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Roundup of Recent Ulster County Business-Related News, Views, Stories and More

October 31st, 2023

Welcome to another edition of the Ulster Strong Business Bulletin. This past month has been an especially busy time for Ulster Strong. We hosted our first very successful thought leadership summit on housing, and we're currently running our latest 'Ulster What's the Plan' public service campaign to inform voters of candidates views on key local issues, including housing, economic development, and sustainability. Early voting has begun and election day is November 7th.

Happy Halloween!

This newsletter includes the following:

Early Voting Has Started - Ulster Strong Asks Local Candidates

"WHAT'S YOUR PLAN?"

Hudson Valley Developer Plans Affordable Housing in Modena

By Tina Traster

Hudson Valley Private Sector Jobs Report

Woodstock Holds First Public Hearing on New Zoning Changes Proposed

Kingston Releases New Development Guide for Updated Zoning Code

Belleayre Makes Investments for Year-Round Venue

by Bond Brungard

Nevele sold for $5 million, plans housing

Rent Control Considered for New Paltz - Process Questioned

Cresco Gets $25 Million Mortgage on Ellenville Site

Ulster Strong Launches Video Channel

In Ulster Strong's latest initiative to raise awareness of local elections and inform the public of Ulster County candidates’ views on key economic issues including housing, jobs, sustainability and economic development, we are reprising our campaign ‘What’s The Plan?’. The initiative includes a survey submitted to over 140 local candidates for policy-making positions for County and Town offices. Candidate survey submissions are published, unedited, on the Ulster Strong website for the public’s review and reference. The initiative also includes ad buys on local news sites and social media to promote awareness of the campaign and link to candidates’ responses to the survey.

The promotional phase of the initiative launched October 18th and runs through until Election Day, November 7th. Early voting began October 28th.

HUDSON VALLEY DEVELOPER PLANS AFFORDABLE HOUSING IN MODENA

By Tina Traster

A housing developer has purchased a nearly 200-acre farm in the hamlet of Modena that has a long and storied history in the Hudson Valley. The tract purchased is part of the former Lembo farm and is also the tale of many an American farm. Lembo began as an apple orchard in the 1940s, added revenue streams along the way to survive, but ultimately transferred ownership of almost 200 of its 300 acres after falling into foreclosure. Over the past decade, and under new ownership, the still-fertile spread of 195 acres has been leased by farmers to grow vegetables, and for one year, hemp.

But now the farm will transform into much-needed single-family affordable housing, if the developer’s vision for the land is realized.

“If you put a dart through the epicenter of the housing crisis, of a lack of affordable home ownership, it would be right here,” said Keith Libolt. “There is a great need for housing for millennials and seniors.”

In August, PreFab City, Inc., a Florida-based corporation, sold the 195-acre property at 1752 Route 44/55 in Plattekill to a group of companies owned and controlled by Keith Libolt. The group paid $1.5 million for the land.

The Lembos retained 100 of the 300 acres of the original farm after the rest was lost to lenders; their parcel was not part of the sale.

The Libolts are a third-generation development company that owns Affordable Housing Concepts (AFC) in Gardiner. Keith Libolt Sr. co-founded the company in 1973 with Philip Jannotti. Today the company is run by Keith Libolt, the founder’s son, and his son, Keith Libolt II.

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The Hudson Valley region’s private sector job county in September reached 805,200, the highest September employment count since 2019, the State Labor Department reported.

Jobs rose by 9,600, or 1.2 percent, to 802,200 in September of this year.

Job gains were largest in private education and health services (+11,700); leisure and hospitality (+6,200); and other services (+2,100).

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“The two top items coming out of the comprehensive plan were a need for affordable housing and a need to protect even more our environment,” he said. “And in some ways, some people could say Well, that they could be very conflicting. But that was the task that I asked this group and I think that they worked extremely diligently on putting that together.”

This third version of the proposed changes was presented after comments and feedback from various groups. “Along the way, they’ve met with official town committees and boards over 20 times in this process,” McKenna said. “They’ve also had over 20 open meetings with various constituency groups, [Woodstock] Land Conservancy, new residents, old residents, young people, police officers, town employees, and got input from all these folks as well.”



Housing oversight task force member and planning board vice-chair Judith Kerman said the planning board has given its green light to the zoning changes."

The City of Kingston’s zoning code, called Kingston Forward, is a form-based code that regulates the location, design, alteration, occupancy, and use of structures and the use of land. It is designed to make it easier to develop in Kingston while protecting what makes our City so unique. The code was adopted on August 2, 2023.

Some noteworthy priorities:

Diversify housing types, prices, and locations

Introduce new mandates and incentives for affordable housing

Design streets for everyone, not just cars

End minimum parking requirements in all transects

Allow adaptive reuse of existing buildings

Legalize accessory dwelling units (ADUs) Citywide

Legalize neighborhood businesses and mixed-use development

Ensure that new development contributes to the City’s historic urban form

To access the Form-Based Code and its Regulating Maps, please access the Online Zoning Portal to the right.



A PDF version may also be found here(External link):



https://engagekingston.com/kingston-forward

HIGHMOUNT – Within a few months, if Mother Nature is in a seasonal mood, Route 28 through Ulster County, will be busy with cars and SUVs headed to Belleayre Mountain, roof racks topped with skis and snowboards. However, some of the added improvements coming to the mountain are not dependent on snow, or the ability to make it. Although there will be improvements to Alpine and Nordic skiing trails, the Olympic Regional Development Authority (ORDA), which manages the recreational facility, wants to make improvements to its mountain biking trails.

 The facility’s mountain bike operations originate from Overlook Lodge, and about 15 new miles of trails are proposed to challenge riders seeking easy, difficult and more difficult treks.

“Among the reasons for the 2023 amended plan is the fact that Belleayre Mountain does not currently possess any significant mountain biking trails. It is adjacent to the Shandaken Wild Forest area, which includes mountain biking trails as part of the recreational opportunities available there,” said Darcy Norfolk, ORDA’s director of communications. “The 2023 Unit Management Plan includes a master plan to foster interconnections for mountain biking between these two areas.”

When it is cold enough to make snow, ORDA has made important improvements to snowmaking equipment that ensures the process can be more energy efficient.

“Over the past several years, the Olympic Authority has invested in updating Belleayre’s snowmaking infrastructure,” said Norfork. “It’s been a multi-phase series of projects that mean today’s Belleayre is better equipped to make more snow faster with less energy, because snowmaking accounts for approximately 70 percent of ski resort energy.” This work is considered a high priority. The goal is more snow, faster, using less energy.

Away from the mountain, an economic impact analysis for 2022-2023 by ORDA concluded Belleayre contributes about $25 million to Ulster County through consumer spending on lodging, retail, transportation, food and beverages and recreation.

“Belleayre is now a four-season destination. We are delighted that the management of Belleayre, together with the leadership or ORDA, has opened up additional uses. In the summer you can enjoy water-themed activities at the Belleayre Beach, take a scenic gondola ride, hike miles worth of trails, play a round of disc golf…We are looking forward to the completion of an expansion project that will allow Belleayre to have mountain bike rentals on-site starting this coming spring,” said Lisa Berger, Director of Ulster County Tourism & Office of Film. “The gondola allows at least one Catskills peak to be accessible to people with mobility issues – differently abled guests can ride up the gondola and right back down if they choose.”

And it’s the investments made by ORDA, seasonal snowmaking, mountain bikes and for other activities, that Berger said are helpful and instrumental in stabilizing and possibly boosting the economic prospects in this very rural part of the county.

“ORDA has been incredibly generous in terms of the money and attention they have paid to improving snowmaking, over-all on-mountain facilities, and expanding uses at Belleayre. That work has resulted in season passes that exceed those of Hunter Mountain for the upcoming 2023-2024 season,” said Berger. “They averaged 500 people this summer at their Music on the Belle series and hosted an incredibly successful Fall Festival/Oktoberfest that ran over two consecutive weekends in October bringing in people who may never put on a pair of skis. These people stay in our hotels, eat in our restaurants, visit our art galleries, go to our farmers markets and visit our quaint mountain towns. They play a vital role in the coalition of private/public interests that work cooperatively to improve economic and social issues in our northern-western part of the county.”

The former Nevele resort has been sold for $5 million to 1100 Arrow LLC as part of plans by New York City-based developer Somerset Partners to demolish remnants of former Borscht Belt hotel in favor of a new facility with lodging, accompanied by a 126-unit housing development.

Developers on Sept. 29 closed on the purchase from Star Nevele Owner LLC, which had bought the two-parcel site totaling 497.5 acres in 2018 for $27.92 million.

Rent Control is being sought for New Paltz. At a public hearing it was met with lots of questions about proposal and questions about the process.

There are real concerns about the cost of housing locally, and nationally. However a permanent-type solution of Rent Control (once enacted it never goes away in practice) is not helpful. It disincentivizes investors and developers from building locally, or they only will build for luxury-type housing where rent-control doesn't apply. Rent Control may be a short term 'win' for tenants, but long term it mothballs the existing housing stock for the working-class and ensures no new housing is constructed for the middle classes.



Ulster Strong encourages towns to work with developers to streamline the planning application process and work with communities to get buy-in and pre-site approvals for the construction of new badly-need housing, rather than make their communities 'no-build' sites for potential investors due to new onerous deal-killing regulations.

Cresco Labs said it secured a $25.3 million commercial mortgage on the former Schrade/Channel Master site in Ellenville, giving it funding to build a 183,000-square-foot growing and processing facility that could bring hundreds of jobs and provide a welcome jolt to the local economy. 

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Ulster Strong has launched a new YouTube channel where the public may view its produced videos all in one place. Currently the channel includes An Introduction to Ulster Strong, Explaining PILOTS, and Housing Summit. As more videos are produced, they will be archived in this easy to access online location! Be sure to 'SUBSCRIBE' so you will be notified when new video footage is added!

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