Kingston Board of Ethics Lacks Quorum For Several Months. Apply to Volunteer

By Rebecca Martin

In the City of Kingston, there are 25 committees, boards and commissions that provide opportunities for community members to serve on a range of topics. They include planning, zoning, water, the environment, fire, policing and – ethics.  One of the historical challenges with the appointments, however, has been a lack of transparency in the process overall, and particularly pertaining to appointment selection.

Kingston’s Charter allows for the Mayor to make all appointments without oversight.  To tip the scales further towards the executive branch, those appointments are guided by corporation counsel and, at times, City department heads – most of whom serve at the pleasure of the Mayor. We have witnessed the challenges that members have faced when seeking independence as a body in their decision making. Removal of members of the Historic Landmarks Preservation Commission in April of 2019

Early in Mayor Noble’s first term, he created an online application for attracting and recruiting volunteers for Kingston’s boards, commissions and committees. “All individuals interested in serving on a board, commission and/or committee must complete an application and submit it to the Mayor’s office for review. This information will be used in determining which individuals are best suited to serve, based on their qualifications, backgrounds, skills and interests. The purpose of this application process was to enable the City to recruit individuals who have a strong desire and ability to serve, but who may not have had the opportunity before.” 

Although the on-line application was a new approach, and intended to bring some clarity to a murky process, it didn’t address the lack of oversight to appointments.  It also lacks fundamental information and policies such as what vacancies there are, how many terms one can serve, what expertise the City might be looking for, the official response or response time to expect, what the renewal or removal process is or how many terms a community member is able to serve. 

Over the years, we have heard administrations complain of a lack of volunteers to choose from. But with the gaps illustrated above, it should come as no surprise.  We have also heard our current Mayor say that the City has an abundance of volunteers eager to serve and yet, vacancies remain. 

The most recent list of appointments show that some members of the community serve on multiple boards, committees and commissions and, although it lists term expirations, it does not provide information on how long the members have served.  We are aware that there are community members who have served for decades in the same seat (several of the Water Board members is a case in point). It illustrates that even the “updated” process maintains the status quo. 

As of February 2020, the Ethics Board had a vacancy to fill and terms expiring. The board has struggled to maintain a quorum and the last time they met was on March 3 (over three months ago).  As far as we can tell, the minutes from that meeting are still not posted on the City’s website even though the Committee on Open Government states that ”…minutes of meetings of all public bodies shall be available to the public in accordance with the provisions of the freedom of information law within two weeks from the date of such meeting”   In the case of membership missing consecutive meetings, what is the number of allowed absences before they are removed and replaced by a more readily available member of the community? 

According to the Charter, the Board of Ethics for the City of Kingston, “…shall consist of five members…The Corporation Counsel, or Assistant Corporation Counsel in his or her stead, shall serve as counsel to the Board of Ethics. In the event the Corporation Counsel identifies a conflict of interest, or a conflict of interest is identified in writing by the Board of Ethics, outside counsel shall be secured for the Board. There will be a budget line established and maintained for outside counsel in an amount of at least $10,000. Written retainer agreements shall be required for retention of services of outside counsel. Such retainer agreements shall be subject to the approval by the Mayor of the City of Kingston. In the event that the matter involves the Mayor or a member of his family or household as those terms are defined above, the Alderman at Large shall act in the Mayor’s place.”

Now is a good time to help the Board of Ethics meet its monthly quorum.  If you live in the City of Kingston, do not hold office in a political party or elective office in the city and are interested in assuring that Kingston’s elected and appointed officials are maintaining their responsibility to uphold the public trust, please apply (and request a response).

APPLY NOW

RESOURCES
Ethics board Rules and Regulations 

KingstonCitizens.org Request UCRRA to Remove BioHiTech Facility in Local Solid Waste Plan for Ulster County

By Rebecca Martin

On Monday, June 29 at noon, the Ulster County Recovery Resource Authority (UCRRA) will hold their monthly meeting. We have provided the following pubic comment.

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Dear Members of the UCRRA Board,

We wish to commend you for your hard efforts in creating a Local Solid Waste Plan for Ulster County.  From our early conversations with professionals, Ulster County and specifically UCRRA is seen as a leader on managing solid waste. 

However, in regard to the BioMass section of your document (page 111-112), we request that the board consider a resolution to remove the BioHiTech facility in Ulster County from its plan.  

Recently, we have learned about BioHiTech, a “Municipal Solid Waste Processing Facility” with a project that is now online in West Virginia and another currently under scrutiny in the City of Rensselaer. 

The proposed facility in the City of Rensselaer initially referred to itself as a “composting facility” in its Environmental Assessment Form for SEQR. Far from it.  As we understand it, this “emerging technology” produces Refuse-derived Fuel (RDF) by first collecting municipal waste. After removing any valuable metals, the plastic and fibers are dried and shredded into confetti.  They are then trucked away to cement plants where it is incinerated to supplement coal in creating energy. The remaining waste is dumped in unnamed landfills or garbage incinerators.

With a population of 9300 residents, the City of Rensselaer community is already shouldering four polluting facilities (a nearby massive asphalt receiving facility, the Rensselaer Cogeneration gas-fired power plant, a major Amtrak hub and the Dunn Construction and Demolition debris landfill (situated next to a pre-K to 12 public school) and across the river, Global oil terminal). “The proposed BioHiTech facility project, situated near a DEC potential environmental justice area, would be built on top of a capped toxic waste site, the former BASF property, where existing contamination affects the soil, groundwater, and nearby Hudson River.  It would accept constant shipments of municipal garbage. Trucks would make about 82 trips in and out of the facility every day, according to the applicant.” This would be tragic for Rensselaer.

So it is of great concern to us that in UCRRA’s most recent plan, it calls to contract a consulting firm to evaluate the possibility of permitting and constructing a local landfill or a BioHiTech Facility within Ulster County.

In section 7.11 Technology Selection, it says, “..three technologies have been selected to pursue in the 10-year planning period. Feasibility studies for siting a local landfill, installing a BioHiTech (biomass) Facility, and waste exportation by railroad will be conducted”

To be clear, we understand that to date, UCRRA has not included incineration as a solution to municipal solid waste within Ulster County. That’s wise given the history of environmental advocacy here, as the outcry would be fierce. Let it be known that we also do not support Ulster County engaging in incineration anywhere. 

On page 74, section 5.2.9 Local Environmental Justice it says,. “Environmental justice means the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. Fair treatment means that no group of people, including a racial, ethnic, or socioeconomic group, should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences resulting from industrial, municipal, and commercial operations or the execution of federal, state, local, and tribal programs and policies. Environmental justice, under the NYSDEC Policy 29 aims to enhance public participation and the review of environmental impacts from proposed construction of facilities in environmental justice communities, and to reduce disproportionate environmental impacts in overburdened communities.” 

If UCRRA is indeed concerned about Environmental Justice communities in Ulster County, then it should also be concerned in its role to potentially exploit communities outside of Ulster County, those who would bear the brunt of our shipment of shredded plastics and fiber for incineration. We encourage you to think hard about how you would feel if you and your family were living near an incinerator burning waste in general, and then the waste of those from another state. 

For all of these reasons, we request that the UCRRA board consider passing a resolution to remove BioHiTech from its current Local Solid Waste Management plan as a potential future option in Ulster County.

In addition, we sought advice from Neil Seldman and made a small donation to the Institute for Local Self-Reliance to review UCRRA’s 2011 and 2020 Local Solid Waste Plans and provide a memorandum to outline the pros and cons for Ulster County. All incineration plans are stated as “a very bad idea.”  He goes on to say that he “will not comment on this very outdated 20th century technology.” Most, if not all of us, are aware of Seldman’s work and hold him in high esteem. We are submitting the memorandum as an attachment to our public comment. 

RESOURCES

READ: Ulster County Resource Recovery Agency Local Solid Waste Management Plan

READ: Institute for Self Reliance Memorandum on Ulster County Local Solid Waste Plan

READ: Riverkeeper Opposes Waste Facility on the Hudson River in Rensselaer

Kingston Council Laws and Rules Committee Continue to Discuss the Executive Branch’s Decision to not Enforce “Building/Zoning” Law

By Rebecca Martin

In April, community members impacted by the proposed Irish Cultural Center (ICC) located at 32 Abeel Street in the Rondout co-authored a letter to the Common Council Laws and Rules Committee ostensibly asking, “Why does the City of Kingston have laws on its books that it won’t enforce?”   The letter was referring to a recent decision by the Building Safety and Code Enforcement Department guided by the Executive Branch’s Corporation Counsel in the City of Kingston, where it was determined that the ICC’s expired permit (the third since 2011) would not be upheld due to the city not having found  “… an instance of its usage” and that it would be “unfair to arbitrarily enforce said article by invalidating (the ICC’s) building permit.”

The Laws and Rules Committee took up the question at its May meeting where they decided to send an inquiry to the Director of Building Safety and Code Enforcement.  In an email, Chairman of the Council’s Laws & Rules Committee and Ward 1 Alderman Jeffrey Ventura-Morrell asked, “In your letter to the developers, you mentioned that you found no previous instance of its (the article’s) enforcement and therefore you determined that it would be unfair and arbitrary to enforce it in this instance. Can you please expand on why you reached that conclusion?”

The Director replied, “Following a review of a number of files, conversations with current staff and speaking with former inspectors, no one could remember an instance when a permit had been invalidated for this reason. Building Safety issued 1350 permits last year and we have no mechanism to alert us when each permit has reached the six months’ revocation limit. The recognition of a permit’s potential invalidation date is only the first step in the process. An actual inspection of the premises would be needed to verify the presence or absence of construction work. I am of the belief that this code, if strictly enforced, would overwhelm the capacity of the department and frankly is not necessary.”

What is notable here is that the Building Safety, with guidance from the Executive Branch’s Corporation Counsel, provided two explanations.  In his letter dated March 10 to the ICC, the law would not be upheld because the city hadn’t used it before and concluded that it would be unfair to the applicant if it were enforced.  In the June 2 reaction to the chair of the Laws and Rules Committee’s inquiry, the reason was because of a lack of mechanism to alert his department of the six month expiration for each permit that they have approved. 

It’s problematic for Kingston going forward, as enforcement of the law is critical. If the law is flawed, then it should be reformed.  Additionally, in the 21st century, technology must exist to provide a ‘mechanism’ that would allow the City of Kingston Building Department to assure compliance of all of its 1,350 approved building permits. (Note to City: Check out Airtable)

The City of Kingston’s Common Council Laws & Rules Committee will continue the discussion “Building / Zoning Laws” during their remote meeting on Wednesday, June 17th at 6:30pm.

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