Recovery Fund takes a haircut, closes quietly

Deadline-driven, legislators repurpose CMC’s biggest award

Reporting and analysis by Robert Lynch; May 7, 2026

It was a product of the pandemic.  And just as the pandemic has ended, so, too, has it.  Don’t expect a party.

Fueled by millions of dollars in federal COVID relief money, Tompkins County’s Community Recovery Fund drew to an unassuming close late last month.  It did so as lawmakers repurposed the last of its set-aside cash on a laundry list of unglamorous bureaucratic necessities.  Leaders buried the decision as best they could.

One meeting later, I marked the moment.

“On April 21, two weeks ago, the Community Recovery Fund effectively ended,” this Enfield Councilperson, Robert Lynch, reminded the Tompkins County Legislature as it met this past Tuesday, May 5.  “It did when this Legislature redirected more than $1.6 Million in unspent American Rescue Plan (ARPA) funds from Community Recovery Fund grants and instead repurposed them for such mundane things as buying Microsoft 365 subscriptions.”

“Why?” I asked.  “Mostly because despite all its wealth and political clout, Cayuga Medical Center could not drag its Crisis Stabilization Center project over the finish line.  Its inability to do so simply baffles me.”

As it stands now, the Tompkins County Community Recovery Fund has spent barely $5 Million of its original sum toward its originally intended purpose.  And that purpose was to assist nonprofit agencies, local governments, and struggling small businesses hard-hit during this decade’s early years by COVID-induced shutdowns.

This year’s late-April decision marked “the turning of a page,” I advised the Legislature.  “There was no fanfare.  Few may have noticed,” I said. “But we in Enfield did.”

Enfield remembers the Community Recovery Fund because our town’s government and the agencies we support got little benefit from it.  

The Community Recovery Fund started with seven million dollars.  County government’s own budget needs quickly pared that total to just over $6.5 Million.  But of that amount, the only money that came to Enfield was $26,592 to buy some replacement two-way radios for the Highway Department. 

$26,592 is just four-tenths of one percent of the $6,513,893 the Recovery Fund had set aside for its late-2022 and subsequently revised funding awards.  Perhaps a little something is better than nothing at all.

Truth told, the highway radio money was a last-minute add-on, an allocation not originally recommended.  Former County legislator Susan Currey gets the credit for providing Enfield at least a morsel of nourishment.

The federal government’s American Rescue Plan (ARPA) awarded Tompkins County nearly than $19.9 Million in 2021.  Washington’s relief supposedly was to compensate Tompkins County for revenues lost during the pandemic, fiscal shortfalls that never really occurred.

The late-April reassignment of money became necessary because ARPA rules specify that any appropriated moneys not actually spent by the end of this year get clawed back to Washington.

Back five years ago, County leaders first floated the idea of shoveling ARPA’s money into “cash for capital.” It would have earmarked Washington’s entire windfall toward major building projects.  The idea didn’t please the public.  Many preferred investing in hard-pressed agencies and people.

In September of that year, the Community Recovery Fund was born.  It started on wobbly feet.

Initially, an assigned trio of lawmakers proposed a more ambitious, $15 Million, three-year funding scheme.  But their money pot soon shrunk to $7 Million, and lawmakers jettisoned the multi-year concept. 

Although Recovery Fund awards were initially to have come from County Government’s own savings, not from ARPA, legislators later reversed course upon learning that ARPA rules accorded them far greater flexibility in gifting public money to non-governmental recipients.

A consultant was hired.  Invitations went out.  And requests for support came in by the bushel.

As of an October 2022 deadline, as many as 231 non-profit organizations, qualifying individuals and local governments had applied for program support.  Of those, 23 filed for the highest funding category, each seeking over $250,000 apiece. 

Among those 23 was Enfield Food Distribution, which sought up to $1.6 Million to build a new food pantry.  Among applications less expensive was that of the Enfield Community Council (ECC).  The agency asked for $206,000 to build a “Mental Health and Community Services Wing” onto its community center.

The aggregate $34 Million in requests overwhelmed the Recovery Fund’s resources.  Requests stood at more than five times the amount of grant money available.

An exhaustive, consultant-aided, yet legislator-driven triage began.  Some would later fault the process as being arbitrary and unfair.  A select panel of six legislators scoured (and scored) each application.  Within minutes during marathon meetings, members rated every request.  Individually and collectively, those six lawmakers wielded tremendous power.  Unanimous support by all six almost always assured a grant’s award.  A three-three tie (or something less) eliminated an applicant from contention.

The Enfield Food Pantry fell from favor early on. (It garnered only two votes out of six.)  The Enfield Volunteer Fire Company’s low six-figure request to build a volunteer bunk room, died in a three-three tie.  The Enfield Community Council’s appeal squeaked past first-round review (four-to-two), only to tumble out of contention later on after the money supply ran out.

Bangs got a new, $150,000 ambulance from the fund.  And for a brief while, Second Wind Cottages stood in line for money to grow its Newfield encampment of tiny homes for the formerly unhoused.  But Second Wind later forfeited its $510,000 after community objections became too burdensome to bear.

Yet by far, the biggest winner from the start was Cayuga Medical Center (CMC).  Its award was the largest of all.  CMC had requested $1.5 Million to build an Intensive Crisis Stabilization Center to treat substance abusers and the mentally ill.  The hospital first planned to quarter its center in the Shops at Ithaca Mall.  But it later switched to a stand-alone building on North Triphammer Road, one that the Alcohol and Drug Council had vacated after it folded operations.

Even though some would view CMC’s application as shaky, the hospital corporation’s request won every round of Recovery Fund review.  It gained support from five out of six on the review committee.  It then won final approval when the full Legislature made its decisions in late-December 2022.  Only Enfield-Newfield legislator Randy Brown opposed the hospital’s seven-figure grant.

“I’m not against the project,” legislator Brown stressed to Enfield leaders in his monthly report prior to the December vote.  It’s just that the one request would eat up 23 percent of the fund, he said.  “Cayuga Medical has over $130 Million in cash and investments as of January 1, 2023 and is contributing very little to the project,” Brown asserted.

As it came to pass, CMC’s most ambitious of all applications never got its money. 

Cayuga Medical needed two more things to move its project forward; a New York State license and clear title to the use of its building.  It could gain neither.  And it would have needed them by year’s end.

Along the way, some in Enfield became none too pleased that the hospital took so much time, ate up so much of the Recovery Fund’s cash, yet had so little to show for it.  .

“This makes me so angry,” one prominent Enfield resident wrote on social media last month upon learning that administrators had to repurpose the award.  “Some of that money could have accomplished tremendous things for the county’s towns and villages,” she wrote.  “Instead, the county gave extension after extension for a plan that was dead in the water from almost the beginning.”

“Tompkins County’s entire process to allocate the six million that they disbursed was laughable,” another Enfield resident, a former legislator, said, “and in the end (it) didn’t end up disbursing the money to many that could have used it legitimately.”

Yes, CMC’s inability to see its project to the finish line troubles many, including a few of the leaders who doled the money out. 

Quite rightly, intensive crisis stabilization locally would serve a purpose, a valuable one.  Local legislators wholeheartedly endorse it.  Yet year after year the hospital hit insurmountable roadblocks.  And CMC officials often danced around the edges as to the reasons why.

“I wish I had a better update for you,” CMC Assistant Vice President Frank Kruppa prefaced his remarks to a County Legislature committee last November 19. ”We are still efforting to get the Withdrawal Stabilization and Intensive Stabilization Center operational, but are having challenges related to the ownership of the building,” he admitted.

For 20 minutes that November day, Kruppa, Tompkins County’s former Health Commissioner, hired away last year by CMC to guide the Stabilization Center down the home stretch, attempted to explain to the Health and Human Services Committee why approvals had taken so long and still hadn’t arrived.   His roundabout journey never persuaded attendees convincingly.   

Two state agencies, the Department of Health and the Office of Addiction Services and Supports (OASAS) must license the center.  But there’s a tangle.

The Alcohol and Drug Council still owns the North Triphammer Road building, Kruppa advised the committee.  The Department of Health bonded the Drug Council’s purchase and renovations.  But the Drug Council now exists only on paper at best.  And until someone can figure out how to move a defunct agency to grant consent, state licensure cannot proceed.

That said, what may have troubled legislators the most was what Kruppa said next:

“When the opportunity comes where we do have approvals from the state to move forward, with the ever-changing health care environment as it is, the health system has to evaluate every new program almost in every moment when there’s decisions to be made about moving forward,” Kruppa admitted.

“I think we have to have a conversation about Plan B for us,” legislator Shawna Black, now Legislature Chair, reacted to the hospital rep’s tenuous commitment.  “Because if you’re saying that Cayuga Health Partners is questioning if they’re going to pursue this, that also gives me pause.”

Frank Kruppa then denied that CMC was contemplating backing out. “There’s just a lot of moving pieces, much of which are out of our control,” for former health commissioner admitted.

“So it was a lot of money, and you all have known for some time that there was some issues, and there was no sharing of that information with us,” committee chair Travis Brooks reminded the CMC administrator that day.  “So that’s disappointing to say the least.”

Now, nearly six months after the committee heard Kruppa’s unpredictable forecast, there’s still no known movement on either building title or state licensure.

And no, there is also no “Plan B.”  In recent weeks, County Administration staff has made clear that at this late stage in the ARPA funding cycle, forfeited dollars cannot redirect themselves to new projects.  Only agencies contracted before the end of 2024 qualify for extra support, and then only with difficulty.

One would think that given the high-powered attorneys Cayuga Health retains and the hospital’s high profile, mountains could be moved in Albany.  But maybe those mountains resist movement.  Perhaps state regulators really don’t like crisis stabilization centers all that much.

Tellingly, during another, little-publicized committee session, back in September 2023, former Cayuga Health CEO Martin Stallone admitted that regulators had rejected CMC’s initial proposals for crisis stabilization.  Stallone advanced that what they only may accept was the equivalent of  “a full-blown psychiatric emergency room.”

“To be clear, it’s not Crisis Stabilization,” Stallone then said of the revised option advanced to the state. “It’s a level above that.”

Again, if mountains could be moved, one would think someone could move them.  The mountains don’t budge.

Hope springs eternal.  Local legislators of both parties have offered assurances in recent weeks that once CMC casts obstacles aside, the County Legislature would likely re-appropriate from its own treasury the $1.5 Million the hospital corporation needs.  It’s a source not impeded by ARPA deadlines.  Never stated was how this alternate path would bypass that pesky state prohibition against gifting money to those outside of one’s own government.

“This legislature… has been committed to that project and we all realize the need for that in our community,” Shawna Black insisted April 21.  Of crisis stabilization, she said, “That’s really the one missing piece—we actually have many missing pieces—but that’s one of the big ones.”

“Voting on the mental health stabilization unit… was one of the prouder votes I’ve had actually in this Legislature,” Republican Mike Sigler stated two weeks later, Sigler responding to this Enfield Councilperson’s critical assessment, “because I felt that that money actually addressed something that COVID exposed, and that’s what that money (ARPA money) was for,” Sigler explained.

“So I just take pause when people say that Cayuga Medical couldn’t get its act together or things along those lines,” Sigler added.  “This project’s not dead.  They are still working on it.”

“Enfield had shovel-ready projects that could have spent this money on time,” this Councilperson, Lynch, advised legislators last Tuesday.  The Community Council’s mental health wing stands first among them.  “It would have cost a fraction of what CMC planned to spend,” I stated.

And yes, it would have been finished on time, no Albany approvals required. 

At an ECC Board of Directors meeting in late-March, speaking before learning that the ARPA money couldn’t be repurposed for her agency, Community Council President Cortney Bailey was already laying plans for demolishing the dilapidated modular annex that stands on the new wing’s site, and recruiting volunteers to construct the mental health wing “like a good, old-fashioned barn raising.”

But the ARPA money’s now been spent on other things.  The Community Recovery Fund’s doors are closed.  That said, Bailey remains resilient.

“We will get there one way or another,” Bailey assured her board one month later, on April 23.  “It might take us a while.  But we will do it.  We will make it happen.”

And if gifting rules can be bypassed to help Cayuga Heath, why can’t a similar work-around also provide the Community Council money it needs?  There’s been no immediate answer.

“Legislature, please helped the ECC and help Enfield,” this Councilperson closed his statement that night.

All of us move on from here.

###

Eversley Bradwell to retire from ICSD Board

Former member Jill Tripp to seek return in 4-way race for 3 Board seats

by Robert Lynch; May 2, 2026

The Ithaca Board of Education’s longest-tenured member, its current president, 17-year incumbent Sean Eversley Bradwell, will not seek another term in this month’s election, Ithaca City School District (ICSD) officials revealed on the district’s website late this week.

The district’s listing, posted after the mandated April 29 ICSD candidate filing deadline, also disclosed that former Board of Education member Jill Tripp, defeated for reelection in last year’s voting, has returned as a candidate this year  to seek a new, three-year term.

Incumbent Board members Garrick Blalock and Madeline Cardona will also seek reelection in the May 19 contest.  One newcomer, Sara Garner, has also petitioned for the Board, making this year’s a four-way race for three Board seats.

Tripp’s return stands notable as many have seen her as a taxpayer-friendly voice seated among colleagues viewed by some as far more liberal.

To some, Board President Eversley Bradwell’s planned retirement from school board service comes as little surprise.  During several meetings this school year, the Board President has hinted of his potential departure from the nine-person body.  Yet he’s never stated those plans outright. 

Eversley Bradwell’s exit at the end of his current term June 30 sets the stage for a leadership contest this summer.  Based on the outcome of this month’s voting, several persons, including Blalock and Tripp, stand as the incumbent’s potential successors.

Adam Krantweiss and Emily Workman,, two moderate-leaning Ithaca school board members, could also compete for the president’s position.  Krantweiss’ and Workman’s seats on the Board of Education do not expire until 2027.

The latest ICSD candidate announcement provided only brief resumes of the four declared candidates.  It allowed no opportunity for departing members—in this instance, Eversley Bradwell—to state reasons for declining a new term.  To the best of knowledge, Eversley Bradwell has not issued any such statement to date.

“We are fortunate on this board to have the leadership of Dr. Bradwell, who has an encyclopedia knowledge of school policy,” Garrick Blalock praised the incumbent president last July 8 as he, Blalock, successfully sought elevation to become Board Vice President.

Of Eversley Bradwell, Blalock said, “I’m told he will not serve as president forever.  There will be an end,” Blalock predicted.  “I don’t know when that will be.  But before that date comes, I would like to avail myself of his expertise and work with him and absorb the knowledge that he has accumulated over the years and basically learn from him.”

Garrick Blalock’s words that day provided perhaps the most telling prediction that Eversley Bradwell was on his way out.  At several meetings hence, the board president has only vaguely alluded to an intended departure.

Dr. Sean Eversley Bradwell, an assistant professor of Education at Ithaca College, was first elected to the Ithaca Board of Education in 2009.  He was elected Board President in July 2022, and then reelected by board colleagues to continue as president in each of the three succeeding years.  Only once did he face opposition to preside.

In the traumatic year of 2024, when voters rejected a first-proposed school budget by a seven-to-three margin and also ousted two long-time board incumbents, Eversley Bradwell faced a leadership challenge from Jill Tripp, perceived as a more frugal centrist.  After divided votes on the first two ballots during the Board’s July reorganization meeting, Eversley Bradwell eventually prevailed and went on to serve a third term as board president.

Most recently, Eversley Bradwell earned his fourth, and now final, term as president last July.  He won that year without opposition.

Jill Tripp, if elected May 19, would return to the school board after only a one-year absence.

“I’ve been watching and listening closely for two years,” Tripp stated when she competed unsuccessfully for school board president against Eversley Bradwell in 2024, “and I feel like all too often, lately every week the Board finds out about important decisions that have been made that we weren’t informed of.  This is a real concern to me,” she said.

“This is the Board of Education.  This isn’t some satellite advisory board of a special interest.  It is the Board of Education,” Tripp stated at the time.

During her three years of service, Tripp may most famously be remembered for her attempting to squeeze a major increase in financial contributions from Cornell University toward school operations.

First elected in 2022, Jill Tripp earned the support of many taxpayers and fiscal conservatives.   Yet in last year’s reelection campaign, she failed to win the influential endorsement of the Ithaca Teachers’ Association (ITA), support crucial especially in lower-turnout elections like that in 2025.

In a seven-way race for four open positions, Tripp fell to fifth place, losing to Madeline Cardona by 113 votes (2,238 votes to Cardona’s 2,351).  Cardona, like other winners in last year’s contest, had secured the Teachers’ Association’s endorsement.

Madeline Cardona’s victory allowed her only to fill out the final year of a vacant position, requiring her to run again this year to remain on the school board.

The Ithaca Teachers Association has yet to announce its endorsements in this year’s ICSD elections.

Of any incumbent, Garrick Blalock has perhaps worked the hardest this past year to groom himself for presidential succession.  Blalock, an Associate Professor of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell, has served on the Ithaca Board of Education since 2023.   He’s chaired the Finance Committee since 2024 and the combined Facilities and Finance Committee this past year.

Those two committee assignments have accorded Blalock prominence in shepherding both annual district budgets and this year’s proposed $43.9 Million Capital Project Referendum.  That capital referendum is also on the May 19 ICSD ballot.

In 2024, Blalock vied with Adam Krantweiss for Board Vice President.  As was the case of the election for president that July, Blalock tied with Krantweiss in successive board votes as he sought to become second-in-line.  Impasse ended when on the third attempt Blalock conceded and switched his vote to Krantweiss.

This past July, under revised procedures that allowed secret ballots, Blalock secured the Vice Presidency, five votes to four, beating Emily Workman.

Madeline Cardona, now seeking her first, full board term, is a native of Puerto Rico and serves as the board’s only Latina representative.  A Tompkins County resident since 2019, Cardona is the mother of two teenagers who attend Ithaca High School.  Her candidate profile lists her employment as that of an Uber driver, a job she says which allows her flexibility to raise her family.

Cardona’s candidate profile states, “Madeline is committed to teaching her children the importance of self-advocacy and empathy, believing that strong communities are built through shared responsibility, accountability, and support.”  Cardona also credits her Puerto Rican roots for instilling within her “values like collective responsibility, integrity, and mutual support.”

Cardona has attended most Board of Education meetings during her past year in office.  But she’s remained noticeably silent during most discussions.  During a 2025 pre-election candidates forum, Cardona said she was “not fully educated” on that year’s district budget to say how she’d vote on it.

“I’m running for the Board to give a chance to families like mine; somebody who cares and works hard as a single mom.” Cardona proudly told that candidates forum.  Blessed with the ITA’s endorsement back then, Cardona edged out Tripp and was given a year to prove the value of her contribution.

If Madeline Cardona was last year’s fresh face to ICSD Politics, Sara Garner is this year’s. 

A former Cayuga Heights and Boynton Middle School attendee and Ithaca High School graduate, Garner holds a degree in Human Development, Social Policy and Inequality earned at Cornell, and currently serves as the Director of Community Nursery School in Ithaca.

Garner’s resume, stated in her district-posted candidate profile, references her past teaching experience in New York City and San Francisco.  Among those assignments, the profile states, “Sara worked in New York City for an alternative-to-incarceration program, where she taught GED classes and served as a court advocate, facilitating non-prison sentences for individuals facing felony charges.”

This year’s four-way election for ICSD board service stands less crowded than that in the two most recent election cycles.  Seven candidates (for three seats) ran in 2024, and another seven (for four seats) ran in 2025.  The decline in candidate interest could reflect the waning of taxpayer anger over the first-offered 2024 budget..

Sean Eversley Bradwell’s departure will not only spur a succession rivalry for ICSD board leadership. It may also mark a change in leadership tone.  On matters as recent as this year’s proposed budget and its tax levy, Eversley Bradwell has stood at times in the middle, mediating competing sides that would tax more or tax less.  He refused to interject his own opinions at times while also attempting compromise.

“I hope that I have demonstrated compassion, empathy, understanding, an ability to reach out to further having conversations, taking walks, having coffee, being yelled at, all those things,” Eversley Bradwell said two summers ago, when during his contested fight for leadership another board member asked him to describe his management style.  “I hope that I maintain that level of… humanity and compassion for the community,” the board president said.

Come this July, Sean Eversley Bradwell’s leadership will be gone.  Someone else’s must take its place.

###

Our State of Dysfunction

We wait on a budget.  What else is new?

Analysis and commentary by Robert Lynch; April 25, 2026

You’d never build a government like the one New York State has built for itself.  No sane person ever would.

New York State was supposed to have put its budget in place this past April first.  It didn’t.  And as of this writing more than three weeks later, it still hasn’t done so.  No one can predict when we will have a budget.  New York’s dominant political class doesn’t seem to care. 

Tompkins County’s first line of defenders in Albany, State Senator Lea Webb and Assemblymember Anna Kelles, repeatedly and blithely brush off the ongoing fiscal impasse.  They assure us that the day-by-day, week-by-week budget “extenders” they vote to enact will do what they must to keep the paychecks and benefits flowing.

But that’s all that they say.   Their assurances lack the slightest degree of outrage.  Webb and Kelles are majority Democrats.  They’re of the party that controls both legislative houses and the governorship.  Each must obediently answer to her leadership.  Neither dares to rock the boat.

But I will rock it.  And I’ll be blunt.  New York State’s structure of governance lacks reason, common sense, or any fair respect for democratic principles.  It’s always operated this way for as long as I can remember.  And unless the people of the Empire State rise up and demand change, it will probably always remain that way.

As the lead of her weekly online message written to constituents Friday, April 24, Senator Webb stated:

“Dear Neighbor: The budget is moving forward, and this week in Albany we passed another budget extender to keep the government open while negotiations continue.” 

Nothing to worry about, friends; nothing to see here.  It’s what’s become Lea Webb’s underlying narrative.  To readers like me, her words do not comfort.

And for the record, last Wednesday’s extender was the sixth—yes, the sixth—Band-Aid legislators have slapped onto the Empire State’s open wound since late-March.  No doubt, they’ll have to bandage the wound still more.

And this year’s delay is not a one-off.  In New York State, tardy annual budgets have become the rule and not the exception.  Commend Kate Lisa of the downstate-focused “City and State” for keeping recent score:

“The budget was one week late in 2022, 32 days late in 2023, 20 days past the deadline in 2024 and a whopping 38 days late last year—pushing negotiations into May,” Lisa wrote April 7.  And that was back when this latest impasse was only on its second, week-long extension.  Since then, extensions have grown shorter, and more numerous.  Back-bench lawmakers often go home in-between extension votes.  Only leadership remains.

Reach back farther.  At times it’s even gotten worse.

“Crossing the finish line in May isn’t all that bad, comparatively,” Gannett’s Emily Barnes wrote April, 22.  “The state’s 1997 and 1999 budgets under then-Gov. George Pataki went into August.  A couple years later, in 2001, Pataki’s budget was late again by 125 days and budget conversations between then-Gov. David Paterson and the Legislature in 2010 also exceeded the April 1 deadline by 125 days.”

So, quite clearly, the problem is systemic.  It’s a product of how the New York State legislative process is structured and functions… make that, how it’s meant to function, even if it truly does not.

And because budget impasses have become so politically engrained within New York’s legislative attitude and expectations, the systemic problem transcends who happens temporarily to occupy the Governor’s Mansion or command a legislative super-majority.  Democrats and Republicans may share the blame.  But because Democrats hold all the levers of power at present, they deserve to shoulder all the resulting blame right now.

Long has it been said that the New York State budget is crafted by “three men in a room.”  Ignore the fact that two of those people are now women.  Gender holds no claim to power. 

Governor Kathy Hochul, Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie are those three most favored people right now.  The State Senate may have 63 members; the Assembly 150.  Yet Stewart-Cousins and Heastie often negotiate with Governor Hochul in secret.  Sure, chosen insiders like Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris squeeze inside the door.  But most rank-and file remain in the dark.  At least that’s what they tell us.  Certainly, minority Republicans haven’t a clue.

“It’s a hallmark of Hochul’s strategy to wear down lawmakers until they concede to her spending priorities,” City and State’s Kate Lisa writes.

Yet why does it have to be this way?  Why must budgets be negotiated in private by the chosen few?  Why can’t spending be resolved out-in-the-open on the legislative floor or during committee debates?

Why can’t it be as simple as the Senate and Assembly coming to agreement on a budget—or maybe, a series of budgets for things like education, health care, police and highways?  Then the governor gets to sign or veto those budget bills?  And should she cast her veto, then the Legislature gets the opportunity to override that veto by a two-thirds vote?

Oh, that would be too simple for a state like New York.  Because in New York, as a product of the system that’s been set up, a “state budget” gets stuffed into it more things than does a Christmas turkey.  It shouldn’t be that way, but it is.

You may like or dislike Anna Kelles’ politics.  But our local Assemblymember has done a good job of concisely identifying the political obstacles we now confront:

“Why the Governor has so much power over the New York State budget,” Kelles asks.  Her answer:

“In most states, the Governor proposes a budget and the Legislature has broad authority to revise it through back-and-forth negotiations.  In New York, the Governor has notably more power than the Legislature throughout the negotiating process.

“The Governor starts by sending a full budget plan to the Legislature in January. This plan can include entirely new programs that have fiscal impacts on the budget, and it can also include policy proposals that do not have any fiscal impacts.

“But unlike in many other states, the Legislature cannot freely rewrite that plan or replace it with its own version. Instead, the Legislature has to work from the Governor’s proposal and respond to it within a more limited framework:

• The Legislature can remove proposals from the Governor’s budget plan or reduce funding for proposals, but we generally cannot change the detailed language within each individual proposal.
• The Governor can revise her budget plan for 30 days after submitting it to the Legislature, which allows changes while negotiations are already underway.
• After the Legislature passes a budget and sends it to the Governor, she can cross out individual items before signing it into law. This means the Legislature must either send a budget the Governor is prepared to accept or risk having parts of it removed without any further opportunity to negotiate.

“This means the Governor is not just proposing a starting point, she is shaping the structure of the entire negotiation, and the Legislature is working within that framework,” Kelles concludes her first explanation.

Next question Kelles asks, “What happens if the budget is late?”  Her answer:

“If the budget is not passed on time, the state cannot legally spend money unless the Governor sends the Legislature short-term budget bills, often called “extenders.” These extenders keep government running for a limited period of time. Once an extender is received by the Legislature, we can either vote it up or down, but we cannot amend it before voting. This means we either pass the extender as written or risk a government shutdown.

“The Governor also decides what goes into each extender and how long each extender lasts, whether a few days, a week, or longer. In practice, this gives the Governor significant control over the timeline and pace of negotiations once the budget deadline passes. She can require frequent votes or stretch things out in ways that shape the direction of negotiations.”

That’s how our Assemblymember, Anna Kelles, sees things.

Is it right for this much power to rest with just one person, the Governor?  Many Democrats castigate President Trump for taking so much into his own hands.  Yet one seldom hears comparable criticism leveled at Hochul for the power she grabs.

Based on what insiders have learned or what’s leaked out from those locked rooms, the impediments to agreement this budget cycle include issues like Hochul’s drive to contain auto insurance rates through tort reform, to dial back New York’s 2019 climate law, to sweeten state pensions for newly-hired employees, and to confront the seemingly-unrelated issue of whether to allow New York City’s new mayor to impose a wealth tax on rich people who own second homes.

Yes, even immigrant protection and buffer zones around abortion clinics and houses of worship have found advocacy stuffed into the turkey that may become the 2027 New York State Budget.

“Here we are twenty-two days late on the budget, for the fifth year in a row,” Republican Senator Tom O’Mara, who not too long ago represented western Tompkins County, said this past Friday. O’Mara complained of both procrastination and secrecy.

“We really do need to get this budget done,” O’Mara stated.  Our school districts need to come out with their budgets to put before the voters in the middle of May,” he said.  “The time for putting those together is rapidly approaching and that’s a big problem for our districts. It will only result in, perhaps, unnecessary property tax increases, not knowing what state aid is going to be.”

Yes, late state budgets hurt.  They hurt school districts planning their own budgets.  They hurt counties.  And they hurt towns like Enfield.  How much will our “CHIPS” highway aid be raised this year?  We don’t know.  And it’s spring.  Road work will start soon, if it hasn’t already.

“We really need to get moving here,” Senator O’Mara told constituents. “We’re getting no information from the majority on where any of these major issues that are sticking points stand.”

Problem identified.  Grievances registered.  Now what’s the solution?  Here are my thoughts:

• The first step is to generate public outrage.  Same old; same old cannot continue.  And unless average New Yorkers stand up and voice their anger, what we’ve so long endured and come to accept year after year will continue to exist until the day we die.  And it will likely persist thereafter.  Please, get mad.

• Next, we need to ask tough philosophical questions of ourselves.  Do we benefit from the “Strong Governor” breed of politics that we have in New York?   The status quo’s advantage lies in that a single election for a single office (that is, the Office of Governor), can instantly alter a full one-third, if not, in practicality, one-half of the political equation.  The status quo’s disadvantage lies in its concentration of power in that singular executive position.  Is power better diffused through the voices and votes of our more than 200 elected legislators, Senate and Assembly?

• Next, we should demand transparency.  Why should budget negotiations occur in secret?  Budget business should involve all members of the Senate and Assembly, not just leadership.  If the law must be changed to enforce such broader participation, we should change the law.  If enforcement begs for constitutional protection, we should amend the state constitution to ensure compliance.

• Next, we should clear away the legislative litter. A new law affecting who gets sued for how much after a car accident holds no place in discussions toward a state budget.  Neither does whether New York extends sanctuary protection for undocumented immigrants statewide.  Let those bills stand on their own two feet.  Give them fair, independent consideration, not a stealthy, hurried vote in the dead of night.  Laws enacted when nobody’s looking have become the laws we New Yorkers have come to hate the most.

And finally, need I save this most monumental change for last:  We need seriously to consider uncoupling ourselves from New York City.  Upstate and Downstate have co-exited as incompatible partners for too long.  It’s time to thoughtfully contemplate an amicable divorce.  The five boroughs may need to go one way; the rest of us the other. (I’d tag Nassau and Suffolk Counties onto upstate for now; but we can wrestle with that option later.)  Let New York City go in Mayor Mamdani’s democratic socialist direction, should it prefer.  From Westchester to Williamsville, we, the rest of New York, may find ourselves getting along better resembling places like Pennsylvania, Michigan or Ohio.

****

“What’s been a dysfunctional, secretive and unproductive effort appears to only be getting worse,” Assembly Minority Leader Edward Ra was quoted by Spectrum News on April 15.  And that was back when New York was only on its fourth budget extender.  Assemblymember Ra didn’t like Hochul interjecting talk of that New York City second-home tax.  Ra claimed she’d just introduced the new tax spontaneously, even though it had never been part of executive or legislative proposals before that point.

“It’s a concerning process,” O’Mara complained of the budget process more than a week later.  “I really see or feel no sense of urgency on getting this budget wrapped up.  We continue to just extend spending,”  O’Mara said.

“A late budget is not ideal, but as long as you’re moving the extenders and it’s not too long-lasting, it’s very manageable,” Senate deputy leader Gianaris told City and State back on April 7, nearly three weeks ago.  Easy for him.  He’s among those on the inside.

Of course, no reasonable person would design a budget process this way—or a state political circus that’s incrementally made it what we expect… and dread.  Something needs to change.  And only we, those of us on the outside looking in, can change it.

###

A Board, a Budget and a Soggy School

ICSD sets 3.4% levy hike; speeds Heights flood repairs

Reporting and Analysis by Robert Lynch; April 17, 2026

If there was any air conditioning, it wasn’t working well.  Had it been that night, members of Ithaca’s Board of Education April 14 might have grown more focused; attended to their driving, taken fewer side trips, and reached agreement sooner on the 2026-27 District Budget.  Members finally landed at their destination.  But it took work.

Finding just enough votes to make a majority, the board Tuesday adopted the $177.6 Million proposed budget, its spending left essentially untouched from that earlier presented by district administrators. Ithaca City School District (ICSD) voters will either ratify or reject that budget in a May 19 referendum.

Far less contentious, yet equally significant, the ICSD Board set aside up to $1.5 Million from the school district’s savings account, its “fund balance” accumulated through prior budgets, to underwrite expected flood remediation at Cayuga Heights Elementary School (sometimes assigned the acronym, “Ches”). 

Flood waters rushing down a hillside behind Heights Elementary during the March 31 deluge caused major damage to the building’s first floor.  Remediation work has already begun.  Only the first $500,000 of repairs will be covered by insurance.  Administrators have yet to tally a full damage estimate.

We’ll deal with the budget first:

As finally adopted, yet only after 90 minutes of sometimes-tense deliberation, the proposed ICSD budget would raise spending by just over five percent from the current year and hike the tax levy by 3.4 percent.  That’s less of a levy rise than administrators had originally sought, yet still higher than were a couple of lower-tax options earlier presented to the board.  One year ago, the levy rose by 3.76 percent.

Reflecting on that hour and a half of often-meandering discussion, one found absent any grand, visionary fiscal optimism—not from Superintendent Dr. Luvelle Brown, not from program-conscious progressives like Erin Croyle or Karen Yearwood, nor from taxpayer guardians like Todd Fox.

The budget, itself, earned few if any accolades that night.  Praised far more was the administration’s new computer tool that helps the homeowner calculate the budget’s impact on his or her own property.

The budget program is “not only transformative, but also very innovative,” Superintendent Brown proclaimed at the discussion’s start. 

It leads to “a different way of looking at the budget,” Dominick Lisi, Assistant Superintendent for Business and Finance, advised attendees.

That may be true.  But praising the budget tool rather than the budget is somewhat like going to the Taughannock Falls overlook and walking away talking about the tower viewers instead of the waterfall.

No, there was little satisfaction and more equivocation that night.  Perhaps the empaneled, elected educators fell victim to the curse of too many choices.  A tool that enables an infinite range of fiscal alternatives also invites an unbounded field of divergent opinions.  Spectators seated in chairs against the wall of the all-too-small, all-too-stuffy ICSD board room sensed indecision.

“If we suddenly have another disaster like what happened to Ches, or gas prices go up even more, or whatever, are we suddenly going to say, ‘Oh, my gosh, you should have made the rate even lower, you should have made it higher…’” Emily Workman pondered aloud.

Workman’s quandary stood as a good testament to the curse of too many choices.

The ICSD Board adopted the budget in a split vote; five votes in favor, one opposed, and (surprisingly) three abstentions.  Because of those abstentions, the budget barely passed.

At the last regular Board of Education meeting, March 24, little attention was given to spending.  Talk focused on the tax levy.  And on how much to tax, members could not then agree.  At a subsequent committee session on April 9, fresh word about the Cayuga Heights school flood and the uncertainty that flowed from it over the remediation’s cost forestalled any recommendation on taxes then as well. 

Fiscal reality dictates that should spending remain untouched, any lowering of the tax levy would pull money out of the fund balance.  And the fund balance reserves will be needed to fix the Cayuga Heights School.

At the Tuesday meeting, the board’s majority saw the 3.4 percent levy increase as a middle-ground compromise.  Superintendent Brown had wanted a higher, 4.18 percent increase, a percentage just below the New York State tax cap assigned the ICSD this year.  At the April 9 committee session, Superintendent Brown had first floated a 3.9 percent increase, only to later throttle it back to 3.4 percent.

“I think 3-4 is the right number,” Garrick Blalock, chair of the Facilities and Finance Committee, said of the compromise number Tuesday night.   “I think 3-4’s the number that gives us a healthy fund balance, healthy reserves, and t also recognizes the pressure, the inflationary pressure that taxpayers are under.”

“I’m thinking about, as a taxpayer, you want me to approve a school district budget and I’m in a world where I’m paying $5.00 for a gallon of gas,” Board President Sean Eversley Bradwell commented.  Compared with the alternative increase of above four percent, “I feel better going to taxpayers asking for 3.4, understanding all these other financial constraints.”

The lone dissent in the budget vote came from Todd Fox.  Fox was elected two years ago during the ICSD’s taxpayer revolt, the one that rejected the budget that year.  Fox stood his ground Tuesday for a tax increase even lower than the one adopted that night, a levy increase no higher than three percent.  And Fox had a plan to achieve it.  He’d tap into fund balances this year and replenish them later.  Fox would sell off the long-mothballed Danby Elementary School and reap the proceeds.  Danby hasn’t held a class there for almost a half-century.

Danby’s “probably worth $1 Million if you put it on the market,” Fox predicted.  If you drew down the fund balance by $1.4 Million to contain this year’s levy increase to three percent, Fox reasoned, “we could recoup that 1.4 (Million) from that one sale.”.

“Hey, we have that lever, that number, and we should dispose of that asset,” Fox said of the Danby building.  “And I’m happy to do that this year, next year, whenever it is, as soon as possible.”

“It’s a little weird to me that this late in the game we’re talking about selling Danby,” colleague Erin Croyle countered, “because that’s something like that to me is not a factor in what we’re talking about now.”

“Maybe next year,” Croyle suggested the district consider offloading Danby. “But for the budget, you’ve got to have a vote, set timelines; you’ve got to move forward.”

The three unexpected abstentions on the budget vote came from Adam Krantweiss, Jacob Shiffrin and Emily Workman.  Collectively, each in his or her own way, they redirected attention this budget cycle to the little-spoken issue of spending.

Theirs became the side trip the night’s budget journey took.  And some at the table, including Board President Eversley Bradwell, did not enjoy the ride.  It began late in deliberations, commencing after member Karen Yearwood had moved the budget for adoption—complete with its 3.4 percent levy hike.

Krantweiss said he couldn’t support the budget given how it came to be.  He read from a prepared statement.

“I’m going to abstain from the budget vote because I disagree with the process in which the budget was developed,” Krantweiss had written and then spoke. 

Administration had prepared the budget and handed it to us, he said.  Yet “I feel like we as a collective board have not had substantive public discussions at the full board meetings to provide collective input about how to fund categories included in the budget…”

Krantweiss continued, “We’ve talked a lot about using the reserves to save taxpayers some money this year, but we haven’t even discussed making budget cuts to save money.  Not that we would necessarily do that or want to do that, but we haven’t even talked about it together.”

Adam Krantweiss rattled off issues he believes the full board should have discussed, but hasn’t:  class sizes, course offerings, the number of teachers in the classroom, even the restoration of the controversial 2024 elimination of Mandarin language classes at Ithaca High School.

Krantweiss’ grievance runs deeper than that of one rogue board member’s complaint about process.  It asks the question, “Who’s in charge here?”  Is it all nine members of the Board of Education, or is it a well-funded administration that begs annually for deference, joined by allied board members holding a similar vision?

“Against my better judgment, I am opposed to a number of things that were also said about the process,” President Eversley Bradwell remarked at one point.   He didn’t elaborate.

“I’m somewhat flabbergasted,” board member Karen Yearwood interjected.  Yearwood maintained that the program-related issues Krantweiss had raised have been fully aired at meetings of the Curriculum Committee, meetings few from the public ever attend.  Krantweiss sits on that committee.

Krantweiss countered that committee consideration is far different from full board involvement.

Erin Croyle offered the most passionate rebuttal.

“The budget process is a year-long process,” Croyle reminded Krantweiss. “You had all year to have these conversations, all year to bring up all these items, but you’re doing it tonight in this format with a canned speech.”

“Salaries are people,” Finance Chair Blalock reminded everyone.  “The reason I think perhaps we haven’t had a lot  of focus on the expense side of the books  is because… changing expenses means changing the people and how they teach, how this district educates.”

“Should we just take a sponge and wipe the blackboard of our education model all down and start all over again?” Blalock asked, waving the air like he held that sponge.

Yes, the room was hot; the night was long. 

Jacob Shiffrin and Emily Workman joined Adam Krantweiss with their abstentions.  Neither talked as long as Krantweiss did, nor evoked as much drama.  Yet each conveyed general agreement with the process-rooted argument.  Workman urged that the “collective input” issue earn discussion at a future meeting.  Shiffrin said he didn’t “have sufficient information on the content of the budget to make an informed vote as a board member.” 

Yet both Krantweiss and Shiffrin promised to support the budget in the May referendum.

The side trip had ended; the destination reached.  The roll was called. The budget passed; just barely.

****

As of meeting night, officials had not fully assessed the dollar loss from the March 31 flooding at Cayuga Heights Elementary.  But to be on the safe side and to cover what might be worst-case outcomes, the board passed an emergency authorization allowing the district to draw up to $1.5 Million from its unappropriated fund balance to cover remediation work at the school.  Officials say insurance will cover the first $500,000 in claims.

Preliminary damage estimates that night varied wildly.  The district’s contractor, SERVPRO, had put in an initial estimate of $388,000 for remediation alone.  But Assistant Superintendent Lisi quoted state benchmarks predicting that mitigation and reconstruction work could cost $150 to $250 per square foot.  And for 13,000 square feet of damaged area, those guidelines could push costs to $1.95 to $3.25 Million.

Lisi’s best compromise guess was $800,000 to $900,000.

“I think 1.5 (Million) is way too high,” Todd Fox, a commercial developer, reacted.  “We don’t have hard numbers back,” Fox stated.  “I don’t think the damage is as much as you think it is.  It’s mostly cosmetic.  There’s nothing structural; no electrical, no plumbing.  It’s like flooring and drywall.”

Fox would have set aside only $500,000 now and sought more money later should the need arise.  Board President Eversley Bradwell floated a $1 Million mid-ground compromise.  Board members stuck to the original $1.5 Million commitment, approving the resolution with only Fox casting an abstention.  Fox later explained he’d need more information before he’d support the higher figure.

Most on the board agreed with Erin Croyle’s assessment supporting worst-case contingency.  “I don’t understand why we wouldn’t say 1.5 as a C.Y.A. and call it a day,” Croyle remarked.

There’s another consideration, too; government red tape.  If you submit the state an emergency authorization now only to come back later with a second appeal, the state might claim it’s no longer an emergency and demand such formalities as competitive bidding, Lisi cautioned.

We should also acknowledge that “it could potentially cost us more,” Eversley Bradwell warned.  “Any time you open the wall, there’s the potential you’ll find something.”  

Cayuga Heights Elementary remains open.  Students are using mostly the upper floor.  Remediation work’s begun.  Crews have packed up books and ripped up floors.   Eversley Bradwell doesn’t like using the term ‘disaster.’  “It’s not a disaster, but a natural occurrence,” the Board President said, though he quickly added, “It looks like a disaster when you walk through the school.”

###

Apology given as Flock flies away

Legislature fast-tracks camera system’s departure vote

by Robert Lynch; April 15, 2026

Sometimes the truth comes out when a politician lets down her guard and forgets first to calculate politically.  And that’s what happened Tuesday, April 14 during a suddenly-called, 15-minute meeting of the Tompkins County Legislature.

Convening a session otherwise purposed for a private discussion of a personnel matter never revealed, the Legislature slipped onto its public agenda the termination of a multi-year contract with Flock Safety, the company that’s provided license-plate reading security cameras along local roadways.  The resolution passed.  Flock’s contract would terminate at the end of May.

“Resolved,  that the County Administrator and County Attorney are directed to provide timely written notice to Flock terminating the Flock Contract prior to the auto-renewal date,” the adopted resolution states.

The flash of unguarded candor came through the words of Legislature Chair Shawna Black, a recent driving force behind the removal of Flock surveillance.  And while Black and the Legislature’s other dozen Democrats have supported the controversial cameras’ removal, leaders in local law enforcement, most notably Tompkins County Sheriff Derek Osborne, have staunchly defended Flock’s presence.  Osborne has maintained the Flock cameras deter crime and save lives.

“We made Sheriff Osborne’s job very, very hard whenever we decided against the Flock cameras,” Black stated from the podium Tuesday, truth admitted  in that most unguarded of moments. 

“And I want to apologize for taking away one of your tools,” Black continued her candid apology to the Sheriff.  “I know that it was effective at times,” Black said of Flock.  “And Derek was about to kill me a few weeks ago,” the chairwoman acknowledged in jest, “but I think we’re friends again.”

Maybe Shawna Black believed the public wasn’t watching or listening Tuesday night.  The gallery appeared empty.  Yet by the next afternoon, YouTube reported as many as 92 people had viewed the meeting’s video stream.

Critics, both on and off the Legislature, have criticized the Flock cameras as an invasion of civil liberties and privacy.  They’ve also accused the parent company, Flock Group, Inc. of colluding with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in the surveillance of undocumented immigrants.

Any critic of what the Legislature’s been doing lately may have sensed a touch of remorse in Chairwoman Black’s unscripted words; sudden second-thoughts, maybe fleeting deference to conscience, Shawna Black’s honest recognition of right versus wrong, of responsible governance versus slavish obedience to the small, yet vocal cadre of activists who’ve pummeled the Legislature at meeting after meeting to urge Flock’s banishment as a bad actor.

But too late.  Tuesday’s decision was, effectively, a foregone conclusion.  Its outcome became certain one week earlier when Black’s ally, Lansing Democrat Deborah Dawson, had sprung onto the agenda—and won quick passage—of  the motion directing the County Attorney and County Administrator to write the resolution that unwound our county’s involvement with Flock.

“I’m super appreciative and supportive of this,” Caroline/Danby legislator Irene Weiser said of the unwinding resolution.  Other than Black, Weiser was the only legislator to speak to the Flock resolution prior to its adoption at the special meeting.  “So thank you all, and especially Sheriff Osborne, for being flexible here in the community and still looking for ways to protect the areas that are wanting and needing protection.”

The April 14 resolution passed on a vote of 12 to one.  No votes had changed since Dawson’s motion had passed one week earlier. 

Sentiment again split along party lines.  Each of the dozen Democrats present supported canceling the contract.  Newfield/Enfield’s Randy Brown, the only Republican in the room, opposed it.  A second Republican, Lansing’s Mike Sigler, attended remotely, but was advised the circumstances of his virtual attendance prevented him from voting.  The third Republican, Lee Shurtleff of Groton, didn’t attend.

When Dawson’s test vote cleared the Legislature one week earlier, Dawson and others had signaled the final vote on Flock would occur at the Legislature’s next regular meeting, April 21.  But the timetable would have proved tight in meeting the April 28 deadline for notifying Flock of the contract’s termination.  Otherwise, the agreement would have auto-renewed for two more years.

County Attorney Maury Josephson told Tuesday’s meeting that the move-up of legislative action provided the county some “breathing room.”

But sadly, the accelerated adoption schedule did something else.  It precluded additional public comment.

Supporters of Flock could not have anticipated Dawson’s motion of April 7.  They wouldn’t have been in the Legislature’s chambers to speak that night or to have pre-filed written comments.  And the rules of the Legislature do not allow for public comment at special meetings.  So by accelerating this latest vote, the procedure silenced Flock supporters again.

On Wednesday, April 8, the Enfield Town Board had considered a Resolution titled, “Providing Tompkins County Guidance in the Continuation of Flock Safety Services.”  The resolution gained support from two out of five Enfield Town Board members (including this Councilperson/writer, the resolution’s author.)  The resolution, as drafted, opposed Tompkins County’s impending contract termination with Flock and had argued that the termination would be “premature and unwise” and “would endanger public safety.”

Given the absence of any public comment opportunity, neither an Enfield representative nor sympathetic legislators could easily air Enfield’s (minority) municipal viewpoint before the contract termination vote had occurred.

Neither of the two attending Republican legislators, Randy Brown nor Mike Sigler, offered opinion before the resolution’s adoption Tuesday.  Asked by Shawna Black to speak to the resolution before it passed, Sheriff Osborne declined comment.  Osborne did address next-steps after the vote was taken.

Money for the Flock program had come through a state-sponsored $220,650 “Gun Involved Violence Elimination” (GIVE) grant. Local law enforcement officials, principally Ithaca Police Chief Tom Kelly, wrote for renewal of the GIVE grant last week.  Pressed for ideas on deadline and given the Legislature’s newfound opposition to Flock, Osborne said grant writers plugged in a request to buy dash-mounted license plate readers for police cars as a substitute.  It would serve short-term as a placeholder.

“We’re getting quotes now on camera trailers,” Osborne reported.  “They look nice, but they’re extremely expensive,” the Sheriff cautioned.  Each trailer costs about $73,000.  The GIVE grant money might buy at most two, Osborne said.  He also questioned the trailers’ feasibility.

But then, again, if the public objections lie in surveillance, might camera trailers themselves resurrect the central issue that terminated Flock?

“Are we prepared for the backlash when one of these things shows up, and people say, ‘Well, now you’re not watching the whole county, you’re watching a specific area or a specific group of people?’” legislator Sigler asked.

The Sheriff acknowledged Sigler’s scenario could be true.

“Yeah, for sure,” Osborne said.  “These are cameras that do similar work,” he said.  “”But I’m hoping that if we just deploy them to areas where need arises, that maybe that’ll be the difference, at least I hope.”

That could be more easily said than done.  Public opinion is seldom unanimous.  One neighbor’s crime fighting tool is another neighbor’s peeping intruder.

The Sheriff has another worry.  It involves timing.

“There’s certainly probably going to be a time frame when Flock goes away before we purchase and have these devices, if we even move in that direction,” Osborne advised legislators, referring to the trailers.  “So I’m more worried about that, about what happens in-between with gun crime and violent crime.  So time will tell,” Osborne concluded.  

Clearly by his words, Derek Osborne is not pleased with the hardline position against Flock that the Tompkins County Legislature has chosen.  A repopulated and more progressive table of lawmakers this year has struck a new path that pleases some, but not others.  Last fall, legislators had approved Flock’s continued presence; but not now.

In early-March, the Ithaca Common Council, also tilting liberal, canceled its contract with Flock.

“I’m afraid we are letting a few strong voices really take away the common sense,” Randy Brown told the Enfield Town Board earlier his month as he gauged the new legislative environment.

No doubt, Tuesday’s action underscored Brown’ impression, Shawna Black’s spontaneous second thoughts accepted or not.

###

Flood damage at Heights Elem. tops $500k; impacts new budget

Update (April 12): In a resolution posted Sunday, one attached to the Board of Education’s Tuesday, April 14 agenda, the Ithaca City School District proposed assigning up to $1.5 Million in previously budgeted funds to undertake flood damage remediation at Cayuga Heights Elementary School, the district expecting that insurance payments would cover a third of the projected maximum cost. 

The ICSD’s drafted resolution states, “that it is in the best interest of the District to utilize up to $1.5 million that is currently housed in the District’s unappropriated fund balance of the 2025-2026 budget to cover the cost of any remediation work that is necessary to repair the water damage at Cayuga Heights Elementary School, recognizing, however, that the District will likely recoup approximately $500,000 of such expenses through insurance proceeds secured by the District.”

The Ithaca Board of Education placed the emergency funding resolution on its meeting’s “Consent Agenda,” placement that generally assures an item routine, unanimous adoption. / RL

The previously-filed story on this subject follows:

****

by Robert Lynch; April 11, 2026

Off-camera and defying certain identification, an Ithaca Board of Education member asked, “Has there been local press about what happened at Heights?”

No there hadn’t been.  Of course, teachers knew.  Students and parents knew.  The neighborhood likely knew.  But we in the broader community did not.  Yet thanks to what was said at a media-ignored committee meeting nine days after the catastrophe, we now know.  At least, we know a little bit.

The out-like-a-lion March 31 torrential rainstorm that inundated greater Ithaca during the late-afternoon rush hour and poured inches of water down upon us within minutes caused major flood damage at Cayuga Heights Elementary School.  Preliminary reports price the damage at more than $500,000.  And officials haven’t ruled out repairs topping One Million.

The Tuesday, March 31 storm occurred during the Ithaca City School District (ICSD) spring break, so pupils and teachers weren’t around.  Students didn’t return to classes at the Heights school until the following Monday.  We’re told the school reopened on schedule.

But the physical and financial impacts of the flood remain with us and are yet to be fully tallied.  Administrators could not put a final dollar figure on the damage when they first disclosed the flooding publicly at the school board’s Facilities and Finance Committee meeting Thursday, April 9.  Those administrators hope to have better estimates when the full Board of Education next convenes Tuesday, April 14.

The ripple effects of the flood have already extended to the 2026-27 ICSD proposed budget, now in its final stages of preparation.  Administrators and board members have conceded that the repairs at Cayuga Heights Elementary could nudge the proposed $177.6 Million budget’s tax levy upward, at least slightly.

“So we’re in the process of determining the full scope of work, Dominick Lisi, ICSD’s Assistant Superintendent for Business and Finance, informed the committee.  “Right now our first order of business is the resolution to declare it an emergency so that we can use funding to serve that purpose,” Lisi said.

Lisi advised the committee that Cayuga Heights Elementary is insured for $500,000 in damages.  But he stood confident that the insurance money wouldn’t cover all the cleanup.

“Do we have an order of magnitude of what it might cost?” school board and committee member Todd Fox asked.

“Hope to have that soon,” Lisi answered.

A walk around Cayuga Height Elementary School this Saturday would fail to alert the observer to their having been a flood.  Of course, you’d need to overlook the contractor fencing, the signs on doors closing off entrances, and a little mud here and there.

The National Weather Service reports that more than two inches of rain fell during the 24-hour period that included the afternoon of March 31.  Most of that rain fell during a brief afternoon cloudburst that caused the flash floods in Cayuga Heights, Ithaca, Enfield and elsewhere.

The storm is long gone, but the Cayuga Heights School’s first floor got soaked.  Peering through windows at ground-level reveals naked floors and materials packed in boxes.  One hears ventilation fans running.

“Is this like correlated to the ongoing issue we’ve had with water runoff coming off the hill and kind of percolating under the building?” Todd Fox asked committee chair Garrick Blalock.

“It is, precisely,” Blalock answered.

A wooded lot stands behind Cayuga Heights Elementary.  One can easily envision how a rushing torrent could slam against the school, go beneath it, and come up from under the floors.

Blalock said he’d toured the school the prior Tuesday.  The committee made efforts to encourage every member to tour the building before the upcoming April 14 meeting. 

Neither administrators nor board members described specific interior damage during the committee session.  But a post-meeting summary, released Friday by district staff, referenced “mold and mildew concerns.”

Blalock urged that “modernization” of the building be considered, specifically to address the hillside runoff problem.

An ICSD profile states that Cayuga Heights Elementary School was built in 1956, closed briefly, and then reopened in 1989.  The profile describes the school as “well equipped and maintained.”

In January, the school board received a Cornell professor’s report that cited Cayuga Heights Elementary, along with Enfield Elementary, as among three facilities the board could consider closing to address declining enrollment.  The Facilities and Finance Committee never discussed possible closure during its Thursday meeting.  Any decision on closing buildings stands months, if not years away.

****

The Facilities and Finance Committee had intended its April 9 meeting to be one to button down its next year’s budget.  Spending within the more than $177 Million proposal is essentially set.  Spending would rise by about five percent.  Yet members have yet to decide the tax levy, and they’d planned to do so that day.  They’d expanded the meeting to a committee-of-the-whole work session and encouraged all nine board members to attend.  Seven did.

Back on March 24, when the full board last convened, administrators had offered three alternative tax scenarios.  The levy could rise by 2.18 percent, 3.18 percent, or 4.18 percent, they said.  The 4.18 percent number would fall just under the state-calculated tax cap for next year.  Board members earlier couldn’t decide which number to pick, although Board President Dr. Sean Eversley Bradwell expressed a preference toward the middle number.

But that was before the Cayuga Heights flood.

“So capital has changed since the last time we met,” School Superintendent Dr. Luvelle Brown stated when discussion turned to budget planning. “We had a flood that’s cost a lot of money that needs to be replaced immediately,” Brown said.  So from my perspective, yes, we have a fund balance for a reason.  And the fund balance is going to be dipped into in a way that we didn’t think about two weeks ago.”

ICSD budget planners had used simple math to calculate their tax scenarios.  Programs wouldn’t be touched, nor would payrolls.  To reduce tax increases, the district would just dip deeper into its “fund balance,” its pot of accumulated savings.  For each one-percent drop in the tax levy, about $1.15 Million in fund balance would need to be withdrawn.

But unforeseen flood repairs would need to come out of that fund balance.  And money diverted to fixing a school can’t be used to cut taxes.

 “Doctor Brown’s right; we did have a flood, and we don’t have the final bill yet.  But we do know that it’s going to be substantial,” Blalock, chair of the committee, affirmed.  “And so I have been, myself, looking at somewhere in the middle, but then we have to update, and now we know that we have this actual expense and we don’t have a number for it set.”

“I’m kind of tempted to hold off until we have that number,” Blalock hedged.

Contrary to what may have been its original plan, the committee never reached consensus on a tax recommendation Thursday.  Board President Eversley Bradwell’s absence may have contributed to the drifting indecision.  (Board member Emily Workman was also excused.)

Blalock said he had “a number in the back of my head” that might come close to what the ICSD would need to spend out-of-pocket for repairs at Cayuga Heights, but he declined to reveal it publicly.  A figure of $322,000 was bandied around a bit, yet never stated definitively.  The $322,000, of course, would stand on top of any insurance reimbursement.  (There’s apparently no deductible.)

The most likely levy increase emerging from Thursday’s meeting was one between 3.4 and 3.9 percent.

“I’m recommending we do three-nine, and you can say I don’t like your recommendation, or I do,” Superintendent Brown initially advised the committee.  “I don’t think we need to go above four (percent), and I like the three-nine number.” 

“I think we need the three-nine based on what’s just happened and to keep our trajectory and fund balances healthy for the next three years according to my formula,” Brown stated.

That said, before the committee had adjourned, Brown had amended his recommendation downward to a 3.4 percent increase.  And it reflects the fact that Ithaca’s tax increase has become very much a moving target.  It’ll likely come to rest somewhere between 3.4 and 3.9 percent.  But just where it falls may depend on the flood damage estimates yet to be received.

What the increase will certainly not do—barring a monumental change in thought—is to stray above the 4.18 per cent tax cap.  If it did, the budget would require 60 percent approval at the polls.

“I’m absolutely committed to tax relief,” Blalock stated.  “I’m absolutely committed to coming under the tax cap.  It’s just a question of how much.”

Todd Fox was elected to the Board of Education two years ago in a taxpayer revolt against high budgets.  Seventy percent of voters turned down the ICSD budget that year.

“I feel like we could go closer to three percent this year,” Fox told Thursday’s meeting.  “I think we reevaluate next year, and I think there’s enough of a fund balance,” Fox said.

Todd Fox’s drive for frugal taxation likely led the Superintendent to amend his recommendation downward; that is, to 3.4 percent.

Whatever budget the Ithaca Board of Education eventually recommends this coming week must still win voter approval in the May 19 referendum.

Cayuga Heights Elementary School’s teachers and staff made miracles happen to open their school little more than five days after the flash flood had soaked it.  Maybe their stories get told another time.  But Garrick Blalock has already credited Principal Aileen Grainger and her instructors for a job well done

“I just wanted to acknowledge the really heroic efforts of staff of Cayuga Heights in getting that school up and running,” Blalock told committee members.  They worked over spring break and “they gave up their weekend so that school was ready to open on Monday morning,” he said.   “I want to shout out to her team.  That was really a commendable effort.”

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Tompkins to jettison Flock; Enfield Board concurs

Legislature vote could shutter license-reading cameras by month’s end

by Robert Lynch; April 10, 2026

First, Ithaca’s Common Council acted.  Now the Tompkins County Legislature will follow.

Sending a message that couldn’t have been clearer, the recently rebuilt and increasingly progressive Tompkins County Legislature this week retraced City Hall’s footsteps and signaled its intent to terminate the county’s grant-funded contract with Flock Safety—and do it soon.  Flock’s crime-fighting license-plate reading surveillance tool has earned unquestioned support among local law enforcement.  Yet Flock has confronted withering criticism from privacy advocates and from defenders of immigrant rights.

Then one night after the Legislature’s Tuesday, April 7 test vote, the Enfield Town Board took its own turn at Flock.  When it did, Enfield Town Board members narrowly rejected a member-filed resolution that would have opposed termination the County’s Flock contract.  It would have described the Legislature’s imminent action as “premature and unwise” and one that “would endanger public safety.”

“I want to be very clear that we’re not going to renew the contract at this point with Flock,” Legislature Chair Shawna Black stated before Tuesday’s motion had even come to a vote, Black confident that what she wanted adopted would, indeed, pass. 

“I did not support Flock when we voted for it back in October,” Black reminded meeting attendees.  “I was in the minority.  That’s why we started using Flock cameras,” she explained.  “Now we have a new Legislature with eight new members.  They felt very differently than the previous Legislature, and that’s why we’re moving this forward right now.”

What the Tompkins County Legislature adopted Tuesday—it did so on a 13-3 party-line vote—was a motion, one submitted by Lansing Democrat Deborah Dawson, that directs the County Administrator and the County Attorney to prepare a resolution for the Legislature’s next meeting, April 21.  That resolution would terminate Tompkins County’s contractual relationship with Flock Safety “at the earliest possible time and in a manner consistent with the County Government’s grant funding obligations.”

“I do wish we could move a little faster,” recently-elected legislator Judith Hubbard remarked at one point in Tuesday’s discussion.  Hubbard was among several who’d prefer the Flock cameras be turned off sooner rather than later.  But majority Democrats deferred to County Attorney Maury Josephson, who’d recommended the two-step action to better preserve the state government’s $220,000 underlying grant for the broader crime prevention program.

Josephson explained that preserving the grant funding “would be most prudent,” and that “the purpose of the motion is to provide a document that lays out an orderly unwinding of the contractual relationship between the County and Flock Safety,” and to do so in a way that doesn’t otherwise jeopardize the grant.

Last July, the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services granted Tompkins County $220,650 under its “Gun Involved Violence Elimination” (GIVE) Initiative.  Most of the GIVE money has been purposed for Flock. 

By a vote of 9-4 last October, the Tompkins County Legislature accepted the grant money and authorized the Flock program’s continuation.  Since then, an increasing number of Flock license-plate reading cameras have been installed around Tompkins County.  The City of Ithaca had also installed Flock cameras, as have the villages of Trumansburg and Cayuga Heights.  A report last fall claimed Tompkins County operated 22 Flock cameras around the county.

At its meeting on March 4, the Ithaca Common Council voted unanimously to begin winding down its own contract with Flock Safety and shutting down the cameras.  At the time of Council’s action, Flock had positioned nearly two dozen of its cameras at city locations, according to media reports.

Josephson told the Legislature that some degree of ‘coordination” needs to occur between the city and county as part of the Flock termination wind-down, presumably to preserve state money.

As the County Legislature prepares for the expected April 21 termination of its Flock contract, enter the Town of Enfield.  The Enfield Town Board holds no control over Tompkins County’s decision-making regarding Flock’s future, only a limited power of persuasion.  Wednesday, April 8, one Town Board member attempted to flex that persuasive muscle.

Responding to the County Legislature’s action of the night before, Enfield Councilperson Robert Lynch (this writer) moved a 14-paragraph resolution that would have put the Town Board on record as opposing Tompkins County’s intended termination of its Flock contract.  Instead of termination, the resolution had urged that the Flock contract simply auto-renew at month’s end, as it otherwise would.

“This Town Board believes that the termination of the Flock contract is premature and unwise, would endanger public safety, and could compromise Tompkins County’s continued access to the GIVE grant,” the Enfield resolution stated.

Following extended discussion held near the end of its nearly three-hour meeting, the Enfield Town Board rejected Lynch’s resolution, two votes to three.  Lynch and Councilperson Jude Lemke supported the resolution.  Town Supervisor Stephanie Redmond, with Councilpersons Cassandra Hinkle and Melissa Millspaugh joining her, opposed the measure.

Redmond’s and the Board majority’s argument fell much along the lines of Flock’s most vocal downtown critics.  Their argument holds that Flock Safety cannot be trusted; that despite the firewalls and protocols local law enforcement have imposed, Flock’s sensitive surveillance technology could intentionally or inadvertently fall into unauthorized possession.  Most worrisome, critics say, it could reach the hands of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and be used to track undocumented immigrants.

“My distrust is not with Tompkins County or the Sheriff’s Office or anybody locally,” Councilperson Hinkle insisted Wednesday.  “My distrust is in the cameras themselves in connection with the federal government.”

“I’m very torn about it,” Councilperson Lemke admitted before she voted her support for the resolution.  “I vote Aye, but with a lot of reservations,” Lemke stated.

Randy Brown, one of two Tompkins County legislators who represent Enfield, was invited to participate in the resolution’s discussion at the Town Board table.  Brown was among the three Republicans who’d opposed Dawson’s motion the night before in legislative chambers.  And in Enfield Wednesday, he defended the position he’d earlier taken.

“I trust Sheriff Osborne and Undersheriff Olin,” Brown stated, defending Derek Osborne’s support for the Flock cameras and the restrictions that the sheriff and undersheriff Jennifer Olin have put in place to protect personal privacy and block unauthorized data sharing.  Brown said Osborne will only release information to ICE upon submission of a judicial warrant.

“The Sheriff’s Department has done everything they can to control the data,” Brown told Enfield.  “This is extremely important to them.” Brown praised the privacy protocols imposed by Osborne and District Attorney Matthew Van Houten.

“I think Derek Osborne is wonderful at his job,” Supervisor Redmond credited the Sheriff and his team. “My concern is Flock itself, the company itself,” Redmond said.  “There’ve been some concerns that people have, and I don’t want to ignore those.”

The Tompkins County Legislature has trended more liberal since the November 2025 election, and the progressive tilt may help explain why a crime-fighting tool accepted by a majority of legislators last October is heading toward overwhelming rejection this spring.

“I’m afraid we are letting a few strong voices really take away the common sense,” Randy Brown described the current legislative climate surrounding Flock, when he spoke to Enfield’s Board.

Indeed, many of those strong voices came out to speak at the Legislature’s April 7 meeting.  Chair Black tallied as many as 33 who’d signed up to address the Legislature that night.  Not all spoke to the issue of Flock, yet many did.  Public privilege-of-the-floor comments occupied nearly two hours of the Legislature’s four-and-a-half hour meeting.  Dawson’s motion was adopted before any of those participants had gotten to the mics.  But after Dawson’s motion passed, the gallery erupted in applause.

Few people other than government insiders had expected Dawson’s termination initiative to reach the floor Tuesday night.  Randy Brown admitted he’d only learned of it earlier that day.  Shawna Black moved it to near the top of the meeting’s agenda, likely to preemptively answer those many Flock critics who’d turned out to speak.

“I’d be happy to cancel the contract today,” proclaimed legislator Veronica Pillar—who, like Black, had opposed Flock last October as well as now.  “It’s abundantly clear that Flock Safety… is irresponsible with security on a number of levels and untrustworthy and not really it turns out a company that Tompkins County should do business with,” Pillar concluded.

The record shows that Deborah Dawson had supported the Flock-based GIVE grant’s acceptance last October.  But she opposes Flock’s continuation now.

“This community seems to conflate license plate readers with surveillance; it’s been a fairly consistent occurrence” Dawson said at Tuesday’s meeting. “It’s not one that I indulge in,” she qualified. 

But while she paid deference to Flock’s endorsement by Sheriff Osborne and the Ithaca Chief of Police, Dawson added, “It’s clear to me that Flock’s not the contractor that we want to move forward with in any event legally because it is a company that has allowed itself to be co-opted by a federal administration that consistently subverts our justice system, and that’s my major concern here.”

As with legislator Dawson, an anti-Trump theme runs through many a Flock critic’s statements.

Legislature Public Safety Committee Chair Travis Brooks had assembled an ad-hoc “working group.” He’d intended it to hold several meetings and then render its judgment on Flock’s future.  But the working group met only once, sometime in early April.  It reportedly gathered together administrators, law enforcement, and some legislators.  But after just that one meeting, Brooks conceded, the message stood clear; the political will for Flock’s continuation had vanished.  Brooks had supported the program. But he now believes “alternatives” must to be sought.

“I understand what you’re saying,” Flock supporter Mike Sigler told Brooks.  “I agree with you.  I don’t think there are the votes to keep this going.  But that doesn’t mean there aren’t negatives to the cancellation.  I think the Sheriff, the DA, and Probation have stated those negatives.  I’d be curious as to what they believe those negatives to be in the cancellation of this.”

Brooks replied, “There are negatives.  And there are pockets of this community who feel differently and appreciate that technology, appreciate those concerns.  There are families and folks that feel more safe in their community knowing that this technology exists.  But there’s not nine votes in this room to keep it moving,” Brooks conceded.

Nine votes is the number needed in the Tompkins County Legislature to get anything passed.  Remember, the Dawson motion got 13 votes Tuesday.  And it would deconstruct the service.

Caroline/Danby’s Irene Weiser, new as a legislator, but for years a veteran sideline observer, was among the 13 who’d supported Flock’s termination.  But Weiser has misgivings.

“I will be supporting the motion,” Weiser said, “But I do want to raise the other side that I think is important too,” she cautioned.  “There are people in neighborhoods that have been particularly impacted by violent crime that have appreciated these cameras and have found them to help the safety in their communities.”

Weiser said she hopes alternatives can be found that protect those in high-crime areas “without requiring surveillance of the rest of us.”

After his discussions Wednesday in Enfield, Randy Brown commended both Travis Brooks and Irene Weiser for their open-mindedness and their willingness to view both sides of the issue.

What drove the Enfield concerns Supervisor Redmond and Councilperson Hinkle expressed Wednesday night was the omnipresence of electronic eyes; peeping cameras seemingly everywhere.  But Randy Brown pointed out you’ll find that intrusion almost everywhere these days; in stores, along the street, even in government buildings, whether Flock or no Flock. (Yes, cameras spied on our meeting room.)

Back at the County Legislature, the Ithaca Town’s recently-elected representative, Christy Bianconi, recognized the intrusion.  Said Bianconi, “Cameras taking pictures of people all over the community” construct “a sum totality of pictures that can very much track a person’s life and their habits and their activities and so reveal their private habits.  And to me that crosses over into a violation of our civil liberties and our privacy.”

The almost-adopted Enfield resolution would have encouraged further “discussions by the Legislature, as well as by its designated committees and working groups” prior to any termination of the Flock contract so as “to address Flock Safety’s continued role in this community.”  Where discussions go now remains to be seen.

But the immediate goal is to turn the page. Shawna Black made that clear.  Flock will go.  Its cameras will vanish from the local streetscape. Flock is a company she does not trust and wields a technology that reaches too far.  Furthermore, those who wear blue uniforms must recognize who’s in charge.

“The Legislature was designed as policymakers,” Black stated bluntly.  “We are the ones that decide what type of policies we use here in Tompkins County.  This is a policy decision.”

And while the elected Sheriff, the elected District Attorney, and the appointed Ithaca Police Chief may write the next grant application for whatever the repurposed GIVE money gets spent on, Black warned, “If they write a grant with something that the Legislature is not willing to accept the government funds for, it will be a waste of time.”

“It pains me, how law enforcement has been abused,” Deborah Dawson observed.  “And that’s why I’m bringing this motion and why I want to see the last of Flock,” Shawna Black’s ally made clear.   “I hope the door doesn’t hit their butts on the way out.”

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