Mayor Shayne Gallo. (Photo: Dan Barton)
Later the sheriff spoke to the future. “It’s encouraging to see so many young people speaking tonight,” he said, and it was. “We’ve heard enough from old people like Dr. Nolan.” Dr. Kathy Nolan is Van Blarcum’s Shandaken neighbor and good friend, a pediatrician and ardent advocate for all good things.
“I just turned 60,” she chuckled afterwards. “He must have known it was my birthday.”
Kingston Mayor Shayne Gallo has announced that he and Hein were working on a plan to develop the former Uptown parking garage site. If so, maybe he shouldn’t refer to the city parking lot where the parking garage used to be as “the crater.”
Condolences to the family of former Saugerties councilwoman Marie Post, who gave so much to her community over a long lifetime. Left unmentioned in well-deserved eulogies was that one of her sons, Democrat Ken Post, is a former sheriff of Ulster County.
Mother Post, a Republican committeewoman during her son’s single term in office, had a brief conflict with the sheriff. Post’s predecessor, Republican Tom Mayone of Saugerties, had given out official sheriff’s badges to every Republican committee member. Democrat Sheriff Post met some resistance when he called them in. In the interests of family peace, Mom complied.
Conventional wisdom would render educator Gerry Benjamin of New Paltz an underdog for appointment to the state Regents against an incumbent from Brooklyn. Not to sound the homer, but the old (age 69) professor, with solid upstate support and friends in high places, might surprise the currently divided city faction.
RE the CMRR lease, the cash rent is based on a percentage of gross revenues (starting at 1% initially and rising to the current 5%) minus the cost of rehabilitating at least 1 mile of track per year to Class 1 standards… it is not based on net revenue as mentioned in the editorial.
Currently CMRR is about 18 miles shy of meeting their “mile per year” of track rehabilitation. This despite the fact that there is plenty of trackage available that was not storm damaged. This deficit is clearly a result of their management decisions…
it doesnt say that and you know it. quit throwing false statements around to fool the public into thinking the railroad is not complying with the terms of the rent agreement
Folks can get a copy of the lease for themselves and read it… they will find that what I wrote is true. The Daily Freeman had the complete lease posted on-line. Not sure about the Kingston Times???
this is what it says exactly….”and there shall be deducted from the gross revenue,………the amount of the ACTUAL CAPITAL INVESTMENTS made by the lessee”. so you can see ALL the capital investments can be taken off includint the cost of rehabilitating the one mile. this is the net revenue in no uncertain terms. by the way please dont respond to this post as i can not converse with you anymore because of your negative comments and attitude. i am done with you and your kind.
The Capital Investments made by CMRR are minimal… a couple “train stations” with ticket booths and platforms, and a parking area at Mt Tremper are about all that are in evidence.
The track and bridge maintenance required per the lease terms do not constitute capital investments and are not deductible from the gross revenue (nor are things like rolling stock expenses, fuel to run the trains and maintenance carts, etc.) At that, the rail inspection report shows CMRR has only completed 20% of the track maintenance they are liable for under the lease.
I understand that being held accountable is not a pleasant thing but CMRR needs to be held accountable. They are so far out of compliance with the terms of the lease that there is about a zero percent chance that they will be certified as a qualified bidder for the coming RFP. As such CMRR will not be the rail vendor for Ulster County come 12:01 PM May 31, 2016 anyway and they need to develop an exit strategy.
Gotta love Ronk’s comment:
“I’m not picking sides,” he said, “but if I were, I think the trail people are being more reasonable.”
Sure appears to me that he has chosen a side.
Kevin wants to die in office. That’s what Kevin wants. And he wants to live to 100 in the process. Not much different from what Hein wants….