Hugh Reynolds: Monday night politics

The columnist Reynolds.

From time to time there comes a call to eliminate the office altogether. Most legislative bodies elect their own leaders.

Seldom are incumbents seriously challenged; they usually lead the ticket. But when they are, things get shook up. Ingarra, a young lawyer at the time, came from nowhere to unseat the first Gallo. Keith Haviland was here and gone in four years, but surprised McGrane on Election Day.

Noble, given his cakewalks to election some years, has reason to be confident in his primary race against retiring 12-term county Legislator Jeanette Provenzano. But then, no alderman-at-large has ever been challenged in a party primary, where funny things can happen.

Turnout is always a factor but it’s who turns out that counts. The 2011 mayoral primary between Gallo and Hayes Clement was hotly contested, luring almost 30 percent (twice the normal primary participation) of Kingston’s 4,900 enrolled Democrats to the polls. The contest for alderman-at-large (and mayor and other offices) will be waged on a Thursday. As such, turnout may approach 20 percent or about 500 voters. Somebody can be elected alderman-at-large — there is no Republican candidate — with as few as 250 votes. I suspect each candidate has that many names on speed-dial.

It would appear that under-the-radar Noble is hearing footsteps. How else to explain the hastily called and quickly abandonded plan to host a public meeting on the long-running rail and trail controversy? It was meant to showcase Noble as a leader” even though he didn’t take a stand. In any event, the county legislature, with Provenzano voting in the affirmative, passed that buck to another study committee last spring.

Weary dismissals notwithstanding, nepotism concerns remain. Obviously reacting to same, the Nobles have been careful to keep their respective candidacies separate. I note Noble-for-mayor lawn signs on one side of front yards, with Noble-for-alderman-at-large on the other. Gallo and Provenzano, recently allied for this race, are joined in purpose, at least in terms of lawn signs. That synergy alone could make a difference in a close election.

This just in

There’s only one word to describe the conversion of the former Sophie Finn Elementary School to an adjunct campus of SUNY Ulster: Boffo!

Lace panties

This has absolutely no connection to with any other subject at hand, but I can’t but help remember the late, great radio editorialist Harry Thayer raving about “lace-panty justice” when I toured RUPCO’s Lace Mill housing project in Midtown Kingston last week. Harry’s rants practically set the courthouse on fire. You could see the smoke rising after his “Editorials of the Air.” One angry lawyer, in an appeals brief, referred to Thayer by name as “a braying ass.”

Other than the common reference to lace, my memories of Harry Thayer don’t have much to do with last week’s opening of the Lace Mill project. It has been only mildly controversial, much less so than a housing project for low-income persons in Woodstock was. Despite all the hubbub from the liberal art colony, Woodstock Commons seems to have worked out pretty well.

In Kingston, RUPCO took a long-abandoned factory hard by railroad tracks and in less than two years of heavy construction converted it into 55 apartments and gallery space for artists. The apartments, which range in monthly rent from $576 for a large studio to (one) three-bedroom spread for $1,040, are open and airy. They retain the industrial look of the original. RUPCO will not supply earplugs for the nearby freight trains that run through the night.

Designers took pains to preserve the building’s industrial look, including railroad tracks that ran into the building to feed coal to two massive boilers. Once the home of one of the largest lace-manufacturing facilities in the country, period photos show huge spaces with women in white blouses working over material, male foremen ever at the watch. It could not have been a pleasant place to labor, especially without air-conditioning in summer. They didn’t call those Midtown factories “sweat shops” for nothing.

And yet they are fondly remembered for providing employment for hundreds of families for more than five decades in Kingston’s industrial age. To its credit, RUPCO respected that heritage in its reconstruction of this historic building — unlike in Rondout where Urban Renewal wrecking balls knocked down everything in sight some 50 years ago.

Lace Mill cost about $18 million with the bulk of financing derived from selling tax credits to J.P. Morgan. That works out to almost $325,000 per unit, which as a single-family home would be pretty impressive for Kingston. RUPCO will pay $55,000 a year in taxes under a pilot agreement with the city.

RUPCO CEO Kevin O’Connor. (Photo: Phyllis McCabe)

The old brick building is chock full of modern renovations, the kind those women doing piece work in mid-summer would have appreciated. It’s innovative heating and air-conditioning system recirculates water from large tanks to maintain temperatures at the desired level. “It’s a lot cheaper to heat water than air,” explained RUPCO CEO Kevin O’Connor.

It’s obvious that a great deal of thought and planning went into what O’Connor called “a very complex project.” Setting up public galleries for resident artists was one of the more imaginative ideas.

RUPCO, which some suggest has too much low-income rental property in Kingston despite the demonstrated demand, is not done yet. Plans are under way to convert a former bowling across Broadway into affordable housing. With the Lace Mill as an example of innovative reconstruction, it should be a welcome addition.

Here and there

Congressman Chris Gibson‘s announcement that 55 percent of his Facebook friends agree with his decision to oppose the proposed treaty with Iran isn’t all that impressive, given the source. Gibson, who won’t seek a fourth term next year, is working the grass roots, however. He honored the late Esopus town supervisor John Coutant with a statement in the Congressional Record last month. Coutant, 69, one of the town’s more popular leaders, died in June.

Supporters of the Catskill Mountain Railroad have cast their lot with Republican Terry Bernardo, no doubt sealing their doom come next May. But what choice did they have?

While few agreed, they might have endorsed arch-enemy Mike Hein, who after spending hundreds of thousands in taxpayer monies on legal fees to fight the railroad, might have been persuaded to give these homegrown volunteers at least a fair hearing when the railroad operation goes up for bid after its lease with the county expires next spring.

That train has left the station.