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September 2017 | Real Estate In-Depth | 13 ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT

ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

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Page 1: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

September 2017 | Real Estate In-Depth | 13

ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT

2017 OC Real Estate InDepth Cover FINAL.indd 1 9/8/17 9:50 AM

Page 2: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

14 | Real Estate In-Depth | September 2017HUDSON VALLEY SUPPLEMENT

By Ron GarafaloAs September begins and we look

back at the summer of 2017, I do hope that all of you had a wonderful summer filled with good times. It was definitely a summer that generated significant real estate activity. The theme that started last year continued into this year where the market featured a significantly lower number of homes for sale, while the number of homes sold and sale prices remained strong.

As our country and Orange County specifically experienced positive news about job creation and interest rates re-mained at historically low levels, buyer demand remained high. However, with inventory (the number of homes for sale) not keeping up with that demand, this

created situations we have not seen for about a decade. Many buyers experi-enced difficulty finding a home as some properties had accepted offers shortly after they were listed. Other times, buy-ers were faced with multiple offers on a home they were interested in.

Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the National Association of Realtors, said recently, “Buyer interest in most of the country has held up strongly this

summer and homes are selling fast, but the negative effect of not enough inven-tory to choose from and its pressure on overall availability put the brakes on what should’ve been a higher sales pace.” NAR recently described overall home sale inventory as “anemic.”

I have spoken to many fellow Real-tors that have said they are busier than they have been in many years, and are working very hard to assist their buy-ers in finding a home, or working with sellers when they have multiple offers on their home. They need to convey to their buyers that it is important to view homes soon after they come on

the market, and if interested, many times must make an offer at or near list price. Once again, even then, agents and buyers are finding that they are in a multiple offer situation. This transi-tion from a buyer’s market to a seller’s market has been occurring for about a year. In 2015, 5,848 homes were sold in our entire MLS in June, July and August. That number increased to 6,682 in 2016 and 6,850 in 2017. During that same

time period, the number of homes for sale reached 14,808 units at the end of August 2015 and decreased to 12,213 by August 2016 and to 10,264 at the end of August 2017.

Buying and selling a home is one of the cornerstones of our economy. Home ownership is viewed by many as the “American Dream.” However, the process of buying or selling in this area can be very complicated. For a seller, marketing their home effectively to a large pool of agents and buyers, and pricing the home accurately is critical. For buyers, knowing about properties as soon as they get listed and making an

educated offer, based on accurate in-formation, is just as important. For both buyers and sellers, the need to work with an experienced, professional and knowledgeable real estate agent, one who understands the process, pricing and can serve as a calming voice when things get stressful, is more important than ever.

Summer is traditionally the busiest market for home sales. Many buyers and sellers have a shared interest in moving so their children can start the school year in their new home. Also, the summer time is also busier because it is simply easier to move when the weather is favorable. However, it is important to know that home sales remain strong even after the summer is over. There are many buyers and sellers where the above-mentioned situations are not a factor.

This brings us to the question of what does the fall real estate market look like? I believe that the fall market will be very similar to the summer, with the main difference being that the number of homes sold will be less than the summer, but still at very strong levels when compared to similar time frames in previous years. The lower inventory that we have been experiencing will not change dramatically. There will still be many buyers looking for homes. Interest rates will remain low, making it a desir-able time to buy a home. We are at a time when pricing has been increasing, and the dialogue on a national level has been that interest rates will be going up

Residential Buyer Demand Remains High in Orange County

Continued on page 16

By John JordanSince winning the County Executive

post in the November 2013 election, for-

mer Chester Supervisor Steve Neuhaus has tackled a host of difficult issues that initially included closing significant budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center in Goshen.

Orange County Executive Neuhaus, who is running for re-election in Novem-ber, sat down recently with Real Estate In-Depth and discussed a host of press-ing issues, including growth at Stewart International Airport, prospects for redeveloping the former Camp LaGuar-dia homeless shelter, and the future of Route 17.

Q. What is the status of attempting to redevelop the former Camp LaGuardia homeless shelter property in Blooming Grove and Chester?

Neuhaus: We have had some inter-est in the lower section, near the farm-ing areas, and I think that is an easy thing to do right off the bat to cut that piece of property—about 100 to 150 acres—and sell it and put it back to farm-ing use. That is something we can do in the foreseeable future.

County Executive Neuhaus Talks Economic Growth, Stewart International Airport’s Expanding Impact on Region

The other part of it, which has a lot of old buildings that need demolition work,

might need some help from the CFA (Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Consolidated Funding Application program) to help maybe do some of the demo work. Any potential purchaser has to look at the costs of the demo, the cost of the pur-chase of the property and if there are any possibilities of rehabilitating some of these buildings. Editor’s Note: The County Executive said the county was not ready to proceed with a CFA fund-ing proposal this year and is focused on maintaining the property and marketing it to the right user. The county has had discussions with several water park op-erators that have expressed interest in the Camp LaGuardia property.

I think it is a property ripe for devel-opment and I’ve had a lot of interest in it. When I get the right user, whether it is an educational institution or a big economic development project with money and capital, I will bring that pub-licly to the Orange County Legislature to vote on. We are not doing a Request for Proposals at the moment. We have also been waiting for 50 acres in Blooming Grove that is currently zoned residential

that hasn’t been changed to match the rest of the property that is zoned for

commercial use. Q: The redevelopment of the Gov-

ernment Center complex in Goshen has been going on for some time. Can you tell us if it is close to being completed?

Neuhaus: We expect to get the keys on October 1st. I am giving my budget address there on or around October 1st to the County Legislature. It is beauti-ful and almost ready to go. Across the hall from us right now (at the County Executive’s temporary offices at 40 Mat-thews St. in Goshen) we are conducting a meeting to discuss how we will be securing the building. The only thing different, besides the building looking new inside, will be that we will have very strict security as opposed to how it was in the past. You are not walking in and out of there freely. When you come in, you will go through a metal detector. If you have a bag, it will go through one of those scanning machines…

Beginning in October we are going to be rolling departments into the new building. I see IT (Information Technol-ogy) and security going first, as well as the District Attorney, probably the Coun-

ty Executive and other departments. The courts will move in around the

holidays, because they have a break. We fully expect the DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) and everybody to be fully functional by the end of this year or by early next year. We will be relocating out of leased space, which will save us a lot on leasing costs.

Q: With Amy’s Kitchen, LEGOLAND New York and other developments in the pipeline in Orange County, along with the impending opening next year of the Resorts World Catskills casino in Sullivan County, is there a need to up-grade Route 17?

Neuhaus: Right now there is a Re-quest for Proposals out for high-speed tolls at Harriman (exit 131) and add three lanes in certain areas between Harri-man and Monticello… High speed tolls are going to do a lot because you and I could put six lanes either way and you will have six lanes of traffic if you do not have high-speed tolls. Every month I drive to Virginia Beach, VA on Friday and I come back late Sunday night around 10:30 p.m. and there is traffic backed up. You put that high-speed toll

Continued on page 18

The lower inventory that we have been

experiencing will not change dramatically.

There will still be many buyers looking

for homes. Interest rates will remain low,

making it a desirable time to buy a home.

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Page 3: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

September 2017 | Real Estate In-Depth | 15HUDSON VALLEY SUPPLEMENT

By John JordanGOSHEN—The Orange County Part-nership, the Orange County Citizens Foundation and the neighboring Sullivan County Partnership for Economic De-velopment have begun lobbying state lawmakers to provide funding to priori-tize needed improvements to Route17 to accommodate future traffic generated by new businesses and attractions to the region.

The three agencies reported at a re-cent meeting of the Commercial Invest-ment Division of the Hudson Gateway Association of Realtors that discussions are now underway to fund an Imple-mentation Plan by the New York State Department of Transportation on how to best address the impending traffic increases on the mostly current two-lane (both east and west) Route 17—the future I-86.

With the March 2018 opening of the more than $1-billion Resorts World Catskills Casino and Resort in Sullivan County and the prospect of a $500-mil-lion LEGOLAND New York theme park being developed in Goshen, both busi-ness leaders and residents of Orange and Sullivan counties have expressed concern about how Route 17 can handle the millions of new visitors that will travel to the region in the coming years. The highway already suffers from periodic traffic backups due to the high volume of traffic generated by the immensely popular Woodbury Common Premium Outlets in Central Valley and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, for ex-ample.

HGAR’s CID roundtable panel held on Sept 7 at the Harness Racing Museum & Hall of Fame in Goshen discussed the impacts of economic growth on Or-ange and Sullivan counties. The panel featured: Orange County Partnership President and CEO Maureen Halahan, Sullivan County Partnership President and CEO Marc Baez, David Mistretta, general manager of Woodbury Common Premium Outlets, and Nancy Proyect, president of the Orange County Citizens Foundation. Co-modertors for the break-fast program were John Lavelle, a com-mercial broker with Rand Commercial and CID President John Barrett.

At the session, Halahan, Baez and Proyect revealed that their respective organizations feel that Route 17 needs to be improved to accommodate the future growth in the region. In fact, all three organizations have embarked on a cooperative campaign to convince state lawmakers to free up $4 million to have the New York State Department of Trans-portation review prior Route 17 improve-ment and expansion studies, the latest completed in 2013, in order to draft an Implementation Plan that would include all needed improvements. The plan would also include priority projects that could be undertaken in the short term.

Proyect said that the plan would look at the work that would be needed to al-leviate expected traffic congestion from Exit 131 in Central Valley/Harriman to Exit 104 in Monticello. While all expressed support for adding a third lane in each di-rection on Route 17, the panelists believe that the project would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to build and will prob-ably not be built in the short term.

Woodbury Common’s Mistretta said that Gov. Cuomo’s decision to expedite work on the Route 131 improvement proj-ect adjacent to the popular discount out-let center will help alleviate traffic in and out of the property that attracts approxi-mately three million vehicles a year. The project, expected to cost between $130 million to $150 million, will include the advent of cashless tolling, which should also help decrease traffic congestion in that area and at press time is scheduled

Orange County Partnership, Others Launch InitiativeTo Address Future Economic Growth Along Route 17

to begin this November. Mistretta said that approximately 13 million visitors shop at Woodbury Common each year.

The shopping center is completing

final work on a major expansion project that has included additional retail, res-taurants and a four-level parking garage that has added more than 1,000 parking spaces at the complex. The $130-million capital improvement project added a net gross leasable area of 60,000 square feet that has now brought the center to more than 900,000 square feet. A major facet of the project also included the relocation of the food court and the development of a new Welcome Cen-ter. Other enhancements to the center included new facades and roof renova-tions of existing buildings; new landscap-ing throughout the entire property; new hardscape for all walkways and common pedestrian areas; new seating areas and site amenities; rehabilitation of all exist-ing restrooms and new restrooms. The complex, built in 1985, has undergone previous expansion projects in 1993, 1994 and 1998.

Halahan related that the proposed LE-GOLAND New York project, if approved, will come with approximately $40 million in traffic improvements, including a new Exit 125 in Goshen that will feed traffic directly into the theme park. The project, which could begin construction next year, is in the final phases of the approval process in the Town of Goshen, and when completed in 2019 is expected to bring approximately 2.5 million ad-ditional visitors to Orange County. In addition, work is also expected to begin shortly on a new $95-million organic foods manufacturing facility for Amy’s Kitchen in Goshen that will bring added commercial traffic to the roadway.

In anticipation of these projects, Halahan reported, “We are seeing a tremendous interest and real growth that is happening, betting on the arrival of Legoland.”

She added that there are three new hotel projects along Route 17 in Orange County that have opened for business in 2017 with another two hotels slated to begin construction in 2018—a Holiday Inn and Residence Inn. In 2019, LEGO-LAND New York, if approved, will open a new hotel on its property as well. In addition, the Castle Fun Park in Ches-ter, which has attracted approximately 300,000 visitors a year, has been ex-panding its operations adjacent to Route 17.

Another byproduct of these major projects has been a return of speculative development in Orange County. “We have spec development going on,” Hala-han related. “For the first time in prob-ably a decade or more there is a confi-dence in the market that if these specu-

lators, these risk takers build something, people will come and fill them.”

Baez related that Sullivan County has its lowest unemployment rate in

years at just 4.2% and noted that many of the employ-ees at the casino and other planned projects there will come from outside of Sul-livan County. In fact, Resorts World has opened several “casino dealer schools” in Orange County in prepara-tion for next year’s opening.

He sa id the fo rmer Borscht Belt currently has a tourism industry that boasts 4 million visitors each year. By the end of 2019, the county expects that number to jump to 10 million.

Proyect noted that the Orange County Citizens Foundation, a non-profit that is focused on improving the quality of life in Orange County, became involved in the Route 17 initiative be-

cause it seeks to foster economic growth in certain areas, including downtowns, as well as preserve open space.

“Route 17 has been a blessing and a problem since it opened,” she said, noting that traffic has been an issue for more than 40 years on the roadway.

“With all this economic development coming to Orange and Sullivan counties, we recognize that traffic is just going to increase unless we do something to fix it,” Proyect said.

Proyect and Halahan noted that the initiative is especially needed because some communities along the Route 17

corridor have reported they are consid-ering building moratoriums because of concerns over future growth and traffic issues those projects might cause in the region.

Speaking for the partners in the ini-tiative, Proyect told the CID gathering that instead, “We decided we would rather take the bull by the horns and fix the transportation infrastructure so that we can grow properly and continue the strong growth that we have seen.”

Halahan stressed that the Implemen-tation Plan is vitally important because if these improvements can be properly planned and designed, they would be first in line to get built once funding be-comes available.

Doing nothing to address the traffic congestion that is already here is not an option. She said that the state and region can either do nothing, bring no new jobs to the area that will force young residents to seek employment and residence elsewhere, or address the problem now.

Near the end of the program, Halahan said those involved in the effort are real-istic about what can be accomplished at least in the short-term. “The idea of hav-ing a third lane (from Harriman to Monti-cello) is probably never going to happen in our lifetime. So, I think what the state wants to do is (identify) critical areas of Route 17 that create all the back-ups… There are certain areas (the state feels) that need to be addressed.’

She also noted that technology ad-vances have been used in other cities across the nation and properly inte-grated could also help alleviate traffic congestion in the future on Route 17.

Orange County President and CEO Maureen Halahan discussed the need for improvements to Route 17.

Page 4: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

16 | Real Estate In-Depth | September 2017HUDSON VALLEY SUPPLEMENT

MIDDLETOWN — The Board of Direc-tors and CEO Michael Gilfeather of Orange Bank & Trust Company an-nounced on Aug. 24th that the bank had opened its fourth full service branch in Westchester County. The branch is located at 510 South Columbus Ave. in Mount Vernon.

This new branch supports the bank’s strategic plan to expand its operations regionally with a focus on business banking. The branch will be headed by Vice President and Relationship Man-ager Patrick Smith, who will lead a team of experienced business bankers to deliver a professional client experience, Orange Bank & Trust stated in the an-nouncement.

Additionally, the bank’s Westchester Trust Division lead by Vice President and Trust Officer, Sinead Fitzsimons, moved its operations to the new Mount Vernon location. The bank’s other Westchester County locations are in White Plains, Mamaroneck and Mount Pleasant.

Joseph A. Ruhl, Westchester Region-al President at Orange Bank & Trust stat-ed, "Orange Bank is excited about the prospect of doing business in the Mount Vernon area. Pat Smith, our relationship manager, has years of experience in this marketplace and we are happy to have him head our team at our new location.”

The branch will be open, Monday-Friday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and provide a complete range of financial services; with a particular focus on commercial lending, cash management, and trust and estate services.

Orange Bank & Trust Company, which began operations 125 years ago, currently has assets approaching $1 bil-lion. Orange Bank and Trust has branch-es in Orange, Rockland, Westchester and Dutchess counties. While growing, Orange Bank & Trust continues to focus on providing community banking, based on personal relationships for business-es, organizations and individuals.

Orange Bank & Trust Company OpensFull Service Branch In Mount Vernon

The management team at Orange Bank & Trust Co.’s new full-service Mount Vernon branch, from left: Nicole McNab and Alicia Bradley, Business Bankers and Patrick Smith, VP, Relationship Manager.

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Residential Buyer Demand Remains High in Orange CountyContinued from page 14

in the future. Buyers realize that waiting to buy a home may very well cost more in the years to come, so I don’t see the demand on the buyer side decreasing.

I believe that home prices in Orange County will continue to go up in the coming years, not like they did 10 or 11 years ago, but at a more “normal” level of appreciation—several percentage points a year. At the same time, I believe interest rates will increase as well. If a home were priced at $200,000, and increases in value 3% a year, in two years it would be valued at $212,180. During that time, if interest rates go from 4.25% to 5.25%, a buyer putting down 10% would have a monthly payment on a conventional 30-year mortgage that would increase from $885 to $1,054 buying that $200,000 home. Today’s buyers are aware of this, and I believe this is one of the main reasons we are seeing such strong buyer demand. Of course, these are just projections, as the future of home prices and interest rates are never a certainty.

As we move forward, my hope is that sellers are happy that their home is worth more now than it was sev-eral years ago and that they may be in a better position to sell. On the other hand, buyers are pleased that interest

rates are still at historic low levels, and home prices, even though they have increased in the last year or two, are still attractive. Together, this would make for a market that gives buyers more homes to choose from and sellers the ability to sell in a positive environment.

Finally, as previously stated, whether you are a buyer or seller, I strongly be-lieve that the most important decision you can make is to contact a real estate professional. When dealing with what is probably the largest financial decision in your life, the importance of working with a real estate professional is critical. As Realtors, we pledge to follow the Real-tor Code of Ethics, which obligates us to always do what is in the best interest of our clients. I wish you all a wonderful fall season.

Ron Garafalo is the sales manager at John J. Lease Realtors. He has been a Realtor for 17 years. The past president of the Orange County Association of Realtors, Garafalo is currently a direc-tor for the Hudson Gateway Associa-tion of Realtors and also serves on the New York State Association of Realtors Board of Directors. He has also been a licensed New York State real estate instructor for more than a decade.

Page 5: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

September 2017 | Real Estate In-Depth | 17HUDSON VALLEY SUPPLEMENT

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By John JordanNEW WINDSOR—The long-held be-lief by many government officials and business leaders that Stewart Airport could finally be a key driver of economic growth for Orange County and the en-tire Hudson Valley region may finally be coming to pass.

Spirits soared in February when it was announced that Norwegian Airlines would offer low-cost transatlantic flights from Stewart International Airport to Bel-fast, Northern Ireland, Dublin and Shan-non in Ireland and Edinburgh, Scotland beginning this past June. By all reports,

the first international air service in years at the Orange County-based airport has been a rousing success. In May, USGlobal Airways reported it planned to lease a fleet of 767s and launch full-service flights in the future from Stewart to destinations such as Paris, Barcelona, and Tel Aviv, pending approval from the

Stewart Airport Finally Goes InternationalFAA and the DOT. The carrier is cur-rently leasing space at Stewart Airport from a tenant Atlantic Aviation.

In addition, Allegiant, which already has domestic air service at Stewart, recently reported it would begin twice weekly flights to Orlando and Punta Gorda, FL beginning in November. At present, Allegiant, JetBlue Airways, American Airlines and Delta Connec-tion are the domestic carriers at Stewart International Airport.

At the time of the Norwegian an-nouncement, then Port Authority Execu-

tive Director Ed Foye said, "This new service is a great milestone for Stewart In-ternational Air-port. Connectiv-ity to new des-tinations is vital for our airport to realize further growth and re-main competi-t ive." Stewart se rved more than 275,000 passengers in 2016, but pro-j e c t i o n s f o r 2017 are about 400,000 pas-sengers wi th a s m a n y a s

700,000 in 2018.Ed Harrison, general manager of

Stewart International Airport, told Real Estate In-Depth that discussions began about three years ago with Norwegian Airlines, but negotiations began to heat up about a year-and-a-half ago when

executives with the airline traveled to Stewart Airport. He noted that Stewart was competing with other locations and the Port Authority put together a pack-

age that stressed the airport’s strong demographics and proximity to New York City. A key facet of the package to Norwegian was bus service (Stewart Airport Express) offered by Coach USA from the Port Authority Bus Terminal to and from Stewart International Airport for $20 that is timed specifically to coor-dinate with passenger Norwegian arriv-als and departures from Stewart.

The bus service has been a rous-ing success. Harrison noted that the Port Authority expects the bus service

that began in June will have serviced 25,000 passengers by sometime during the month of September 2017.

“The Port Authority has been invest-

ing around $200 million in (Stewart) air-port upgrades,” Harrison said. Despite the Great Recession and the downturn in air travel that had taken place, he stressed that the Port Authority “still has a long-term view and is optimistic about the future here in Orange County and at Stewart Airport.”

Harrison said that the Port Authority overcame many hurdles to land Nor-wegian and since its launch in June has

Continued on page 18

Ed Harrison, general manager, Stewart International Airport

The number of passengers serviced at Stewart is expected to rise to as many as 700,000 in 2018.

Page 6: ORANGE COUNTY SUPPLEMENT - Orange County Partnership · budget gaps, stabilizing county govern-ment finances and shepherding the redevelopment of the Orange County Government Center

18 | Real Estate In-Depth | September 2017

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in there (at Harriman) it is going to make a major difference overnight. Is it going to solve all of the problems? No, but the good thing is when I talk to the governor and others in Albany, I don’t say, “If you build this they will come.” They are here, so build it. Editor’s Note: The County Executive also stated that if the LEGO-LAND New York project in Goshen is approved, the developer has promised to spend approximately $40 million on a new and improved Exit 125 that will lead traffic directly into the theme park.

Q: How important are the recent de-velopments, including the introduction of Norwegian Airlines flights to select European locations and the highly suc-cessful second Annual New York Air Show to the future of Stewart Interna-tional Airport in New Windsor?

Neuhaus: Ed Harrison, the general manager at Stewart International Air-port, and I are close friends…The New York Air Show started this (turnaround). The air show proved we could bring a lot of people to this airport. Then you have the parking lot that has been im-proved and expanded at the airport to facilitate it… The biggest problem we had with Norwegian Airlines was when we got in a logjam with them about five months ago when they said they would come here but wondered where exactly Orange County was? They said they would bring their passengers here in the middle of Upstate New York, but won-dered how they would get their passen-gers to New York City, which is where they want to go. Ed Harrison told me the deal was in trouble. We brought in Ed and Coach USA (which is relocating its corporate headquarters to Chester) and they signed a contract. Now Coach

USA is doing phenomenal. They said if you give us the people, we will give you the buses…

The only thing that has been interna-tional about Stewart, except for the past two months, has been cargo and the military—those were the only interna-tional flights. Right after Norwegian an-nounced they were coming to Stewart, Jet Blue (which maintains daily flights to Orlando and Fort Lauderdale, FL) changed their flight status here. Editor’s Note: The County Executive explained that Jet Blue has coordinated its flight schedule to accommodate Norwegian passengers traveling from Europe, who wish to connect with their flights to Flor-ida. He also stressed the growing cargo operations at Stewart and its impor-tance to the Orange County economy.

Q: For years, first with National Ex-press and then with the Port Authority

of New York and New Jersey as the op-erator at Stewart International Airport, there was always the promise that the airport would be a major economic engine for the region. Do you think that finally that time is at hand?

Neuhaus: I think that National Ex-press was an English-based company whose focus was to bring their revenues back there. With the Port Authority we have to fight for some crumbs here, but we have some people that are seeing the benefit of investing here. It helps the Port Authority to do this. It relieves

County Executive Neuhaus Talks Economic Growth, Stewart International Airport’s Expanding Impact on Region

the traffic congestion at the big three (airports). We have brought Port Author-ity officials to the air shows and to the ribbon cuttings, such as Norwegian Airlines, and they see the excitement. Legoland, which I believe will be ap-proved, will bring about 1.5 million visitors a year, a third of which will be international—many flying with Nor-wegian. You and I can fly to Edinburgh, Scotland, a seven-hour flight and then take a three-hour train and we will be in Downtown London. You can’t beat that for a low-cost flight…

Continued from page 14

proven that Stewart was a great choice for the carrier. At present, Norwegian is averaging approximately 90% capacity for all its flights. Currently the airline is flying daily to Dublin and Edinburgh and offers three flights a week to Bergen, Norway and to Shannon and Belfast, Northern Ireland.

“It is the first time in the long history of this airport that we’ve had scheduled international service here,” Harrison said. “That is an historic moment for Stewart.”

He said international passengers are coming to Stewart from New York City and Westchester County from the south and from the Albany area to the north.

“Norwegian is delighted with their loads,” he said Norwegian will be an-nouncing in September what their schedule will look like next summer at Stewart he noted that the Port Author-ity has learned that Norwegian been exploring adding some locations at the airport.

“They know that the market here is growing and they are delighted that Le-goland is being built a half hour away,” Harrison added. “Legoland tells them they expect 30% of their visitors to be coming in from Europe. So that is just an incredible opportunity for Orange County.”

Stewart Airport Finally Goes InternationalContinued from page 17

International travelers already know and frequent Woodbury Common and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and will no doubt be trying their luck at the Resorts World Catskills casino be-ginning next March.

“So not only are we serving the New York metropolitan area, but folks are looking to stay here three, four, five days in a week in taking advantage of all of the opportunities the traveling public want to see,” he added. “It is really an exciting moment for Stewart Interna-tional Airport and Orange County.”

Harrison said that the Port Authority is marketing Stewart to other domestic and international carriers, but at present does not have any new or expanded service offerings to report.

He noted that there is “a buzz” about Stewart International Airport, with publi-cations such as the New York Times and the Telegraph in London, as well as ma-jor airline and travel trade publications, taking notice of the airport’s promise.

A key facet at Stewart that has al-ready been a key driver for the Orange County economy has been its cargo op-erations. So far this year, cargo handling through July was 10,830 tons, which is trending 1% higher than during the same period in 2016. Last year, the airport handled 22,837 tons.

Mentorship Program Teaches Area YouthThe Importance of Economic DevelopmentGOSHEN—In 2004, Advance Testing Co. of Campbell Hall developed a Mentor-ship Program for high school students designed to teach leadership skills, provide real life work experience and a taste of what the materials testing and engineering industry has to offer. Over the past two years, Jimmy Smith, president & CEO of Ad-vance Testing Company, recruited the Orange County Partnership team to teach an economic development session geared toward the importance of growth and development in Orange County. According to Smith, “We will only thrive as a county if we invest in our youth.”

On August 7th, students from Monticello High School and Newburgh Free Acad-emy participated in a day-long session that informed them on the economic growth and development philosophy of Orange County.

The day began with a comprehensive presentation on the services offered by the Orange County Partnership including how it markets the county and attracts new business through site selection assistance, identification of available incen-tives and demographic research. The presentation also touched on the wide-rang-ing tools employed by the Partnership to retain and expand existing businesses and how the financial support of local businesses supports its mission.

A tour of the Orange County Emergency Services Center (911 Center) was followed by an in-depth roundtable discussion that included Orange County Ex-ecutive Steve Neuhaus, Larry Gottlieb, president and CEO of the Hudson Valley Economic Development Corporation, Maureen Halahan, president and CEO of the Orange County Partnership, Dawn Ansbro, executive director of the Orange County Arts Council, and Christine Little, a representative of LEGOLAND New York. The day concluded with a tour of Satin Fine Foods in Chester.

On Aug. 23rd, Advance Testing hosted a graduation ceremony to honor the 2017 Mentorship Class.

The Partnership’s Halahan praised the mentoring program, saying, “Jimmy Smith has been associated with the Partnership as an advocate for economic develop-ment for the past 20 years. He continuously creates new and innovative ways to engage the next generation. Because of his leadership, students are able to recog-nize the opportunities and challenges they will face in forging a career in the county they call home. I applaud Jimmy and hope more business leaders take his lead and help us develop the next generation of Orange County.”

Orange County Executive Steve Neuhaus said that county depart-ments will begin moving into the renovated Government Center com-plex in Goshen in October.

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