The Newburgh Advocate

Authorize another $6.313 Million?

The City Comptroller Charles Emberger asked the Council for a resolution last night that would increase a 2004 bond authorization by $6,313,000 to cover additional costs associated with the new City Courthouse. Located at the intersection of Broadway and 9W, the Broadway School is undergoing renovations to become the new City Courthouse.

The original cost allotted for the courthouse was $12, 240,000 in 2004.
At Broadway School, the current cost is $18,553,000.

Why the big difference?

Mr. Emberger cited increased construction costs due to inflation, such as steel being up over 131% from last year. “And we had the additional costs of the asbestos.”

The current cost comes to $15,227,000.
The original bond approval was for $12,240,000.
That comes to “a difference of $3,287,820.”

Mr. Emberger noted that there were also previous expenses that had been outlaid (with the other site) chosen prior to the Broadway School’s final selection. (For those that don’t remember, there was some conflict about where the new courthouse would be located and the terms of the previous deal.)

Those other expenses bring the additional cost to $6,313,000.

The Comptroller urged the council to authorize the additional bond since he has been paying courthouse expenses out of the general fund, and there is a need to replenish the fund.

“I had pages of questions that I didn’t get to ask”

Councilwoman Maryann Dickinson was determined to meet with the auditors before considering an additional bond authorization.

“Before I’d even consider this, back when we first had the problems with the courthouse… we were supposed to meet with Nugent and Hauser to go over the audit. But that never happened. And so I have a lot of questions that I would want answered about what’s going on right now before I would even consider this.”

The City Manager and the Comptroller agreed to have a meeting with the auditors set up in the coming weeks. Councilwoman Dickinson and others will get to ask their questions.

“Why aren’t we suing?”

“But my question is, we have this asbestos, in this building. Now anybody who lives in Newburgh has got to know there’s asbestos… why aren’t we suing the people who didn’t tell us about the asbestos before?”

There was a burst of spontaneous applause from the audience at Councilwoman Dickinson’s question. The City Manger immediately said “May I ask that that be a subject for executive session? …That will be part of the discussion on pending litigation…”

So perhaps there already is pending litigation against whomever is deemed responsible for not knowing when they should have known about the asbestos.

It remains to be seen if the partners of Den Cass will hold any liability. Den Cass was a partnership created to buy ownership of Broadway School from the City of Newburgh in 1986 and included the partners of William Hauser, Richard McGooey (of the consulting firm McGooey, Hauser and Edsall, consulting engineers to the City) William Loewenstein of “Community Development Group, Inc.” and the City of Newburgh Local Development Corporation. (Does the name Loewenstein sound familiar? He’s the consultant that proposed the prior site and deal for the city courthouse, much to the consternation of many local citizens.)

Did the consulting engineers know their own building had asbestos?

The partners do make a representation that is revealing in its selection for a mortgage dated from 1991. The signatories are McGooey, Hauser, Loewenstein and Donald Presutti, then Mayor, signing as partner for the Newburgh Local Development Corporation.

The partners had to choose between two representations about asbestos in the building. They did not choose “No asbestos or urea formaldehyde foam insulation is located in any of the buildings or structures improving the property.” They did choose this: “[Alternative: No urea formaldehyde foam insulation, no friable asbestos insulation and no unencapsulated asbestos-containing material is located in any of the buildings or structures improving the property.]