Small Village, Big Issues

Cold Spring mayor on the year ahead

Cold Spring covers 400 acres and has fewer than 2,000 residents. But the issues it faces are not unusual and often reflect state and national trends. The Current spoke with Mayor Kathleen Foley about priorities in 2025; her responses have been edited for brevity and clarity.

Has the work of running the village changed in recent years?
The regulatory environment and planning around infrastructure needs have become more complex. It’s hard to do the work as a part-time mayor. My family situation allows me to focus on the job and move things forward, but we’re going to have to look at that. We added a deputy clerk and board secretary so the clerk can do what he’s supposed to: filing local laws, managing FOIL requests, compliance issues, grants. His job has more of a chief-of-staff feel than before.

Your 2025 project list has 20-plus items. Is that unusual?
The volume of work and capital projects we need to address have always been there, but we haven’t always been able to act. I created the spreadsheet so we can stay centered on the work of running the village and determine priorities. And there’s everything else that pops up. In the past week, we’ve had a service-line break, a water-main break and a valve failure. The extreme cold wreaked havoc; we have aging infrastructure that is like whack-a-mole.

You advocate the Hudson Highlands Fjord Trail beginning at Little Stony Point. Can the village influence HHFT’s preference to start it at Dockside Park?
I hope so. There’s a lot of money and political weight behind HHFT. We are outgunned. We have a state park within our boundaries, but a day trip for someone from the city or a weekend experience for someone from Watertown shouldn’t destroy our village’s quality of life. That’s going to be a hard balance. Our biggest tool is advocacy as an involved agency. We are taking our review of the DGEIS [Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement] very seriously.  

Damage to Fair Street stormwater drainage caused by the July 2023 storms will cost about $1.5 million to repair. How is that progressing?
The project was originally eligible for FEMA [Federal Emergency Management Agency] damage reimbursement and mitigation funding, but the roadway is now eligible for Federal Highway Administration [FHWA] funds, as well. The process is very slow. We have not had formal confirmation of the portions of the project either agency will fund, or dollar amounts they will provide. The federal regulatory and documentation requirements may prove more costly than the reimbursement we could receive. FHWA is questioning our engineer’s assessment to upsize the culverts, which FEMA considers essential. It’s a bureaucratic tangle.  We can’t leave Fair Street unfixed; it’s a public safety issue. Once SEQR [the state environmental review] is complete and bids are out, we will proceed with the work, as early as June. Upstream from Fair Street, multiple points along Back Brook must be engineered and upgraded in the future, including key locations near The Endless Skein [on Main Street], at the intersection of Mountain and Fishkill avenues and at Cedar Street.

New York State recently awarded $2.5 million toward $8 million in Upper Dam repairs at the reservoirs. What is the project status?
Schematic engineering is done. We need access across private property to do the work and bring in big equipment. We’re in talks with the property owners about easements; one has agreed to donate the property to the village. This year will be spent on land acquisition, then fine-grained engineering and planning, with construction next year.

Will the 2025-26 budget process differ from previous years?
We have a pile of expensive capital projects, and we don’t have the option of not doing them. We’ll need to bond [borrow] but have to be able to afford the bond payments. We’ll have some hard conversations about tax rates, water and sewer rates, and maybe the tax cap. The cap gives people a sense of security because it constrains local government spending. But infrastructure keeps deteriorating, costs keep increasing and at some point, it’s a race to the bottom. I’m not saying we’re going over the cap this year, but we might have to have the conversation.

Why is updating the short-term rental law a priority?
It’s hugely significant in terms of revenue. It’s one of the few ways we can offset the cost of tourism. The first quarter of the new hotel occupancy tax brought in about $10,000. Leveling the playing field between hotels and short-term rentals [STRs] will be helpful. There was hyperbole around the impact of STRs and a couple of problematic properties initially, but we haven’t had a complaint since 2022. We’re living with STRs now; they’re part of our local economy. 

I see the update as future-proofing. With overtourism rising and the prospect of large-scale park development, we have to think about what comes next. Last fall, there were several busy weekends when we had to add two police officers; that comes out of our budget. If our numbers keep going up, we have to think about the invisible costs.

What are the issues around pedestrian safety?
The spine of our commercial district is Route 9D, a state highway. DOT [the state Department of Transportation] works to keep traffic flowing, not slow it down. That’s fine outside the village but not in a dense residential area where 9D crosses through senior housing, medical facilities, a post office, grocery store, gas stations, a pharmacy, school crossings and a playground. We’re so lucky to live in a walkable place and there are ways 9D can be made safer, including safety islands, crossing mechanisms and activated flashing signs. On Main Street, big delivery trucks are a safety issue. We’ve made visibility zones wider at crosswalks. We’d like to try those floppy crosswalk signs in the middle of the street. We’re not Massachusetts, where if a pedestrian even thinks of using a crosswalk, drivers stop. We have to build that culture here. 

What’s your assessment of the parking changes initiated last year?
This summer we’ll have a full year of data to review. It’s working really well on residential streets; feedback has been generally positive. There are kinks to work out, including a smoother system for visitors and service provider passes. There’s always drama around something new like paid parking, but I think people are getting in the habit. We need to improve signage. We’ve struck a good balance having Main Street parking free during the week and paid on weekends. We increased parking fines; $25 tickets were just another cost for visitors. It has to hurt, there has to be a consequence. And, we don’t have an option; we need parking revenue to offset visitation costs.

It’s been over a year since “First Amendment auditors” disrupted village meetings. Will you reinstate public comment as a routine agenda item?
Public comment is always available. The process is different now, but well within the boundaries of the [state] open meetings law. If people have things to say or want to comment on an agenda item, we take a vote to open public comment. I hate that we had to do that. The village was always informal; you could come in, speak about anything. There were few limitations. But people were coming in and filming at village employees’ desks. This allows us to establish boundaries and to keep our employees and records safe.