In the news

Residents opposed to DSS move continue to push for 'Plan B'
by Jamie Larson
Register-Star
Apr. 15, 2009

HUDSON — Concerned Hudson citizens and officials came together Tuesday night to discuss their opposition to the Columbia County Board of Supervisors’ plan to move the Department of Social Services from Hudson to the old Ockawamick school in Claverack. Meeting at the First Presbyterian Church on Warren Street in Hudson, the group listened as Mayor Richard Scalera broke down the details of his “Plan B,” which would see the department remain in Hudson under the roof of a newly constructed 40,000-square-foot building on the corner of Columbia and Fourth streets with a three-story parking garage.

A detailed discussion of the DSS issue was lead by political activist and co-owner of Time and Space Limited Linda Mussmann and the mayor, and saw residents from Hudson, Claverack and elsewhere raising their voices and even singing in opposition to the move. The meeting was also attended by many Hudson politicians, as well of Supervisor Thomas Dias, R-Ancram, who voted in favor of the Ockawamick move, and said he was there with an open mind but feels it is probably too late to consider new options.

Scalera said these are frustrating times for Hudson and the citizens who want to keep DSS in the city. He says that instead of giving Hudson officials a seat at the table to discuss options to keep DSS in the county seat, he and others have been shut out. Scalera was put on a county sub-committee to evaluate options for the move early on in the process, but says when he was told that none of those options included keeping the office in Hudson, he left, not wanting to be a part of any body that wouldn’t entertain a Hudson location.

According to the mayor, Board of Supervisors Chairman Art Baer asked Scalera to “do his homework” on a Hudson plan that would work. While Scalera now has that plan he feels the county had its mind made up on the move and it didn’t matter what he said. “No way it’s my responsibility,” the mayor said, “The county should have done their diligence. We’re talking about fairness.”

Baer says, contrary to Scalera’s assertion, he has evaluated Plan B and it doesn’t hold water. He says the structure Scalera proposes is a “vanilla building,” just a shell, and its cost will increase once they start building and realize what additional supplies they need.

Scalera says this isn’t so. He says while the county got its supply and square-footage numbers for Ockawamick out of an architectural digest, he got his straight from contractors based on materials they use. He also said he thinks the supervisors are underestimating the cost of Ockawamick’s remediation, as it has a number of serious issues including asbestos and oil contamination in the well.

The Ockawamick plan is slated to cost the county $16.7 million, plus the cost of a bus to shuttle Hudson residents to the old school and a possible satellite office in Hudson. The specifics of the transportation plan and satellite have not been finalized.

The cost of plan B breaks down like this, according to Scalera: Developers estimate the DSS building will cost $175 per square-foot — that’s $7 million for the 40,000-square-foot building. The 200-lot garage will cost $3.4 million. The mayor estimates land acquisition to cost $600,000, bringing the total to $11 million. Scalera says this sounds like a lot of money, because it is, but it is less than the current plan. Also it is his belief that the shuttle bus plan will cost the county $6,046,000 over 35 years, taking inflation into account, and his plan would save all that extra money.

Scalera also took exception to a statement made by Baer last week to the Register-Star, when the chairman said if his constituents were in Hudson, and he were up for re-election this year, he would probably be saying the same things as the mayor. “Chairman,” Scalera said, “if you lived in Hudson you’d have a better understanding of what it means to struggle.”

Though tempers have flared numerous times around the issue, officials stressed they wanted to make Plan B as available to the supervisors as possible. After Tuesday night’s meeting the mayor said he was encouraged by Dias' presence at the meeting and hopes that others will follow. Dias said he never considered Plan B when he voted for the move because it “wasn’t on the menu,” saying had it been, he would have looked at the numbers. Scalera said that Dias, who has only been a supervisor a year and a half, didn’t see it because Plan B was deliberately omitted from consideration because the county had already purchased Ockawamick and needed to find something to do with it.

Those opposed to the plan say taking such a vital office — DSS — which services the most needy members of society, six miles out of the area with the most need is a mistake. Residents are concerned about the stress that shuttle buses would put on citizens who use the office almost every day. Around 60 percent of people who use the DSS office are from Hudson and Greenport. “[Baer] called [Ockawamick] the geographic heart of the county,” Scalera said, “it makes no sense when Hudson is the demographic heart of the county.”

Residents and officials then spoke for more than an hour about what they could realistically do to change supervisors’ minds about DSS. Many applauded Dias for his willingness to appear, even if his mind wasn’t changed and called for residents to pound on the doors of their supervisors to demand they at least listen to Plan B. They put a particular emphasis on reaching out to Claverack politicians, to secure opposition at both ends of the move. Claverack citizens in attendance all said that they don’t want the office there either and that they are going to fight to keep it out as hard as Hudson will fight to keep it in.

Attendees were also treated to a puppet show by TSL co-owner Claudia Bruce, which comically depicted the plight of Plan B as it was rejected by the Board of Supervisors. In the quick show, Baer was depicted as a blue chair and Supervisor Doug McGivney, D-Kinderhook, was portrayed as a rat.