2 Putnam Towns Receive Climate Smart Communities Grants

PUTNAM COUNTY, NY — As part of a program help local communities increase resilience in extreme weather, New York's Department of Environmental Conservation's Climate Smart Communities Grant program awarded $85,000 to the towns of Kent and Putnam Valley.

It's in a new round of funding sending more than $11.6 million to 25 municipalities across the state, including seven in the Hudson Valley region.

The grant is meant to help municipalities afford projects that will help them adapt to the ongoing impacts of climate change, such as by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, reducing flood risk and relocating or retrofitting critical infrastructure. The long-term goal is to save taxpayer dollars that could have to be spent for clean-up and re-building.

"We continue to see increasingly extreme weather each year," said Gov. Kathy Hochul in an announcement. "The significant funding under New York's Climate Smart Communities Program is critical in supporting local efforts to protect residents and infrastructure."

The two Putnam grants are going to the towns of Kent and Putnam Valley.

Kent will receive $45,000 for a Bike and Pedestrian Improvement Plan. The town of Kent will develop a bicycle and pedestrian plan to identify multi-modal transportation improvements throughout the community, thereby creating additional transportation options and reducing reliance on traveling by car. The town will assemble an advisory committee, complete a traffic audit, and produce a plan to outline objectives for improving existing infrastructure.

Putnam Valley will receive $40,000 for a Government Operations Greenhouse Gas Inventory. The inventory will help the town prioritize actions and garner local support for a climate action plan, which will include short- and long-term investments and policies to conserve energy and reduce emissions.

In the Hudson region, grants are also going to:

Village of Irvington - $1,136,000
Route 9 Flood Mitigation Project: The village of Irvington will design and construct drainage improvements along Harriman Road/U.S. Route 9, where the existing culvert is inadequate to convey the volume of runoff during medium and large precipitation events. Flooding regularly requires these busy roads to be closed for hours, prohibiting emergency access. The project will also mitigate flooding for residential developments and multi-family properties along the route.

City of Kingston - $50,000
Citywide Refrigerant Management Program: The city of Kingston will develop a municipal refrigerant management plan, including an implementation program, to address the city's purchasing, management, and disposal of refrigerants. The project aims to educate staff about the dangers of refrigerants to the climate as well as reduce the city's greenhouse gas emissions from refrigerant sources.

City of New Rochelle - $100,000
Evaluation of Policies for Climate Resilience: New Rochelle's Climate Resilience Policy Evaluation will guide resilient procedures and policymaking with three focused components: (1) Metrics for environmental, social and governance issues and an annual reporting framework; (2) Heat emergency plan policy evaluation; (3) A coastal resilience policy evaluation.

Sullivan County - $100,000
Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan: Sullivan County will develop a bicycle and pedestrian plan focused on improving the safety, comfort, and convenience of these alternative transportation modes. The plan will encourage healthy and active transportation while avoiding emissions associated with combustion engines typically used for transportation in rural upstate New York.

Ulster County - $1,684,980
Golden Hill Renewable Energy Project: Ulster County will partner with Family of Woodstock, Ulster County Housing Development Corporation, and a developer to build the Golden Hill affordable housing project in the city of Kingston. This will be an all-electric, mixed-income, inter-generational housing development with a 600-kilowatt solar photovoltaic system, 80 units of senior housing, 84 affordable units serving those with 30 percent to 130 percent of the area median income, and a 5,000-square-foot community building. This grant will go toward the cost of the solar system.

The program also supports the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which requires New York to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 85 percent from 1990 levels by 2050.

Since the Climate Smart Communities Grant Program's inception, DEC has awarded more than $50 million to municipalities in support of local climate mitigation and adaptation projects.

More information about the grant program is available on the DEC website.