Jason Watts named ‘Water Operations Specialist of the Year’

Provided photo: Jason Watts, right, receives the “Water Specialist of the Year” from Kevin Miller, a state technical assistance provider with the New York Rural Water Association. Watts was recognized during the organization’s annual workshop last month at Verona.

MEDINA – The superintendent of the Village of Medina Department of Public Works has been recognized by the New York Rural Water Association as the “Water Specialist of the Year.”

Jason Watts, the Medina DPW superintendent the past four years, was presented the honor during Rural Water’s annual workshop last month in Verona.

Watts was praised for finding and fixing several big leaks in the village’s water system. That has cut the water loss rate from about 30 percent to about half of that, saving the village significant money in unaccounted for water.

Watts said the DPW’s team of 10 other employees are all dedicated to their jobs, and have been successful hunting down many leaks.

“It’s all my guys that do all of the work,” Watts told the Village Board recently. “I wouldn’t be where I am without them.”

The award from Rural Water goes to someone showing  “outstanding dedication to his profession and duty.”

Watts said the Rural Water Association has been a great resource for Medina, helping to pinpoint some of the leaks.

Photos by Tom Rivers: Fireworks reflect in the Erie Canal on Tuesday after a performance by the Albany Symphony in Medina.

MEDINA – Wednesday was a historic day for Medina with a performance by the Albany Symphony in the Canal Basin followed by fireworks over the Erie Canal.

The concert included the debut of a composition written specifically for the concert in Medina celebrating the 200^th anniversary of the Erie Canal.

The stage was set top next to the Erie Canal in Medina.

David Alan Miller conducts the symphony during Tuesday’s concert. The Grammy award-winning Miller has led the group since 1992.

The opening piece of the concert included 18 minutes of George Frideric Handel’s “Water Music.”

World-renowned, Brazilian American composer Clarice Assad wrote “Medina: A Portrait in Sound” for the event. The composition included taped remarks from Medina residents she met while visiting the community in March. They shared about their love for their hometown, the historic downtown, nature and wildlife, the Christmas decorations on Main Street, Medina Sandstone and cobblestone buildings, and the joy of seeing old friends when out for a walk.

Assad also shared sounds she recorded and were crowdsourced from the community. Some of those included church bells and wildlife, including a rooster crowing.

Assad’s world premiere piece was in seven parts: Home & Nature, Animals, Summer Nostalgia, Winter, Community Heritage, Cultural Diversity and Home & Nature.

Medina Mayor Marguerite Sherman welcomes the Albany Symphony. She thanked the NYS Canal Corp. and New York Power Authority for including Medina as one of five communities along the canal to host the concerts celebrating the bicentennial of the historic waterway.

The rest of the schedule includes: Utica on July 3, Seneca Falls on July 4, Fort Plain on July 5, and Schuylerville on July 6.

Each concert includes a world premiere of a new composition. The themes for the original compositions include environmental justice on July 2, immigrant communities on July 3, women’s rights on July 4, Indigenous stories on July 5, and Black experience on July 6.

Angelyn Chandler, vice president of NYPA, is next to Sherman. Chandler said the new commissioned music is an attempt to tell an “expanded narrative of the canal.”

“We think telling these stories is very important for all of us,” she said.

Chandler thanked Medina for hosting the concert and being part of the bicentennial celebration.

“Thank you for showing us what a canal community can look like and sound like,” she said.

Photo by Cindy Eibl: Two of the performers in the Albany Symphony have local connections. Dana Oakes is a trumpet player with the orchestra. He is the brother of Wendy Oakes Wilson and Darrel Oakes of Lyndonville.

Paula Oakes (center), wife of Dana Oakes, has been a member of the Albany Symphony’s first violin section since 1986.

Britt Hewitt, a soprano at left, and Devony Smith, a mezzo-soprano, sang an arrangement of pop hits, including “Uptown Funk” by Bruno Mars during the concert.

The two singers led off the concert by singing the national anthem, “Star Spangled Banner.”

About 1,000 people attended the concert, a rare event with a symphony performing in Orleans County.

A crowd filled the basin to see the symphony, which performed from a stage on the northside of the parking lot.

The calm water of the Erie Canal acted like mirror reflecting the fireworks on Tuesday night. The fireworks were let off with the threat of rain looming.

Photos by Tom Rivers

MEDINA – A stage has been set up on the north side of the Canal Basin’s parking lot for a concert today by the Albany Symphony.

The orchestra will begin its performance at 8 p.m. The group is shown during a rehearsal this afternoon.

Fireworks will follow after tonight’s concert. People are encouraged to bring their own chair for the concert and fireworks.

The Albany Symphony is in town as part of a celebration of the Erie Canal’s bicentennial. The New York Power Authority and NYS Canal Corp. have set five concerts for the symphony from July 2-6, events that will feature the debut of commissioned compositions.

At Medina, the symphony will perform a new composition by world-renowned, Brazilian American composer Clarice Assad. Her composition is on a “Sound Capture Journey,” as she began crafting a new orchestral work on the theme of the sound of nature and the environment and along the Erie Canal.

Assad visited Medina in March, and she and others recorded sound snippets from around Orleans County, collecting personal stories about local connections to nature, the environment, and individual sense of place.

Jim Hancock, chairman of Medina’s Tourism Committee, welcomes the symphony to Medina today. Hancock organized a day of events with other musicians and historical presentations.

McHenry and Baz performed from noon to about 2 p.m., playing music from the ’60s, ’70s ’80s and ’90s.

Photo by Ginny Kropf: Kay VanNostrand of Medina, left, and her pen pal of 70 years, Kay Reid of Australia, are all smiles as they met for coffee Saturday at the Coffee Pot Café, during Reid’s visit.

MEDINA – Kay VanNostrand of Medina and Kay Reid, who lives in a suburb of Sydney, Australia, could never have imagined as little girls forming a close friendship with someone half-way across the world.

But that is just what they did.

Last week, Reid arrived in Medina to spend some time visiting VanNostrand.

The girls were both 10 when VanNostrand joined Girl Scouts and Reid joined the Australian equivalent – the Girl Guides.

“I got Kay’s name and wrote my first letter to her on July 1, 1955,” Reid said.

“And I wrote right back,” VanNostrand said. “We wrote back and forth all summer.”

But their friendship didn’t end there, although they drifted apart for a few years. Life got in the way, they said.

VanNostrand went to college and became a teacher, while Reid married and raised four children.

“We always sent Christmas cards and gifts,” VanNostrand said. “When we realized we could talk on the phone, that was how we corresponded.”

“When we got computers, we could correspond with Skype,” Reid said.

When VanNostrand retired in 1997, Reid and her sister Margaret came here to visit.

“I asked if we could come visit, and Kay answered, ‘Yes, yes, yes,’” Reid said.

“It took two weeks for me to get her letter and another two weeks for her to get my reply,” VanNostrand said.

In 2002, VanNostrand’s friend Barb Filipiak went to Australia to visit a fellow teacher and extended her stay to visit Reid.

VanNostrand’s first trip to Australia was in 2004.

In 2006 and again in 2008, the Kays met in Hawaii with Filipiak and spent a week together. In 2011 they all met in Alaska, then spent three days after that in Seattle. Reid flew back to Australia and VanNostrand and Filipiak took the train back to Buffalo.

In 2017 Filipiak and VanNostrand went to New Zealand on a tour, and then flew to Australia and spent a week with Reid.

Reid described her flight here this time as a real challenge. She left Sydney on Quantis Airlines and arrived in Dallas to find long lines and only two employees working. She had a two-hour layover to check in, go through Customs and make the long walk to get to the next gate for her flight to Buffalo.

When it became evident the line wasn’t moving fast enough for her to make connections, she found a security person and relayed her concern. He took her where she had to go and she had a 15-minute wait there. In the end, she missed her flight to Buffalo and had a six-hour wait before she could get another flight.

This week, VanNostrand, who turns 83 today, and Reid, who turns 83 on Sept. 12, shared some of their old memories.

“If it wasn’t for Kay, I’d have never done international travel,” Reid said. “It is remarkable because neither of us liked writing letters.”

In previous years, the Kays would open their Christmas gifts together on Skype, but recently they have decided instead of buying each other gifts, they will send something to a charity in the other’s name.

During Reid’s week-long visit, they have done a lot of catching up, they said. They visited Sarah’s Greenhouse and friends in Brockport. They still want to go to Holley Falls and the Western New York National Cemetery in Pembroke.

Reid will leave July 4 to return home to Australia.