ReVivo Medical products looking to FDA acceptance
Medical device company ReVivo, of Albany, has successfully completed the first two of 50 planned surgeries using its proprietary products, the company said, according to the Albany Business Journal. The company’s “cervical plate and cage implants” hold vertebrae in place following spinal surgeries, and the company hopes they hold better and heal faster than the devices currently used, the story says. It is one step toward FDA approval.
Land is not sacred enough to stop apartments
A plan to build a 231-unit apartment complex along the Hudson River passed its environmental impact analysis in Troy last week, the Albany Business Journal says. This approval came over the objections of the Friends of the Mahicantuck. According to the story, they are fighting to keep the last stretch of undeveloped forest wild and are claiming the site is sacred to Indigenous people and has other cultural, historic and ecological significance, which if proven would have changed the analysis. An archaeological company found no evidence of burial sites last October, the story says. The project still has many hurdles to leap.
Stopgap zoning in Ballston Spa chafes a bit
The Planned Development District zoning legislation in Ballston Spa is intended to slow development without stopping it, while the village revises its 50-year-old comprehensive plan, a story in the Daily Gazette says. Detractors say the rules or “guardrails” are too restrictive and will kill expansion. For locations over 15,000 square feet, the guidelines would require a Planning Board and Board of Trustees approval after a neighborhood work session. Given the loose nature of current zoning rules, this feels like a nice compromise to supporters, but looks like a solution trying to find a problem in a village that has had little overzealous development in the past 50 years, detractors say.
AG James pushing for abortion bill
Given the expectation that the U.S. Supreme Court will reverse the Roe v. Wade abortion decision, New York State Attorney General Letitia James is pushing with lawmakers to increase access to abortion providers in New York to people from out-of-state where abortions may be more restricted. The proposed "reproductive freedom and equity program" is estimated to cost $50 million annually and would fund grants to help the clinics and the people trying to reach them, covering transportation and other costs, the Times Union is reporting.