TIMES
MID
HUDSON
Vol. 27, No 48
3
DECEMBER 2 - 8, 2015
3
ONE DOLLAR
LCA
Gift
celebrates Guide
Page 48
SERVING NEWBURGH AND NEW WINDSOR
Asbestos basis for lawsuit
Demolition project goes sour at Stewart Airport
Trees in
trouble on
Liberty St.
By SHANTAL RILEY
[email protected]
A pile of debris sits at a stalled demo project at Reed Street and Raz Avenue in New Windsor.
By SHANTAL RILEY
[email protected]
A contractor hired to demolish 10
Army barracks at Stewart International
Airport plans to sue the Town of New
Windsor this month. John Pastor Sr. of
Hudson Valley Environmental Solutions
claims the town failed to notify him
about asbestos contained inside the
buildings.
“We were told it was abated,” Pastor
said.
Two separate claims will seek compensation for exposure to asbestos and
compensation for monies lost resulting
from asbestos at the site. In turn, the
town is accusing Pastor of breach of
contract.
Vice president of operations for the
Walden-based company, Pastor signed
a contract over the summer to demolish
10 dilapidated buildings located on town
property next to the airport. According
to Pastor, he was never informed about
the asbestos, not in the bid contract nor
verbally by town officials. “There was
nothing referring to asbestos in the bid
contract,” said Pastor on Friday.
Several large piles of rubble rested
atop concrete foundations at the site earlier this week. Directly across the street
was the Orange County AHRC, home to
the New Windsor Preschool.
Town of New Windsor Supervisor
George Green offered “no comment”
when contacted about the project on
Monday.
Pastor said he first learned of the
asbestos on day one at the work site.
“The first day, the union showed up,”
he said, meaning the New York State
Laborers’ Union. “They said, ‘You’re
starting to knock down buildings and
you have asbestos here. You’re not set
up properly.’”
At that point, Pastor said, he called
town Land Development Manager Jim
Petro. “He told me, ‘It’s abated,’” said
Pastor. Petro also declined to comment
Monday.
About a week after the project began,
the Department of Labor’s Asbestos
Control Bureau ordered the company which did not have an asbestos handling
license - to cease and desist demo work.
In a 2008 asbestos report, certified
state Department of Labor asbestos
Continued on page 3
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Following years of disease and
over-pruning by utility companies, City
of Newburgh volunteers are looking
to replace about two dozen ailing trees
along Liberty Street with hardwoods better suited to the environment.
“They’re sick,” said Kippy Boyle, a
member of the city’s Conservation
Advisory Council. “They’ve been hit by
trucks and disease. They’re dying.”
Over time, the trees have been cut back
by utility companies needing access to
power lines, leaving them deformed and
vulnerable. “The wrong trees were planted,” Boyle added. “Their root systems do
not do well under sidewalks.”
The City of Newburgh will apply for a
$20,000 TD Bank Green Streets no-match
grant, administered by the non-profit
Arbor Day Foundation, to re-plant 25
healthy trees along Liberty Street, from
Renwick Street to Bay View Terrace. Ten
of 14 eligible communities will be awarded the grant in January.
“We’ll try to plant some shade trees, as
well as flowering trees,” said Boyle, such
as flowering pear trees.
Several trees standing on Liberty
Street near Overlook Place appeared as
if their tops had been hacked off with a
giant axe this week. Sidewalks lifted and
buckled at their roots.
The trees in most distress are Norway
maples, Boyle explained. “They look like
giant martini glasses,” she said, describing their shape due to sheared-off tops.
Continued on page 2