Monthly Report
Tompkins County Council of Governments
for April 9, 2025
by Councilperson Robert Lynch
Enfield TCCOG Representative
The Tompkins County Council of Governments (TCCOG) met on March 27th.
TCIDA: By unanimous vote, TCCOG endorsed a resolution, tabled two months ago, but amended and resubmitted at the March meeting, to support state Home Rule legislation that would expand the Tompkins County Industrial Development Agency (TCIDA) Board of Directors from seven to nine members.
The retooled resolution reflected the Tompkins County Legislature’s own endorsement at its meeting February 18 of the membership expansion. The revised TCCOG resolution also embodied the County Legislature’s own, more open-ended criteria for TCIDA “at large” membership. Rather than reserve a particular TCIDA board seat for a rural municipal representative or one from a board of education, the County Legislature’s resolution proposed:
“That the appointing body of the TCIDA shall seek to fill at-large seats with a diverse representative board including the following representatives from as many of the following as possible, both urban and rural areas of the County, a member from the Ithaca Area Economic Development Board of Directors nominated by its Chair, municipal taxing jurisdictions, school districts, organized labor, finance & banking, development & construction and economic development appointed in a manner consistent with New York State law and local practices.”
At the January TCCOG meeting, the City of Ithaca’s representative had questioned whether reserving a particular TCIDA seat for a rural municipal representative or a school board member would jeopardize the City’s de facto presence on the TCIDA board. A representative from one of the more developed rural municipalities had raised a similar concern that day about his community’s potential exclusion.
The revised resolution prompted little discussion prior to its adoption. I, Enfield’s representative, viewed the open-ended membership standards as providing a “fair compromise.” The City of Ithaca’s delegate to TCCOG, Alderperson Pierre St. Perez, wondered whether the County Legislature’s endorsement had rendered TCCOG action “redundant.” I responded. “I don’t think it does any harm to show intermunicipal support for this legislation,” I said. “It’s not just the County’s initiative. It’s also a grass roots initiative from the local governments.” So TCCOG support might prove persuasive in Albany.
“I do appreciate that my concerns from last time about different appointment structures for different representatives were addressed,” Pierre St Perez said regarding the resolution’s revised wording.
EMS: The deepest discussion at TCCOG March 27 involved how to progress toward resolving the challenges impacting three municipal ambulance services, those in Dryden, Groton and Trumansburg. Each finds itself shouldering an increasing share of local 911 emergency responses.
The situation is “a little discombobulated,” Caroline Supervisor Mark Witmer, chair of TCCOG’s Emergency Planning and Preparedness Committee, informed other TCCOG members.
Dryden, most particularly, finds itself strained. Dryden Supervisor Jason Leifer estimated his town subsidizes its ambulance service at over $1,000,000 annually. Dryden Ambulance now answers 40 percent of its calls from outside Dryden. Dryden Ambulances travel to Cortland County as well as to other Tompkins County municipalities. 911 calls generally lose money.
“We’re getting to the stage where taxpayers are starting to ask where their tax dollars are going and why those tax dollars are going to subsidize service elsewhere,” Trumansburg Mayor Rordan Hart said.
“One idea that’s out there… is to have countywide ambulance taxes and administer ambulances at the countywide level,” Witmer told TCCOG. But while that may work elsewhere, it may prove challenging in Tompkins County, where a private provider, Bangs Ambulance, still answers the majority of EMS calls.
Governor Hochul in January called for Emergency Medical Service to be elevated to an “essential service.” The elevation could carry not just clout, but also a modest amount of state funding. But Mayor Hart reported that while the Governor’s proposal had been included in the State Senate’s budget, it had not made it into the Assembly’s budget, meaning prospects for passage have dimmed.
Mayor Hart said downstate interests tend to dismiss the EMS issue as Upstate’s problem and assign the issue diminished importance. Therefore, the mayor said he was encouraged to learn that the New York City Fire Commissioner was quoted in the press as making “some very alarming statements about the status of EMS in the New York metro area.” Hart wants to “get some face time with the commissioner” soon, he said. Still, Hart cautioned, “Our issues are not Westchester’s issues. Our issues are not Chautauqua County’s issues. Our issues are unique to Tompkins County, and we have to resolve them.”
To Mayor Hart’s observation, I, Enfield’s representative, responded, “By that same token, Dryden’s issues are not Ithaca’s issues are not Danby’s issues. So it’s a very unique situation, and it’s going to be a very tough nut to crack; to figure out how we accomplish what we want to accomplish: to help out Dryden, help out Ulysses and Trumansburg, to help out the municipal ambulance services without at the same time gifting money to a private ambulance provider which is doing the majority of the ambulance runs in Tompkins County.”
Lost along the way, at least at the moment, is third-year funding for Tompkins County’s Rapid Medical Response (RMR) program. A state grant has covered 2025 funding for the RMR. But 2026 funding, including the prospect for municipal cost-sharing, remains unresolved. Discussions have yet to begin.
“We haven’t done a direct review of our funding model for 2026,” County Administrator Korsah Akumfi responded to my direct question March 27 about RMR’s funding future. “We are beginning our budget process for 2026 (in the) next month, and we’ve begun the process of gathering information,” Akumfi said. He added, “From what I have been informed so far, the (RMR) program is receiving a lot of support from various municipalities, and I have had calls to enhance that service. So we need to examine the cost implication of that enhancement at what level and how that can be taken care of.”
One can infer from Administrator Akumfi’s statement that 2026 RMR funding could expand to include some sort of ambulance operation or subsidy.
“It’s probably going to be one of the toughest decisions that we are going to be confronting in this decade… to figure out how to do that,” I said of ambulance service funding and operational coordination. “I don’t know how to do that.” Others at TCCOG agreed with the assessment of difficulty.
A further discussion of the broader EMS funding issue occurred six days later at a meeting of the Emergency Planning and Preparedness Committee of TCCOG, a meeting attended by Administrator Akumfi and several Tompkins County legislators.
I attended that April 2nd session as Enfield’s representative. It lasted nearly two hours. Discussions were wide-ranging, frank, and productive. Among those invited was Paul Bishop, a municipal EMS consultant from Penfield, NY. Attendees agreed to keep discussions confidential. Committee Chair Witmer released the following brief statement thereafter:
“TCCOG committee on EMS met with County Legislators Klein, John, and Mezey, and County Administrator Korsah Akumfi to discuss gaps in service and how the county can support a more robust countywide EMS service. The meeting was attended by Paul Bishop, and his agency will be presenting a proposal for action for consideration. “
Additional information may become public at the Tompkins County Legislature’s Public Safety Committee meeting April 22.
Wetlands Management: Darby Kiley, Associate Planner with the Tompkins County Department of Planning and Sustainability, provided TCCOG an overview of new and forthcoming state regulations concerning wetlands management.
The rules are changing. And so is the protocol. The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is transitioning from a map-based “Jurisdictional Wetlands” categorization to an “Informational Wetlands” identification procedure.
The wetlands “no longer need to be mapped,” Kiley said. She’s not too concerned. “The mapping was terrible,” the planner admitted.
At present, wetlands in New York are areas limited to 12.4 acres or larger. But in 2028, Kiley said, the minimum size shrinks to 7.4 acres. Moreover, there are new categories, eleven of them; so-called “wetlands of unusual importance.” Kiley said they include such categories as “floodways,” “wetlands with significant flooding,” and “vernal pools.”
Several webinars are available for those who seek to navigate the new system, Kiley said. “It’s going to cause a lot of confusion and have some questions asked of DEC in the future,” she acknowledged.
To Danby Supervisor Joel Gagnon’s question, Kiley said the absence of maps may prompt builders to take chances. “It’s the risk of the landowner if they choose not to get a delineation or a jurisdictional determination,” Kiley acknowledged. “It’s not up to the towns to be enforcing the state’s regulations.”
TCCOG next meets May 22.
Respectfully submitted,
Robert Lynch, Councilperson
Enfield TCCOG Representative