Archive: Around Town

Did you know that nearly 40% of all food produced in North America is never eaten? Or that 97% of food waste in the United States ends up in the landfill or incinerated? These were just two of the shocking revelations in the film documentary Just Eat It, shown Thursday night as part of this year's Finger Lakes Environmental Film Festival.

The screening and panel discussion that followed is one component of a food waste prevention campaign by Tompkins County Solid Waste Division with support of a nearly $15,000 grant from the New York State Pollution Prevention Institute (NYSP2I). The project will further the County's goal of 75% waste diversion by the end of 2016.

Lansing Loves To Read (LLTR) is launching a new cookbook, 'Dish It Up!', Sunday in honor of Town Historian Louise Bement and long time columnist Carolyn Montague.  The literacy volunteer group is hosting the launch with sweets to eat and a presentation by Bement on the history of cooking.

"This is the sweet little cookbook that was put together by Lansing Loves To Read," said Lansing Deputy Supervisor Sharon Bowman at Wednesday's Town Board meeting.  "Lansing Loves To Read and the Town of Lansing are collaborating on this event.  We're really hopeful that folks will turn out in honor of these two women who have done a terrific job passing stories on and creating a history and memories for the Town of Lansing and its citizens.  And encouraging reading from the very young to the very old."

Lansing Planning Board member Raymond J. Farkas passed away unexpectedly after a sudden illness on February 12, 2015.  Last month Lansing Town Supervisor Kathy Miller read a tribute to Farkas at a Town board meeting.

"Ray served as an alternate member of the Planning Board for the year 2013 and became a full time member of the Planning board in 2014," Miller said.  "It was obvious ray enjoyed being a member of the Planning Board.  he took being a member very seriously and attended numerous training sessions in and outside of the County, and frequently referenced what he had learned during Planning Board meetings.

As outspoken supporters for fair housing issues and home ownership, the Ithaca Board of Realtors® will join the nation as it honors Fair Housing Month this April. For over 100 years Realtors® have promoted and protected the dream of property ownership for millions of Americans and strongly supports the Fair Housing Act.
 
 "As leading advocates for home ownership, Realtors® strive to promote inclusion, diversity and fairness in today's housing industry," said Melissa Miller Fedrizzi, 2015 President." Realtors® work hard to build communities and an environment where everyone, regardless of race, color, religion, sex or disability can choose where they want to live. It is important to take time to recognize Fair Housing Month in order to promote awareness about fair housing laws."
 

One of the main characters in the Tom Robbins' witty Jitterbug Perfume names barbarian clans on unidentified territory of Bohemia as a beet and turnip clans. Having a Central-Eastern European background, I couldn't be more amused with luscious author's description of root vegetables which were a staple of the culinary heritage of the whole Eastern European region for centuries. Encouraged by the author's imagination I would happily assemble a radish clan, with the tangy black (Spanish) radish on the pedestal.

In the kingdom of vegetables, root veggies have the most of resilience and preservation qualities. They are robust and hard.  Earthiness harbored in flavor and their capacity to be preserved, made them vegetables of necessity during the cold seasons. If we would just rely on cellars as a storage places for the food, as it was not so long ago, in early spring they would still be our only major plant source of nutrients. Most of them have a sweet or almost blended flavor, but radishes bring spicy and fiery tones to palatable experience as being a real nutritional treat.

IPEI, the Ithaca Public Education Initiative, has awarded the first ever Connecting Classrooms Grants.  The Connecting Classrooms Grants program is IPEI's fourth and newest grants offering for teachers, staff and others with ideas for enhancing educational opportunities for Ithaca City School District (ICSD) students.  Five grants totaling $34,950 were announced by IPEI Grants Committee Chair Connie Patterson.

"IPEI is pleased and excited to support these fantastic proposals that find new ways to get students actively involved in learning and discovery," IPEI board member and retired educator Patterson said.  "Each project was created by a group of educators who have chosen to focus on scientific content while incorporating language arts, math, and technology.  We are impressed with the teachers' vision and commitment!"

New Roots seniors Emily Feavearyear and Soren Mortensen had a novel idea for their required graduation project. They wanted to teach a class at their own school. Now they (and teacher Maria Gimma) are not only instructing their peers in a year-long elective, but they are also taking their interactive presentation to Ithaca High School, to Wells College and Tompkins Community College this April 12th, and—they hope again—to Washington D.C.

All seniors at New Roots must carry out a "Capstone Project" that demonstrates the skills and knowledge they've learned in high school. Emily & Soren's idea of designing and teaching their own class came from a course during 11th grade that taught the principles of humanitarian law. As a class, they developed an education campaign to teach other youth about child soldiers. Impressed with their work, last year the American Red Cross invited the students to present and compete with other student groups at a human rights conference in Washington D.C.

TCAT is asking local citizens in Tompkins County to contact their congressional leaders to renew funding for the federal transportation bill, Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21), which is set to expire on May 31, 2015.

With the future of America's public transportation and road network in jeopardy, TCAT on Thurs., April 9 is joining transportation and community leaders from across the country for "Stand Up for Transportation Day" by enlisting help from is passengers and local residents. Sponsored by the American Public Transportation Association (APTA), with support from national and local partners from various transportation modes, business and community oriented interests, is urging communities across the country to ask their federal officials to support the passage of a long-term, sustainable and reliable federal transportation funding bill.

Teachers were hopeful after a 'Because We Care Community Forum' on education at Lansing Middle School March 19th, especially when legislators said they would vote against Governor Andrew Cuomo's so-called education reforms.  But they came back from Spring Break to bad news: Cuomo's education spending bill, widely seen by educators across the state as an attack on teachers, passed 92-54 in the State Assembly, and 36-16 in the Senate.  Lansing seventh grade English teacher and Lansing Faculty Association (LFA) president Stacie Kropp told the Lansing School Board Monday that teachers are feeling attacked by Albany.

"On behalf of all the teachers in the district I'd like to thank our board of education for your support as we fight for our jobs in New York State," she said.  "This has been a very disappointing break for many of us, and we're coming back from it disheartened and feeling attacked and under the gun.  But we know that we are in an incredible community with great support from our board of education and our administrative team.  Not every teacher in New York State has that.  We'd like to sincerely thank you for that."

by Rochelle Davis

I'm not your average cat, I have PRESENCE. I'm sometimes more interested in getting my chow than in greeting a new visitor, and exploring any new environment is also of interest to me - though once I'm sure of my surroundings I may well come back to you and rub, head butt, and meow for a little attention from you. Really, I would love to be someone's best furkid and spend the rest of my days sharing a home with someone who appreciates my extra special self. I promise to love you back just as much.

Visit the SPCA Web Page

v11i13

Mentoring at Lansing, Inc. (Ment@l) is about to pass a unique milestone.  Normally you would expect a student initiative to last until the founding student or students graduate.  But Lansing's peer-to-peer tutoring program founder and president William Lewis has done everything he can to insure his legacy continues to help Lansing students do better at school long after he has graduated.  In addition to building student buy-in he has also gotten teachers to recognize the program, and in August Ment@l received 501(c)3 certification so it can accept tax deductible donations.

"The overall goal of this program is to act as an agent of social change and promote an environment of greater academic encouragement while removing the stigma of needing special help in a class," Lewis told the Lansing Board Of Education earlier this year.

Lansing Middle School students participated in the Northeastern United States Thinking Cap Quiz Bowl. Fifty-five teams from Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania participated. The team from Lansing Middle School in Lansing, New York won first place (of 26 competing teams) in the 5th grade division of the Northeast Thinking Cap Quiz Bowl.  Lansing's 5th grade's high score was 1237. Second place in 5th grade was won by Coopertown School in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania with a great 1193. A fine 6th grade score of 1174 score won a first team trophy and ribbons for Park Forest Middle School in State College, Pennsylania. Lansing Middle School won second place (of 26 competing teams) in the 6th grade division with their nice 1156.