News Briefs:
Tax Cap Override Retry
(July 31): Tompkins County legislator Deborah Dawson, a reliable budget hawk, was out of the country for several meetings last spring and this summer. And because she was, a customarily-routine annual Resolution to permit next year’s County budget to override the New York State Tax Cap failed for lack of a supermajority.
Now Dawson’s back. And Tuesday, August 6th she’ll ask the Legislature for “Renewal” of its June 4th override measure. If successful, and if all her allies attend the meeting, she’d cast the ninth deciding vote to put the override over the top.
But she may have a fight. First, a bipartisan coalition that joined Dryden Democrat Greg Mezey with Lansing Republican Mike Sigler nixed the override two months ago.
“The public is 100 per cent against this,” Sigler said of the override. Mezey argued the County could tap its estimated $30 Million fund balance to keep property taxes within the cap.
And there’s a parliamentary question. We were told at the time that reconsideration could come only at the Legislature’s next meeting, not now. Dawson may be attempting an end-run around that rule.
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Verba Exit may signal discord
(July 30): People take pay cuts for good reasons. And no doubt, Amanda Verba has hers.
In a decision that scores a major win for Trumansburg’s Central Schools, but provides a troubling commentary on where Ithaca’s education stands, the Ithaca Times reported this week that Amanda Verba, the departing Chief Operations Officer for the Ithaca City School District, has been hired by Trumansburg as School Business Executive. She’ll start work in September.
The Verba hire was made remarkably low-key, considering its stature. Her appointment was buried in a unanimously-adopted “consent agenda” during the school board’s mid-July organizational meeting. Her name was never mentioned. The matter got no discussion. Neither Verba, Trumansburg, nor Ithaca Schools officials chose to comment on the administrator’s transition.
At ICSD, we’re told Amanda Verba most recently earned $182,402 annually. The Times reports Verba’s Trumansburg salary will be only $146,286 next school year, a $36,000 cut.
Whatever the reason for Verba’s step downward, the decision bodes poorly for Ithaca, where its Superintendent has time-limited his presence there, the Deputy Superintendent has left, not likely to be replaced, and school board elections last May turned out two incumbents in favor of newcomers with plans for change. / RL
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Void at the Top; Verba resigns ICSD
(July 24): More than one top administrative office will be vacant when Ithaca City School District students return this September.
Amanda Verba, Chief Operations Officer of the District and reportedly its second highest-paid employee, has resigned her position, The Ithaca Voice reported Wednesday. She becomes the second administrator just below School Superintendent Dr. Luvelle Brown to resign this year. Deputy Superintendent Lily Talcott departed the District in June to head the local BOCES.
Amanda Verba did not announce her planned departure. Rather, the publication learned of it through sources. It was unable to contact Verba directly.
“A spokesperson for the district confirmed Verba had ‘notified the Board of Education of her intent to transition out of the Ithaca City School District,’” The Voice reported.
The go-to point-person for this year’s controversial and once-rejected District Budget—and thus a convenient recipient of undeserved blame—Amanda Verba has worked for the ICSD since 2013. She has been “shaping the district’s financial and operational strategies with exceptional skill and dedication,” a District spokesperson stated.
Not only does the freshly-restructured Ithaca Board of Education have Verba’s and Talcott’s positions to fill. It must address Superintendent Brown’s own decision to end his service to the District when his contract expires in 2028.
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Battleground 52nd
(July 24): If New York Republicans hold hopes of recapturing the State Senate—or at least trimming its Democratic supermajority—latest data confirms their path heads through Ithaca and Binghamton and the political success of Mike Sigler.
Money never flows by accident. And recently-released campaign finance data shows the GOP pumping Big Bucks into Sigler’s 52nd District fight against first-term incumbent Democrat Lea Webb.
The Sigler campaign crowed last week when its latest report indicated a four-to-one fundraising advantage over Webb.
During the reporting period, Republican Sigler raised more than $166,000, while Webb raised just under $41,000.
And the Lansing Republican legislator has money in the bank still unspent. Sigler’s campaign reported an account balance of more than $165,000, compared to Webb’s less than $67,000.
“Sigler benefited significantly from the new NYS Public Financing Program, which provides candidates running for Senate and Assembly with the ability to qualify for public matching funds based on small donations from residents in their district,” the Sigler campaign stated.
The 52nd District stands among the most competitive in New York. Two years ago, Webb beat Republican Rich David by just under 2,400 votes of more than 107,000 cast. Webb won only in Tompkins County; David in the other two.
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“Flaco’s Law” may come to Ithaca
(July 24): Remember “Flaco,” the New York City owl released by a vandal from his enclosure last February at the Central Park Zoo , only to later fly into a building and die? It prompted a state effort—never adopted—to “bird-proof” window glass. Now that initiative is coming to Ithaca.
According to The Ithaca Voice, Alderperson Patrick Kuehl has sponsored a proposed Ithaca ordinance that would require all new buildings built in the City to comply with the U.S. Green Building Council’s “LEED” rating system to reduce bird collisions, predominantly through use of “bird-friendly materials.”
Kuehl’s “bird bill… would specifically require that all new buildings applying for a permit present documentation that the building meets the outlined bird-friendly design standards,” The Voice reports.
Ithaca’s proposal would not affect Enfield or other places in Tompkins County. But it would go farther than the state bill Assemblymember Anna Kelles had sponsored. Hers would have only impacted buildings built or leased by State Government.
Kelles’ measure cleared the State Senate, but died this term in an Assembly committee.
Predictably, experts at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology back Kuehl’s initiative. The Alderperson plans a June 27th forum at Kendal at Ithaca before bringing his measure to a vote.
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Tompkins County’s Next Big Thing?
(July 24): You could be excused for thinking members were talking in code for more than a half-hour near the end of the Tompkins County Legislature’s July 16 meeting.
They were pondering the little-discussed potential sale of their Human Services Annex to an “LDC,” letters they never thought to define.
Moreover, they adopted two seemingly-conflicting resolutions, one of which was in their “red folders,” hidden that night from the public.
Indeed, you had to retrieve a long-forgotten April posting in The Ithaca Voice to gain context.
It seems a “Local Development Corporation”—there; that’s the “LDC”—with former Downtown Ithaca Alliance Executive Director Gary Ferguson its driving force, and developer Mack Travis by his side, has its eye on the Human Services Annex, its adjacent County employee parking lot, and other privately-owned parcels on so-called “Block 14. ” (Yes, more code.)
Whatever Ferguson, Travis, and whoever else want to do remains unclear: maybe some kind of “mixed use” including senior housing, possibly a bus station. Details aren’t known right now.
By one 8-5 vote, the Legislature resolved the block “is not for sale at this time.” But then, by an identical margin, it agreed to “cooperate with the LDC in its pre-development work.”
“Whenever I hear ‘Let developers be developers,’ those words make me nervous,” legislator Shawna Black remarked.
Yes, to some, this whole thing suddenly has a stench about it; the stench of big money, political manipulation, and sweetheart transactions followed only by dashed expectations. We’ve smelled that stench before. / RL
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Paving re-do for Enfield Roads
(July 19): How often does this happen these days? A freebie.
Highway Superintendent Barry “Buddy” Rollins informed the Enfield Town Board Wednesday night that three roads resurfaced last year with tar and stone will be resurfaced again in the coming weeks… and at no expense to the Town.
They got “a bad batch of oil,” Rollins said the paving contractor had told him. The work was warranted, so the contractor will come back and do the job right.
The west end of Bostwick Road, as well as Rothermich and West Enfield Center Roads will each receive fresh oil and stone. Rollins said drivers may have noticed that since last year’s oil “didn’t stick,” a lot of the stone has drifted to Bostwick Road’s shoulders since then.
No doubt, somebody will pay for this mistake. Thank goodness, it won’t be Enfield.
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Terms Laws likely to face Enfield voters
(July 18): Nothing said or written at an adjourned Public Hearing Wednesday will likely dissuade a majority of the Enfield Town Board from resubmitting to voters this fall proposals to double the length of future terms for three Town offices.
Aside from comments from Town officials or their spouses, no one spoke publicly at the hearing that law required be held before the Town Board places on the ballot measures essentially identical to those voters rejected in 2021.
Only two comments came in from the general public. Both were in writing and read before the Board. One supported the change. One opposed it.
Former Town Supervisor Jean Owens wrote that she deserves “the right for my vote to be my voice and to have the opportunity to vote for this change.”
Julie Magura of Rockwell Road wrote that “Elected positions are not a right and should not be taken for granted.”
The changes would affect the Enfield offices of Town Supervisor, Town Clerk and Highway Superintendent. Both Highway chief Barry “Buddy” Rollins and Supervisor Stephanie Redmond spoke in favor of longer terms.
It’s likely the Board will vote July 31st to schedule referendums for November.
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Minimum Wage Showdown Delayed
(July 17): Thinking politically, if for no other reason, the lawmaker whose committee backed study into a stand-alone Tompkins County Minimum Wage surprisingly yanked it from the County Legislature’s agenda Tuesday, thereby delaying its consideration for three weeks.
Dryden’s Greg Mezey requested postponement “so that we can have additional experts here to speak on the topic,” experts who, he said, had “scheduling conflicts” Tuesday.
Names weren’t mentioned, but they likely include leaders of the Tompkins County Workers’ Center and Cornell University’s principal labor union, the United Auto Workers. Workers’ Center and UAW activists had lobbied Mezey’s committee for a local Minimum Wage the week before.
But although there was no action, there was comment; namely from this Enfield Councilperson, Robert Lynch:
“It’s a bad thing to think about going it alone,” this Councilperson told legislators. “It’s probably not legal under state law to start with…. But you’re also sending a signal, a bad signal to the small businesses of this community that you really do not matter that much to us.”
“I want to see those businesses… survive,” I said. Former Ithaca mayoral candidate Zach Winn also voiced opposition to setting a higher local wage.
So far, only legislative Democrats have weighed in. Those on the committee each supported the study Resolution. But Republican Mike Sigler has yet to comment. Expect him to criticize it vigorously.
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Restoring the Outage
(July 16): Maybe half of them, but not everybody, will get relief by Midnight from the power outages caused by the destructive thunderstorms that swept through Enfield and the rest of Tompkins County Monday.
In a mid-afternoon conference call with local officials, T. F. Winderl, spokesman for NYSEG’s Ithaca division, said he expects “40 to 50 per cent” of those customers in Tompkins County affected by the Monday evening storm to have their service restored by Midnight Tuesday. Winderl cautioned that another round of storms passing through or later predicted for the area could hamper restoration efforts.
The spokesperson told conferees that as many as 100 “wire-down calls” had been received, as well as 18 reports of broken poles (including, by the way, behind this writer’s house.)
The Tuesday storm left as many as 5,992 customers in the Ithaca area without power, Winderl reported.
As for remedial efforts until full power is restored, the utility spokesperson said NYSEG is arranging for shipments of dry ice and bottled water, distribution details yet to be finalized. In Tompkins County, those supplies will likely be transported to the NYSEG operations center on Route 13 near Etna. As yet, no cooling stations had been established to Winderl’s knowledge.
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Hochul-Delgado Dust-UP
(July 14): A decision by New York Lt. Governor Antonio Delgado to urge President Biden to exit the Presidential race has caused a rift between him and Governor Kathy Hochul. How deep of a rift it is depends upon whom you ask.
Politico reports Governor Hochul was “displeased with Delgado’s surprise show of political independence,” yet she denied that she was “furious” about her second-in command’s urging that Biden withdraw his re-election candidacy.
“Every day we’re talking about people who have a difference of opinion is a day we’re not talking about the existential threat of Donald Trump becoming president,” Hochul said Thursday, two days before former President Trump was wounded at a campaign rally. Hochul firmly wants Biden to stay in the race.
While saying he holds “immense respect and admiration” for President Biden’s commitment to the American people and to democratic ideals, “He can add to his legacy, showing his strength and grace, by ending his campaign and making room for a new leader,” Delgado posted July 10th on social media.
The news site “City and State” quoted an anonymous labor source as saying “Hochul is now ‘furious’ with Delgado,” whether for the urging itself, or that Delgado chose to upstage New York’s top elected leader.
“It’s undermining the governor and makes her look weak,” a different source told Politico.
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Town Board Business Delayed
(July 10): The initial reason was an ongoing Tornado Watch. But as the Enfield Town Board abbreviated its regular July 10th meeting, shoving most of its reports and actions—including a trio of Public Hearings—to a hastily-scheduled July 17th session, it learned of a legal wrinkle that would likely have forced postponement anyway.
The evening’s principal business was the renewed initiative by some Board members to extend future terms-of-office for the Supervisor, Town Clerk, and Highway Superintendent to twice as long as they are now. But an arcane New York law, retrieved by Councilperson Jude Lemke (a lawyer), requires physical or snail-mail service of the proposed local laws to each Board member as long as eight calendar days before their vote. That hadn’t been done. (Email doesn’t count.)
By the time Lemke had discovered the glitch, the weather-conscious Board had already adjourned its hearings for one week—not quite enough time. So, members concluded they’d need to convene yet again, probably on July 31st, if they wanted to vote.
Enfield’s electorate roundly rejected the terms-of-office extensions in 2021. This Councilperson, Robert Lynch, opposes their reconsideration. Yet other Board members stand more sympathetic. / RL
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Post-COVID Mural Unveiled
(July 10): A $9,999 Centers for Disease Control grant funded it. This week, we learned what Tompkins County got for its money.
Tuesday, the Department of Whole Health unveiled the mural it commissioned for the Albany Street side of the Human Services Annex, artistry “commemorating community public health efforts and honoring those who passed away from COVID-19.”
Sadly, the message could be lost on passers-by. While the graphics may be in-your-face, as is the tradition of Ithaca street art, the message is ever-so-subtle, showing a group of candles, a masked nurse in one corner, and most prominently, the portrait of Millicent Clarke-Maynard, a retired local educator.
You’d need to be told. Millicent was among the first older adults who received the COVID-19 vaccine locally.
“The mural captures different visual elements of the COVID-19 pandemic and the Tompkins County community,” Whole Health stated in a news release. “The mural shows people coming together in an uncertain and challenging time for our community.”
Despite the earlier hype, the mural is relatively modest, gracing just one section of the building’s expansive western wall. Mind you, in a few years the Annex may come down after the offices it houses consolidate in a new Center of Government.
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Kelles weighs-in on ICSD Threats
(July 5): Ithaca-area Assemblymember Anna Kelles has commented on the recently-reported death threats and racist messages sent two African-American leaders of the Ithaca City School District.
As disclosed at a June 11th Ithaca Board of Education meeting—and reported here first —Ithaca School Superintendent Dr. Luvelle Brown and School Board President Dr. Sean Eversley Bradwell were sent the vulgar messages after national conservative media picked up ICSD’s “Students of Color Summit,” an event viewed by some on the Right as racially-exclusive government advocacy.
“Whether the voice messages came from people within or outside our local community, they are indicative of a pervasive sickness in our culture, one that we need to face and heal,” Kelles said in a 550-word statement, released June 28th. “This sickness stems from a myopic focus on the ‘me and mine,’ a tribalism that is fundamentally threatened by any kind of otherness,” the Assemblymember added.
Commentators can argue whether Kelles’ verbal intervention carries corrective benefit or fosters community healing when the spokesperson holds only a peripheral link to what occurred. But speak out, Anna Kelles did. And she also urged concerned residents to reach out to groups like “Village at Ithaca,” and “Showing Up for Racial Justice,” organizations seen by some as on the Far Left of the racial debate.
Police have yet to identify the source of the threats made against Doctors Brown and Eversley-Bradwell.
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Enfield EMS Committee Formed
(July 2): Regulation of the Emergency Medical Service (EMS), especially from the New York State Health Department, has become increasing complex. Tuesday night, the Enfield Board of Fire Commissioners responded to that complexity.
At Chairman Greg Stevenson’s initiative, the Board July 2nd established a District EMS Committee. It will draw half its membership from the Board of Commissioners and half from members of the Enfield Volunteer Fire Company (EVFC).
The committee will “help us with compliance and advise us on all matters relating to EMS,” Stevenson said. “The District and the Fire Company will benefit,” Stevenson assured the Board.
Fire Commissioners Robyn Wishna and Alan Teeter were named to the committee. Alexis Comparetta and Ellen Woods will be invited to represent the EVFC.
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ICSD Board struggles to reorganize
(July 1): The newly-reconstituted, more moderate-bending Ithaca Board of Education found it hard to get its house in order Monday. The absence of Todd Fox, likely its most conservative new member, didn’t help.
One person short, the Board agonized through a series of 4-4 tied votes as it tried to pick both a President and Vice-President. A 9 AM meeting that should have been open-and-shut, dragged on until almost Noon.
At the end of three ballots, incumbent Sean Eversley Bradwell emerged to secure another year as Board President. He won 6:2, with Jill Tripp and Adam Krantweiss dissenting.
Tripp, the newfound favorite of fiscal conservatives, was also nominated for Board President. But she failed to secure the needed fifth vote.
Krantweiss became Vice-President. Yet much like Eversley Bradwell, he had to outlast his own tied-vote challenger, Garrick Blalock.
Yes, it’s early. But what emerged Monday was an apparent philosophical and attitudinal divide on this new Ithaca Board of Education. It puts Tripp, Krantweiss, Katie Apker, and newly-elected Emily Workman nearer the center; with Eversley Bradwell, Blalock, Karen Yearwood and Erin Croyle to their left. At least on leadership, that’s how they’ve aligned.
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