Brendan J. Lyons reports in the Times Union that the lawyer for Rensselaer County Executive Steven McLaughlin wants a judge to dismiss a two-count felony indictment against the former state assemblyperson for allegedly using campaign funds to pay off a $3,500 debt to a former aide. After winning his second election as county executive in November, a month later McLaughlin was indicted for using campaign funds to pay off a debt to his former Assembly chief of staff, Jennifer R. Polaro. She was arrested in March 2020 for grand larceny, a felony, and petit larceny, a misdemeanor, for allegedly withdrawing funds from McLaughlin's campaign account and spending the money at Rivers Casino in Schenectady nearly five years ago. Polaro pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor larceny charge in Schenectady City Court two years ago. Now Polaro is cooperating with investigators, and testified before the grand jury that indicted McLaughlin. But Benjamin W. Hill, McLaughlin's attorney, says McLaughlin's payments were kosher. "The people adduced no proof whatsoever in the grand jury, circumstantial or direct, that the $5,000 payment to HVS was fraudulent, unearned, unauthorized, or otherwise illegitimate," Hill wrote in a motion to dismiss the case. "Rather, all of the proof submitted to the grand jury focused on the existence of a debt owed to Ms. Polaro and HVS's $3,500 payment to her." The attorney general's responding motion says, "It is elementary that McLaughlin could have paid the debt to Polaro directly from his personal funds. Instead, McLaughlin set into motion a scheme whereby (his) campaign funds were used to settle this debt." Read more about this story in the Times Union.

Jon Campbell reports at Gothamist that State Appellate Division Associate Justice Stephen Lindley of Rochester issued an interim stay April 4 at least temporarily keeping the recent Democrat-drawn redistricting maps to remain in place for this week, while an appeal of a ruling overturning the new maps is heard. Last week, State Supreme Court Justice Patrick McAllister, a Republican from Steuben County, threw out the new maps, and ordered lawmakers to come back with a bipartisan plan. But Democrats appealed, and on April 7 the Appellate Division, Fourth Department, will hold a hearing on the matter. Meanwhile candidates are currently gathering petition signatures to get on the June 28 primary ballot. That election could be delayed the longer the appeal process takes. "The appeal will be greatly accelerated for obvious reasons, and I anticipate that a decision could be rendered within the next three weeks, if not sooner,” Lindley wrote on April 4. Read more about this story at Gothamist.

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Margaret Hartmann reports at New York Magazine that 66 people sent complaints to the Federal Communication Commission regarding ABC's telecast of the Oscars which included a physical and verbal attack by actor Will Smith on comedian Chris Rock. Those complaining said they were “traumatized,” “offended,” “triggered,” and “shaken” by the attack. “I haven’t been able to sleep as a result. My child was also scared. I had to take medicine to calm me down,” one anonymous viewer wrote to the FCC. “I thought your agency was supposed to keep this type of violence and cursing off television. I hope you can bring sense and reason back to the public airways,” another wrote. ABC did keep Smith's profanity off the airwaves, cutting to silence while viewers in Japan and Australia heard the entire encounter. After the 2004 Super Bowl, where Janet Jackson's nipple was exposed at halftime, the FCC received 540,000 complaints. Read more about this story at New York Magazine.

Natasha Vaughn-Holdridge is reporting for Columbia-Greene Media that Chatham town officials are looking for volunteers to serve on its newly formed Grant Acquisition Advisory Committee. The committee will work to secure funding for capital projects and purchases. Chatham Town Supervisor Donal Collins said, “It’s an advisory committee we’re setting up to staff with volunteer residents to work on chronicling our grant applications and pursuing future grant applications.” The committee will have anywhere from five to nine members and should be able to start meeting in a few weeks, Collins said. He said there is a good deal of federal and state funding now available and the town is hoping to capture some of that for the municipality. The new committee will look at outside funding streams for improvements to town buildings, roads, services, parklands, equipment, and residential broadband. Committee meetings will be held monthly. Information is available by emailing Chatham [at] chathamnewyork [dot] us. “We’re just trying to expand our possibilities, funding with outside sources and revenue streams and get the public involved. I think those are the most important things about this committee,” Collins said. Read the full story at HudsonValley360 [dot] com.

Danny Jin is reporting for The Berkshire Eagle that Gina Divola, a self-described “America first” Republican, has announced she is running against Democrat incumbent Tricia Farley-Bouvier for Pittsfield’s seat in the Massachusetts House. Divola, 32, of Pittsfield, said she left her job as a nursing assistant because she felt a COVID-19 vaccination requirement infringed on her medical and personal freedom. She now runs a business called Maga Cleaning Services. Divola cites election integrity and medical freedom as top concerns for her campaign. “I believe that we are endowed by our creator, which is God, not government,” she said. She opposes mail-in voting and voting drop-boxes. Farley-Bouvier, 57, co-chairs the House Progressive Caucus, and has served as the Pittsfield representative since 2011 and plans to run for reelection. Comparing herself to Farley-Bouvier, Divola said she is “more for the America first idea.” She expressed opposition to allowing undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses, a bill that Farley-Bouvier worked to push through the House, where it passed by a large margin. The most recent Republican to represent Berkshire County in the State House was Shaun Kelly, who represented the 2nd Berkshire District from 1991 to 2005. “I’m aware this is a pretty Democratic-voting, liberal-leaning area, but I think what’s important is a lot of voters were starting to wake up to the idea that we’re getting misrepresented, being strung along for agendas more than things that actually concern us,” Divola said. Candidates for state representative must receive 150 certified signatures to appear on the ballot in November. Read the full story in The Berkshire Eagle.

Andrea Macko reports for Porcupine Soup that Greenville High School junior Hunter Smigel was elected as New York State FFA vice president for 2022-2023. Smigel first joined the group, formerly called Future Farmers of America, in sixth grade. “It has been amazing watching him grow and accomplish this next step in his journey,” said Diane Lewis, Greenville FFA advisor and longtime ag and technology teacher. Greenville’s FFA chapter was chartered in 1939, and is the only one in Greene County. The story does not quote Smigel. Read more about this story in Porcupine Soup.

Here is this week's WGXC Congressional Report, tracking the votes, statements, positions, and campaigns of the representatives and candidates for the 19th and 20th Congressional seats in New York. Current Democrat Reps. Antonio Delgado and Paul Tonko vote with the positions of President Joe Biden 100 percent of the time, according to the fivethirtyeight.com website. Click here to listen to this report.

Phoebe Taylor-Vuolo reports for PBS station WSKG that Rep. Antonio Delgado visited a Delaware County dairy farm last week. At Clark Farms Creamery near Delhi, fifth generation dairy farmer Kyle Clark said supply chain issues have raised his operating costs. “The price of milk’s definitely improved, especially in the last couple months. But relative to the increase in input costs, and even the availability of a lot of those things… it’s not keeping up,” Clark said. Delgado said he is working to create more demand for milk. “Making sure that our milk can go to our schools, milk can go to our hospitals, milk can go to our community centers. Wherever there’s more localized opportunities to grow and build from, that should be the focus,” Delgado said. The Congressperson Delgado has cosponsored legislation to provide whole milk in schools instead of one percent and fat-free milk, and also wants New York City to keep serving chocolate milk to students. Delgado, though, does not comment in the story about whether farm workers should get paid overtime the same way grocery store and other workers are paid, when they exceed 40 hours a week. The Farm Bureau opposes farm workers getting overtime at 40 hours. Read more about this story at the WSKG website.

Nick Reisman reports for New York State of Politics that Rep. Antonio Delgado has waded into a contentious state issue. Farm workers want to get paid overtime wages just like grocery workers, and everyone else, while farm owners want to continue only paying overtime after 60 hours of work a week, rather than 40. The state Department of Labor is moving to the 40-hour threshold for farm worker overtime, but getting stiff resistance from the capitalist farm owners. Delgado, who represents the 19th Congressional district, is now the first Democratic House member from New York against the farm workers getting overtime pay like everyone else. "These farms have faced a difficult farm economy in recent years, and severe market disruptions as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic," Delgado wrote in the letter to Gov. Kathy Hochul on an issue where he does not have a vote. "Lowering the overtime threshold from 60 to 40 hours adds another hardship for our farmers, and may cause many to close their doors." The story does not quote any farm workers, nor anyone advocating on their behalf. But Delgado gets his say. "Rather than move forward with the wage board’s decision, I urge you to work with farmers to find a better solution," he wrote. "Including farmer input will ensure potential changes are viable for farmers." Read more about this story at New York State of Politics.

On April 1, Reps. Antonio Delgado, Paul Tonko, and Sean Maloney voted for removing cannabis from the list of scheduled substances under the Controlled Substances Act. The measure, making cannabis legal across the country, passed 220-204 with only three Republicans voting with the majority. Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, who represents the northern Hudson Valley, was not one of them. Similarly, on March 31, Delgado, Tonko, and Maloney all voted for the Affordable Insulin Now Act, which would cap insulin prices at either $35 a month or 25 percent of an insurance plan's negotiated price — whichever is lower. Fortune magazine reports that in the United States insulin costs on average 800 percent more than in other developed economies. The bill passed in the House of Representatives 232-193 with only 12 Republicans voting for the measure. Again, Stefanik was not one of them.

Matt Schudel reports in the Washington Post that Bill Fries, an advertising executive with a unique history in one form of radio, died from cancer at the age of 93 on April 1. Under his stage name C.W. McCall, Fries hit number one on the pop charts in 1976 with the song "Convoy," the most famous musical ode to citizens band radio. Fries first created the character C.W. McCall as a truck driver in a series of commercials for a Midwestern bread company. Then he had top 20 country hits with “Old Home Filler-Up an’ Keep On-a-Truckin’ Cafe” and “Wolf Creek Pass,” both songs about truck driving. Then his song “Convoy,” an odd ode to breaking the law on the nation's highways told through CB radio, knocked the Bay City Rollers’ “Saturday Night” off the top of the Billboard pop chart in January 1976. The song was a CB radio conversation between Rubber Duck and Pig Pen, the CB radio handles of two truckers, and filled with the lingo and code words of citizens band radio of the era. “It was timely,” Fries told the Associated Press in 1990. “Back in 1975-76, that craze was sweeping the country. The jargon was colorful, and the American public liked that, too. It was laced with humor, but it had a rebellious feeling about it and people responded to it.” “Convoy” sold about seven million copies and inspired Sam Peckinpah’s 1978 film of the same name, starring Kris Kristoffersen. “Well, mercy sakes, good buddy, we gonna back on outta here,” C.W. McCall says at the end of “Convoy,” with a slight alteration of a trucker’s farewell: “Keep the bugs off your glass and the bears off your … tail.” Read more about this story in the Washington Post.

Ted Remsnyder is reporting for Columbia-Greene Media the former owner and publisher of the Daily Mail, Gunther Hafner, died March 11 in Queensbury, at the age of 82. Friends and colleagues are remembering Hafner as an enterprising and commanding presence in Greene County. Born in January 1940, Hafner graduated from Catskill High School and went on to serve four years in the U.S. Navy before returning to Greene County to launch his career in the newspaper business. He was hired at the Daily Mail in 1961 to work in the mail room, and from there made his way up in the company, then owned by the Conland family of Connecticut. Hafner held a variety of jobs with the paper, working as the circulation manager, advertising manager and general manager before moving up into an ownership position. Current Managing Editor Raymond Pignone remembered Hafner as a hands-on publisher who was not afraid to roll up his sleeves to get the job done. “Gunther was a very hard-working publisher,” Pignone said. “He started out as an advertising rep, but even when he was a publisher, he would go out on the street with a camera and take news photos and photos for ads. He would go out and promote the paper and sell ads, even when he was the publisher.” Hafner retired in 1989, and sold the publication to the Johnson Newspaper Corporation. He was a longtime fixture in the Catskill community, with memberships with the Catskill Elks Club, the Greene County Council of the Arts, the Catskill Rotary Club and the Catskill Merchants Association. He also sponsored local sports organizations including the Catskill Little League. Hafner is survived by his wife Lucille, son Mark, daughters Stacey and Kym Bongiorno as well as nine grandchildren. Read the full story at HudsonValley360 [dot] com.

Liz Montgomery is reporting for Porcupine Soup criminal charges have been dropped against ]former Cairo-Durham Elementary School teacher Melissa Eising Saccoccie, arrested last year in connection to what authorities characterized as a “large-scale narcotics operation.” Saccoccie, 41, of Coxsackie was charged by state police in May, 2021, with driving while ability impaired by drugs and seventh-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance, a misdemeanor. This week, Greene County District Attorney Joseph Stanzione said the case against Saccoccie has been “formally closed as the charges were withdrawn.” The DA said, “There remains the possibility it could be reopened. That determination is yet to be made. But as for now the court case is closed.” Authorities are reportedly awaiting identification of the substance Saccoccie was allegedly impaired by at the time of her arrest. Saccoccie taught kindergarten at the time of her arrest and she was subsequently placed on paid administrative leave. This week, Cairo-Durham Superintendent of Schools Michael Wetherbee confirmed that she was no longer employed by the district, having resigned her position effective June 30, 2021. The probe that led to the charges against Saccoccie resulted in the arrest of seven other people, including a state trooper. Read the full story at porcupinesoup [dot] com.

Rick Karlin is reporting for the Times Union the historic Brodie Mountain ski resort in the Berkshires seems to have an interested buyer. The broker handling the property, located three miles from Jiminy Peak in New Ashford, Mass., says the sellers have an accepted offer on the 500-acre property and the sale could be finalized in the coming weeks. The property includes three ski lifts and was listed at $1.9 million. Mitch Muroff, of Muroff Hospitality, who is handling the sale, declined to name the potential buyer or the offer amount. An issue that could impact the sale is a covenant attached in 1999, that supposedly prohibits "public downhill skiing" on the property. It is unclear whether the covenant has an expiration date or if it remains in perpetuity. The Brodie resort dates to the 1930s, and after several owners it was purchased by the Fairbank Group which owns and operates nearby Jiminy Peak. Fairbanks closed the ski operation in 2002, but a snow tubing park remained in place until 2007. The area was then sold to the Holiday Inn/Silverleaf company. Potential uses for the property include a private membership-based ski club, snowboarding or cross country skiing or redeveloped as a "glamping" site, an ATV track, RV park or for vacation homes. Read the full story in the Times Union.

Today's daily news update.

Bill Mahoney reports for Politico that a Republican judge threw out New York's Congressional and state legislative redistricting plan on March 31, saying lawmakers failed to follow the legal redistricting process. “The people won, and the politicians lost,” said former Rep. John Faso, who used to represent the 19th Congressional District, and worked on overturning the new district lines. Now New York’s June primaries will likely be delayed if the ruling is upheld on appeal. But Democrats and political observers believe there's a good chance the appeal will overturn this decision. "We always knew this case would be decided by appellate courts. We are appealing this decision and expect this decision will be stayed,” said Senate Democratic spokesperson Mike Murphy. Besides throwing out the new district lines, Supreme Court Justice Patrick McAllister ordered legislators to create new lines by April 11. Candidates had already been gathering petition signatures based on the district lines, which may or may not be used. Political observers predicted that Democrats would pick up additional seats in Congress and in Albany under the redistricting plan. Read more about this story in Politico.

Massarah Mikati reports for the Times Union that Democrats in Bethlehem, in Albany County, are warning voters about Doug Lloyd, who is running for one of two open seats on the Board of Education there with a history of radical social media posts. Lloyd claims, “My platform is based around non-partisan ideas that we should all be able to agree on,” but his social media posts include untrue conspiracy theories. He shared a story about a study on COVID-19 vaccines and menstrual cycles and commented above it, "Tell me again how this isn't an experiment." He also posted a meme of a photo of Jeffrey Epstein, who was accused of having sex with children, saying, “Don’t leave me hanging this Valentine’s Day." The Bethlehem Democratic Committee wrote its own social media post about the candidate: "We don’t want (Lloyd) anywhere near our children." Lloyd repeatedly has talked about COVID-19 conspiracies, which have not been proven, and transexual atheletes, which he opposes. "I'm also concerned about women's sports as trans women are dominating due to their biological advantages." he told the Times Union. Bethlehem's Republican committee is backing Lloyd. "We share his concerns with the current board's judgment, and their lack of ideological diversity,” they wrote in an email. Lloyd has campaign signs out, but no petitions from any prospective candidates have been submitted to the district yet. Those petitions for the two open seats with three-year terms are due by April 19, with school elections on May 18. Read more about this story in the Times Union.

The Upstater reports that April 1 used to be the beginning of trout season in New York, but is now the end of catch-and-release-only trout fishing. Year round trout fishing is now allowed on most streams in New York with an artificial lures-only catch-and-release season from Oct. 16 to March 31. Fishing in New York state is a highly anticipated, world-class experience that brings seasoned and amateur anglers to our waters in every corner of the state every spring,” said New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Basil Seggos. “DEC’s extensive fish stocking efforts throughout the state are certain to complement our existing healthy fisheries and make the upcoming harvest season a success.” DEC stocking trucks are adding 1,872,105 catchable brown, rainbow, and brook trout to ponds and streams across the state this spring. There are also several new fishing regulations this year on the DEC's website. Read more about this story at The Upstater.

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Click above to download or play today's "Better Weather." Produced by Joe Demanso of the Catskill Makers Syndicate.

Bernadette Hogan and Sam Raskin are reporting for the New York Post that state lawmakers and Gov. Kathy Hochul will miss their midnight budget deadline as legislators prepared March 31, to leave the capital for a long weekend. Democratic legislative leaders are in the process of working out the details of a compromise with Hochul on her proposed public safety plan, but they will not reach an agreement by midnight on April 1. Bail reform laws remain a major sticking point in negotiations. State Senate Democrats were briefed on the negotiations tied to the issue of whether to grant judges more discretion to consider the risk of potential harm to others when releasing suspects pre-trial. “They’re trying to figure out a way to allow judges to consider harm or risk without triggering the ‘dangerousness’ debate,” said one Democrat briefed on the discussions. Hochul has proposed maintaining the “‘least restrictive means of ensuring a return to court’ standard for bail and release determinations, but allowing judges to consider the risk of harm as a factor when making that determination,” according to a summary of where negotiations currently stand, obtained by The Post. The Senate has countered with a plan that would allow judges to consider whether the alleged crime involved harm to an individual or group of people. Hochul has also proposed adding hate crimes to the list of bail-eligible offenses, but state Senate leaders have opposed that change. The deadline for the state budget is April 1; the $216 billion final proposal must be signed into law by 4 p.m. April 4, “to avoid any issues with upcoming payrolls” of state workers for the new fiscal year, according to state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s office. Read the full story in the New York Post. .