Hudson Valley News

U.S. Senator Charles Schumer is lending a hand to jumpstart the efforts of a not-for-profit cooperative to produce organic hops for New York’s craft breweries. The New York Democrat says he would like to see a site in Dutchess County become a major hop yard.

Schumer dropped by Dutchess Hops, the core of the cooperative, in Lagrangeville on Monday.

He spoke about how New York in the mid-1800s was a leading producer of hops, but fell victim to changes in climate conditions, blight, and:

LAGRANGEVILLE – Standing outside one of the hops drying houses at Eastern View Farms & Dutchess Hops in Lagrangeville on Monday, US Senator Charles Schumer pledged to work with the US Small Business Administration and Department of Agriculture to get funding for local farmers to grow hops and buy equipment.

A two-week delay in the first furlough warnings to civilian employees at West Point and other federal installations will harm the workers even more, according to American Federation of Government Employees Local 2367 Vice President James McCabe.

He said cutting two weeks off the furlough time at the US Military Academy and elsewhere will hurt workers even more than the original plan.

WHITE PLAINS – The US Department of Housing and Urban Development Monday threatened to reallocate $7.4 million in fiscal year 2011 funding For Westchester County's community development block grant and other federal programs.

“To date, the county has not provided satisfactory certification that it will comply with its obligation to affirmatively further fair housing as part of its FY2011 Annual Action Plan,” HUD Director of Community Planning and Development Vincent Horn wrote to County Executive Robert Astorino.

U.S. Senator from New York Charles Schumer was in the Hudson Valley Monday. He stopped by a farm in Dutchess County, saying he hopes it will become the region’s first major “hop yard”. 

There’s a new cooperative in Dutchess – Hudson Valley Hops. Here’s Schumer.

"It's a not-for-profit co-op whose mission is to bring brewers and farmers together to produce a very high-quality hop for our region."