Debate, delays, cost Kingston $500,000 - Westfair Communications

A five-year-old debate on how best to spend money for repairs to the porticos in Kingston”™s historic Stockade District has cost the city a half-million dollars in federal funding.

Now city officials are hoping that a spending plan being considered by state officials will allow them to move forward on a $1.1 million project. But some building owners are critical of the plans, saying they underestimate the cost of the renovations and would leave them with paying the bill for any cost overruns.

Back in the 1970s, in an attempt to improve the historic district, a series of porticos was installed to create an outdoor mall, putting a roof above the sidewalks of Wall Street and North Front Street in a design that became known as the Pike Plan, after its architect.

The Pike Plan Commission is a certified Business Improvement District involving some 42 buildings and 55 businesses along the two streets.

With the structures in disrepair, the debate has centered on whether to repair the porticos or tear them down and allow natural light to fall on the building facades.

While City Planner Suzanne Cahill said that plans are moving forward, she could not say when state officials will sign off on the proposal, allowing the city to move forward with an RFP (request for proposal). There is still opposition to restoring the portico, although how many building owners are for and against the project is difficult to assess. She said there is strong support for the project, but could not identify a vote that was taken to actually poll sentiment among members of the Pike Plan BID.

A petition dated Aug. 18 suggests opposition to the project is strong among the building owners themselves. The petition was signed by 37 of the 44 property owners in the BID and reads, “From this date forward we demand an individual vote in regard to all plans and monies received or spent on the future of the Pike Plan. Without a vote we consider this to be taxation without representation.”

There are vacant storefronts under the portico in the Stockade District, which has historical significance as the first capital of New York and has some 30 pre-Revolutionary War buildings in good to excellent condition.

The tourism potential of such attributes has never been realized. At least one building owner said the portico is not helping market the vacant storefronts.

“This is one of the oldest cities in the United States and its historic buildings don”™t need a drop ceiling over their sidewalks,”Â said Dominick Vanacore, who for 13 years has owned the building on the corner of North Front and Wall Street that holds Dream Weaver”™s hair salon and a cafÃ©. “I should be able to look out from my building and see the steeple of the Old Dutch Church.”

He said the portico blocks light and traps cigarette smoke and obscures the storefront windows from potential customers passing by. He said the project should work from the ground up, improving crosswalks and handicapped access and tearing down the portico.

He said porticos such as the Pike Plan were designed in the ”™70s to combat the then-new suburban malls and were popular for a while but said that in most cities around the country they have been removed because they proved to be bad for business. He said a mere walk along the Pike portico with its vacant storefronts proves that the rooftop is not effective as an attraction to businesses or consumers.

Carter Hastings, chairman of the Kingston Pike Plan Committee did not return calls seeking comment. He does not own a property that is under the portico, but owns a building nearby.

As city officials have debated the issue, some of the federal money set aside for the project has been taken back by Congress because it was not spent in timely fashion.

In April, when architects, consultants and city officials presented the final version of the renovation plan, the funding package, which included federal transportation money secured by U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, a $200,000 state grant through the Rural Ulster Preservation Co. (RUPCO) and a $100,000 bond by Pike Plan property owners, stood at $1.7 million.

At that point, refurbishment of the portico included plans for new electrical and lighting systems and the replacement of a wood ceiling with translucent panels were estimated to cost about $1.1 million. The remainder of the money would pay for wheelchair-accessible curb cuts and other street improvements. Work, officials had said, would begin this summer and possibly be concluded by year”™s end.

Now, funding has dwindled to $1.2 million after Congress rescinded a portion of the money. That number could fall to $1 million in December when the state grant secured by RUPCO is due to expire.

Meanwhile, officials at the state Department of Transportation, which administers the federal funds, have yet to sign off on the plan.

Cahill said she is confident that the amount is enough to complete the project, even though no RFPs have been issued. The wood structure has a flat roof that is leaking in many places and plans are to add a peaked roof to move water off the structure, as well as adding skylights, and improving lighting and drainage of the structure.

“I think we have sufficient funds to cover the proposed work,” Cahill said.

But Vanacore said he does not think that the proposed work could be done for less than $2 million or perhaps significantly more and worries that members of the Pike Plan BID would find themselves paying for a refurbishment that many of them oppose.