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It looked like a good crowd at Lansing Community Library Center 's (LCLC) 'Meet the Candidates' night last week until you counted the number of people not affiliated with the library.  With only about a dozen of those, many of them supporters, you had to wonder whether LCLC officials were preaching to the choir.  Despite efforts to make their case to the public, it was not clear that they are reaching those who could make a difference when the library comes up for a vote next Tuesday.  If the vote fails library officials say that LCLC will close its doors when it runs out of money, they estimate within six months.

The question LCLC will put before the taxpayers next Tuesday is whether they are willing to pony up 15 cents per $1,000 of assessed property per year to raise $105,310 to hire a professional librarian, pay operating costs, and grow the collection.  For most residents that cost is about the cost of a new hardcover book.  But naysayers charge that the 15 cents is the beginning of a slippery slope that will lead to spiraling library taxes in the future.

Village of Lansing Trustees considered a change to the zoning law that would allow The Shops at Ithaca Mall to construct apartment buildings on the mall property.  The idea was presented to the Planning Board last month by the mall's Principal Partner Eric Goetzmann, when he showed plans to build an outdoor mall area with two-storeyed buildings.  "The ground floor is going to be shops," explained Planning Board Chairman Ned Hickey.  "The second floor will be apartments, so we need to have the mixed use authority to do that in our law."

As presented the plan proposes a commons-like area with outdoor parking and walkways in an area between three new buildings to be constructed west of Best Buy.  3,000 to 5,000 square foot boutique-style stores would line the ground floor with parking along the front doors of the shops.  Possibly as many as 42 apartments would be constructed above the shops.  "In an odd sort of way they are sort of looking at duplicating a downtown area," Dubow said.  "On a smaller scale in a mall setting."

Extra!  Extra!

The Board of Education of the Lansing Central School District has selected and appointed Dr. Stephen L. Grimm as its new Superintendent of Schools. He is expected to begin his duties as our Chief School Administrator on or about January 1, 2008. Dr. Grimm is currently the Executive Director of Secondary Schools in the Greece Central School District in Monroe County, which serves over 13,000 children. He has served as its Executive Director of Secondary Schools since September 2006. Previously, he served six years as a Middle/Senior High School Principal in the Wheatland Chili Central School District and served two years as Assistant Principal in the Canandaigua City School District.

Albany- Continuing his support for America's brave men and women serving our Nation, New York State Senator Michael F. Nozzolio is announcing a new program on his website to connect area residents with local soldiers serving overseas. 

As part of the program, Senator Nozzolio is asking all families who have a soldier serving overseas who wish to participate in the program to send their soldier's photo and contact information to the Senator.  The photos and contact information will then be posted on Senator Nozzolio's website .  This will allow area residents to send mail, email and care packages to local soldiers. 

Village of Lansing Planning Board members got a unique look at the future of the Shops at Ithaca Mall Monday when Principal Partner Eric Goetzmann made a surprising presentation about the next phase of construction.  While the mall will continue to bring stores into the indoor shopping area, it will also offer an outdoor experience with a commons-like area that will include three new buildings containing boutique-style shops with outdoor walkways and parking. 

"When we redid the mall we were looking at the larger stores like Target," Goetzmann says.  "For the shops here we're looking at smaller stores down to 3,000 square feet or 5,000 square feet, boutiques to a certain degree.  It brings in that last mix that we're missing here today."

Two of Tompkins County's top legislators weighed in this week on actions taken by Governor Eliot Spitzer.

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Tompkins County Legislature Chair Tim Joseph testified today at a hearing in Syracuse, one of a series of sessions conducted across the state by the Governor's Partnership for Coverage, to take public comment on options to reform the state's healthcare system.

Governor Eliot Spitzer has directed the Department of Health and the Department of Insurance to conduct the hearings to solicit input on development of proposals to achieve health system reform, increase access to health insurance coverage, and move toward universal healthcare coverage in the state.
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The Tompkins County GOP is extremely pleased that Governor Spitzer has dropped his plan to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.  County Legislators Mike Hattery (R-Dryden) and Mike Sigler (R-Lansing) had been advocating a resolution in the legislature's Government Operations committee asking the Governor to abandon the plan.  The resolution would have been voted on next week, but this now becomes unnecessary. 

The legislators joined with the 70% of New Yorkers who felt the Spitzer proposal was a bad idea.
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After an exceptional in-house youth soccer program this fall, Lansing's Recreation Department doesn't have time to rest on its laurels.  A set of programs are in full swing for adults and children, and more are in the offing.  For adults men's basketball, women's volleyball, and coed volleyball are in progress.  For the kids it's the bowling program and gymnastics.  "We're finishing a remarkable year," Colt says.  "Soccer went well.  We've had people stepping up.  We haven't had to beg people to help, and that makes a huge difference.  We got really lucky with the weather.  And our Small Fry Football program and the flag football programs were immensely successful this year."

To paraphrase the famous Monty Python 'dead parrot' routine, the sewer isn't dead -- it's just resting.  Well, that's not completely accurate.  The large overall sewer project is indeed dead, but a smaller project on the east side of Lansing is alive and well.  That project will bring sewer service from the Village of Lansing sewer system up to the Warren Road Business Park, where Transonic Systems has taken the lead -- and paid the bill for a sewer study. "We've priced it out in two ways," says Town Councilman Bud Shattuck.  "One is if it just goes out and collects sewage from the business park itself.  The other is if it extends on to the Lucente properties."

The Tompkins County Public Library Board of Trustees announced today that it has received official word that the Support Staff Association (SSA) unit of Local 2300 of the United Auto Workers has declared an impasse in its collective bargaining negotiations. The Library's contract with the SSA expired on December 31, 2005.

"We very much regret that the terms and conditions of a proposed 5-year contract negotiated at the bargaining table were not accepted by the SSA," said Henrik N. Dullea, president of the Library Board of Trustees. "We value and appreciate the hard work and dedication of the Library's support staff.

The only people who don't work for the Town of Lansing showed up for the 2008 budget hearing Wednesday were students required to attend municipal meetings for school credit.  With department heads and Town Board members ready to answer questions, there was nobody to ask them.  But the news wasn't surprising in a town that has kept at or below the rise in the Consumer Price Index year after year.  The town tax rate will increase only 3.22% this year.  "We always try to work with what department heads want," explained Councilwoman Connie Wilcox.  "But sometimes we just have to cut.  People think we don't cut -- we do.  Because we have to."

(Left to right) Bookkeeper/Personnel Officer Sharon Bowman, Principle Account Clerk Typist Charmagne Rumgay, Environmental Planner Darby Kiley	(Left to right) Deputy Highway Superintendent Charlie Purcell, Highway Superintendent Jack French, Park Superintendent and Recreation Director Steve Colt

Last week's merger of the two largest national carsharing firms, Flexcar and Zipcar, will delay Ithaca Carshare's launch date. The Ithaca-based organization had been hoping to become an affiliate of Flexcar and to open for business later this year.

"We had been working since May on an agreement to become part of the Flexcar network while maintaining our own not-for-profit local identity," said Jennifer Dotson, Ithaca Carshare executive director. "Now we have learned that the new merged firm is not interested in that kind of model."

When the unofficial election results were released by the Tompkins County Board of Elections last Tuesday night the results seemed clear: in the contested races Connie Wilcox and Marty Christopher had retained their seats on the Town Board, defeating challenger Hugh Bahar, and Scott Pinney had unseated incumbent Supervisor Steve Farkas by a margin of 70 votes.

On Wednesday a bombshell hit: more than 50 votes for Farkas hadn't been reported.  That made Pinney's lead a vulnerable 18 votes.  And with 120 absentee ballots sent out, it was anybody's guess who would win the Supervisor race.  Inspectors at the Central Fire Station polling place had misread results generated from the voting machine when they called them into the Election Commission late Tuesday.  The machines print on an oversized four-part form, with the clearest being the bottom page.