The potential effects of a proposed state property tax cap, mentioned by Andrew Cuomo throughout his campaign and in his recent State of the State speech, will be disastrous for New York education, school administrators and others in the education field are saying more vehemently, as reported in a Times Union piece this morning when schools are closed across the nation for the Martin Luther King holiday. The piece by staff writer Scott Waldman not only charts the numbers of teachers that would have to be cut to balance budgets in Capital District schools, but also trhe amounts of budget shortfalls already anticipated before any curb gets put on district revenues, including a possible merger between the Schodack and Ichabod Crane in Rensselaer and Columbia counties.

Without accompanying mandate relief, such as reduced pension contributions and a wage freeze, a cap could further devastate struggling school districts and force them to run out of money within the next two years, said Richard Timbs, executive director of the Statewide School Finance Consortium, an advocacy group for about a third of New York's 700 school districts. "This is the tipping point that is going to redefine public education in New York state," he said.

Waldman goes on quote the Statewide School Finance Consortium pointing out how the tax cap may be politically popular, but would do little to reform property taxes. To alleviate the burden on districts, the group is recommending that a cap be accompanied by a wage freeze for all public school employees and a limit on the amount districts spend on benefits. The group also recommends a repeal of the Triborough Amendment, which keeps existing union contracts in place during collective bargaining, and significantly weakens a district's power at the table. The cap would also mean an additional 5,000 layoffs statewide and loss of $200 million in salary, Timbs said.

Though some states spare homeowners by funding districts through income taxes, New York could achieve meaningful reform by imposing limits on government spending, said E.J. McMahon, a senior fellow with the Empire Center, a conservative think tank in Albany. He said Massachusetts once had a property tax burden on par with New York, but set a 2.5 percent property tax three decades ago to rein in spending and now posts some of the best academic results of all the states. He said the cap is an essential first step. "The tax cap has to be done first and foremost," he said. "It's the essential hammer that gets people to do mandate relief."

Schodack Superintendent Robert Horan said more school districts will consolidate in the next few years. He said district officials should consider such moves now, especially since Cuomo announced that he will establish a $250 million pot of funding to reward districts that find cost savings. He said getting the difficult choices out of the way now will allow districts to once again focus on how to keep offering programs for the students who show up every September.

"We have to stop talking about doom and gloom," he said. "We have to concentrate on providing great programs. We have to start thinking differently."

For the full story, click here...

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="Taconic Hills High School"][/caption]The Taconic Hills Board of Education will be holding a special meeting at 7 p.m. this Wednesday, January 19 for the sole purpose of hearing a grievance from the district's Faculty Association. The Register Star's John Mason reports today that Association President Kevin Reis said his entity had requested it be an open session, and he said as far as he knows, it’s the first time a grievance has been heard in open session. The grievance concerns the way the district is implementing a program known as Response to Intervention, which is replacing Academic Intervention Services, which Reis has called "less than they were under AIS." He did add, however, that he was glad that the board was establishing a legitimate board meeting to hear a grievance, because grievances such as this, that do not concern an individual or contract negotiations, should be heard in open session.

At the Dec. 22, 2010 meeting, New York State United Teachers representative Pamela Melville objected to the board’s intention to consider union grievances without the union being present and without providing adequate time for the union to prepare informational packets for board members. But, speaking during the public comment period, she was not allowed to complete her questions to the board. Later, board Vice-President George Lagonia told the Register-Star Melville is a counsel for the union, and the board wanted to have its own counsel present if she were going to speak.

“I have no issues with anyone making comments in open forum,” he added this week, in the Register Star. “I have an issue with the counsel for the union using the open forum as a stage to make a presentation about the union to the Board of Education. I think that’s inappropriate.” Melville, he said, had been asked numerous times to let the board know beforehand if she would be attending.

For a succinct summary of the recent brouhaha the Taconic Hills board had with its teachers union rep, check out The Columbia Paper's account here...

Amtrak: Sunday schedule.

Banks: Closed.

County offices: Closed.

Columbia Transit: on Saturday schedule; regular schedule otherwise.

Federal offices: Closed.

Financial markets: Closed.

Greene County Transit: No service.

Mail delivery: None.

Metro-North: Saturday schedule, with additional trains for morning and afternoon peak times.

Schools: Closed.

Trailways: Regular schedule.

The former bookkeeper for the towns of Kinderhook and Greenport, indicted in September on 18 felonies and two misdemeanors for allegedly stealing more than $350,000 from the municipalities she worked for, appeared briefly in Columbia County Court Friday, January 14, in anticipation of her pending trial. A report in the Register-Star by Andrew Amelinckx notes that the charges against Pegeen Mulligan-Moore, 40, are related to alleged thefts from the town of Kinderhook, which began in December 2006 and went through Dec. 31, 2009, when her tenure there ended; and in Greenport from January of this year to her suspension in July.

Authorities said Mulligan-Moore stole more than $287,000 from Kinderhook and around $53,000 from Greenport. On January 14, Amelinckx reports, Mulligan-Moore appeared in Columbia County Court in Hudson with her attorney Andrew Safranko, of Albany, before Judge Jonathan Nichols. After a conference in chambers between First Assistant District Attorney Michael Cozzolino, Sr. Ass. D.A. David Costanzo, Nichols and Safranko, the date of the pre-trial hearing in the case, originally scheduled for Jan. 21, was move, with the pre-trial hearing will now be on the morning of the first day of trial, set for Feb. 28. The change may necessitate pushing back jury selection, according to Nichols. The defendant continues to be out on bail.

Besides the criminal trail before Mulligan-Moore, the story continues, she is also facing a civil lawsuit by the town of Kinderhook filed late last year. The suit is not only seeking the money Mulligan-Moore allegedly stole, but for the salary she earned during the time period in which the alleged embezzlement occurred.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="200" caption="Windham Mountain"][/caption]An 18-year-old Long Island woman, characterized in most reports as a "novice skier," died after a skiing accident at Windham Mountain on Sunday, January 16. The Daily Mail and other local papers reports that Erin Clare Malloy-McArdle of North Bellmore sustained extensive head injuries Sunday morning after striking a tree off-trail, according to state police. The accident occurred around 10:30 a.m. Sunday, after Malloy-McArdle had gone off the Upper Warpath trail, which was marked as “more difficult” using the blue square symbol, according to the resort. State police said Malloy-McArdle was “a novice skier” and lost control on the trail. She was not wearing a helmet at the time of the accident.

She was treated at the scene by two physicians and members of the Windham Mountain Ski Patrol. After on-site treatment she was transported by Windham Ambulance and Greene County EMS to the Columbia Memorial Hospital in Hudson where she was later pronounced dead.

“This is a tragic event,” said Tim Woods, general manager of Windham Mountain, in a statement. “We grieve along with the young woman’s family.”

The last ski-related fatality at Windham Mountain occurred more than 15 years ago. According to the National Ski Areas Association, an average of 40.6 people have died skiing/snowboarding per year in the past decade.

Two years ago, the death of actress Natasha Richardson of a head injury suffered while skiing in the Canadian Laurentians, with a helmet on, drew much attention to the sport.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="Photo from Wikipedia."][/caption]Today is the observed holiday for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday. Schools and government offices are closed.


Town meetings tonight
TOWN OF ATHENS First and third Mondays of each Month 6:45 p.m., at
Town Clerk’s Office, unless otherwise advertised.




Weather
COLD Sunny.


Astronomical bodies
TIDES Hudson: High, 12:42 a.m./Low, 6:47 a.m.
SUNRISE/SUNSET 7:21 a.m./4:50 p.m.
MOONRISE/MOONSET 2:36 p.m./5:23 a.m.


Birthdays
JANUARY 17 Cus D'Amato, Muhammad Ali, and Steve Earle.

Snowmobiles, like other vehicles, can fan flames of road rage, and in the Town of Stuyvesant they can also cause a "scrum" or "fracas" inside too. Those are the words Bob Green used in the Register-Star to describe a part of a town meeting there when a report by the Recreation Committee asked the town to enforce the terms of a conservation easement on a town park held by the Columbia Land Conservancy. [caption id="" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Snowmobiles in Yellowstone Park, from Wikipedia."][/caption](Green is not clear about whether the incident took place at the Jan. 8 Recreation Committee meeting or the Jan. 13 Stuyvesant town board meeting.) WGXC's Martin Roby shared a recording of the meeting with WGXC, and listeners can hear the chaos that erupted in the room. Listeners can try to determine exactly what is said, but clearly someone is called a bozo. Listen here for yourself or copy and paste the following url into your computer's media player:
http://www.wgxc.org/media/uploaded_files/2011/01/TownofStuyvesant_snowmobiles_meetingchaos_Jan2011.mp3

Local farmers might benefit from a new US Department of Agriculture proposal to cut the sodium and fat in school lunches, Ron Plants at Buffalo TV station WGRZ reports. Linda Muldoon, Director of Food Services for the Hamburg Central School District, says her cafeteria staff has been preparing items like nutritious wraps and serving up vegetables and fruits for some time. They also offer healthier soup options for students in the cafeteria, and they try to partner with local farmers to save money and get children healthier vegatables. The federal government may try to provide an extra six cents per meal for districts which comply with their guidelines, the station reports.

An 18-year-old woman died after an off-trail skiing accident Sunday Jan. 16 at Windham Mountain, according to Fox23 TV news. Police say the accident occurred around 10:30 a.m. on the Upper Warpath trail, which is rated difficult, and that the skier was not wearing a helmet. The skier died at Columbia Memorial Hospital, the first ski-related death from a Windham Mountain accident in more than 15 years.

The Daily Freeman reports applications for funding from the Greene County Youth Bureau are available online at the Greene County website, click on the Departments tab and scroll to the Youth Bureau page. Only 501(c) 3 organizations are eligible, and applications are due Feb. 1. For more information, call Terry McGee Ward at (518) 719-3245.

Catskill hosted Martin Luther King, Jr. Day festivities Saturday, starting with a peace march from the Second Baptist Church in Catskill down the street to hear speakers at the First Reformed Church of Catskill. WNYT's newcast included short clips of several speakers, including Assemblyman Pete Lopez (R - Schoharie), and Dr. Kathleen Farrell, Superintendent of Catskill Schools.

Columbia-Greene Community College student Samantha Visconti (of Chatham), who is also president of the Student Senate, receives the organization's United Way of Columbia and Greene Counties Jim Riley Student Scholarship Fund from James Riley, second from left, local United Way Executive Director Brad Poster, right, and CGCC President James Campion, far left. Photo from United Way Facebook page.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="SUNY Chancellor Susan Zimpher"][/caption]SUNY Chancellor Susan Zimpher is saying that the state university system's 64 colleges, 88,000 professors and employees, and hundreds of thousands of students are all part of her new “Power of SUNY” plan to jumpstart the state's jobs picture and economy, while simultaneously strengthening academic excellence and meeting the needs of today’s students. The prolific Kathy Kahn of HVBiz has a story out this week about a series of recent Chamber of Commerce and other regional community meetings where she's pitched her vision for SUNY as an engine for job creation.

With the economy in the doldrums and unemployment hovering nationally at 9 percent, the state’s education system is not immune to the pain of staff reduction, where tenure does not necessarily guarantee a lifetime job anymore, and cutting programs are needed to streamline curriculum and make them more in tune with what is needed to jumpstart the economy. Zimpher is confident the schools’ $4,970 yearly tuition and newly created programs will make it economically feasible for students and see them graduating with job skills designed for the 21st century.

The story goes on to note how Zimpher has toured all 64 SUNY campuses in the past year, including Columbia-Greene and Hudson Valley community colleges, meeting with presidents, boards of trustees and personnel, taking notes and creating a vision for SUNY as an economic engine, one that will tout innovation, entrepreneurship and “jobs, jobs, and more jobs.”

Gov. Andrew Cuomo has tapped SUNY to be part of the regional economic councils his transition team is creating to address different segments of the economy.?With nearly a half-million students in its 64 schools – including three medical campuses, an optometry college and the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering in Albany, Zimpher’s presentation to the business community outlined the course it plans to take in being part of job creation and stimulating New York’s sagging financial status.

RCC has several programs already on line for the spring and summer semesters, among them, Small Wind Energy Workshops, Introduction to Photovoltaics and Solar Hot Water System Design.

“Unfortunately, although many programs are geared toward the needs of the future, will those jobs be there?” asked Arthur Anthonisen, president of the Hudson Valley International Trade Association and deeply involved with the state’s SUNY system for two decades.

Anthonisen also pointed out that many students coming out of high school are interested in other trades that do not require a college degree. “What are we doing to meet that need?”

At the end of 2010, SUNY opened its fifth Confucius Institute for Business in the Levin Institute at SUNY’s Global Center in Manhattan, focusing exclusively on business and working professionals. It is affiliated with the Chinese Ministry of Education and will focus on preparing the working business person with language skills and cultural knowledge.

Zimpher is bullish on business – many are hoping the “Power of SUNY,” combined with the system’s interaction with the business community and involvement in the new administration’s economic councils, will bring the jobs that New York desperately needs for its students.

“The Power of SUNY” is available in its entirety at www.suny.edu/powerofsuny.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="200" caption="Black Angus Elba with her three new triplets on the Punsit Valley Angus Farm in Spencertown. Photo by Lance Wheeler of Mid Hudson News Network."][/caption]Who would have thought a story about a local cow giving birth to triplets would have gone viral, at least on a regional basis. And yet the story's spread to all our local publications. Seems that at least with beef cattle, the odds are 1 in 105,000 for triplets. Which, given the storms of the past two weeks, the news from Tuscon, and all the policy stuff out of Albany, Hudson, Catskill and other county seats, makes the January 3 birth of Elba's triplets on Spencertown's Punsit Valley Angus Farm in Columbia County the feel-good story of the year to date. According to Karolyn Shepard — who co-owns the farm with her husband, Mark; mother, Dorrie Kern; and friend, Bobby Pinto — the story of these triplets began back on April 7, 2010, when Elba, a registered black angus, was bred to Select Sires bull, TC Total. On May 25, the veterinarian confirmed that Elba was expecting on Jan. 11. But then on January 2, the farmers decided to pull Elba inside the barn and set her up early. The next morning they showed up expecting to find one calf, discovering two, and then stumbling on a third behind a hay bale, getting its footing. The three are currently named A, B and C, at least until further calving completes over the coming week. For the best of the stories on Elba's little miracle, go the Register Star's account here.

The Columbia County Board of Supervisors halved its number of working committees through consolidation and the doubling up of tasks, according to a story in the Register-Star about its meeting last week. A few supervisors complained that the mash-ups would make for too much work and that the six-member committee structures did not allow for possible voting ties. Francesca Olsen's Register-Star piece on the committees notes the county Board of Supervisors’ number of committees have decreased from 19 to eight, though two members -- Pat Grattan, R-Kinderhook, and Reggie Crowley, R-Copake -- votied “no” on the new structure. At the same meeting, the Board's chairman, Roy Brown, said that it was too early to start making budget cutting decisions, given how everyone's still waiting for word on what the state will be cutting in terms of aid, as well as mandates, although some choices were outlined this week. Register-Star stories in their January 15 issue reported on both issues.



In terms of financial decisions, the county controller and treasurer have developed a list of contingencies in the event cuts from the state translate into new expenses for the county, with no layoffs planned. Instead, a number of small revenue hiking and cutting costs are under consideration, including shrinking the county's basic work week to four days, lagging pay checks by a week, selling off the county's soil and water building in Ghent, and going down to single person snow plows, as is happening in Greene County.

Instead, the county may do the following to gain revenue in the event of any shortfalls:

- Charge for airport parking. There’s currently no charge for parking at the Columbia County Airport on Route 66 in Ghent. It’s estimated that $10,000 can be made in 2011 by charging for parking, officials said.

- Repeal the clothing tax abatement. This has already been done, and according to Brown, no other changes will be made regarding the tax exemption except for those voted on by the BOS in December. From March 1 through April 1, 2011, clothing and shoes, regardless of price, will be taxed; but from April 1, 2011 through April 1, 2012, the sales tax will only apply to clothing and footwear purchases more than $55. After April 1, 2012, it will go back to the way it was, with the sales tax exemption applied to purchases more than $110.

- Close all non-essential services on Fridays. “Non-essential,” in a nutshell, means “not related to public safety/not providing mandated programs.” For example, the county controller, treasurer and attorney’s office would close on Fridays. “Most of the offices in (401 State Street),” would be considered non-essential, Brown explained. Salaried employees’ income would be “adjusted accordingly,” said Controller Ronald Caponera. According to the county’s contingency list, this action would save around $650,000.

- Maintain a zero wage increase in 2011. Expected to save $750,000 over the course of the year.

- Eliminate community home health care service. Brown said the county is working on a “feasibility study to look at the costs of community home health care and what it’s doing for us.” There’s currently no cost savings estimate for this item.

- Lag payroll one week.

- Eliminate all non-essential vehicles. Again, “non-essential” means not related to public safety — no plans are in the works to retire any police vehicles. But, Brown said, gesturing to the employee parking lot outside the 401 State St. County Office Building, “a lot of those vehicles you see out there would be eliminated.” This would include department head vehicles — and Brown’s vehicle. “If we pulled the trigger on that initiative, I’d be willing to give up my own private vehicle (issued to him by the county for use),” he said. That measure would end up saving the county around $100,000, according to the contingencies list.

- Change the health insurance plan for county employees. Expected to save up to $500,000.

- Freeze all non-essential capital purchases. Expected to save $1 million to $2 million in county costs.

- One man snow plowing. According to Public Works Commissioner David Robinson, two county employees are currently in each plow truck; this initiative would leave just one man in each truck. This would cut down on hours, overtime hours included, but “on the flipside, we’d need to implement a training program,” Robinson said, adding that some county roads may not be conducive to that idea. The county may also implement reduced snowplowing on county-maintained roads — “maybe once every two hours (instead of twice), based on what we see in Albany,” Brown said. This could save $400,000.

- Eliminate local share funding. It’s been business as usual to issue checks to the towns and villages of Columbia County from leftover tobacco securitization funds. Hudson gets a share, too; treasurer Ken Wilber said municipalities usually use it to offset EMS costs. They’ve doled out $4 million over the last decade through this program, and it would save the county $400,000 if they didn’t do it this year. “If municipalities are using it towards their EMS costs, it may be passed to the taxpayers on the other end,” he said.

- Sell the soil and water building. It’s not for sale yet, but the county estimates around $1 million in revenue from the sale of the building, located on Route 66 in Ghent.

Hunter Mountain posted this to YouTibe this week, following the January 12 snow storm. Talk about capturing a sense of the opportunities offered by all the winter precipitation this year, given you can keep warm enough to enjoy it all.

The final missing person listed in Columbia County in recent weeks was reported found today in a short piece we've culled from the Mid Hudson News Network. They report that State Police have located Gwendolyn Fuks, from Ghent, who had been reported missing last week. Fuks contacted State Police after seeing herself in news reports as being missing. She had left New York State for personal reasons and was verified to be alive and well by another police agency. Earlier reports of a missing man from Valatie were rescinded when the man returned from several days in Albany, and a lost 16-year-old, also from the Kinderhook area, was found at a local Wal-Mart and then sent to Berkshire Farms for parole violations.

[caption id="" align="alignright" width="200" caption="The Village of Valatie "][/caption]The Columbia County Office for the Aging opens its newest 60+ Food and Friendship Center Wednesday at the Valatie Senior Center on Williams Street in the village. The site will be open Mondays and Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. There will be a ribbon-cutting ceremony at 10 a.m. Wednesday, January 19. “Valatie will be a nice complement to established centers in Stuyvesant (Tuesdays and Thursdays) and Chatham (Fridays), which together will make services available five days per week within about a 6-mile radius,” said OFA Administrator Kary Jablonka in a press release.



Providing a balanced, hot meal containing one-third of the recommended daily intake for seniors, recreational activities, presentations on topics of interest including community resources and an opportunity for socialization, the county network of now nine 60+ Food and Friendship Centers is an important part of serving the growing senior population.

Seniors could call OFA Site Coordinator Debbie Gumprecht at 518-751-0267 by 1 p.m. the day before to make a reservation.

[caption id="" align="alignleft" width="200" caption="A transformer fire at Athens Generating during the snowstorm on January 12 pulled firefighters from around the area, who put out the blaze and are monitoring it as it was reported to be "still smoldering" as of January 14."][/caption]While the rest of us were battening down the hatches for the January 12 blizzard, a transformer failure at the Athens Generating plant caused a fire late Tuesday night that occupied local firefighters into Wednesday afternoon, although no injuries were reported and the incident was "contained immediately" according to a report in the The Daily Mail on January 15. The problem occurred shortly after 11 p.m. on Tuesday, with officials from Greene County Emergency Services and the West Athens-Lime Street and Catskill Fire Departments rushing to the scene. While the fire was contained immediately, the transformer continued to smolder on Friday afternoon, even though plant officials maintained the situation was "completely contained" and the incident did not cause a hazardous condition for the public.

“The system was engineered for containment and it worked,” Administrative Manager Kristine Overbaugh said on Friday. “Everyone is safe. We have two other units and operations were not impacted on those units.”

Plant officials are now saying they are in constant communication with local fire departments, which they say provided an excellent response to the emergency. The transformer is located outside the main turbine hall on the grounds of Athens Generating. The cause of the problem is not yet known.

Athens Generating produces and sells electricity to the Mid-Hudson Valley, southeastern New York and the New York City regions, according to the company’s website. Planning and construction of the massive plant occurred a decade ago despite opposition from many in the local community.

“We are still looking into the cause,” Overbaugh said.

Because mineral oil is inside each transformer, fire and company officials worked to contain that as well, and there is no danger to the community. The plant has also been in contact with the Department of Environmental Conservation, the Department of Energy and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, which is a requirement of the plant’s permit compliance in the event something like this should occur.

Employees are on-site at Athens Generating 24 hours a day, seven days a week, so the regular operating crew was on the job when the transformer blew. There were no injuries.

According to Overbaugh, this was the first time an incident like this has occurred since the plant was constructed several years ago.

President Barack Obama's trip to visit the General Electric plant in Schenectady has been rescheduled for Friday Jan. 21. The trip was originally slated for this last Tuesday Jan. 12, but was postponed due to the aftermath of the shootings in Arizona. The White House says of the trip via Capitol Confidential:

"The site is home to GE’s largest energy division, including steam turbines, generators, wind and solar, and the future home of GE’s advanced battery manufacturing facility. The President will tour the site with GE CEO Jeffrey Immelt and he will make remarks on the importance of growing the economy and making America more competitive by investing in jobs, innovation and clean energy. The GE plant in Schenectady is a direct beneficiary of GE’s power turbine deal with India announced during the President’s trip last November."