Archive: News

	The Village of Lansing election is scheduled for April 22 at the Oakcrest Road Firehouse.  Two seats are open: John O'Neill is running for a third term as Village trustee, and Julia Ann Kilgore Baker is running to fill the seat to be vacated by Trustee Frank Moore.  This week the Lansing Star spoke to O'Neill about his candadacy, and next week we'll feature an interview with Baker.

On April 22 John O'Neill will almost certainly be reelected for a third term as Village of Lansing Trustee.  He is running unopposed for his seat, which he has held for two thirds of the six years he has lived with his wife Germaine in the Village of Lansing.  He has two sons, one in San Francisco, and another in this area, and a step daughter in New York City.  O'Neill works from his home as a consultant for the Federal Highway Administration's technology exchange program.  He coordinates the international visits for transportation engineers from all over the state, and his job involves a good deal of travel, which he says he enjoys.


In his second term in particular, O'Neill took on a number of issues residents were concerned about.  The most visible is the deer population control initiative that the Village instituted last year, and a hunt that village officials hope will become an annual event on the sprawling Murray Estates farm starting this year.

O'Neill invited the Lansing Star into his home to talk about why he is running again and his views on the issues facing the Village over the course of his next two year term.

Lansing Star: Why do you want to run for another term?

John O'Neill: I simply enjoy being able to contribute.  It's always a satisfying feeling when you see something being done and you've had a hand in it.  I love politics at this level, because it's there for the people who live around you and you really do know them.

I think the one challenge that everybody on the Board of Trustees and the Planning Board sees somewhere over the horizon -- but nobody is sure how far the horizon is from here -- is the build out and development of what is called Murray Estates.  That may or may not be a crisis.

LS: In some ways the Village is just the little engine that chugs along.  I haven't noticed any big crises.  The board of Trustees and the Mayor deals with things as they come along, without a lot of strife.  But every community has challenges.  What do you see as the key challenges in the Village now and in the next two years?

JO: I think the one challenge that everybody on the Board of Trustees and the Planning Board sees somewhere over the horizon -- but nobody is sure how far the horizon is from here -- is the build out and development of what is called Murray Estates (the large parcel also known as Sundowns Farm).  That may or may not be a crisis.  It will certainly be a lot of work that will require a tremendous amount of attention.

The Village has a dichotomy going here.  You have a lot of people who like the sound of the word 'Village,' yet we've got all the makings, either by plan or by accident, of a small town.  The danger of development overtaking our character as a village bothers a lot of people.  We rather like the quietude.


There's a fine collegial atmosphere in the way the Village works, and we don't want to lose that either.  Like you say, it chugs along without any controversy.  Problems are addressed.  But potential problems with a future build out is the main thing that everyone has on their mind.

LS: I think most people assume that build out will happen.  Are you talking about that inevitability or the form it will take?

JO: The form that it will take.  The most attractive thing would be a large housing development that might have a mix or levels of housing available to people.  It would be planned carefully, allowing for as much recreation and green space as possible.  It could be a clustering effect, or simply a very nice design that many developers across the eastern seaboard are doing right now.

LS: You definitely want to keep that beautiful pond.

JO: Oh there's the pond, there's a gorge there.  We have a few other parcels in the Village, but very few that will be looking at some sort of development.  You've noticed some parcels along Triphammer have not been developed.  They seem like prime territory, but maybe not quite the level of economic buzz to attract anything coming in right now.

LS: Is Murray Estates zoned for residential?

JO: It is, for medium density.

LS: Does that mean that businesses would be prevented from building there?

JO: No, any of the zoning that is in place can be reconsidered, but it would take a lot of discussion.  It's quite a lot of acreage -- it's 390 acres.  There are many parts of it that could be approached in different ways.

LS: (Trustee) Lynn Leopold talked about village identity before Triphammer was rebuilt.  Ironically the Village was formed at least in part as a reaction against having this mall sprout up.  What we would have to consider the village center is too sprawled out to be a real center.  Even with the new sidewalks it's a big piece of real estate without a focal point.

JO: Yes, there is no focal point in the sense of the old Americana version of a village.

LS: It seems to me, just thinking about what you were saying before about Murray Estates, that if the Village wanted to pursue an identifiable village square, this property presents that opportunity, because in a way it's a blank slate right now.

JO: Of course the property rights of the owner allow him to mark on that slate as he wishes and the Planning Board allows.  The idea of speaking to him about the possibility of thinking about a village center is interesting.  I don't believe anybody has really thought of that yet.  Most of the concentration has gone to preserving as much of the green space and natural beauty as possible.

The danger of development overtaking our character as a village bothers a lot of people.  We rather like the quietude.

LS: Right, and I'm not suggesting that I think all of that property should be business.  Most of it will probably be residential.  What I'm saying is that when you have a space that large in a municipality this small, opportunities arise.

JO: That's an interesting point.  To the best of my knowledge nobody has given that thought.  It might be worthwhile in the near future to give it some thought.

LS: There are other things to do with village identity.  Certainly the Triphammer reconstruction in my opinion did help to define that identity.  The sidewalks, the lighting fixtures... they definitely give that strip a character that it didn't have before.

JO: Yes.

LS: Another thing -- and this is my pet peeve -- the Town of Lansing, including the Village, is divided into five different ZIP codes.  If it were possible for the Village to get its own ZIP code would you support that?

JO: I don't see anything that would make me object to it.  Of course the elephantine bureaucracy called 'The Post Office' would have all sorts of boundary decisions, route decisions.

I really appreciate that Triphammer Road creates not a center, but at least an axis that gives us some identity.  Everyone knows it's a different part of the Ithaca area.  They know that.

LS: I talked to the Postmaster about it.  There are two issues.  One is that when you have a large number of people changing addresses you worry about the switchover.

JO: Business stationary, etcetera, etcetera...

LS: Right.  But he brought up something that hadn't occurred to me, that some people might like the cachet of having an Ithaca address.  And that was one of the things Lynn Leopold said was a negative, that some people in the Village have that Ithaca address and don't even realize that they live in the Village.

JO: I would say the vast majority don't realize they are part of a village.  Although we send out flyers for elections and newsletters, they don't understand it, because the vast majority are people in the apartments, transient students and people like that.

Sure it's much easier to say 'Ithaca' because that's recognized in many places.  I'm not sure 'Village of Lansing' would get that look of recognition, and that glint of jealosy because Ithaca is pure heaven.  (Laughs)  They just don't know about that 'Ten Square Miles' bumper sticker!

LS: The one that says, 'Ten square miles surrounded by reality...'

JO: (Laughs) I've always wanted to see where that boundary is drawn on our side to make sure we're on the good side of that.

LS: Well, that's where you need that village identity!

JO: That's true!  We need that identity!  Given the fact that the Village was really formed in reaction to what was perceived at the time as uncontrolled development, as opposed to establishing a village which reflects a certain atmosphere.

LS: As I recall when I interviewed you last time you ran you didn't give village identity a high priority.  You said it would be nice, but you didn't think it was important to do a lot to define it.

JO: No, I still don't.  I really appreciate that Triphammer Road creates not a center, but at least an axis that gives us some identity.  Everyone knows it's a different part of the Ithaca area.  They know that.  And if they read the signs at the entrances they'll know the Village of Lansing is somewhere there.

That may be as far as it goes.  Maybe in the far distant future if we get a pot of money we could develop a nicer building for our village office.  But I don't foresee any great focus of attention on that.  It's pretty much a suburban atmosphere where everybody is happy in their small neighborhoods, or happy behind their four walls.


LS: At the risk of getting tedious, I grew up outside of Boston in a city that population-wise is huge compared to our area.  It was divided into several villages, and most of those had a village center pretty well defined.  This is definitely a suburban experience, but I guess how homogenized it becomes is defined by the community itself.

JO: But again, the reason for the founding of the Village was a whole different impetus than the usual founding of a village.  Although we say we're the Village of Lansing, it's a suburb of Ithaca and a part of the Town -- I would be surprised if there would ever be any way to create something like a village center after the fact.

LS: OK, I'll get off my high horse!

JO: (Laughs) You just want to recreate your childhood home, don't you?

LS: Well I don't even live in the village, so I'm just kibbutzing.  (Laughs)

JO: You're here so much we'll have to get you an apartment!

LS: I want to talk about initiatives that you have taken on.  I can name three off the top of my head.  Two of them are going forward, probably more slowly that you would hope, but with some success.  And the third didn't go through.  They are the deer population control initiative and the flooding insurance initiative, and the neighborhood no-soliciting law.

JO: Well the no soliciting law, after a little bit of investigation  -- which I appreciated very much.  Again, I brought it up as a reaction to concern by several residents -- it turns out that it would be a bureaucratic dead end.  If you put up a sign it means nothing if you have no will or ability to enforce it.  And we just don't have that ability.  Since the problem is very random, the will is not there either.

LS: But you did follow up on it.

JO: We all followed up on it.  Our Village Attorney did a little exploration.  Cayuga Heights does have that in place.  Whether they do any enforcement I don't know.

LS: But that village has more enforcement resources than this village does.

JO: Absolutely.  They have a police force.  We don't want to have soliciting vigilantes around the neighborhood!  So that was not going to happen.  But now we know more about it than we did before.

LS: The other two initiatives are moving forward, and you have been the one driving them.

JO: Again all of this is in response to concerns from residents.  The one (where the Village is applying to be part of the) National Flood Insurance program turns out to have been of high interest to a lot of people.  The nuances of the insurance are that flood insurance covers rising water.  Well, we always think of rain as falling, but it's the flow that comes into your basement.  Anybody that's had that lovely experience knows it's horrible to see that water rising down there.

We have a good number of residents who would be interested in carrying flood insurance.  At the present time since we are not part of the National Flood Insurance program they can not.

LS: This came from one guy originally, right?

JO: Originally it came from one of my neighbors.  I promised him I would follow up on it, and have done so.  Albany has presented us with a model law.  One would think it would be a very simple, straightforward thing.  But it's 40 pages of red tape!  So our devoted lawyer is going through the 40 pages and cutting the red tape and putting it into the right place.  So it will happen.  It's just one of those glacial-paced bureaucratic processes that governments are famous for.

LS: Deer population control is pretty much in place now except for the agreement with the landowner where the hunt would take place.

JO: I've been in contact with him this Spring.  We're going to be meeting some time in the early summer and get that moving again.  He had some very reasonable concerns.  Not objections, just concerns.  I found ways to answer most of those concerns, and he is quite willing to pursue it as long as we address his concerns.

So I think this coming Fall the program will be in place.  We had one landowner who actually did use the program and was able to remove some number of deer.  I was doing the math -- if each of those deer is a doe, that's three less deer on that property this Spring.

That program will get back on its feet and something will start happening this Fall.

LS: There has been pretty much no movement on the new fire station for the Village.  My understanding is that more than 50% of the emergency calls to the Lansing Fire Department come from the Village.  How important do you think it is to get that moving?

JO: There are two facets to that.  One is that the push by the Lansing Fire District for an enlarged firehouse in this area really has to do with the mandates that are coming from the federal and state governments.  It's not simply the fact that the volunteer firemen are first responders.  Now they are supposed to get a lot more training, they're supposed to have a lot more very expensive equipment on hand.  Of course the logic is to have it on hand closer to the mall area and all these apartments, which I think are basically tinderboxes, all wood structures.

LS: The current fire station isn't big enough to hold that mandated equipment?

JO: No, they had an architect look at it and it's not big enough.  Following all the mandates, the territory on which the current firehouse is situated is not big enough.  So they need to put it on a larger piece of territory. 

The last time we had any serious conversation it was going to cost a little over two million.  With inflation I'm sure it's over three by now.  As the school district is aware, and everybody is aware, it's getting harder and harder to find money to do these projects.

LS: You know, I don't think money will be their problem, because they are amazing planners.  And they have about a half a fire station socked away in their bank account.  So the tax rise to fund it wouldn't be that much.

JO: That's what they said, that it wouldn't be that much.  But these mandates have to be answered and they're logical.

LS: From a Village standpoint I haven't really heard anybody talk about this.  Have there been any complaints about response time?

JO: No, none whatsoever.  But it's like everything else -- the great accident has not happened yet.  Or the great firee of 2000-whatever.  Of course these things take a disaster before they get our full attention.  Our biggest fear is that some fuel truck on Route 13 could go up in flames.  I shudder to think about something like that happening here, because our first respnders out of this (Oakcrest Road) station would not have the equipment.  The Central Station has the equipment, but that's another ten minutes away.

That's a worst case scenario and I'm hoping that will never, never come to pass.

LS: The one party system in the Village seems almost anti-democratic.  It appears as if a group of people here decide who is going to run the Village, and they are elevated to the Board of Trustees.  They go through an election, but there is no contest.  Is that the best way to decide on leadership here?

There are about 100 members of the Community Party.  People sit and analyze -- we express differing opinions whenever necessary.  But it doesn't break into arguments and it doesn't break down the mechanism.

JO: In the environment that we find ourselves in here, it works.  Opposition is not a problem.  The loyal opposition always makes people think a little bit harder, and solutions come a bit better.  But what we have here I think is the Cornellian effect:  it's a very collegial atmosphere.  And it's ecumenical.  We have Republicans and Democrats.  I'm registered as a Liberal.

The point is that it is a group.  There are about 100 members of the Community Party.  We are constantly trying to encourage other people to join the party, with little effect simply because the way this system is working, seems to be working very well.  People sit and analyze -- we express differing opinions whenever necessary.  But it doesn't break into arguments and it doesn't break down the mechanism.

I think basically that the residents who are aware of the Village workings are content.  Because it works in this environment.  I do not believe it would work in much larger environments, simply because you would end up having these different opinions.

One of the peculiarities of the Village, of course, is that the vast majority of residents are the apartment dwellers.  They're students, they're transients, here for up to two years.  They're concentrating on their programs, and they're not concentrating on their environment.  It's just a place to live.  So that's a peculiarity of our village.  Given that this system is working quite well.

If issues were to come up, I think very quickly -- we have a lot of very smart people in the Village and I'm sure opposition would spring up if necessary.  But in the meantime both of the boards are working very hard to be extremely conscientious to make sure that whatever issues come up and whatever problems need to be solved are solved in the most logical manner.

It's worked so far.

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