News Briefs:
Major EMS Upgrade Advanced
(May 26): The cost of Tompkins County’s Rapid Medical Response (RMR) service would grow more than five-fold under an ambitious expansion plan Tompkins’ Department of Emergency Response (DOER) will present to a County legislative committee Tuesday.
The heretofore undisclosed plan—called an “EMS Strategic Vision” and attached to the Public Safety Committee’s agenda—proposes that the two-year old RMR service, created to assist volunteer rescue squads in filling daytime staffing gaps, be expanded in both size and scope.
DOER’s proposal would purchase three ambulances, each priced at $150,000, to supplement the trio of pickups and SUV’s now in use.
RMR would quadruple its staff to 24, a mix of full-and part-time paramedics and EMT’s under various staffing plans. The service would expand from just Basic Life Support (BLS) to include Advanced Life Support (ALS) as well. One ambulance would run 24/7.
But it’s the cost that could cause jaws to drop. RMR’s projected annual expense would rise from its current $546,828 to just over $3 Million.
DOER’s proposal—which it’s possible was never intended for advance release—declines to list a start-up date for the expansion, but the text implies it could be as soon as 2026.
Most importantly, the proposal doesn’t indicate who would pay for the expansion—or how.
(Note: A prior posting had erroneously indicated that the proposal had arisen from a consultant, not a County department.)
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Fire District Treasurer Tapped
(May 21): The Enfield Board of Fire Commissioners has named its new Treasurer.
The Board unanimously appointed Jenna Oplinger as Treasurer May 20th. Oplinger succeeds Cortney Bailey, who’d announced her resignation in mid-April, Bailey citing personal obligations. Bailey has served since the Enfield Fire District’s establishment in August 2023.
A Lansing native, Oplinger now lives n Enfield and became a member of the Enfield Volunteer Fire Company last September. She presently performs financial work for Koskinen’s Towing. Her experience also includes serving as a bank teller.
“Thank you for stepping up,” Commissioner Robyn Wishna said after the board took its vote.
There’ll be a smooth transition. The board will hold the treasurer’s salary at $5,000 per year. But the board authorized Bailey and Oplinger to serve together during the month of June, the Enfield Fire District paying its newly-hired officer one-twelfth of her eventual annual salary during the overlap.
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The “Three Sisters” of ECC
(May 24): We’re told that just about every country school once had them. This year, the Enfield Community Council (ECC) will plant one.
Martha Fischer, until recently an Enfield resident, briefed the ECC Board meeting May 22 on efforts to plant a “Three Sisters Garden” on a small, fenced-in plot behind ECC’s Community Center.
For those unfamiliar, the “sisters” are corn, pole beans, and squash. The beans grow up the corn stalks. The squash vines choke out the weeds. You get the picture.
Fischer said the garden has roots in Native-American heritage. “Ancestral seeds” will be provided for planting, she said. To keep with tradition, Fischer lays her hand on the ground and plants three corn seeds about the fingers. The bean seeds go in later. The squash is planted three feet away.
“I’m fascinated by three seeds together,” ECC’s Debbie Teeter remarked. “Corn and beans use different nutrients,” ECC President Cortney Bailey interjected.
Fischer said that at harvest, heritage holds that one third of the crop is left for deer, one-third consumed by humans, and the remaining third retained for next year’s planting.
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Tompkins, like Towns, Rebukes Trump
(May 20): By a nine-to-three party-line vote, the Tompkins County Legislature Tuesday followed the lead of both Enfield and Lansing and messaged state and federal leaders to press the Trump Administration to obey the Constitution and follow the rule of law.
“There has definitely been a call from our local constituents to make sure that we’re not silent in this time,” legislator Shawna Black said in introducing a resolution remarkably similar, though somewhat more concise, to one first adopted by the Lansing Town Board April 16, and then affirmed by the Enfield Town Board May 14.
Like the towns’ pleadings, Tompkins County’s version faults the Trump Administration’s deportation policies, its “disregard for judicial authority,” and its targeting of individuals for exercising free speech rights.
Legislator Deborah Dawson, a Democrat, urged action to “oppose the Administration’s attempts to undermine the constitutional order and basically shred our constitutional form of government.”
The Legislature’s three Republicans each opposed the anti-Trump resolution. Mike Sigler called it “a dangerous ploy” designed to “question other legislators’ intent.”
Newfield’s Randy Brown seized the moment to credit the current President for reversing what Brown saw as Joe Biden’s harmful policies and praised Trump’s efforts to “stop these ugly wars.”
“For that reason, I do support Donald Trump and his Administration,” Brown said.
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Seven Candidates; Seven Questions
(May 20): In their only pre-election debate, the three incumbents and four challengers competing for four seats on the Ithaca Board of Education answered seven, pre-scripted questions May 15 at BJM Elementary School.
The two-hour forum produced no break-out moments or gaffes. The closest to the latter came when candidate Madeline Cardona said she was “not fully educated” on the school district’s proposed $169 Million budget and could not say whether or not she’d support it.
“I think we can do a better as a district with the budget we have,” candidate David McMurry said, while still supporting the spending package.
McMurry, Jacob Shiffrin, and Scott Jahnke are running in the May 20th election as a reform slate.
“We need a change now; we need to see that the community gets what it needs,” Jahnke told the forum’s 30 or so attendees.
Some questions were softballs. (“Why are you running?) Others were tougher (Will New York’s cell phone ban make students less safe?) The final question blindsided some, though not others.
Should 16-year-olds vote in school elections, the moderator asked?
“Yes, 100 times yes,” incumbent Erin Croyle answered.
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Inspiration on Display
(May 12): With creative names like “Party Wall,” “The Communal Porch,” and “Hugs,” as many as 23 varying design concepts for a new, stand-alone Enfield Food Pantry were placed on display behind the Enfield Courthouse Saturday, May 10.
Cornell Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Engineering students collaborated in 30 or more teams this semester to envision designs for the new Pantry, one which Enfield Food Distribution would construct on land it purchased, with Town assistance, at Bostwick and Teeter Roads.
Pantry director Jean Owens said she hopes to build the new facility within two to five years. Construction depends on grant funding. The project would include not just a distribution center, but also a test kitchen, classrooms and a community garden.
Designs displayed on separate panels hung outdoors Saturday demonstrated creativity, if at times revealing a drift away from practicality. But that’s what academic instructors probably encouraged.
How will the best design—or a design combination of them—get chosen?
“I’ll sit under a tree with no distractions,” Owens said.
Expect a compilation of the designs to eventually find its way to a book in the Town Clerk’s Office.
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Odd-to-Even Election Law Upheld (for now)
Update (May 10): Media reports indicate that Republicans, as expected, have appealed the mid-level appellate court decision to the state’s Highest Court, the Court of Appeals. That Court must decide whether or not to take the case.
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(May 9): With “Rocket-Docket” speed, a five-judge mid-level New York appellate court has reversed a lower judge’s decision and allowed a politically-driven change in election law to take hold this year. It would move elections for most local upstate offices from odd-numbered years to even years, those when the President and Governor stand for office.
In Enfield, the holding means that contrary to voters’ decision last year to extend the terms of three key Town offices from two years to four, those elected this fall for Supervisor, Town Clerk and Highway Superintendent would serve just three years during this first election cycle.
Four-year terms for those elected to Town Councilperson and Tompkins County Legislature would similarly shorten in this year’s elections.
Court appeals usually proceed at a snail’s pace. This one did not. Five judges for the Appellate Division, Fourth Department, heard arguments Tuesday, May 6th. They rendered their unanimous decision the next day, Wednesday, the seventh.
The Democratic-controlled New York Legislature enacted the change in June 2023. Governor Hochul signed it later that year. But Republicans successfully challenged the law, obtaining a lower court ruling last October that it violated New York’s Constitution.
Wednesday’s appellate ruling overruled the lower court.
This is a “Big win for Democracy,” State Senator James Skoufis, a Democrat, said of the latest ruling, upholding the law he’d sponsored.
Republicans claim the change favors Democrats, whose voters more often turn out for even-year elections.
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Enfield “Survives” Community Slope Day
(May 9): As has been well-reported elsewhere, Cornell students celebrated two “Slope Day” end-of-semester celebrations May 7th, one of them in Enfield.
And despite some pre-event neighborhood jitters suggesting that the “Community Slope Day” event at Porter Hill Road’s Stone Bend Farm might get out of hand, media photos from the event confirm it didn’t.
In contrast with the University-sponsored party on Cornell’s Libe Slope, a concert featuring national headline acts, the Stone Bend Farm alternative invited only local bands. Attendance appeared no greater than for a large-guest wedding.
That said, neighbors may have a point. One has told of cars lining Porter Hill Road that day, and music heard as far as a mile away.
With Stone Bend Farm, the Treman Center and Pine Creek Campground all in close proximity, residents in the area have good cause to urge some sort of noise-limiting ordinance. They should bring their concerns to the Enfield Town Board, and we who govern should listen.
But worst fears were allayed Wednesday. To students who attended Community Slope Day, Enfield proved inviting. / RL
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Protest Limit Law Loses
(May 7): Rich John, a Cornell professor, is also a Tompkins County legislator. And at his committee’s urging, the full Legislature considered Tuesday night a cautiously-worded “Resolution in Support of Responsible Public Protest” to guide citizen behavior. The Legislature rejected it.
“While we want to encourage people to express their opinions, we want people to do it responsibly and to the acknowledgement that they live in a community,” John said. “If you’re going to violate the law, you should expect consequences.”
John and four others supported the resolution. Seven opposed it.
“I’m just not sure that we need to reestablish what the laws are,” Shawna Black said before voting no. “People are really pissed right now, and I think that they need a way to express themselves.”
“We are not in normal times,” Amanda Champion said in agreement. Some who demonstrate may “uproot the status quo and challenge the law,” Champion argued, “and I don’t believe that it is my place or responsibility, even as an elected leader, to tell others how to exercise that right.”
The nine-paragraph resolution carried few specifics. It deferred to protest guidelines set by the City of Ithaca and the Sheriff’s Department. It would have discouraged “dangerous and illegal activities… including acts of violence, vandalism, and intentional obstruction of traffic.”
Both of Enfield’s legislators, Anne Koreman and Randy Brown, opposed the resolution, as did Legislature Chair Dan Klein.
“I don’t like weighing in on things that are beyond our purview,” Klein said.
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TC Highway’s Smith to Retire
(May 7): Yet another top-level Tompkins County department head is stepping aside, leaving administrators scrambling to find successors.
Highway Director Jeff Smith will retire later this year, Facilities and Infrastructure Committee Chair Lee Shurtleff disclosed in his report to the Tompkins County Legislature Tuesday.
“If anybody in County Government ever exemplified a public servant that ascribed to the principles of interdepartmental and intergovernmental cooperation, Jeff was one of those people, and we’re going to miss him,” Shurtleff told the Legislature.
Shurtleff did not reveal Smith’s exact retirement date.
The Highway Director is but the latest in a string of top-level departures this year. County Whole Health Director Frank Kruppa has left to join the local hospital corporation. Social Services Commissioner Kip Kephart and Finance Director Lorrie Scarrott have also announced planned retirements.
County Administrator Korsah Akumfi told the Legislature he plans to fill some of those vacancies as soon as June.
Jeff Smith’s department oversees 302 miles of County-maintained roadways and 106 bridges. It spends about $6 Million annually for their upkeep.
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Danby’s Ho-Hum Hearing
(May 5): It was newsworthy; covered as a possible dress rehearsal for a Public Hearing set for Enfield nine days later. But it may have proven a bad example.
The Danby Town Board May 5 convened its hearing into a Flood Damage Prevention Law, a state-written document nearly word-for-word the same as a new law Enfield’s Town Board will consider May 14.
The problem is, no one in Danby spoke at the hearing.
More than an hour later, after 17 minutes of non-controversial questioning, the Danby Town Board approved the flood law 5-0.
An ambitious presentation by seven Cornell design students to transform the late Rick Dobson’s one-time salvage yard got far more time and attention.
Monday’s Danby session could be a poor predictor because in Enfield citizen objections to the flood law have already surfaced. Critics charge the flood plain development restrictions smack of zoning.
Danby, unlike Enfield, already has a zoning law. And also unlike Enfield, Danby Planner Greg Hutnik—who doubles as Enfield’s Deputy Supervisor—says affected Danby landowners were not notified.
Danby’s flood plain, Hutnik says, runs along Buttermilk Creek and near Jennings Pond, each close to the Danby hamlet. It encompasses 17 buildings, perhaps ten of them homes. Enfield’s flood zone includes perhaps 20 dwellings. Many are mobile homes in the Sandy Creek Park.
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Seven Vie for ICSD Board
(May 2): All three seated incumbents, plus four newcomers will vie for four positions on the Ithaca City School District (ICSD) Board of Education in the May 20th annual election.
Candidate petitioning ended with the month of April. And incumbents Erin Croyle, Jill Tripp and Karen Yearwood all qualified for the ballot. Joining them are newcomers Scott Jahnke, Madeline Cardona, David McMurry, and Jacob Shiffrin. None of those new to the race have competed in recent years.
A fourth seat on the board falls open because member Katie Apker resigned last August.
Remaining members deadlocked last September on appointing an interim replacement for Apker and defaulted to leaving the seat vacant until the annual election.
Perhaps surprising, neither of two incumbents who lost in last year’s high-turnout, taxpayer-skewed election—the long-tenured Moira Lang or Eldred Harris—filed for this year’s balloting. Lang, last year’s first runner-up, had been moved to fill the Apker vacancy, but failed to secure a board majority.
The ICSD promises to post candidate bios on its website soon.
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Should ICSD “Sniff” Your Kid?
(May 1): To some, it sounds a lot like “Big Brother.” And by a long shot, it could come to your Ithaca school… but more likely not.
In what seemed all-too-much like a class project, four current or graduated Cornell students presented to an Ithaca Board of Education committee April 22 a proposal to install electronic vaping detectors at Ithaca High as well as at Boynton and DeWitt Middle Schools.
The detectors, however many of them, could cost up to $1,000 each. They’d mostly be in bathrooms.
“They’ll send an email or text message to school officials each time that vape smoke is detected,” “Ishetta,” a Cornell Senior, told the Facilities Committee.
“School administrators and teachers have to repeatedly take time out of their day to monitor and police student vaping activity,” “Lauren,” a future law student, said.
Vape detectors were tried in Lincoln, Nebraska schools, reportedly with some success. E-cigarette settlement money paid for them.
But nowhere in the ten-minute, mostly scripted student presentation were civil liberties ever referenced. Nor that the monitors can quickly poison the student-teacher bond. Nor that, according to NPR, a student’s spray deodorant once set a vape detector off.
“We’ll fold this in with all the other data that we’re gathering,” committee chair Jill Tripp told the students in perhaps the politest of brushoffs. Colleague Karen Yearwood suggested the Cornelians should have talked to administrators first.
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Rockwell Cutting Resumes
(May 1): Those who thought the Enfield Highway Department had finished its much-maligned tree cutting along Rockwell Road with the end of last year were proven wrong this week. Rockwell’s aggressive pruning has resumed.
Highway Superintendent Barry “Buddy” Rollins has now targeted the road’s east end. And he’s left some residents angry:
“Last Fall Buddy said he was going to cut down three sugar maples, all 100+ years old, along Rockwell Rd near the campground,” one resident wrote on a neighborhood listserv.
“He cut down the three last fall and said that would be it,” the writer continued. “As of today he has cut down a total of nine trees, clearing all road side shade off the corner of Rockwell Rd and Hines.”
Complaints about Rockwell’s tree cutting prompted heated exchanges between neighbors and Town officials at several meetings during 2024.
Rollins, for his part, defends his practice on grounds it keeps motorists safe and that pavement open to the sky helps melt wintertime snow.
Rollins has said he also plans to prune trees along Van Dorn and Colegrove Roads this year in connection with road improvements there.
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