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posticon Great American Outdoors Act Signed

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Washington, DC -- Congressman Tom Reed joined President Donald Trump, Department of Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, and lawmakers from the Senate and House Tuesday for the signing of the 'Great American Outdoors Act'.  Reed co-sponsored the legislation, and the Problem Solvers Caucus, which Reed co-chairs, endorsed the bill in July.

“We care about the preservation and conservation of our country’s natural treasures, landmarks, wildlife, and public lands,” said Representative Tom Reed. “By securing annual funding to eliminate a backlog of maintenance at our national parks and historical sites, this legislation will ensure generations of future Americans will be able to enjoy everything our great nation has to offer. We appreciate the administration’s ongoing leadership on this issue and will continue to fight in a bipartisan manner to protect our environment.”

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posticon Rhode Island Added to NYS Travel Advisory

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Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced Tuesday that an additional state meets the metrics to qualify for the travel advisory requiring individuals who have traveled to New York from those states, all of which have significant community spread, to quarantine for 14 days. The newly-added state is Rhode Island. Delaware and Washington, D.C. have been removed. The quarantine applies to any person arriving from an area with a positive test rate higher than 10 per 100,000 residents over a 7-day rolling average or an area with a 10 percent or higher positivity rate over a 7-day rolling average.

"Our progress in New York is even better than we expected, thanks to the hard work of New Yorkers. Our numbers continue to decline steadily, and for the third straight day in a row, there were no reported deaths in New York City," Cuomo said. "But we must protect that progress, which is why today we are adding another state to our travel advisory. We cannot go back to the hell we experienced just a few months ago - and surging infection rates across the country threaten to bring us back there - so we must all remain vigilant."

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posticon Helming Appointed to Senate Health Committee

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Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt recently announced the appointment of Senator Pam Helming to the Senate Committee on Health. As a member of the Senate Health Committee, Helming will play an integral role in the joint legislative hearings to investigate New York nursing home deaths related to COVID-19.

"It is an honor to be appointed to the Senate Health Committee and I look forward to participating in legislative hearings that will examine what happened in our nursing homes, especially in the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since early this month, I have been calling for an independent investigation into nursing homes. We must use these hearings to learn where the state went wrong in order to prevent a similar situation from occurring in the future. Nursing home residents and their loved ones and friends deserve answers and accountability," Senator Helming said.

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posticon Face Coverings Key to Public Transit Rider Confidence

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The majority of TCAT riders agree with a recently beefed-up state mandate that says that people using public transportation must wear face coverings, a recent survey suggests.  More than 200 people, the majority of whom identified as TCAT riders, responded to an informal online survey TCAT launched in June. The intent of the questionnaire was for TCAT to gauge what safety protocols give riders enough confidence to ride a public bus during the coronavirus pandemic.

In judging each safety measure independently ̶ with one being the most important and six being the least ̶ 133 or 67% gave strict enforcement of the face covering mandate the highest ranking. TCAT has been requiring both riders and bus drivers (unless they are alone while driving) to wear masks or face coverings since April, per an executive order from Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Since that time, TCAT has supplied drivers with masks to hand out to riders in need, but strongly encourages customers to bring their own in case supplies are depleted.

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posticon Village Sewer Extension Held Up By Landowners

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Cayuga Heights Road

Village of Lansing Mayor Donald Hartill reported Monday that unsigned easements for a new sewer extension are holding up construction.  The project would bring sewer along Cayuga Heights Road in the Village, and also make Sewer District #1 possible in the Town of Lansing.

"The thing that is still a challenge is getting the necessary easements," Hartill said. "We have six that have not been signed yet, of the 14 for the sewer extension, uh, along 34 and Cayuga Heights Road. We have to have those easements almost all in hand before we can bid the project, which means we're really pushing the envelope on the construction season for that kind of project."

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posticon State Cracking Down on Speeding

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Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced Wednesday that New York State Police and local law enforcement will be increasing patrols over the next week to crack down on speeding across the state. Unsafe speed was a contributing factor in 34 percent of all fatal crashes from January to May this year, compared to 30 percent of fatal crashes during the same period in 2019, according to data from the Institute for Traffic Safety Management and Research at the University at Albany's Rockefeller College.

"Speed limits are not a suggestion, they are the law and they save lives," said Cuomo. "There is no excuse for driving at high speeds - it's unnecessary and endangers everyone on the road -- and I urge New Yorkers to be smart and slow down because it's not worth risking lives to save a few seconds on your next commute or trip to the store."

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posticon Cornell President Says Reopening Decision is Based on Science

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Cornell University Campus Reopening

Cornell University President Martha E. Pollack sent a message to the community Wednesday to attempt to address accusations that the reason for reopening the Ithaca campus are financial, rather than on health grounds.  She said that approximately 20,000 students plan to return to Ithaca, and acknowledged that new cases can be expected.  But she said that would happen even if Cornell does not open its campus.

"As Cornell’s president, I feel acutely our responsibility to safeguard the health and well-being of not only our students, but of our entire community: those who study and work at Cornell, and those living in the region we call home. As we have determined our path forward during this pandemic, I want to be absolutely clear that every one of our decisions has been, and will continue to be, driven by that responsibility, not by our own financial considerations. Rather, we made the choice to reopen based on our finding – counterintuitive though it may be – that an in-person semester is the best possible way for Cornell to limit the spread of the coronavirus, on our campus and across the Ithaca region," she wrote.

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posticon Mall Senior Housing Subdivision Challenged by Deputy Mayor

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Lansing Meadows

Lansing Meadows developer Eric Goetzmann and construction manager Jim Bold were back before the Village of Lansing Board of Trustees Monday to ask for rule changes to facilitate a plan to subdivide triplex buildings in the Lansing Meadows project.  About a month ago the pair said that subdividing the properties would facilitate selling the units, rather than renting as the original plan proposed.  On Monday they said the reason for the subdivision was because of water commission rules that allow separate water meters if each unit is in its own parcel, and noted that subdividing would not also mean changes to the building plan for the four buildings being completed or the two other proposed buildings..  But Deputy Mayor Ronny Hardaway exploded with years of frustration, scolding the developer for nearly a decade of changes that Hardaway charged have resulted in a project that is not what the Village agreed to.

"If we have to do it, we have to do it. But personally, I'm going to say no -- no more," Hardaway said. "I can be out voted. That's fine. But my vote on this is so far... no. No more givings. Work harder next time."

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posticon Lansing School Reopening Planning Continues

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If Shakespeare were alive in Lansing today he might very well say, "To Open Lansing Schools, or not to open?  That is the question."  Indeed it is the question school district officials are struggling with here and across New York State in the wake of new guidance by the New York State Education Department (NYSED).

Last week (7/20) Lansing School Superintendent Chris Pettograsso provided the Board of Education with a comprehensive look at plans for reopening after Labor Day.  The school leadership team is taking on a massive juggling act. Since NYSED finally released its 144 page reopening guidance, the team has scoured the document and worked to provide a plan early enough to obtain public input before finalizing and submitting it by the state deadline, which is today (July 31st).  As districts across the state rush to meet the deadline, they must also prepare staffing, classroom space,and materials.  But they must also have contingency plans, because Governor Andrew Cuomo is expected to tell school districts when or whether they can open some time in August, after all the plans have been reviewed.  And permission to remain open may be rescinded at any time, depending on local COVID-19 infection statistics.

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posticon Stabbing at Hanshaw Village Mobile Home Park

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On 07/28/2020 Tyler W. Rodkey, 33 of Ithaca NY was charged with 1st degree Assault and arraigned in the Village of Cayuga Heights Court, and remanded to the Tompkins County Jail on $10,000 bail. Rodkey is scheduled to appear in the Town of Dryden Court on 08/03/2020. More charges are pending.

On the previous morning at 5:54am Tompkins County Sheriff's Deputies resonded to the Hanshaw Village Mobile Home Park in the Town of Dryden for a reported stabbing.

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posticon Lifton Shares Answers to Questions on Cornell Reopening

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NYS Assemblywoman Barbara Lifton released answers last Friday to 20 questions she had submitted to Cornell University about its plans for reopening its Ithaca Campus.  Responding to constituants' concerns Lifton sent a letter July 22nd and made it public in a press release the next day.  Cornell President martha E. Pollack responded July 23rd, and Lifton also made her response public.  Lifton concluded that Cornell and Tompkins County had clearly done a lot of science-based work to mitigate concerns about the spread of COVID-19 when the campus reopens.

“Having publicly released the questions and concerns from many constituents about Cornell's reopening plan, which I also forwarded to the NYS Department of Health (DOH), asking that DOH make sure these concerns are addressed before approval, I am likewise releasing the responses I've received from Cornell and Tompkins County in a joint document," Lifton said. "I have spoken directly with Cornell about their testing regimen, which has been one of my greatest concerns, and I am encouraged at what certainly seems, to this non-expert, to be a rigorous and accurate testing protocol with a turnaround time of 24 hours or less, which will allow for effective contact tracing."

Following are Lifton's questions and Pollack's responses:

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posticon Village Considers Mall Subdivision Plan

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Shops at Ithaca Mall

After the Shops At Ithaca Mall was sold, a representative for the new owner approached Village of Lansing officials in 2017 proposed subdividing the mall. In a nutshell, the plan is to sell anchor store spaces to their tenants, and the security implied by the big stores' investment would then attract smaller tenants who would feel secure that the big stores will stick around to generate foot traffic. The Village, for its part, has long wanted the mall to dedicate Graham Road West, the portion of the mall road that goes from Triphammer Road to the entrance to BJ's Wholesale Club, plus a portion of the mall ring road between Graham and Catherwood Roads (the two north-most of the three mall entry roads) to the Village so it can better maintain those road segments. The owner's representative, Ken Farrall, was back in January. Farrall and attorney Michael J. Gavin were back again Monday for a preliminary plat hearing before the Village Planning Board, hoping to move the subdivision plan forward with new urgency.

"Generally the budgets for the major retailers prioritize city locations first because there's more people to do the shopping in those locations," Gavin said. "As a result of the   byproducts of the protests that money has been reallocated to suburban locations. This is considered to be a suburban location. So we have several tenants that are ready to move forward, and they have budget money available both for third quarter and fourth quarter closings. So we're trying to accelerate our process to take advantage of those opportunities that we hope will allow us to re-tenant and revitalize the center."

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posticon New York State to Establish Church Testing Site in St. Petersburg

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New York State will establish a testing site in St. Petersburg, Florida. The site, at Pinellas Community Church, will provide up to 500 tests per day.

"In our time of need, I asked on one dark day when I was doing a briefing for volunteers to come help us. I asked for doctors and nurses to come to New York, and 30,000 people from across the country rolled up their sleeves to help," Governor Andrew M. Cuomo said Wednesday. "I know I speak for all New Yorkers when I say we will always be grateful for that help that came to us, and we are paying back the favor today by sending PPE to St. Petersburg, where we've worked together to establish a community testing site. We will continue to return the favor and lend help to whoever needs it."

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