Emma Foster, 27, is an educator at the Hudson River Maritime Museum where she coordinates tours, lectures, concerts and other programming. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Kingston Wire: How did you or you family come to Kingston

Emma Foster: My mother’s side has been here since the 1600s, allegedly. My father’s side grew up in Queens, ended up in West Shokan and then we kind of inched our way down to Kingston. I used to live in Woodstock when I was little and then we moved around and ended up here.

KW: What do you like about Kingston?

EF: The personality and the history. As a history person there’s just such a rich history here. We were the first capital of New York State, so you get a kind of unique perspective that a lot of other places won’t have. I love the culture, there’s things to do here. I’ve lived other places, I lived in New Jersey for a while and I came home because it just didn’t feel the same. Part of that history are the museums. I used to work at the Senate House state historic site, I worked at the Reher Center up the hill and now I work at the Maritime Museum and its just such a beautiful place.

KW: What would you change about Kingston?

EF: The potholes, definitely the potholes. But honestly, not much. When I was in Jersey there were like a million and one things I would change about living there. But here? I’m very happy here you know. And my apartment is rent controlled which is cool. Maybe I would make it a little bit cheaper to live here for some people, in whatever way you would do that, I’m not really a politics person so I don’t know how.

KW: How do you think Kingston will be different in ten years?

EF: I think that depends on if people from Brooklyn keep moving up here. I’ve already heard people call Uptown “Little Brooklyn” and I don’t know if we can keep going on that trajectory. Eventually you hit a saturation point, right? I hope that it’s a little more accessible to people because the more people move up here, the harder it is for locals to find places to live. So, I hope we don’t continue with that little Brooklyn to medium to Brooklyn to just Brooklyn mentality. I just hope locals can keep their place here.