Archive: News

As members of Lansing Pathways we feel it is important to respond to Connie Wilcox's public statements characterizing our group in the August 5th and August 12th issues of the Lansing Star.  Like other volunteer organizations in our community, our members are residents who share a common interest and devote our efforts to creating opportunities for the greater good without relying on taxpayer funding.  We've learned that many Lansing citizens share our belief that trails increase the quality of life within the community.  The new Lansing Town Trail which was opened by Pathways this past January is a part of our vision and has been a popular attraction.

We appreciate Ms.Wilcox's past support of Pathways as a town board member.  However, we believe her comments relating to the voting for the town supervisor candidate at the recent Democratic Caucus mischaracterize our Pathways' mission and the work we have done for the community.

As reported in the August 5th issue of the Lansing Star Ms. Wilcox made the following statement when officially announcing her candidacy at a Lansing Fire Commissioner's meeting:   "I have nothing against Kathy Miller," she said.  "She's a very nice person.  She's been on the board for a year and a half, and she is very interested in special interest groups such as the library, the pathways committee... anything that liberally wants to spend money."

In a follow-up letter to the editor in the August 12th issue Ms. Wilcox went on to say:  "I would like to clarify that I am in support of our Community Library and Our Pathways.... I have nothing personal against the 69 people that showed up at the Democrat Caucus, and determined the candidate for Town Supervisor, but unfortunately the majority of them all had two things in common, The Library and Pathways. ...I don’t feel they are focused on the whole town, only what they think is important their corner of the world..."

We don't feel it is appropriate to categorize people based on their volunteer interests or draw unsubstantiated assumptions about the integrity of community volunteers. The facts are:

• The Town Board - including both Connie Wilcox and Kathy Miller - has fully supported Pathways proposals and efforts.  During the past 18 months, the Board has acted unanimously on Pathways matters to:  grant official town committee status, approve plans for developing the new Lansing Town Trail, and resolve that Pathways be involved in planning and developer discussions.
• Citizen groups who are dedicated to various interests within the town provide tremendous benefits for our community.  Just as the town Supervisor and Board members serve community interests, groups like Community Council, Farmers Market, Myers Playground Project (MP3), Pathways and many others work hard to raise funds and improve our town in various ways.
• Pathways members have willingly contributed countless hours of volunteer efforts and expended personal funds to help build the new 2.4 mile community trail, to solicit donations and work with town officials to promote the further development of trail opportunities for the town.  We are diligent to use money wisely and aggressively control costs.  All of this has been done with full disclosure to and cooperation with the Supervisor's office and with endorsement of the Town Board.  While we have received wonderful support of time and energies from the Board, Supervisor’s office, Highway Department, Recreation Department and others, there has been no request for taxpayer dollars from Pathways.
• Only a handful of Pathway members participated in the democratic process at the Caucus and there is no way for anyone to know how they cast their individual votes.  In any case, with those small numbers, they certainly had no impact on the overall results.  Furthermore, Pathways members represent diverse political views and party affiliations.  Our common interest is in promoting community trails and Pathways has not and would not endorse any political candidate.

We wish Ms. Wilcox and other candidates the best in their bids for town supervisor and other elected positions.  And, we trust the upcoming campaign will provide an opportunity for all candidates to discuss their views and demonstrate their leadership abilities.  Our town will continue to benefit from dedicated officials who can create a vision, build consensus, partner with various interest groups within the community and come together to achieve common goals.

More information about Lansing Pathways can be found at: http://lansing-pathways.com/

Respectfully Submitted by the following members of Lansing Pathways:

Dale Baker; Maureen Cowen, Chair; Sue Ruoff, Fundraising Coordinator; Reenie Sansted; Linda Westlake, Fund Coordinator

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