Glens Falls Mayor Collins catching much flak; his response

By Zander Frost & Mark Frost, Chronicle Staff Writer & Editor

Glens Falls Mayor Bill Collins is catching flak on several fronts as 2023 begins.
• Food truck fees.
• Parking fees and penalties.
• Building permits, stop work orders.

“None of these issues are easy,” Mayor Collins told The Chronicle in a wide-ranging phone conversation Tuesday.

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The building permit issue was raised angrily by Mark Shaw. He is co-founder of Go Play With Your Food, a board game cafe planned at the corner of Glen and Park Streets in a building now owned by Elizabeth Miller.

Mr. Shaw said a City “Stop Work Order” risked $100,000 he’s invested. He said he issued the mayor a deadline of Monday at 5 p.m. for a solution — or he’d take the cafe to Queensbury or North Carolina.

Mayor Collins defended the city’s new code Enforcement Officer and said it was discovered “they were in the middle of rehabbing the inside of the building without a building permit.”

The mayor said, “I’ve got a brand new building and codes department and what we’ve found is that in the past..,apparently Glens Falls did not follow all the state laws.”

“Mr. Shaw has voiced his concerns, calling some of us anti-small business. What I’ve done is try to help.”

The mayor said “engineering designs are difficult to do quickly…So I just recently said that I wanted the contractor to get together with my building and codes directors, and give them all the information on what they plan on doing, and then get us the designs, the signed documents, as soon as possible.”

That led to the current solution — that work can resume. Mr. Shaw sent out a photo of a building permit Tuesday and declared, “We have success.”

Mayor Collins said, “It sounds like right now everybody’s happy, but if you talk a day and a half ago, two days ago, the statement would be that we were getting in the way. And I would say no, not true. We are following the law and trying to make sure everyone’s safe.”

Shirt Factory owner Eric Unkauf said in an email food truck fees may make it impossible to hold events like the Summer Thursday Food Truck Corral.

He said the city made “sizable increases in fees…From a poll of my vendors, Glens Falls is already the most expensive venue in which they operate (for mobile food permits), more than Albany, Schenectady, Troy, Saratoga or Lake George,” he wrote.

Mayor Collins insists Mr. Unkauf had misread his email regarding vendor fees.

He said previous Mayor Dan Hall had an agreement where Mr. Unkauf would pay $1,000 for the year for the Food Truck Corral permit. Mayor Collins said that in December the city emailed Mr. Unkauf to say the $1,000 had not been received.

Beyond that, the mayor says he was seeking information so the City could work better on these and other events. The Mayor said Shirt Factory events are actually very low demand on City resources, unlike others that require police and DPW to shut down streets.

“We’re asking how we can work together to minimize the overhead of the city and maximize these events in a way that benefits everyone,” Mayor Collins said.

The mayor acknowledges that he did run some big numbers by Mr. Unkauf. “You had roughly 25 vendors…That cost, if we charged those vendors a six month fee, would be $15,000.”

Mayor Collins said Mr. Unkauf was upset, and that Mr. Unkauf said that event number didn’t even count some of the Shirt Factory’s other seasonal events.

“We said, oh, you’re right,” Mayor Collins said. He said they revised the estimate to $17,000, “which would be the normal fee that any vendor who wants to be all year in Glens Falls. And Eric again overreacted and said, you know, how can you ask us for this money?

“We said, we’re not asking you for the money, we’re asking you for the 2022 fee. And we’re trying to figure out what events you’re holding, and how many food vendors you are having.”

Mayor Collins said Mr. Unkauf has now paid the $1,000 for 2022, “and I had a very good conversation with him this weekend. He seemed to understand what I was asking.”

Meanwhile, as of Jan. 1, Glens Falls has resumed parking limit enforcement. Social media is rife with criticism.

M. David Howard, CEO of Erbessd Instruments on Exchange Street, focused on parking issues for employees.

“Perhaps the city doesn’t feel the need to solicit feedback from their private sector partners?” he wrote.

Mr. Howard asked, “How many passes will be sold for $180 per pass per year?…The fact that unlimited passes are being sold and there is no guarantee of a parking spot after paying for a parking pass is what makes no sense!!!!”

Mayor Collins said he is simply reinstituting parking rules that were suspended due to Covid. He said the city issued 900 warnings before parking rules returned.

He said he hears from businesses that don’t want parking limits enforced and from other businesses “complaining about other business owners and their employees that park all day long right on Glen Street in front of their door.”

“We don’t have a parking plan,” said the mayor. “We have an amalgamation of parking rules and regulations that have been made reactively over the last 40 years.”

Mayor Collins said he has formed a subcommittee headed by Ward 5 councilwoman Mary Gooden (the city’s former parking enforcement officer) to find a long-term resolution.

The mayor says his concept of turning the Elm Street lot into a “transportation hub” failed to get the federal grant they were pursuing to study it.

He acknowledged, “We got plenty of people complaining to us,” but he said they’ve held meetings on “10 evenings, three business leaders each evening” to talk parking.

Mayor Collins’ State of the City address is Wednesday, Jan. 18, at 12:30, City Hall, in the 2nd floor lobby.

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