In the Town of Ulster, 2023 is going to spill over into 2024.
“There was a general theme that’s going to continue into 2024,” said Supervisor James E. Quigley, III. “And the major focus in ’23 was the redevelopment of the (former) IBM/TechCity site into iPark 87.”
That redevelopment was helped on Thursday night when the Town Board voted to grant a request to modify the property’s zoning overlay district to allow for more flexibility in where residential units can be built. The move was the culmination of a year spent helping move the iPark 87 project forward.
“That’s kind of what we spent most of 2023 on, and it appears that we’re going to be spending mostly 2024 moving this project through, hopefully into construction and delivery,” said Quigley, who noted that anyone doubting the commitment of developer National Resources to make iPark 87 a success need only see what they’ve done so far, from cleaning up a property that was left in various states of disrepair, to beautifying it ahead of larger work. “There’s a tremendous amount of physical activity indicating to the community that there’s somebody there that’s willing to make the investment and willing to improve the project. Leasing has been slow and I’m hopeful that once the construction starts on the apartments and people realize that the project is real and the commercial tenants will follow.”
Quigley said that Ulster will also have to make a decision about how to deal with its emergency medical services (EMS), which he said since the Empress EMS takeover of Mobile Life Support Services in June has led to numerous complaints coming into the town headquarters. Quigley said that compounding the issue is simply being able to afford their services.
“Empress has been approaching communities saying that, ‘If you want to guarantee your ambulance services, you have to enter into a contract with us.’” he said. “For example, they have asked the City of Kingston for a million dollars for a contract where they would provide X number of ambulances over a specific schedule during the day. They’ve done this in the Town of Lloyd, they’ve done this in the Town of Poughkeepsie, they’ve done this in the Town of Middletown. It’s throughout their service area. And the problem that I have as supervisor is that another million dollars on top of the town’s budget, it’s just going to blow everything up. And that is our big concern for 2024 as to where is the ambulance service going to go.”
Quigley said he believed Kingston was unlikely to comply and may be going it alone. Other communities, like Saugerties, contract with other EMS options, and still others use volunteer companies. The Town of Ulster will likely weigh their options in the new year, but are waiting to see what Empress EMS proposes first.
“We haven’t had that conversation yet,” Quigley said. “We have a bimonthly emergency services meeting with all the fire companies within the town and they’re all concerned about it, but they’ve all made it clear to us that they don’t seek to have a volunteer ambulance corps hung off of the volunteer fire service. They can’t handle it.”
Join the family! 
