Archive: News

After finally filling the last of the interim positions with the hiring of Elementary School Principal Chris Pettograsso it seemed that after years of turmoil that Lansing was finally on a steady course with its top administrative team.  So it was a blow to the community last night when School Board President Bonita Lindberg announced at the start of the regular school board meeting that the Board of Education would vote later in the meeting to accept Superintendent Mark Lewis's resignation.  "Not to address the 5,000 pound elephant in the middle of the room would be a mistake," she said.  "So I'm going to raise it right now even though the action on it comes later in tonight's meeting."

On May 15 Lansing voters will vote on whether to approve a $22,094,333 and elect two school board members from among three candidates.  Dan Brown will retire from the Board Of Education when his current term is finished, and Christine Iacobucci's second term on the board is also up.  Iacobucci is running again against David Dittman and, with the withdrawal of Gina Lord Shattuck, Mike Cheatham entered the race.  This year the election is important because the board is faced with many challenges, not the least of which is a taxpayer base that has lost its trust and confidence in the district.

David Dittman

Christine Iacobucci

Mike Cheatham

Mike Cheatham Mike Cheatham threw his hat in the ring for a school board seat this week when Gina Lord Shattuck withdrew from the race, because he says the Lansing community deserves to have choices. Cheatham has attended and participated in school board meetings frequently over the 20 years he and wife Terri have lived here. Their three children Danny, Kelly, and Sean have attended all the Lansing schools. Danny is not at Syracuse University, and Kelly will be joining him after she graduates from Lansing High School this year. Sean will be starting high school next year.

Cheatham is a research specialist at Syracuse University, where he has worked for ten years. Before that he worked at Cornell for ten years, and prior to that Cheatham worked for NASA. In a whirlwind day Tuesday, he collected the signatures required, rearranged his commitments, and showed up prepared for the

David DittmanSchool Board Election

David Dittman and his wife Maureen have lived in Lansing for 16 years. His daughters Megan Kelly Dittman, and Carra Kathleen Dittman started school in Lansing in 1990. Dittman says that the year before moving here he paid tuition for them to attend, because of the school system’s good reputation. He is the Hubert E. Westfall Professor of Accounting at the Cornell School of Hotel Administration, and is a past dean there.

Dittman says he is running to give back to a community that has been very good to him and his family. He came to the Lansing Star to talk about his candidacy and issues facing the Lansing School District.

On May 15 Lansing voters will vote on whether to approve a $22,094,333 and elect two school board members from among three candidates.  Dan Brown will retire from the Board Of Education when his current term is finished, and Christine Iacobucci's second term on the board is also up.  Iacobucci is running again against David Dittman and Gina Lord Shattuck.  This year the election is important because the board is faced with many challenges, not the least of which is a taxpayer base that has lost its trust and confidence in the district.

Gina Lord Shattuck

David Dittman

Christine Iacobucci

Gina Lord ShattuckGina Lord Shattuck lives in Lansing with her new husband, Town Councilman Bud Shattuck, and her two children Mairi and Stevie. Since she moved here four years ago she has been active in the school system, serving on numerous committees. She is the Employee Benefits Manager at TST-BOCES. “My job is to help people and to provide them with resources and information that they need where the benefits are concerned,” she says. “So I have what I think is a very unique perspective within the educational system because I work with teachers and support staff, and administrators. I’m not on either side, I’m there for everybody and my role is to hold that balance and to facilitate.”

Shattuck says she is running because she cares deeply about the district and it is an important way to serve. She came to the Star to talk about that and the many issues she wants to tackle if elected to the Board Of Education.

Albany – As the State Senate prepares to approve legislation to reinstate New York State’s death penalty, State Senator Michael F. Nozzolio today launched an online petition to allow New Yorkers to register their support for reinstating the death penalty to punish cop killers.

”In the wake of the tragic shootings this week of three State Troopers, it is necessary that New York State reinstate the death penalty for those that kill law enforcement officers,” said Senator Nozzolio.  “I encourage all those that support my legislation to reinstate the death penalty to visit www.senatornozzolio.com and register their support.”

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Today, U.S. Representatives Michael A. Arcuri (D-Utica), Maurice Hinchey (D- Hurley), and John Hall (D-Dover Plains) requested a follow-up congressional hearing and a Department of Energy public meeting in Upstate New York to address public concerns regarding the Department of Energy's draft proposal to create a Mid-Atlantic Area National Corridor, which could allow New York Regional Interconnection (NYRI) and other private companies to circumvent state authority and utilize federal eminent domain to acquire private property.

In their letter to Kevin Kolevar, Director, Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, Arcuri, Hinchey, and Hall requested local public meetings in Upstate New York during the 60-day public comment period for the Department of Energy's draft designation of a National Interest Electric Transmission Corridor - to allow communities most affected by NYRI's proposed power line the opportunity to voice their concerns.

Christine Iacobucci and husband Joe Woelfel have lived in Lansing with their family for 18 years. Iacobucci has spent nearly six of those as a school board member. She has four children, a son in college, and one child each in each of the Lansing schools. She is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Wells College.

Often controversial, she frequently challenges administrators and fellow board members in school board meetings. Iacobucci is wary of identifying herself or her family on the Internet, so she asked the Star not to use a picture of her for this interview. The Lansing Star caught up with her in Macmillan Hall at Wells College last Tuesday.

For approximately the cost of one book per year you can fund a library in Lansing, and bring Lansing taxes back into the town.  The newly refurbished Lansing Community Library Center (LCLC) is entirely paid for, and is a gift to the community.  Now it's time to take it to the next level with a very small (17 cents per thousand of assessed value) tax that will enable the hiring of a professional certified librarian, and make the facility eligible for County and State dollars.  That is the message library volunteers hope voters will get when they decide whether to approve the establishment of a school district library on May 15.

"Volunteers like to say that our renovated new building is a gift to Lansing," said Fund Raising Committee member Donna Scott.  "The roof, the utilities, even the old part is refurbished, so it is good to go for many years to come.  We just completed a $385,000 addition paid for by voluntary donations.  The building is completely debt free.  There's no mortgage.  Your friends and neighbors worked six years to give this to you."

Jeffery Swan and Keith Uruski of Conquest Seismic Services, Inc., (formerly Geophysical Applications Inc.), Inc. were at the Lansing Town Board meeting last week to ask the Board for permission to explore for natural gas beneath Town properties.  Their company is a sub-contractor to Ansbro Petroleum, a Denver based company that has been prospecting for gas in Tompkins, Chemung, Cayuga, and Cortland Counties.  "If you see those guys walking across fields and traversing the roads in the orange vests, that is indeed us," Uruski said.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Representative Michael A. Arcuri (D-Utica) voted last night to authorize over a dozen U.S. Army Corps of Engineers water resources studies and projects for the 24^th congressional district. The Water Resources Development Act of 2007, H.R. 1495, would authorize programs through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to help local communities control flooding, mitigate flood damage, upgrade aging water and wastewater infrastructure, and oversee environmental restoration.

“People in Upstate New York know all too well how devastating severe flooding can be to a local economy and how essential the Corps’ projects are to helping prevent or reduce the damaging effects of natural disasters,” said Arcuri. “The severe flood events in June 2006 caused overwhelming amounts of property destruction and subsequent recovery projects have drained the resources of local communities.”