Common Council - Regular Meeting

Hello everybody. Welcome to March's Common Council meeting. Before we begin, a few quick public, maybe not so quick, public service announcements. For an emergency, please note the exits on either side of the chambers and proceed down the stairs. Bathrooms are located at the door to my left, women's to the right, men to the left. We allow 30 minutes for public speaking. If you have not done so, please sign up at the podium. Speak. Zoom. Speakers are only permitted if you signed up by emailing the city clerk and requesting so by 11:00 a.m. today. If you did sign up, you must turn on your camera so we could see you as you address the council. Please note that the council has rules of decorum for our meetings, including the public speaking portion. We ask that respect be shown to all, whether they serve on the council, on the staff, or are here as public members. As noted on the signage, we do not allow weapons of any sort, signs mounted on wood, metal, or similar material, or signs larger than 19 by 24. If you have an appropriately sized sign, you cannot raise it in the air, as this could affect a person's line of sight. This will help ensure we comply with open meeting law. Not only are we here tonight to listen to the public's voices, but we are also here to conduct government proceedings. To best serve us all, we cannot have any distractions. When a speaker is addressing the council, no disruptions are permitted. This includes talking over, yelling, clapping, and snapping. When this body proceeds with the day's business, we also need no disruptions. As per open meeting law, section 103, interruption of a speaker or government proceedings will not be tolerated. After one warning, anyone interrupting a speaker or the proceedings of today's meeting will be removed from chambers. I am now calling this common council meeting to order at 7:37 p.m. on March 3rd, 2026. If you are able, please stand for the pledge of allegiance and remain standing for a moment of silence.

Thank you. You may be seated. May I please have roll call? Alderman Pasti here. Alderman Tierney here. Alderman Marlli here. Alderman Faulk here. Alderman Mickens excused. Alderman Dennison here. Alderman Ham here. Alderman Katz here. Alderman Hirs here.

We have a quorum. Can I have a motion to dispense with the minutes of the previous meeting and approve same? Motion by Sarah Pasti, second by Michelle Hirs. All in favor? Opposed? Motion is adopted 8 to zero. Can I have a motion to dispense with the reading of the general bills? Motion by Sarah Pasty. Second by Bob Dennison. Don't all you know rush forward here. All in favor?

Thank you. That's the energy I'm looking for. Opposed. Motion is adopted eight to zero. We actually do not have the the common council community award to give out today because of the weather. The recipients were traveling more than the rest of us um and didn't feel safe driving. So we will acknowledge and uh honor ours Kis next month in April. So we now enter into the public speaking portion of the meeting. We have allotted 30 minutes for this purpose. Speakers will have three minutes. Please be aware that I will give a verbal 30 second warning. If there are remaining speakers after 30 minutes, I will call for a motion from the council to extend the period for another 30 minutes. Speakers, direct your comments to the chair as council members cannot engage in debate during this time. Please state your name and your ward number on the record before you begin. If you do not reside in Kingston, please state your name and the municipality where you live. There could be no distractions from the audience in chambers or on Zoom when a speaker addresses the council. The common council has also received written comments for our consideration and they could be found on the city's website under tonight's agenda. May I have the first speaker, please? Maryanne Donaldson.

Good evening. Uh, my name is Maryann Donaldson. I believe I'm in Ward Five um on Elizabeth Street in Kingston. Um, I've lived in Kingston in that location for over 30 years. And I'm here tonight because of the approval process for the development um at 21 Elizabeth Street. Uh, this process did not give my neighborhood a honest, timely, or meaningful participation. The planning board has a responsibility to ensure transparency and to understand the impact on existing residents before granting approvals. That did not happen here. This project was announced to us back in August uh by Ky Lord Farmer of the planning board and there was an open house in September. We were assured that there would be plenty of open houses and time for us to come and provide our input. That never happened. Um, basically what happened is we found out after the fact that this was in front of the planning board when we saw that there was a public hearing back in December. So much has just transpired. I know I'm only given three minutes, so I'm really going to have to cut a lot of this off, but we have so many questions. Our neighborhood is like, we're not against housing in our neighborhood. The project is just too big for our neighborhood. 15 units were a small little, you know, street. We finally got our quiet back from the years of abuse we took from Elizabeth Manor. Um, there's a lot of unanswered questions. There's unanswered questions about how this limited equity ownership is going to work. Um, there's a lot of contradictions as far as information that's being posted on the planning board's website and what is being told. Um it it's it's just been as I said there's been a lot going on with it. I have a full letter. Um I would like to submit a package. We did a

petition in our neighborhood. The concerns are listed in the package I'd like to submit to the common council. There's a petition there at 27 people. There's letters of support for the for the petition that neighbors wrote and there's also a um a letter that was sent in published in uh a paper as regard to what it happened at Elizabeth Manor. This it was not handled the way everybody thought it was that it was a smooth and easy process and the community had involvement. There was no involvement whatsoever. Um and seconds That's basically what I want to I have time to say. The package has a lot of good information. There's a lot of good letters and um we'll have that distributed to the count council. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Michelle Dinius.

Hello, my name is Michelle D. Dominius. If you could just talk a little bit closer to the microphone, that would be helpful. How's that? Better. Yep. Thank you.

Thank you. My name is Michelle Dminicus. I live on Elizabeth Street as well. And again, we're not against having new neighbors. The project is just very large. And um as I was talking with other folks, especially one of my clients who happens to be a former legislator, we talked about this being um the project of this size and how it's going to be affordable housing and how this might impact the the value of our own properties, which we have put quite a lives into. and we were wondering if our property is devalued because of this going on. How are we going to be compensated? Are we going to have our taxes held at at one level or is it going to keep going up? Because I keep going up every year. So, it's not going to be good. We just got done with Elizabeth Manor. And as Maryanne said, we finally have some peace back on our block. That's all we're looking for. a smaller project, not something that's going to overpower our whole neighborhood and impact our parking, which is already quite limited. The other thing was, and this wasn't brought up in my letter, but um who is responsible for any damages while this is being built? Because I'm made aware that our water and sewer system is very old. It's from the turn of the century, early 1900s, and we're going to have huge, heavy equipment on our street. If this is destroyed or crushed or anything like that, is it still up to the homeowner to fix their water system since we're responsible for it out into the street? I mean, the houses that are closest to this project under are going to be the most impacted. So, we just wanted a little more information and we didn't get that, especially at the very last meeting that we tried to attend, we were kind of brushed off. So, if anybody here could help us out with that, that would be great. That's all. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please. Leah Wesselman.

Good evening. Is this on? Okay.

Hi, Leo Wessleman, Ward Nine. As you know, um I'm here to put my two cents in about the occupancy tax proposal. I'm in full support of a 5% tax, 2% of which I agree should be for funding the right to council program for most at risk humans. Recall that 25 20% of our family here in the city of Kingston lives in poverty or at the poverty level. So why do I support this so enthusiastically? Well, Kingston is one of the hottest STR markets in the state and statistics, my favorite thing to look at, shows that downstate visitors to our city tend to stay in STRs within the city. Why? We've got the stockade district uptown for history and food. We have Midtown District for arts and culture. And we have the downtown waterfront area for waterfront activities and fine dining. As you know, culinary graduates tend to stay in the area and we have some of the best food around. Um, all of these are walkable areas. Why stay out of the city and drive back and forth when you can ride a bike or walk? Another thing, STR revenue and nightly rates have both surged since 2023 to the present. The average nightly cost of a BNB in Kingston is $275 a night. So with a 5% increase on a room at 275 a night, there'd be an additional 13 bucks. Big deal pennies. When you're paying for a room and you're coming from Westchester and Suffach counties, which are the majority of renters in this area, I'd venture to guess that they don't

even look at charges. I know personally when I go to Cape Cod to book a room. I don't look at I don't look at the cost of the search charges or the rentals uh on the room uh the occupancy taxes uh and they're 20% of the charges to book a room and I don't have the AMI of 165 or 170,000 of those people coming up to stay in Kingston from Suffach and Westchester counties. I think people are also hearing the word tax and automatically think that it's hurting the taxpayers here that live here. This is strictly attacks on people renting rooms. It's disguise. It's designed to bring additional money back into our own city and its people here. This occupancy tax works. Many other vacation hotspots have added an additional STR tax and tourism has not been affected. Tourism here is still booming.

Thank you. That's the three minutes. Oh, I know it goes by fast. Did you say 30 seconds? I did. Oh my god. I need to Anyway, thank you. You could always submit the comments if you have more. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Rose Quinn. This is on Zoom. So, council member, she want to spin around, but we're also just going to make sure that we're set. Rose, you need to have your camera on. She does. We don't see her. Oh, there you are. Hey, Rose. Hi. Hi.

You have three minutes. I don't know if you could see the clock from where you are, but I'll give you the 30 second warning. Okay. So, whenever you start, I'll start.

Great. Okay. All right. Um, thank you so much, council members. Uh, good evening. My name is Rose Quinn. I reside in the city of Kingston in Ward 2. I'm a renter and a longtime resident and I also work in the hospitality industry. I am here to support a 5% occupancy tax. I strongly support dedicating 2% of that tax to continue funding the right to council program as has been suggested. As a renter, I believe it is important that tourism dollars directly support housing stability in our city and the 2% allocation would uh clearly be designated and not absorbed into a general fund. Um if we say this money is meant to help renters, then it needs to be used specifically for that purpose. I also believe a portion of the occupancy tax um should be invested into our sidewalks, our very sad sidewalks um and critical infrastructure improvements. Tourism increases demand on our streets and our public spaces. And we need safe sidewalks, better walkability and infrastructure that supports both the residents and the visitors. These improvements help local businesses strengthen neighborhoods and make Kingston more welcoming overall. As someone who works in the hospitality industry, I can confidently say that people are coming to Kingston because they want to. We have a desirable destination. Visitors are not bargain hunting over a small percentage on a room tax. A 5% occupancy tax will not stop people from coming. An extra few dollars to uh to stay will not make or break their decision. This is a reasonable balanced approach. tourism should con be should contribute to our

community. Um, and it should benefit them by by approving a 5% occupancy tax and dedicating 2% at least um directly to uh a renters's benefit program, investing in sidewalks and infrastructure that ensure uh residents and visitors uh benefit. I strongly believe that this is the right course of action and many other communities have also um endorsed that, moved forward with it and had a great deal of success. Um I think that's it for me for tonight. So thank you very much. You didn't have to give me the 30 second warning, Andrea. How amazing. You got to 2 minutes and 28 seconds. So you were just about to get the warning. Thank you.

Good night everybody. Good night. That is all that we had signed up to speak. Is there anybody here in chambers who has not spoken who would like to speak? No. All right. I am going to call for a twominut recess and don't so don't go far. But so we'll start again in two minutes.

All righty. Welcome back, council members. Thank you for allowing me that time. We're now entering into claims and communications hearing. No discussion. They will be on file in the clerk's office. Can I get a motion to dispense with the second reading of the general bills and pay same motion by Michelle Hurst, second by Ruth Katz. All in favor? I opposed. Motion is adopted 8 to zero. We now enter into the report of committee starting with resolution number 26, please.

Resolution 26 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the mayor to submit an application to the New York State Department of Transportation for transportation alternatives program grant in the amount of up to $2 million for the Kingston Safe Roots to School Bailey and Edson project to execute any and all related documents. On the question, older woman Sarah Pasty.

Hello. I just want to explain a little bit for anyone who may be listening. um that this project is for sidewalks in Ward One and all of them are sidewalks that children and families now walk on their way to either Edson Elementary School or Bailey Middle School. There are no sidewalks at all in this neighborhood. So, children are navigating their way to school along with buses, cars, other pedestrians. It's it's really been an unsafe situation for many years. And I just want to really thank my colleagues for supporting this grant application because if we get it and uh we're able to actually move forward with it, it would be a huge public safety um sort of contribution to the neighborhood. So, thank you very much and uh hopefully we'll get it. So, thanks.

Thank you, Alderman Michael Tierney. Thank you, President Shot. Uh I'm in favor of this resolution. Uh but I just wanted to state for the record um that this was a very productive discussion in the finance committee where we removed the funding in the first instance from this resolution. So this is simply an application to uh seek this tap grant and it is the intent of this body that the administration must come back to us if and when it is awarded for uh for funding of the project. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else hearing? No further discussion. I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I

opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 27, please. Resolution 27 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. A 2026 transfer in the amount of $10,000 in the arts and cultural affairs department for an NYC grant awarded for programming. on the question hearing no discussion I'll call for the vote all in favor I opposed resolution is adopted 8 to zero moving to resolution 28 please resolution 28 of 2026 resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston New York a 2026 transfer in the amount of $12,300 in the parks and recreation department of unspent allocated monies for materials and installations of the Albert Brown Community Center signage on the question hearing. No discussion. I'll call for the vote. All in favor?

I opposed. Resolution is adopted. 8 to zero. Moving to resolution number 29, please. Resolution 29 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. a 2026 budget modification in the amount of $37,33842 in the police department for detective division police vehicles and patrol division computer equipment. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution number 30, please.

Resolution 30 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, a 2026 budget transfer in the amount of $150,500 in the building safety department for the demolition of unsafe buildings. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 31, please.

Resolution 31 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. a 2026 budget transfer in the amount of $6,47727 in the building safety department for vehicle repair, uniform expenses, and postage overages. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 32, please.

Resolution 32 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. A budget transfer in the amount of $23,831 by the controller on behalf of all city departments to reconcile the 2025 sewer fund employee benefit accounts. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 33, please.

Resolution 33 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. A budget transfer in the amount of $928,429 by the comproller on behalf of all city departments to reconcile 2025 general fund employee benefits accounts. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor?

I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 34, please. Resolution 34 of 2026, resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, a 2026 transfer in the amount of $60,000 and the fire department for internal transfer of funds from Olter County reimbursements to purchase various ambulance equipment. on the question. Alderman Bob Dennis,

I just want to point out this is the first new piece of equipment, new new structure that the uh fire department has got for the ambulance system and I think it's great. They've done a great job with the ambulance and I'm glad to help them get a new piece of equipment. Thank you. Anyone else? Hearing no further discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 35, please. Resolution 35 of 2026, an ordinance amending an ordinance in relation to the traffic in on the public streets of the city of Kingston, New York, establishing a loading zone on Broadway.

On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution number 36, please. Resolution 36 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, declaring the month of May henceforth as historic preservation month.

On the question, Alderwoman Marissa Marlli. Um I am um happily supporting uh this resolution as historic preservation is a major backbone to our city economy and it fosters great um pride in place and this is um a great opportunity to educate the public about the benefits of historic preservation here and this will be henceforth so every year will May will be historic preservation. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Hearing no further discussion I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution number 37, please.

Resolution 37 of 20126. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing a budget transfer to expend up to $140,000 from the recreation fee reserve. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I. Opposed? Resolution is adopted. 8 to Z. Before we move to resolution 38, does anybody have a motion? Motion by Michael Tierney. Uh, yes. I would like to block resolutions 38, 39, 40, and 41. There's a motion to block resolutions 38- 41. Second by Michelle Hirs. All in favor?

I opposed. All right. We are going to block resolution 38 through 41. So, ask Alisa to read them all and then we'll take one vote on all of them. Resolution 38 of 2026, resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the transfer of surplus property located at 72 Garden Street. Resolution 39 of 2026, resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the transfer of surplus property located at 371 to 383R Boulevard. Resolution 40 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the transfer of surplus property loc located located at Catskill Terrace. Resolution 41 of 2026, resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the transfer of surplus property located at 207 Delaware Avenue. On the question hearing, no discussion, I will call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolutions 38, 39, 40, and 41 all pass 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 42, please. Resolution 42 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York. Adopting a memorializing resolution asking our state legislators and our governor to allow Kingston to implement an occupancy lodging tax up to 5% pending comments from a public hearing.

On the question, Alderwoman Michelle Hirs. Uh, thank you, Madam President. I would like to make a motion to send this resolution back to committee as we just held a public hearing last evening and public comments are being held open until March 11th and so this will go back to finance for discussion. There's a motion to send back. Is there a second? Second by Sarah Pasti. Any discussion to send back? Then I will call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution 42 is sent back to finance please. Resolution 43, please.

Resolution 43 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the mayor to enter into and execute Pike Plan legal settlement agreements with the owners of 31 properties and transfer funds for said settlements. On the question hearing, no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. Moving to resolution 44, please.

Resolution 44 of 2026. Resolution of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York, authorizing the renewal of the intermunicipal agreement between the town of Olter and city of Kingston for shared police services and use of the town of Olter's firearm training facility. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor? I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero and moving to resolution 45 please.

Resolution 45 of 2026 an ordinance of the common council of the city of Kingston, New York amending section 390-96 schedule 13 school speed limits to reflect a 15 mph speed limit on Delaware Avenue from Murray Street to Hasbrook Park Access Road. On the question hearing no discussion, I'll call for the vote. All in favor?

I opposed. Resolution is adopted 8 to zero. And that concludes our communications. Before I open up the floor, I would like to highlight a couple of council events for the public awareness. I assume there's hundreds of people watching us online, too. So, I will address them as well. And maybe a council reminder here. We do have two upcoming public hearings. Uh, one is regarding the potential senior tax exemption and lowincome tax exemption that will be held on March 11th at 6:15 p.m. We also have one regarding the proposed tree ordinance that will be held on April 6th at 6:30 p.m. Both will be in council chambers. Um, regarding the proposed tree ordinance, I would like to highlight that it is still in draft form and that we are eager to hear from the public with your opinions. Um, also a reminder to the public after our caucus last night. Uh, the school speed zone cameras are rolling out. So, please do drive accordingly as the weather I wrote this last night. as the weather warms up and then then then today happens. But the weather will warm up next week and we will have more bicyclists and pedestrians on our streets. So I urge drivers to stay alert and be courteous. And a reminder that the citywide speed limit is 25 miles hour and in school zones it's either 15 miles per hour or 20 miles hour. So just be alert so that we could all stay safe on our streets. I would also like to recognize that March is mental health awareness month. As a person diagnosed with a couple of mental illnesses, I encourage you to take a few minutes to reach out to your people. Sometimes it's the person that you would least expect suffering is the person

suffering. So just, you know, send a text to somebody and say, "Hey, how are you?" A kind word goes a long way. And lastly, a happy women's month to all my fabulous women colleagues, Michelle, Ruth, Terrell, who's not here, Marissa, Sarah, Janet, who also is not here, Gracie, Alisa, and Barbara. It's a pleasure to serve with you all. Thank you very much. And Leah, too. Um, now less light-hearted. uh going into the memorials. I actually have two and one of them Michelle and I both have words to speak on. So I'll start with the other one. Um if I could get through this one. Um I would like to close in memory of Lori Rodell, a dear friend of mine. So, every month I recite the same little blurb to introduce our council community award about how on our time on the council we meet these wonderful people who do a lot of community through our service. Well, Lori was one of those people for me. Um, you may know him. He was a volunteer, longtime volunteer for Citizen Action, which is how I first met him. Um, he was also a constituent at Yasmin Tower for a brief time. Um, but we quickly developed a deep respect for each other and our shared pursuit of bettering the community and our love of music. He was a frequent supporter of mine at music events throughout Kingston and just a really, really fabulous person who cared deeply for this community and devoted a great deal of time volunteering to make it even better. I will forever be grateful for Lor's support over the years, but more importantly his friendship, and I will miss him very much. Um, I also like to close in memory

of Dr. Michael Torres, another staple in the Kingston community. Um, he is a 1980 graduate of Kingston High School, University of Rochester, and then Drexel University where he received his medical degree in psychiatry. He moved back to Kingston in 2021, continuing his medical practice. He was also a musician, a jazz basist, and an avid photographer. So, that's probably where you will have seen him around because he was at all the events volunteering his time and talents. I was extremely fond of Michael. Um, and we'll deeply miss our conversations, usually rooted in our shared love of community and jazz. And I know Michelle also wants to say a few words about Michael.

Uh, thank you, Madam President. Um, uh, Alderwoman Mickens actually wanted to close in memory of Dr. Michael Andre Torres, and I told her that I would share a few words as well. Um, I think that uh, President Sha shared um, all of this quite eloquently. Um, I know for myself he was um, he was just someone that you would see at every event and he always had a kind smile and something nice to say and would be, you know, someone that was a beloved member of our community. So, it's hard to imagine him no longer here. So, thank you.

Has definitely lost two great recently between Michael and Lori. Does anybody have anyone else that would like to close? Michael Tyranny and then Bob. Thank you, Michael.

Uh, thank you, President Shot. I would like us to close in memory of the 150 students killed by American Israeli air strikes in Manab this past week, as well as all the other innocent victims of imperialism and American fascism. Thank you. My mic's not on. We hereby stand adjourned until the next regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, April 7th, 2026 at 7:30 p.m. Thank you all very much.