This office represents Jim Shaughnessy along with a substantial and growing number of concerned residents of the City of Kingston who are appalled and outraged at the clandestine process used to approve the Kingstonian at great cost to the residents and taxpayers of Kingston. For fear of reprisal to their personal and professional lives, these dedicated citizens wish to remain anonymous for the moment while making their voices heard.
The Kingstonian is an out-of-scale and out-of-context project in the nationally-recognized Kingston Stockade Historic District that will negatively impact the City for generations. We urge you to reconsider the issues below:
ALMOST A THIRTY-ONE MILLION DOLLAR GIVEAWAY!
1) Why are taxpayers giving over 30 million dollars to the developer to lose parking spaces? The developers have repeatedly touted parking as a major public benefit of the Project. However, only 97 remain for public use after subtracting the required Kingstonian spaces. That’s only 2/3 of what’s currently available. Yet, the City insists on giving away public land for zero consideration(FREE), forgiving $27 million in school taxes (FREE), in addition to a $3.8 million state grant funded by taxpayers (also FREE). Why all the free stuff?
ALMOST ANOTHER HALF-MILLION DOLLAR GIVEAWAY?
2) Why are you considering waiving the $417,000 recreation fee for this Project? The developer has requested a waiver of the recreation fees, which amounts to almost half a million dollars. This money could fund City parks and programs. Instead, the developer is claiming that the pedestrian plaza, which will be on land formerly owned by the City and given to the developer for free, is adequate to serve all of the active and passive recreation needs of the Project's future Residents.
ONCE A PARKING GARAGE, NOW A TAXPAYER SHUTTLE?
3) Why are the developers and the City using taxpayer money to funnel people out of Uptown over Schwenk Drive to a privately owned shopping center owned by the developer? Is the bridge over Schwenk Drive just a band-aid for a dangerous intersection? Why doesn’t the City require the developer to make lasting improvements that would benefit all businesses on Schwenk Drive, not just the developer’s plaza? A pedestrian bridge is an outdated planning concept and prioritizes cars over people. An urban planning expert has advised that many pedestrians will opt to just cross at street level due to the extra length and effort of using the bridge. Instead, the Planning Board should encourage development that improves the streetscape of Schwenk Drive and make it more accommodating to pedestrians.
COUNTING EXISTING PARKING AS NEW?
4) Why should the Planning Board accept that the parking spaces at Herzog’s Plaza are adequate to serve Uptown businesses? These private parking spaces already exist and are underutilized because they are located too far from Uptown to be convenient. This fact remains even after Development.
TOP SECRET DEVELOPMENT PRINCIPALS?
5) Who is the developer of this Project, and why is it being kept a secret? This Project is the recipient of public land and public money. If there are new principals, this information should be publicly available. Does this new partner have the financial competence and experience to complete the Project? Are the current partners selling off their interests? Or are they even still Partners?
APPROVALS AND TRANSFERS WITHOUT AUTHORIZATION?
6) Why did the City give the developer Fair Street Extension and the parking lot before the Planning Board even approved the Project? Is your approval predetermined? These and other issues have caused the public to lose trust in the local approval process. We have resorted to this open letter because we have not had an adequate opportunity to address you during the review process. In urging you to fulfill your duties as public officials and members of the Planning Board, we formally request that you refrain from issuing a decision until the public receives adequateand complete answers to the above stated questions. Or the board should choose to do the responsible thing and simply deny approval of the Kingstonian.
Respectfully submitted,
Wayne Thompson, Esq.
The above represents the opinion of the authors at the time of writing.
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