Housing group looks at alternates in housing inventory

MILLERTON — Along with continuing its ongoing exploration of affordable housing ideas for North East, Amenia and Pine Plains, the Millerton-North East working group for the Tri-Town Coalition engaged its members to see where their interests lie in moving their affordable housing projects forward at a meeting on Tuesday, April 13.

The group convened over Zoom for its monthly meeting due to the health crisis. One by one, members introduce themselves and spoke of their interests, from community outreach and gathering data to looking at what other states and local municipalities have done regarding affordable housing.

Architect Karen Jacobson shared her knowledge in regard to assessing costs and suggested it would be best to approach housing in a “very logical way, so it gets built.” 

Millerton resident Meg Winkler shared her thoughts that the concept of affordability is “a bit skewed” because even when talking about Millerton and North East, they have to put into perspective what affordable housing looks like in other parts of the state. 

As supervisor of the town of North East, Chris Kennan said he’s confronted with the challenges involving housing on a daily basis, between the people who need affordable housing and can’t find it and those who are being priced out of housing opportunities. 

He said “very small town government” can be frustrating, as it doesn’t have the resources or capabilities to take on the issue like a larger city, like nearby Poughkeepsie. 

He spoke of the work ahead like gathering data and resources, and reminded those present “this is something we can’t walk away from.”

Once everyone introduced themselves, group member Sam Busselle announced that the project they had planned to look at on South Center Street had been disqualified. The coalition had planned to asses a set of three housing units on South Center Street from an affordability perspective; Busselle said two of the three units had just been gutted in order to be renovated. 

However, he said the engineers who looked at the units didn’t think they were worth renovating. Busselle commented that it was “a big blow” since the group had been making plans for more than a year and had hoped to get significant funding for the project. Then he said if the group can find another three units, it may still be able to get funding.

Busselle stressed its community outreach committee should have different perspectives and narratives prepped and “really point out that [affordable housing] is a vital part of [the community’s] economic development.”

Moving on to accessory apartments, Busselle said there’s another option in the local housing inventory. The group has been looking at large houses with few tenants who might not be struggling to afford the upkeep, yet might have a garage apartment available. He suggested it would be nice to renovate those garage apartments to accommodate other renters. 

Given all the logistics involved, group members mused that they have to be careful in terms of making garage apartments housing options. In addition to considering the ongoing problems with village septic systems, they spoke about green housing alternatives and looking into where properties could be built so that they have a viable septic system and meet the local building codes.

Latest News

Father Joseph Kurnath

LAKEVILLE — Father Joseph G. M. Kurnath, retired priest of the Archdiocese of Hartford, passed away peacefully, at the age of 71, on Sunday, June 29, 2025.

Father Joe was born on May 21, 1954, in Waterbury, Connecticut. He attended kindergarten through high school in Bristol.

Keep ReadingShow less
Fallen trees injure man, destroy fences at dog shelter

Two uprooted locust trees still lie in the yard in front of Animal Farm Foundation’s original kennels where they fell on a fence during a storm on Thursday, June 19.

Nathan Miller

AMENIA — Fallen trees, uprooted and splintered during a thunderstorm, injured a man, destroyed fences and damaged a dog kennel at the Animal Farm Foundation facilities in Bangall.

Isaias Nunez was cleaning along a road on the property with Marco Ortiz, another employee of the dog shelter, when the storm rolled in on the afternoon of Thursday, June 19.

Keep ReadingShow less
Siglio Press: Uncommon books at the intersection of art and literature

Uncommon books at the intersection of art and literature.

Richard Kraft

Siglio Press is a small, independent publishing house based in Egremont, Massachusetts, known for producing “uncommon books at the intersection of art and literature.” Founded and run by editor and publisher Lisa Pearson, Siglio has, since 2008, designed books that challenge conventions of both form and content.

A visit to Pearson’s airy studio suggests uncommon work, to be sure. Each of four very large tables were covered with what looked to be thousands of miniature squares of inkjet-printed, kaleidoscopically colored pieces of paper. Another table was covered with dozens of book/illustration-size, abstracted images of deer, made up of colored dots. For the enchanted and the mystified, Pearson kindly explained that these pieces were to be collaged together as artworks by the artist Richard Kraft (a frequent contributor to the Siglio Press and Pearson’s husband). The works would be accompanied by writings by two poets, Elizabeth Zuba and Monica Torre, in an as-yet-to-be-named book, inspired by a found copy of a worn French children’s book from the 1930s called “Robin de Bois” (Robin Hood).

Keep ReadingShow less