By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 30 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Matt C.M. Contracting is a repeat grand champion
Photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA – Matt Mundion and his giant igloo – The North Pole – was named grand champion in Saturday’s Parade of Lights. Mundion and his business, Matt C.M. Contracting, also won last year for a float with a team of deer pulling a sleigh stacked with presents.
Mundion this time built a framework of wood and attached white fabric on the outside to give an igloo look. He used two of the deer from last year – Rudolph and Dasher – as part of the display.
He also built a door in front so he could see to steer the igloo. He drove a four-wheeler underneath the igloo to travel the parade route.
Mundion is pictured under the igloo with Heather Schrader.
Other winners in the parade include:
Business/Commercial: Weed Man with Dancing Derrick Bradley on top of the float.
Service Organization: Albion FFA, which had a Polar Express themed float.
Not-For-Profit: Medina Band Boosters
Religious: Orleans County Christian School (with a Charlie Brown theme)
Fire Company: Shelby Fire Company
Other groups: Medina School Transportation Department. Pictured include, from left: Rob Dennis, transportation director; and drivers Tina Dennis, Linda Draper, Bonnie Carpenter and Mike Lyons.
Littlest Elf Award (for best design for involving youths and adults): Medina Head Start
Star Award: Bentley Brothers (Laura Bentley fills the snow machine on top of the float)
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA – A giant snowman makes its way down Main Street in a lighted float by MAK Plowing and Landscape in Medina. The 6th annual Parade of Lights included many businesses, civic groups and other organizations.
The parade drew a big crowd to downtown Medina as well as spectators along Park Avenue.
The floats received some last-minute setting up in the parking lot at the Olde Pickle Factory. 810 Meadworks, which celebrated its opening today, also debuted in the parade. The float is show in the Pickle Factory parking lot.
The Medina Transportation Association had a patriotic theme for its float. Several bus drivers marched down Main Street waving flags and dressed as soldiers while bus driver Mike Lyons dressed as Uncle Sam.
A school bus is decorated to look like a giant flag. The vehicle is the new bus for the marching band. Students submitted design ideas to bus drivers. Last year the bus drivers turned a bus into a pirate ship.
“We do it for the kids,” said Mike Lyons, one of the drivers. “Each year we try to do something.”
The Medina FFA created a float with a theme about toys that escaped. Many of the FFA members were dressed as presents. In the top of the float, Josh Wells is the Jack-In-The-Box. He is pictured with elves, Chantelle Kidney (left) and Abigail Maines, the FFA president.
The Orleans County Christian School participated in the parade and had several characters from Charlie Brown.
The Albion FFA had a Polar Express themed float. The newly formed Roy-Hart FFA also participated in the parade for the first time.
Matt Mundion of Matt C.M. Contracting created this float of the North Pole. Mundion made an igloo using scrap wood for a frame. That supported the fabric to give the igloo its white look. Mundion steered the igloo with a four-wheeler inside.
Regan Stacey and Tom Follman portray characters from the Frozen movie. They were featured on the float for Habitat for Humanity.
Dancing Derrick Bradley returned with the Weed Man from Albion.
A member of the Medina Marching Band performs for the crowd. Even his trombone was decorated for the occasion.
The Medina Fire Department has its ladder truck decked out for the parade. Several other fire companies joined in the parade.
East Shelby firefighters, including fire chief Mike Fuller (right), dressed as reindeer for the parade.
Orleans Hub will post more photos from the parade tomorrow.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Editorial
File photo by Tom Rivers – Downtown Albion, shown in this picture from a year ago, has many independent merchants offering products and services.
For many of our local merchants, the next month is a make or break time for their businesses. I hope for their sake, and for our community’s, they succeed. But they can’t do it own their own. They need local residents to spend some of their money at these establishments.
It’s harder and harder for the small town merchants to make it. Customers seem entranced by the malls and mega-retailers with their massive marketing budgets. Dollars spent there don’t stay in our community and trickle back to other local businesses.
There is a perception of savings with the giant chains, and I suppose a trip to the mall is a chance for a little adventure. But I would encourage you to give the local downtown business districts a try. There are more businesses in our local downtowns than many people realize. Dollars spent there stay in our community.
The “mom and pop” businesses spend it with other local businesses. They employ local people. They try to keep up historic buildings that are part of our community identity.
Today is Small Business Saturday, a national initiative that seeks to direct some of the holiday shopping dollars with the local merchants.
Medina and Albion have events today as an added incentive to shop downtown. Medina’s Olde Tyme Christmas is a jam-packed schedule from 9 a.m. to the evening, a schedule highlighted by a Parade of Lights at 6 p.m. Click here to see the full schedule.
The Albion Merchants Association is offering a raffle with $100 of gift certificates from local businesses.
The Orleans Hub is possible because of the many advertisers in our community. We won’t survive without these small businesses. These are the business owners who support other local efforts. They are the ones who sponsor 5K races, who take out ads in the school yearbooks, who give baskets of items for benefit fund-raisers.
These are the businesses that build a strong community. They are deserving of your support.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA – Many volunteers are at the State Street Park in Medina this morning, decorating Christmas trees and setting up a Nativity scene and other signs of the upcoming holiday season.
In the top photo, Dennis Dubai and Christine Limina string lights on trees at the park on Route 31, on the east side of the village.
Debbie Feltz and Gage Masters add lights to one of the trees.
The Medina Lions Club takes the lead in decorating the park. The “Decorate Medina” committee pays for bulbs and other supplies for the annual display. Pete Kaiser of the Lions Club heads the decorating effort.
“It should be nice tonight when the lights are on with all the people here for the Parade of Lights,” Kaiser said.
Lions Club members David Bellucci, with hammer, and Andrew Meier, right, join other volunteers in setting up one of the scenes at the park.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 29 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
MEDINA – The 6th annual Parade of Lights in Medina this evening included a long lineup of floats with holiday lights. The event for the first time also included fireworks.
That display preceded the parade. In the photo above, Travis Phillips (orange hat) of Medina holds his daughter Evelyn while standing next to his wife Kristen. Their son Jaxon also joined them for the fireworks at 5:45 p.m. on Main Street, just before the start of the parade.
The fireworks went off north of Main Street. They gave a nice glow on the historic downtown business district.
The parade also include a grand marshal for the first time. Randy Bushover served in the role. He urged the residents to give back to Medina, their neighbors and family.
“Everyone of you is a light for your community,” Bushover told the crowd.
Orleans Hub will soon have highlights from the parade.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 28 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Editorial
Photo by Tom Rivers – This photo shows downtown Albion after a storm barreled through the area in June. Albion is among the top 100 jurisdictions for highest tax rates out of 3,663 in the state.
Orleans Hub reported on Tuesday that several of our local municipalities are among the most tax oppressed in the State of New York. Medina tops the local communities and nearly all of 3,663 jurisdictions in the state for highest tax rate. (Click here to see that article.)
Only Wellsville and a few other Allegany County towns and villages top the $54.13 combined tax rate in Medina. That ranked 13th in the state, according to the Empire Center’s study.
Medina’s overall rate includes $25.63 for the school district, $15.52 for the village, $9.63 for county and either $3.35 for Town of Shelby, according to 2012 data.
Other Orleans communities are close behind Medina. The Village of Holley is 50th overall at $49.98 – $24.94 for school, $12.99 for village, $9.65 for county and $2.40 for town of Murray.
The Village of Albion is 77th at $47.77 – $18.06 for school, $15.92 for village, $9.60 for county and $4.19 for town of Gaines.
You see the report and it’s easy to point fingers at the villages, to blame the village officials for the crushing tax burden in these locales.
But it’s not the villages’ fault. New York gives the villages very little in state aid, while showering cities with funds. Cities get the lion’s share of Aid and Incentives to Municipalities, state funds designed to help preserve the population cores by helping to maintain aging infrastructure and keep up with critical services such as police and fire protection.
Villages have these same issues, but the state turns its back on these communities. To keep police officers, patch pot holes and maintain parks and cemeteries, villages have to pass nearly the full cost onto to village taxpayers. That’s why these tax rates in the villages are so sky high.
Villages get about $5 to $10 in per capita AIM funding. For Medina, that totaled $45,523 for 6,065 people or $7.51 a person. That is far cry from what a similar size city gets. Consider the City of Sherrill in Oneida County. That city actually has half the people as Medina. The city gets $372,689 in state funding or $121.35 a person. Sherill’s combined tax rates are only $32.66, more than $20 less than in Medina.
Cities also have the added benefit of being spared a town tax. Villages not only are deprived of state aid, but a village resident gets double taxed by towns. In Orleans County, if you live in a village you will pay a double-digit tax rate and then pay about $3 to $4 more per $1,000 of assessed property to a town.
It is a crushing burden. These villages are at a major competitive disadvantage in attracting and keeping residents and businesses. Move to a small city or out in the country and you’ll pay far less in taxes.
Consider the City of Batavia. That city of 15,465 receives $1,750,975 in state funding. That helps drive down the city tax rate to $10.52 per $1,000, about half of the combined village/town rates in Medina, Albion and Holley – our local villages that are high on the tax oppressed list.
The bigger the city, the more generous the state is in helping those municipalities provide services and ease the tax burden for residents, who are often senior citizens and lower-income people – the same situation in villages.
Consider the City of Buffalo, which receives a whopping $161.3 million in state AIM funding for 261,310 residents or $617.22 per person. Buffalo’s combined tax rate is only $27.74 per $1,000 of assessed property, about half the rate in Medina.
I fully support the aid for cities, but the state needs to direct similar funding to the villages, or else they will continue to see property values fall and tax rates jump, creating a vicious spiral.
Our local officials need to sound the alarm about this situation and demand equitable treatment from the state. By propping up the cities, the state is picking winners and losers. It’s particularly destructive in small rural counties like Orleans and Allegany where there are no cities. These counties don’t have any population centers with reasonable taxes. Every village is a high-tax environment.
That ultimately chases businesses outside the county, which results in fewer jobs and retail establishments. That means less local sales tax for the counties, which further drives up our property taxes. The vicious cycle continues, with no end in sight unless that state can be fair with the AIM dollars.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 28 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
ALBION – Black Friday isn’t just about buying Christmas presents. Many local residents find the day after Thanksgiving to be an ideal time to buy a Christmas tree.
In the top photo, Emily Bannister, left, and Kristin Pahl pull a Douglas fir tree through a baler at County House Christmas Trees in Albion. The site is located at Panek Farms, 13420 West County House Rd.
For many years Hugh and Eleni Dudley operated a Christmas tree farm on County House Road before their granddaughter Katie Klotzbach moved the operation down the road to her parents’ farm last year.
Bannister and Pahl both work at the site during the holiday season.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 28 November 2014 at 12:00 am
Aleka Schmidt appointed pastor at First Baptist in Albion
Photos by Tom Rivers – Aleka Schmidt has been serving as a guest preacher at the First Baptist Curch in Albion. She starts a one-year, part-time appointment leading the church in January.
ALBION – Aleka Schmidt was 28, married with a 2-year-old daughter when she was diagnosed with breast cancer in the fall of 2006.
It was a fight for survival, with surgery, chemo and radiation. After 18 months, Schmidt completed her treatments and made it through the fight.
“It was hard facing mortality,” she said. “There were body issues and the side effects. But it many ways it stripped away the distractions of life. I listened to the spirit and the God nudges.”
Schmidt said the battle with cancer brought her closer to God. She grew up in Kendall, and attended the Concordia Lutheran Church. When she married Scott Schmidt and moved to Albion, they attended the Barre Center Presbyterian Church. Scott played the organ and Aleka directed the church choir and hand bell choir for a decade.
After cancer, she shared her story at church, about her deepening of faith. She served as guest preacher a few times. Then other churches asked her to preach, including the First Baptist Church in Albion.
Aleka Schmidt when she was fighting cancer.
“I felt like God was preparing me to say something and to do something,” she said. “I want people to know there is hope in this lifetime and in the next.”
Schmidt, now 36, felt a calling to the ministry, and on Jan. 1 she will begin her first pastoral appointment at the First Baptist Church. Schmidt will serve in a part-time role while working on a seminary degree at Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School in Rochester. She also works as a music therapist for The Arc of Orleans County and the Orleans-Niagara BOCES.
She officially starts on Jan. 1, but Schmidt already is preaching and maintaining some office hours at the church. She also is joined by new church organist, Gary Simboli.
Schmidt is a classically trained musician herself. She said music will be a big part of the church’s worship experience.
Her husband is continuing as the organist at the Barre Center church. Mr. Schmidt will be a guest organist at times for the Baptists.
The congregation at the corner of Liberty and West Park streets meets in a building that was constructed in 1860. The building includes a clock tower, numerous stained glass windows and a large pipe organ. The site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Aleka Schmidt is pictured by the church, which is made of brick and Medina sandstone.
There are only about 15 to 20 regular attendees, but Schmidt said she is impressed by their faith and optimism that the church can make a big difference for the community.
While at the church on Wednesday, she noted that sanctuary was decorated for the holidays.
“They just did it,” she said about the members.
The church-goers also committed to appointing her for the year, while also hiring Simboli, a high school music and drama teacher, to play the organ.
“That is a sign for a hope for the future,” Schmidt said about the church appointments.
Besides preaching on Sundays, Schmidt will do home and hospital visits, program development and represent the church in community events.
She is thankful to be serving the Baptist Church, with a congregation of so many mature and welcoming Christians. Many of them, like her, have seen their faith tested and come out stronger.
“Breast cancer didn’t change me,” she said. “It just made me more of what was already inside.”
MEDINA – Medina Mayor Andrew Meier will host a series of office hours to provide constituents an opportunity to ask questions about the village government dissolution plan and the upcoming dissolution vote scheduled for Jan. 20.
Office hours will be at Village Clerk’s Office, 119 Park Ave. in Medina. The first set of office hours will be as follows:
Wednesday, Dec. 3 from 3 to 5 p.m.
Tuesday, Dec. 9 from 4 to 7 p.m.
Residents seeking clarification or who have general or specific questions regarding the dissolution of village government are welcomed and encouraged to attend. The format will be informal and conversational, and no appointment is necessary.
The dissolution referendum will be Jan. 20, 2014 with polls open from noon to 9 p.m. at the Senior Citizens Center on West Avenue in Medina.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 28 November 2014 at 12:00 am
File photo by Tom Rivers – This house at 8 Eagle St. was decked out for the holidays last year.
Press Release
Lyndonville Lions Club
LYNDONVILLE – Bright holiday lights and happy decorations will soon line the streets of Lyndonville, as they will in most towns and cities. In an effort to encourage and thank the residents for their decoration skills, the Lyndonville Lions Club will sponsor its annual “Spirit of Christmas” lights and decoration contest.
Plaques awarded to the homes that are picked as the winners of the contest. Residents do not need to pre-register their homes for contest entry. Committee members will be the judges of the contest.
In order to have your home included in the judging you need to have your lights and decorations turned on by 5:30 p.m. on Dec. 8. The judges will canvas the entire Lyndonville area.
