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Cooperstown, New York, Thursday, December 6, 2018
Recordbreaking Month Coldest, Cloudy, Snowy By JIM KEVLIN ONEONTA
I
t may not seem like much, but 7.1 degrees made for an all-time “record-cold” November, according to Dave Mattice, Oneonta weather observer
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GEORGE H.W. BUSH, 1924-2018
Locally, Many Hold Fond Memories of’41
for the National Weather Service. “I’ve got records for every day since 1854,” he said. “And Black Friday, Dec. 23, was minus 10.1 below zero. The record for that date was 7 degrees above in 1880.” To put that in context, Mattice said, imagine a Please See DISMAL, A7
Cooperstown hotelier Bob Holt was impressed by the former president’s graciousness on meeting him at a Nashville convention in 1999.
‘LIVE BIRTHS’ DECLINE The Freeman’s Journal
No one can say Cooperstown’s Frank Wilsey isn’t light on his feet, as he dances in to a second-place finish Saturday, Dec. 1, at the Ugly Sweater 4K/MORE PHOTOS, B8
Hampton Inn Aims To Use Village’s F.D. HARTWICK
D
evelopers of a fourstory Hampton Inn south of the Dollar General in Hartwick Seminary plan to depend on the Cooperstown Fire Department’s ladder truck in the event of a fire, Skyline Hospitality engineer Rudy Zola told the Hartwick Planning Board Tuesday, Dec. 4. The planning board set a public hearing on the project for 7 p.m., Jan. 8, at the town hall in Hartwick hamlet. For more details, visit
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GET YOUR TREE: The Cooperstown Lions Club’s annual Christmas Tree Sale is underway 5-6:30 p.m., Monday-Friday, 9-5 Saturday, and 11-5 Sunday across from the Chestnut Street fire house. 10 CABINS DUE: The required public hearing on plans for 10 cabins on Bush Road on Christian Hill, Town of Hartwick, proposed by Jason Tabor of Tabor Rentals, was held Tuesday, Dec. 4, by the town Planning Board. Neighbor Wendy Weeks
CCS Still Dipping, Data Say is the Cherry Valley-Springfield school districts, which anticipates 16 more seniors a neonta High dozen years from now. School’s Class of “Unfortunately, this year’s 2031 will overall decrease is have 41 more part of a declin►FOR A PDF students than the ing trend we’ve of the ONC Class of 2019, seen over the past BOCES projecaccording to ONC decade,” said tions for its BOCES annual Nick Savin, ONC nine school dis- BOCES superinprojections based tricts in Otsego on “live births” tendent. County, visit data. Reviewing But in the Savin’s data at last AllOTSEGO.com Cooperstown week’s Oneonta Central School City Schools District, with a 22-student board meeting, Superintendrop over that period, and dent Joe Yelich welcomed all but one of the other ONC the prospective 2 percent BOCES district in Otsego growth in student populaCounty, “live births” show a tion. continuing decline. “We know neighboring The one other exception Please See ESTIMATE, A7
BY LIBBY CUDMORE & JIM KEVLIN
By JENNIFER HILL
O
COOPERSTOWN
A Milo V. Stewart/Baseball Hall of Fame
Former President Bush chats with grandson Robert Koch at the 2003 Induction in Cooperstown.
Case Fought In D.C. Puts Otsego 2000 In Big Time By JIM KEVLIN COOPERSTOWN
T
he attorneys general of New York, five other states and the District of Columbia filed an amicus brief Monday, Dec. 3, supporting
Otsego 2000’s lawsuit seeking to require FERC to consider greenhouse-gas (GHG) impacts when approving energy-related projects. “The brief is very persuasive and we are enormously grateful,” Otsego 2000 President Nicole Dillingham said TuesPlease See AMICUS, A7
s Ronald Reagan’s vice president, George H.W. Bush came to the 1985 Hall of Fame Game, then-Assemblyman Tony Casale and his son Peter were sitting with him in the box behind home plate. Then-Congressman Sherwood Boehlert had organized the gathering, and U.S. Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan was there, along with rising star Jim Seward, then the county’s youngest GOP chairman, businessmen and political bankroller Walter Rich, and Hall of Fame executives Howard Talbot and Ed Stack. “He signed a baseball for my son, then handed it to the guy next to him to sign it,” Casale, who now lives in Cooperstown, recalled. “It was Ted Williams.”\ Please See PRESIDENT, A6
2ND YEAR OF DATA ALLOWS COMPARISONS
SUNY ‘Monster’ In Otsego Lake Gives BFS Warning Of Warming By JIM KEVLIN FIVE MILE POINT
W
hen a team of divers removed a bright yellow CLMB (continuous lake monitoring
buoy) Saturday, Dec. 1, from Otsego Lake near here, they could do so with a sense of satisfaction. The device discovered that while Otsego Lake’s waters had surpassed 26 degrees Celsius – that’s 78.8 Farenheit – for only 1.5 hours in 2017, they Please See MONSTER, A7
THE FREEMAN’S JOURNAL & HOMETOWN ONEONTA, OTSEGO COUNTY’S LARGEST PRINT CIRCULATION 2010 WINNERS OF The Otsego County Chamber/KEY BANK SMALL BUSINESS AWARD