Copake plans open meeting Sept. 14 to air ideas for NYS grant

COPAKE — As Copake citizens gather at an open meeting at the Town Hall at 230 Mountainview Road, on Saturday, Sept. 14, from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., they will be doing so with hope to fine tune a proposal which could bring a $4.5 million grant to revitalize the community.

Town Supervisor Richard Wolf said the town is vying for one of two grants from the state’s NY Forward program which is designed to help small towns improve in a number of ways.

Copake was not successful when it applied for last year’s program, but Wolf feels that although it is a challenge, this year, “We are likely to have a good shot.”

With a due date of Oct. 18 for proposal submission to the state, he says “preparation time is very short, so we’re busy at work on getting this organized.”

As this is the second time around for Copake, Wolf says, “We have a good idea of some of the proposals that we want to do, assuming that the folks who were involved in them last time around are again preparing to participate, so we have a good base of things we intend to do. What we’re hoping that we’ll hear at the first meeting is support for those ideas as well as some new ones.”

The town has set a deadline of Sunday, Sept. 15, the day after the meeting as a deadline for new proposals so, “we can get those ideas in so we have some time to develop them.”

He explained, “What we are looking for are quality proposals that can have the most important impact on what they call ‘placemaking,’ which means sort of strengthening the ‘downtown’... to make it easier for pedestrians to transverse it and to make it more appealing for people to come town and to be pedestrians in it.”

With the ultimate aim of stimulating economic growth by creating jobs and affordable housing, Wolf made it very clear that this grant would have an impact on the entire area, and so he is hoping as many residents as possible become involved.

According to the state’s description of NY Forward, the program for which Copake is applying, was “not designed to fund one large, expensive project. Rather, NY Forward applicants should develop a full suite of synergistic projects…that may include one or two substantial anchor projects supplemented by a variety of smaller supportive projects.”

Wolf says the town is hoping to gain as much support as possible for the proposal by both this meeting and a second one which is as yet unscheduled.

Extensive information, as well as a link to submit proposals and to complete a survey is available at copakewaterfronts.com/nyforward.