In the four years since the idea of a kitchen incubator was first cooked up, proponents of the project to re-use the former firehouse on Washington Street have completed a great amount of preliminary work, including the transfer of the title of the property, emptying the building, drawing up construction plans and preparing documents to go out to bid.
The next obstacle to moving forward is one of the basics in business that brings dreams to life — money.
The kitchen incubator is conceived as a way for local underserved individuals to create culinary jobs and small business opportunities, partnering with Westchester Community College, Peekskill schools and private industry in Peekskill.
“Whether you have your grandmother’s salsa or a muffin recipe, these kitchens are intended to help people make and sell their products but we offer more than just that,” said Matthew Rudikoff, the city’s economic development director and executive director of the Peekskill Industrial Development Agency (IDA). He projected that the incubator could create 552 skilled culinary jobs, 378 new businesses and $132 million in total food production over a five-year period.
The next step is getting the word from the federal government to go out to bid for the construction to convert the building.
Funding the kitchen incubator budget
The total budget for all the renovations to the building, the fixed kitchen equipment, including stoves and refrigerators, and money to operate the kitchens for the first 18 months, comes to nearly $6 million.
A portion of that number is covered by a $2.4 million federal grant announced by New York Senator Charles Schumer in December of 2022. “I am proud to deliver this new federal investment to help Peekskill cook up new jobs by transforming the abandoned former Peekskill firehouse into a one-stop shop,” Schumer said at the time.
Today, city officials are ready to start construction but they need to hear that they can proceed.
“Two months ago our next step in the process was to take our completed plans and specifications for the construction project and submit it to the U.S. Economic Development Administration [EDA] for approval to go to bid, which is part of the standard process,” Rudikoff said.
“We have been working with the EDA continually for the last year or so to finalize these plans and specifications, not just the construction but all the red tape and procedural and regulatory matters that had to be included. That package was submitted and we’re still waiting for a response.
“Normally the review would have taken a couple of weeks but it’s being held up by a combination of whatever is going on in Washington D.C. these days,” Rudikoff said. “We can’t imagine that creating new jobs and giving important skills would fall afoul of any of the administration’s policies.”
The federal money comes from the Commerce Department’s Economic Development Administration and is funded by an American Rescue Plan Act Economic Adjustment Assistance grant. Peekskill supporters remain positive that the federal money will be released soon. The press office of the federal EDA did not return an email asking for comment.
New York state’s Empire State Development office has committed $995,000 to the project. And the local share of the costs comes to $850,000 from the IDA, according to a resolution the Peekskill Common Council passed in support of the project. The IDA had a cash balance of $1.14 million at the end of 2023. The agency has spent approximately $180,000 of its own money so far on the preliminary work.
Another funding source was expected to be approximately $1.5 million in money from Westchester County. The county has provided approximately $200,000 and administrative help so far, but that potential grant has not been forthcoming.
“We made that submission close to a year ago and it had to do with completing the construction and also providing some capital that was going to be needed prior to the opening for funding for a short operating period,” Rudikoff said. “We haven’t heard anything on whether that will happen or not happen. At this stage we’d be extremely happy for that to be our primary concern.”
The County’s press office did not return an email requesting comment on funding.
The project was recognized with an award from the Hudson Valley Regional Council (HVRC) in September 2024 for its “…renovation of a former fire station for adaptive re-use, enabling small food-related businesses to access shared facilities, training opportunities, equipment and technical assistance.”
A long and winding road
In February of 2023 Rudikoff, executive director of the Peekskill Facilities Development Corp. (PFDC), told the Peekskill Herald that converting the municipal firehouse into a hub of food entrepreneurs would take about eight months of construction that was then slated to start in the late fall of 2023.
The next target date after that was a groundbreaking in September or October of 2024, with an expectation to be fully operational for clients in spring of 2025. Now, with a major portion of the grant money in limbo, projecting when construction might start is unknowable.
The former firehouse totals 8,000 square feet, including a 2,400-square-foot, two-bay garage. After the adaptive reuse conversion is completed, the 4,500-square-foot commercial kitchen portion of the building would house five fully equipped and licensed commercial kitchens, complete with stations for preparation, storage, packaging, shipping and receiving, along with office space.
In addition to the garage, the property has a parking area that fits 40 cars, providing ample space for pickups and drop-offs of large orders and inventory, in addition to planned food truck cleaning and washing facilities.
[The PFDC now owns the firehouse property. The PFDC will hire the operating entity for the Kitchen Incubator once it’s built. The Peekskill IDA can’t be the owner but is supplying all grant matching funds and some start-up support. The IDA and PFDC are non-profit agencies independent from the city government.]
The city’s five firehouses closed down when the new $12 million Central Firehouse on Broad and Main streets opened in 2018. The station at the top of Broad Street now hosts a Family Support Center and operations facility for the school district. The former Highland Avenue station was sold, and the house behind the Beach Shopping Center, which was owned by the volunteer company, was sold to an electrician’s firm. The city used the former Cortlandt Hook & Ladder truck portion for storage and the city’s Youth Bureau has its offices in the adjoining building.
Plans in 2008 to transfer the Centennial Hose station on Water Street to the Lincoln Depot site ended in a pile of bricks and rubble when the building collapsed while being moved.
Here is a four-minute video by MJM Television and Video Productions, documenting the attempted move and collapse on Aug. 21, 2008.
