GHENT – At last month’s Town Board meeting in Ghent, board members adopted Local Law 2, which amends the town’s zoning laws to include time limits for special use permits.
Passage of the law October 19 means that going forward Ghent has set parameters on the amount of time an applicant has to start or finish building; it also covers the timing for when an applicant applies for a special building permit. If construction has not begun within 180 days of receiving a permit, that permit will need to be renewed.
For anyone curious about the new yellow box outside of the Town Hall on Route 66, Ghent has received a Little Free Library from the Claverack Library’s Junior Engineering Program, to provide the town with 24-hour access to reading material. The library was built by children and their mentors, and donated to the Ghent community. People can take a book and return it, or take a book and leave one in its place. All are welcome to use it.
The food pantry is still in need of more volunteers. Food pantry records for August show there were 93 families served in the month, and in the month of September, that number rose to 105, with 8 new clients. Across the country, 1 in 7 Americans rely on food pantries to have enough food for their families, and while Columbia County is better off than many other counties in the state, the county does have people who face not having enough to eat. In an estimate from the Feeding America organization, there are more than 6,000 food insecure individuals in the county–people not able to access the food they need.
Anyone interested in volunteering at the food pantry can show up at Town Hall on Route 66 Monday to Thursday, from 9 a.m. to noon. Additionally, there will be a food drive for Thanksgiving on November 18.
Volunteer drivers are needed for Meals on Wheels, delivering food to elderly residents. For more information, call Town Clerk Michelle Radley at 518 392-4644, or visit the Town Hall.
In other Ghent news:
• The Bicentennial Committee is still looking for any photos people may have of Ghent over the past hundred years. To contribute, stop by the Town Hall
• There has been an RFP (Request for Proposal) timeline extension for the electric car charging stations to go in the Village of Chatham, as no bid proposals were submitted
• Election Day is Tuesday November 7 and Supervisor Michael Benvenuto, Councilman Mallory
Mort and Councilman Charles Wood are all running unopposed for reelection, as well as Clerk Michelle Radley and Highway Superintendent Benjamin Perry.
The next Board meeting will take place on Thursday, November 9 at 7 p.m. There will be a public hearing 15 minutes prior to the start of the meeting concerning the town’s preliminary budget for the upcoming year.
