Editorial for November 30, 2018. Ruffles Takes First Step Against Whack-A-Mole For years now, Otsego County’s annual auction of foreclosed-on tax-delinquent properties has eaten up a lot of oxygen at the county Board of Representatives’ monthly meetings. It’s the Whack-A-Mole of county government, which suggests: There are unresolved issues. So a take-charge presentation by the new county treasurer, Allen Ruffles, at the November meeting was welcome, if partial. First, he declared, having studied the issue, giving delinquent taxpayers four years…
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Editorial for November 23, 2018 CONTRIBUTE NOW, DOUBLE YOUR INVESTMENT Let’s Give Back To Ensure SPCA Keeps Serving Us When the Susquehanna SPCA learned last February it had won $500,000 from Governor Cuomo’s Companion Animal Capital Fund, Executive Director Stacie Haynes sought bids to upgrade the aging shelter in Hartwick Seminary. To a person, all of the prospective contractors said: Don’t spend a half-million on this building, Haynes related the other day in an interview leading up to the announcement…
Column by Mike Zagata for November 23, 2018 Knowledge Workers? Great, But Traditional Industries Needed, Too As I began to read an article in last week’s edition, I felt a surge of excitement. The author, an elected official, had just stated that her constituents elected her twice because they understand that protecting our environment and growing our economy are not mutually exclusive policies. That is close to a statement in my recent book, “A Journey Toward Environmental Stewardship.” My excitement,…
Editorial for November 16, 2018 State Zigged To Democrats, But County Zagged To GOP The Wall Street Journal headline was sly: “Blue Wave Breaks Softly.” The article reported that, as of Nov. 6, Election Night, Democrats gained 27 Congressional seats in the midterms, regaining control of the U.S. House of Representatives. That pales compared to Democrats losing 63 in the first Obama midterms in 2010, and losing the House as well; still, even one-vote control is control. (As canvassing ensued,…
Column by Adrian Kuzminski for November 16, 2018 Can Human Ingenuity Save Us From Perils Of Our Successes? It’s a widespread article of faith that “economic growth” is essential to future prosperity. That’s hardly surprising, since the modern world has been brought into being in less than 200 years by an unprecedented wave of economic growth. If we go back 200 years – to 1818 – we see there were no automobiles, no airplanes, no railroads, no antibiotics, no anesthesia,…
Column by Tom Morgan for November 9, 2018 Downstate Controls, Doesn’t Care About Upstate Yawn. Upstate’s recovery from the Great Recession is the weakeast of any U.S. region. According to a recent study. You can examine all the nooks of Upstate’s economy. Most every one is daubed with lackluster. Papered with anemic. Writ large with blah. Yawn. Upstaters grew accustomed to this long ago. Our motto should be “We’re Number One at being Number Fifty!” Most of us know what…
Editorial for November 9, 2018 ‘Knowledge’ Is Our Future This week’s Tom Morgan column on the facing page, and former DEC Commissioner Mike Zagata’s column last week capture the Upstate dilemma: Upstate is rebounding more slowly than any other area of the country. First, let’s look at local bright spots. • Custom Electronics in Oneonta is planning a futuristic 250-job production line making self-recharging batteries. Andela Products, the Richfield Springs glass recycler, is likewise looking to expand. And Corning’s Oneonta…
Editorial for November 2, 2018 Are We Doing Political Debates Right? Let’s Talk About It League of Women Voters’ moderators lost control of the Monday, Oct. 22, debate between the incumbent Otsego County Sheriff Richard J. Devlin, Jr., and his challenger, retired state trooper Bob Fernandez. Not the candidates – the League, to the point where moderator Barbara Heim of Oneonta threatened at least twice to shut it down and send home the 150+ attendees who packed The Fenimore Museum…
Column by Adrian Kuzminski for November 2, 2018 Gerrymandering Takes Away Our Right To Representation The most remarkable thing I’ve seen in this year’s midterm election campaigns is Chad McEvoy’s op-ed in the New York Times. The headline says it all: “If I win my district, I’ll get rid of it.” That’s the 101st Assembly District, a model of gerrymandering, which snakes in a narrow strip from New Hartford near Utica through part of Otsego county to the Hudson Valley.…
Column by Mike Zagata for November 2, 2018. Is Upstate Downbeat? Blame Slow Recovery According to a newly released report from the Empire Center for Public Policy, “New York’s Uneven Economic Recovery: A Tale of Two States,” those of us who live in Upstate New York escaped the real estate/housing bubble that led to the economic crash in 2008. Why? Because our economy was so bad that we didn’t experience a bubble like the rest of the country. How’s that…