Public Hearing on Colarusso Haul Road Conditional Use Permit Application

We urge all Hudson citizens to attend the meeting in person or via Zoom, and be prepared if possible to make comments. We also encourage sending written comments about your concerns to the Board (we’ll follow up with information on how to do this). This is a critical moment in which the Board may decide whether to engage in a real examination of impacts, or give in to a Greenport company that has spent six years trying to hide the facts and circumvent our zoning laws–and bullying Hudson (and our Planning Board) by running gravel trucks needlessly through vulnerable city streets.

While OHW has been branded as a group of uncaring radicals in this matter, the attached rundown of real concerns, actual facts, and worrisome projections should set the record straight (see attached 8/24/23 OHW letter to Planning Board, with updated Waterfront Vision document). In truth, no one–not the County, not Greenport, not Hudson–has examined environmental, economic and safety impacts on the City. The attempts by the Hudson Planning Board to probe those impacts have been fought by the applicant every step of the way, which is why this issue has dragged on for so long.

Bottom line, by pressuring the city with its trucks, Colarusso created its own “environmental justice” issue and is now using it as a cudgel against Hudson to get its way. The company’s “solution” is really aimed at expansion and higher profits, not justice; and if that solution creates problems or impedes economic progress for the City, it is NOT a concern of theirs. Clearly, Colarusso deserves no deference or special consideration here. It is the right and responsibility of our city officials (in this case, the Planning  Board) to serve the interests of the City and no one else. And, contrary to what some may think, denying the permits to the haul road and the dock will not put Colarusso out of business. Colarusso reaps millions in city, town, county and state projects, and successfully operated for over 100 years before it purchased the dock in 2014.