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Mid Hudson Times, Wednesday, July 24, 2019
Town of Newburgh Junior Police Academy Graduation
Garbage
fees prompt
cry of foul
By ILYSSA DALY
Photos by Bob McCormick
On Friday July 19, inside the Gardnertown School, the Town of Newburgh Police,along with the Recreation Department hosted a Graduation
Ceremony for the Junior Police Academy. Cadets attended classroom sessions with lectures, role plays and demonstrations. Officers with
the Police Department showed and demostarted areas of traffic control, defensive tactics, crime scene investigation, K-9 demo, bomb squad
and SWAT. Cadets also attended Dan Leghorn Fire Department and a demonstration was held there on their recovery boat used on Orange
Lake. During the graduation awards were given out to cadets and their Diploma for their attendance and completion of the course. Members
of the town board and Judge Martini along with Lt James Nenni attended.
When property owners in the City of
Newburgh opened their sanitation bills
for the upcoming quarter, they all felt
the same thing: a mixture of panic and
horror. Businesses and properties in the
City all faced a 55% increase per quarter
to their bills, which will be overwhelming
for many.
To put it into perspective: sanitation
bills for a single family home in the City
of Newburgh used to only be $115.50 per
quarter. These bills are paid four times a
year, so residents were annually paying
$462 for their garbage pickup. With this
new increase of fees, residents who own
a single family home are now required
to pay $179 per quarter, or $716 per year.
This net increase of $254 per year will be
devastating for low income homeowners.
Those who own properties with more
dwellings, along with mixed property
owners will also see a 55% increase in
their bills.
Though a majority of the City’s
residents rent their homes, the sanitation
bills are only paid by the minority of
property owners, not tenants.
“I think the increase is excessive,
[and] it really does concern me,” said
Paul Belsito, a homeowner in the City
of Newburgh. He was stunned when he
opened his bill for this quarter. “Whether
you’re a homeowner or landlord, you
have to be concerned that there’s just no
oversight for this increase… I understand
increases have to happen now and then,
but a 10% increase would have been fair.
I believe that this goes beyond fair at this
point.”
The conversation surrounding this
increase began at the April 4 City Council
Work Session. Both City Comptroller
Todd Venning and DPW Superintendent
George Garrison presented the plan for
this increase to the council. Comptroller
Venning reasoned that the last sanitation
user fee increase took place in 2012. Since
that year, he explained that “there have
been a number of fees imposed by [the
city] from the county and the state” and
“the user fees have not been re-assessed
by the City [with]in the last six to seven
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