A-6 HOMETOWN ONEONTA
friday, December 11, 2015
8 Charter Originators: We’re Watching, And Will Force Referendum If We Must VOW/From A1 was signed by seven other members of the original commission: John Dudek, Martha Forgiano, Steve Londner, now-Council member David Rissberger, Sarah Patterson, Kay Stuligross and Laurie Zimniewicz. Scheele was harkening back to the first ad hoc committee meeting, when making the mayor “chief executive officer” and the city manager “chief administrative officer” was discussed; the manager now fulfills both roles. “The mayor directs the City Manager, not the other way around,” said chair John Nader at the time. If that change is made, the original commission will insist
that a public referendum be made, Scheele said. “Our concern is that it would creating a good cop/bad cop scenario,” he said. “We don’t want department heads saying, ‘If I don’t get the answer I want from the mayor, I’ll go to the city manager’.” The statement he read also gave a brief history of the commission, its findings and primary recommendations. “We believe the central ongoing need is for our elected leaders to invest their time and talents to achieve a comprehensive understanding of all the implications of this new system and to thoughtfully design and execute
That Night, Sinatra Was Cool SINATRA/From A1 replied, ‘There’s a man who knows what to say to me’!” Sinatra asked him his name, and when he gave it, he asked if he was related to Johnny Fabs, who played trumpet with the Tommy Dorsey Band. “That’s my uncle!” Fabrizio told him. He took Sinatra’s hat and coat to the coat check, and Sinatra tipped him $100. Then he introduced him to his old bandmate, Cy Oliver, who was playing at the Rainbow Room. “There was me, Cy and Frank, all hanging out like we were friends,” said Fabrizio. “I’ll never forget it.” Frank Sinatra may be gone, but as his 100th birthday approaches on Saturday, Dec. 12, he is not forgotten. “I turned and asked one of my students and asked. ‘What do you think of Frank Sinatra?’ and he said, ‘I love him,” said Dr. Janet Nepkie, SUNY Oneonta music professor. “The younger generation still knows him.” “Frank’s always been there,” said Vincent Mashburn, owner of the Vinyl Vault on Main Street. “He never left!” “Ol Blue Eyes” died in May 1998, age 82, leaving behind a legacy of hits, including “New York, New York,” “Fly Me To The Moon” and “My Way,” as well as starring roles in film versions of hit musicals “On The Town,” “Guys and Dolls” as well as “The
Commissioners Challenge Facts VOLPE/From A4 period, of which 163 were within our fire district (23 percent of such calls). As fire commissioners, we are charged with securing fire protection. The city has a separate agreement with Mr. Wood, the town supervisor for EMS services. We appreciated the opportunity to exchange points of view at our meeting. As “customers” of the city’s fire department, we value the service. The issue is to have affordable fire protection – our district residents are the only ones in the county that pay more fire tax than town tax. We would prefer to remain “customers” and do not want to pursue other options, but mischaracterizing our discussions is not helpful. Sincerely, FRED VOLPE JOHNA M. PEACHIN Commissioners
Manchurian Candidate” and “Ocean’s Eleven.” In the voice classes Nepkie teaches, she emphasizes Sinatra’s imFabrizio peccable talent. “A singer can do a hundred takes just to get three syllables of one word,” she said. “But Sinatra would go in there and get it on the first or second take.” “When he hits the ‘ooo’ when he sings, ‘I’ve Got You Under My Skin’ I get chills,” said Colby Thomas, a SUNY Oneonta lecturer in Voice and American Musical Theater. “From a vocal standpoint, there are singers in every generation who try to emulate him. In my generation, it was Harry Connick Jr. In this generation, it’s Michael Buble. They’re trying to emulate Sinatra. How many other singers do you know where that happens?” And if you don’t know Sinatra, there’s still time. “It’s not too late!” said Mashburn. “Just because it’s old doesn’t mean it’s bad.”
a comprehensive plan of change management to complete a full and successful transition,” he read. “We believe such an effort was never fully engaged and is still needed.” “We feel this is, in some instances, why the city has revolved through city managers,” he said. “And our concern is that the committee is leaning in that direction.” Making the mayor, not the city manager, the “liaison” with other governments, was also discussed at the latest meeting. But the most discussed was the Article III, C-23, Filling Vacancies in Office – specifically, in case there is another tie during an election, as seen in the recent
Fourth Ward race between Jeff Back and Michelle Osterhoudt. “If we hadn’t seen this happen, we wouldn’t be talking about it,” said Nader. City Attorney David Merzig presented a document with two possible amendments: The first, allowing the mayor to appoint someone to a one-year term until the next general election. The second? The Mayor would flip a coin and whoever called “heads” got the position. “That’s how we settled things on the schoolyard!” said Council member Russ Southard, Sixth Ward. “It takes out favoritism,” said former Mayor David Brenner.
“And it settles things quickly.” Ultimately, the committee tilted toward the first option. “If we don’t put it in this year, it will happen again next year,” said Southard. “But if we put it in now, it’ll never happen again.” The proposed changes will be drafted into a final document to be reviewed by the commission before presenting to Common Council. “We want the entire committee to see a version of the charter with these revisions,” said Nader. “We want to make sure we agree with the document before we presented it to the mayor, Common Council and the public.” The next meeting is Dec. 22.
Who Will Get $½ Billion? Upstate Holds Breath
HALF-BILLION/From A1 plans to be there, too. And Caroline Lewis, SUNY Oneonta President Nancy Kleniewski’s economic developer. Others expect Kathy Clark, R-Otego, chair the Otsego County Board of Representatives, will be there again as well. Regardless, there will be many municipal and economic-development leaders back home holding their breaths: A half-billion dollars over the next half-decade can make many of their fondest dreams for their communities come true. (At the session, winners of CFA grants – the state’s annual allocation of economic-development funding – will also be announced; but this year, that’s of secondary interest.) In an interview, Seward
pointed out that many promising projects – he mentioned redevelopment of Oneonta’s D&H yards for commerce and manufacturing, and the two nanotechnology-associated commerce parks being talked about in Richfield Springs – are “in the pipeline.” This year they may get a CFA allocation, and next year and the year after. “These projects have a way to go,” he said. But if Otsego County’s Mohawk Valley Regional Economic Development Council is one of the three regions to share the $1.5 billion in what is now being called the Upstate Revitalization Initiative (URI), “$120 million is guaranteed for the next four years,” the senator said. “If you have four years of that commit-
ment of money, that’s going to make sure they (projects) become reality.” Last Jan. 15, Cuomo proposed what he then called the Upstate Development Fund in an address to Upstate political and business leaders in Rochester. The idea was to use $1.5 billion – settlements of Wall-Street wrongdoing obtained from BNP Paribas, Credit Suisse and other institutions responsible for the 2008 financial collapse – to help turn around Upstate’s long economic decline. Seven of the state’s 10 economic-development regions would compete for the money: The three with the best long-term economic-development strategies would
get the money. Over the summer, the MV500 effort formed to ensure the MVREDC application was as good as it might be. It was dominated by Oneida County, the most populous of the six-county region and home to SUNY/ Polytechnic, a nano vehicle. But a number of influential Otsego countians had a seat at the table, including Katz, county Rep. Craig Gelbsman, R-Oneonta, and Ken Meifert, the Hall of Fame VP who is also president of the Cooperstown chamber. Elizabeth Horvath, Otsego Now COO, helped write the plan that was submitted by the Oct. 5 deadline.
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