LEGISLATOR BRIAN CAHILL: Um, prior to starting the meeting, I just want to, I see we have a lot of folks who aren’t normally here. And I just wanted to set a few ground rules for tonight’s meeting so everyone is aware there will be no public comment and no interaction between the legislators and the speakers or, unless they come through the chair and the public has if they have any questions or any, any comments, please feel free to send them to the clerk for this committee, Deputy clerk Fawn Tantillo and she will make sure that they get entered into the record for any comments preceding or following this meeting. Okay. Thank you very much. So, to start tonight’s meeting, I just wanted to remind folks that when we selected our new IDA board that we would request that they would come in and speak with us once every quarter, give us a little bit of an update of what of what’s going on and how things are going. And in particular this meeting, as some of you are aware and I’m sure some of the IDA board members are also aware, there’s been some concern about the process from which the Kingstonian PILOT was awarded, and some of the changes that took place just preceding that approval. And so I thought it would be a good idea to invite the IDA president, CEO and attorney in to explain exactly what their process was and what the reasoning and intent was for changing that process just prior to approving that PILOT. So with that I’ll turn it over to Jim Malcolm and Jim you can let whoever you’d like to speak on behalf of the IDA. Go ahead and thank you very much for attending by the way.
IDA CHAIR JAMES MALCOLM: Thank you, Chairman Cahill, board members and legislative members as well as members of the public. First of all, I appreciate an opportunity to always interact with the legislature and the committees. My position has never changed as long as I’ve been a board member, willing to sit listen and at the end of the day, disseminate the information, bring it back to our board, and have a healthy discussion on the topic, and this is one of those situations where this bubble (?) board went above and beyond to try to make sure people are educated on the whole process. What it entailed. The upside, the pratfalls, everything that could be you know everything that could be explained. We exhausted it more than any project that I’ve seen in, you know, 10 plus 12 plus years. So I’ve had discussions with the chair, I’ve had discussions with other legislators and it was a difficult process, so it’s nothing spur of the moment decisions that were made. We came through the process. And, again, a brand new type deal here where housing was a part of it again. And I asked our CEO and our counsel, Joe Scott, to look into where it put us at the end of the process. So what I’ll do is I will turn it over first to Rose Woodruff, our CEO, and she interacted with Joe through it and then Joe Scott can explain the process, if that’s okay, chair.
BRIAN: That’s fine. Thank you very much.
IDA CEO ROSE WOODWORTH: Thank you, Chairman Cahill and members of the committee for having us here. Um, so I’ve prepared a list of some of the things that we’ve done over the last year since, well, since we were last here so since last summer, and some of that did include the policy changes for the Kingstonian. And I think what we were working on ahead of those changes is very relevant to explaining how we arrived at the changes we arrived at at the time of the Kingstonian as well. So, since we last appeared before the committee the IDA has been working diligently to advance the job opportunities, general prosperity and long term economic vitality of Ulster County residents by targeting tax incentives, bonding and other assistance to foster creation and attraction of new business, and the retention and expansion of existing business. Since last summer, we’ve been going through each of our policies trying to update them. We repealed our audio policy. We no longer felt it was necessary to make audio recordings of all board and committee meetings because we’re now required to live stream and keep video recordings of all of our meetings.
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We amended our housing policy in an effort to open up the possibility of helping with the housing crisis in many places in Ulster County and the board felt it was unnecessary to have a policy that prohibited us from housing projects since New York State allows it. We amended the travel and discretionary funds policy to help staff work more seamlessly without having to use personal funds to pay for IDA necessities. We amended our fee schedule guidelines twice over the last year to better match our current practices and to make fees more fair for applicants. We began crafting a FOIL policy. We created a policy for retained jobs to ensure that applicants were getting credit for jobs retained in Ulster County and ensuring they weren’t just simply saying they were taking the jobs elsewhere, but instead they have to prove it. We amended our organizational chart to better match our new structure. We amended our property disposition policy because there was a minor discrepancy with our bylaws.
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After it was called to our attention that the amendment we had made to our housing policy was not in line with our Uniform Tax Exemption Policy we amended it again. We amended our background check policy to lessen the burden on small businesses instead of requiring three years of independently audited financial statements from existing businesses. We will allow the yourthe (?) board to use its discretion for projects with assets less than $5 million, and potentially only require three years of tax returns. We amended our procurement policy to better protect the agency against vendors that do not perform the task promised in their agreement with the IDA. And we amended our enforcement of agency project policy to better reflect our practices and to better protect the taxpayers of Ulster County. Instead of allowing a 20% decline from a promised full time equivalent jobs, we have lowered the amount to 10% before the agency will review the project for possible enforcement action. And we’re not done making changes. We’re working on a community benefit agreement to essentially replace our local labor policy.
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We highly value local labor, but we realized that there’s a lot more that we can achieve for the economy in the county by incentivizing the support of all types of local businesses, not just local labor, and we hope this important change will then pave the way to begin updating our UTEP matrix once again, so that we can continue to further our mission. So we’ve done more than just make important policy changes. We’ve also worked hard with projects and potential projects. We approved the transfer of a PILOT to the new owners of Golden Hill nursing home, the IDA worked hard to modify the terms of the PILOT in a way that has never been done before here in Ulster County. The PILOT nearly doubled increasing revenue to all taxing jurisdictions, and the IDA required the project to increase the number of promised employees by nearly 50 full time equivalents so that the level of care would not decrease from what was currently in place at the nursing home. The board went as far as to ensure certain Medicare ratings, and the hours of certain nursing professionals were maintained, even though those things aren’t required by New York State for nursing homes, just yet. We examined in depth and spoke with all non-compliant projects after finalizing the 2019 year-end reporting. We unfortunately determined that the PILOTs and bond incentives given the three projects are not in line with their actual performance, all prior to COVID. The board felt it was important to hold these projects to the employment levels that were promised when they applied for and obtained IDA benefits. The board took great care in amending these incentives, in a way that was fair to the projects and the taxpayers of Ulster County.
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We approved, as you know, one of the largest IDA projects in the county after months and months of deliberation, negotiation and very serious analysis. We started using our own internal cost benefit analysis software again. And then we’ve since, acting swiftly after New York State Legislature changes that temporary allowed IDAs to provide grants for PPE, we have issued over $245,000 of the funds originally allocated and approved grants to over 100 local businesses and nonprofits. The board extended the program until March 31 so if you know any local businesses that we can help, please don’t hesitate to send them our way. Agency staff is meeting with the Department of Economic Development every other Friday to keep in touch on various projects as well as trying to work together on common goals. After meeting with Director Wiedemann, he saw to it that I was put on the Healthcare Consortium to help increase health care jobs, and to help fill the needs of health care agencies in the county. We’ve started working on a mentor program for new applicants to make sure that all of our projects are successful.
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And last but not least I’ve been working over the last couple of months are bringing awareness to the issue that school districts face with PILOTs and the tax cap. I’ve had a few conversations with New York State Economic Development Council’s executive director Ryan Silva about the issue. He provided more insight about the subject for me and it was my understanding that at the time the bill was passed through the Assembly and the Senate, but it did not make it off the governor’s desk, and there’s a belief that because the tax cap formula is now permanent, there is a chance that Governor Cuomo could sign the bill if it were brought back before him. So I’ve personally made phone calls to a Republican senator, Senator Oberacker, a Democratic Senator, Senator James Skoufis, and sent them both a copy of the bill, and obviously both of them agreed that this is a great issue to be a bipartisan issue. I’ve also been in touch with Michelle Hinchey, and looking forward to a meeting with her. And then I wanted to respectfully ask the County Legislature that they try to push this issue as well. And I’m grateful to the board of the Kingston Consolidated School District for bringing the issue to our attention when discussing the Kingstonian PILOT, and I look forward to the agency doing everything we can to help the issue so we can continue doing our part to help with the economic development of Ulster County and assist school districts and IDAs throughout New York State.
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JAMES MALCOLM: Chair, if you wouldn’t mind I’d like to give Joe Scott, our counsel, an opportunity to bring you through the process of when they, when he found that discrepancy in the housing policy and the UTEP, and the steps he took.
BRIAN: Thank you very much. Look forward to hearing it, thank you.
IDA COUNSEL JOE SCOTT: Thank you chair. As, as Mr Malcolm indicated, my name is Joe Scott. I’m counsel to the, the agency and very pleased to be here with Rose and the chair this evening along with the other IDA board members. I think in terms of looking at the housing policy and the changes that were made at the January meeting, I think we need to go back in history a little bit just to get this all in perspective. I have had the opportunity to work with the IDA for many years. I think I did my first project with the IDA back in 1992. And so I’ve had a long, and we appreciate the opportunity to work with the IDA. I’ve had a long history with the IDA. Where I would like to start with is the IDA’s Uniform Tax Exemption Policy because that’s really the key to this discussion, chair. Back in the early 90s, the IDA had a Uniform Tax Exemption Policy. It was, it was not as involved as the policy that it has now, but it had a policy that it followed with respect to projects. Then subsequently the New York State Legislature enacted legislation which among other things required all IDAs in New York State to have a Uniform Tax Exemption Policy. And the purpose of that policy or the purpose of that requirement was to ensure that IDAs treated all projects uniformly. So if it was a commercial project it would get a certain PILOT structure, if it was an industrial project it got a certain PILOT structure and happily this IDA prior to that legislation had a policy that already required the IDA to do that. In connection with the adoption of the Uniform Tax Exemption Policy formally required under the statute, though, what the IDA then did was, among other things, impose on itself a requirement that if it was to ever deviate from its policy with respect to the granting of PILOT agreements that it would do so only after it got the approvals of the local taxing jurisdictions that were affected by that PILOT agreement. And that was a very unusual provision. I will say we represent approximately 20 IDAs throughout the state. And I would say maybe 20% of the IDAs that we work with provide that level of power to the local governments, by way of having an impact on the structuring of a PILOT agreement. And the reason why the Ulster County IDA did that was that it was concerned about making sure that local governments in cases where the IDA deviated from its normal policy that the local governments had the ability to weigh in on that on that structure. Subsequently, and I’d have to go back to give to to actually give you the time, I want to say five years later, eight years later, the IDA amended its policy to provide a mechanism that if the IDA went to the local governments to get those approvals, but was not able to do so, the IDA, on good cause, based on its determination, based on its review the project, would be able to move forward with that PILOT deviation, even without the approvals of those local taxing jurisdictions. So that’s the historical context. The IDA then, I want to say a year ago, two years ago adopted a housing policy. And in connection with our review of that housing policy toward the end of last year, in preparation for our January meeting, we noted that the local consent provisions in that housing policy did not mirror the local consent provisions that were contained in the, in the IDA’s Uniform Tax Exemption Policy. And we had discussions with, uh, staff we had discussions with the IDA chair. And it certainly made sense and we recommended from a from a consistency and a logic and a rationality standpoint that we amend the housing policy to make sure or to make it consistent with the provisions, the exception provisions contained in the IDA Uniform Tax Exemption Policy. With respect to the January meeting date, if you look back in history and again, using history to kind of provide some perspective to how the IDA dealt with all this, historically the IDA has adopted at their January meeting resolutions regarding policies. This was one of the several policies that were considered that was considered at the January meeting. Again, it’s a fairly typical, fairly routine activity by the IDA with respect to considering policies and other administrative matters at the January meeting, and this, and this amendment to the housing policy was just one of those matters that was, that was addressed and approved and a resolution adopted at that meeting. So that’s the background. If you look back in history, there’s the UTEP policy that kind of started all of this. There were some changes to it. Subsequently, there was a resolution adopting and approving a housing policy. In connection with our normal review of of policies we noted that there was inconsistency between those two policies. And again at our January meeting we routinely look at policies, adopt changes to those policies, confirm policies, make other take other administrative actions, approval of professionals, approval of banks etc etc. So that’s the history. And with that I’ll open it up for any comments or questions.
BRIAN: So, I will just just want to remind everyone that the comments and questions will come from the legislators on this committee first and then any other additional legislators and then if the county executive staff has any questions. So we’re going to start tonight with Legislator Archer.
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LEGISLATOR LYNN ARCHER: Thank you Chairman, and thank you IDA board members for coming tonight, I do appreciate all the efforts that you have put in over the last year. This board has taken some of the work that was done previously, enhanced it, has done quite a bit of work and, and I do I do appreciate all of that. Um, I do have a couple of questions though as it relates to changes in the housing, changes to the process of when it goes, when a when a plan goes to taxing jurisdictions, and one specific question right off the bat and I will have follow up questions if I may, chairman is, I know that the prior board had talked about housing for quite some time but it had never come to the board for a vote as I recall. The changes to include housing as a part of the work that you’re doing happened with this board. And could you tell me specifically the date that it, it did get put into effect because I know you, you talk about January as being your, your housekeeping organizational update meeting but I do believe you pass policies throughout the year. When was this housing policy passed to allow the board to consider housing projects?
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ROSE: I believe that was our August meeting.
LYNN: Of this past year?
ROSE: August of 2020. Yes, as I what I was saying, we’ve, we’ve done it all year.
LYNN: So So you did so you you approved that. And I understand… So, so this this disconnect from the UTEP was never identified through that process? You guys have been going through a lot of, of these, and I hear what you’re saying, but I think you have to understand that the timing of the change raises huge questions about … and all the hard work that you’ve already done, it puts all of that into question, because in the past, as taxing jurisdictions any deviated PILOT that came to the legislature had already been negotiated and approved by the IDA. That was not the case with this one. It was… there were preliminary numbers, but it was not the case and, and this went to all the taxing jurisdictions because of the change that you made with the housing condition. So I’m trying to understand, I get if you find a mistake down the road, but the timing of this, along with that decision on the Kingstonian, is really somewhat suspect and I and I’m saying this, recognizing all your hard work and for this one thing because of the size and scope of this project, it has created major credibility about the process of how things played out. So if you could help me understand from the… you made this housing approval in August so that, because prior to that Kingstonian really didn’t have a shot. Now they have a shot because you’ve now put a policy in place. And then we come to January, we change a policy because one of the taxing jurisdictions did not approve it, which you still could have done anyway. You didn’t really need to change the UTEP. With the authority you have, you can, you know, you put a policy in place that said, if the taxing jurisdictions weren’t agreeing across the board you wouldn’t do the project. So, this is really where, kind of, you got stuck and people are looking for an understanding of how this happened and what’s the explanation for it.
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ROSE: The policy was already in place from a number of years ago and the amendment was in an effort to allow us to do any housing of any kind. The project would have gone to all of the taxing jurisdictions either way, housing or not, because it’s a deviated PILOT, so we still would have looked to the legislature, the school district and the city for their approval. And then as we’ve said with our UTEP, although we look for their approval it’s not something that is required. So we were looking to put that in line and taking out when the Kingstonian was approved, taking that out of the matter, like I said, we did amend other projects that were not in line with our bylaws. And we also amended other policies, we amended other policies, more than once, last year as well when finding issues. I think the one I specifically was talking about earlier was the fee schedule guidelines. We ended up changing that twice in just a matter of months when finding more issues. And then when it came to the January meeting this was something that was brought to our attention. The Kingstonian had been on hold for months before that. It wasn’t, you know, just slated to be put in right when we were dealing with this, this change. We did go back and forth about putting them in the same meeting, it did you know, we can understand the optics here. However, it didn’t really make sense to penalize an applicant because of a mistake that was made on our part putting a policy out of line with our UTEP.
LYNN: except that you just, if I may just as a follow up.
BRIAN:, okay, well I was just gonna let the that was Mr. Scott wanted to respond. Is that correct. If that’s right we you, Lynn, because i think i i did set a follow up but that right but I think you wanted to respond to your initial question, right. Thank you.
JOE: And thank you chair and just to underscore what what Rose indicated. If you go back 10 years, you’ll see during our January meeting where we adopt, as, as a regular course, either amendments to policies or confirmations of policies. So the issue was identified, we, we had it on for January because that’s when we do these things. We identified it in November, December. Again, the January meeting schedule is something that we typically devote toward this kind of activity and frankly this kind of activity is consistent with the points that Rose was making in her in her original remarks where the IDA is acting very deliberately, very professionally, with good practices in terms of considering its policies, considering the various professionals considering it’s very … its operations, you know, bank accounts accounts, etc. And so they have a very organized program of doing these, taking these administrative actions early in the year at their January meeting, and again this housing policy consideration was just part of that, part of that mix.
LYNN: Now chairman.
BRIAN: Yes, you may go ahead and then I think before if you do have another follow up I think Legislator Uchitelle has a question. I like to mix it up a little bit
LYNN: I totally get it I just would lik….
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LYNN: As it relates to the housing policy you did have a housing policy in place, but it was affordable housing and this… not market rate housing if I if I went, if I’m not mistaken,
ROSE: it’s all housing or housing was …
LYNN: But there’s never been a project that had been approved, is that correct. I mean, oh no no, that’s not true that we had the gravity in your house and we had senior housing, we had senior housing.
ROSE: Yeah, we did. Right. And then the housing policy was put into place after that so this would have… if there was senior housing that needed to come in after this policy was put in place, that wouldn’t be in line with it either unless all taxing jurisdictions were on board. Again, not aligned with our UTEP.
LYNN: So, so can you explain to me then, what changed with the way in which deviated PILOTs go to the taxing jurisdictions? In the past, deviated PILOTs were already agreed to and basically solidified by the IDA before they were sent to the taxing jurisdictions. That was not the case. And and it’s been quoted in many meetings that, you know, we’re waiting for feedback from the taxing jurisdictions, which is a totally different way than what had transpired in the past with these deviated PILOTs. So when did that policy change?
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ROSE:. And, yeah, there’s no policy about that specifically. We did actually approve a preliminary PILOT for the Kingstonian. I believe that had a 4% escalator. There wasn’t a difference between what the different taxing jurisdictions were getting, it was just a more standard, for a better word, even though it’s deviated, a more standard deviated PILOT. And then we, knowing the size of the project, we really did value the input from the taxing jurisdictions and we wanted their opinions, after another cost benefit analysis was done and after more negotiations and we really heard the school district’s issue, we worked with the applicant to amend what we had already preliminarily approved. And that’s when we broke out the PILOT so that it would be three different escalators reflecting what every taxing jurisdiction was getting, so to speak, right? So, the city is called sort of getting a parking garage and they’re the ones that really wanted this, so their escalator was then going to be 3%. The county was getting some sales tax, but they weren’t getting as much as the city was getting so their escalator was 4%, and the school district wasn’t getting anything extra so then their escalator would be 5%, which really increased the taxes a lot because they have 60 plus percent of the taxes that are being paid in total. We also then went ahead and changed the 5% net profit sharing, to be a 10% of gross revenue over the pro forma figures that that the applicant had already come up with. And then we showed what the difference would be when the if they hit what NDC was saying they would hit for revenue because the real issue sounded to us after listening to everybody’s feedback, like there was real potential for the project to make a lot more money than they were maybe disclosing or maybe they were realizing, and if that was going to happen then we wanted to make sure that we were protecting the taxing jurisdictions and getting them more tax revenue. Because clearly if a project is making more than anticipated, then they can pay more tax.
BRIAN: Legislator Uchitelle?
LEGISLATOR ABE UCHITELLE: Thank you Chairman Cahill, and thank you to the members of the IDA for being here tonight, and for the work that you’ve done. You know in your capacity on, you know in serving our county. Mr. Scott you mentioned the change here as one that was based on to update the rules to make them consistent with the UTEP as a change that was based on consistency, logic and reality. So I represent the district that the Kingstonian is going to be built in, and I… These are my constituents that are cheering for it to be built and also incredibly concerned about the changes to our community and the changes that a large market rate housing development is going to do both for the rents of low income people and also, which are already unaffordable in many cases, and also for the character of the neighborhood that I happen to also live in. This is a, you know, significant concern. And so, when the rules were changed, it’s a bit, it’s a bit confusing because you mentioned, the rule change being something that typically happens in January, but we see that that wasn’t the case when a rule needed to be changed in August in order for this to be considered in the first place. When the rules are then changed, it makes it very hard for me to look at my constituents and tell them about the board that we appoint, that we confirm members to, which have have spelled out a process about how this is going to unfold for a huge development that’s gonna change our community and about the democratic process that we all participate in everyone here on this call, which is going to determine the outcome here, and then the rules are changed at really the 11th hour there, and I, I have a big problem with that. I have a really hard time looking my constituents in the eye and explaining to them, how consistency, logic and rationality are the underpinning of this decision. And so I asked if you can please tell me how consistency, logic and rationale can be explained to the residents in my district on this change in rules.
JOE: Well, I’ll take a stab at that. I mean, the fact that there was a change made in August indicated and that and this was in fact the case that we saw an issue with that policy in June and July and decided to take action with it. I take.. you all need to take into account that this was a new, a relatively new policy of the IDA, and to be honest, we were all struggling with the definitions, the impact, the goal, the purposes. We were also in transition, I mean this IDA has had a significant amount of transition over the past several years with a step with respect to staff, and members, and to be to be blunt, housing is a very, um, it’s not an easy issue to discuss with people. Some of our IDA clients…. I had mentioned that, that we represent approximately 20 IDAs throughout the state. Some IDAs use housing as or housing is their major purpose their major number of projects. Some IDAs don’t want to do housing and and some IDAs, given membership changes, change their position on on housing. So, it’s a controversial issue with some jurisdictions. It’s not an easy issue, it’s a relatively new development, I want to say the last 10 years. As you’ve seen, a rapid and steep and significant increase in the number of housing projects that IDAs have done because there were some discussions early on, with respect to whether it was a legitimate, legal authorized project for IDAs. So it’s not an easy issue both from a, from a political philosophy standpoint, or a legal standpoint. With respect to addressing your specific question, we made a change in August because we saw an issue. We made a change in January because we saw an issue in November and December. We react to issues that we see. We don’t sit back. The, the IDA and I think Rose has indicated this, both at this meeting, and in the press, you know we we make a, we make rule changes and policy changes throughout the year to react to issues. And I only made note of the January date because it’s it’s something that’s very typical and very routine with the IDA and candidly the fact that the IDA is looking at their policies, thinking about their policies. They have a very active governance committee with Mr. Ham as the chair. So there’s a significant amount of internal review, and internal analysis as to what the IDA is doing. And in terms of logic and consistency, if you compare the language in the housing policy to the language in the Uniform Tax Exemption Policy, you’ll see that they’re essentially the same. And candidly it, it makes sense from a logic and a consistency standpoint, if you’re going to defer to the locals on uniform tax exemption matters. And you’re going to defer to the locals, or housing policy matters. If there’s an out if you will or an exception in the Uniform Tax Exemption Policy, you would think that there’d be a similar provision in the housing policy, and the fact that it wasn’t in there in the first place was frankly, not, not, not explainable as counsel. I’m not going to take responsibility for that. It’s really an issue of the evolution of the policy, and the evolution of the views of the members as they looked at the policy.
BRIAN: Any other questions, any other legislators prior to going back to legislator Archer on the committee that is okay go ahead Lynn. Thank you.
LYNN: Thank you, Chairman. Can you explain to me how these policies come to the board for decisioning? What’s the process?
ROSE: Absolutely. So, what we started doing, I think it was back in August, it might have been July what we started doing in August was literally going through our policies alphabetically in the governance meeting, which, as I don’t know if you remember that was first one that I noted that we changed was the audio policy because it starts with the letter A. So we started going through them alphabetically. As governance went through them, some of them were better suited to go to the audit committee. So some of them were deferred to audit, and some of them just were … recommendations were made from governance, and they went straight to the board. We’re not done going through all of the policies, because there were some that proved to be a little bit more cumbersome and a little bit more involved that we needed to take a harder look at. Like I was saying, the local labor policy although there were some things that we want to change in there and we’ve had on the list for probably six months, we realized there’s a bigger issue of a community benefit agreement rather than just local labor.
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LYNN: So, so, if so, the change for that housing came out of the Governance Committee?
ROSE: Which? the first change came in the first in the Governance Committee meeting, yes that changed a bunch of other policies as well.
LYNN: So that was the August meeting. And in the January meeting that that that change for the housing again came out of Governance?
ROSE: That one did not.
LYNN: Where did that one come from?
ROSE: That came from our counsel looking at it and realizing there was an issue, and we had the next meeting in line with a board meeting and not a governance meeting we haven’t had a governance meeting in a few months.
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LYNN: And you do and you also mentioned you have an internal tool for assessing these projects? And I would assume that, given the complexity of this one — It wasn’t just a straight parking garage, it was not just a straight boutique hotel, it was not just a straight housing, it would have multiple facets and size and scope and, you know, with the, with the complexity of a project this size was your internal tool really the best tool to assess numbers because you’re putting in numbers that you’re getting from, from the developer. And so, you know, how is that really a, a true assessment of a project from an objective standpoint to ensure on behalf of the taxpayers that we’re really looking at all aspects of a project?
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ROSE: I think that’s a good question. At first I first I did not think that our cost benefit analysis software was good. And then I was honestly shocked after putting everything in that it was very in line with the other cost benefit analysises is that were done and were a lot more expensive. And in defense of what numbers you’re using, we’re using the same numbers that every other cost benefit analysis would have used, and every other number that we would have used from any other project Kingstonian or not. All we can do is use the information that the project gives us, and then make the best determination from that. And if they don’t meet the criteria that they’re saying they’re going to meet, then we’ll claw back, and the board showed this year that they’re willing to and going to do that.
LYNN: No, you have, and I do appreciate that I know you guys have spent a considerable amount of time looking at projects already on the books that have not delivered what contractually they should have so I do applaud those. I again I just go back to the point here, that for all the hard work that you have put in this one issue and the way this was handled, really kind of added a negative impact, I would say, and, you know, if you’re trying to help people understand what a, what a PILOT is, how we can benefit a community, and I think you’ve set yourselves back with this one in the way it was handled and I thought it was important for you to come here and I so appreciate that the chairman did that because, you know, this, this is a, this is an ongoing problem and I know it is for you all as well.
ROSE: So Legislator Archer, Legislator Archer, I want to tell you also I know you and I had specifically talked about the cost benefit analysis in regards to projects several months ago. Out of that discussion I’ve talked with Diane Hyman, who is our audit committee chair, and another one of the policies that we’re looking to put in place would be something to ensure that projects of X amount of size will have another independent third party cost benefit analysis. In this case, the County Executive’s office took that on so we didn’t have to deal with it and make a policy change right then in the middle of this project with regards to this project, and we were able to kind of, you know, pass the ball and then start and really make changes that we wouldn’t have to amend again, but it is something that we’re looking at, as well.
LYNN: And I appreciate that. I, the only thing is that I’m not sure the scope of the review by the county. Did it include all taxing jurisdictions? which I don’t believe it did. And to me, your taking this on and putting that in as a policy for a project of this size and scope would be very helpful because then I think that all taxing jurisdictions would get an analysis of the impact of the project to them, which would make for better decisioning as we go forward so I appreciate that. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman.
BRIAN: So, yeah, you’re welcome. Thank you. So Legislator Uchitelle, then I’m going to ask that if anyone has a we could kind of make it a little bit more brief in the respect everyone else’s time. We have another full agenda tonight. Aside from this, and we also want to save some stuff for the IDA to report back to us in June. So, Legislator Uchitelle.
ABE: Thank you Chairman Cahill, I’ll be brief and this is, you know, full disclosure, this is a statement not a question that I’m about to make, because we are in this together. We are, you know, on the same team in regard to making this county a better place. And, you know, with all due respect, I do find that we have as a team on this project missed the target on consistency with regard to our relationship with the public. And that is something that is going to take work to recover from, it’s work that we need to do together, and it’s very important that that we’re committed to doing that and figuring out what how we need to change because quite frankly, this has been a reset on the trust with the public.
JAMES MALCOLM: Chairman Cahill.
BRIAN: Yes, sir Mr Malcolm.
MALCOLM: I’d just, I’d just like to say something and I certainly can appreciate both Legislator Archer and Uchitelle’s position on these things. I mean it’s very difficult, but unless you’re there, through the entire process, and I’ll be honest I’ve sat on these boards for a long time, and from our CEO on down through counsel, and you know what, I guess it’ll fall on my lap. I set this board up in a way where we have governance chairs and audit chairs and these people are independent and bring back, and it’s made for a much stronger board. I can, you know, if things don’t look good but sometimes they’re not gonna look good. But I stand behind the decisions that each and every one of these board members have made. I think we extended ourselves above and beyond. When, when, when the county got involved in using an independent third party administrator we sat at the table with them. And my only concern at that time was look, let’s sit down and find some common ground. And I think we did, and, you know, Tim Wiedemann was there and, and other people and and something was crafted at that point that everybody could live with. And I think there’s a misconception out there that we’re handing somebody $50 million. It’s not the case at all, but I don’t think we get anywhere unless we have this good good discussion and opinions from all sides. And again, I stand behind the decisions that were made by this board, I think that Ulster County is on the precipice of some important development and everything that we’ve done since this board came together is is a stepping stone and a block to move forward. We have a couple of more significant size projects coming down the pike. Whether it’s the housing at Golden Hill, or Enterprise Drive and you know it’s been our goal to expedite the process but get it right. And when we get it wrong we live up to it, so I can appreciate the sentiments that have been put out there. And we’ll do everything we can to regain your trust, so thank you for your time. Thank you Chair.
BRIAN: Thank you Mr Malcolm. Yes Mr Ryder and then we’re going to wrap up the IDA portion of our meeting.
DEPUTY COUNTY EXECUTIVE MARC RIDER: Thank you. Yeah. The only thing I wanted to add is I just wanted to clarify that the cost benefit analysis that was done by the county did include all three taxing jurisdiction. They looked at all three. When it was done, so just putting that on that
BRIAN: thank you for that bit of information. appreciate it. If there’s no other questions from the committee. I will take the opportunity to thank the three members from the IDA who spoke and those who also attended. And, again, extend the gratitude of the legislature to you folks for the work that you do. It’s very difficult. It’s very time consuming. And a lot of times it’s thankless as we all know anybody in public service knows that. And I do want to take the opportunity to thank you for your service. And I really truly appreciate you taking the time to come and explain and answer the questions that were presented to you tonight.