Got A NEWS tIP? news@sevendaysvt.com
Experienced team. Quality work. Competitive pricing.
ConstruCtion serviCes: remodeling • excavation • additions • rot repair • decks & fences • finish carpentry • kitchens & baths • design/build • insurance work • basements • egress windows • siding • fix to sell • tile • drywall • roofing • slabs • demolition • handyman • window & door installation • foundation repair • concrete Painting serviCes: EPA lead certified • interior/exterior • c o n s t r u c t i o n , i n c. power washing • wall repair • textured ceiling removal B U I L D • PA I N T • R E M O D E L
www.polliconstruction.com
6h-polli061213.indd 1
6/6/13 10:24 AM
07.16.14-07.23.14 SEVEN DAYS LOCAL MATTERS 17
nORTh COunTRy pRiSOn
A contractor you can rely on...
SEVENDAYSVt.com
many as 19 correctional facilFranklin County’s ities at one time. Some were median per capita income is built from scratch. Others $19,800, ranking it 61st out were housed in abandoned of New York’s 62 counties. THE schools or other renovated Unemployment is higher A D I R O N D A C K buildings. than 8 percent, and 15 perThe town of Moriah, cent of its residents live in ISSUE reeling from the closure of poverty. Gabe Lopardo used to be one of an iron mine, cheered the opening of six barbers in Chateaugay. Now, after Moriah Shock Correctional Facility, more than 50 years of running a shop which brought more than 100 jobs when downtown, he is the only men’s barber it was built in 1989. In 1993, Chateaugay welcomed conin Chateaugay and three other nearby struction of a medium-security facility towns. He charges $10 for a haircut. On a recent weekday, with no cus- on a former farm the state bought just a tomers in his shop, Lopardo peered out couple of miles east of the village. Towns thought they had stumbled on his window and remembered, buildinga business that would be immune from by-building, what used to be. “On the corner was a clothing store. economic downturns. But like family Insurance office next door. Little drug farming and light manufacturing, the store, and another one where the food inmate business has also turned out to pantry is. Two hardware stores. That be vulnerable to changing times. The crime rate has fallen in New next big building was a little-bit-ofeverything store. We had a diner on the York and much of the country. And after years of watching prisons consume an corner, and a restaurant next to that...” Those businesses had vanished long ever-growing chunk of state budgets to before the state decided to shut down warehouse nonviolent offenders, lawthe prison, which was seen as a last makers have relaxed sentencing guideresort to keep the town’s economy from lines for drug crimes. Tax revenue shortfalls from the Great crumbling. Lopardo worries for the Recession forced the issue. future. In Franklin County, Camp Gabriels “Band-Aid’s gone,” he said. “There’s not much else we can do. It wasn’t grow- closed in 2009, and Lyon Mountain ing before. It’s not going to grow. It’s not went in 2011, taking a total of more than going to attract any young people, that’s 200 jobs. People in Chateaugay watched those developments nervously, but held for sure.” With the prison gone, the only major out hope their prison might be spared employer left in town is the McCadam because it was one of the newest in the Cheese Company plant. The company, state. State law requires towns get a owned by a Northeast dairy giant AgriMark, offers mostly blue-collar process- one-year notice before a prison is closed. Last July, Billow got a call from ing jobs at the plant. Cuomo’s office. Chateaugay’s days were numbered. Crime Paid The town tried to fight back. The Adirondacks region was an unlikely beneficiary of the national War on Drugs Residents created a 30-page glossy — a reaction to rising crime in urban pamphlet stating all the reasons that areas such as New York City in the Chateaugay needed the prison, and why 1970s. Policy makers increased penalties the state needed Chateaugay: The prison for drug offenses and hired more cops. had always operated near capacity and The federal government in 1994 pledged was more financially efficient than its millions of dollars to help build prisons peers, they argued. Planned construcfor states that enacted “truth in sentenc- tion of wind towers would reduce the prison’s utility bills. ing laws.” Clearly concerned that 111 jobs would The result: more inmates. New York’s prison population more than doubled seem negligible to officials from larger between 1985 and 1999, from 32,000 to communities, they compared the impact to losing 6,000 jobs in Brooklyn. 72,000. “The are no equivalent jobs in Where would all the new inmates go? Many communities resisted prison- Franklin County to replace these posibuilding proposals, for obvious reasons. tions,” the residents wrote. “The area But others around the Adirondacks simply will not recover.” rolled out the red carpet, hosting as
» p.19 3V-BrattRetreat061814.indd 1
6/17/14 10:10 AM