Sheriff Bower urges seniors to participate in Yellow Dot

By Ginny Kropf, correspondent

Photo by Ginny Kropf: Lynn Creasey, president of the Senior Center of Western Orleans, and director Kelly Shaw introduce Sheriff Randy Bower, who talked about the Yellow Dot Program during the monthly senior luncheon on Monday.

MEDINA – Seniors who attended Monday’s luncheon meeting at the Senior Center of Western Orleans learned about the workings of the Orleans County Sheriff’s Office and also were given a lesson in promoting their own safety.

Guest speaker at the meeting was Sheriff Randy Bower, who explained the role of the Sheriff’s Office. One of the responsibilities is the 911 call center and the $1 charged on everyone’s cell phone bill which is supposed to help pay for it. However, the state takes almost all of the money, Bower said.

Recently, Bower met with Congressman Chris Collins and the Federal Communications Commission, and it looks like counties are going to start getting more of that money back by the end of the year, Bower said.

The sheriff also focused on the Yellow Dot Program. He passed out a form which seniors were encouraged to fill out with all their pertinent medical and contact information. Then, by placing one of the yellow dots on the rear driver’s side window of their car, in case of an emergency, first responders know to look in the glove compartment for the information form. Also, a yellow dot placed on a window or door in the house lets emergency personnel know the information form is in the freezer compartment of the refrigerator.

Bower said his department gives the yellow dots out at the fair, schools or any event which they attend.

He also praised the cooperation his office receives from neighboring sheriff’s offices in Niagara, Genesee and Monroe counties.

“Any time we need something, like a helicopter from Niagara County, it is here, at no cost to Orleans taxpayers,” Bower said. “We are the most blessed county.”

The senior luncheon also included a business meeting, during which president Lynn Creasey said the Center is planning to install new lights. He will meet with National Grid to make sure the lights purchased qualify the Center for rebates. The installation will save the Center about $600 a year, he said.

On June 9, the Senior Center will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the organization of Senior Center of Western Orleans. The historic depot in which they meet is 110 years old, Creasey said.

As part of the celebration, all members of the Senior Center will receive a magnet with a picture of the depot. The Center will be open from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and refreshments will be available.

A basket raffle is scheduled to benefit the Center on June 30. Donations of baskets will be accepted after May 27 and tickets will go on sale shortly after.

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Provided photos: The Medina Marching Band participates in the parade during the Gorham Pageant of Bands. Medina scored 96.5 along with recognition for Best Drum Major (Shelby Green) and Best Colorguard. The Naples band scored 88 and Roxboro scored 85. Marcus Whitman also performed in exhibition. Overall Class Champions went to Medina.

Press Release, Medina Marching Band

Marcus Whitman Central School held its 57th Annual Gorham Pageant of Bands on Friday and Saturday. The pageant represents an opportunity for students in the various band programs to come together and perform.  This pageant is particularly special to the Medina Marching Band because it was started by Robert Steele, our band director’s father.

The Medina High School jazz ensembles performs in the jazz competition. Medina scored a 97, the most of five schools. In the Junior High (medium size school) Medina scored 87. In High School (small) Bloomfield scored 88. This band is under the direction of Scott Hoffman, a Medina graduate. In the large high school category Webster-Thomas scored a 92 while East Ridge scored a 95. The East Ridge band program is under the direction of Jeff Hoffman, also a Medina graduate. East Ridge also received recognition for Best Soloist (tenor sax), Best Brass & Woodwind sections. The Webster-Thomas jazz ensemble received recognition for Best Rhythm section.

Medina’s High School jazz ensemble had the top score at the competition.

In Concert competition there were three groups performing. Medina’s Middle School, under the direction of Rebecca Botsford, scored 165 while Medina’s High School under the direction of Jim Steele scored 197.5. The Roxboro Middle School in the large school category scored 175.

The Robert Steele Award was started in 1994 and named after Jim Steele’s father who was the band director in Gorham for 37 years. It’s given to band directors, administrators, boosters who promote music education and are a strong role model & supporter of their school’s music program. This year’s recipient was Mollie Steele.  Accepting the award in her name was her son, Jimmy.

The pageant concludes this season’s competitions. However, the community can see the band perform in the Memorial Day parade. The music for the fall season will be distributed before the Band Banquet on June 9 and Band Camp is scheduled for August 6-10.

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Photos by Tom Rivers

MEDINA – About 200 Medina students spent half of the school day working on service projects at the school and in the community as part of Mustangs Make an Impact Day.

Medina 10th-grader Haley Hurt, left, and substitute teacher Madelin Pheltz painted at the Canal Village Farmers’ Market on West Center Street.

The community service projects originated two years ago from the IMPACT (Influencing Many People As Concerned Teens) students with staff rallying behind the effort.

Medina had a half day of school and students volunteered to help with many projects around the community and at the school district.

Neveah Conley, back, and Valencia Bloom paint the door on the Canal Village Farmers’ Market across from the Post Office.

“It’s nice to do things for the community,” Bloom said. “It’s the least we can do and it’s fun.”

Xander Payne, back center, and Brendan Luthart, right, help Dan Doctor, the school district’s director of community outreach, make more room in the basement of the YMCA, where the district runs an after-school tutoring program that also includes games. The YMCA was among the many sites where students worked on a service project.

Lily Joe Carpenter, left, and Arella Biesinger are shown in the basement of the Medina Historical Society with an wooden water line, part of the village’s early infrastructure. They moved several items to basement to make room upstairs for an exhibit at the Historical Society.

Students set up a new Little Library at Pine Street Park, one of two as part of a pilot program to promote literacy in the community. The library was built by the FFA. It needs a door and some trim. It should be ready on Saturday. (Another Little Library will go at Rotary Park.)

These students include, from left: Kali Schrader, Ian Joseph and Mason Lewis.

Students put paver blocks in the grass, and planted flowers in a half a barrel made of oak. A wooden stand was added to hold the library.

An Impact team also worked on a Little Library at Rotary Park. These students include Mark Reigle, Marguerite Brackenbury and Ashton Laird. The little libraries will be stocked with books, and users are encouraged to take a book to read, and bring one for someone else.

Aubrey Adkins, left, and Melanie Green paint Medina Mustang logos that will get a final coat of red paint and be secured to the tennis courts to promote Mustang pride. Students in Eric Valley’s art classes made the wooden signs. Valley, the school’s athletic director, first made them about three years ago for Vets Park where three are mounted on the dugouts. Four others are displayed inside the high school gym.

Photo courtesy of Tim Petry: Shelby Volunteer Fire Company President Tim Petry sent in this photo and offered his appreciation for Medina students and staff who helped wash and wrap potatoes for the fire company’s Mother’s Day chicken barbecue. The students include Dakota Alexander, Ava Page, Anastasia Smith and Jelia Howard, with staff members John Sherman and Pam Nowak.

Students also worked on projects at Medina Fire Department, the East Shelby fire station and the Medina police station.

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MEDINA – Four Medina firefighters are among 57 graduates of the state academy in Montour Falls today.

Firefighters Bradley Mahnke, Cody Doran, Steven Long and Timothy Miller graduate from the 11-week Recruit Firefighter Training program at the NYS Fire Academy.

In addition, Captain Matt Jackson of the MFD graduated from the month-long First Line Supervisors Training Program conducted by the Fire Department of The City of New York.

Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today congratulated the 57 graduates of the Recruit Firefighter Training Program at the State Office of Fire Prevention and Control’s Academy of Fire Science in Montour Falls.

Today’s graduates hail from 24 fire departments and represent the Academy’s 75th Recruit Firefighter Training class. This is the largest class to ever graduate at the Academy since the program’s inception in 1984.

“These graduates join the more than 100,000 brave men and women serving in the fire departments across this great state who, with dedication and courage, respond to emergencies day and night to protect us all,” Governor Cuomo said. “I congratulate these New Yorkers on this significant accomplishment, and thank them for their commitment to public service.”

The Recruit Firefighter Training Program class is 11 weeks long and includes more than 500 hours of intense training that exceeds the state’s minimum standards for firefighter personnel. Graduates of the program also receive national certification in Firefighter I, Firefighter II and Hazardous Materials Operations. All of today’s graduates will become full-time firefighters in their respective fire department when they return home.

During the 11-week program, firefighters received training in areas such as emergency vehicle and pump operations, flammable gas firefighting, basic rescue technician skills and foundational firefighting training and operations. They also participated in daily physical fitness training in preparation for the Candidate Physical Ability Test.

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Press Release, Medina Fire Department

MEDINA – The Village of Medina Fire Department on Wednesday at 6:24 p.m. was dispatched to a possible electric fire in the bathroom with a resident unable to exit the house at 611 Ann St.

Second platoon firefighters arrived on location and simultaneously removed the resident and encountered a fire in the ceiling of the bathroom. A working fire was then declared bringing the Ridgeway and Lyndonville fire departments to the scene.

Crews exposed the bathroom ceiling as well as the flooring above the bathroom on the second story and stopped any further fire spread. Damage is estimated at $25,000 to the structure and $15,000 to the contents.

The resident was uninjured and is being assisted by the Red Cross at this time. The area of origin was the bathroom ceiling fan/light and the cause is being listed as accidental at this time.

There were no firefighters injured. Also assisting on scene were fire investigators from the Orleans County Emergency Management Office.

During this incident, two 911 ambulance calls were handled by crews as well.

We thank all of the departments on scene as well as the public safety dispatchers at the Sheriff’s Office for their assistance.

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MEDINA – Residents of the Medina Central School District voted in favor of Lee-Whedon Memorial Library’s 2018-19 budget on Tuesday. There were 97 votes, and 92 were in favor of the $608,061 budget.

Isabella Mark, the current board president, also was re-elected to another five-year term at the library’s annual meeting on Monday.

The $608,061 budget for 2018-19 increases the tax levy by $3,473, or 0.66 percent. This tax, which comprises the majority of the library’s funding, is charged to all property owners in the school district and is collected on the school tax bills.

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Provided photo: At the May meeting for the Medina Band Boosters, elections were held for the offices that make up the organization. The 2018-2019 officers include Mindy Kenward, president; Julie Granchelli, vice president; Kelly Allen, treasurer; Holly Rousch, secretary; Kelly Uderitz, student accounts; Diane Grosslinger, uniforms; Lyn Woodruff, chaperones; Sean Callard, transportation; Kathy Dreyfus, publicity; and Eric Alexander and Stacy Silker, delegates.

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Rain and mud push party inside; 68 new trees going in ground

Photos by Tom Rivers

MEDINA – Karen Sanchez-Cabrera and other first-graders in Allison Woodburn’s class perform a skit this morning at Oak Orchard Elementary School in honor of Arbor Day.

This year’s celebration at Medina was pushed back a week to accommodate teachers and staff who attended last Friday’s calling hours for Andrea Lonnen, a kindergarten teacher who passed away unexpectedly on April 22 at 45. Lonnen was a big supporter of Arbor Day and had her classes help plant trees, said Chris Busch, Medina’s Tree Board chairman.

Nicole Goyette, a Medina teacher and Tree Board member, holds the microphone for first-grader Mckenna Adams, who was part of the Arbor Day skit. The event typically is an outdoor celebration and students help shovel dirt and plant the trees. But the threat of rain, and the wet and muddy grounds prompted organizers to shift the event inside.

Nicole Goyette is the Arbor Day coordinator. She welcomes students to the celebration. This year’s Arbor Day was dedicated to Wilson Southworth, who passed away at age 70 on Dec. 8. Southworth was a long-time member of the Tree Board, its vice chairman and a proponent of reforesting the Village of Medina.

Medina Mayor Mike Sidari reads a proclamation about Arbor Day. “Trees are enjoyed by every citizen, young and old, wherever they are planted, and are a source of joy and beauty in our community,” Sidari said.

Medina is planting 68 trees this spring. The community is an official Tree City USA, a recognition of the village’s commitment to plant trees.

The auditorium at Oak Orchard was full of students this morning.

Stevie Parker reads her poem about Arbor Day that won a competition in the high school.

The Tree Board presented a “Friend of the Urban Forest Award” to the Medina Departent of Public Works and to Bob Sanderson, a Medina resident who donates to plant many of the new trees. Sanderson owns Candlelight Cabinetry and Kitchen World in Lockport. The company uses lots of wood, and Sanderson has said the business is committed to planting new trees through several initiatives.

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Jack Wheatley has been on dialysis for two years

By Ginny Kropf, correspondent

Photo by Ginny Kropf: Jack Wheatley of Medina is one of 10,000 in New York state who is awaiting a kidney transplant. Here he is shown with his nurses, Abigail Roberts and Dorothy Nolan, both certified clinical hemodialysis technicians, and his wife Sherry, after being hooked up for dialysis, a procedure which takes 3 1/2 to 4 hours three times a week.

MEDINA – Jack Wheatley is playing a waiting game – one he hopes will end soon with a healthy kidney.

Wheatley must undergo dialysis three times a week while he waits for a donor for a kidney. Wheatley is one of 120,000 people nationwide waiting for an organ transplant.

In New York alone, more than 10,000 people are awaiting organs, according to Donate Life in New York.

Wheatley has been on dialysis for two years, according to his wife, the former Sherry Lanning of Albion.

She wishes there was a way to make more people aware of the need for organ donors.

Jack’s condition stems from having systemic lupus for the last 30 years. He has been on steroids, which beats his body up, Sherry said.

The couple’s love story began four decades ago. He was a patient at the dentist’s office where she works, and it was love at first sight.

“I fell on my desk and said, ‘Who is that guy,’ and he went home and told his mom he had met this girl,” Sherry said.

They’ve been married 38 years.

“It’s pretty hard to watch someone you love go through this and not feel good all the time,” Sherry said of her husband’s wait for an organ donor. “It’s not about being unable to go on fancy vacations. It just about being able to sit at home, holding hands and watching TV, knowing he feels good.”

Jack started his dialysis at home, but had to go to Millard Fillmore Hospital in Buffalo three days a week after developing a hernia. He is now able to have dialysis at Lake Plains Dialysis in Medina, but the procedure still takes a toll on him.

“Your body feels like it’s running a marathon, and you just crash,” Sherry said. “The next day you feel better, then it’s time to start again. It feels like having the flu all the time.”

She said if they want to go on vacation, they have to find a dialysis center close by, and then Jack’s not going to feel good afterwards.

Jack finally had to give up his job at NAPA in Albion, but still tries to work a few hours a day at NAPA in Medina.

“That just killed him to have to quit working in Albion,” Sherry said. “He doesn’t have a lot of hobbies to occupy his time like I do.”

Doctors told the Wheatleys they have to be creative about ways to find a donor and they hope someone reading this article may consider being tested.

Laurie Joslyn, director of renal services at Lake Plains Dialysis, said they have 40 patients on dialysis three times a week.

“There is an extreme need for donors,” Joslyn said. “I have six patients on the transplant list. Some of my patients have been coming for years, and one has been on the transplant list since this facility opened more than 30 years ago.”

A person can register to be an organ donor on the website www.donatelifeny.

The site also reports another person is added to the waiting list every 10 minutes, and 22 people die each day because the organ they need is not donated in time. One organ, eye and tissue donor can save and heal more than 75 lives.

It is reported 90 percent of Americans are in favor of being a donor, but only 30 percent know where to register.

In addition to registering at the above website, a person may also indicate on their driver’s license they wish to be an organ donor.

Someone wishing to be tested as a match for Jack may call the Wheatley’s at (585) 798-3358, or the Transplant Center at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester.

A person needing a kidney transplant does not have to wait for a cadaver, as a live donor can safely survive with one kidney. And there is no expense to the donor.

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Courtesy of Medina Mustang Band, Kathy Dreyfus, publicity chairwoman

The Medina Mustang Marching Band traveled to Chicago from Thursday through Sunday to perform in competition in the Music in the Parks Festival.  The photo is the 2018 Spring Band in front of “Cloud Gate,” a public sculpture and centerpiece in Millennium Park.

The festival was started in 1981 and is a day-long event for students of choral, orchestral and band ensembles held annually across the US.  Music groups perform before adjudicators who rate the ensemble and then awards are issued at the end of the day.

In concert band, Medina won first place in Class A with a score of 96 and a superior rating. In Jazz, Medina took first place in Class A with a score of 96, the overall high jazz score. Alyssa Beyer was recognized as best jazz soloist.

In Parade, the band also won first place in the large band division with a score of 95. There were approximately eight groups from NY, Michigan, Virginia, Nevada, North Dakota and Illinois.

Jim Steele, Medina band director, said the kids did a great job in their performances.  The chaperones are to be commended for all of their diligence in keeping everyone on track with their busy schedule.

In addition to the competition the group went to a Chicago Cubs game, The Blue Man Group, Willis Tower, the Navy pier and the Six Flags amusement park in Gurnee, Ill.

The band will perform next at the Gorham Pageant on May 11-12 followed by the Memorial Day parade.

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