Orange County, NY, Middletown | featured news

A turtle had traffic at a standstill on Route 17 westbound near exit 120 at around 12:15 p.m.The turtle was heading into the road and cars were swerving to avoid hitting it, said New York State Trooper Steven Nevel. Someone did hit the turtle and it did not make it, he said."It was taking its time, people were waiting and somebody didn't want to," Nevel said.Traffic should be moving normally as the turtle's remains were removed from the road.

SLATE HILL - The Minisink Valley school district is looking at cutting teachers' jobs and programs as it considers a new 2019-2020 budget proposal after voters overwhelmingly rejected the budget put forth on May 21."Reductions" will be necessary to keep the tax levy increase low, administrators told the school board at a Finance Committee meeting Thursday evening at Minisink Valley Middle School."Our exit survey was clear to us that the May 21 tax levy was too high, [...]

​TOWN OF WALLKILL – Private label pharmaceutical and personal-care products maker Geritrex LLC is closing its Town of Wallkill plant just a year after telling the state it was moving production there from Mount Vernon.News of the closure came in the company’s recent filing with the state Department of Labor. The firm, which is still headquartered in Mount Vernon, told the state it will lay off 56 of the 76 employees at its 40 Commercial Ave. plant in the Town of [...]

Among the proposals pending in Albany with three weeks to go in the session is a bill that would let upstate cities like Newburgh and Kingston opt for the same sort of restrictions on rent increases now in effect in New York City and offered to municipalities in three suburban counties. The bill, sponsored in […]

NEW WINDSOR — Town police have raided massage parlors in New Windsor four or five times in the past five years, they say, but for the most part the businesses continue to operate.The latest raids here were on March 8, when police went into four spas and arrested five women. They charged all five with the felony of unauthorized practice of a profession, and four also with misdemeanor prostitution. As of April, three of those spas were still open.This [...]

VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. — A longtime city employee opened fire in a municipal building in Virginia Beach on Friday, killing 12 people on three floors and sending terrified co-workers scrambling for cover before police shot and killed him following a "long gun-battle," authorities said.Four other people were wounded in the shooting, including a police officer whose bulletproof vest saved his life, said Virginia Beach Police Chief James Cervera. The city's visibly shaken mayor, [...]

Montefiore St. Luke’s Cornwall Hospital recorded positive 2018 operating results, continuing the community hospital’s monumental financial turnaround in recent years, according to newly disclosed data.The hospital, which includes Newburgh and Cornwall campuses, was $7 million in the black in 2018, a 7.28 percent operating margin, the company disclosed at the American Hospital Association's recent 20th Annual Not-for-Profit Health Care Investor Conference in New York City. [...]

State Sen. James Skoufis announced Friday that seven bridges along Route 9W in the towns of Cornwall, Highlands and New Windsor will be repaired or replaced in the coming months.All seven bridges will undergo work this year at an approximate cost of $23.6 million, according to a news release from Skoufis' office.The bridges are located on Angola Road and Willow Avenue in Cornwall, River Road in New Windsor, and four Route 9W overpasses in Cornwall, Highlands and New Windsor, [...]

State education officials announced Friday they will propose regulations by July 3 on how much time nonpublic schools must spend teaching core academics after losing a court ruling in April that found they had skipped steps in their effort to police religious and independent schools.The statement signaled the Education Department will continue its effort to ensure those schools are offering instruction in basics such as English, math and science that is "substantially [...]

TOWN OF WALLKILL — A Town of Wallkill man pleaded guilty to forcibly groping a teenage girl, Orange County District Attorney David Hoovler said on Friday.Joseph Retherford, 38, admitted that on Dec. 28, in the area of Scotchtown Collabar Road and Goshen Turnpike, while the girl was in his car, he forcibly grouped her with the aim of satisfying his own sexual desires, Hoovler said.Retherford pleaded guilty on Wednesday in Wallkill Town Court to forcible touching, [...]