Did The Owner of 458 Union Request A New Taxpayer-Funded Sidewalk AND DRIVEWAY? Or Did They Demand Them Both?

It was suspicious enough that the Public Works Board determined months ago that the relatively decent, not-at-all dangerous 120 feet of sidewalk along the South 5th side of 458 Union was in need of replacement as part of the taxpayer-funded Sidewalk Improvement District project (which began in earnest last week).  Add to that the fact that, according to public records, our Common Council "president," Margaret Morris, owns 458 Union Street.  And now that Morris's lengthy sidewalk has been replaced with taxpayer funds, not solely her own, we can plant another red flag into what only points to an elected city official who continues to confound with her bizarre behavior, bad optics, and questionable motives.  It never seems to end with her.

Rejoice, For Our Prodigal Son Hath Returned. Again! And Just In Time For Helloween!

Do Our New Sidewalks Come With A Warranty? Does The Public Works Board Know What It Is Doing?

In case you haven't noticed it over the past few days, the first of the Public Works Board's six sidewalks of varying lengths "slated for replacement" was completed this past week.  Hoorah! The SID project is off and running!  South 5th from Warren to Union got new concrete on Wednesday and was reopened on Friday thanks to the low bidder for this year's portion of the slow-going, taxpayer funded Sidewalk Improvement District (SID) project, Frank Vosburgh & Sons, Inc., an excavating contractor based in Rhinebeck.  Vosburgh outbid 4 other contractors vying for the project, and by quite a bit.  Their bid of $349,000 was $207,000 lower than the next highest bidder, Luizzi (!!!!) and $500,000 (half a mil!) lower than the highest bidder, a contractor by the name of RAJ Contractors that appears to be based a few miles away in the New York City borough of Brooklyn.  As HUDseen pointed out last summer when Vosburgh was hired to replace several corner curb ramps as part of the ADA-compliance settlement agreement brought to us several years ago by the Federal Department of Justice, nowhere on Vosburgh's website or on the sides of their trucks does it mention anything about concrete work or sidewalks.  First and foremost, they are an excavation company.  RAJ's website claims that one of the several services they provide is concrete work.

Is It Possible We Are Governed By Nincompoops Who Don't Know How To Manage Much Of Anything, Including Money? It Sure Looks That Way!

For the past 24 hours I had been planning on using the picture above for an article simply titled, STOP SIGN NUMBER TWO.  That's the new stop sign and pole at Warren & Park that DPW installed (once again 8 feet from the curb) on Wednesday to replace the sign and pole that were knocked over on Tuesday after surviving two months of thousands of close calls from trucks, tractor trailers, bad drivers, and drivers confused about the new, safer intersection. Notice the vertical reflective red strip on the pole; it was not included in the first stop sign effort!

Then, this morning, I came across this:

Thank Goodness The City Got Rid Of Those Old Parking Meters So That Parking Revenue Could Flood The City!

The $10,000 (plus $100-plus per month "connectivity fee") parking kiosk for the 700 block of Warren (just beyond the grey car in the background) is meant to be used by people parking their cars in the unmarked parking spaces seen above.  That so-called kiosk has been OUT OF SERVICE and DEAD for at least 13 f'ng weeks, and Parking Captain David Miller continues to see no reason to attach an OUT OF SERVICE sign to it or bother explaining to the public and the so-called SAFETY Committee for months what is going on with it.  (The kiosk's solar panel has been kaput for months, failing us no more than three months after it was installed, a fact I learned on the sidewalk from a city employee.) And why should we expect PC Miller to do such things that are far beyond his paygrade, not in his job description, and possibly beyond his mental acuity?  Why should we expect anyone at Hudson City Hall or at HPD to do such basic, decent things that come naturally to any self-respecting city hall in America that is occupied by adults?

Raise Those Parking Ticket Fees Right Away, Our Mayor Needs Another Stop Sign And Pole!!

It was August 25th when I first wrote about mayor Ferris' new stop sign at Warren & Park, one week after it had been installed 8 feet from the curb.  At the time, I gave it two weeks to be demolished.  In a rare case, I was proven wrong.  I should have chosen TWO MONTHS instead!

Earlier tonight, about 55 days after Joe Ferris' new stop sign atop a new sign pole was installed by DPW, I noticed it was no longer there.  In its place, in the street 8 feet from the curb, was a much shorter temporary stop sign.  Anyone with a pair of eyes and half a brain could have seen this coming.  I did.  What am I, a genius?

Why Did Officer Eric Dunham Depart HPD After Just Three Years? We May Never Know. Shouldn't We Know?

 

As regular HUDseen readers may know, during the HPD report at last month's meeting of the so-called SAFETY Committee, Chief Mishanda Franklin mentioned that a police officer had recently resigned.  "We are down an officer.  Under unfortunate circumstance we had an officer resign last week.  So, we will be our doing our best to fill that position prior to year end."  Head Code Enforcement Officer Nick Fox, sitting next to Franklin and always on top of safety issues, then asked a critical question that was begging to be asked:  "Do you guys hire part-time or is it only full-time?"  (I'm not kidding!)  Is Nick looking for another job?  A new job?