The first Hurley Day held at West Hurley Park provided an opportunity to learn about the town’s latest efforts, to appreciate its volunteers, to catch a flag football game, and to enjoy the weather. The Rock Academy band provided entertainment. Attendees enjoyed food from the Hudson Valley Farm Hub and Veritas Family of Farms.
The West Hurley and Hurley fire departments, state troopers and the sheriff K-9 units were also on hand.
The town honored Doug Eighmey, who was supposed to be the grand marshal for the rained-out Memorial Day parade. Eighmey had been a commissioner of the West Hurley fire district for many years. He is a retired truck mechanic for the state DOT who for the past 23 years has operated Doug’s Trike Shop, where he converts standard motorcycles to three-wheeled vehicles.
The ambulance district
The town’s safety committee booth explained the upcoming ambulance district and road-safety efforts.
Safety committee chair and councilmember Debbie Dougherty provided an update on the Hurley ambulance district, whose formation is now under way with the support from the town board for a special tax district.
“We’re looking at the location, trying to get a centralized to the density of population, plus the far end of town,” she said. Hurley is in discussion with the county to coordinate regional access to EMS.
“That is the cost of readiness,” Dougherty said in response to criticism about paying people to sit and wait for ambulance calls. The current all-volunteer ambulance personnel either have to come from their homes or maybe from work when they get a call. Dougherty is going to start driving the ambulance herself until a paid workforce is established. She also will start driving the fire trucks.
“We really got for the most part, a lot of really positive feedback from the town folks so far,” she reported. “We did have a couple of people that were in opposition, and we’ve tried to address those and answer those questions as best we can.”
Though Hurley has already started discussion with some surrounding towns, “at the end of the day, we’ve got to fix the problem right now for Hurley,” she concluded
Hurley is in the process of lowering the speed limit to 25 m.p.h. on town roads and increasing the distance of zones near schools. The town board is seeking state approval to lower the speed limit on U.S. Route 209.
Flag football
Going on all Hurley Day were the games of the Mountain Valley Youth Flag Football League, started many years ago in Olive with 23 players. Now there are 200 players.
“I took over in 2018. and we were on the verge of folding, and then when we came here and it just exploded,” said league president Mike Dittus. “It’s the last of the back-yard leagues. It’s really a teaching and learning league for kids, and we start at five years old and we go up to 18.”
Most of the referees are high-school students, said Dittus, the varsity football coach at Kingston High School. “They get a chance to come and learn the game from a different perspective, and they absolutely love it. I give them a small payday for their time, and the community absolutely loves them. The support of the community, the Town of Hurley, they’ve been a godsend.”
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