Festival of Lights returns for annual tradition
Cold temperatures pushed the Sneed family into Candy-o’s on Main Street where Tanner Sneed shows off his Grinch face to son William on Friday, Nov. 28.
Photo by Nathan Miller
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Tim Watson sits in the front room of a home he and his family are temporarily occupying. Watson and his family evacuated their apartment at 7-9 Main St. in Millerton after a carbon monoxide leak.
Photo by Aly Morrissey
Several tenants described their displacement as the latest failure of the owner, Kastriot “Chris” Rrapi, to properly maintain the 126-year-old building, an argument that Rrapi disputes.
“Our entire world got flipped upside down in a matter of hours,” said Brittney Watson, 22, who said she woke to the smell of smoke and felt dizzy as alarms sounded. Her family — including her father, Tim Watson, who uses a wheelchair after losing both legs — was among those forced to evacuate.
The property now appears unoccupied. Village officials said they shut off water to the building as an additional measure to prevent anyone from living there.
The Watson family is currently staying in temporary housing with assistance from the American Red Cross — an arrangement that is set to expire in early March, around 30 days after they first moved into the temporary home. The family said their future living situation is now uncertain.
Tenants describe displacement and past conditions
Tim Watson's electric wheelchair sits in an alley space near a side entrance to the 7-9 Main Street apartment building. Watson said his brother helped him install a stairlift on the staircase leading to the door because the building lacked wheelchair-accessible entrances.Photo by Aly Morrissey
Tim Watson said he and his family moved into a first-floor apartment in the building about three years ago — though Rrapi describes it as less than two — and did not sign a written lease. Watson said his family was asked to pay rent in cash under a verbal agreement that would allow for weekly payments based on their fixed-income financial situation. Rent was $1,650 per month for a two-bedroom apartment.
“There was no lease,” Watson said. “It was always cash.”
The Watson family described long-standing problems, including pests, unreliable heat, and water leaks. The family said they repeatedly raised concerns about maintenance issues that went ignored. In the weeks leading up to the fire, Watson said the apartment went days without heat or hot water, forcing the family to rely on a space heater.
Jason Wendover, who is married to one of Watson’s daughters, described similar issues during his time in the building in 2025 in a second-floor apartment, including concerns about whether utilities were properly separated by unit and what he said was a severe cockroach infestation.
“They got into everything,” Wendover said of the cockroaches. “I’d wake up in the morning and, if I forgot to change the coffee, there would be roaches floating in the coffee pot.”
Rrapi disputes many of the Watsons’ claims and said they stopped paying rent months ago, leaving their unit in disarray after the evacuation.
“The building is old, I understand that,” Rrapi said. “It needs work. But the drama this family puts landlords through — it’s unacceptable.”
He said the family destroyed the apartment and caused tension for other tenants, noting complaints about loud arguments and smoking indoors.
Rrapi disputes allegations that he required cash-only payments, saying all of his tenants are welcome to pay by cash, check or Zelle — a cellphone banking app that allows for electronic payments. He also said a professional exterminator was sent to the building and that the Watson family refused to allow them into their apartment.
“I submitted the receipt to the Dutchess County Department of Health,” Rrapi said.
Rrapi said the Watsons owe him nearly $22,000 in back rent and damages, and eviction proceedings are underway. He said they were provided with notice in the months leading up to the fire. He described the apartment left behind by the family as severely damaged, saying they did not maintain the interior of the apartment.
“It’s a wreck to the point that it has to be gutted,” Rrapi said. “It’s my fault that I rented to them, but I felt sorry for them.”
Tim Watson denied ever receiving an eviction notice and rejected claims that his family caused damage to the apartment. He said he withheld as much as $15,000 in rent in the months leading up to the fire, describing the decision as a protest against what he called “slum-like” conditions in the building.
Foreclosure, zoning roadblocks and an uncertain future
Just inside the building's side entrance is a hole in the wall caused by the doorknob.Photo by Aly Morrissey
Rrapi said the building’s future remains uncertain amid foreclosure proceedings that began in 2023 after a commercial loan went into default, which he attributed largely to a discrepancy he said he discovered after purchasing the property with his father, Zef Rapaj.
With 12 electrical meters on the building, the pair believed it was configured for 12 units, but they later learned it is legally zoned for six, which complicated the property’s finances and prompted him to pursue a variance through the village’s Zoning Board of Appeals.
He described the property as “the biggest headache I ever bought,” citing years of zoning roadblocks and financial strain that have left him uncertain how much more he is willing to invest in the property. Rrapi purchased the Millerton property along with two residential properties in Amenia and a vacant lot in Dover Plains from Christine Lilley of Brewster in 2021.
“I’m not going to put that kind of money into it if I’m not allowed to use the building the way it’s set up,” he said.
While he said he plans to replace the furnace, Rrapi said renovation plans have stalled amid what he described as shifting standards and mixed signals from the village.
With his legal team and architect Ray Nelson of Earthwise Architecture, Rrapi sought to scale back a proposal from 12 units to nine, which the ZBA rejected in June 2025.
The variance request was denied in part due to parking requirements, which mandate 1.5 spaces per unit — a standard that village officials have acknowledged has been difficult to meet in Millerton’s dense downtown.
Rrapi said he considered demolishing the building out of frustration, though he said he still has hope that there is a path forward to rehabilitate the building.
No timeline has been set for repairs or occupancy. Village officials said residents may not return until all safety requirements are met. Rrapi said he will complete the required work but remains undecided about whether he will continue renting the building long-term.
Douglas Broughton, left, and Glenn Hilliard of Newtown, Connecticut, package cannabis flower for wholesale to dispensaries at Broughton’s home in Wassaic on Dec. 19, 2025.
Photo by Nathan Miller
The work will include cosmetic updates and the installation of freestanding, custom-made display cabinets.
Broughton said he hopes to open in April, but red tape at the New York Office of Cannabis Management could delay the opening.
The Millerton storefront will mark another milestone for the 63-year-old farmer, who has been cultivating cannabis since the 1990s, when the plant was still illegal.
Cannabis branches hang after being weighed.Photo by Nathan Miller
“I just loved the plant and how it grew,” Broughton said. “It’s a very alien plant — it seems like it came from a different planet.”
In the early 1990s, Broughton was bartending in Brooklyn and couch-surfing after becoming disenchanted with the television broadcast industry. As an Asian American, he said his dreams of becoming a leading man or primetime news anchor were dashed by what he described as discrimination in the industry.
Broughton, who was raised in Washington state, initially moved to New York City in the late 1980s, when a series of internships brought him out east. Rather than return home to complete his degree, he opted to stay and try to make it on his own.
By 1995, Broughton was regularly growing multiple plants on the roof of an apartment building in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, selling small quantities of the plant on the black market to customers at the bar where he worked.
“Bartending in the city is pretty good,” Broughton said. “It was just that I didn’t want to bartend.”
His chance to leave bartending came in 2000, when he met Joe Murray, known in New York City’s cannabis scene as “AJ Sour Diesel” for pioneering the Sour Diesel strain, prized for its strong effects and pungent odor.
Broughton said Murray helped expand the operation, allowing him to rely on cannabis cultivation as his primary source of income beginning in 2000.
Broughton moved to his home in Wassaic in 2016, where he operated a black market farm until New York state legalized cannabis and began accepting license applications in 2021.
A crop of cannabis at the end of its growing cycle waits to be processed into wholesale products for sale in southern New York.Photo by Nathan Miller
He said his age was a factor in deciding to get a license and form a legitimate enterprise. Broughton, nearly 60 at the time New York legalized cannabis for recreational use, had been running illicit grow operations for decades and said the anxiety of avoiding law enforcement had worn him down.
“Every aspect of what you did had to be hidden,” Broughton said. “You couldn’t tell anybody.”
After legalization, however, he said he faces a different set of challenges brought on by bureaucracy and corporatism in New York’s cannabis industry.
Broughton said New York’s tax scheme hits small growers the hardest. He said he has to pay taxes on each plant he grows, and then again when he sells to retailers or, eventually, directly to consumers.
Despite those hurdles, Broughton said he is eager to bring a high-quality product to consumers in Millerton.
Over the past 30 years, he has developed a growing technique that relies entirely on artificial light and strict control of nutrients and moisture. He said he maintains a level of oversight that borders on obstinance.
“I’m more of a purist when it comes to this stuff,” Broughton said. “I’m not very forgiving.”
That rigidity pays off with better product, he said, even when it means destroying an entire harvest.
“We cut down an entire crop of amazing Sour Diesel like two years ago because we got mites,” Broughton said.
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