While many municipalities are finalizing their budgets for the 2024 fiscal year, the Town of Plattsburgh is in the middle of its budget year. Supervisor Michael Cashman says the town’s economy remains strong despite the announcement this month Nova Bus will close its manufacturing plant and Amtrak’s suspension of passenger rail service through the area. The Democrat spoke with WAMC’s North Country Bureau Chief Pat Bradley.
We're very strong. The Town of Plattsburgh has been well positioned even through the period of COVID when the border closed, we responded much earlier than most municipalities and other businesses. We were using the best information from the Comptroller, from the Association of Towns, our partners in the Clinton County ledge (Legislature), for example. So we remained very, very strong and we've been able to continue to do so. We also use a modified zero-based budgeting process. So we're really stripping out everything from the budget and starting from the basement as we build out a budget each year, so that we know where we're going to go. It allows us to create priority pipelines to be flexible with focus and it also has put us in a position to maintain one of the most critical things that local government is responsible for and that's infrastructure. The Town of Plattsburgh has been working on a $24 million water capital plan for the last several years. We've made significant progress. COVID obviously was one of those things that kind of slowed a couple of those projects down. But in the next couple of months we're going to be onboarding a new wellhead, for example, about 800 gallons per minute, that's going to go into our system. We know that businesses and people move into communities to have robust infrastructure. It's about health and safety, economic development and sustainability. And that's a focus that we use as an overlay for all of our budgeting process.
You just mentioned a new wellhead. Have you finished with the water tank conversions?
We have. That program did a couple of different things. One is we went in and cleaned and scrubbed and maintained and gone into a maintenance operation program. We also built a new to us or brand new, but just meaning that we didn't have it in our system, two-million gallon water tank on our water tank farm or campus. Because not only is it critical for us as the Town of Plattsburgh, but we're a regional water supplier. We actually provide water through contract to two other municipalities.
You are also working to upgrade the town parks. What's the status there?
We are. We're using a two-pronged approach there. We're working on a master plan for our parks. But we're also making significant investments through some smaller approaches but not any less important. What we really wanted to do is to create an opportunity for play and engagement and accessibility by upgrading the parks, by bringing new features to key areas of the town and providing more variety as well. And we're doing that through a recreation, a Plattsburgh Recreation Advisory Committee that we've engaged directly on that.
Michael Cashman, taking a look at some of the economic aspects of the town. We heard recently Nova Bus, which is literally less than a half a mile from your offices, will close by the beginning of 2025. What kind of potential impact do you expect that will have on the town?
Sure. So Pat you don't need to be an economist to know that there's going to be an impact. Since the announcement, I've been really reflecting on the impact of the employees, the workforce. There's such a remarkable workforce there. Nova Bus is one of those businesses that I've had the pleasure of touring multiple times with folks from around the globe or state and regionally. And there's going to be a financial impact. Now, to the town for example, the town doesn't have a traditional property tax, so it's not felt in the same way as other municipalities. And in fact, the business has not been on a PILOT for a number of years and talking with senior leadership, as news was breaking from Nova, they specifically said that they acknowledge and appreciate the quality and the dedication and the talents of the workforce. They love the region. They love the host community, which is us the Town of Plattsburgh. It really was just an impact of their larger international financial model. And it's it's disappointing. It's frustrating and the news was shocking. But the silver lining that I look at is we're well positioned for individuals to find employment at other locations and we continue to see our town high on-site selection. You know, when the border closed during COVID we still saw significant expansion. Let's just take Schleuter for example. They're expanding by 450,000 square feet. That's just one project right now. We have two new hotels that are looking at us. One already purchased the property and would like to put shovels on the ground in August. We're having conversations with other restaurants. We’re having conversations with folks that want to reinvest or change hands into second generations. And in fact, we're partnering with the Clinton County Board of Realtors to launch the first-ever developer’s guide that any municipality has ever done in Clinton County, we believe on the northern portion of the North Country, that will specifically target businesses that we would like to see in the footprint of our town center. So we're not sitting on our hands. We're actively working for growth and tomorrow. But we also have to understand there's challenges and sometimes some of those challenges are created by things that are outside of our control.
Speaking of another one of those challenges outside your control, we heard this week that Amtrak is suspending the Amtrak Adirondack. Now the train station is a couple miles, a few miles down from where the town is located. Would that have any sort of significant impact on the town and your efforts to bring business and other tourism to the town at all?
Sure, when you live in a rural area, you depend on multimodal transportation. It's an important point of connectivity and it is most frustrating that that railroad station was dormant for three years. And then we finally seem to get things back on track. Now, what I will tell you is I have a source that I've been speaking with too directly, and they've said that there's a good chance that this could actually extend up to Labor Day, if not beyond, and that the quotes that are being shared about the heat on the tracks as being part of the reason may not be the full story. I think you're going to see more information break in the coming days and weeks ahead. But I really hope that the persistence of all of our voices locally, just like we needed to do the last time, we will see some results.
In attempting to bring people to the area, particularly businesses and new residents, broadband is always an issue. And the federal government has announced broadband funding to try to get it to all areas of the country especially those that lack broadband right now. New York State has been allocated $670 million in broadband funding from the federal government in this most recent announcement. Does the town need broadband funding?
Sure, every community has areas that need to see increased infrastructure for broadband. You know, being in the in the core of commerce and the core of Clinton County we benefit more than others. So there's more impact to our friends say in Blackbrook and Saranac etc. But my point is we've been talking about this for such a long time. Such a long time. It seems like every other year, every other month, there's these big great grand sweeping announcements of investments and broadband. And it's needed and it should be celebrated. But can we get the friggin’ work done, folks. People are tired of the announcements. They want to see that they can actually get online and connect. And I say this to all people. I say this to our partners in the state, to the feds, a little less talk, a little less press releases and a lot more rolling up your sleeves and getting people hooked up. Because it's old news and it's great that the funding is coming there. But it only matters if people can actually get online.
The Town of Plattsburgh is also working with the Clinton County American Legion on the first phase of construction of a waterfront Battlefield Memorial Gateway Park to honor veterans from the Revolutionary War to the modern era.
