WASHINGTON – An administrative change by the Coast Guard in the definition of the Port of New York may once again open the door for commercial vessels carrying oil or other hazardous cargo to park on the Hudson River in the Mid-Hudson region.
Former Congressman Sean Patrick Maloney was successful in preventing those ships from parking for long periods of time, but now the Coast Guard enacted an administrative change that would allow them up and down the Hudson.
Rhinebeck Village Mayor Gary Bassett, who is chairman of the Hudson 7, the group of seven Mid-Hudson communities that draw their drinking water from the river, is concerned about the change.
“We are working very diligently as an organization to what is called a block-out area to petition the Coast Guard to block out an area in the vicinity of the five water intakes that serve 100,000 people,” he said.
Congressman Pat Ryan is now arguing the case with the Coast Guard to, at the least, protect the Hudson 7 communities that draw their drinking water from the river via water filtration plants in Rhinebeck, Hyde Park, Poughkeepsie, Lloyd and Esopus.
