News Briefs:
October ’25 Vote Urged
(Dec. 19): The Ithaca Board of Education avoided talk about a looming capital bonding referendum during its final meeting of the year, December 17. And at its session one week earlier, the Board left unresolved whether to hold such a vote during its annual May 2025 elections or at some later date.
Quietly—and largely in secret—some on the Board have gravitated toward a referendum next October.
The disclosure came during a weedy, hour-long committee meeting December 12 that made little other news.
“We had a discussion at OACM this morning and would like to recommend to the committee that we have an October 21st vote on this upcoming capital project that we discussed at the meeting on Tuesday,” Facilities Committee Chair Jill Tripp told members. “We seemed to sort of agree on putting it off (to) be not at the usual time in May, but going forward,” Tripp said.
“OACM” stands for “Owner, Architect, and Construction Management.” The committee meets in private. Its recommendations hold only the power of persuasion.
At the end of the Facilities meeting, Tripp urged her committee to endorse the October date. It adjourned without doing so.
And most notably, School Board member Erin Croyle did not attend the committee’s session. Two days earlier, Croyle had insisted she was “not okay” with a stand-alone referendum, and urged any capital vote be coupled with the district’s May elections.
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Kathy’s Campaigning Cash
(Dec. 18): Call it gubernatorial generosity or just plain “walkin’ around money.” What do you think?
New York’s election for Governor isn’t until 2026. But you can tell Kathy Hochul is running scared.
On December 9th, the Democratic incumbent announced her “Inflation Refund.” It’s a planned $300 a person—or $500 a couple—giveback to every taxpayer of modest means. She’ll tuck it into next month’s State of the State address. You’d get your check in the fall.
“It’s simple: the cost of living is still too damn high, and New Yorkers deserve a break,” Hochul’s self-serving news release proclaims.
In accountant-speak, the Inflation Refund is highly “progressive.” It’s a one-size-fits-all payment. So the less money you’ve earned, the higher a percentage of your tax burden it becomes. And for singles earning more than $150,000—or couples over $300,000—you wouldn’t get a penny.
The refund’s intended “to help address the impacts of inflation on the cost of everyday goods in the years following the COVID pandemic,” Hochul’s press release claims.
But by any objective standard, New York State is broke and getting broker. The Inflation Refund will cost our treasury some $3 Billion. It could throw us over the edge. Needed services suffer. And all the while, Hochul’s bean-counters hijack the federal Medicaid assistance that counties like ours rightly deserve.
Keep your gimmicky cash, Governor Hochul. To me, it’s filthy lucre. / RL
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Conaway tapped to lead Trumansburg Schools
(Dec. 18): The Trumansburg Central School District will promote from within to fill its soon-to-be-vacated Superintendent’s slot.
In a December 10th news release, the District announced that Megan Conaway, T-Burg’s current High School Principal, will become Superintendent of Schools January 11th, succeeding the retiring Kimberly Bell.
The district’s glowing statement says Conaway “brings a wealth of experience in educational leadership, equity initiatives, and community engagement.”
The release quoted School Board President Megan Williams: “Ms. Conaway’s seven years of experience [at T-Burg Schools] has given her a strong foundation to be able to support current district goals as well as look at ways that we can move the district forward with new and innovative ideas.”
Superintendent-designate Conaway described herself as “beyond excited.”
“I am proud of my tenure at Trumansburg, and I look forward to strengthening partnerships to ensure our students receive the best education in a safe and vibrant community,” Conaway said.
Lily Talcott, now CEO of TST BOCES and until this summer an Assistant Superintendent at Ithaca’s schools, led the Trumansburg search. The search reportedly “sought wide-ranging community feedback,” seeking input from students, families and staff.
The District’s statement did not discuss the candidate field beyond its designee.
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Town Board debates, delays Cargill vote
(Dec. 11): Following a spirited exchange that put Town Supervisor and environmental activist Stephanie Redmond on one side and Councilperson Robert Lynch (this writer) on the other, the Enfield Town Board Wednesday postponed action for a month on calling upon state regulators to heighten review of Cargill’s renewal and modification of a Reclamation permit for its salt mine under Cayuga Lake.
Delay came after Lynch accused Redmond of holding a conflict of interest, as she draws a salary from Cayuga Lake Environmental Action Now (CLEAN), a group that’s already taken a stand against Cargill.
Had Redmond recused herself, and with another Councilperson absent, the Enfield Board would have had one vote too few for the measure to pass.
“Significant concerns have been raised regarding the adequacy of Cargill’s application,” the proposed Resolution before Enfield lawmakers stated. It said the company’s proposal to flood an underground zone “raises serious questions about the safety and environmental integrity of Cayuga Lake.”
State regulators have issued a “Negative Declaration,” concluding that a full-blown Environmental Impact Statement isn’t needed. Groups like CLEAN disagree.
Lynch warned that putting too much pressure on Cargill could force the mine to close and cost more than 200 people their jobs.
Redmond countered that the Lansing mine is being sold, and that the buyer may shutter it anyway, leaving the employees both jobless and with few benefits.
Delaying its vote for a month could allow the excused Enfield Board member to return and provide the one vote needed for passage.
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If you build it…
(Dec. 10): On November 25, Tompkins County opened its new, state-mandated “Code Blue” shelter at Tioga and Buffalo Streets to warm the homeless on cold nights. Early on the morning of December 2, at the end of a cold night, a homeless man died while sleeping outdoors just one block away from that shelter. He may have frozen to death.
Roland Hoyt was 60. Suffering from mental illness, he’d been unhoused for two years. There’s no evidence of drug or alcohol abuse. Best information says cold temperatures contributed to Hoyt’s death. Media reports indicate that when Hoyt reached the hospital, staff tried to raise his body temperature, but failed.
This death didn’t have to happen. We in Tompkins County are spending hundreds of thousands, likely millions of dollars to renovate and staff-up the interim Code Blue shelter. We’ll spend millions more to build a more permanent shelter on Cherry street to harbor up to 100 of the unhoused at a time.
But the unspoken question is whether if we build shelter housing, the homeless will come… and choose to use it. Whether Roland Hoyt tried to visit the Code Blue shelter that night, County officials won’t comment.
Roland Hoyt, of course, cannot be asked about what went wrong. But the people who represent us… and spend our money… can be asked. And ask them we should. / RL
Much talk; little change
(Dec. 4): After a long… long… executive session—more than two-and-a-half-hours—with Commissioners seen animated at times behind their closed, windowed doors, the Enfield Board of Fire Commissioners Tuesday approved revised leadership standards for the Fire District’s line officers, from Fire Chief on down.
“It’s a little bit more training,” Board Chair Greg Stevenson summarized the changes after the meeting had ended. Stevenson conceded it’s a “delicate balance” between demanding more proficiency from those who command the firefighting force, and not placing demands so high that members don’t volunteer.
The Board of Fire Commissioners’ vote was four-to-one. Chris Willis dissented on both the final package of requirements and on considering the standards collectively, rather than officer-by-officer.
Willis gave no explanation for his dissents. And no one on the Board explained why with so few changes, the closed discussion took so much time.
The Enfield Fire Chief, unlike others in leadership, requires five years of line officer service with Enfield’s Fire Company. But that’s been a requirement since at least 2020.
The Enfield Volunteer Fire Company nominates its line officers December 5th. Fire Commissioners consent to the selections come January.
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Willis-Gunning Rematch
(Dec. 1): This year, unlike last, Enfield voters will have just one Fire Commissioner, not five, to elect in the Enfield Fire District’s December 10th election. But just like last year, two of the same candidates will be running.
Fire District Secretary Alexis Beckley confirms that incumbent Chris Willis has filed to lengthen his current one-year term of office by five additional years. Opposing Willis will be Donald Gunning, whom Willis beat by only two votes last December. No other candidates sought the post of Fire Commissioner this year.
As was the case in 2023, this month’s contest could put Fire District finances at center stage. Willis is a member of the Enfield Volunteer Fire Company. And Willis voted this October for a 2025 District Budget that will raise spending by more than 28 per cent.
Donald Gunning, by contrast, is a long-time critic of fire service spending. And in a campaign statement mailed Enfield residents, his supporters cite that double-digit increase.
“It’s time to elect a new Fire Commissioner to help rein in future Fire District costs and residents’ taxes,” the three-paragraph flyer states.
Polls at the Enfield Fire station will be open Dec. 10th from 3PM-9PM. There’s no opportunity to vote absentee. No word yet on any pre-election debate.
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Fracktivist faults Webb-Kelles bill
(Dec. 1): This is truly an odd one. It’s as though an imposter had written it. But apparently not.
Ithaca-based anti-fracking activist Walter Hang—who actually hosted a fundraiser for Assemblymember Anna Kelles long ago—is now urging Governor Hochul NOT to sign a supposed frack-hostile bill that both Kelles and State Senator Lea Webb had sponsored.
The bill, initially heralded by environmental activists and adopted by the State Legislature last March, would expand New York’s statutory fracking ban to also prohibit using carbon dioxide to crack underground shale. But now Hang and his group, Toxics Targeting, assert the bill doesn’t go far enough.
In a blast email to his supporters Nov. 26, Hang stated, “[T]he bill clearly does not include carbon dioxide in the definition of High-Volume Hydraulic Fracturing. This makes zero sense,” (emphasis added).
Hang labels a Kelles news release touting the bill’s passage as “inaccurate, misleading, and irresponsible.” And he fears it may not have the strength to stop frack-friendly Donald Trump from overriding New York’s current prohibitions.
“We must not allow public interest groups to provide political cover for a horrifically weak bill that cannot 100% stop carbon dioxide shale fracking proposed throughout New York’s Southern Tier,” Hang asserts. “That plan was announced a year ago and is still alive.”
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