Radio Chatskill

The Borscht Belt hotels and resorts featured more than just celebrity musicians and comedians… they also featured celebrity Cantors for Jewish religious services and holidays. The Borscht Belt Museum in Ellenville is hosting a panel this Sunday entitled “When Showbiz Went to Shul: Star Catskills Cantors” about the fierce competition between Borscht Belt venues to book the best of the best, in Cantors. Radio Catskill’s Ronald Kelson spoke with two of the panelists, Henry Sapoznik and Danny Fingeroth, to learn more about this singular time in our area’s history and also about the upcoming event.

A math teacher, a school psychologist, and library aides are among 26 positions the Rondout Valley Central School District in Ulster County is cutting or leaving unfilled. The proposal includes eliminating 16 staff positions and not replacing 10 others due to retirements.The district unveiled an $83.5 million budget during a school board meeting on Tuesday night. Hundreds of people filled the high school auditorium just hours after students staged a walkout to protest the cuts Radio Catskill’s Kimberly Izar was at the meeting Tuesday night and has more.

Some Parksville residents on Lily Pond Road are now going on 11 days without running water. Yesterday, residents received a boil water notice after they lost water – but they have no water to boil.Radio Catskill’s Kimberly Izar spoke with residents and local officials yesterday and brings us this report.

Some school districts nationwide face a tough choice: keep their transgender protection policies or risk losing Title IX funding. In Pike County, Pennsylvania, the Trump administration has sent a letter to the Delaware Valley School District threatening federal action. Radio Catskill’s Kimberly Izar was at the school board meeting on Thursday night where the board voted to abruptly drop its policy.

A new investigation from The New Pine Plains Herald found that Pine Plains Supervisor Brian Walsh quietly approved 11 Flock Safety cameras without town board approval. Radio Catskill's Kimberly Izar spoke with Patrick Grego, Editor-in-Chief at the New Pine Plains Herald, to learn more.

In 1991, students protested Bard College’s lack of action in handling cases of sexual violence. Decades later, some students and alumni say the problem persists. WAMC’s Elias Guerra looked into the college’s history on the issue. A warning that this story contains many mentions of sexual violence.

Budget negotiations are heating up in the New York state legislature as lawmakers race to meet the April 1 budget deadline. For Assembly District 100 Assemblymember Paula Kay, high utility bills, childcare, and local road maintenance are among her top priorities for her largely rural district.Radio Catskill checked in with Assemblymember Kay, who represents Sullivan and Orange counties, about what’s top of mind for her this month.

Housing insecurity remains a key barrier for many students’ ability to learn and participate in schools. This past week, New York State’s Education Department awarded $8.1 million in federal funds to support school districts and charter schools across the state serving homeless students.Liberty Central School District was one of those grant recipients and received a three-year grant totaling $525,000 to support students facing housing insecurity.Radio Catskill’s Kimberly Izar spoke with Deborah DeGraw, Director of Student Services at Liberty Central School District, and Dawn Hurley, the district’s McKinney-Vento Outreach Coordinator, to learn more. A McKinney-Vento Outreach Coordinator is a mandatory school district staff member who identifies, enrolls, and supports students experiencing homelessness.

The Sullivan County Visitors Association is making a case to county lawmakers that the key to boosting the local economy lies in reaching a different kind of tourist — one flying in from St. Louis or Milwaukee, not just driving up from New York City.At a Sullivan County Legislature meeting last Thursday, SCVA Executive Director Michael Martellon laid out an ambitious vision for transforming how the agency markets the Catskills region, centered on a shift toward digital advertising and away from the print ads and trade shows that have historically driven the agency's outreach, according to Liam Mayo of The River Reporter. Fewer Day-Trippers, More Overnight GuestsThe underlying logic is simple: the further away a visitor comes from, the longer they tend to stay — and longer stays mean more money flowing into the local economy through lodging taxes, restaurant bills, and retail spending.Martellon was also eager to clarify where the SCVA's money comes from in the first place. As Mayo explained, "He really emphasized that the SCVA doesn't get tax dollars that are generated on people who are living and working in the county. The SCVA is funded fully through the lodging tax that is collected on hotel rooms and Airbnb stays in the county."Martellon said the county currently sits at about a 25% annual occupancy rate across its hotels, inns, and short-term rentals. Nudging that number up even modestly, he argued, could translate to significant revenue gains. A jump to 30% occupancy, he projected, would generate roughly $2.69 million in additional sales and lodging tax revenue. A climb to 40% — a figure he said he achieved over eight years while leading tourism efforts in Telluride, Colorado — could mean $8 million more, with $5.6 million of that coming through sales tax alone.He acknowledged the figures are projections, not guarantees.Showing Up on ChatGPT, Not Just GoogleTo attract those distant visitors, Martellon said the SCVA plans to invest heavily in what he's calling "generative AI engine optimization" — making sure Sullivan County appears when someone asks ChatGPT or Google Gemini where to vacation, not just when they type a query into a traditional search engine. He also described plans to build out a direct digital marketing infrastructure, allowing the SCVA to reach potential visitors without relying solely on broad media buys.The approach is supported by early data. A campaign the agency ran this past December and January showed interest from well beyond the tri-state area. "Some of the sites were other places in the Northeast like Hartford, New Haven, Connecticut, Boston, Massachusetts," Mayo noted. "But there were some sites further afield in there as well, like Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Orlando, Florida and St. Louis, Missouri."Mark Baez, president and CEO of the Sullivan County Partnership for Economic Development, backed the direction, noting that digital-first strategies have become essential for both tourism promotion and economic development broadly.Not Everyone Is Fully ConvincedThe pivot away from traditional marketing drew some questions from legislators. Mayo described a notable back-and-forth between Martellon and Legislator Cap Scott: "She was asking for more of a specific report on what the SCVA was doing sort of to increase tourism on a day-to-day basis. And he was saying, 'I'm trying to focus on the overall direction — focusing on tactics is getting a little bit too much in the weeds.'"The concern from lawmakers, Mayo said, was straightforward: "Yes, we're all about the digital, yes, we're all about this new direction, but let's make sure that we're not transitioning too quickly away from what we were doing before we know quite what we are doing."Grant Program Gets a ResetLawmakers also received an update on the SCVA's tourism event grant program, which Martellon has restructured since taking the helm.When he first arrived, Martellon froze all pending grants — including some that had already been promised to county businesses. After conversations with affected business owners, those were ultimately released. But the episode set the stage for a broader rethinking of how the grants would work.Under the new model, the SCVA received $1.6 million in funding requests and awarded $150,000. As Mayo put it, the new philosophy boils down to this: "We gave less money to a lot more people." The grants are now framed explicitly as marketing dollars — the SCVA will cover up to 20% of an event's marketing budget, but it's not in the business of funding entire events.The second round of SCVA tourism event grants is currently open. Information sessions run March 16 through March 26, and the application deadline is April 14. More information is available at sullivancatskills.com.

LIVINGSTON MANOR, N.Y. — For the Catskills Community Land Trust, the dream of permanently affordable housing in the region just got a lot more tangible. The organization has been awarded a $98,000 grant through New York State’s Smart Growth program — money that will allow it to purchase its first piece of land and take the first concrete steps toward building a two-family rental home in Livingston Manor.“We’re excited to say we can start doing the fun part of this work — buying land, building homes,” said Gwen Schantz, one of the organizers behind the effort. “It’s a huge first hurdle for us to get over, just owning our first piece of land.”WHAT IS A COMMUNITY LAND TRUST?The Catskills CLT was formed roughly a year ago with a clear diagnosis: housing costs in the region have outpaced what local workers earn, and the area lacks rental housing altogether. In much of the Catskills, the service industry is the backbone of the local economy — but seasonal wages and soaring rents make it nearly impossible for those workers to stay.A community land trust addresses that tension by removing land from the speculative real estate market entirely. A nonprofit organization holds ownership of the land in perpetuity, while homes on that land are rented or sold at prices calibrated to local incomes. The housing stays affordable not just for one tenant, but for every resident who follows.“Real estate is treated like an investment opportunity, and that has had a big impact on housing prices and land prices,” Schantz said. “The goal of the nonprofit community land trust model is to keep housing accessible to people no matter how much money they’re making.”THE FIRST PROJECTThe grant will fund the acquisition of a small vacant lot on Meadow Street in the Town of Rockland — a parcel the town board voted to sell to the CLT nearly a year ago. Remaining funds will go toward hiring an architect and preparing the site for construction, bringing the project to what Schantz calls “shovel-ready” status.The planned structure is a two-family rental home built with local hemlock timber frame — a material Schantz describes as not only durable and beautiful, but a carbon sink that helps offset the footprint of construction. The building is designed to be climate-resilient, a priority in a region with a long history of flooding, and energy-efficient enough to keep tenants’ heating costs low.“We want to build something that’s strong, beautiful, and helps beautify the street,” Schantz said. “We really think we can solve a lot of problems at once — beautification, affordable housing, and making our town greener and more climate resilient.”Actual construction will require a second round of fundraising. The grant gets the organization to the threshold — land owned, design in hand, site prepared — but building the home is phase two.WHO WILL LIVE THERE?The CLT intends to prioritize local workers — people already employed in Livingston Manor, Roscoe, and surrounding hamlets who struggle to find housing they can afford on local wages. Rent will be set at roughly 30 percent of household income, the standard affordability benchmark.“Local businesses are struggling to hire and keep employees because it can be really expensive to live here,” Schantz said. “If you’re a family working in town and making $20 or $25 an hour, we want to make sure the rent is affordable to you.”A MODEL FOR THE REGIONThe CLT is thinking beyond Livingston Manor. Schantz says the organization’s scattered-site approach — identifying vacant infill lots rather than pursuing large developments — translates well across the small river-valley hamlets that define the Catskills. The Binghamton-based First Ward Action Council, a long-established affordable housing nonprofit, serves as one model.Looking further ahead, the organization envisions not only building new homes but also acquiring and renovating vacant historic structures — a persistent problem in the region, where old homes sit unoccupied because repair costs are prohibitive.The Town of Rockland has been a key partner, having earned a state “pro-housing community” designation last year through the New York Homes and Community Renewal program. The Community Foundation of Orange, Sullivan and Rockland has served as fiscal sponsor for the young nonprofit.For Schantz, the timing feels right. “Things are thawing out, and it feels like it’s springtime for our organization,” she said. “We’re excited to hit the ground running this summer and literally get some foundations laid.”