# croton.news — Croton-on-Hudson, NY Local News

> Comprehensive LLM-readable documentation for croton.news
> For the shorter version, see https://croton.news/llms.txt

## About

croton.news is an independent, AI-assisted civic information project covering the Village of
Croton-on-Hudson, New York (population ~8,200, Westchester County, 35 miles north of Manhattan).
The site publishes news articles and meeting coverage generated from public records, official
meeting transcripts, and government documents using AI-assisted journalism workflows.

- 145 published articles generated from 304 public meetings
- 1063 tracked entities (people, organizations, places)
- 28 government committees and boards covered
- Coverage period: September 2024 to present
- Updated daily as new meetings are transcribed and published

## How It Works

1. Public meetings are recorded and transcribed (YouTube recordings, audio files)
2. Transcripts are chunked and indexed in a RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation) database
3. AI generates long-form articles from transcript chunks, with citations to specific timestamps
4. Articles include quick summaries, full narrative coverage, and links to source transcripts
5. Named entities (people, organizations, places) are automatically extracted and cross-linked
6. Topics are tracked across multiple meetings to show policy threads over time

## Site Pages

### Main Navigation
- Homepage: https://croton.news/ — Latest articles, weather, upcoming meetings
- Meetings: https://croton.news/meetings — All covered meetings by committee and date
- Editorials: https://croton.news/editorials — AI-generated long-form investigative pieces
- Calendar: https://croton.news/calendar — Upcoming village meetings and events
- Topics: https://croton.news/topics — Policy topics tracked across meetings
- Entities: https://croton.news/entities — People, organizations, and places mentioned in coverage
- Documents: https://croton.news/documents — Meeting packets and source PDFs
- Search: https://croton.news/search — Full-text search across all articles and transcripts
- Gallery: https://croton.news/gallery — Community photo gallery
- About: https://croton.news/about — Project description and methodology
- Contact: https://croton.news/contact — Contact form
- Editorial Policy: https://croton.news/editorial-policy — Transparency and sourcing standards

### History Archive
A curated historical section covering Croton-on-Hudson from pre-colonial times to the 20th century:
- History Home: https://croton.news/history — Overview and featured stories
- Timeline: https://croton.news/history/timeline — Interactive chronological timeline
- Historical Maps: https://croton.news/history/maps — Annotated historical maps
- Historical Documents: https://croton.news/history/documents — Primary source documents
- Stories: https://croton.news/history/stories — 27 narrative essays on local history
- McDonald Interviews: https://croton.news/history/mcdonald — 232 oral history transcripts
- Search: https://croton.news/history/search — Search across all historical content

### History Stories (27 essays)
- The Cannon at Teller's Point: https://croton.news/history/story/01_cannon_tellers_point
- The Fifteen-Year Revenge: https://croton.news/history/story/02_fifteen_year_revenge
- Nimham's Last Stand: https://croton.news/history/story/03_nimham_last_stand
- The Grape King of Senasqua: https://croton.news/history/story/04_grape_king_senasqua
- Little Italy and the Dam: https://croton.news/history/story/05_little_italy_dam
- The Westchester Tea Party: https://croton.news/history/story/06_westchester_tea_party
- Slavery at the Patriots' Manor: https://croton.news/history/story/07_slavery_patriots_manor
- The Other Harmon: https://croton.news/history/story/08_other_harmon
- Five Lives of Croton Point: https://croton.news/history/story/09_five_lives_croton_point
- Prohibition's Wild Croton: https://croton.news/history/story/10_prohibitions_wild_croton
- Croton in Poetry: https://croton.news/history/story/11_croton_poems
- Brinton Brook Sanctuary: https://croton.news/history/story/12_brinton_brook
- Croton Gorge Park: https://croton.news/history/story/13_croton_gorge_park
- Teatown Lake Reservation: https://croton.news/history/story/14_teatown
- Oscawana Island: https://croton.news/history/story/15_oscawana
- Blue Mountain Reservation: https://croton.news/history/story/16_blue_mountain
- Croton Landing Park: https://croton.news/history/story/17_croton_landing
- George's Island Park: https://croton.news/history/story/18_georges_island
- Old Croton Aqueduct Trail: https://croton.news/history/story/19_aqueduct_trail
- Original Research Collection: https://croton.news/history/story/20_original_research
- The Tea Captain: https://croton.news/history/story/21_tea_captain
- The Sacrifice at Pines Bridge: https://croton.news/history/story/22_pines_bridge
- Mosier's Fight: https://croton.news/history/story/23_mosiers_fight
- The Burning of Crompond: https://croton.news/history/story/24_crompond_burning
- Bearmore the Bear: https://croton.news/history/story/25_bearmore
- Tim Knapp's Croton: https://croton.news/history/story/26_tim_knapp
- The Cornell Dam Strike: https://croton.news/history/story/27_cornell_dam_strike

## Committees Covered

- Advisory Board on the Visual Environment
- Advisory Board on the Visual Environment (VEB)
- Arts & Humanities Advisory Council
- Bicycle and Pedestrian Committee
- Board Of Trustees
- Board of Education
- Board of Trustees Organizational Meeting
- Board of Trustees Work Session
- CHUFSD Board of Education Candidate Forum 5/12/26
- Conservation Advisory Council
- Croton History
- Fire Council
- Gouveia Park Project Meeting
- HEART Committee
- Half Moon Bay Bridge Reconstruction Project Webinar
- IDEA Advisory Committee
- Mayoral Candidates Forum - October 9, 2025
- Old Post Road Traffic Study Webinar
- Other
- Planning Board
- Police Advisory Committee (PAC)
- Recreation Advisory Committee
- School Board Election Coverage
- Sustainability Committee
- Water Control Commission
- Waterfront Advisory Committee
- Zoning Board of Appeals

## Recent Articles

### 49 Apartments, 31 Questions: Planning Board Opens Its Review of 425 S. Riverside
- URL: https://croton.news/article/150
- Committee: Planning Board
- Date: 2026-07-28
- Summary: The Planning Board opened what its acting chair called "a long, long process" on Carmel Riverside LLC's 49-unit apartment proposal at 425 S. Riverside Ave., with Chairman Rob Luntz recused, 31 issues flagged by the village's planning consultant, and the applicant agreeing to complete the application before variance requests go to the Zoning Board of Appeals. The board also plans to flag the chicken-coop setback in its comments back to the trustees on the proposed animal-keeping law.

### Your Online Pothole Report No Longer Counts: Croton Quietly Adopted a Paper-Only Notice Law
- URL: https://croton.news/article/383
- Committee: Topics
- Date: 2026-07-27
- Summary: Local Law 7 of 2026, adopted 5-0 in June and effective July 14, makes paper delivered to the Village Clerk — by hand, certified mail, or overnight service — the only legally valid prior notice of a street or sidewalk defect. Email, the village website, report-an-issue tools, and social media are expressly ruled out — so an online report no longer preserves a resident's right to sue if the hazard later causes an injury. The change, recommended by the New York Conference of Mayors after a Court of Appeals ruling about Albany's reporting app, passed with no public comments and about four minutes of discussion.

### Trustees Build Zoning Defenses as State Pares Back Environmental Review; Riverside Zone Floated for Cannabis
- URL: https://croton.news/article/238
- Committee: Board of Trustees Work Session
- Date: 2026-07-22
- Summary: With New York's new budget exempting many housing projects — including those on most sites in Croton — from SEQR review, the Board of Trustees walked through code amendments meant to preserve local scrutiny of development, leaned toward steering cannabis dispensaries into a defined Riverside-area zone, and reached consensus to raise the income limit for senior and disabled rent relief in the village's rent-regulated buildings.

### Conservation Advisory Council to Take Up Leaf Blower Charge, Park and Trail Updates
- URL: https://croton.news/article/232
- Committee: Conservation Advisory Council
- Date: 2026-07-21
- Summary: The council meets Tuesday, July 21, with its charge from the Village Board on gas-powered leaf blowers atop a ten-item agenda that also covers Black Rock Park, trails, dark skies, and the Natural Resources Inventory.

### Reorganized School Board Seats Two New Trustees and Two Student Members, With Bhatnagar as President
- URL: https://croton.news/article/252
- Committee: Board of Education
- Date: 2026-07-16
- Summary: At its July 16 organizational meeting, the Croton-Harmon Board of Education swore in newly elected trustees, elevated Anamika Bhatnagar to president and Omar Mayyasi to vice president, seated two student ex-officio trustees for the first time, appointed an interim athletic director, and — after a trustee flagged unchecked AI-generated committee minutes — made an AI policy a priority.

### Preliminary: Bicycle Pedestrian Committee — agenda for 2026-07-16
- URL: https://croton.news/article/226
- Committee: Bicycle and Pedestrian Committee
- Date: 2026-07-16
- Summary: Preliminary agenda-only summary for the Bicycle Pedestrian Committee on 2026-07-16. This article will be enriched with full coverage when ChampDS publishes the meeting video.

### Police Advisory Committee to Plan Community Survey and Finalize National Night Out Logistics
- URL: https://croton.news/article/147
- Committee: Police Advisory Committee (PAC)
- Date: 2026-07-16
- Summary: The committee will focus on designing a September community survey and finalizing plans for National Night Out on August 4.

### When every Croton yard kept chickens
- URL: https://croton.news/article/157
- Committee: Croton History
- Date: 2026-07-15
- Summary: From manor rents paid in hens to a Revolutionary spy selling eggs, Croton's historical record is full of poultry — and the village's relationship with backyard livestock is older than the nation.

### Village Wins 53,744 Sidewalk Grant; Trustees Address Committee Minutes Controversy Over the Chronicle
- URL: https://croton.news/article/151
- Committee: Board Of Trustees
- Date: 2026-07-15
- Summary: The Board of Trustees adopted a revised debt policy, authorized a slate of state grant applications, and commissioned an independent Kaplan's Pond assessment, while the village manager announced a 53,744 county sidewalk grant. Trustees also addressed a committee's minutes that documented discussion of the Croton Chronicle: Trustee Stacey Nachtaler — saying she would have called it an inappropriate topic had she been in the room — praised the paper, and Mayor Brian Pugh said committees should be judged on their work product, not 'table talk.'

### VEB to Review Sign Proposal for Brooklyn Embodied Pilates on Maple Street
- URL: https://croton.news/article/145
- Committee: Advisory Board on the Visual Environment (VEB)
- Date: 2026-07-14
- Summary: The Advisory Board on the Visual Environment will consider a sign permit application for Brooklyn Embodied Pilates at 66 Maple Street and vote on draft minutes from its June 9 meeting.

### Preliminary: Waterfront Advisory Committee (WAC) Meeting — agenda for 2026-07-08
- URL: https://croton.news/article/149
- Committee: Waterfront Advisory Committee
- Date: 2026-07-08
- Summary: Preliminary agenda-only summary for the Waterfront Advisory Committee (WAC) Meeting on 2026-07-08. This article will be enriched with full coverage when ChampDS publishes the meeting video.

### Croton Board Advances Animal Law Overhaul, Approves Student Committee Members Amid Con Edison Backlash
- URL: https://croton.news/article/144
- Committee: Board Of Trustees
- Date: 2026-07-01
- Summary: The Village Board introduced a sweeping rewrite of animal regulations, approved student participation on eight advisory committees, and heard sharp resident complaints about Con Edison's disruptive gas main project during a wide-ranging July 1 meeting.

### School Board Hires Four Teachers, Shifts $200,000 to Reduce Lunch Fund Deficit at June 29 Special Meeting
- URL: https://croton.news/article/251
- Committee: Board of Education
- Date: 2026-06-29
- Summary: At a June 29 special meeting, the Croton-Harmon Board of Education appointed four teachers and two leave replacements, authorized a Repair Reserve expenditure to fix a middle school boiler, expanded a middle school air conditioning contract to $805,800, moved $200,000 into the deficit-running School Lunch Fund, and authorized up to $2.7 million in reserve replenishments.

### Solar Delays, EV Incentives, and a Battery Storage Push: Sustainability Committee Wraps Up Before Summer Recess
- URL: https://croton.news/article/223
- Committee: Sustainability Committee
- Date: 2026-06-28
- Summary: Croton's Sustainability Committee covered a packed agenda June 28, from a Con Ed delay on the DPW solar canopy to new state EV incentives and a fresh push for a second battery storage system.

### Board Approves Battery Storage Study, Eyes Winter Parking Changes for Business Districts
- URL: https://croton.news/article/143
- Committee: Board of Trustees Work Session
- Date: 2026-06-24
- Summary: The Board of Trustees authorized a $2,000 study of battery energy storage on village land, moved to relax snow-parking rules for business districts, and debated a sweeping rewrite of animal-keeping regulations at a wide-ranging June 24 work session.

### Planning Board OKs Moving EV Charging Stations Outside at Hudson Condos
- URL: https://croton.news/article/137
- Committee: Planning Board
- Date: 2026-06-23
- Summary: The Croton Planning Board unanimously approved moving all four EV charging stations at The Hudson Condos from the indoor garage to the outdoor parking area based on fire safety concerns.

### Police Committee: Body Cameras by Early October, New Handguns in September, Community Survey Set for Fall
- URL: https://croton.news/article/194
- Committee: Police Advisory Committee (PAC)
- Date: 2026-06-18
- Summary: Croton's Police Advisory Committee covered body camera deployment, a September delivery of new department handguns, fall community survey dates of Sept. 15 to Oct. 15, policy manual progress, a consultant search, and National Night Out planning at its June 18 meeting — and learned the summer soccer game is off over liability concerns.

### Village Board Adopts Cannabis Dispensary Moratorium, Approves Major Capital Bond Program
- URL: https://croton.news/article/186
- Committee: Board Of Trustees
- Date: 2026-06-17
- Summary: The Board of Trustees imposed a six-month moratorium on cannabis dispensaries, adopted affordable housing preferences for first responders, and authorized more than two dozen bond resolutions funding infrastructure projects from road reconstruction to fire station improvements.

### Trustees hand the leaf-blower question to the conservation council; CLEAN crew pulls a record 1,500 pounds from Silver Lake
- URL: https://croton.news/article/140
- Committee: Conservation Advisory Council
- Date: 2026-06-16
- Summary: The Board of Trustees has tasked the Conservation Advisory Council with gathering information and public opinion on gas-powered leaf blowers, while the council sharpened a letter urging a village light-pollution code. Volunteers reported their largest cleanup haul yet: 1,500 pounds of trash from Silver Lake.

### ZBA Grapples With 1931 Animal Code: Fowl Means Any Bird, Split Vote on Coop Setbacks
- URL: https://croton.news/article/139
- Committee: Zoning Board of Appeals
- Date: 2026-06-16
- Summary: The Zoning Board of Appeals voted to define fowl as 'a bird of any kind' and split 3-2 on whether coops can stay within 50 feet of property lines, after parsing ambiguous language in a zoning provision dating to the village's founding.

## Topics

Policy topics are tracked across multiple meetings to show how issues evolve over time.

- Leadership Succession (53 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/leadership-succession
- Affordable Housing (Lot A) (47 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/affordable-housing-lot-a
- Curriculum & Academic Vision (40 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/curriculum-academic-vision
- Electric Vehicles & Green Fleet (38 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/electric-vehicles-green-fleet
- Solar & Battery Storage (35 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/solar-battery-storage
- School Budget & Tax Levy (30 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/school-budget-tax-levy
- Cell Phone Restrictions (24 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/cell-phone-restrictions
- Gouveia Park (24 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/gouveia-park
- UPK Funding & Expansion (22 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/upk-funding-expansion
- Water Infrastructure (20 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/water-infrastructure
- Village Budget 2026-2027 (20 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/village-budget-2026-2027
- Mount Airy Road Subdivision (19 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/mount-airy-road-subdivision
- Cannabis Dispensary Zoning (18 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/cannabis-dispensary-zoning
- Harmon Parking (18 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/harmon-parking
- Backyard Chicken Regulations (17 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/backyard-chicken-regulations
- Police Body Cameras (16 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/police-body-cameras
- Rental Registry (12 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/rental-registry
- Equity Policy & Antisemitism (10 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/equity-policy-antisemitism
- Court Consolidation (9 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/court-consolidation
- Short-Term Rental Tax (5 meetings): https://croton.news/topic/short-term-rental-tax

## APIs

### GET /api/articles
Returns recent articles as JSON array.
- Parameters:
  - limit (int, default 20): Number of articles to return
  - committee (string): Filter by committee slug (e.g., board-of-trustees)
- Response: Array of objects with id, headline, quick_summary, committee, date, article (full markdown)
- Example: GET https://croton.news/api/articles?limit=5

### GET /api/search
Full-text search across meeting transcripts.
- Parameters:
  - q (string, required): Search query
- Response: Array of transcript chunks with content, speaker, timestamps, committee, date, doc_id
- Example: GET https://croton.news/api/search?q=water+infrastructure

### GET /api/calendar/events
Returns upcoming village meetings and events.
- Response: Array of event objects

### GET /api/search/documents
Search across meeting packet documents and PDFs.
- Parameters:
  - q (string, required): Search query
- Response: Array of matching document sections

### GET /api/weather
Returns current weather for Croton-on-Hudson.

### GET /api/health
Service health check endpoint.
- Response: JSON with status, article count, latest article date

### GET /feed
RSS 2.0 feed of recent articles.
- Content-Type: application/rss+xml

## Data & Feeds

- RSS Feed: https://croton.news/feed
- Sitemap: https://croton.news/sitemap.xml
- News Sitemap: https://croton.news/news-sitemap.xml (Google News format)
- Robots: https://croton.news/robots.txt
- LLMs.txt: https://croton.news/llms.txt
- LLMs-full.txt: https://croton.news/llms-full.txt

## Article Structure

Each article page includes:
- Headline and quick summary (1-3 sentences)
- Full narrative article (typically 1,000-5,000 words)
- Committee name and meeting date
- Links to related articles from the same committee
- Entity mentions linked to entity profile pages
- Topic tags linked to topic thread pages
- Source transcript with timestamps (when available)
- Meeting packet documents (when available)
- NewsArticle JSON-LD structured data

## Technical Details

- Stack: Python/Flask, SQLite (RAG database), Jinja2 templates
- Hosting: Self-hosted on VPS behind nginx reverse proxy with SSL
- Search: SQLite FTS5 full-text search over transcript chunks
- NLP: Named entity recognition for people, organizations, and places
- AI: Article generation from transcripts using LLM pipelines
- Design: Newspaper-style layout with serif typography, warm color palette

## FAQ

### Is croton.news affiliated with the Village of Croton-on-Hudson?
No. croton.news is an independent project. All content is derived from publicly available records.

### How are articles generated?
Articles are generated by AI from official meeting transcripts. Each article cites specific
timestamps and speakers from the source recording. Human editorial review ensures accuracy.

### How often is the site updated?
New articles are published within days of public meetings being held. The site covers meetings
from the Board of Trustees, Planning Board, Zoning Board, and 20+ other committees.

### Can I use the API?
Yes. The articles API and search API are free and open. No authentication required.
Please be respectful with request frequency.

### What is the McDonald Interview collection?
232 oral history transcripts collected by local historian Mary McDonald, documenting
personal stories and memories of Croton-on-Hudson residents across decades.

### What topics does the History section cover?
27 narrative essays covering the American Revolution in Croton, the Croton Dam construction,
Prohibition-era bootlegging, Native American history, local parks and landmarks,
and lesser-known episodes in the village's history.

## Related Sites

croton.news is part of a network of free tools and services:
- helloandy.net — Free developer tools (regex, cron, API tester, CLAUDE.md writer)
- launch.pics — AI image processing API and browser tools (250+ tools)
- everyone.food — Recipe collection, kitchen tools, and calorie API
- contextwire.dev — Search API and MCP server for AI applications
- qrmcp.dev — QR code generator with MCP integration
- mcp.vin — VIN decoder and vehicle data API
- webmcplist.com — WebMCP protocol directory
- qrcode.host — AI microsite builder with QR codes
- stockandflow.live — Systems dynamics simulator
- stockandflow.org — Systems dynamics model library (1,000+ models)