Mayor's Message

Freedom Art Exhibition at City Hall Opens December 7

ARPA Business Hardship Grants Awarded

City Issues RFI for Developer Partners

Barrel Factory Project Moving Forward in Midtown

Family Holiday Movie Event at AMNC

Kingston City Land Bank Homes for Sale

Wintertide Event Downtown on November 30

Mayor Noble's Tuesday Radio Show

Weekly Roadwork/Infrastructure Update

City of Kingston Board & Commission Opportunities

Mayor's Message:

Dear Friends -

Wishing everyone a happy Thanksgiving! City offices will be closed on Thursday and Friday next week. There will be no trash/recycling pick-up on Thanksgiving Day. Thursday trash and recycling will be picked up on Friday.

The Warming Center, located at the 2nda Iglesia La Mision Church at 80 Elmendorf Street, will be open through the weekend.

-Steve

Freedom Exhibition at City Hall Opens December 7

An art exhibition entitled, FREEDOM! will be on display from December through August 2025 at the Ground Floor Gallery of City Hall, featuring works by local artists that reflect Sojourner Truth’s legacy.

An opening reception will be held on Saturday, December 7 at 2:00pm with performances by the Boys and Girls Club of Ulster County chorus, the Center for Creative Education dancers and drummers, Ulster County Poet Laureate Kate Hymes, Rev. Deborah Zuill as Sojourner Truth, vocalist Evelyn Clarke, and pianist Peter Tomlinson. There will also be a virtual reality and photo booth courtesy of My Kingston Kids. The event is free and open to the public.

The FREEDOM! exhibition, coinciding with the temporary installation of Trina Greene’s Sojourner Truth: First Step to Freedom statue at City Hall, will include a wide spectrum of artistic mediums such as quilts, metals, mixed media textiles, oil on linen, etching, acrylic, pencil, tintype, photography, and more.

The exhibition will feature artwork by the Boys and Girls Clubs of Ulster County, Jean Campbell, D.R.A.W., Mary Elwyn, Amy Fenton, Judit German-Heins, Tracy Hurley, Sikena Khadija, Carmen Lizardo, My Kingston Kids, Shani Richards, Pablo Shine, Kay Stuntz, Tafari the Artist, Ben Wigfall, Rochleigh Wholfe, Carol Wood, and Susan York.

For more info on the Sojourner Truth: First Step to Freedom installation, visit https://engagekingston.com/sojourner-truth-first-step-to-freedom. 

ARPA Business Hardship Grants Awarded

Three Kingston businesses will each receive a $7,500 Business Hardship grant from the City’s federal American Rescue Plan Act: Petalos Floral Design, Headstone Gallery, and Uptown Coffee.

The ARPA Business Hardship Grant Program was created to support local small businesses adversely affected by infrastructure projects that were funded, or partially funded, through ARPA, which included the Dietz Stadium Improvement Project and the Clinton Avenue Intersection Improvements Project.

For more information about this and other ARPA programs, please visit https://engagekingston.com/arpa-business-hardship

City Issues RFI for Developer Partners

The City of Kingston, in partnership with the Center for Public Enterprise, has released a Request for Information (RFI) to gather information from developer partners interested in developing mixed-income real estate projects that would meet the City’s housing goals.

The City has contracted with the Center for Public Enterprise (CPE) to help create a mixed-income housing development model that is less reliant on tax credits and other traditional financing methods than existing models. CPE, which helps municipalities develop cutting-edge programs to grow housing production, is helping the City explore a mixed-income public development model in which public entities leverage a revolving loan fund and other local tools to help finance new housing. This type of housing production model was recently featured in a brief by the New York University Furman Center and has been pioneered by jurisdictions such as Montgomery County, Maryland, and Atlanta, Georgia.

With the RFI, the City hopes to attract developers of multifamily projects with existing shovel-ready projects located in Kingston and/or from private/non-profit sector partners that are interested in expanding into the Kingston market.

A virtual information session will be held on December 6, 2024, at 12:00pm. Registration instructions are included in the RFI.

RFI responses are due January 8, 2025, at 2:00pm. Find the RFI here.

Barrel Factory Project in Midtown Moving Forward

Last week, Empire State Development celebrated the groundbreaking of the Barrel Factory Apartments, a 100-unit mixed use, mixed income housing development featuring 20% affordable units, and the grand opening of the project’s earlier phase, the restoration of the historic 120-year-old Kingston Barrel Factory into a multi-use community hub in Ulster County, which had been vacant for 15 years.

The Barrel Factory project consists of two phases:

• Phase I is a $4.6 million mixed-use development restoring the deteriorating historic Kingston Barrel Factory to create a new central hub. The adaptive re-use of a 120-year-old warehouse had been vacant for 15 years. The 18,000 square foot building has been transformed into 12 affordable residential units, along with 3,500 square feet of commercial space, and other amenities.



• Phase II, which broke ground last week, is a $26.2 million project creating a 100-unit mixed-use, mixed-income development in Midtown Kingston. It will feature 80 market rate residential units and 20 affordable units at 80% Area Median Income (AMI). The four-story project includes a ground-floor commercial component, and the restoration of The Barn, a vacant 21,000 square foot warehouse targeted for manufacturing and professional, or maker office uses, potentially bringing up to 20 jobs. 

Family Holiday Movie Event

Kingston Parks and Recreation will host a special holiday movie double feature on Friday, December 13, 2024, featuring It’s a Wonderful Life at 2:00pm and The Polar Express at 6:00pm at the Andy Murphy Neighborhood Center.

Complimentary donuts and hot cocoa will be provided. Please bring chairs and/or blankets.

The event is free and open to the public, with adult supervision required for anyone under 18 years old.

Kingston City Land Bank Homes for Sale

The Kingston City Land Bank has four fully renovated and affordable homes available for sale: 28 Abbey, 20 Stephan, 38 Chapel and 69 Gill.

Full renovation details include upgrades to structural, plumbing, electric, insulation, new kitchens, bath/bedrooms, new windows, roofs and flooring. Upgrades also include new high-efficiency, energy-efficient systems for heating and cooling.

Register now for the opportunity to purchase one of these homes - registration is open until December 15, 2024. All interested buyers must submit a new registration form during the current campaign period.

Walkthrough videos and mood boards are now available on the registration page. Registrations must be completed by 5:00pm on December 15, 2024. For more information, visit: https://kclb.org/homes/

Wintertide Event on November 30

The 3rd annual Wintertide on Saturday, November 30 will feature activities for all ages throughout the day across the myriad of businesses lining Broadway, Abeel Street, West Strand, and Rondout Landing.

The event, which kicks off the holiday season on Small Business Saturday, will culminate with the official tree lighting at T.R. Gallo Park at dusk with performances by the Rock Academy. For more information on the participating businesses, visit https://thekingstonwaterfront.com/wintertide-2024.

Mayor Noble's Tuesday Radio Show

Mayor Noble's weekly radio show, "It's the Mayor" airs on Tuesdays at 5:00pm on Radio Kingston.

This week, Mayor Noble spoke with Snowflake Festival organizers Julie Herzog and Nan Potter. Click below to hear their conversation.

Weekly Roadwork/Infrastructure Update

Wall Street & Main Street- starting on Monday, there will now be a stop sign on Main Street at the intersection of Wall Street. This new stop sign creates and all-way stop at the Wall & Main Street intersection.

Clinton Avenue Intersection Improvements–  signal work continues next week. Roadway painting/striping was delayed due to weather. Possible striping next week, weather permitting. 

From 8:00am to 11:00am on Monday, November 25, DPW will close John & Clinton Avenue for sewer work.

Central Hudson– gas service replacements will continue on Greenkill Avenue, and South Prospect, South Clinton and Barman Avenue with possible lane closures and/or road closures.    

Gas main work may occur on Greenkill Ave, N Wilbur Ave, Pine St, S. Pine, Fair St, Wall St. S. Wall St with possible lane closures.

Central Hudson will be doing a gas service reconnect on Monday at 314 Wall Street. Full road closure is not expected, but flaggers will be in place.

Archtop Fiber– trenching will begin on Grandview Ave, Main St, Mountainview Ave and Pearl St. A second crew will likely be scheduled to begin next week on Emerson St, Main St, Lafayette Ave and Janet St. A third crew is expected to start in the Washington Ave, Elizabeth St and Marius St.

Prospect Street sewer project– work continuing between Liberty and St. James. 

Post Office Park— berms have been created, trees have been installed, and shrubs and perennials have been placed for planting next week. After landscaping, signs, benches, and solar lights will be installed. 

ADA Curb ramps project has wrapped for 2024.

Due to the Hullabaloo at the Andy Murphy Neighborhood Center on Saturday and Sunday this weekend, there will be limited parking and there may be increased traffic on Broadway.

New landscaping being installed at Post Office Park

City of Kingston Board & Commission Opportunities

The City of Kingston has over 25 boards & commissions, and we're always looking for volunteers to serve the community.

The following currently have openings:



• Arts Commission
• Zoning Board of Appeals
• Historic Landmarks Preservation Commission 
• Live Well Kingston Commission
• Complete Streets Advisory Council
• Conservation Advisory Council



Find the application at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/KingstonBoards.

The Kingston 311 app, website, and phone system allow residents to quickly and easily report issues and submit service requests.

The Kingston 311 app, available for Android & iPhones, is a fast and simple way to connect to City officials in non-emergency situations. Photos can be attached to illustrate service orders.



This system is a valuable resource to submit municipal service requests. Examples include:

• Streetlight replacement
• City signage, including overgrowth blocking traffic signs
• Snow removal, reporting parking violations, and other snow-related issues
• Parks & playground repairs
• Report graffiti or vandalism
• Trail issues

Dial 311 from any phone within City limits to reach us, use the app or visit www.kingston-ny.gov/311/