Governor Hochul: “I want you to know how much I appreciate you and this region, and I will, as every day that I'm Governor, fight to protect it and preserve it. And that's why I want to talk to you about my investments in our State Budget that we unveiled a couple weeks ago. A $233 billion spending plan. Now what's important is that this solid, balanced Budget, without cuts or added burdens, but it also prioritizes the right fights.”
Hochul: “Look forward to seeing a big impact in the great community of Lowville. And also, two of the North Country winners for the New York Forward program, Canton and Alex Bay, will each receive $4.5 million in funding and they're both developing strategic plans to turn rundown parts of their downtowns into housing … So, we're excited about those, and this is how we put the seed money in, get the projects, the catalyst for them, and all the others start paying attention.”
Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul announced Lowville will receive $10 million in funding as the North Country winner of the seventh round of the Downtown Revitalization Initiative, and the villages of Canton and Alexandria Bay as this year’s North Country region NY Forward winners, receiving $4.5 million each. For Round 7 of the Downtown Revitalization Initiative, each of the State's 10 economic development regions are being awarded $10 million, to make for a total State commitment of $100 million in funding and investments to help communities boost their economies by transforming downtowns into vibrant neighborhoods.
VIDEO of the event is available on YouTube here and in TV quality (h.264, mp4) format here.
AUDIO of the Governor's remarks is available here.
PHOTOS of the event are available on the Governor's Flickr page.
A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:
Good morning, it's great to be back in winter wonderland. Love coming here all year round, but this is a spectacular time. I said to my team, as soon as I finish the Budget, “Where are we going to go for one of our early rollouts?” I said, “I need to get some fresh air, I need to see some trees, I need to just breathe in this magnificent experience of the North Country.” So, it is so beautiful here. You know, the snow on the pine trees as you descend and the winding roads that give it such the character and charm, and also, of course, the mom-and-pop shops that work so hard year round and struggle when the weather's not right, and I just want to give them a special shout out.
Here in these communities, there's so many diners and restaurants, and I've been to all of them. Hit a few breweries in my time, too, but the day is too young to talk about that. But I also want to talk about some of the other projects that we're working on here. It's great to be back at this very site, where we've made some incredible announcements over the last couple of years. And we're really, really proud to be back here.
So, I do want to just acknowledge some of the people who are here today that I'm really, really proud of. And Ashley Walden, you're doing an extraordinary job as a great Ambassador for ORDA. We've been together showcasing what we have here, making the pitches to bring even more activities here. Is that not right? We just sat together in December down in New York City saying, “You know, there's no better place for bobsledding in the entire world than right here”. So, we're trying to entice an Olympic opportunity here as well.
I also want to acknowledge, some individuals who will be finding out why they're here today, although they know why they're here. I know Mayor Joseph Beagle of Lowville is not able to be here, but he's represented by Deputy Mayor Dan Salmon from the Village of Lowville. I'm never going to say Lowville, it's Low. Thank you for joining us. Mayor Michael Putnam, the Village of Alexandria Bay. I don't know if you know this, but we used to vacation up there all the time when I was a little girl. I still might have my pirate costume that I used to bring out during the activities there. The Village of Canton is well represented by Mayor Michael Dalton.
Also, we have someone who cares deeply about our entire state, but I know the North Country is a very special place in his heart, and that is our Commissioner of DEC, Basil Seggos. So, thank you for joining us. And Barbara Rice, representing APA, thank you for joining us here, the Executive Director. And is Senator Betty Little in the audience here? There she is. Please stand up, Senator. One of our ORDA board members. Jim McKenna, the CEO of ROOST, but also, Co-chair of our Regional Economic Development Council. So, I want to thank them.
I’ve mentioned many times, I've come here since I was a little girl, every side of the North Country. From Frontier Town to Santa's Workshop, where I think I've told some of you that my kids were on the cusp of not believing in Santa anymore. And we took them up there and they left there. I think they believed all the way through high school. It was such a transformative experience. And so, the North Pole, Lake Placid. And then also, all my experience vacationing at Wellesley Island and going through the great communities there. Alex Bay, as you mentioned, up to Canton.
So, these are places that touch your soul. When you're a child and you get exposed to them, you have this sense of wonder and magic. And these communities cannot be replicated anywhere else. These are so unique. Each one has a story, a personality. And as Governor, who's experienced so many of them firsthand, I know it's worth preserving. And we have to make sure that we're doing everything we can to lift up our communities. And it's not by your size or with this size, populations should get more and others get less. That's not how I view it. I view my responsibilities to be the keeper of the soul of the state. And when I think about the heart. It has to be the North Country, because it beats every single day with such passion for the beautiful natural wonders that you are keepers of and stewards for, but also, the charm that is just dripping in every time you turn a corner.
So, there's also a rugged resilience here. Not all the winters are like this. This is a lovely, easy day in the North Country. Am I right about that? I track your snow rather regularly. Now, Watertown and Western New York, North Country, Lewis County – little, little rough couple weeks that we've had, right? It's been rough. I'm always calling to say, “How many feet?” We don't say how many inches, that's New York City. “How many feet did they get today? And so, do they need more help?” And we're calling, we're always calling the county managers, the administrators, and offering more plows, more resources. So, we've been doing a lot of that. And so, parts of our state have really been hit hard. But it is a resilience that endures. And that's part of the character of being a resident of the North Country.
And also, preserving the beauty of the Adirondacks and capitalizing on these other assets as well. And if we don't invest in infrastructure, and in these assets, and in these places, like all the buildings and locations represented by ORDA, then they will deteriorate. If you don't put money in, they won't be worth going to. We will not be able to attract world class events and sporting events and attract people from all over. We have to make those investments. And so, we've funded investments, upgrades to protect Mirror Lake, for example, Clinton County's partnership with VETA Technologies, so we've taken that to new heights. The AgriMark plant in Franklin County, we've been sponsoring, helping keep hundreds of jobs so people from around the world can enjoy cheese right from right here in New York.
And so, I want you to know how much I appreciate you and this region, and I will, as every day that I'm Governor, fight to protect it and preserve it. And that's why I want to talk to you about my investments in our State Budget that we unveiled a couple weeks ago. A $233 billion spending plan. Now what's important is that this solid, balanced Budget, without cuts or added burdens, but it also prioritizes the right fights. I mean, you have to take on the right fights for the people of this great state and find common sense solutions. Something that – don't take for granted that everyone's focused on common sense solutions. It doesn't always happen. And whether it's the tiniest hamlet to our biggest cities, they all are worthy of our support and attention.
And, again, New York is a great place, but if people don't feel safe in their homes, in their communities, in their streets, in their schools, that it doesn't matter. The basic responsibility of government is to provide that sense of security and safety. So, I have been laser-focused on protecting people and their lives and our properties, their businesses, and succeeded in driving down violent crime. We are down to the pre-pandemic historic lows when it comes to shootings and gun violence. And that's not just because it happened. Other areas are still going up in the country. But we made major investments in gun violence prevention programs, respecting the rights of sportsmen and women, but also saying, in some of our streets, we have to make sure that we keep the guns out of hands who could do harm to others as well.
So, we're turning up the heat in other kinds of crimes as well. I mean, retail theft. And something has been unleashed here where people feel no qualms about going in and stealing from a little shop in Saranac Lake all the way down to Midtown Manhattan. So, we're focused on that. Domestic violence has been there. And we're sort of in the shadows for a long time. It's something my mother was an advocate on because of what she saw happen in her own family. But we have to focus on that as well as hate crime. So, I wanted to let you know we're making some of these major investments as well. And we've seen racist graffiti scrawled on a bridge in Saranac Lake, and pride flags that are torn down. We all know this. Hate has no place in our state. And so, we've invested money into supporting law enforcement to enforce all these sort of quality of life issues and crimes. And making sure that we have the money necessary to protect our vulnerable communities.
So, we're also investing in our kids. This is so important. Investing in education. Now in the North Country, you'll hear a lot of different stories, but we're adding more school aid than ever before in the history of the state. We've increased school aid this year in the North Country alone by $30 million, to a total of $1 billion. That is an enormous jump from even when I first became Governor two years ago, because we had such underinvestment, especially in something called Foundation Aid. We have $18 million more in Foundation Aid, and that's really important. This billion-dollar investment in the North Country schools is an increase of 20 percent since I took office just two years ago. That's a big jump.
Now, I said at the time, we have money from the pandemic sources from the federal government. We have other money from better than usual tax receipts. We obviously cannot keep going at 20 percent all the time. We know that. So, we have to have some rationality behind this. I said, “We're going to make up for lost time and then we're going to stabilize.” So, those who are now saying these are all cuts, I said, “That's not a cut if it's just not the same increase you had before.”
But also, when it comes to educating our kids, we have to get back to basics. What has happened over about a 20-year period, people had a different way, sort of a fancy way of teaching kids to read. It didn't work. Any teachers in this room, you know what I'm talking about. I mean, teachers are so grateful that I've said, “No, that did not work. That experiment did not work.” Our kids are falling further behind than ever before. So, New York is joining other enlightened states and saying, let's get back to basics, teach phonics, and drop curriculums that are based on debunked learning theories. And just help our teachers as well, so we have to invest money to train our teachers, $10 million to train educators to rethink how we do this.
But also, mental health is so critically important. If I was giving this speech just a few years ago, we would not have been talking about children's mental health. It wasn't an issue, right? Now we're seeing that the effects of the pandemic, this isolation, whether they're little kids in grade school or middle school, high school, older teens who've turned inward to social media as a substitute for connection in school.
Every adult who thinks we've turned the page on the pandemic, you need to meet a teenager because they're not over this. They're still suffering the effects of this. And we can't ignore this. If we don't invest in young people's mental health now, we'll be paying for them to get services the rest of their lives.
So, we're going to make sure that there's mental health services available to all the kids in every school that wants it. We have to help them now. So, $45 million for school based mental health programs, wraparound peer programs. Also, just reimagining the mental health system overall. It's so critical in rural areas. Rural areas can so often be health care deserts. Every kind of services you need. But the number of providers who are professionally trained to assist people with their mental health challenges, the number here in the North Country is paltry. We just don't have enough people. So, we have to keep focusing on this.
In Essex County, for example, there's one mental health care provider for every 600 people. That doesn't get you a healthy population. And it's nobody's fault. They want to live here. But we have to focus on areas where we have these big gaps, and I'm proud of the work that the Mental Health Association, for example, of Essex County and Citizen Advocates are doing. They're trying to help fill these gaps. And so, I'm here to tell you, tell them, that help is on the way. We're investing more money in mental health in this state than ever in history. $4.8 billion, which is a 45 percent increase. That's extraordinary. But it's finally saying we know there's a problem, we're going to recognize it.
There's another group of individuals who have seen the worst side of human nature. These are our first responders. They respond to crises and situations that none of us ever get exposed to. And it takes a toll on them. So I want to make sure that we can open up this conversation. This was brought to me by a head of a PBA saying, no one talks about mental health for law enforcement professionals. I said, “Yes, we are now.” I'm investing $13 million to make sure that we have the resources to help them because the suicide rate among law enforcement is 60 percent higher than the average, the national population. So, $13 million to help connect them to services, find out what's missing, and help them.
The opioid epidemic has ravaged our rural communities. I don't know a single family that doesn't know somebody or touched by somebody in their kid's school that has endured the pain and anguish of losing a loved one, myself included. No one's immune from this, no matter where you live or where you come from. And we started distributing $200 million for the Opioid Settlement Fund, and we're going to get $67 million out of it for all these programs. I've dedicated $25 million of that $67 million to the North Country because this area has been underserved for too long and that has to stop right now. So that's what we're going to focus on as well.
And as I've heard since I used to come up here all the time, even as Lieutenant Governor, we have great jobs up here, hospitality, tourism is everything. Restaurants need cooks, they need waiters, they need waitresses. I used to be a waitress so I can help if I need to. But we also have hotels that need cleaning people and staff. There's so many jobs, the small shops that just need someone to work the retail end of it. We have great jobs and opportunities here. And now, we don't have enough workers. One of the reasons we don't have enough workers here in the North Country is where are they supposed to live? The employers are begging for them.
People want to work, but if you don't build some housing for them, they will not drive an hour and a half or two hours to come from affordable housing to work at a minimum wage job in the North Country. It just doesn't work. And that is going to suppress our opportunity here to expand our tax base in a way that our local governments can be supported without additional burdens on all of the residents while still balancing our need to protect and preserve the beautiful assets here. They're not mutually exclusive. We can do this. And I feel really, really impassioned about this, because I don't want to lose any more young people to other states where they can afford housing easier, have that dream of having that first apartment when you get out of school, or even on the path to have your first home, something your parents never had to think about.
Of course, you're going to be able to buy a home someday. That's out of reach for too many young people in our state, and particularly here as well. And it comes down to one thing. We need more supply. It is the most basic premise of all – supply and demand. You build more supply, the prices will start going down. And that's what I want to do. Now, you saw during the pandemic, an influx of city dwellers coming up here. A lot of people discovered it. They said, Well, I didn't even know this is my backyard. It's extraordinary. That's a great thing, but also sucked up a lot of the housing supply we had. There's no longer there for the people who lived here all their lives. You know, short term rental investors came in, too. You know, swooping up, taking a lot of the housing inventory. So, it's up here. Costs have skyrocketed, pricing out blue collar and lower wage workers. I mean, you shouldn't just have to be a rich person to be able to afford to live up here.
And that's what we're starting to see. Local residents need more than that. So, we can't run from this problem. A lot of people don't want to talk about it. I've told them I'm the first Governor since Rockefeller to talk about housing. Because, yes, it's controversial, and people don't want it, and they don't want to change. If you're already here, you have your house, you don't want anybody else to come in. Unless you're an employer who says, “Where are my workers going to live?” And unless you're a grandma who says, “Why can't my grandbaby grow up in the community where I raised their parents?” Those are the people we've got to look out for.
As well as the firefighters and police officers and teachers who want to be able to live in the community where they work and not be priced out of it as well. Now I proposed a very transformative housing plan a year ago. A lot of legislators, you know, sort of weaponized and misinterpreted it and it didn't go very far. And a lot of people said she won't do that again. They don't know me. Unless this crisis went away in the last year, I'm going to go right back at it. And that's exactly what I'm doing now. I'm going to do everything in my power to build more housing, and I'm dedicating $500 million to develop 15,000 housing units on already state-owned properties.
Think about the genius of this. There are underutilized properties all over our state. Why can't they be converted into beautiful housing and homes for people? We can do this. Also, I'm continuing to build affordable housing. 100,000 units, $25 billion. But when you think about $25 billion gets us 100,000 units, and we're short 800,000? It's a long, expensive journey for the state to do it. I need my localities to help step up. Look at your zoning. What are the barriers to developers being able to come in and build – I don't care if it's market rate housing, luxury housing, affordable housing. The idea of affordable housing, people say, “Oh, that's all Section 8 housing.” It's not all Section 8 housing. It's what's affordable for your neighborhood. I just want everybody to be open minded about this. I know that this is one of the great challenges of our time, and we can solve it.
I spent 14 years as a local government official. I draw on that experience every day of my life. I know all the ways that a community can say no. I know about traffic safety, I know about seeker, I know about IDAs, I know about the planning board and the zoning board appeals. I know the 100 ways that a community can say no. But I want to get them to yes. And the people in this room should help me go out and advocate and say, we can realize our full potential here if we can lean into this opportunity to build housing in the right places, the right style, you want something that fits in with the personality of your communities, and all of that can happen.
I'm putting forth $650 million in something we're calling the Pro Housing Community Fund, taking all the discretionary money that I have for communities and saying, if you want access to this, like the DRI, like New York Forward, which we'll be talking about in a couple minutes, you need to be part of solving the problem. You need to help me, help yourselves. So that money will go to pro housing communities.
It is not hard to be designated as a pro housing community. I need you to pass a resolution with your town board or your county legislature and say, yes, we embrace the idea of building more housing. I'm not saying you have to do 20 percent a year. We're saying 1 percent a year. It's not that much. Or if you've already been doing it, we want to give you credit for what you've already done. Show us the numbers that you've already met these metrics and are going to continue. That's how we're going to do that. So, the programs we're talking about will come through the DRI and other programs.
I'm really pleased that nine North Country communities have already stepped up. They've said, “We'll do this.” They're already working toward their certification. And they'll be eligible for even more funding if they've already stepped up before and received it. North Elba, the Village of Lowville, Town of Plattsburgh, Town of Canton, Village of Canton, Chesterfield, Newcomb, North Hudson and Willsboro. Those are the leaders. Those are the ones who say, “We get it. We care about our residents. We want them to have nice homes for their families and their employees.” So, I want to congratulate them for having the vision of being among the first. And I have a feeling when people start seeing where the next round of funding is going for a lot of projects, they're going to say, “Me too.” Where do I sign up, right?
If we can work together, we can reverse this trend. Just look at what we've done up in Malone. The state teamed up with a community organization called Citizen Advocates, right? They, they leveled a blighted block and built a new mixed-use complex. That's what we're talking about. We're not talking about taking your farmland and putting up high rises, which is what some people would have you think we're trying to do. I know in my local government; we had a lot of abandoned strip plazas or buildings that had just been blighted for such a long time. Can't you see people living in them? Can't you see new life coming through? That's how you spark energy in the North Country. We can do this.
You know, it's going to open with storefronts on the first level, that's great. Forty affordable and supportive housing units, that's how you take care of your people. That's what's possible here. That's what's possible. I know we can do that. And we're going to continue making sure that the North Country is the envy of the world. It certainly is, to protect our stunning natural resources, and continue our record funding in the Environmental Protection Fund, $400 million. We're not taking our foot off the gas and making sure those resources are there every single year. As well as the Superfund Cleanup, $100 million. And $500 million for clean water because if you do not have clean water, you cannot survive. We're going to make sure that the cost of these clean water projects don't get passed on to New Yorkers living in our smaller rural areas. They can't afford it. I know you can't afford it.
I had a mid-sized town, and I knew that when it came to water and sewer projects, we just were aghast with the size of the price tag. And that was a time when the state of New York was not bending over backward to help localities. And we are now. And that's what we're going to continue to do. So, we'll make those upgrades. We'll help the communities get the support they need and make those clean water infrastructure grants widely available.
Also, to manage climate change, which is something that I don't think anyone in the North Country would deny exists. It's $435 million for climate resiliency statewide. We have to look at every community and look at its vulnerability. I remember coming up here as lieutenant governor and seeing the ravages of flooding and the fire station and going into the water and everyone's just, how are we going to rebuild here? These are real problems. These are real problems. And so, we're going to be rehabbing high risk dams that are vulnerable right now and other places we can help build the local infrastructure to protect us against the next storm because the next 100-year storm never waits 100 years. They come every other year here in our state.
As someone who's been through more natural disasters in two and a half years than anybody in history, including hurricanes, tornadoes, massive floodings, massive snowstorms, and even air quality compromised by fires in Quebec. Remember the orange skies? We're seeing it all. I mean, I wake up in the morning and say, are the locusts here yet? Because something - it just keeps coming. And we cannot, I've said this before, we're the first generation to really feel the effects of climate change. Really feeling it hard. And we're the last generation that can do anything about it. That's what we're focused on.
So, I'm committed as we celebrate the 100th anniversary of our state parks, which we're very proud of, that we're making sure that our parks are also thriving 100 years from now. And we have amazing parks, I've been to all of them. Sacketts Harbor Battlefield site, beautiful, beautiful location. Jacques Cartier State Park, Wellesley Island State Park. I remember as a kid, one of the reasons I'm such a risk taker, I used to jump off the cliffs at Wellesley Island State Park. We'd go camping, there'd be a bunch of, there's six kids, my parents, and a couple of pets piled into tents. It was a great experience.
And we'd go out on these little boats with just a tiny motor and go right next to these, these giant oceans. Cargo ships, like, we're going to drown out here. But, all that was part of growing up in a beautiful area. I treasure it. And you can, you have my commitment that I'm going to continue making investments in all of those beautiful resources.
We also have to make sure we can get around on our roads, right? The winter is brutal on the roads. I know this, I'm from Buffalo. We'll spend $75 million to improve local North Country roads and bridges, including $8 million for those potholes. Okay, how about that? We're sick and tired of the potholes on our roads, so we're going to help fill in the potholes.
We're going to also make sure that we'll tap into the Environmental Protection Fund to resurface the Adirondack Lodge Road, the gateway to the high peaks. We're going to make sure that's in pristine condition.
And $13 million from the Bond Act to continue the Adirondack Rail Trail. I know so many of you have been great proponents of this. It's all I've heard about for a long time when I'm over in Lake Placid and Saranac Lake and the other communities. 34 miles to take you through paradise. Who can say no to that? It's extraordinary. And that brings us all the way to this Olympic region. The venues, the facilities, the mountains, draw hundreds of thousands of people here every single year. It's so exciting. We've had 1.1 million visits just last year. That's $200 million of economic impact. I'll take that any day, won't you? I'm glad that's coming here. Because Lake Placid is synonymous with international competition. And we've been hosting athletes for 100 years, and people remember where they were when the U.S. hockey team toppled the Soviet team back in the 1980 Olympics. I was watching the game, working as a waitress at Syracuse University and I was so engrossed with what was happening. I probably messed up a lot of orders that day, but it was a great experience.
And so, you know, that Al Michaels, his voice is still in our heads, “Do we believe in miracles?” We believe in miracles every single day here in the North Country. This is a miraculous place. It is a very special place. And we had a lot – you think about that experience – a lot of amateurs with heart and an inspiring coach. People still think about that. And I'll never let that magic slip away. That’s that special character that we have here.
We've already invested $550 million to modernize our winter sports venues: renovations at the Lake Placid Olympic Center, the Saranac Lake Civic Center. Last year we brought back the World University Games. Guess where I was one year ago today? One year exactly today? At the opening of the World University Games. And that was the first time in three decades. And I was part, with Senator Betty Little when she was a Senator and I was a Lieutenant Governor, we holed up everybody in a hotel room in Lake Placid and said – I remember I remember saying they were from all over. It was from France and Russia and all these dignitaries like that – “I have an idea. We won't feed anybody until they say yes. We'll just sort of trap them in this room here.”
So, we were trying to find all the different ways we can get them. We got them to yes and that was very exciting. So, we had people from 46 nations and over 500 universities. But that was last year. You never rest on your laurels. You keep going higher and higher and higher. That's our motto in the State of New York, it's “Ever Upward, Excelsior.” So, I've got my sights set even higher. I'd like to make sure that we can do everything that Herb Brooks would have wanted us to do it. Here's what he says, “Success is won by those who believe in winning and then prepare for that moment.”
I believe that someday we can even bring the Winter Olympics back to Lake Placid, and we have to start preparing. We prepare for that moment and everything in between. So for that we're spending $82 million this year in new capital funding for ORDA. And make sure that they can keep investing. That'll go towards new upgrades, new upgrades to our ski resorts, including Whiteface and venues and facilities. We're going to keep making those investments to make sure that people know that the North country is the most desirable winter sports destination in the entire world. So, I'm excited to write the next chapter for Lake Placid and American sports right here. And I know we can do that.
And our Budget reflects that commitment to all facets of life here in the North Country and the great State of New York. And I'll never forget the people who have supported me to be in this position. And even if you didn't, I've got your backs. I'm fighting for you. I'm going to look out for you and your communities every day of the week. And I want to make sure that we also protect, and never take our eye off of protecting, the breathtaking beauty that we have here. If that goes away, it's part of our character, it's part of our identity here. We have to keep the open spaces and the parks and the trails, and we'll keep making the investments to make sure that we are the center of all that is fun and amazing, magnificent in the wintertime.
Now I mentioned a couple minutes ago about the DRI program, and I said we'd talk a little bit more about it. I'm really proud to announce that we have some communities that really did step up. They're competitors. They're Olympic-style competitors. They pulled together elected leaders, community leaders, citizens, businesspeople who all love their community so deeply, with passion. And this DRI program, Downtown Revitalization Initiative, is one of my favorite programs in the entire State. Because when I was a local government official representing two little villages in a town, if someone had told me that I could have the possibility of having $10 million to implement our vision – not Albany's vision, but the vision that was created by the people who love the community – I would have thought I thought I died and went to heaven. $10 million all at once.
Because when you're in local government, you're hoping, well maybe I can get 250,000 for a grant this year, and maybe in a couple years maybe we'll get a million. You piece it together, it takes forever to have the wow effect, the impact. This program, in one shot, brings the money all at once, so projects can be worked on simultaneously, so you're not waiting for one to finish to start another, which is what has always happened. You see and feel the impact almost immediately, as soon as these products are in the ground. And when we get the shovels in the ground, and the buildings start changing, and the facades change, and the downtown feels more connected and more alive.
You bring some housing downtown. You have new signage. You fix up the shabby facades that just lost their luster and are brought back to their original beauty. That doesn't just change the physical character of a downtown or a community, it changes the psychology of the people. Because the community that took for granted what they had there, and maybe it did lose some of its luster, they start to believe again. They start to have confidence in their community. They start to believe that they have a community that's worth fighting for. And that's a powerful sentiment. And that's what is captured with this program and why I wanted to expand the DRI to – not just the communities that could sustain $10 million worth of investments. And this is just the State share, there's always, it always leverages multiple times more in private investment.
I also knew, thinking of the North Country, there's smaller communities, where they necessarily can't find that much. Some are just little intersections, practically, and just a few side streets, a few businesses. I didn't want to leave them out of the opportunity, which is why, listening to local officials, I started the New York Forward program, which allows the same effort to go forth. But you can compete for a smaller share of money, $4.5 million.
So, today, we're very, very, very proud to announce the winners for the North Country Competition, our seventh round. And I have it again in my Budget for next year. That Lowville will receive the $10 million DRI funding to transform its downtown. Congratulations. Now, in Lowville, I love this, they called their vision, “Restore, Rediscover and Connect,” and that really captures the essence of what we're trying to do with the DRI. They're at the intersection of a Thousand Islands, the Tug Hill Plateau – by the way, I'm going to get up skiing soon, I hope, I'll let you know when. And the Adirondack Mountains and snowmobiling, snowboarding as well. I want to get up there and do some snowmobiling too, so watch out for me if you're in the fields. The Adirondack Mountains, Tug Hill Plateau and Thousand Islands, it's all right there. I mean this is the gateway, and it has great potential for growth. And they can improve their public spaces and redevelop blighted buildings and attract more opportunities in the downtown area as well. So, we're very excited about that.
They'll become a regional center without losing any of its small-town charm. And you're not going to – what's the cow's name? Lucinda? Miss Lucinda? Luinda? Okay, I was close. I was close. I've been photographed with that cow, okay? It's a very interesting cow. Oversees, isn't she the protectorate of all the small dairy cooperatives? You think that's right? I got that right. Look forward to coming up there, but again, congratulations once again. Look forward to seeing a big impact in the great community of Lowville. And also, two of the North Country winners for the New York Forward program, Canton and Alex Bay, will each receive $4.5 million in funding and they're both developing strategic plans to turn rundown parts of their downtowns into housing.
Yes. Thank you. Thank you. That's the right answer. And revitalizing their downtowns in the process. So, they'll beautify the main streets, bring in new entrepreneurs and Alex Bay is going to have some work on their waterfront there – one of the most beautiful waterfronts we have. And you'll have a real surge in investment there as well. So, we're excited about those, and this is how we put the seed money in, get the projects, the catalyst for them, and all the others start paying attention. The money that may not have discovered these downtowns finds its way there. I've seen that before, so I can't wait to see what's in store for all three communities.
I promise to come back and visit, and congratulations to all of you, and congratulations to the North Country as well for your great successes. Thank you very much, everyone. Thank you.