illegal since the 1930s; complain about loopholes in background checks; assert the need to "pay most attention to the boys who commit crimes because of bullying and social estrangement"; declare his support for "money to assist schools to harden their facilities" and for "red flag laws" that would allow judges to remove guns from people who pose a threat to themselves or others.

When they got to the questions, it seemed the majority were meant for Faso. Responding to a question about the Second Amendment and its reference to a "well-regulated militia," Faso said he did not think the Second Amendment was outmoded and made reference to the majority opinion, written by Justice Antonin Scalia, in the 2008 Supreme Court case District of Columbia v. Heller. Faso concluded, "We can accommodate needs for safety without limiting the rights guaranteed by the Second Amendment." When asked about contributions he has received from the NRA (a reported $5,950 in 2016, $2,000 in 2017, and so far $3,000 in 2018), Faso called the question a red herring and maintained that his support for issues was not dependent on campaign contributions. When asked if he would stop accepting money from the NRA, the answer was "No."

When a student from Chatham High School reminded Faso that he had been quoted in the newspaper as saying their walkout in protest of school gun violence had been "a loss of valuable academic time" and asked how cowering in a closet during "active shooter drill" was not a loss of academic time, Faso told her she had taken his quote out of context. He didn't respond directly to the question but instead said he appreciated her activism and energy and would be happy to speak with her. When another student from a different school noted there had already been twenty school shootings in 2018 and asked what was being done about it, Faso, who had earlier characterized the polarization of the country as, "The left watches MSNBC and CNN, the right watches FOX," told the student that twenty was "a CNN number." He then went on to talk about the mental health issues of adolescent males.

When the question was raised of how other countries manage to avoid this kind of violence, Faso provided the information that the CDC (Center for Disease Control and Prevention) would no longer be barred, as apparently it has in the past, from studying the sources and causes of violence. He then returned to the theme of male adolescents and the sources of alienation of dissatisfaction. Barrett asserted that gun violence was not limited to mass shootings, citing suicides and kids getting shot on their way to school. Then, Geher, the moderator and a professor of psychology weighed in, saying he had just done a paper on the topic. He answered the question by explaining that, when mass shootings had occurred in Scotland and Australia, stringent gun control laws were enacted "within months," and there was "zero repetition."

The last person to ask a question of the panel was Dave Clegg, one of the seven Democrats vying to be the candidate who challenges Faso in November. His question was about House Rule 38, which he said was "one of the top priorities of the NRA" and would "drop the standards to the lowest common denominator." He went on to say that people with concealed carry permits from states with no background checks would be able to "conceal-carry into New York State." Clegg asked the two law enforcement officers on the panel--Chief Moore and Sheriff Bartlett--to comment on the possibility. Moore said he was "very dubious about how we can deal with this"; Bartlett concurred. Faso noted that Vermont had some of the most lax gun control laws in the country, but no one felt "imperiled by hordes of Vermonters coming into New York State--except maybe Bernie Sanders." Yesterday, Clegg posted the video of his exchange with Faso on his campaign website. 

Dan Udell's video of the entire two-hour discussion is now available on YouTube and can be viewed by clicking here. 
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Not to Be Missed

Photo: Ralph Gardner, Jr.

In his weekly commentary, broadcast earlier today on WAMC, Ralph Gardner, Jr., talks about the opening reception for Design Hudson, which took place last weekend at the Dr. Oliver Bronson House, and pays tribute to Timothy Dunleavy, who will forever be linked with the house in our memories: "A Rural Resident." One of the rooms at the Bronson House was decorated for the occasion by Steve Blutall, the current proprietor of Rural Residence, the shop created by Dunleavy in 1999, and featured a small portrait of Dunleavy in a gilded frame.

Early on in his commentary, Gardner explains the Bronson House is "the earliest extant example of the style known as Hudson River 'Bracketed'" and then confesses that he doesn't know what bracketed architecture is. I won't flatter myself to assume that Gardner ever reads The Gossips of Rivertown, but, should he, I will attempt a definition. What is called "Hudson River bracketed" is a picturesque style of architecture that originated with Alexander Jackson Davis, the architect famously associated with the Bronson House, and is characterized by projecting eaves with decorative brackets beneath. The photo below shows one of the brackets, embellished with an acorn drop, which were added when the eaves of the second floor roof were extended as part of Davis's "refitting" of the house in 1839.

Photo: Wikiwand

To learn more about A. J. Davis and the Bronson House, explore Peter Watson's Dr. Oliver Bronson House Day Book.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

The Great War: May 28,1918

This series of posts exploring life in Hudson during the First World War has twice told of Hudsonians suspected of being "pro-German." In April, we shared the story of C. H. Frese, a naturalized American citizen of German descent who owned a delicatessen at 421 Warren Street. Around the time the United States entered the war, rumors circulated about Frese and his family intimating that they were unpatriotic and disloyal to the country. In December, we told the story of George Stubits, an immigrant from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, who was jailed for failing to return a questionnaire to the local draft board. Today, we share another story about someone in Hudson being suspected of pro-German sentiments.

On May 28, 1918, the Columbia Republican reported the fate of Lewis Federigo Felix von Kobbe, who had been arrested in Hudson three months earlier. Gossips could find no report of von Kobbe's arrest in the newspapers when happened in February 1918, and a search on Ancestry.com turned up no information about him.

The news of von Kobbe's internment was reported in newspapers throughout the region. It was from a report in a Newburgh paper that we learned he had been arrested, for failing to report a change of address, by Chief John Cruise, who a few years later, in 1922, would be charged with and convicted of dereliction of duty for allowing "the sale of intoxicants and prostitution" to exist in Hudson.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

A Sign of Change

The state budget passed in April 2017 included a plan to raise the age of criminal responsibility in New York from 16 to 18. No longer would 16- and 17-year-olds be tried in criminal court. Instead they would be tried in family court. Reporting on this at the time, Gossips wondered what impact raising the age of criminal responsibility might have on the Hudson Correctional Facility, which, in August 2016, had become a facility exclusively for the incarceration of 16- and 17-year-olds of both genders who had been tried as adults.

Today, we have a public manifestation of the answer. A new sign was erected on Worth Avenue this morning, near the entrance to what used to be known as the Hudson Correctional Facility.

Photo: Richard Wallace

COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Thanks to Richard Wallace for bringing this to our attention

Flag Day 2018

On June 14, 1777, the combination of stars and stripes and the colors red, white, and blue, stitched together, according to legend, by Betsy Ross, was adopted by resolution of the Second Continental Congress as our national flag. It wasn't until more than a century later, in 1885, that it occurred to anyone to celebrate the day. It was a schoolteacher in Fredonia, Wisconsin, who first had the idea of having students observe what was then called "Flag Birthday." Now, more than a hundred and thirty years after those simple "patriotic exercises" involving schoolchildren, we in Hudson celebrate Flag Day with a daylong revel on the Saturday closest to June 14, which begins with a ceremony in the morning and ends with fireworks at night, with a parade and a carnival in between.

Today, just nine days before the event, the Register-Star reports that the Flag Day celebration is $5,000 short of the $47,000 required to stage the celebration: "Flag Day Committee calls on support from local community." In the past, Flag Day regularly received $3,000 or more from the $20,000 allocated in the city budget to support events and festivals. This year, because the Arts, Entertainment & Tourism Committee was abolished at the beginning of the year, and it took four months to decide if and how the $20,000 would be distributed, applications for a share of that money aren't due until June 15, a week after the Flag Day celebration happens, and decisions won't be made until Tuesday, June 26. The Flag Day Committee would certainly be in a better position in meeting its budget if the Common Council had made and announced its awards in a more timely manner.

On the topic of Flag Day, you can get a head start on Saturday's festivities on Thursday, June 7, by attending a presentation by the Hudson Elk's Lodge 787 at the Hudson Area Library called "Know Your Flag: History of the American Flag & Flag Day." 

Photo: Carmine Ciancetti Collection, Hudson Area Library History Room

The event will feature a display of American flags throughout history, information on how to care for, display, and dispose of a flag, instructions in proper flag folding techniques, vintage photographs of Flag Day parades in Hudson, and a special American flag cake.

The event takes place from 6 to 7:30 p.m. at the Hudson Area Library, 51 North Fifth Street. It is free and open to the public.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Feeding the Donkey

A rather eccentric and folksy professor of mine in undergraduate school used to say, "It's too late to feed the donkey at the bottom of the hill." His reference was to cramming for exams, but the metaphor works as well for preparing to cast an informed vote. If you're a Democrat still trying to educate yourself about the seven candidates vying to be the Democrat who will challenge John Faso in November, there are two good chances to feed your donkey coming up.

Today, from 1 to 2:30 p.m., WAMC is hosting a live debate among the seven candidates.

The debate will be broadcast live on WAMC, and if you listen online, you can also see a live video of the event.

On Monday, June 4, the seven candidates will be at Montgomery C. Smith Intermediate School right here in Hudson for a debate presented by the League of Women Voters.

This debate takes place from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. The event is free, but tickets are required. Click here to get your ticket and secure your spot.

The primary takes place on Tuesday, June 26--just a little more than three weeks from now. If you are not registered to vote, tomorrow, June 1, is the last day to register in order to vote in the primary on June 26. Also, to vote in this primary, you must be a registered Democrat.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Locavore's Delight

Didn't make it to the Hudson Farmers Market on Saturday? Didn't buy enough to get you through the week? You are in luck! The Upstreet Market opens for the season tomorrow, Wednesday, May 30.  

Tomorrow and every Wednesday through early October, the vendors of the Upstreet Market will be in the Public Square (a.k.a. Seventh Street Park) from 4 to 7 p.m., with local produce, meats, specialty foods, and more. So, eschew the supermarket, celebrate the bounty of our region, and support our local growers and makers.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK

Gun Laws, School Safety, and Mental Health

The press release announcing a panel discussion to take place on Friday, June 1, in the Hudson High School auditorium begins: "The national gun debate has only increased in pitch since the February 14 Parkland Florida school shooting." Because there is no mention of the May 18 attack at Santa Fe High School in Texas, which according to news accounts was the seventeenth school shooting since Parkland, we can only imagine that the press release was drafted before the Santa Fe shooting, which took ten lives, entered the national conversion.

The event planned for Friday here in Hudson, organized by former Fourth Ward supervisor William Hughes and HCSD superintendent Maria Suttmeier, is described as a "wide-ranging panel discussion about gun safety, mental health, and school safety legislation." Panel members represent "the entire spectrum of positions--from NRA-aligned to community health organizations." Those members include:

Congressman John Faso, who has a lifetime "A" rating from the NRA  

Assemblymember Didi Barrett

Malcolm Nance, author and media commentator on terrorism and intelligence

David Bartlett, Columbia County sheriff

Michael Cole, director of community services, Columbia County Department of Human Services

Maria Suttmeier, superintendent, Hudson City School District

Mike Needham, safety engineer at Needham Risk Management

Edward Moore, chief of the Hudson Police Department

The press release assures us that all members of the community are welcome, the conversation will be civil and productive, and the event will be gun-free. Admission is free, but attendees are required to have tickets, which can be secured by clicking here. People are encouraged to submit questions for the panel in advance by emailing them to Hughes. 

The panel discussion takes place this Friday, June 1, from 6 to 8 p.m. in the auditorium at Hudson High School, 215 Harry Howard Avenue.
COPYRIGHT 2018 CAROLE OSTERINK