Roger Hannigan Gilson reports in the Times Union that the City of Hudson’s Department of Public Works began tearing down the historic the Furgary Shacks fishing village last week with a plan to complete the work in the summer. The shacks date to the 1800s, built on state land with mostly found materials. The shantytown was a recreational and commercial fishing village from the late 1800s until Hudson police forcibly cleared people from the shacks in 2012, two years after the city took ownership of the area from the state in a land swap. The city is using part of its Downtown Revitalization Initiative grant to pay for the demolition. Hudson Mayor Kamal Johnson said the city ran out of grant money to preserve the shacks and blamed past administrations. Johnson said, “This was the plan created by those before me — I’m just kind of following the DRI process," and that his “overall goal would be to preserve a couple of structures and make it parkland.” New York Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation spokesperson Dan Keefe said, “Our review is ongoing.... However, we anticipate recommending that a portion of the grant funds go to preserving one or more of the buildings, and/or installing educational signage and photographic documentation.” Read more about this story in the Times Union.