Photos and information courtesy of Fred Fierch

Continuing a high school experience begun in the 1990s by Anne-Marie Finger and Alexandra Peracciny, 15 Medina High School students traveled to Greece during the spring break vacation. Adding to the European event was the fact that a companion group of adults from Middleport joined them. Because of that, there were numerous multi-generational combinations.

The group photo on top includes:

Front row:  Elaina Bitsas, Valeria Canales, Abigail Pratt, Malloree Rinker, Elaina Huntington, Makenzie McGrath, Adreanna McMurray and Gloria Fierch.

Middle row:  Jill Westcott, Keri Pratt, Madison Pratt, Robin Watts, Ava Blount, Paisley Pasnik, Emiliana Batista, Aurora Owczarczak, Madisynn Stanton, Vonda Westcott and Alexandra Peracciny.

Back row: Renee Webber, Emilia Peracciny, Fred Fierch, Keira Walker, Michael Cavanagh, Linda Kozubal, Tyler McInally, Conor Crandall, Celeste Stahl-Balaban, Hunter Pratt, Dominic Peracciny, Matt Peracciny, Alex Balaban, Gary Watts and Richard Westcott.

Alex Balaban and his mother Celeste Stahl-Balaban.

The group enjoyed a sun-filled week visiting the Acropolis and its museum in Athens, having a Greek cooking class, a cruise in the Saronic portion of the Aegean Sea, visiting the islands of Hydra, Poros and Aegina, a visit to the incredible Corinth Canal, the ruins of Mycenae, a pottery class and a wonderful visit to the gorgeous city of Nafplio. The latter included a picturesque boat ride in the blue waters and a visit to the local beach.

Dominic, Emilia, Matthew, and Alexandra Peracciny, and Fred and Gloria Fierch.

The visit was coordinated through EF Tours and its Athens and Argolida Tour.  Many people on this tour went together 24 years previously, and there were four families who were traveling with children or grandchildren.

Some of the past travelers inspired Mrs. Peracciny to restart the student program. This tour was chaperoned by Mrs. Peracciny and Mr. Michael Cavanagh, Medina High School Principal. The Middleport portion was organized by Matt Peracciny.

The people who went on this adventure all share a love of travel, adventure and learning.

Dick, Vonda and Jill Westcott, Keri, Hunter, Madison and Abbie Pratt.

Gary and Robyn Watts and Makenzie McGrath.

MEDINA – A Ridgeway volunteer firefighter who collapsed and needed CPR at the scene of a fire on Thursday has made a full recovery, Medina and Ridgeway fire officials announced in a press release this afternoon.

As crews were finishing active firefighting operations at 515 North Academy St. on April 4, the Ridgeway firefighter suddenly collapsed in the street without warning.

The firefighter, whose name is not being released, did not have a pulse and wasn’t breathing. High-quality CPR was initiated, and the firefighter was defibrillated five times over the course of the next 14 minutes while simultaneously receiving advanced airway control and multiple Advanced Cardiac Life Support medications, according to the news release from Medina FD and the Ridgeway Volunteer Fire Company.

The firefighter was initially going to be transported directly to Buffalo General but was too unstable at that point and was taken to Medina Memorial Hospital Emergency Department. Once stabilized by team members at Medina Hospital but still critical, the firefighter was transferred by a team of Medina firefighters to Buffalo General.

“We are happy to announce that the firefighter walked out of the hospital today after being discharged home, 100% neurologically intact!” said Steve Cooley, Medina Fire Department lieutenant and public information officer.

The two fire departments thanked the following for their assistance at the scene, after the fire and cardiac arrest: Albion Fire Department, Medina Police Department, Orleans County Dispatchers, Medina Memorial Emergency Department Staff, Orleans County Director and Deputy Director of Emergency Services and the Staff at Buffalo General.

Those agencies assisting Ridgeway with immediate district coverage after the event were Middleport, Hartland, Shelby, East Shelby, and Murray Fire Departments.

Sudden Cardiac Arrest can happen anywhere at any time, Cooley said. He urged people to learn CPR.

The American Heart Association has released Heart and Stroke Statistics for 2022. According to the report, cardiac arrest remains a public health crisis. There are more than 356,000 out-of-hospital cardiac arrests annually in the U.S., nearly 90% of them fatal. The incidence of EMS-assessed non-traumatic OHCA in people of any age is estimated to be 356,461, or nearly 1,000 people each day. Survival to hospital discharge after EMS-treated cardiac arrest languishes at about 10%, Cooley said.

MEDINA – The Village Board has been discussing in recent months how to best name three streets that lead into the Medina Business Park off Maple Ridge Road.

One of them will be named for Pride Pak, a company that opened a 68,000-square-foot vegetable processing plant at the Business Park in 2016. The Pride Pak street could eventually extend farther back into the business park.

There are two other short roads that aren’t named. Making them official village streets will qualify Medina for more CHIPS funds from the state for road maintenance.

 The board has received many suggestions to name them in honor of key village entrepreneurs or community leaders from the past and present.

But some of the board members are leaning towards more generic names such as Commerce Way, Enterprise Way or Industry Way. (The board prefers “Way” in the street name to be consistent with Marcia Tuohey Way, a street leading into the business park off Bates Road.)

Village Trustee Jess Marciano said many of the names mentioned honoring people are already noted on many of the buildings in the community. She said she would prefer not picking certain family names for the street signs. Village Board member Debbie Padoleski agreed. She mentioned that too during the April 1 Village Board meeting.

Mayor Marguerite Sherman said the board will take two more weeks before likely reaching a decision on April 22. She said she would be open to naming a street in honor of Owen Toale, the former publisher of The Journal-Register and an active community volunteer in his retirement. He was also on the Village Board for about a decade.

He passed away from cancer at age 76 on March 25.

“He had cancer for over 22 years and that didn’t stop him from giving of himself,” Sherman said. “I think that says a lot.”

In other action, the board accepted the resignation of Medina police officer Corey Collins, who is joining a different law enforcement agency. Collins’ resignation is effective on April 14. He joined the Medina PD in 2016.

He is the second Medina officer to resign within the past month. Michael Borrell resigned on March 30 after 16 years with the Medina PD and has joined the Orleans County Sheriff’s Office.

‘Wish list’ budget would raise taxes 35 percent

MEDINA – The Village Board held a public hearing on Monday for the 2024-25 village budget that would raise taxes 34.9 percent, an amount that will surely be significantly reduced by the end of the month, Mayor Marguerite Sherman said.

The numbers presented on Monday are what department heads submitted for their budgets in a “wish list” before there has been any paring down. Sherman, the new Medina mayor, said the board will be scrutinizing the numbers with department leaders in several upcoming meetings.

“It’s going to be a lot lower than this,” Sherman responded during a public hearing about the budget on Monday. “When I saw that my jaw dropped.”

The board has several budget meetings with department heads this month. The budget needs to be adopted by April 30.

The numbers so far show the tax levy increasing by 34.9 percent or $1,320,759 – from $3,786,974 in 2023-24 to $5,107,733.

The current budget for 2023-24 represented a 14.9 percent tax levy increase, and the tax rate went from $18.85 to $21.15 per $1,000 of assessed property.

Medina will see a major boost in its tax base in the new budget for 2024-25 following town-wide reassessments in Shelby and Ridgeway. The village’s tax base grew by 56.1 percent or $100.5 million – from $179.0 million to $279.5 million.

Because of the big jump assessments, the tax rate will be going down from the $21.15. The budget, as it stands now, would have a rate of $18.27. But Sherman said that will come down more after the board and department heads work to reduce expenses.

“This is only preliminary,” Sherman said about the budget numbers. “We will go line item by line item to get the budget down.”

The preliminary budget calls for $8,298,364 in expenses in the general funds, up $705,068 from $7,593,296 in 2023-24.

The sewer fund is tentatively slated to increase from $1,296,011 to $1,384,428, and the water fund would go from $2,019,651 to $2,056,647.

The 2024-25 budget does not include the debt service payments for a new ladder truck or an addition to the fire hall, which will be in the general fund in the future.

The ladder truck payment is expected to start in the 2025-26 budget and will be the first of $159,000 annually over 20 years for the ladder truck. The fire hall addition will likely cost even more for the village.

The big jump in taxes in 2023-24 followed several years of small increases. Here are the recent tax levy amounts and tax rates for the village budget:

• 2023-23 tax levy, $3,786,964; tax rate, $21.15
• 2022-23 tax levy, $3,296,140; tax rate, $18.95
• 2021-22 tax levy, $3,259,119; tax rate, $18.77
• 2020-21 tax levy, $3,197,059; tax rate, $18.46
• 2019-20 tax levy, $3,138,059; tax rate, $18.32

MEDINA – A man was taken into custody by Medina Police Department after allegedly threatening an ambulance crew from Medina Fire Department this afternoon.

The ambulance was dispatched to what was expected to be a low-priority basic life support call for service.

“After arriving on scene, the crew was quickly met by a person with a gun, making threats to the crew and a neighbor,” said Medina Lt. Steve Cooley, the Medina FD public information officer. “The crew retreated and requested police assistance.”

The man with gun went back inside and came out without the weapon. The crew was able to restrain the male, prior to the police arriving on the scene. Medina police officers arrived on scene shortly thereafter and placed the male into custody, Cooley said.

“We would like to thank the Medina Police Department, the Orleans County Sheriff’s Department deputies, the Orleans County dispatchers and the neighbor for the quick assistance they provided to our crew,” Cooley said in news release. “Our crew is safe and both members remain on duty. We will have no further comment on this issue at the present time.”

Photo by Ginny Kropf: Jeff Lewis, director of the Medina Railroad Museum, holds a picture of an E8 locomotive, which was used by the New York Central when it was in operation. The museum owns the only two of the engines in existence painted in the iconic lightning strike pattern.

MEDINA – Medina Railroad Museum’s director Jeff Lewis has had a busy few months since taking on the new job in January.

His current project is applying for the plaque which designates the building’s historic status.

According to Lewis, the Railroad Museum founder Marty Phelps started researching a historic marker in 1995, when he applied for historic status for the building. In 1997, New York Parks, Recreation and Historic Places granted the museum a designation as a member of the downtown historic district.

The Main Street Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1995. It included the parcel on which the Medina Railroad Museum stands as a portion of historic district. If the Freight House was listed separately on the registry as a historic building it would assist the museum in attracting restoration funding.

“We would like to get designation for the building to enhance our efforts to attract restoration resources,” Lewis said. “We have to apply again and ask to have the building added to the historic register.”

The building which houses the Medina Railroad Museum was built in 1905 and is 301 feet long and 34 feet wide. It is purported to be the largest, existing wooden freight station in the United States. It was built by the New York Central and Hudson River Railroad Company and replaced an earlier freight station which outgrew the shipping needs of the burgeoning community of Medina.

It was reported the single industry which most contributed to the development of the village was the establishment of H.J. Heinz Co. plant in 1899. This plant, located west of the Railroad Museum on Park Avenue, is today known as the Olde Pickle Factory.

The museum building operated as a freight station until 1965 when it was converted into a furniture warehouse. A lifelong railroad fan, Phelps purchased the building in 1991 and began transforming it into the railroad museum.

Contributing elements to be added to the Historic District include the freight station and that portion of railroad tracks which extends from the present district boundary to the western edge of the nominated parcel.

Lewis explained this effort is in preparation for a capital campaign next year and celebration of the building’s 120th anniversary.

He is also going to apply for a Tag Grant from New York State Preservation to put together a renovation plan which will address new gutters to take water away from the foundation.

“We need to address it now so it doesn’t get out of control,” Lewis said.

He said the museum will do a bunch of things next year in honor of the special anniversary. This includes selling bricks for a walkway to the trains as part of a legacy program.

In other museum business, the board has recently had the two E8 locomotives they own appraised. If enough money is raised to put in a siding, the E8s could be displayed there for the public to view.

1 firefighter transported to hospital after medical emergency

MEDINA – Firefighters put out a basement fire in Medina this afternoon. One firefighter had a medical emergency while working at the scene.

Immediate care was rendered and the firefighter was transported to a hospital. No additional information is being released at this time about the firefighter, said Steve Cooley, lieutenant of Medina Fire Department, fire investigator and the public information officer.

Firefighters were dispatched to 515 North Academy St. at 2:09 p.m. for a reported basement fire. All residents were out of the structure by 2:14 p.m. There were no civilian injuries.

Medina firefighters extinguished a small fire in the basement as other personnel performed searches and ventilation. Damage estimates are $1,000 to the structure and $5,000 in contents, Cooley said.

Both families at the site are being assisted by the Red Cross at this time until repairs can be made.

The fire cause has been ruled accidental. The fire Investigation was handled by the Village of Medina Fire Department’s Fire Investigation Unit with assistance provided by the Orleans County Fire Investigation Unit.