Weekly Link Round Up

27259385103_6c17d72beb_z

Photo by NR flickr user Steven Rosas. The weekly link roundup is a collection of links related to Newburgh, revitalization, urban planning and anything else that might inspire change or create dialogue.

Jane Jacobs on why cities need ‘holes in the wall’ [Star]
Developer prepared to sue Newburgh over project delay [THR]
Newburgh pushes for high-tech weapon against gun violence [DF]
Newburgh Author Book Review Sarah Jaffe – One Nation, Under Stress [NYT]
James Patterson and Tim Malloy Investigate the Murder of a Small Town [POP]
Newburgh gets okay to spend federal funds to new security camera network [Mid Hudson News]
Skateboard park to go forward, but not at expense of community safety, says Newburgh City Council [Mid Hudson News]

Add your own photos depicting city life to the Newburgh Restoration flickr pool to be used on the blog, or email me. **Flickr users please do not forgot to remove disabling of downloading of pictures. Otherwise I can’t use them**

3 Comment

  • -‘Seen a sign recently posted on a Grand St. house front stoop…”No Loitering”
    -Let ’em have it. When the locals ask for more street cams, lights, parks, edu programs, etc. show them the tax deficit and legislate a renter’s tax. It relates back to the ‘holes in the walls’. It seems some of the locals want that trade-off…careful what you wish for.
    -Developed in war torn Iraq for combating snipers as they tend not too move much, s.p. worked great. In occupied urban environments, not so much. The council once debated why the ‘City, vs the feds, should pay for security at the congressman’s building. That money could have paid for a street cop.
    -‘Er, when exactly was America ” more homogenous”? It seems to me the contemporary progressives are doing their best to accomplish just that in spite of diversity. Hmmm, me thinks that’s the problem. ‘…the financial crisis of ’08 was the signal that “democracy” was failing.The country is a pot ready to boil over.’ Really? I’m thinking 1914 should have provided a couple of clues. The founding fathers’ original wishes were for a republic, democracy was a tool to be kept in check.
    -Are these public cameras going to provide a live feed viewable by the public that’s footing the bill or does the public not want to look in the mirror? Alternative; install numerous ‘dead’ cameras, at a fraction of the costs, and the placebo affect will do more to deter crime than a few ‘live’ cams will.
    -The ‘City had the opportunity to build a modest skate park a few years ago, which would have afforded additional street lighting where needed. Instead, the majority council held grandiose ideas of a revenue generating ‘complex’, never mind the fact that the city is struggling to maintain its infrastructure. It was a citified version of the town’s ‘LOOP’.
    Observation, the ptb are achieving what others in the past didn’t even dream of…voluntary oppression.

  • The idea of building a skate park with taxpayer money for $700,000 is obscene. And you just don’t know what you are talking about when it comes to law and order and video cameras! 8 people got shot on South St last Spring and the victims were told no suspects were on camera because the cameras were turned off and would not be turned on unless there was a special request. insanity. Watch channel 12 news almost every night they show video footage of crimes being solved from information gathered from cameras. This is nation wide and worldwide. And Newburgh is a very high crime area. If private money can help we need a program that private property owners can opt in to obtain the best standard equipment and infrastructure, services so that can at least be coordinated with law enforcement. Fake cameras don’t cut it.

    • Do I get a bonus ‘brown shirt’ if I “coordinate”? Re-read my post. A few cameras would have an actual live feed viewable by the public in real time. As the main cost is in the ongoing monitoring, the individual live feeds would alternate with ‘dead’ cameras, not “fake cameras”…two different concepts. If there are cameras in every home bedroom of your neighborhood and only one is variably live, one will act differently…to the point that either you become insensitive or emotionally indoctrinated as a eunuch. Case in point to the former, though NYC has become more ‘wired’… homicide, rape and robbery increased the past year. To the latter point, x gender bathrooms in public schools. Anyway, let me guess, this ‘quasi private/public money program’ includes some sort of tax credit or direct subsidy paid for by the collective. Fwiw, there’s nothing stopping private peeps from opting to provide live feeds on the net or from coding them for select viewing. I’m not paying for anyone’s camera. Nobody pays for my water or sewer service once it leaves the street, nor do I expect them to. And how’s that working out anyway? Last I checked I’m on the hook for replacing the public side of both svcs as the ‘keepers’ dismissed maintenance for a few decades. ‘Insult to injury, they managed to make the effort to piss in my water so to speak because, well, they didn’t ‘intend’ to. If I am tapped to pay for cameras, I want to see the feeds in real time, not ‘bleached’ (I can view frick’n nestling peregrines on the Mid-Hudson bridge 24/7). That’s not going to happen because most of the sheep want out of sight out of mind, until it’s their problem but unrelated directly to them. Then it’s everyone’s problem. A lot of people are claiming ‘lack of oversight’, ‘others not doing their job’, ‘blah,blah, blah…’ . Yet, some are more than willing to throw more $’s and responsibility at those they charge. ‘Survivor’s guilt, Stockholm syndrome, dismay? Meanwhile, the street lights are still out on Montgomery Street. When CH responded to the list of 133 outed lights, did they imply a month per light? This we already paid for…I hope, one never knows as the ‘Burgh does have a defecit. – Again, the initial skate park discussed was budgeted at a modest $150k there about, nothing fancy.