Letter from Joan Parrillo

Banners Would Honor Veterans

My first instinct when I started working on a proposal to install “Hometown Heroes” banners in the Village of Cooperstown was to write a letter to the editor.

Instead, I e-mailed Cooperstown Mayor Ellen Tillapaugh and asked why we couldn’t honor our veterans with banners like all the other towns. She felt it was a good idea and so this is how the story of the unwanted banners begins.

I asked for permission of the use of the poles on Main Street for the banners for honoring the Cooperstown hometown veterans. Right away, one board member said to me that we have people who come here every year and feel like this is their home and I said, no, it’s for people that have lived or presently live in Cooperstown. Also anyone that went to school here and Legion members—that’s what “hometown” means.

The village trustee meeting on Monday, July 22 begins. I read my request and the questions start. I had the representative from the banner company come to town to answer any questions the trustees had. I used the words “Hometown Heroes,” so they wanted to know why just veterans. My reply was that I was only working with veterans—that anyone else who wanted to take on others could. (I did not say what I should have, that every Memorial Day there is something to do with the Hall of Fame that takes the Memorial Day weekend away from the veterans. All those people that come are thinking about is baseball, let’s face it.)

Yes, we have a memorial parade for our veterans. When I was kid, there was a school band, other schools would come, the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts would march and, after the parade, we would go back to the Vets’ Club and get an ice cream sandwich, then head home.

Back to the meeting, where one of the trustees said he didn’t want to advertise for the banner company. Nowhere on the banner does it have the company name. As for advertising, Main Street is one giant advertisement. The stores that sell baseball cards are advertising for Topps, Upper Deck and so on. The stores that are selling T-shirts are advertising Hanes, Fruit of the Loom, and Spaulding. The liquor stores advertise for Absolute, Bacardi, etc. I could go on, but won’t.

I thought the banners would look nice on the Main Street poles, but as we talked it became clear that wasn’t going to happen. The banners would have to come down for Hall of Fame Weekend, I was told. It was pretty obvious the trustees weren’t in favor of that.

So I asked for other streets to use—had to go to a second meeting for that.

On Monday, August 5 it was on to meeting number two, the Streets Committee, where one of the board members give me and Tim—a veteran helping with this project—a sign law stating that signs are not permitted in the median between the sidewalk and the curb, nor attached to the trees, bushes, support wires, street municipal signs or utility poles located within the median. Where did that leave us but to ask for an amendment to the sign law, which would require a public meeting.

On Monday, August 26, the third board meeting I attended, several veterans also showed up and spoke about how they felt about having to ask for different streets. I had suggested Chestnut Street, Lake Street, and Pine Boulevard, seeing as how the veterans’ monuments are located there, and also Glen Avenue.

Meanwhile, before the meeting I drove through town and took photos of all the signs that were illegally posted and presented them to the Board of Trustees. They admitted that I was right and the signs were not supposed to be there. But yet the next day they were still there. I said to the board, if you’re going to have rules and laws, they have to apply to everyone, not just us.

We all left after our part of the discussion. I went home and watched the rest of the meeting online. The two trustees who oppose hanging of the “Hometown Heroes” banners wanted the Planning Board to review things.

I’m not sure where we are at this point—Planning Board or public board meeting to vote “yes” or “no.” I truly believe Mayor Tillapaugh is on our side. Some trustees did not voice their opinion, so we have no idea what they are thinking.

We have submitted an application for the use of the utility poles on which to hang the “Hometown Heroes” banners, but have been told that the village won’t be putting them up or taking them down for us because it’s not their property. So now, if approved, we have to pay someone to do that.

No other towns have gone through this. Officials have told me how welcoming and easy it was to get approval. Personally, I think the Cooperstown trustees thought we would just give up.

Just remember—every time you see the American flag waving, every breath of every man and woman who fought for this country and who gave their last breath is what makes our flag continue to wave.

Joan Parrillo
Toddsville