Public Hearing to transfer city property to Kingston Land Development Corporation for Kingstonian developers on February 25.

WHAT
A public hearing on a transfer of city-owned property that is currently used as a municipal parking lot at 21 N. Front Street to the Kingstonian Local Development Corporation (KLDC)

WHERE
Call: 646/558-8656
Meeting ID: 832 7922 5917
Passcode: 01295278
Watch live on the City of Kingston’s YouTube channel

Anyone wishing to speak or to submit a written comment can email City Clerk Elisa Tinti at emtinti@kingston-ny.gov (by 3pm on 2/25)

WHEN
Thursday, February 25th at 6:30pm

WHY
The Mayor of Kingston has requested that the Kingston Common Council transfer a city owned property to the Kingston Local Development Corporation to give to the Kingstonian project developers for their luxury housing and boutique hotel project in Uptown, Kingston.

The Kingston Common Council’s Finance Committee will hold a public hearing on Thursday, February 25 at 6:30pm regarding a proposed transfer of city-owned property that is currently being used as a municipal parking lot and public park at 21 N. Front Street to the Kingston Local Development Corp (KLDC). The transfer would allow the KLDC to facilitate the property’s use as part of the Kingstonian, a proposed luxury housing and boutique hotel project in Kingston’s historic stockade district in Uptown, Kingston. 

The public can provide testimony for the record that evening as to whether or not they have concerns about the city transferring a piece of public land currently being used for a municipal parking lot and public park to a luxury developer who has already secured tens of millions of dollars of public subsidies. It is unclear whether or not the city intends to sell the parcel or to provide it to the developers for free. Following the public hearing, the Finance Committee will vote during a special Finance Committee meeting on Monday, March 1st at 6:30pm prior to the council’s caucus at 7:00pm. It will likely move out of committee and onto the floor for a full council vote the following day on Tuesday, March 2 at 7:00pm

Thanks to a LETTER submitted by Victoria Polidoro on February 10, the attorney representing several Uptown Kingston building owners, please consider the following concerns in your testimony that she identified:

1. The 21 N. Front Street property is currently used as both a public parking lot and public park. In order for the City to transfer the parcel to the Kingston Local Development Corporation (KLDC), it must first find that the property is not needed for its current public purpose.

2. Regardless, as it pertains to the public park, Not-for-Profit Corporation Law prohibits the City from conveying any land that is “inalienable as a forest preserve or a parkland.” The issue of whether the Park constitutes inalienable parkland is currently pending before the Ulster County Supreme Court and any action to convey the Property before this issue is decided would open the City to further legal action.

3. It is apparent that the City is seeking to convey the Property to the KLDC in order to do what it is otherwise prohibited from doing, conveying a city-owned parking lot to a private developer for free. The City must fulfill its obligations to its taxpayers and negotiate a fair price for the Property. In doing so it would require, at minimum, an appraisal of the fair market value of the Property. The City has assessed the Property at $724,000 and its fair market value is likely significantly higher since the pandemic has caused Ulster County to have the fastest rising property values in the Country.

4. Given that the Project will actually reduce publicly available parking and frustrate the Property’s public purposes, the City cannot justifiably claim that the conveyance of the Property will be paid back in the form of public benefits. Moreover, any alleged public benefits have already been presented by the developers as the basis for grants and PILOTs worth tens of millions of dollars and zoning amendments custom-tailored to allow the Kingstonian. 

If permitted, this conveyance would result in the elimination of an existing public parking lot and the construction of an inadequate replacement of those parking spaces in the form of a private parking garage. After everything the City and its residents have given and will give up to indulge the Kingstonian, the City must ensure that it receives fair compensation before handing over City-owned, publicly-utilized Property to private developers.

Next up. The closure of Fair Street Extension in Uptown Kingston for the Kingstonian project will be next on the Kingston Common Council’s list of giveaways. According to city code Chapter 355 Streets and Sidewalks, in Article XIII Procedures for Disposing of Certain Streets unlike the municipal parking lot being transferred to the KLDC, the council will need to approve the “sale” of the street. That is, unless the Mayor and his lawyers find a clever way to work around the language in the code. There has never been a more willing council.

RESOURCES

VIEW “Finance Committee Discusses Transfer of 21 N. Front Street to Kingston Local Development Corporation (KLDC) on February 10” (KingstonCitizens.org)