Archive: News

The long awaited switch in service happened on Saturday, October 16th, when American Airlines completed its merger with US Airways.

Passengers flying out of Ithaca Tompkins Regional Airport will notice new signage at the ticket counter, but behind the scenes there are profound changes intended to improve service.  Like a unified reservations system and a state-of- the-art Operations Center to manage American's fleet.

	We normally interview candidates in contested elections, but we wanted to interview Charlie Purcell because he is running for office for the first time.  Purcell is running uncontested for Lansing Highway Superintendent.

Charlie 'Cricket' Purcell is a lifelong Lansing Resident.  He and his wife, Marcella, have two sons, Daniel and Alec.

Purcell has worked at the Lansing Highway Department for 22 years, and has been the current Highway Superintendent Jack French's Deputy Superintendent for the past nine and a half years.  With French retiring at the end of this year, Purcell is running to take his place.  The Lansing Star caught up with him at the Highway Department office earlier this week.

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Ruth HopkinsIn the past several years one of the hottest political potatoes in Lansing has been a disagreement on whether the Town should hire a full time or a part time planner.  the argument has split along party lines, with Republicans arguing that a part time planner would save taxpayer dollars, and Democrats arguing the opposite.  But until this week neither side could offer hard figures to support their position.  Councilwoman Ruth Hopkins (D) gave a preliminary report at Wednesday's Town Board meeting that concluded the Town is paying $9,000 more because it has a part time planner.

"In recent days I've been asked if we know whether we've saved any money by hiring a part time planner.  I didn't initially  know the answer to that, so I used our accounting reports with some additional input from our Town accounting office to look at what the projected year end expenses are in our planning and zoning account would be, in order to compare them with expenses in that account for the last year in which we had a full time person in that position, which was 2012," Hopkins told the Board.  "I corrected that for inflation.  I found, so far, that our expenses in our planning and zoning account are projected to be $9,000 higher in 2015 than they were in 2012, corrected for inflation."

The perception most people had that the Town of Lansing had a leash law turned out to be false until Wednesday night when the Town Board unanimously passed a revision to it's dog law.  While past laws had leash provisions, the 2009 revision had inadvertently removed the ability of the Town to exact fines for nuisance dogs.  Town Attorney Guy Krogh said the new law corrects problems that arose when a new law was put in place to comply with changes in New York State law.

"We have amended it periodically -- in 2004, 2006 and 2009 was the most recent," he said.  "That was because New York State dumped all the licensing as a giant unfunded mandate downhill on municipalities -- technically counties and towns, but not Villages.  So the Town adopted a local law in 2009 that was based upon a generic template.  It had some substantial infirmities beyond due process, it had some problems.  It first came back to the Town in 2009 and then last year from the Parks Department because they weren't able to write tickets for nuisance dogs in the parks because the dog law didn't actually apply to dogs that weren't on a leash."

Property owners in the Lansing Fire District will pay just under an additional two cents per $1,000 of property valuation.  The $1,398,949 budget was passed Tuesday after a public hearing at Lansing Central Station.  $1,238,442 of that will be raised by taxes.  The tax rate will be $0.918, up from $0.90 last year.

"This actually falls under the tax cap," said District Treasurer George Gesslein.  "We get credit because we dropped our rate about 4% last year.  We're within $3,000 of the tax cap."

	As Republicans and Democrats vie for a majority on the Lansing Town Board, the Supervisor race is clearly the most politically charged.  Incumbent Kathy Miller and challenger Ed LaVigne clearly have very different visions of the future of Lansing.  The Star asked the same questions of both candidates, publishing transcriptions of their answers.

Ed LaVigne is challenging incumbent Kathy Miller Republican for Lansing Town Supervisor.  LaVigne is completing his first term as a Town Board member this year.

He has lived in Lansing since he was one year old.  A pharmacist at the Lansing Tops Market, he has been married to his wife, Debbie, since 1983.  They have two children and five grandchildren.  LaVigne holds a degree in accounting from TC3, and a pharmacy degree from Albany College of Pharmacy.  He has been President of the Lansing Community Council since 2007. 

LaVigne sat down with the Lansing Star last week to talk about why he is running and what he will do if elected.

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	As Republicans and Democrats vie for a majority on the Lansing Town Board, the Supervisor race is clearly the most politically charged.  Incumbent Kathy Miller and challenger Ed LaVigne clearly have very different visions of the future of Lansing.  The Star asked the same questions of both candidates, publishing transcriptions of their answers.

Kathy Miller is running for a second term as Lansing Town Supervisor.  She and her husband Bill have lived in Lansing for 30 years.  They have two grown sons and one daughter.  Miller worked at Cornell University in Clinical Sciences at the Vet School in the field of molecular genetics, studying genetic disease in animals.

Miller was a Town Board member for two years before being elected Supervisor four years ago.  She has served as liaison to the Cayuga Lake Watershed Management Plans Intermunicipal Organization and Lansing's Zoning Board of Appeals.  Miller is a former Lansing Board Of Education member, and chaired the Lansing Town Center Committee.  After being elected Supervisor she decided not to pursue another job, because she views her work in the Supervisor's office as a full time commitment.

The Lansing Star met with her in her home this week to talk about why she is running again, and what she hopes to accomplish in a second term.

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In a letter to their respective legislative bodies, City of Ithaca Mayor Svante Myrick and Tompkins County Legislature Chairman Michael Lane today proposed a State-funded study of the consolidation of City and County law enforcement agencies.

Legislation is being submitted to the Common Council and County Legislature that will authorize the two governments to jointly apply for State funding for the study, and to develop a request for proposals that will seek expert consultants to assist with the study.

Tom Reed called the recent Sixth Circuit Court Decision to block the President's vast expansion of the Water Ways of the United States rule "a victory for land owners" and cited the impact the ruling would have on the local economy.

"I care about the rights of Private Property owners, especially our farmers," said Reed. "The Administration's attempts to regulate everything from irrigation systems to puddles of rainwater would ultimately do more harm than good for so many in our area.  I applaud the court's decision and am hopeful this ruling will encourage the Senate to act on the House's legislative proposal that would block this action once and for all."

Citing the injustice in the case of convicted murderer Michael Moore, Senator Michael Nozzolio is calling on his fellow New York state legislators to join him in his efforts to close a state loophole that allows convicted murders to profit from their crimes.  Michael Moore who was convicted in the murder of his fiancée Kayla stands to collect as much as $577,000 from her life insurance policies, which designated him as the sole beneficiary.  As the law stands, a convicted murderer is able to collect insurance money from his or her victims if they are deemed not criminally responsible due to mental illness.

"It is an outrage that a loophole exists in New York state law which allows murders to profit from their victims," Senator Nozzolio continued.  "As the Chairman of the New York Senate Codes Committee, I intend to introduce legislation to close this absurd loophole and tilt the scales of justice back on behalf of victims, not murderers."

The Lansing Town Board is considering whether to consider joining a major solar project that could save considerable taxpayer dollars in utility bills.  Town officials have been asked to consider joining a partnership between the Lansing Consolidated School District and RER Energy Group, which proposes to build a 1.5 megawatt solar array in Lansing that could save the school district $45,000 in the first year.  Town officials are not ready to jump on the project, however, unless they are convinced the Town can also realize significant savings.

"Lansing taxpayers will save over 25 years via discounted electric rates and hopefully this will inspire other businesses, public entities and homeowners to invest in renewable technologies since they are now economically practical," said TST BOCES Energy Management Coordinator Michael Koplinka-Loehr at a Town Board working meeting earlier this month."

Finger Lakes Wine Business Coalition co-founder and winemaker of Eagle Crest Vineyards and O-Neh-Da Vineyard Will Ouweleen, Waterloo Container Company andConcerned Citizens of Seneca County's attorney Douglas H. Zamelis, and Seneca Lake advocate and renowned author Sandra Steingraber testified at the Department of Sanitation public hearing in New York City on the morning of Thursday, October 15th. They voiced opposition to the proposed contract to transport and dump a large amount of NYC's solid waste in the Finger Lakes region to Progressive Waste Solutions' (IESI NY Corporation) Seneca Meadows Landfill in Waterloo, NY.

The twenty-year, $3.3 billion deal would transport NYC garbage by rail and trucks to Waterloo, New York. This is just 4 miles away from the famed birthplace of the women's suffragette movement in Seneca Falls, NY and in the heart of the over $4 billion a year Finger Lakes Wine Country.