State Senator Stephen Saland (R-41st), state Assembly members Marcus Molinaro (R,C,I-Red Hook), Peter D. Lopez (R,C,I-Schoharie) and Tim Gordon (I-Bethlehem), county Board of Supervisors Chairman Art Baer (R-Hillsdale), Hudson Mayor Richard Scalera, and Common Council President Rob Perry were part of the group that met Wednesday behind closed doors on the campus of Columbia-Greene Community College.

In a telephone interview Thursday, Baer said he was encouraged by the conversation that took place. “We presented some of our strategic initiatives for the county and made a request for support, specifically to address the Kaz and LB closings,” he said.

Kaz, one of the largest employers in Columbia County, announced on September 8 that it will begin outsourcing all local manufacturing operations and will close its twelve-year-old Greenport facility early next year. That action is expected to add nearly 350 people to the county unemployment rolls. The Kaz closure—referred to as the “straw that broke the camel’s back” by one city official—is the most recent of several plant closings that appear to signal the end of the city’s long-standing status as a manufacturing center.

In March 2008, Hudson furniture manufacturer LB Furniture Industries, LLC, filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 and ceased all operations. The sixty-year-old company once employed a workforce of 250. Its 300,000 square foot facility now sits abandoned in the South Bay. The loading dock equipment manufacturer W.B. McGuire closed its Hudson plant in 2006, putting 72 out of work.

“We are planning to create an intergovernmental task force and attempting to develop a turnkey package, matched to the facilities [available] and the workforce. We will market the package to businesses outside the area,” Baer said. “We are appealing to either a new business or one that wishes to relocate. We’re looking for a business readily adaptable to the [Kaz] building.

“The task force is being formed as we speak,” he said.

According to Baer, the task force will consist of three core members (a team leader and two staff). He explained that individual members of the larger group that assembled for the meeting Wednesday will participate based on the task at hand.

“We have support from the state and county and city,” Baer said.

Baer’s immediate priority will be to meet with the owners of the Kaz property to make certain the basic concept formulated during the Wednesday meeting is a possibility. “We want to get in sync with them,” he said.

“We will begin the process of inventorying and analysis,” said Baer. He explained that the existing labor force will be profiled by the task force for the skill sets available to any new employer, and the state will provide all necessary training for all potential employees, when the time comes.

The task force will also profile the building with an eye toward the type of business that might easily adapt to the space. The facility in question was built twelve years ago and is located on Route 9 in the Town of Greenport, just over the City of Hudson line. The building measures 200,000 square feet, 170,000 of which is manufacturing space.

Baer said that economic incentives will be available for all interested businesses, in particular the benefits provided by the New York State Empire Zone. Hudson and Greenport are located within Empire Zone 69, which was designated by the state in November 2001. Empire Zone certified companies are eligible for a variety of inducements, including wage tax credits, investment tax credits, and New York state tax refunds.

The ultimate objective, Baer said, is to “create an attractive proposition” for the private sector. “We are going to do our best,” he said.