by Enfield Councilperson Robert Lynch; January 15, 2026
I launched this website, bob-lynch-enfield.com, in April 2019. The website was born during my initial campaign for Enfield Councilperson. Back then, what I wrote was mostly introductory stuff. I provided information to inform you of who I was and why you should vote for me. It was a campaign website limited in its purpose. That’s what you’d expect.
And at first I didn’t write much about the events happening around us. Over time, the emphasis changed. This website evolved. Campaign victories left a void to fill. I filled it with news.
Among the initial essays I’ve raised from the dust is one I’d posted in September of that first year. I’d responded to a lengthy political commentary written back then by a former Enfield Town Supervisor who never liked me very much; a person best forgotten, someone no longer a community resident and whose words and actions I forgave long ago.
I revisit that essay because I quoted in its heading the words of a woman and political leader I respected then and respect even more today, former Vice President Kamala Harris:
“I was raised by a mother who said many things that were life lessons for me, including, ‘Don’t you ever let anybody tell you who you are. You tell them who you are.’”
The essay I wrote had attempted to carry forth Vice President Harris’ admonition as I addressed the troubling, untruthful insinuations that had been hurled at me. I wrote, “When anger overwhelms civility and reasoned judgment, facts get distorted, quotations twisted, and political ignorance rewrites the truth.”
One of my earliest news stories posted here came in January 2020. It reported the Tompkins County Democratic Committee’s endorsement of Tracy Mitrano to face Congressman Tom Reed in that November’s General Election. (Mitrano, of course, lost.) I happened to be a member of the Democratic Committee at the time. I’d voted on the endorsement. Was there a conflict of interest in my writing that story? You decide.
Over the years, I have employed this website to report on actions and controversies involving the Tompkins County Legislature, the Ithaca Board of Education, and here, most to the point, the Enfield Town Board, the governing body on which I sit.
Some have thanked me for the work I’ve done, for the information I’ve conveyed. Others have not. Many of my toughest critics hold positions of power and influence, either present or former, in local government. These people would rather I shut my mouth, exit my keyboard, and keep my thoughts to myself. They’d have me refrain from any attempt to report what I see and hear. They allege that any reporting I do compromises and conflicts with my governing responsibilities as a municipal leader.
James Madison and Alexander Hamilton helped frame the U.S. Constitution. They played key roles in the constitutional republic that they had helped build. But they also wrote much of The Federalist Papers, a series of advocacy essays that influence our constitutional understanding to this day. I would never place myself on an equal plane with the founders of our nation. But I never recall anyone challenging Madison’s or Hamilton’s written advocacy as a conflict with either man’s former or future governance. If any had thought of doing so, they dared not state it.
But maybe newswriting is different? Journalism was my first career. And the instincts engrained within an inquisitive reporter will forever rest within his being. More than any other attribute, my desire is to search for facts kept secret; uncover them, analyze them, and then share them with others. It defines the person I am. This talent, sharpened through experience, will never leave me. Understand that.
I have a style of newswriting some do not like. They find me too critical. I beg to disagree with those detractors. I take pride in how I practice my craft. I peer behind the curtain. I ask questions that maybe no one else will ask. I stand guard against fabrication, equivocation, or flawed reasoning, whether the words come from the President of the United Sates or from a town highway superintendent.
Some have labeled my writing “tabloid journalism.” I call it reporting and writing with candor, honesty and an edge. I do not refrain from calling events as I see them; from drawing conclusions as objective insight pulls me into them. I recognize nuance and respect context. I attempt to put matters into reasoned perspective. I attempt to tell you not just what happened, but also why it happened and why what happened should matter to you. That’s why the stories you read here may delve deeper into a controversial topic than those others write. And you may read stories here that you will find nowhere else.
Case in Point: On January 6 of this year, I wrote how the Enfield Board of Fire Commissioners had—in the words I chose—“ditched” The Ithaca Journal as its designated newspaper for publishing legal notices in favor of Tompkins Weekly. To offer perspective, I reported that in so doing, the Board of Fire Commissioners was “going to a place where Tompkins County (had) chickened out.”
I’ve been criticized for the comparison that I drew. One community leader did not welcome the candid assessment. It was bluntness with a sting, to be sure. It was also true. I stand by it.
As I’d reported in a story posted November 21, the Tompkins County Legislature November 18, in stand-your-ground defiance, put itself at odds with its County Attorney, its legislative clerk, and likely New York State law. Legislators defeated, two votes to 12, an otherwise-routine annual designation of The Ithaca Journal as the official newspaper, thereby denying the Gannett daily its monopolistic ability to extract tax dollars in exchange for publishing legal ads. Annual designation makes the Secretary of State happy, and counsel claimed that only the Journal qualified.
Defiant legislators that November night wanted state law updated, drawn into the 21st Century, to the era where online publications get more eyeballs than does a cranky old Fishwrap like The Journal. They’d punish a paper that charges exorbitant ad rates, gets delivered only by mail carrier, and no longer covers local news in the first instance.
I quoted one legislator this way:
“I think we all understand our right to protest,” Dryden’s Greg Mezey, leader of Tuesday’s anti-Journal rebellion, made clear. “I think sometimes as a lower level of government, we need to rise up and use our voice and our platform to encourage the state to move more swiftly.”
I granted the Legislature’s thumb-in-the-eye revolt against same-old, same-old more than 1,200 words. Tompkins County’s official post-meeting press release accorded the action 76 words. The Ithaca Times gave it 158. My story assigned the defiance top placement, as my news judgment dictated. The others buried the decision beneath the meeting’s more predictable actions.
Fast-forward two weeks, and to the Legislature’s next meeting, December 2. Greg Mezey, who’d voiced rebellion a fortnight earlier, conceded defeat:
“It’s like falling on a sword,” Mezey said, “as much as it pains me to move [to reconsider.] “Friends, we had our opportunity to stand up to higher levels of government and protest… But here we are. This needs to pass.”
And pass it did, ten votes to four. Only Mike Sigler, Anne Koreman, Travis Brooks and Deborah Dawson held true to their principles. Dawson peppered her dissent with these words: “We really need to point out to Albany that The Ithaca Journal sucks.”
I heard the words, I recorded the votes, I read the room, I drew my inferences, I wrote what I had found and as I had found it. And when later the Board of Fire Commissioners took a divergent path, I drew a comparison. I stated it bluntly. I think I did good work. And well, I rest my case. (And lest you think otherwise, legislator Mezey was not the leader who faulted me for my reporting.)
With the turn of the calendar, the sands have shifted down at the ornate Gov. Daniel D. Tompkins Building, Legislative Chambers. With the start of 2026, fully one-half of the newly-expanded, 16-person County Legislature is brand new. Some venerated traditionalists have left. A few Young Turks have taken their place. And one of them is very young; he’s just out of college. I know when it’s time to say goodbye. As I‘ve appended to my final legislative story, dated January 9, I will no longer report on meetings of the Tompkins County Legislature. Let others do it.
Now to Enfield. Here lies a problem somewhat different.
Trust me, at every meeting of our Enfield Town Board, I wish there was some brave soul out in the visitors’ gallery with a pencil in her hand, a notebook (or a computer) on her lap, and an employer who commanded she be there. Sadly, there is no such person. But if there was, I would not need—nor choose—to report what occurred that night. I’d prefer someone totally impartial and detached from Enfield Government chronicle what we do every second Wednesday of the month. And let that person be as brutal as he or she wants to be regarding what I say and do. I’d welcome it. I can defend myself.
Yet for the mainstream Ithaca media, the reality is this: The Town of Enfield is the smallest town in Tompkins County and lies at the bottom of the informational food chain. It always has been. When I cut my teeth as a radio reporter in the 1970’s, it was like that too. Cover the Enfield Town Board only when nothing else is happening or when something big in Enfield blows up. (And back then, Ithaca Common Council met the same night.) Ordinarily, the best we could do is phone then-Supervisor Robert Linton the next morning and have him summarize what happened; that is, only if we thought of it.
I may never convince some of those I sit with that I do not write what I write purely to criticize or diminish them, to place their words, their actions, and their personalities in the worst possible light. That is not why I write about what we do. I write because all too often in Enfield government trees fall in the political forest and no one hears them crash. For those who do not know about or read this website, the refrain heard too often carries surprise. “When did you do that?” they say. “I didn’t know you were considering that.” The remark usually follows—often by months—some Town action that curtails freedom or raises taxes.
Much discipline goes into everything I write and post on any Enfield story. I cannot rely merely upon my mental recollection or on scattered, scribbled notes taken by me at a board table when I’m transacting business. Bias or selective memory may creep in were I to do so. That’s why it may be days, even weeks, before an action of the Town Board gets reported. I must revisit the meeting’s audio recording, listen and transcribe what was said, words spoken not just by others, but also by me. Did I get the facts right, the votes right, the quotes right, and did I place them in proper context? Trust me; it takes hours, sometimes days, to complete that task. It’s hard work. And I do it because nobody else will.
For months, indeed years, I’ve agonized over the conflict that lies at the heart of the decision I must make: How do I fulfill a self-set duty to provide Enfield’s residents, our constituents, timely, accurate information and at the same time honor my foremost responsibility to provide those in Enfield effective, impartial leadership without compromise. With the decision I have reached today, I conclude that I cannot do both.
I intend to serve out my four-year term as your elected Councilperson, a term running through December 2027. At this point, I also plan to seek re-election, barring the arrival of some unforeseen circumstance. So for at least two more years, and maybe longer, the conflict that I face is the conflict that I must resolve.
I will resolve it this way: For the remainder of my tenure on the Enfield Town Board, I will not report on Enfield political decisions and deliberations in the way I have done so for much of these past six years.
I will inform, but in a different way. As time permits, I will post Town Board actions or decisions on this website, doing so in a cold, factual manner, with each issue’s prioritization tempered by my news judgment. You’ll find little context; minimal controversy; and news that’s bland and oftentimes boring. Sorry, but expect it. It may not entertain. It may not sufficiently inform. But it may placate my critics. And it will make my own life a whole lot easier.
I make one exception to this general rule. Since my political committee owns this website and I control its content, I reserve the right to quote my own statements made at Town Board meetings as an exercise of my First Amendment freedoms. I may also write commentaries from time to time on issues I deem of importance to Enfield and Tompkins County.
Those who serve in local government; in Tompkins County Legislative Chambers, but also in Ithaca City Hall, should be damned glad that they serve now and not 50 years ago. Back then, The Ithaca Journal had perhaps a half-dozen news hungry reporters on its City Desk. And competing radio stations fought to be first with every story. No one, not in politics, business, or community leadership in general, stood immune from examination. None could get away with half of what they find possible to get away with today. An inquiring press does that, and democracy benefits.
I remember how it was. I wish it was still that way. But it is not. I’ve attempted in some slight way to fill the vacuum. But because of what I have written here, I can no longer step forward on my own and light that one little candle to help illuminate the darkness.
Good luck. I hope that before I leave elective office I spot that single lowly reporter sitting in the gallery of our Enfield Town Board, pencil in hand, notebook on lap. But that person cannot be me. I have standards to uphold, my character to defend. I have another job to do. And only I have the right to define who I am.
Peace,
Bob Lynch
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And now, to the news:
Costly Culvert Bids Boggle Enfield Board
by Councilperson Robert Lynch; January 16, 2026
This isn’t the way the Enfield Town Board had hoped to start the New Year.
Bids for a giant concrete culvert to be placed under Bostwick Road not far from Route 327 came in way over estimate when those bids were opened earlier this week at the Town Clerk’s Office.
“We are going to be way over,” Town Supervisor Stephanie Redmond remarked as Clerk Mary Cornell January 12 unsealed the three submitted offers, one by one.
Of the three, a Watertown firm, Jefferson Concrete Corporation, submitted the apparent low offer of $471,600. The cost covers the concrete culvert’s manufacture and delivery alone, not its installation.
Officials had earlier estimated that the culvert would cost around $200,000. But heftier design specifications demanded by New York State had heightened the price, as had inflation.
The Town Board had planned to review the bids and then award one of them at its Regular Monthly Meeting Wednesday, January 14. The board somewhat accomplished the first task, but never got to the second. After briefly inspecting the offers that night, the board postponed action to seek more information.
The Town Board will likely decide its course of action at a Special Meeting Tuesday, January 20. The meeting had been called for other purposes, but Supervisor Redmond has added a culvert decision to the agenda.
When it next meets on the 20th, the Town Board could either award Jefferson Concrete’s low bid, rebid the purchase (although unlikely), or reject all bids in favor of a potentially less costly option.
From roadside, the Bostwick Road culvert project looks like a routine repair. But when two Town Board members, Enfield’s Highway Superintendent, and project officials convened Friday, January 16 to discuss alternatives, project Engineer Brian Reaser outlined the scope differently.
It’s going to look like they “threw a whole bunch of grenades and blew the whole thing up,” Reaser told attendees of what the site may look like this summer. There’ll be a “massive adjustment of what the scenery looks like,” he warned.
Should Enfield officials proceed and award the lowest submitted bid, culvert replacement would likely occur late this summer. Bid papers call for the supplier to deliver the box culvert no later than September first.
Submitted along with Jefferson Concrete’s $471,600 bid January 12 were those of Lakelands Concrete Products of Lima, NY for $684,514, and Binghamton Precast & Supply Corporation’s bid of $705,800.
In 2024, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) awarded Enfield a Water Quality Improvement Project (WQIP) grant of $693,866 for the Bostwick Road culvert replacement and stream relocation. Actual receipt of the grant award was delayed for months by DEC foot-dragging. The delay prevented the culvert’s replacement during 2024. Post-award engineering studies further precluded construction during 2025.
Supervisor Redmond advertised the request for project bids last month. For the sake of expediency, the Supervisor bypassed holding a formal Town Board authorization vote so close to Christmas. Redmond has stressed that offers needed to be awarded by January to assure timely construction.
But disappointment overcame all present the afternoon that Clerk Cornell opened the bids. And part of the problem, Town officials were told, rests—perhaps predictably—with New York State.
“Regulations have changed and been updated,” Angel Hinickle, Resource Conservation Specialist for the Tompkins County Soil and Water Conservation District, informed those present that day. The state now mandates a ten percent increase in culvert size to address predicted climate change, she said. At the January 16 conference, Hinickle also said that New York requires any culvert’s top to stand at least one foot above water level during a; “100-year flood.”
Enfield Creek, whose water would pass through the culvert, lies within the recently-designated Enfield flood zone.
There’s a second complication created by New York State. In late-December, Governor Kathy Hochul signed a new law that would mandate any factory manufacturer of a concrete culvert pay the (generally higher) “prevailing wage” to those who build it. The law would take effect later this year, perhaps June 1. But one or more of Enfield’s submitting bidders may have already factored the prevailing wage into their bids, thereby raising the price to Enfield.
And were Enfield to reject all of the bids just submitted and postpone construction until 2027, the prevailing wage mandate coupled with normal inflation could raise bid submissions by “40 to 50 percent,” Reaser told Friday’s meeting.
The possibility that Enfield might postpone the culvert project and pursue a cheaper, option dominated discussion during the hour-long January 16 conference. And the discussion revealed a split between the two Town Board members attending: Supervisor Stephanie Redmond, and Town Councilperson Robert Lynch (this writer).
In initial planning documents up until now, engineers had counted on installing—and only installing—a precast concrete culvert. The alternative, Board members learned at their Wednesday night meeting, is a “multi-plate aluminum box culvert.” Such a culvert is domed, it’s assembled on-site, and it rather resembles a Quonset hut buried under the road. The aluminum box is cheaper—a lot cheaper.
Although she made only an estimate and didn’t have in hand a firm bid, Hinickle Friday estimated the aluminum box would cost $266,486, just over 56 percent of what Jefferson Concrete’s bid had registered. Nonetheless, Hinickle and Reaser estimated that a metal box may cost $50,000 more to assemble on-site. Its parts bolt together. A concrete box is merely lowered into place by crane.
Bottom line: Friday’s estimates put the concrete culvert’s total project cost at $905,553. The aluminum culvert’s (admittedly more speculative) total price tag would reach$701,928. That’s a savings of $203,625, or about 22.5 percent, going the aluminum route.
Still, it’s not that simple. There’s an outside possibility that the New York State Transportation Department (DOT) may not accept the aluminum culvert’s selection. Pressed by Councilperson Lynch, Brian Reaser gave DOT’s acceptance likelihood at about “75 percent.” Reaser also warned that DOT could take up to nine months to make its decision.
What’s more, switching to the multi-plate aluminum design would require re-engineering the project. Reaser predicted redesign would take about one month to complete and would cost an additional $15,000 to $20,000.
Worst case: Were DOT to reject the aluminum option, a construction season would be lost, the current bids would have long-expired, and the “prevailing wage” mandate could push any fresh round of bids to $700,000 or beyond. Reaser said waiting until next year—and going concrete, by necessity—might inflate a $900,000 project to $1.125 Million.
But the culvert project is already way over budget. Its cost stands hundreds of thousands above the $693,866 that the WQIP grant had awarded.
At Friday’s meeting, Supervisor Redmond favored awarding the Jefferson Concrete Corporation bid and moving ahead with the project this year despite its higher cost. Redmond employed the “bird in the hand” analogy. To cover the funding shortfall, the Supervisor would tap—and significantly deplete—the Town’s budgeted $427,000 Bridge Reserve account.
Councilperson Lynch countered with a different opinion. “I’m willing to roll the dice and go aluminum,” he said. Lynch would bet on DOT’s acceptance of the metal plate. If DOT approved, the put-together aluminum plate box would “save the taxpayers $200,000.”
As Friday’s planning meeting closed, Lynch reduced the available options to four:
- Award the $471,600 Jefferson Concrete bid and utilize Bridge Reserves (or less likely, bonding) to cover cost overruns (Total = $905,553);
- Reject all current bids, reengineer for a multi-plate aluminum box, seek DOT’s approval, and bid the aluminum option, should DOT approve it (Total estimated = $701,928);
- Re-bid the concrete box culvert should DOT reject using an aluminum box (Total estimated = $1.125 Million); or
- Abandon the entire Bostwick Road culvert project until further notice.
The Enfield Town Board will weigh those options and likely decide among them Tuesday, January 20.
****
Writer’s note: In accordance with recent style changes, detailed previously, this Councilperson will increasingly refer to himself in these reports (albeit awkwardly) in the third-person.
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Legislature regroups, amidst the rally
Shawna Black returns to lead; union nursing measure passes
Reporting and Analysis by Robert Lynch; January 9, 2026
[To my readers (Jan. 10): Consider this story the final report I will regularly write on meetings of the Tompkins County Legislature. For reasons one may infer from the paragraphs that follow—and for further reasons left unstated—I believe it best to assign the responsibility for providing objective oversight of Tompkins County politics and chronicling its Legislature’s decisions to others not doubly burdened by a conflicting tie to municipal governance. I trust website readers will understand this painful choice. And I encourage journalists locally to embrace the opportunity offered and provide our community’s residents the insightful reporting that Enfield, Greater Ithaca and Tompkins County so rightly deserve, yet sorely lack. / Robert Lynch]
You shouldn’t be faulted had you’d walked into the Tompkins County Legislature during its January 6 organizational meeting and didn’t know half the people casting votes. That’s because exactly 50 percent of those who represent us and sit twice monthly at that big, oval table downtown are brand new, the largest legislative freshman class in recent memory.
Due to redistricting enacted years ago, the Tompkins Legislature this term expands from 14 to 16 members. Six of those from last year’s Legislature, including 2025 Chair Dan Klein, retired. The remaining eight ran for new terms, and each won.
Whether new or returning, the newly-sworn members faced few political headwinds getting to where they got. Most incumbents ran unopposed. Another eight freshly-scrubbed faces got added to the Legislature in last November’s General Election, but rarely with opposition. Most challenges, if any, took place during scattered Democratic primaries last June.
Given the massive turnover, calling the new Legislature as green as it gets not only becomes a dead accurate assessment; it also understates the fact.
Nevertheless, while this incoming class may be inexperienced, it doesn’t lack spunk or shrink from attention. If last Tuesday’s performance represents what lies ahead, our newly-minted crop of legislators—all Democrats—will be brash, assertive, activist to the core, and not willing to sit for long on any back bench.
Take Adam Vinson, for example. He’s the one with the broccoli-style haircut. If you think he looks like a kid, you wouldn’t be far wrong. Vinson’s 22 and only graduated from Cornell last spring. Nobody ran against him in his campus-Collegetown district. Now he’s among the 16 who govern us.
And while during an interview last September. Vinson told The Cornell Daily Sun he’s passionate about the Green New Deal, his platform also called for extending the last call time for bars in Ithaca to 2 AM. “This is something that would be good for our economy, and it would be good for the student body,” Vinson told the paper. (Ignore, for the moment, that New York sets the legal drinking age at 21, and that there’s also a nasty little crime called DWI.)
True, at age 22, this story’s writer (Robert Lynch) also immersed himself in local politics. But it was merely as a lowly radio reporter covering what was then the Tompkins County Board of Representatives for WTKO, and before that, WVBR. Would I have then considered elevating myself to elective office? Not in your life. I knew I lacked the seasoning, perspective and maturity to serve as a legislator back then. Adam Vinson lacks it now. Yet no one will ever dare tell him that.
As their first order of business Tuesday, legislators elected Democrats Shawna Black as Chair and Deborah Dawson as Vice-Chair. Both have been on the Legislature for at least eight years. Black was Chair in 2022 and 2023. Dawson has played a key role in financial and Budget Committee matters during her tenure.
“You’ll notice a few changes around here,” Shawna Black remarked as she retook the gavel, taking note of the Legislature’s expanded membership and the table’s rearranged seating.
“I’d also like to acknowledge we have eight returning legislators and eight new legislators that represent a beautiful balance of fresh perspectives and experienced leadership,” Black added. “This will be a year of firsts, and I’m really excited about that.”
Dawson followed Black as she accepted second-in-command. “Of course, the Chair is the boss, and she is our outward face,” Dawson acknowledged, and then added, “I view my job this year as helping to shepherd and integrate our eight new legislators, and I’m very excited to work with each and every one of you.” Dawson continued, “I have rarely worked with a group that brought such a wealth and diversity of generational perspectives, education, and life experience, and I’m sure that our Legislature and our county will be much richer for all of that.”
Deborah Dawson would probably revile anyone’s calling her the new legislators’ “mother hen.” So let’s more discretely refer to her as the equivalent of a freshman orientation counselor at Donlon Hall.
And yes, Dawson has much work cut out for her during the months ahead. As prestigious a position as some may find their new roles to be, it’s clear that many newbies have neglected their homework.
Acronyms prove a special problem. Committee names often get abbreviated in legislative slang. “Budget, Capital and Personnel” becomes “BCP.” New arrivals were clueless that night. Greg Mezey mentioned “NYSAC.” “Hey, Greg, what is NYSAC?” someone called out from across the room. It’s the New York State Association of Counties, only the most prominent training and lobbying arm for county governments statewide. Most of our legislators attend NYSAC’s conferences twice yearly.
At the close of Tuesday’s reorganizational meeting, Chairperson Black announced the convening of a special legislative session seven days later. Its posted agenda lists the only business as a closed-door “Executive Session.” Most likely it’ll provide opportunity to acquaint the incoming crowd with all those secretive matters that never see the light of day for the rest of us. Any other purpose for an executive session would violate state law.
Shawna Black was elected legislative Chair on a 13-to-three party-line vote Tuesday. Minority Republicans nominated Lansing’s Mike Sigler and then all voted for him. Sigler now becomes the body’s senior serving member. Majority Democrats never see fit to recognize his seniority with any leadership.
If there was a moment of dramatic surprise during reorganization, it was about what never happened. Dryden Democrat Greg Mezey, last year’s legislative Vice-Chair and a rising star within the group, was never nominated for any top office. Whether Mezey had sought—but then lost—a leadership straw poll during the Democrats’ private caucus held prior to Tuesday’s meeting remains to be learned.
What others may dwell on—but I will not—is the substance of what consumed the bulk of legislator attention and provided most of the media eye candy Tuesday night. It was the community advocacy and the Legislature’s subsequent endorsement of a cautiously-worded, though transparently one-sided resolution supporting unionization by Cayuga Medical Center hospital nurses.
There was the substance, and there was also the circus. For purposes here, reporting on the circus is more instructive.
On social media, the Tompkins County Workers Center, the local living wage lobbying group, had urged all union supporters to “fill the chamber” to support the nurses. Its plea succeeded.
At meeting’s start, nursing-rights advocates packed the gallery. Attendees, we were told, spilled into the hallway, down the stairs and out to the building’s door. That said, only fifteen people provided public comment. Had everyone exercised his or her entitlement to three-minutes of speaking time, the two hour meeting would have stretched past midnight.
Advocates’ themes proved consistent; often repetitive: Cayuga Medical Center (CMC) nurses are overworked, poorly paid, and under-appreciated by hospital management. Nurses deserve the right to form a union. And CMC management has employed unfair labor practices to thwart their efforts.
After about 40 minutes of public comment—far less than the several hours some might have expected—legislators unanimously voted to support a slightly-revised pro-union draft. No one at the table considered opposing it. Essentially, it was all an exercise in labor rights messaging, words carrying no real impact beyond the point of public persuasion.
In retrospect, one suspects the political theater on display was intended not so much for the Tompkins County Legislature as for a broader audience; for the media, for the public, and for the rank-and-file nurses who will vote on union affiliation January 14 and 15. Lawmaker support was pretty much assured. The signs, the speeches, the show of force, the largest of its kind in years, if not decades, were massive overkill. But how the resolution came into being tells us much about those now feeling their oats.
On the meeting’s posted agenda, Deborah Dawson had been listed as resolution sponsor. Not so. When meeting time arrived, newcomer Iris Packman, a Cornell labor lawyer who now represents Ithaca’s East Hill, placed the measure onto the floor. She advanced it; indeed, she anointed it; and did so with an exuberant, proactive passion that shook the chamber. Packman owned the moment. She made nurse unionization not just as a goal, but as her crusade. Shawna Black later acknowledged that the eight new legislators, not Dawson, had collaborated to give the resolution life.
“Government support for unionizing is not new; it’s not a radical idea,” Packman proclaimed in a floor speech that commanded five minutes of legislative time and was greeted afterward by applause.
“We want the nurses to feel the energy that we have in this room right now; to know that the community is behind them,” Packman closed her endorsement.
Packman’s speech proved a standout moment Tuesday night. Watch Iris Packman. Her words, her projection, her body language are that of a blossoming politician. The Tompkins County Legislature may not be her last stop. Think Albany. Think Congress. Think wherever.
Yet for those of us accustomed to restraint and decorum, the January 6 organizational meeting riled our gut. It was as though when Dryden’s Mike Lane vacated legislative chambers last month, ending service that stretched back to 1993, he took gravitas along with him. This latest meeting just felt different. And for some of us, it didn’t feel right. It felt cheapened.
First off, there was the applause; so much of it. After every pro-union advocate spoke and every legislator weighed in, the room erupted. The size of the crowd only amplified the annoyance. It transformed our county government’s sedate deliberative body into the likes of your average daytime TV talk show.
At one point, Deborah Dawson admitted that clapping violates legislative rules. But no one really tried to stop it. Dawson brushed off the violation as a one-off, not to set a precedent. We’ll see. One senses that the emotion-driven, incoming 2026 freshman class finds it fun to break some china.
Yet dig deeper. Irritation draws its energy from another source. It comes in the incoming class’s celebration of “Me;” in members’ frequent self-indulgence.
“I don’t know if I’m gonna’ get weepy now as I’m all cried out… but it is just such an absolute honor to be sitting here tonight,” newly-elected Irene Weiser began her two-minute, scripted inaugural statement, choking on her words.
“And it’s an honor unlike anything I’ve known before.” Weiser continued, holding back tears. “People keep asking me, are you excited?” she said. “What I’ve been feeling isn’t excitement as much as deep respect and humility and honestly just a sense of awe at the seriousness of the responsibility we carry, and the care and thought that goes into the work, and awe at our collective commitment to serving something larger than ourselves.”
Irene Weiser, who now represents Caroline and Danby on the Legislature, has reason to be the most adroit among any who assumed their new responsibilities Tuesday. Weiser’s served on the Caroline Town Board. And when former Legislature Chair (and one-time congressional candidate) Martha Robertson served a few years back, Weiser was one of Robertson’s closest allies. Weiser knows the ropes.
In the CMC nurses debate, if you’d call it that, Iris Packman referenced her kids getting injured and needing after-hours treatment. Christy Bianconi drew upon her day job as a clinical social worker. Judith Hubbard recalled when she gave birth to a three-pound baby and learned only from nurses how to breastfeed and change an under-sized infant’s diaper. At times the meeting begged for Oprah.
Tompkins County lawmakers have long pulled themselves to messaging resolutions like a magnet, taking stands on such issues like the minimum wage and single-payer health care. If anything, the newly-sworn half of the incoming Legislature may gravitate to messaging even more.
“I felt the pulse of democracy coming back,” Irene Weiser stated as she paid respect to the scores of placard-carrying labor activists crowded into the chamber to plead the nurses’ case. “I felt our opportunity to take this country back from the oligarchy and corporatism that is ruining our lives for the sake of profit.”
Given words like Weiser’s, expect the Legislature’s liberal-powered arm to reach ever-farther, well beyond such comparatively mundane, everyday responsibilities as whether to build a Center of Government, remodel a jail, or replace the Podunk Road bridge.
One who observed the real-time video stream of Tuesday night’s meeting “struggled” watching and pledged afterward never again to watch a Legislature meeting. The over-the-top self-centeredness and cheapened theatrics became too much to take.
All during the nearly 90 minutes of public supplication and member posturing meeting night, Newfield-Enfield’s Randy Brown sat silent as talk about the nurses went on and on… and on. Brown voted in favor of the resolution, but he saved his observations about the evening until two nights’ later when he addressed the Newfield Town Board.
Brown’s assessment to Newfield: “What a waste of time.”
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Cloudy conclusions flow from Enfield Water Survey
Fewer than 25% “very interested” in public water; 45% very opposed
“I’m pretty sure at this point we’ve decided that we’re not looking into this any further because clearly it’s not affordable.”
Enfield Supervisor Stephanie Redmond, on prospects for municipal water, Sept. 17, 2025
by Robert Lynch; January 4, 2026
If those who conducted a limited-reach survey of Enfield residents last year were looking for public consensus toward building a municipal water or sewer system within the town, they didn’t find it.
True the sample size was tiny; small enough to make a statistician wince. That said, only 24.7 percent of respondents to a Town-authorized, geographically-targeted survey last summer in Enfield said they’d be “very interested” in changing to a municipal drinking water supply. Another 15.1 percent said they’d be “somewhat interested.” By contrast, a full 45.2 percent said they were “very disinterested” in making the change. An additional nearly ten percent said they were “somewhat disinterested.” That’s more than half the respondents turning thumbs-down.
“Opinions on municipal services are somewhat polarized,” former Town Board member Becky Sims, now New York State Manager of the water consulting group RCAP Solutions, advised the Town Board, at its special meeting September 17th. The consultant clearly stated the obvious.. Sims’ presentation got eclipsed that night by budget talks covering matters ranging from new tractors to health insurance rates to an administrative aide requested by the highway superintendent. Sims’ data got lost in the clutter.
And for months afterward, just about everything else in Enfield politics seemed more important to chronicle than the prospects for a town water district that’ll likely never happen. Still, before we launch headlong into the business of 2026, best we discuss the water survey’s findings and do it now.
By design, the Enfield Water Protection Committee, a semi-public advisory group with no real power, identified five sections of the town where it inferred public water was most in demand and concluded a municipal system was most affordable to build. The Town Board then commissioned Sims’ consultancy study. The only out-of-pocket cost, Board members were told, was the postage.
Any Enfield household stood eligible to participate. Prompts were posted on the Town website and paper copies were available at the Town Hall. But a select 368—and only 368—households were also mailed postcards alerting them of the survey’s existence. Ninety-three (93) responses came back during the survey period that ran in July and August. That’s a 25 percent response rate. “I would say it’s pretty great given the methods of outreach and the way that the survey was conducted,” Sims told the Town Board.
Yet the U.S. Census reports as many as 1,293 households exist in Enfield. So most people never got notified by mail. Fewer than three in ten of us received the cards.
The survey asked more than a score of questions. They dealt with homeowner water quality and quantity, resident interest in municipal water and/or sewer service, and the degree to which residents would be willing to pay for those services.
More than nine in ten respondents said their primary water supply comes from a drilled well. Five in six said their well never runs dry, even during droughts. Yet 65 of the 93 respondents (70%) reported hard water problems. Over 35 percent indicated orange or red staining. Twenty-eight percent said their water has sulfur.
“Water quality problems and treatment for those problems are widespread throughout this community,” Sims concluded. “Two-thirds of people report having at least one treatment system in place even if they’re not drinking the water,” the consultant stated. Forty-four percent of respondents say they drink their tap water untreated, but another 24 percent purchase their drinking water. (30% drink their own water, but treat it first.)
Nevertheless, while many in Enfield may agree their well water stands less than perfect, tapping into some future municipal system, and more importantly, paying for the privilege to do so, remains a reach too far for many.
Forty-two of 92 respondents (45.2%) said they’d be “unwilling” to pay anything to tap into a municipal water line, a number closely in parallel with the percentage opposed to municipal water in any instance. Another five percent said they were “unable to pay.” Thirty-three percent said they’d be willing to spend only less than $500 per year. Just 15 percent were willing to pay a greater amount.
“Willingness to pay is limited,” Sims conceded, “and I think that presents a real challenge for the Town if you were to want to pursue the development of a new water service area in earnest,” she said. “I think you’d be hard-pressed to get a new system built.”
Sims said that if more potential customers were willing to pay $500 to $1,000 per year for water—the survey said only 8.6% would do that—“I think your chances would be better.”
Sims speculated that had more people responded to the survey, the willing-to-pay percentages could have improved. Councilperson Jude Lemke also pointed out a potential survey flaw: If given a range of choices, people are apt to choose the lower-cost option.
But Enfield’s top elected leader has already made up her mind; resolved that given the results, any thought of setting up an Enfield water district now or in the near future has become a non-starter.
“I’m pretty sure at this point we’ve decided that we’re not looking into this any further because clearly it’s not affordable,” Redmond told a questioner from the meeting room’s gallery that night, the Supervisor, again—as she has the (unfortunate) tendency to do—imparting her own opinion and also assigning it to her four Board colleagues. “I think that was the point of the survey,” Redmond continued, “to see if it was going to be something that people really wanted and we should look into it farther, but clearly not only is there maybe not enough interest in it, but there’s not enough interest in paying for it.”
“That’s the value in doing these surveys,” Sims played off of Redmond’s conclusion. The alternative, Sims said, would be for Enfield to invest $30-50,000 on an engineering study; more technical, perhaps, yet still money wasted if a water district is something that neither the public nor the Town Board wants.
“For the Town being the size that it is, I’m not seeing that,” Sims weighed the prospect of advancing to an engineering probe.
But the reliability of a 93-respondent survey holds only the value of its underlying methodology. The Water Committee confined postcard distribution to just five Enfield roadways, most notably to Enfield Main Road (NY 327) from Route 79 south to the current Highway Garage, running through the heart of Enfield Center. Hayts Road (from Sheffield to Halseyville Road) was also carded. A large, eastern and central stretch of Route 79 was polled, as was at least a block of Van Dorn Road South.
“We can’t cover every house in Enfield,” Redmond stated, explaining why neither the entire town could be considered for water service or not every household polled. “So we targeted spots,” the Supervisor explained, where if a water district were built it would be “most likely to be built.”
That said, well-populated—and water-needy—Enfield neighborhoods remained inexplicably excluded.
“When I first looked at this map, what struck me most pronounced was there wasn’t a single response from Iradell Road,” this writer, Councilperson Robert Lynch, told Sims and fellow Board members, “and that’s in the shadow of the big blue tank,” reference made to the standpipe at Iradell and Van Dorn Roads. The standpipe is used by Ulysses to hold water it purchases from the intermunicipal Bolton Point system. Ulysses says the tank holds excess capacity that Enfield could access, should it build a pump house there.
True, Iradell is a town line road demarking Enfield from Ulysses. But Ulysses’ Supervisor has said that multi-town water districts can be created. Still, Enfield residents living along Iradell were never asked.
Moreover, long stretches is Halseyville Road were similarly ignored, leading to a minimal response.
“The water up there is downright terrible,” this Councilperson informed the Town Board. Shale rock limits well output there, the taste is bad, and wells run dry. Halseyville also borders the 33-lot Breezy Meadows subdivision. Breezy Meadows remains largely unbuilt, yet it’s destined for development—and the need for plentiful water—in the years ahead.
“People are concerned that their wells will run dry there when Breezy Meadows gets fully developed,” the Councilperson conveyed their worries. As for Halseyville Road, “I wish it had been surveyed. Too late now, but you might have gotten some responses up there.”
The relative demand for municipal water becomes “a self-fulfilling prophesy,” the argument held. And it does so when only select portions of the town receive postcards. “If people were not aware of it… they might not have known the survey was going to be taking place,” this Councilperson posited.
“Those are irrelevant to the survey,” Redmond countered as to the excluded neighborhoods, “because we were not considering putting any municipal water in their area because we can’t afford to,” she said.
Redmond’s argument may hold for sparsely-populated places such as uphill from Enfield Center. But what about Iradell and Halseyville Roads? What excluded them apart from arbitrariness?
Most discussion to date involving municipal water in Enfield has focused on drilling wells into the plentiful aquifer somewhere near Enfield Center. But a virgin water source like that would require a treatment plant and the staff to run it. An alternative would be to purchase already-treated Bolton Point water and then extend pipes down Iradell and/or Hayts Roads to Enfield Center, tapping Van Dorn, Rt. 79, Applegate and Halseyville Roads along the way. The idea earns nary a mention. Perhaps it should.
While the RCAP Solutions study focused mostly on water service, it also asked about municipal sewers. Sewage treatment would become a far heavier lift for a community Enfield’s size. Resident response about sewers paralleled that for water. Slightly more than one in five respondents expressed great interest in public sewers. Forty-three percent were very disinterested.
“Did anything surprise you,” a Board member asked Becky Sims as her 35-minute presentation wound to a close.
“I actually was a little bit surprised how many people were potentially interested in service,” the consultant responded, referring to the near 40 percent supportive of public water.
But it’s still a minority viewpoint. And perhaps more importantly, only a much-smaller minority would be willing to pay as much as it would likely cost to get public water to their homes. The polling showed that a quarter of Enfield residents buy the water they drink. Given survey results and the political lay of the land, expect that 25 percent to keep schlepping their water bottles for some time to come.
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Posted Previously:
Never (Should) Say Goodbye
County legislators depart at time of transition
Reporting and analysis by Robert Lynch; December 23, 2025
Mike Lane was first elected to the Tompkins County Legislature in 1993. Aside from four years when a Republican briefly represented his eastern Dryden district, Democrat Lane has been a legislative fixture ever since. Come January, Mike Lane will be gone. He’s retiring to make way for someone new.
“There’s so much institutional knowledge that’s going to be walking out of the door,” Shawna Black, a continuing legislator and former Legislature Chair, remarked December 16 as Mike Lane and five colleagues, all Democrats, convened for the final legislative meeting of their careers. None was voted out of office. Each is leaving voluntarily. But their departures will leave their mark. For better or for worse, next year’s County Legislature will look, sound, and feel far different from the one we’ve come to know.
Next year the Tompkins County Legislature will expand from 14 to 16 members. With six departures and two new additions, exactly half of those newly-convening in January to govern us will be freshmen. Moreover, most of those eight new arrivals are political novices, inexperienced in elective service at the local government level.
Experience lost will come with the retirements of Mike Lane (28 years), Dan Klein (12 years), Rich John (10 years), and Anne Koreman and Amanda Champion (each 8 years). The sixth retirement, rather unique, is that of the Ithaca City’s Dan Nolan, elected this past June to fill out an unexpired term, but who did not file to run this fall in a redrawn district.
Decennial redistricting, first imposed with this newest election cycle, played a small role in the incumbent departures. For example, new district lines would have thrown two Ithaca City incumbents, Rich John and Veronica Pillar, into a Democratic primary. Rich John bowed out early, leaving the field open for Pillar to win reelection unopposed.
But most others, including Enfield-Ulysses legislator Anne Koreman, gave no particular reason for their decisions to exit. There’s no imminent catastrophe that would prompt any of them to hightail it from governmental service, to terminate their twice-monthly attendance in meeting chambers on the edge of DeWitt Park. Financially, Tompkins County remains sound. Controversies, like the (now) $64 Million Center of Government project, loom large, of course. But over the years issues like that have always arisen.
What appears more likely is that many of those leaving are simply tired. “You know when it’s time,” Mike Lane, who continues a family law practice in Dryden into his mid-70’s, quietly told a confidante before he announced his planned departure last February. When he publicly disclosed his plans, Lane told fellow legislators much the same thing.
At this more recent legislative meeting, the Dryden incumbent’s colleagues—and the broader community—gave Mike Lane quite a sendoff. State Assemblymember Anna Kelles attended and presented Lane a giant plaque on which was written a proclamation commending Lane for his decades in government, not only on the Legislature, but before that as Dryden Village Trustee and Village Mayor.
“From me to you, I deeply appreciate you, your 44 years you’ve given to all of us in service,” Kelles, a former Tompkins legislator herself, commended Lane. “When I was on the County Legislature, we didn’t always agree on things,” Kelles conceded, “Where we did, we were allies; where we didn’t, we were respectful,” she continued. “And you can’t ask for anything else.”
When Anna Kelles and Mike Lane, both Democrats, served at the same table a half-decade ago, Kelles was the more progressive lawmaker, Lane the more moderate.
“We have to represent everybody,” Lane counseled fellow lawmakers near the close of the December 16 meeting, taking his turn to speak as Chairman Dan Klein—himself retiring—offered each member, whether departing or continuing, an opportunity for final thoughts.
“We have to represent the folks in business, the folks in labor, the folks that are rich, the folks that have no money, they maybe have no house to live in,” Lane advised legislators, both present and future. “We have to represent the people we don’t agree with politically, and we don’t turn our back on any of them,” he went on. “We have to do what we can for them when we encounter those needs. Sometimes we can’t do anything. Sometimes we can.”
At the Legislature’s organizational meeting January 6, Democrat Dan Wakeman will take over as Mike Lane’s District 10 successor.
But the winds are changing. Observers keen enough to raise their political fingers into the air near the Gov. Daniel D. Tompkins Building, the 19th Century landmark where the Legislature meets, will realize it. All the new legislators are Democrats. Republicans, all incumbents, will still hold just three seats. And as the Legislature will expand by two, the GOP members will find themselves even more outnumbered.
And one can also foresee the incoming Democrats providing the Legislature a slightly more progressive tilt. Already five of 14 current legislators decline to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. One can easily imagine an incoming majority following the earlier lead of Ithaca’s Common Council and the Enfield Town Board and purge the pledge from the regular meeting order entirely.
The principal advantage Republicans will hold next year lies in experience. Newfield-Enfield legislator Randy Brown, Lansing’s Mike Sigler, and Groton’s Lee Shurtleff, comprise three of the new Legislature’s eight continuing incumbents. They may find a way to shepherd those eight newly-arriving lawmakers into the ways of Tompkins County Government and educate them to their own points of view.
Change in Tompkins County’s governance comes in a different way as well.
During the past decade, the role of County Administration has risen in prominence, perhaps in large part due to the presence of two men; former County Administrator Jason Molino (2018-2021), who steered Tompkins County through the COVID-19 crisis with what was viewed as a “more regimented, by-the-book management style;” and now Korsah Akumfi, who took over as County Administrator this past January and has since driven legislators with resolve rivaling that of an elected county executive toward their building a Downtown Center of Government.
Whatever course the newly-installed Tompkins County Legislature may take in 2026 and in the years beyond, a key dynamic to watch will be the interplay between an increasingly powerful County Administration and a Legislature which has—at least, traditionally—preferred to have the final say.
But December 16 was a night when incumbent departures, not future power struggles, held sway.
Lansing’s Deborah Dawson almost cried as she lauded the accomplishments of Ulysses’ Anne Koreman, who sat across the big, oval table from her, and then as she hugged the Ithaca Town’s Amanda Champion, sitting beside Dawson. Both Koreman and Champion are leaving. Dawson, herself, almost retired this year as well, only to change her plans. Dawson ran and won this fall as a write-in.
“To the members of my cohort: Annie, you’re the heart; I’m going to miss you,” Dawson praised Koreman, tears welling up. “And you, too,” Dawson reached over and embraced Champion.
That term “cohort,” carries meaning here. It dates back to 2017, when Dawson, Koreman, Champion, Shawna Black and the late Henry Granison ran for and entered the Legislature together. They forged a political and emotional bond, doing so as like-minded liberals. If the Tompkins County Legislature ever had a “caucus” that burrowed inside mere partisan affiliation, theirs was it. During these past four years, the now foursome, one might say, comprised sort of a “sophomore class.”
Praise for Anne Koreman came from other places that December night, including from Veronica Pillar, elected in 2021, but who now usually allies with Koreman, sitting beside her.
“I’m going to miss you all, and that’s a bummer,” Pillar said of the six who convened with her for the last time that night.
And to Anne Koreman, Pillar said, “Annie’s like my big sister. Now I’m going to cry.” Pillar composed herself and continued. “Thank you for everything; for supporting me when I’ve been crying, because sometimes the job is hard, but you’ve taught me a lot, up, down, and sideways.”
Then even Koreman’s pet calico cat earned credit. “And sometimes you brought Princess Buttercup in, and that also makes everything better,” Pillar commended the retiring lawmaker.
Anne Koreman put her departure message this way:
“This experience has been for me one of the hardest, one of the least paid—and I’ve done blue-collar work—but one of the most rewarding things that I’ve ever done,” Koreman reflected on her eight years of service.
Koreman commended fellow legislators, the clerks, the department heads, the county employees, and the late legislator Granison.
“We did this together,” Koreman told them all. “We always haven’t been perfect, and I apologize for my mistakes, hindsight is 20/20; but I hope people know that everybody here, including all our department heads, employees, everybody does the best they can every day for the community, and I hope that people in the community hear this and know that we are doing the best we can,” she said.
The Legislature’s Chairman spoke too.
“It’s been an amazing experience,” Dan Klein stated, as he stood at the podium, presiding over his final meeting. “Mostly, I just feel grateful,” Klein read from prepared remarks. “I’m grateful to my constituents, who entrusted me to be a shepherd of the public good for a little while, and to the people who have given me positive feedback.”
Dan Klein credited fellow legislators, whom he described as “smart, dedicated people who take their jobs seriously.” Klein likewise praised those others who labor for a Tompkins County paycheck. “The employees are the Tompkins County Government,” Klein assigned gratitude, “and Tompkins County Government rocks.”
“As colleagues, we disagree,” Rich John acknowledged, the long-time chair of the Legislature’s Public Safety Committee, taking his final turn as he ended a decade of service. “We’re a decision-making machine. That’s how we’re set up,” John observed.
“We’re supposed to bring a lot of different perspectives to the table, and we do, and we often disagree with each other and that’s the way it’s designed,” the adjunct law professor, took note. “It’s really frustrating at times, but that’s the democratic process that makes Tompkins County work.”
Not all, but most legislators, both those departing and those remaining, reflected on their past four years in office during the December 16 meeting’s final 40 minutes. Some focused on the future; others the past. Mike Lane, the leader with the longest legacy, struck a balance somewhere in-between.
“You think of this Legislature as an hourglass,” Lane reflected. “It has the sand of the beginning, of the four years, in the top. And slowly the grains of sand fall through to the bottom.”
“Those grains of sand are the work we do,” Lane analogized, “the projects that we take on, the discussions we have, and at the bottom the little mound grows higher.” Lane’s comparison continued, “Well, tonight, we’re down to that very last grain of sand about to fall through the neck of the hourglass to the bottom.”
“But don’t fear,” the retiring Dean of the Legislature concluded. “Even though this four years is up, the new legislators will turn the hourglass over, and the sand will start to fall again,” Lane predicted.
A cynic might suggest the symbolism’s weakness: Do successive legislatures do the same things over and over again without progress? But that was not Mike Lane’s intent.
When Anne Koreman exits the Legislature within days, Ulysses’ Rachel Ostlund will take over her role. Enfield’s other legislator, Randy Brown, plans to stay on for one more term.
“This is the best legislature I’ve ever served on,” Brown quipped. (He’s never served on any other.) Then, getting serious, Brown said of his service, “This is one of the highlights of my life.”
“These are really hard jobs,” Anne Koreman closed out her final statement and her near-decade in public office. “We feel a lot of the issues in the community, and we’re trying to do things that are trying to make things a little better for people and more fair and lift people up.”
“So thank you for giving me this privilege,” Koreman concluded. “It’s been an honor, and I’ll see ‘ya.”
Turn the hourglass.
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