Highlands Current Audio Stories

Haldane first-grader pulled from pool The end of the school year is always a big day, but for a 6-year-old Cold Spring boy, it almost marked the end of his life. Haldane kindergarteners and first graders, along with their parents, celebrated the start of summer at a backyard pool party in the village on the afternoon of June 24, the Wednesday of the final week of school. Bethany Califano said that...

Feds lease warehouse in Newburgh Elected officials and Hudson Valley residents are mobilizing against a potential U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in the Town of Newburgh, four months after the agency reversed plans to buy a warehouse in Chester. A notice published by the federal General Services Administration announced that ICE has signed a 15-year, $35.6 million lease with Hous...

Legislators will appoint most members The Putnam Legislature on Tuesday (July 7) approved a law giving it the power to appoint the majority of the Board of Ethics. At the same time, it dissolved the current five-member panel, which had three vacancies. The 5-3 vote (with one legislator absent) could be vetoed by County Executive Kevin Byrne. The executive currently nominates all five volunteer mem...

Newburgh dock withdraws as starting point The Annual Great Newburgh to Beacon River Swim, in which more than 200 swimmers accompanied by dozens of kayaks and other support boats traverse a mile-wide section of the Hudson River, has been canceled for this summer. Scheduled for Aug. 1, the fundraiser for the Beacon River Pool was called off after the Riverfront Marina of Newburgh withdrew as the sta...

Beacon developer ordered to make project right The developer of a Main Street building in Beacon must return to the Planning Board on Tuesday (July 14) with a "full, complete and comprehensive" list of how the nearly complete structure at 364 Main deviated from a site plan approved four years ago. The property owner, Eric Baxter, and other project officials came to the board in May seeking approva...

Also, updates on creekside zoning, cable franchises Ben Swanson was sworn in on Monday (July 6) by Mayor Lee Kyriacou as Beacon's city administrator, completing a seven-month ascension that included a few unexpected steps along the way. After being named the city's first deputy administrator in December, Swanson, 32, learned three months later he would become interim administrator following the re...

Silent Book Club meets monthly in Beacon When it came time for chatting to cease, participants in the Beacon chapter of the Silent Book Club pulled out earplugs and headphones to block out background noise. Then the action began: Everyone started to read. Typically held monthly, this meetup took place at Hudson Valley Brewing, but the group bounces around town and sometimes meets at Long Dock Park...

Statue, Declaration display damaged Police are investigating political messages scrawled on a replica of the Declaration of Independence displayed at Putnam County's Historic Courthouse and damage to a newly restored statue of Sybil Ludington, a Revolutionary War hero. County Executive Kevin Byrne said on Tuesday (July 7) that a large reproduction of the Declaration hung on the face of the courtho...

Reservoir affected by recent storms At the beginning of the Wednesday (July 8) meeting of the Cold Spring Village Board, Mayor Kathleen Foley clarified why a Stage 2 Water Emergency had been declared earlier in the day. [Update: The water emergency was rescinded on Friday morning.] "We are not in a water shortage," she said. Instead, recent storms had overwhelmed the water treatment process with s...

Environmental group says advocacy led to dismissal A highlight of America's bicentennial in 1976 was Operation Sail, a parade of tall ships around New York City that featured the sloop Clearwater, representing the environmental organization of the same name created by folk icons Pete and Toshi Seeger of Beacon. The parade returned to New York City on July 4, this time as Sail4th 250 in honor of th...

East Fishkill approves moratorium When Debra Pagano heard that a developer was proposing a 1-gigawatt AI data center in East Fishkill, she asked her son in Texas what he thought of the controversial facilities. With 466 currently operating or planned data centers, Texas has more than any other state except Virginia, according to the Pew Research Center. "I asked his opinion — if it was to their ad...

Volunteers open paddling routes The Fishkill Creek runs behind Sergei Krasikov's house and it wasn't long after he moved to Beacon that he began to wonder: How much of this is navigable? A quick scan of Google Maps revealed the numerous dams which make canoeing and kayaking the entire 33.5-mile creek from Pray Pond in Unionvale to Madam Brett Park in Beacon impossible, and by late summer some sect...

Mandeville hosted a revolution Last month at Mandeville House in Garrison, attendees ate French fromage and drank Perrier and Champagne. Dressed in Revolutionary War garb, Mark Forlow wielded a scabbard to slice open a bottle of Veuve Clicquot with a clean cut through the glass instead of popping the cork. "You have to suspend the neck in ice for an hour or so," he says. "I've seen people do this...

Walking in the Revolution's footsteps One of the first thoughts that occurs to you when reading up on the history of the American Revolution in the Hudson Highlands is that they sure did a lot of walkin'. Many of the routes they took were trails established by the Native Americans and animals of the Hudson Valley. A lot of those paths have since become beloved hiking trails, so there's a good chan...

Panel considers resident parking in lower village Mayor Kathleen Foley, at the Wednesday (June 24) meeting of the Cold Spring Village Board, outlined changes needed in the lower village regarding parking, enforcement and related signage. Foley said that although a resident parking district was created in 2015, signage was never installed. "Our officers cannot ticket non-residents without signs," s...

Retired officer's 'brain health' being evaluated A report by a psychiatric expert hired to evaluate the mental health of Edison Irizarry, the retired Beacon police officer who said he shot his roommate nearly a year ago, is complete. A second, commissioned by prosecutors, is expected next. The findings of the first report have not been released. Once complete, both will be considered as the crimin...

Allows swimming at Beacon waterfront When folk singer Pete Seeger envisioned The River Pool at the Beacon waterfront more than 25 years ago, he said he wanted to encourage swimming in the Hudson, which he sang about as "My Dirty Stream." "He felt that if people were swimming in the water, they would work to keep it clean," said Karen Frillman, president of the pool's volunteer board. Seeger died i...

Future use remains uncertain Despite a push from Rep. Mike Lawler and the U.S. Department of Energy, a restart at the Indian Point nuclear power plant seems increasingly unlikely. Doing so would require unanimous approval from five entities, three of which — New York State, Westchester County and the Town of Cortlandt — have repeatedly voiced their opposition to nuclear power being produced there....

Hudson Valley Shakespeare debuts Scripps theater For the debut season of the Samuel H. Scripps Theater Center, named after a newspaper scion who lived in Rhinebeck and worked in the theater world as a lighting designer, the Hudson Valley Shakespeare is presenting a double dose from the Bard and a "special run" of Les Misérables. After previews, opening night for As You Like It was June 20, and Kin...

Author, performer will evoke jazz singer If any artist in history could have benefited from better public relations, Billie Holiday fits the bill. Maligned by the press and broadcast media during her lifetime, authors and film producers exploited her legacy after she drank herself to death in 1959 at age 44. To set the record straight about the beloved jazz singer, Paul Alexander, author of Bitter...

Dutchess, Putnam faced funding shortages More funding is on the way for families who were turned away for childcare assistance when Putnam and Dutchess counties suspended their programs last summer. Gov. Kathy Hochul and state lawmakers agreed last month to provide $2.4 billion in the 2026-27 budget for the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP), a 40 percent increase. It also includes $630 million...

Each month, writers gather for feedback at Script Lab Laurie Slattery, who discovered Savage Wonder's Script Lab online and appreciated the nonprofit's focus on veterans, showed up for the first time at a workshop last month. Her grandfather stormed Iwo Jima with the Marines, and her nephew served in Iraq. "I wrote some poetry and a script that I had to retrieve from an old computer," she says. Af...

Will face Lawler, Rolison in November election After a months-long race that initially had eight contenders, Cait Conley won the Democratic nomination for House District 17, which includes Philipstown, with 49 percent of the unofficial vote. The turnout was 22 percent. Conley, who received 53 percent of the vote in Dutchess County and 57 percent in Putnam, now turns to face Mike Lawler, the Republ...

Editor's note: Beacon was created in 1913 from Matteawan and Fishkill Landing. William Coggswell was charged with beating his brother, James, with a club at James' saloon on Main Street in Fishkill Landing. John Oderman, the cornet player for a brass band, badly injured his arm at the fulling mill inside a Glenham factory. Burglars carefully removed a light to reach inside a display at a hotel nea...

Blame foreclosure on 'unhinged' acquaintance A Putnam County judge on Wednesday (June 17) denied an attempt by a couple who owned a dry cleaner on Route 9 in Philipstown to regain the property, which they said was lost to fraud. Judge Gina Capone upheld the foreclosure and eviction by MT&T Bank of Sokhara Kim and Chakra Oeur from 3154 Route 9, which from 1995 to early 2024 had been owned by Kim th...