By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 4 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Photo by Tom Rivers
GAINES – A 13-foot-long fiberglass fish has been a local landmark for nearly 25 years at Al Capurso’s front yard on Route 279 in Gaines.
Capurso used to run the Bait Barn at the location, and bought the fish in 1990 from the Albion and Medina Rotary Clubs, which used it in the 1980s to promote the Orleans County Trout and Salmon Derby.
The Rotary Clubs sold it in 1990 to Capurso. The fish was targeted with graffiti a few years ago as part of a Albion High School class prank. The fish had a Purple Eagle theme until Capurso painted it recently with a message: “Go Fish.” He plans to add yellow spots to the fish once the weather permits.
Capurso said the fish needs some repairs and the trailer holding it is shot. He would be interested in donating it to a new owner if it was used to promote the local fishery.
I’d like to see something like this down at Point Breeze. This is something people would get their picture taken with and could add to charm of the area.
Carlton has $25,000 to spend as part of Point Breeze’s prize for winning the Ultimate Fishing Town. That money needs to be used to promote the fishery and a nice public art project could make the area more distinctive.
I wonder how much it would cost for a 20-foot-long fish?
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 4 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers
KENDALL – The Kendall community held its annual tree lighting and caroling celebration tonight at the gazebo at the town park.
Kendall school musicians performed for the event. Jonathan Price plays the saxophone.
Eliya Cooper, wearing Santa hat, sings with the Kendall chorus. The group sang a few songs, including “Jingle Bells” and “Silent Night.”
Bob Ryan, a member of the Kendall Lions Club, leads a group of children in singing several Christmas songs.
The Lawnchair Ladies performed a couple choreographed songs. The group of 18 includes Kathy Kemp, in front. They will be part of Brockport’s parade of lights at 5 p.m. on Sunday.
The crowd gathered to help celebrate the holiday season.
Santa and an elf joined the celebration at the gazebo, posing for pictures with children. The event then shifted to the firehall, where Santa mingled with residents before getting back to work.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 4 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Provided photo – Downtown Lyndonville has new decorations this season thanks to donations from the Lyndonville Lions Club and the Lyndonville Area Foundation. The following are pictured, from left: Wes Bradley (Foundation and Lions Club), Darren Wilson (Lyndonville Area Foundation President), Dan Fuller (Village of Lyndonville DPW), John Belson (Town of Yates Supervisor, Lions Club and Foundation) and Terry Woodworth (Village Superintendent of Public Works).
Photo by Tom Rivers
Lyndonville will celebrate its first “Christmas in Lyndonville” celebration this Saturday with events from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m.
The celebration includes the lighting of 26 Christmas trees in Veterans Park. Residents, businesses and organizations are all decorating the trees. Those decorations are scheduled to be up by Friday.
The lineup of events on Saturday includes a community breakfast buffet at the Lyndonville Presbyterian Church from 8 to 11 a.m.; a mini mall at the United Methodist Church from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.; games at the Yates Community Library from 3 to 4 p.m.; and caroling at Vets Park from 4 to 5 p.m.
Santa will arrive at 5 p.m. and flip the switch to light the trees. Santa will then be at the Village Hall from 5 to 6:30 p.m. to visit with children and their families. Hot chocolate and cookies will be available at the Village Hall.
There will be a Christmas Choir “LaLaPalooza” at the Presbyterian Church at 7 p.m.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 4 December 2013 at 12:00 am
ALBION – A budget vote that ended in a 3-3 tie this morning would be broken by Ken Rush, a county legislator who missed today’s vote.
Rush had surgery for carpal tunnel on Monday. He stayed home this morning, recovering from surgery.
But Rush said he supports the budget that calls for a 5 percent tax increase. It would raise the tax rate from $9.71 to $10.11 per $1,000 of assessed property.
“I don’t want to see a tax increase but the people have got to have a budget,” Rush said when contacted after the Legislature meeting.
Three legislators – Don Allport, Henry Smith and George Bower – opposed the budget, saying the tax increase was too much. Allport said department heads should be required to reduce spending by 10 percent in their departments.
Rush said the department heads have already worked to rein in spending.
“I don’t know what more can be done with it,” Rush said.
He wants to see the county work towards upgrading its emergency communications system. The budget includes a $475,000 initial debt service payment on the radio system upgrade. Rush said he wants that project to go forward.
The Legislature could have another vote on the budget before a Dec. 20 deadline. If the budget fails to pass, the tentative budget would take effect, which is identical to the one that was deadlocked in a vote earlier today.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 3 December 2013 at 12:00 am
smartDesign architecture of Batavia submitted these renderings of the United Memorial Medical Center project, which includes an addition of about 800 square feet as well as a canopy and brick for the front of the façade.
MEDINA – United Memorial Medical Center, which stepped up its obstetrics and gynecological care in Medina in 2011, is working to have an expanded site on Maple Ridge Road.
The Batavia hospital, which is now delivering about 100 babies a year in Batavia to Orleans County women, wants more exam rooms and medical offices to serve its patients in the Medina area.
The hospital wants to do a major renovation and expansion of a former K & K food mart and gas station at 11360 Maple Ridge Rd. UMMC is currently a tenant for Medina Memorial Hospital.
Photos by Tom Rivers – This building at 11360 Maple Ridge Rd., a former K & K gas station and food mart, will be transformed into a healthcare site for United Memorial Medical Center in Batavia.
Medina closed its birthing unit on July 1, 2011. UMMC and Medina Memorial have worked collaboratively the past 2 ½ years on women’s health services.
“They’re in Medina now and they want to stay in Medina,” Todd Audsley, project manager for smartDesign architecture, told the Medina Planning Board. “They need more room for doctors and patients.”
The property is in the process of being acquired by Chad LaCivita, who is buying it from Reid Petroleum. LaCivita will lease the site to UMMC.
Todd Audsley, a project manager with smartDesign architecture in Batavia, discusses the site plan for a health care site in Medina. United Memorial Medical Center wants to better provide its women’s health services in the community. Village Planning Board member Todd Bensley is at left.
Village officials believe the property has a clean bill of environmental health. The previous gas storage tanks have been removed and they didn’t leak, said Marty Busch, village code enforcement officer.
The project will add about 800 square feet to the building, and will change the looks of the property with a brick exterior on the front and wrapping around the front sides.
“It’s a nice-looking building,” Audsley told the planners. “It will be a welcome addition to the streetscape.”
The project needs to go before the Orleans County Planning Board at 7 p.m. on Dec. 19. It also comes back the Village Planning Board for a vote on the site plan on Jan. 7. Residents can comment during a public hearing on the project at 7:05 p.m. on Jan. 7. The hearing will be at City Hall.
Planning Board members tonight asked Audsley to make sure exterior lighting doesn’t spill off onto neighboring properties. Audsley said wall packs will be mounted on the building and the lighting will be projected downward.
The sign on the building won’t be lighted. A monument sign by Route 31A will have a soft glow, he said.
The hospital would like to start work on the project soon after the local board approvals and permits are secured, Audsley said.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 3 December 2013 at 12:00 am
ALBION – A Holley resident was sentenced to 1 1/3 to 4 years in state prison on Monday after breaking into a building and stealing last year.
Michael Redick, 27, of North Main Street had two prior petty larceny charges before he was arrested and charged with third-degree burglary, petty larceny and criminal mischief in the fourth degree. He broke into a building on Ridge Road on Feb. 2 2012.
He pleaded guilty on Sept. 9 to attempted burglary in the third degree. Orleans County Court Judge James Punch gave Redick the maximum sentence as part of the plea.
Redick apologized in court for the crime.
“I had no right to take from others,” he said.
Redick said he wanted a chance to get a job and take care of his family.
Punch said the court system has given Redick several chances to live a productive life. But Redick’s drug use has led him to “all sorts of crime and chaos,” Punch said.
“I can’t turn you lose on the public,” the judge said at sentencing. “You’ve been given several opportunities to deal with the problem.”
In another case in court, a former inmate at the Orleans Correctional Facility, a medium-security men’s state prison, pleaded guilty to second-degree assault and will spend 5 more years in state prison for assaulting another inmate.
Alejandro Sanchez, now an inmate at Attica Correctional Facility, pleaded guilty in court on Monday. He used a razor to slice another inmate in the neck on March 29, 2012.
Sanchez, through an interpreter, said he was acting in self defense. But District Attorney Joe Cardone said the other inmate did not have a weapon. Cardone said it was an unprovoked attack that left the other inmate with a 5-inch laceration in his neck and ongoing pain.
Sanchez could have gone to trial, but would have faced up to 7 years in additional prison time if found guilty. By pleading guilty, he faces 5 more years in prison. He will be sentenced on March 10.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 3 December 2013 at 12:00 am
MEDINA – A new video about the preservation efforts at Bent’s Opera House is aimed to create enthusiasm for the project.
The Orleans Renaissance Group, owners of the site, worked with Michael Gaughn and Brianna Byrne to produce the new video.
Bent’s was built during the Civil War. The building is made of local Medina sandstone. It is currently mostly vacant. The ORG wants to restore the upper performance hall, and also attract business tenants for the first floor and a restaurant for the second floor.
The organization is currently doing an emergency repair to rotted structural support beams on the building. It is seeking a $500,000 state grant to replace the roof and help with other upgrades. The state is expected to announce this month whether or not that funding will be awarded.
“As most of you know, some structural work/repair/restoration has already begun,” ORG Vice Chairman Chris Busch said in an email to ORG supporters. “The wheels are in motion.The vision continues to takes shape.”
Other videos are planned to help promote the restoration project and the Medina community.
“It is our hope that this short piece will be one of many that will soon follow, telling the story in the stone – of Bent’s history, its people, its community, and its rebirth,” Busch said.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 3 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Photos by Tom Rivers – This barn is on Sheeler Road out in the mucklands.
This barn is on Oak Orchard Road, not far from Route 98. The corn crop was recently harvested.
BARRE – Orleans Hub is going to have 2014 calendar available soon. We have all the pictures lined up and ready to go, but I thought we could improve one of the winters months.
So earlier today I set out on a mission: get a photo of a barn with some snow. I had a feeling something special was waiting for me in Barre. I headed out towards to the muck, taking Oak Orchard Road with a short detour on Angevine Road.
A barn and its neighbor have been fixtures along Angevine Road.
I took this looking through a culvert along Transit Road. There’s a barn in the background.
Barre is the most rural town in Orleans County. It includes muckland and many current and former dairy farms. Barre is a gold mine for rustic old barns. The town signs proclaims that Barre is “A Right To Farm Community.”
I think I got what we wanted for the calendar and I’m not revealing that image today. But I’ve included several others that have loomed large on the landscape for many years.
This barn is still standing on Oak Orchard Road close to the Angevine Road intersection.
These drainage pipes escort water off the muck and into a drainage ditch that runs along Transit Road. This was taken at the intersection with Sheelar Road.
A barn is the background and cattails are in the foreground in this photo taken from what appeared to be an unnamed dirt road off Transit Road.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Albion man also charged with armed robbery in February
Morris Taylor
ALBION – Morris Taylor, an Albion man who already faces charges for an armed robbery in February, was arraigned in Orleans County Court today on first-degree rape, forcible compulsion rape, and criminal sale and criminal possession of a controlled substance, both in the third degree.
Judge James Punch set bail for Taylor at $75,000. He is due back in court on Dec. 23 at 2 p.m.
Taylor, 23, of 239 East State St. is a former state track champion for Albion. He won the 400 meters in 2008.
On Feb. 28, he allegedly was armed with a knife and robbed a pizza delivery person outside Mark’s Pizzeria in Albion. After the robbery, Taylor allegedly left the area with $300.
The rape and drug charges are unrelated to the robbery and will be prosecuted separately, District Attorney Joe Cardone said.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Sandstone Society will announce inaugural class on Dec. 12
Photo by Tom Rivers – The Pullman Memorial Universalist Church in Albion is one of 22 sites nominated for the Medina Sandstone Hall of Fame. The society will announce which of the sites will be enshrined in the first class of the Hall of Fame on Dec. 12.
MEDINA – The Medina Sandstone Society will announce the inductees in the first class of the Medina Sandstone Hall of Fame on Dec. 12.
The 4 to 6 p.m. ceremony at the Medina City Hall also will include an announcement on the Hall of Fame’s location.
The first class will include six inductees, and representatives from some of those sites are expected for the Hall of Fame announcement.
The Sandstone Society on Oct. 10 announced 22 nominees. The Hall of Fame Committee worked to narrow the list to six for the first class.
“This can be an important step for Orleans County in under scoring its great 19th Century heritage as the sandstone capital of the world in fine construction,” Bob Waters, president of the Sandstone Society, said about the Hall of Fame.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
ALBION – A dedication program planned for Thursday, naming a room at Rainbow Preschool in honor of Rachel Miller, has been delayed until January.
There was a recent death in Miller’s family and funeral arrangements are expected to be later this week.
Rachel Miller was a beloved coworker and speech-language therapist who worked 15 years at Rainbow Preschool, which is located at Arnold Gregory Memorial Complex in Albion.
The new room will be a socio-dramatic play center. It will be in honor of Miller, who was killed last March 4.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Photo by Tom Rivers
ALBION – The Village of Albion Department of Public Works and Orleans County Highway Department are putting up a big artificial Christmas tree on the Courthouse lawn in Albion this morning. The tree should be lighted this evening and throughout the holiday season.
The village DPW about two weeks ago put lights on the evergreen tree in front of the former Swan Library building. (You can see it in this photo in the back to the right.) This will be the first season the two trees are both lighted for the holidays.
The artificial tree didn’t go up last year, and the DPW lighted the tree in front of Swan for the first time.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Rachel Miller
Editor’s Note: Due to a recent death in the Miller famiy the dedication of the room has been delayed until January.
ALBION – Rainbow Preschool will dedicate a room in memory of Rachel Miller, a beloved coworker and speech-language therapist. The dedication will be Thursday from 6 to 7 p.m. at the Arnold Gregory Memorial Complex, 243 South Main St., Suite 220. Refreshments will be provided.
The new room will be a socio-dramatic play center. It will be in honor of Miller, who worked 15 years for the Arc of Orleans at Rainbow Preschool.
Miller was killed last March 4. Her boyfriend Frederick Miller has been charged with second-degree murder. He is scheduled to go on trial, beginning Jan. 13.
Rachel Miller was 53 when she died as a result of blunt force trauma combined with multiple stab wounds, according to an autopsy.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
Welfare, radio upgrade, nursing home main culprits
Photos by Tom Rivers – Orleans County had a public hearing on its budget tonight inside the county courthouse. Chief Administrative Officer Chuck Nesbitt is standing at the podium. About 30 people attended the hearing
ALBION – Orleans County property owners will see the average tax bill go up about 5 percent with county taxes in 2014, according to a proposed budget.
The budget totals $79,786,629, a 4.8 percent increase over the $76,133,318 in 2013. Property taxes account for about 20 percent of the revenues to pay for the budget. Property taxes would increase 5.0 percent, up from $15,661,104 to $16,441,366.
“A 5 percent increase is unacceptable,” said Paul Lauricella, vice chairman of the Orleans County Conservative Party and the lone resident to speak out during the hearing. “Come on guys, give us a break.”
The budget increases the tax rate 40 cents from $9.71 to $10.11 per $1,000 of assessed property. The fee for solid waste and recycling is up $5 to $190 for the year.
The tax impact could have been worse, but the county will see its pension contributions drop by $169,376 to $4,271,017. The county’s health insurance costs also will go down by $157,340 and worker’s compensation is budgeted to decrease by $100,376.
But the declines aren’t enough to offset other big increases, including $558,000 more for welfare costs with most of that the result of cost shifts in the Safety Net program. The county also is upgrading its emergency communication system for $7.1 million. The county will make its first $475,000 debt payment for the project next year.
“The coverage will be virtually 100 percent,” Chuck Nesbitt, the county chief administrative officer, said about the radio system’s signal strength throughout Orleans. The current system has many weak spots, especially on the eastern and western ends of the county.
“It will be an incredibly significant upgrade,” Nesbitt said.
Sprint Nextel is paying $3.3 million towards the upgrade and a federal Department of Homeland Security grant will also pay $2 million of the project.
Chuck Nesbitt details the county budget during a hearing tonight.
The county will also repair the Waterport bridge over Lake Alice for $1.5 million, with the county responsible for 5 percent of the project or $75,000. The Hulberton Road bridge will be replaced at an estimated cost of $1,386,970. The county will pay 5 percent or $69,348. The federal government pays 80 percent with the state covering the other 15 percent.
The nursing home will consume about $1.9 million from the county. The 120-bed Villages of Orleans, which the county is trying to sell, is forecast to operate at a $2,734,844 loss. The operating expenses are budgeted at $11,817,649 and revenue totals $9,986,502. That leaves a $1,831,147 gap. The county also has to pay $903,697 in debt service for recent renovations and an expansion at the site in 2007. That adds up to a $2,734,844 loss for 2014.
The county and federal government will each contribute $825,000 in Intergovernmental Transfer (IGT) shares that help offset Medicaid and Medicare reimbursement rates that don’t fully cover expenses.
In addition to the IGT, the county will use $1,084,844 from a reserve fund. County officials say those reserves will soon be depleted. If the nursing home stays county-owned, the tax burden would be significantly higher in the future once the reserves are gone, legislators have said.
Legislators did get some praise after the budget hearing. Charles Pettit, a member of the board of directors for the Cornell Cooperative Extension, thanked the county for not cutting the Extension. Legislators have budgeted to maintain the same funding for agencies that receive county dollars.
Here are the funded agencies and how much they receive from the county: Cornell Cooperative Extension, $219,150; Orleans Economic Development Agency, $150,000; Soil and Water, $57,750; Libraries, $10,000; Genesee-Orleans Regional Arts Council, $1,000; and the Sportsman’s Federation, $500.
The Legislature will meet at 9 a.m. Wednesday to vote on the budget. That meeting will be in the legislative chambers at the County Clerks’ Building.
By Tom Rivers, Editor Posted 2 December 2013 at 12:00 am
ALBION – Despite a death this week in Rachel Miller’s family, the family wants a dedication of a room in Miller’s memory to go forward on Thursday.
Earlier today the Arc of Orleans County said the dedication would be delayed until January. But Miller’s family wants the dedication to stay on schedule.
The dedication will be Thursday from 6 to 7 p.m. at the Arnold Gregory Memorial Complex, 243 South Main St., Suite 220. Refreshments will be provided.
Rachel Miller was a beloved coworker and speech-language therapist who worked 15 years at Rainbow Preschool, which is located at Arnold Gregory Memorial Complex in Albion.
The new room will be a socio-dramatic play center. It will be in honor of Miller, who was killed last March 4.
