August 12, 2026

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ART IS FLYING OFF THE SHELF A look inside the Ithaca Artist Market

PAGES 8-9 JERSEY MIKE'S ROLLS INTO ITHACA

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WOMEN SWIMMIN' FOR HOSPICARE MAKES A SPLASH

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PRIME TIMES LIFELONG TO RELEASE FALL CATALOG

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THEATRE INCOGNITA'S THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST

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FACTORY STORIES HIGHLIGHTS SOUTHWORK'S HISTORY

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VOL. LIV / NO. 48 / August 12, 2026 Serving 47,125 readers week ly

ON THE COVER:

Jersey Mike’s Subs to Open in Ithaca

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By M i k ay l a Rov e nolt

he sandwich chain Jersey Mike’s Subs will open a storefront in Ithaca at 742 S. Meadow St. on Aug. 12. There will be a ribbon-cutting at 9 a.m. at the store.

According to a press release, franchise owner Evan Mayer, Mike Perdichizzi, General Manager Jacob LeGro, and Director of Operations Harlan Iversen, will hold a grand opening and fundraiser from Wednesday, Aug. 12, to Sunday the 16 to support the SPCA of Tompkins County.

According to the website, Jersey Mike’s was founded in 1956 as Mike’s Giant Submarine Shop with one location in Point Pleasant, New Jersey. Since their opening, Jersey Mike’s has grown to more than 3,200 locations in the U.S. and Canada.

According to a press release, the franchise Company has been recognized as one of the fastest-growing fast-casual restaurant chains in America.

Customers who receive a special fundraising coupon distributed through a grassroots effort prior to the opening can make a minimum $3 contribution to SPCA of

Designed by Zachary Isaac Stephens for the Ithaca Times.

Tompkins County in exchange for a regular sub. Customers must have a coupon to be eligible, according to a press release.

“We’re excited to bring Jersey Mike’s to the Ithaca community,” LeGro said. “At Jersey Mike’s, we’re about more than making great subs—we’re committed to making a difference in the communities we serve.

Partnering with the SPCA of Tompkins County allows us to support an organization that does incredible work caring for animals and helping them find loving homes. We look forward to giving back while getting to know our new neighbors.”

Guests can place orders in-store or for pickup through the website or through the Jersey Mike’s app. Additionally, delivery is available in most areas through the Jersey Mike’s app or through third-party delivery partners. Curbside pickup is available for orders placed in Jersey Mike’s app.

Jersey Mike's was recognized on Forbes’ Best Brands for Social Impact List in 2025.

In March 2025, the Company completed its 15th annual Month of Giving, raising a record breaking $30 million and surpassing more than $143 million given to over

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n Aug. 3, the New York State Department of Agriculture and Markets announced that eligible farm employers can now apply for the Farm Employer Overtime Credit Advance program. This allows employers to receive reimbursement for eligible overtime paid to employees since Jan. 1. The program provides a refundable tax credit for eligible farm employers who pay overtime wages, based on the overtime threshold in New York state.

The Farm Employer Over time Credit Advance program is in its third year as part of Governor Kathy Hochul’s plan to support farmers throughout NY with various programs, including a series of new and increased tax credits and other initiatives. The goal is to ensure that farm employers can continue to support their workers while reducing their tax burden.

State Agriculture Commissioner Richard A. Ball said in a press release that the agricultural industry is unique because farmers and farm workers do not work traditional hours.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR ��������������� 6 OPINION / SPORTS ���������������������������� 7 NEWS ������������������������������������������������8-9 POCKET ECONOMICS �����������������10-11 NEWS ������������������������������������������������� 12 CLASSIFIED �������������������������������������� 13 TIMES TABLE ����������������������������14-A15 PRESS RELEASE ������������������������������� 16 PRIME TIMES ������������������������������ 17-19 ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT ���������������������� 21-23

Jersey Mike’s Subs, located at 742 S. Meadow Street.

(Photo: Provided)

200 local charities since it began the tradition in 2011, according to a press release.

Jersey Mike’s is also looking for individuals interested in career opportunities to join their team. Candidates who are passionate about customer service and connecting with their local community are invited to apply at https://www.jerseymikes.com/careers.

The restaurant’s hours are 10 a.m. to 9 p.m., seven days a week. You can contact the Ithaca location directly at 716-338-4221.

ON T HE WE B

Visit our website at www.ithaca.com for more news, arts, sports and photos. Call us at 607-277-7000

N o t e

X Registration Open for New York’s Farm Employer Overtime Credit Advance

By Kaeleigh Banda

NEWSLINE ��������������������������������� 3-5, 10

“I t ’s impor tant that we suppor t our agricultural community and ensure that they have the resources they need so that they can continue providing food for our families,” Ball said. “The Overtime Tax Credit helps provide farmers across our state with timely relief to maintain their workforce and keep our food supply moving. I encourage all eligible farmers to apply and take advantage of this program.”

New this year, all eligible farm employers will need to apply for a year-end certificate from the Department of Agriculture and Markets to claim the credit on their 2026 tax return. The application period to apply for a 2026 year-end certificate will be Jan. 1 through Feb. 1, 2027.

Applications can be submitted to the Department of Agriculture and Markets for a certificate of advance payment of eligible overtime paid between January 1 and July 31 so they can receive reimbursement from the Department of Taxation and Finance. The applications must be submitted by September

30. Approved farmers or business owners can then request their share of the payment from the Department of Taxation and Finance.

Requests must be made no later than Nov. 1 via the online services account at the Department of Taxation and Finance website.

In order to apply, farmers or their businesses must be eligible and employ eligible farm employees who were paid eligible overtime.

The overtime threshold is used to calculate a farm’s credit amount. The threshold is reduced by four hours every two years until it reaches 40 hours in 2032. In 2026, the threshold is 52 hours.

Before applying for the credit, farmers are encouraged to ensure they are registered for a NY.gov ID through My.NY.gov, take the farm employer eligibility assessment, discuss the program with their tax and payroll advisors, and register their farm in the online portal now if they plan to apply for the advance payment and/or year-end credit in 2026.

For more information and resources, including important dates and a chart where upcoming educational events will be available when scheduled, visit the Department of Agriculture and Markets’ website.

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M i k ay l a R o ven o lt, Managi ng Ed ito r e d i to r @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m Scot t Ma n so n, Asso ciate Pu b l ish er J i m B i l i n s k i , P u b l i s h e r E me r i t u s j b i l i n s k i @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m R o y A l l e n , D i r e c t o r o f St r at e g i c Pa r t n e r s h i p s r oy@ i t h ac at i m e s .co m L o r i e n T y n e , A s s i s ta n t E d i t o r l o r i e n @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m A u s t i n L a mb , C o p y E d i t o r a l a m b @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m P h i l i p O ’ D e l l , R ep o r t e r p h i l i p @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m Ja k e Se x to n , Ad m i n istr ative Co o r d i nato r , C a l e n d a r E d i t o r ja k e @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m Mark Sy vertson, Photographer m ar k s y v er t s o nph oto gr aph y@ gm a il .co m Ste ve L awr ence, Spo rts Co lumn ist stevesportsdude@gmail.com Lisa Ellin, Advertising & Marketing l i s a . e @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m K i r a W a l t e r , A r t s & E n t e r ta i n me n t r ep o r t e r a r t s @ i t h ac at i m e s .co m Z a c h a r y I s a a c S t e p h e n s , A u d i e n c e E n g a g eme n t & D e s i g n A s s o c i a t e F r ee l a n c e r s : Barbara Adams, Charley Githler, Stephen Burke, Bill Chaisson, Ross Haarstad, Steve Lawrence, Marjorie Olds, Peter Rothbart, Austin Lamb, Clement Obropta, Jake Sexton, Kira Walter, and Ceili Ayoung THE ENTIRE CONTENTS OF THE ITHACA TIMES ARE C O P Y R I G H T © 2 026 B Y PAT H W AY S T O E Q U I T Y, L L C .

All rights reserved. Events are listed free of charge in TimesTable. All copy must be received by Friday at noon. The Ithaca Times is available free of charge from various locations around Ithaca. Additional copies may be purchased from the Ithaca Times offices for $1. SUBSCRIPTIONS: $139 one year. Include check or money order and mail to the Ithaca Times, PO Box 27, Ithaca, NY 14851. ADVERTISING: Deadlines are Monday 5 p.m. for display, Tuesday at noon for classified. Advertisers should check their ad on publication. The Ithaca Times will not be liable for failure to publish an ad, for typographical error, or errors in publication except to the extent of the cost of the space in which the actual error appeared in the first insertion.

The publisher reserves the right to refuse advertising for any reason and to alter advertising copy or graphics deemed unacceptable for publication.

The Ithaca Times is published weekly Wednesday mornings. Offices are located at 109 N. Cayuga Street, Ithaca, NY 14850 607-277-7000, FAX 607277-1012, MAILING ADDRESS is PO Box 27, Ithaca, NY 14851. The Ithaca Times was preceded by the Ithaca New Times (1972–1978) and The Good Times Gazette (1973–1978), combined in 1978. Founder Good Times Gazette: Tom Newton

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INQUIRING Women Swimmin’ for Hospicare Celebrates 23 Years PHOTOGRAPHER N e w s l i n e

By Mark Sy ve r t son

QUESTION OF THE WEEK: “WHAT’S A GOOD ‘CHEAP DATE’ IDEA FOR ROMANTICS ON A BUDGET?” NOTE: If readers wish to participate in the Ithaca Times’ Inquiring Photographer column, contact Mark Syvertson at marksyvertsonphotography@gmail.com

Participants gather at the finish line.

(Photo: Mark Syverston)

“I would say go for a walk in nature, potentially to a waterfall.”

– Wes

cared for by Hospicare and end of life Hospicare raises allows for them to help experiences. more families and individuals with end “Their courage and strength propels me of life care. Sammons said that dozens of n the morning of Aug. 8, 330 forward as I swim across the lake,” Powers people attend planning committees, merwomen swam 1.2 miles from said.

Camp Comstock to Myers Park to chandise committees, safety committees This year was lifelong paddler Randal support Hospicare services. The swimmers and more to help with preparations for the McDonald’s first helping out as a supsummer event. participated in groups and were accompa"There’s a lot that goes into this, and you port paddler. He said that the weather nied by paddlers in kayaks.

Go the Distance fundraisers, swimmers, know, it's pretty extensive,” Sammons said. was calm and nice in the morning, but volunteers and spectators raised $663, 940 “In order for us to make sure people have a the conditions got a little choppy in the middle. for hospicare through 6,000 donations, ac- safe, powerful experience, I think we have “The path became wider because people cording to the Women Swimmin’ for Hos- to put a lot of work into that.” were getting blown north,” McDonald said.

This year was Jill Shehan’s first swimpicare website. Several safety precautions “And also, we were assigned a pod, which ming in the event, and she said that the were in place during the event including all have the same color hats. So by the water was pretty smooth and there were the coast guard and the city police on the time we got to the middle, there were like only a few rough spots. Shehan said she water. Boaters and paddlers provided a four or five different colored hats because was swimming for her father-in-law, who safe lane for the swimmers. The founders our pod was faster than a lot of them, so passed away this year in hospice, and to of the event are Joan Brumberg and Ann they were all mixing.” support the work that Hospicare does.

Costello.

New York state assemblymember Anna “It's definitely helpful to have people “Twenty three years ago, two powswimming with you, so that way you know Kelles said that she has been swimming erful, determined women decided to the event for 15 years, and that she finds where to go, or even just cheering each swim across the lake for the first time to that it is one of the sunniest days of the other on throughout the race,” Shehan celebrate a 60 birthday and raise money year because everybody is smiling and said. “Getting to each of the checkpoints. for hospice care,” said Emily Hopkins, embracing each other. Kelles said women We kind of did a little cheer together.” director of development and community coming together is a powerful feeling.

Jane Powers, the co-chair of the relations for Hospicare. “Fast forward to Kelles said that she remembers being in Women Swimmin’ planning committee, today, swimming in their wake, we have the water one year, and thinking of three said she has been on the planning comswimmers ages 18 to 82 who swam across close friends who were in hospice. mittee and swimming in the event every the lake today.”

“I remember getting out of the water year, seeing the event evolve from a small Hospicare provides end-of-life services and finding out that one of the women, group to a major effort. Powers, like many to people in Tompkins and Cortland who was a good friend of mine, had other swimmers, reflected on those she counties regardless of income or insurhas lost and those who have been cared for passed away while I was swimming, and ance, according to Executive Director of passed away in the facility,” Kelles said.

by Hospicare.

Hospicare Joe Sammons.

“And I remember visiting her, and it was so Powers said she is a strong swimmer, Joe Sammons said they raise about 20% peaceful. It was so peaceful there. So there but it’s a challenge to get into the water of their annual budget through fundraiswas something about it, like a meditation as she questions whether she is going to ing and the Women Swimmin’ for Hospito support her, knowing that I was swimmake it or not, and she thinks of those care event accounts for about half of the ming for her.” who she has lost and who have been fundraising percentage. The money that

O “Order a pizza and hang out by the lake.”

– Paul

“Get coffee at Gimme and either walk around or just people-watch.”

– Cindi

“In the summer if it's hot out, get ice cream at Cornell Dairy Bar and walk around campus.”

– Katie

“Bring a picnic to the Arboretum.”

– Nicole

By Gr a n t Te rw i l l ige r

Women Swimmin’ for Hospicare was held at Camp Comstock and Myers Park on Aug. 8. (Photo: Mark Syverston)

4 The Ithaca Times / August 12 – 18, 2026

UPS&DOWNS

N e w s l i n e

Rootwork Herbals Owner Settles Racial Harassment Lawsuit Against Neighbor for $100K

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Cayuga Medical Center has earned a “High Performing” rating for hip replacement in U.S. News & World Report’s 2026-2027 Best Hospital Ratings. The rating recognizes Cayuga Medical Center’s performance when caring for patients undergoing hip replacement surgery. This includes the measures related to patient outcomes, complications and patient experience.

By P h i l i p O’ D e l l

Tompkins County woman and her local business secured a $100,000 civil rights settlement from a former neighbor following a federal lawsuit alleging years of racial harassment.

Amanda David and her business Rootwork Herbals secured the financial settlement from her neighbor, Robert Whittaker Jr., following a federal civil rights lawsuit alleging years of racial and sexual harassment, according to CNY Fair Housing Senior Staff Attorney Conor Kirchner.

David, a Black and queer woman, operates Rootwork Herbals to provide herbal medicine and community space tailored to Black, indigenous and people of color and LGBTQIA+ individuals, according to a 2024 federal decision and order. In that court document, U.S. District Judge David N. Hurd denied Whittaker’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit as David provided plausible claims.

According to its website, Rootwork Herbals offers accessible plant-based education and operates the People’s Medicine School, a pay-what-you-can online apothecary, and the Jane Minor BIPOC Community Medicine Garden, a dedicated space for the BIPOC community to learn herbal cultivation. Rootwork Herbals also provides free medicine distribution, educational scholarships, and consultations through its Reclamation Fund, a reparations-driven initiative sustained by community contributions.

According to the 2024 federal court records, David filed suit citing violations of the Fair Housing Act, the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and New York State Human Rights Law. Specifically, David and Rootwork Herbals sought a court order to halt Whittaker’s alleged racial and sexual harassment, remedies for Fair Housing Act and state civil rights violations that include creating a hostile housing environment, and financial compensation for emotional distress and lost business revenue.

Kirchner said the harassment became so severe that David and her family decided to relocate, moving to a new property around February 2025. The relocation forced David to rebuild Rootwork Herbals as she broke ground on a new community garden that spring and incurred costs for

By Kaeleigh Banda

Ups

Downs Ithaca Police Department Officers were dispatched to a hold-up alarm at approximately 9:10 a.m. Aug. 3 at 409 N Meadow St, Beginnings Credit Union.

On route to the bank, the responding officers determined that a robbery had taken place. A description of the suspect was shared on the police radio.

The officers canvassed the area around the bank and interviewed potential witnesses. They learned that the suspect was given a ride away from the area by a person who was unaware of the robbery.

With a vehicle description, officers were able to locate the vehicle being driven on the 200 block of East Green Street with the suspect seated inside. The suspect matching the description given was taken into custody without incident. The has been identified as 56-year-old Ithaca resident Terrance J. Julian. Julian was charged with robbery in the 3rd Degree and a class D Felony. He is awaiting initial arraignment in Ithaca City Court.

Amanda David of Rootwork Herbals. (Photo: Mark Syverston)

moving, business setup, and purchasing a new home.

According to Kirchner, Whittaker denies all allegations made in the suit as part of the settlement agreement executed on April 1. U.S. District Judge Anthony J. Brindisi signed off on the stipulation of dismissal on May 6. Kirchner said Whittaker paid the settlement to David in full, noting that plaintiffs delayed requesting a formal dismissal of the lawsuit until receipt of the funds was confirmed.

Whittaker’s attorney, Syed Shah of the Ithaca-based law firm Williamson, Clune & Stevens, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The 2024 federal court records say David and her three children began renting their home in the Town of Caroline in 2020 before purchasing the property in 2021. Shortly after the purchase, David and her family endured persistent racial and sexual verbal abuse from Whittaker, her next-door neighbor, whenever they encountered him outside. Although David installed a privacy fence later that year to deter the harassment, Whittaker used a step ladder to look over the fence line and continue shouting insults at the family.

The 2024 records says Whittaker threatened to beat her son with a stick or bat at one point. After David reported the incident to the Tompkins County Sheriff 's Office, Whittaker was charged with second-degree criminal harassment. The lawsuit says Whittaker fired a gun in his yard shortly after a group of teenagers arrived for a Rootwork workshop in November 2022. He continued directing racist and sexual slurs at David, tampered with

sections of her property fence, and was subsequently charged with a second count of second-degree criminal harassment.

The 2024 records say Whittaker spraypainted David’s fence, prompting her to install security cameras along the property line around October 2023. The Caroline town court issued a temporary order of protection ordering Whittaker to stay away from the family, but he violated the order two months later by defacing the Davids’ car with spray paint in their driveway. He pled guilty to second-degree criminal harassment for the incident, received a conditional discharge, and was ordered

HEARD&SEEN Heard

The 34th Annual Ithaca Artist Market will be held 12-7:30 p.m. August 14 at the Ithaca Farmer’s Market. Over 80 local artists will show their work in a juried show and sale featuring art from across the region. Live music by the East Hill Jazz Group accompanies shoppers and observers as they explore the market.

Food, wine, beer, cider and desserts will be available from local vendors. Anyone who registers in advance will be entered into a raffle with over 40 chances to win artwork from participating artists or tickets from local arts organizations.

Contin u ed on Page 23

QUESTION

Seen

OF THE WEEK

The New York State Department of Civil Service announced that applications are now open for New York State’s entry-level law enforcement civil service exam.

The exam is for anyone interested and qualified for a position with the Office of State Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation and the State University of New York. The exam is open online through 11:59 p.m. on Sept. 9. All state exam application fees are waived through December 2027, so the exam can be taken at no cost. The exam is scheduled to be held Fall 2026.

Have you gone swimming this summer?

48.4% Yes. 48.4% No. 3.2% I don’t care.

“One of the top priorities under Governor Hochul’s leadership is public safety, and for those ready to make a difference in their community, a career in law enforcement offers New Yorkers a commendable opportunity,” Department of Civil Service Commissioner and Civil Service President Timothy Hogues said.

N EXT WEEK ’S Q UESTION :

Do you participate in the First Friday Art Galleries?

Visit ithaca.com to submit your response.

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IF YOU CARE TO RESPOND to something in this column, or suggest your own praise or blame, write editor@ithacatimes. com, with a subject head “U&D.” 2 0 2 6

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It h Ac A t I m e s

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The Talk at

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

By Ithaca Times Readers

Transition Reentry Act Provides Necessary Support to the Formerly Incarcerated

“

Governor Hochul must sign the Transition Reentry Act (S614A/A1008) sponsored by Senator Rivera and Assemblymember Paulin. Every year in New York, thousands of people leave incarceration and lose access to consistent healthcare at the moment they need it most. During the first two weeks after release, an individual’s risk of death is at least 13 times greater than that of the general population. Medicaid coverage is suspended during incarceration, and delays in reinstatement mean that even a gap of a few days or weeks can leave people without access to life-saving medication, primary care, or mental health treatment.

This bill would provide presumptive Medicaid eligibility for up to 60 days after release from prison or jail, allowing individuals to access Medicaid services while their eligibility is being confirmed. This period gives providers, social workers,

and reentry organizations time to complete the paperwork necessary to reinstate Medicaid coverage or enroll individuals for the first time, while ensuring uninterrupted access to essential healthcare.

An estimated 60% of incarcerated individuals in the United States have a chronic physical condition, and 40% have a diagnosed mental health condition. Without timely access to care, people are more likely to experience medical crises, cycle through emergency rooms, or face untreated mental illness and substance use relapse, often leading directly back to incarceration.

It is imperative that Governor Hochul sign this bill during this legislative session because access to Medicaid will soon become even more difficult for people returning from incarceration. The 2025 budget reconciliation bill (H.R. 1), branded by the Trump administration as the ‘One Big Beautiful Bill,’ introduced new nonwaivable Medicaid ‘community engagement requirements’ mandating at least 80 hours per month of employment, job training, participation in an educational program, community service, or a combination of these activities. These requirements will further exacerbate the structural barriers formerly incarcerated people face and risks cutting off health coverage when it is needed most. Individuals returning from incarceration experience extraordinarily high unemployment rates of approximately 60%, compared to roughly 15% for the

6 The Ithaca Times / August 12 – 18, 2026

toward ensuring that people returning general public, making it difficult to conhome have access to the healthcare they sistently satisfy rigid hourly requirements. need to rebuild their lives and successImposing Medicaid work requirements on fully reintegrate into their communities.” people emerging from incarceration, without addressing employment discrimination, — Naina Kalra, Cornell University health instability, or inconsistent discharge planning, is negligent.

The Save Act is a Voter Despite substantial evidence demSuppression Amendment onstrating the importance of prerelease planning, discharge procedures remain The House of Representatives passed largely unregulated, varying significantly an insider-trading (partial) ban for across states, counties, and even indilegislators. Congressman Josh Riley vidual facilities. New York, in particular, sponsored this bill. Two issues with the lags behind. Eleven other states, including bill forced Congressman Riley to vote no. several conservative states, have received One issue, an amendment that suppresses approval for Section 1115 reentry waivers the vote for seniors, women and the that allow correctional facilities to bill disabled, is the Save Act. The Save Act is a Medicaid for prerelease services, includvoter suppression amendment. ing substance use disorder treatment, case The second issue with the bill, which management, and reentry planning. New was meant to prevent legislators from York has not yet implemented either of trading on privileged information, is that these approaches statewide. Obtaining it did not completely ban insider-trading and implementing a federal waiver can and totally exempted the President from take years, particularly under the current the bill. Last year, Trump is estimated to federal administration. By contrast, the have made up to 1.86 billion dollars on Transition Reentry Health Act offers stock trades with companies he has paran immediate solution, allowing inditial ownership in. Insider enough? viduals to access healthcare immediately WBNG highlighted Congressman upon release while enrollment issues are Nicholas Langworthy as voting for the resolved. By leveraging federal Medicaid insider-trading bill because it allows TSA funding, this bill would reduce the finanworkers to be paid if there is a government cial burden on state and local governshutdown (WBNG July 23, 2026). However, ments while expanding access to care.

Langworthy did not report that a new proIf we want our correctional system gram will place TSA agents under private to be rehabilitative, we must give people companies, so the addition to the insidera meaningful opportunity to succeed trading bill was unnecessary. after release. With new Medicaid work Congressman Riley, I applaud that you requirements placing individuals leaving stood your ground against the underincarceration in New Yorkers at greater handed attempt at voter suppression risk of losing coverage, Governor Hochul and blatant corruption. Congressman must act. Signing the Transition Reentry Health Act would be a meaningful step Contin u ed on Page A15

“

ITHACA NOTES

A Modern Musical Odyssey

By St e ph e n Bu r k e

T

here’s a popular movie out right now about a man in ancient times named Odysseus who left a place called Ithaca (in Greece) to fight a war, and took a long time getting back: about ten years for the war-waging, and another ten years on a difficult return trip.

Your Mother was a rock band in Ithaca (New York) in the late 1970s and early ‘80s who have outdone Odysseus in being away from their Ithaca for over 40 years before coming back. On Wednesday, August 12 (the publication date of this issue of the Ithaca Times), the band has a return gig about 45 minutes from Ithaca at the Seneca Lodge in Watkins Glen.

They haven’t been playing music all this time. In fact it’s been a long time. They quit in the mid-80s after decamping from Ithaca to Boston to try to break into bigtime show biz. (That’s where people with

creative ambitions went in those days, like Brooklyn today.)

There were a lot of gigs in little places, and a few in big places, and some self-produced studio work, but nothing opened any doors, and after a while the six band members (Cathy DeMarinis, Gary Dunn, Gregg Garfin, Casey Koulman, Tom Pandaleon and Al Schaeffer) all left Boston and got jobs you actually had to go to college for, as they did at Cornell.

The current gig in Watkins Glen is not their first reunion. That occurred two summers ago in Ithaca proper.

In 2024 Cornell Alumni Reunions got an idea for a special entertainment for the 45th anniversary of the Class of 1979: to find musicians who played in Ithaca at that time and have them perform at the class reunion.

They found a few, mostly solo performers or duos who were relatively easy to

find and engage.

Your Mother was a long shot, as it was a big group living all over the country now, including two in California and one in Arizona. A group of six involves a lot of communication, time, work, travel and expense for the performers involved.

Your Mother would be a big coup, as a big band playing rock music (two guitars, keyboards, bass, drums, a lead singer and occasional trumpet and trombone), not singer-songwriter stuff, as engaging as that might be. It would be a lot of sound in staid Goldwin Smith Hall.

But what if not all six could (or would) do it? Would five or four of the original band be enough to constitute that coup?

As it turns out, the six are still friends in contact with one another, and they all came. They got a rental house for a few days and stayed together. One of the band has family in Ithaca and some rural property outside town, with a structure the band turned into a rehearsal space.

Performing is always nerve-wracking, and a four-decade hiatus is a test, but once the show started the nerves and the years fell away and it was just fun.

So much fun, in fact, that the band decided they would reprise the reunion in

some fashion, and that’s what they’re doing here now.

This time they’re taking a little more time here, a full week. They’re not doing a Cornell reunion but are here for their own continuing reunion.

They still have the rehearsal space, in Odessa, twenty miles west of Ithaca and in fact closer to Watkins Glen, so that’s where they’re staying, at a place called Seneca Lodge which is unlike anything in Ithaca.

It’s big enough for all of them (and spouses), with a couple of A-frame cabins with three bedrooms, and individual cabins and motel rooms, about 80 units altogether. The price is about a third less than anyplace in Ithaca.

It has been there since 1948 and has a vintage vibe. They have a website but you can’t make reservations through it. You have to phone or write them. Your confirmation comes not through text or email, but on a postcard in the mail.

Contin u ed on Page 12

Sports

The Calm Before the Swarm

By Ste ve L aw re nc e

T

he informal gathering started off as three guys — all north of 70 — talking about sports. The first two guys — Bill White and Buck Briggs, having settled into a pair of wicker chairs on Briggs’ porch overlooking the lake — made note of the fact that they were born less than 5 weeks apart in 1954, and they both went through the Division 1 recruiting process. As they were preparing to take a look at some of the sports memorabilia Briggs has accumulated over the past 50 years, the third guy was walking around on the porch, taking in the view and shooting some photos.

Though neither says much about it, both White and Briggs were fine athletes a half-century ago. Bill grew up outside of Boston, he was a multi-sport star in high school and prep school, and he was recruited to play wide receiver at Boston College. His football days would be limited, as academics became his focus, and he went on to get a graduate degree and

build an advertising empire here in the Finger Lakes region.

Buck grew up 40 miles from Ithaca, graduated from Union- Endicott in 1972, and was very excited to play baseball for the Cornell Big Red. Things got off to a good start, but an awkward slide caused a knee injury that would sideline Buck for a long period of time, and the derailment turned out to be permanent. He too would focus on academics, go to law school and have a great career as an attorney for the National Football League and a Law Professor at two Ivy League Universities.

As Bill and Buck were deep in conversation, the third guy finished up his photography and went over to join them. He plopped down in the third wicker chair, and less than 2 seconds later felt a burning sting on his right forearm. He jumped up, swatting at the first hornet — and then another, and another — and before Buck and Bill caught on to what was happening, all three men were enveloped in a swarm of hornets. All three were nailed multiple times, the scariest one at that moment

being the sting Bill sustained a half-inch from his right eye. The three chilled-out pals instantly became the Septuagenarian Ninjas, jumping and dancing and swatting at hornets at speeds none of them have generated in decades. They made it inside the house, closed the sliding door, and squished the few hornets that had followed them inside. It would have been great had that been the end of the story, but there was a twist that added a layer of stress to the painful stings.

Buck Briggs, you see, is 9 years postheart transplant, and he did not want to learn another lesson about unforeseen allergies. Soon after his transplant, he ate some pineapple — something he had done throughout his life– and he had a brutal allergic reaction. He learned that he had inherited that allergy from his heart donor.

As the three men were recovering from the shock of what had just happened, Buck — clearly and justifiably nervous — said, “This is the first time I have been stung since my transplant. I need to go to the ER right now.”

The third guy told Bill to load Buck into his vehicle and head for the ER, then called 9-1-1 to alert them that a heart transplant recipient had just been stung many times and was en route. He followed the other two to the hospital, all three were checked out, and there was an element of comic Au gu s t

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Bill White (left) and Buck Briggs, moments before the chaos. (Photo: Provided)

relief seeing Buck walking around with one shoe, as he had Ninja-leaped right out of the other one when trying to escape the horde. He spent most of the day in the ICU under precautionary observation, but alas, hornets — like pineapples — are no match for the intrepid Mr. Briggs.

It turned out that the third guy had cluelessly plopped himself down on a wicker chair under which the hundreds of Bald Faced Hornets had chosen to build their nest. The next morning, the exterminator pointed out that had the many stings not been spread out among the three men — or if Buck had been alone — it could have been much worse.

The third guy felt a tiny bit guilty for “stirring up the hornets’ nest,” as it were, but hey, how the hell was I supposed to know that such chaos lurked inches away from my rear end?

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A Peak Into This Year’s 34th Artist Market: Connection, Collaboration, & Diversity

F

rom Porchfest to Grassroots, Ithaca’s big-time annual celebrations often start with something as simple as neighbors spreading an outdoor trend or bands beginning a benefit.

The Ithaca Artist Market is no exception. Returning for the 34th year Aug. 14, the ever-growing event at Steamboat Landing was founded in the 1990s by local artists. As the weekly Ithaca Farmers Market rose to fame beneath its iconic wood pavilion, its volunteer based artistic adjacent was adopted as a program of the Community Arts Partnership of Tompkins County. Now with over 85 art vendors, 18 community tablers, and 15 food and beverage vendors, it’s one of summer’s most highly anticipated events.

Reflecting back on the artist market’s origins, CAP grant and program director Robin Schwartz compared this number of attending artists this year to years at the beginning.

“In the earliest days, we had room for 20 artists,” she said. “This year we received 140 applications, and were able to accept 87. Many of the artists are sharing booths.”

The market runs from 12 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., so folks can visit on lunch breaks or after work. Schwartz, who has worked on the event for 32 years, said that CAP’s market objective is always to increase art’s accessibility in the Tompkins County community.

Since the organization also kicked off in the ‘90s, she reported that over $8.5 million have been distributed through grant programs while CAP continually offers a full slate of services to help local artists market their creations.

“CAP’s mission is to strengthen the arts in Tompkins County by supporting artists and arts groups, ensuring equitable access to the arts, and cultivating a creative culture that reflects our community’s diversity,” she said. “Our programs connect artists and audiences.”

Beyond providing a free gallery on the waterfront, the event delivers on helping creators make sales, reach customers

B y K i r a Wa l t e r

R ac h e l F e i r m a n ’s b o o t h at a p r e v i o u s m a r k e t. ( P h o t o : P r ov i d e d) and forge alliances amongst each other.

Arranging appointments or requesting customized pieces is easily facilitated by exposure and conversation while longterm collaborations yield life-time opportunities.

Ithaca illustrator Rachel Feirman expressed that vending at festivals for the past five years has generated 50% of her income. The annual market also led to a serious commission.

“I was able to get my work in front of an author who hired me to illustrate a series of three children’s picture books for her,” Feirman said. “Every year I make new exciting connections with other artists and community members and that is what my business thrives on.”

8 The Ithaca Times / August 12 – 18, 2026

With “Leaf ’s Life,” Feriman’s first book in the series, newly finished, she looks forward to a book launch at Buffalo Street Books on Nov. 14. Her drawings are inspired by nearby natural areas and incorporate Finger Lakes farmland, waterfalls and wild forests in brightly colored drawings and animations.

Since 82 out of 87 of Ithaca Artist Market’s juried vendors are from Tompkins County, the gathering provides a chance to meet visionaries from the same region with similar inspiration. Many artists seek the muse in local landscapes and trails, including Nancy Medsker, whose pastel artworks feature lake vistas and regional treasures like Jennings Pond in Danby.

Medsker’s pieces are on display at both the Artisan Cove and the Danby Gathery, a gallery which she owns and includes other creatives in. She said she was thrilled that several other artists featured at the Gathery were selected to sell their work alongside her at Steamboat Landing.

Though Medsker began her journey with pastels during the pandemic, she has resided in Ithaca for 40 years with an early career in stained glass, which she paused to raise twins.

“There are some trails around that I go on regularly,” Medsker said. “But if I see something beautiful, even if I’m driving, I’ve learned that I need to stop and take a picture of it right then. Some pictures I take are really beautiful, but

they're not good paintings. Some pictures are so beautiful you can’t make the painting better than the picture.”

Medsker composes collected images and transforms them with pastel, particularly fond of the space behind her house.

While she didn’t deny the importance of publicity and monetizing projects, she found it refreshing that the market creates a setting to return for conversation and comfort.

“It’s an event that’s been going on for a long time,” she said. “It's sort of stabilizing and reassuring that while all this craziness is happening around us, we can still experience a certain amount of normalcy in our lives that feeds our souls. I think that’s what’s important about the artist market right now, but if people want to buy some of my art, that’s great.”

Galleries debut work and storefronts generate revenue, but “meet-and-greets” with the artist behind the masterpiece are generally less frequent, putting the market focus on communication. While art vendors comprise 48 of 183 booths at the regular farmers market, photographer Katherine Solomon said that its annual counterpart creates a setting where art is the focal point of discussions.

“I do have a booth at the Farmers Market, but having a market where people are going specifically to look at and buy art is a very different crowd,” Solomon said. “I’ve had great chats about art with visitors at the Artist Market and it’s good exposure for getting commissions.”

With insight into both farming and art, Solomon’s work includes human and animal portraits, relying on cooperation with the client for her end product. After she and her husband moved to a farm in Spencer six years ago, she’s had the opportunity to meet fellow farmers and animal lovers on weekends. Now, she’s able to concentrate on speaking about her artistic passions at Steamboat Landing with fellow creatives instead.

Also joining the Ithaca Artist Market effort six years ago is CAP executive director Megan Barber, who joined the team in 2020 determined to expand its reach.

“Since I came on board, the CAP team and I have put an emphasis on building relationships with a more diverse group of artists, and that has made the Artist Market more and more vibrant year over year,” she said.

From mosaic bowls to quilts, or Ithaca’s iconic Gourdlandia gourd pieces, there’s no shortage of diversity in this year’s artistic offerings: writers are com-

ing onto the scene while new developments in beverage and musical range spark excitement too. Per popular demand, Cafe Comódo will serve coffee at the pavilion, keeping everyone awake.

Meanwhile, East Hill Classic Jazz Band will play throughout the day with rotating musicians.

A unique figure contributing to visual diversity beneath the wooden roof this season is Teresa Yatsko, who returns to the market for her seventh year with a collection of Ithaca-inspired book sculptures. A former high school health teacher, Yatsko said she ventured into altered book art after experimenting with photos of her grandmother and an old art journal. Over 10 years ago, the prototype catapulted her book sculpture career as she continued the line of projects with upcycled books, found objects and plant based materials.

Though Yatsko has hosted workshops, she mentioned that many are baffled by the structure of her books despite their simplicity. Although adults are often puzzled, she truly enjoys younger reactions.

“Probably the greatest joy of being in the artist market is when little kids come up and they just look and stare with their mouths open. It’s so darn cute because some of the books really do suck you in,” Yatsko said.

Offering personalized book sculptures, Yatsko often takes the time to speak with curious onlookers about what they would want in their own project: people ask for memorials and ways to tell the past.

While participating artists sell art, collect information for future projects and grow their clientele base, the market also promises the chance for visitors to win local pieces in a raffle. With over 60 raffle items to win, both food and art, online pre-registration is all that’s necessary for an extra victory at the market.

Submissions by local artists sit one more online form away on the CAP website, where the vendor and group registry is publicly available.

When asked how the market will maintain a legacy of success going forward, Barber echoed a sentiment amongst vendors, that the market’s persistence is a reminder of a present and passionate local audience for artistic endeavors.

“What will continue to make it successful in the future is for artists to continue to have the resources to make a livelihood here and for community members to keep valuing and supporting the arts,” she said.

M a k ay l a B u n c e’s w o r k . ( P h o t o : P r ov i d e d)

Te r e s a Yat s k o’s “A r t i s t ’s D r e a m .” ( P h o t o : P r ov i d e d) Au gu s t

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POCKET

Thoughts on Money—Yours, Ours & Theirs THE ECONOMIC IMPACT OF SYSTEMIC INDIFFERENCE

Too Big to Care: When Individuals, Large Companies, Municipalities, and Organizations Become Indifferent to the Consequences of Their Decisions

By Roy Allen Director of Strategic Partnerships — Finger Lakes Community Newspapers, The Ithaca Times and ithaca.com There is a particular kind of harm that rarely makes the news.

It happens when a large company decides a small business can wait. It happens when a municipality closes a street, changes parking, moves a bus stop, delays a permit, or enforces a regulation without thinking about the person whose livelihood depends on that street, parking space, permit, or regulation.

It happens when a university, hospital, nonprofit, or other large institution changes a policy and leaves someone else to deal with the consequences.

And it can happen when one individual simply decides that what is convenient for them matters more than what happens to someone else.

Sometimes the harm is intentional. Often it is not.

But that distinction may matter less than we think.

The deeper problem is indifference to consequence.

The person or organization making the decision does not have to live with what happens next. That is what it means to become too big to care—not necessarily too big to be profitable or successful, but too insulated to see the person on the other side of the decision, too powerful to feel the consequences, or too busy protecting its own interests to ask what happens to everyone else.

In a community like Ithaca, this matters.

We are a cap-and-gown economy. Large universities, hospitals, government agencies, nonprofits, and corporations sit alongside restaurants, retailers, contractors, printers, farmers, artists, and independent businesses.

The large institutions matter enormously 10

to our economy.

So do the small ones.

The trouble begins when we forget that they do not have equal power.

Size Changes the Rules

Size creates advantages beyond simply having more customers or revenue.

A large organization has lawyers, accountants, purchasing departments, human-resources staff, public-relations people, and entire teams devoted to managing relationships and rules. A small business may have one person doing all of those jobs: the owner.

A large organization can treat a $25,000 problem as an administrative inconvenience.

For a small business, that same amount can mean payroll, rent, supplies, or deciding which bill can wait.

A large organization may regard 60 or 120 days to pay a vendor as normal. A small business may have to borrow money to finance work it has already completed.

Who among us could reliably pay our household bills if our employers paid us only every three or four months?

The difference is not simply size.

It is who can afford the consequences.

Being “too big to care” is therefore not strictly about headcount or balance-sheet size. An individual can become too secure to care. A government agency can become too bureaucratic to care. A university can become too institutional to care.

What they share is distance from consequence.

When Business Becomes an Excuse

Large companies have many ways of using their leverage. They change fees, payment terms, purchasing policies, procurement systems, and competitive strategies.

The language used to explain these deci-

The Ithaca Times / August 13 – August 18, 2026

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sions usually sounds reasonable: efficiency, innovation, competition, market forces.

The small-business owner often hears something simpler: The rules changed, and there isn't much you can do about it.

The deeper problem is not necessarily that a large company wants a small business to fail. It may simply not think very much about whether it does.

That is indifference to consequence.

Hostility announces itself. Indifference simply moves on.

Government Can Do It, Too

This is not only a corporate problem.

Municipal governments and public authorities can cause serious damage to small businesses without intending to. A road closes. Parking changes. Construction lasts longer than expected. A permit gets delayed. Zoning alters a neighborhood. A new fee appears. Or, like big companies, they delay payment for services already rendered.

• From inside the government, each decision may make perfect sense.

• From behind the counter of a small business, it can feel like death by a thousand cuts.

Yes, governments must make difficult decisions. But a responsible government should also ask: Who is going to pay the price for this decision?

That is not favoritism.

It is responsible government.

“That's Our Policy”

One of the most frustrating things a small-business owner can hear from a large institution is: “That's our policy.”

Policies, however, are written by people.

Procedures are designed by people. Payment terms are chosen by people. Procurement systems are created by people.

A large organization does not have to become a charity. It does not have to accept every price or every request.

But it should recognize the power it holds.

• If you can pay a small vendor in 15 days rather than 90, why wouldn't you?

• If you can give six months' notice rather than six weeks, why wouldn't you?

• If you can design a procurement system a five-person company can actually navigate, why wouldn't you?

Having the power to do something is not the same as having a good reason to do it.

When Three Decisions Become Everybody's Problem

I oversee this newspaper.

Recently, three large organizations each made a unilateral decision to delay payments to us beyond the terms we had mutually agreed upon. The work had been done. The terms had been established. The invoices had been submitted.

Then the payment dates changed.

Inside each organization, the decision may have seemed harmless—a different internal cycle, a process that needed to be followed, a few additional weeks or months.

Three such decisions at roughly the same time had a very different effect on a small newspaper.

They created a very negative cash-flow spiral.

Employees, printers, freelancers, suppliers, the landlord, and others were paid late or remain unpaid. Insurance premiums still came due. Utilities still cost money. The bills did not change their due dates because someone else changed ours.

So we began chasing cash instead of collecting and curating the stories of our community.

A small business can survive a temporary setback. What is much harder to survive

is having money you have already earned effectively withheld by organizations with substantially greater resources.

The three organizations may not have intended to put us in difficulty.

But intention is not the only measure of responsibility.

If you have the power to change the terms, you also have the power to create consequences for the person on the other side.

Those consequences do not stop with us.

Our employees feel them. A printer waiting for payment feels them. A freelancer waiting for a check feels them. A local supplier feels them.

The large institution may think it is delaying payment to one vendor.

It may actually be delaying payment to a vendor that has its own employees, suppliers, and obligations.

• The small business becomes the shock absorber.

• The large institution preserves its cash.

• Somebody else absorbs the strain.

What If Supply Is Not the Whole Story?

I was reminded of this at a recent public discussion about what many call the housing crisis. The conversation followed a familiar path: construction costs, zoning, land availability, supply and demand.

All of those questions matter.

But another question deserves attention: What if supply is not the whole story?

There are millions of bedrooms in American homes that are not regularly occupied.

There are empty and underused spaces right here in Tompkins County.

That does not mean every spare bedroom should become a rental. Homeowners have legitimate reasons for keeping rooms available, and people have every right to privacy, safety, and property.

But the existence of unused space raises an interesting question: Is a shortage of housing always a shortage of physical space, or can it sometimes also be a shortage of connection?

• A student looking for a safe place to sleep does not experience the housing market as a graph.

• A young person starting a first job does not experience zoning as a municipal code.

• A visiting worker does not experience housing policy as a development plan.

They experience it as a much simpler question: Where am I going to sleep tonight?

If we need more housing, let's build more housing. If zoning is preventing sensible housing, let's examine the zoning. If construction costs are too high, let's address them.

But we should also be willing to ask whether the people sitting in rooms discussing “housing supply” are seeing the person who cannot find a safe place to live.

Everyone may be looking at the same community through a different window.

The problem is not necessarily that some-

one does not care.

It may be that nobody has been asked to look through the other person's window.

That brings us back to the central question: Who bears the consequences?

A Community Can Become Too Big to Care

This is where “too big to care” becomes something larger than a criticism of corporations.

A community itself can become too big to care when its problems are reduced to numbers, categories, policies, and spreadsheets— and the people affected by those decisions disappear from view.

We talk about housing units, beds, parcels, parking counts, traffic, tax revenue, and economic development.

All of those numbers matter.

Behind every number, however, is somebody.

Perhaps the question we need to add to every public discussion is: What does this decision look like from the other side?

That question does not solve housing, zoning, business finance, or transportation.

But it puts a human being back into the equation.

The Human Judgment Problem

There may be another lesson in our growing anxiety about artificial intelligence.

We worry about what might happen if machines are placed in charge of important decisions. We fear they may lack empathy, judgment, or understanding of human consequences.

Perhaps the more uncomfortable question is whether our real fear is not that machines might become less humane than we are, but that they might force us to become more accountable for the decisions we already make.

A machine can follow a rule without asking who gets hurt by it.

A human being can stop.

A human being can look at the person on the other side of a decision and ask: What will this mean for them?

Perhaps that is part of what it means to be human. Not simply having feelings, but accepting responsibility for the consequences of our choices.

Maybe humanity is something we practice: paying attention, recognizing consequences, exercising discretion, honoring commitments, and caring enough to notice when someone else is carrying a burden we could have carried ourselves.

The Small Business Cannot Always Be the Shock Absorber

There is a tendency in modern economic life to treat small businesses as shock absorbers.

Eventually there is nothing left to absorb.

Then someone asks: What happened to all the small businesses?

I know this because I am watching the

process from inside a small local weekly newspaper.

When our cash flow is squeezed, we do not simply lose money. We lose flexibility. We postpone things. We make difficult staffing decisions. We ask people to wait. We worry about the next payroll—or find ourselves unable to make the current one.

And the people who depend on us may never know that their problem began somewhere else, with a much larger organization that simply decided it could pay us later than it had agreed to.

That is what makes this issue bigger than accounts payable.

It is about the chain of dependence that holds a local economy together.

None of This Requires a Conspiracy

This is not a story about evil corporations or evil government officials. Most people working inside large organizations are trying to do their jobs.

The problem is the distance between the decision and the consequence.

But a system can be efficient for the institution operating it while being devastating for the people on the other side of it.

That is why the question should not simply be: Is this efficient?

It should be: Efficient for whom?

And then: Who is carrying the cost of our efficiency?

We have normalized the wrong question.

Too often the question becomes: Can they afford to wait?

It should be: Why should they have to?

Those are very different ethical questions.

The Cap-and-Gown Economy

This deserves particular attention in Ithaca.

The heavier you are, the more careful you have to be about where you step.

The question is not whether these institutions have the right to make decisions. They do.

The question is whether they have considered: Who pays the price?

The Emperor Has No Clothes

A free press exists, in part, to say out loud what everyone can see but no one wants to acknowledge.

Sometimes the most important service a newspaper can provide is not telling people something they do not know.

It is giving people permission to acknowledge what they already know.

People who run small businesses know what it feels like to be on the weaker side of a transaction. They know what it means when a large customer says, “We'll pay you later.”

They know what it means when a government decision makes their business harder to reach. They know what it means when an institution's policies seem reasonable from the inside but impossible from the outside.

What they may not have is a place to say

it. It is to ask the questions that power sometimes makes uncomfortable: • Who bears the cost?

• Who gets to wait?

• Who gets heard?

• Who has the power to change the terms?

• Who is expected to simply absorb the consequences?

These are not partisan questions. They are community questions.

Big Enough to Lead

There is nothing inherently wrong with being big. Scale can be a tremendous force for good.But scale comes with responsibility. The larger an institution becomes, the more easily it can absorb a cost that would devastate someone smaller. Being big should not be an excuse for caring less. It should be a reason to care more. The goal should not be to make every organization small. It should be to make large organizations big enough to lead and humble enough to listen.

The same is true when we talk about housing, transportation, development, regulation, or any other issue where the people making the decisions are separated from the people living with the results. That is why “too big to care” is not merely a business problem. It is a community problem. The test of community ethics is not whether an institution intends to hurt someone. It is whether it cares enough to notice when its actions do.

A community economy depends upon reciprocity. I do something for you; you pay me; I pay someone else; they pay someone else. We all keep the economic wheel turning.

When one powerful institution says, in effect, “Our needs come first; you can wait,” it introduces a different principle: power determines whose obligations matter.

That is a principle worth examining—not because large institutions are inherently bad, but because no community can remain healthy when the people with the least power are routinely expected to absorb the consequences of decisions made by those with the most.

A free press exists partly to make that reality visible.

• Sometimes the emperor really does have no clothes.

• Sometimes everyone sees it.

• And sometimes the most important thing a newspaper can do is be willing to say so.

The question is not whether we can afford to care.

The question is whether we can afford not to care about the consequences of what we do to one another.

Footnote: This is an abstract of the complete essay “Pocket Economics: The Economic Impact of Systemic Indifference.” The entire essay can be viewed online at ithaca.com.

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News

Namaste Montessori Switches To A Teacher Led Non-Profit Model

By Kira Walte r

W

hile the educational spotlight at Cayuga’s southern end is often university focused, a variety of schooling options for young learners exists outside of public districts. Finger Lakes parents have more autonomy in deciding how their children spend the first few classroom years, and at Namaste Montessori, they’ve had direct involvement in both big picture administrative and daily decisions for 22 years.

Just off of Trumansburg Road, the daycare was founded by teacher and mother Brigid Beames, who opened her home to the neighborhood in 2004 with her one year old daughter. Beames scaled up the once twelve student preschool at Namaste Montessori’s current location, a former chicken farm, in accordance with parent demand during 2007. She even ran an adjacent elementary program in Jacksonville for 14 years.

Now ready for retirement, she is handing the reins off to fellow faculty members through the first teacher-led non profit model in the Ithaca area. As the school applies for a 501(c)(3) status and builds enrollment, changes are expected as they start having fundraisers and an August 12th open house from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m.

While its new structure develops, the school’s mission remains consistent with providing child-centered learning in a space curated to promote independence, choice and inquiry. Assistant Head of the School Irina Chernyakov spoke to the prepared setting and how it helps toddlers to teach themselves.

“In our classrooms, everything is set up so the children can be independent with the activities that they choose,” Chernyakov said. “We prepare everything in such a way that they need little support once they're doing something. So that they can really do it themselves and feel that confidence.”

A mother herself, Chernyakov has been working at the school for eleven and a half A MODERN MUSICAL ODYSSEY contin u ed from page 7

There is an archery range, hard to find among vacation spots in Ithaca.

years, where she’s witnessed Montessori strategies increase student agency paired with a unique mixed age learning structure. As Namaste Montessori hosts two age cohorts, eighteen month to three yearolds in one classroom and three to six year-olds in another, she expressed that older students develop leadership skills by helping younger ones.

“The nice thing about a mixed age classroom is that there’s always children who’ve been there for one or two years,” she said. “When we have new children, they can have the older children model for them. It really makes it for a nice transition.”

With Assistant Primary Classroom Guide Carrie Gleason, Chernyakov even recalled times when older students conducted book-based research or walked younger students through a planned out activity. Gleason, who’s been at the preschool with Beames since the beginning, recalled kindergarteners taking on capstone projects.

“Fledglings [kindergarteners] did little research projects on something specific, like sea otters or dogs or bats,” Gleason said. “We’d just get all the books out, and they’d read and look up what they want and they’d even give little presentations later on but they got to choose what they want to talk about.”

Childsized furniture, mathematical visuals and hands-on opportunities are based not on obedience or following instruction, but curiosity. Despite meticulous attention to physical detail, Toddler Lead Guide Laura Carpenter voiced the importance of simply giving kids the skill of choice early on.

“When they start in our programs and become so independent, they make that choice of what they want to do,” Carpenter said. “Or even when they don’t know what they want they can sit quietly with that feeling and just think about what they could do, watching other people to figure out.”

Although math-bead models and books introduce academic subjects, little

learners are also able to choose from life-skill oriented activities. They can pick garden flowers, mix up snack time by baking quick bread, or help with animal care. Raised beds in the playground and ample time outdoors keep children active, while an indoor Magic Tree House voted into place by preschoolers contributes to both wonderment and classroom democracy.

Chernyakov and her coworkers discussed that Namaste Montessori attendees are very impressionable during these first five years of pivotal brain development.

Even if daily progress isn’t always obvious, Carpenter has seen former students take high school leadership roles and are active

community members with the library and farmers market.

Across a range of ages in a place where they aren’t just told what to do, children show they want to learn without enforcement. They show a natural willingness to take care of each other with the freedom to explore and socialize.

“The foundation was strong, even though some days you can feel like you’re just changing diapers and cleaning up spills,” Carpenter said. “It’s important work. And it’s the foundation that they build on when they do move out of our primary classroom and out into public school, onto college with that strong foundation.”

There’s a restaurant and bar, which is where the band will play.

Somehow the band’s edgy name did not dissuade the lodge’s establishment.

Maybe they understood that it is an ostensibly tough but primarily jokey name

from the post-punk 1970s and ‘80s meant to convey a wry affability, not an affront.

Maybe (more likely) they talked with the band and liked them.

The band does originals and covers.

Maybe the most emblematic example of

their range and sensibility is a version of “Psycho Killer” by Talking Heads that turns into “Funkytown” by Lipps Inc. As Homer noted in the past, and presently we know, Ithaca brings things back.

12 T h e I t h a c a T i m e s / A u g u s t 1 2 – 1 8 , 2 0 2 6

Namaste Montessori students feeding farm animals. (Photo: Provided)

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PUBLIC NOTICE Tompkins Bank & Trust at 118 E. Seneca Street, Ithaca, NY 14850 intends to apply to the Federal Reserve Board for permission to establish a branch at 1201 Union Road, West Seneca, NY 14224.

The Federal Reserve considers a number of factors in deciding whether to approve the application including the record of performance of applicant banks in helping to meet local credit needs.

You are invited to submit comments in writing on this application to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Attention: Bank Applications Officer, 33 Liberty Street, New York, NY 10045, or via email: comments.applications@ny.frb.org. The comment period will not end before August 31, 2026. The Board's procedures for processing applications may be found at 12 C.F.R. Part 262. Procedures for processing protested applications may be found at 12 C.F.R. 262.25. If you need more information about how to submit your comments on community affairs aspects of the application or to obtain copies of relevant procedures contact Mr. David Erickson, Community Affairs, (212) 720-6141; other questions, including those relating to general procedures, should be directed to Mr. Keith Goodwin, Head of Bank Applications, Bank Applications, (212) 720-5885. The Federal Reserve will consider your comments and any request for a public meeting or formal hearing on the application if they are received in writing by the Reserve Bank on or before the last day of the comment period.

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12-4, Fridays 4-7, and Saturdays 12-4 p.m. | Free Illustrator Visit — Julian Plum | 1:30 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Tompkins County Public Library, 101 East Green Street | Join us to read “Whose Tree is This?” Authored by Marilyn Singer and illustrated by local artist Julian Plum!

Curious about how the art gets made for picture books?

Music Bars/Bands/Clubs

8/13 Thursday

Concerts/Recitals

8/16 Sunday

8/12 Wednesday

33 South Street | The popular series returns for another summer.

Slightly Stoopid: Road Trippin’ Summer Tour | 6 p.m. | Beak & Skiff Apple Orchards, 2708 Lords Hill Road

The Importance of Being Earnest presented by Theatre Incognita | 7 p.m., 8/13 Thursday | Kitchen Theatre Company, 417 W. State / W. MLK, Jr. Street | Theatre Incognita presents Oscar Wilde’s late Victorian farce updated to England of the Roaring 20s. | $15.00 - $30.00

An Evening with Pam Tillis | 8 p.m. | Center for the Arts of Homer, 72 S Main St.

Bywater Call | 8 p.m. | Center for the Arts of Homer, 72 S Main St.

8/13 Thursday

8/17 Monday

8/14 Friday

Beginnings Summer Concert

Live Music — Loveday & the Soiree | 8 a.m. | Hopshire Farms & Brewery, 1771 Dryden Rd.

5 p.m., Ithaca Commons

Terra String Quartet at the Carriage House Theater | 6 p.m. | Carriage House Theater at the Cayuga Museum of History & Art, 203 Genesee St. | Free

Three Bears Inner Crazy Concert | 6 p.m. | Three Bears Ovid, 7175 Main Street | Free

Wagner Sunset Music Series Presents The Smoking Loons | 5 p.m. | Wagner Vineyards, 9322 State Route 414

Series in Downtown Ithaca | Music in the Park | 6:30 p.m. | Myers Park, Myers Point Rd. | Free

Sydnie Christmas | 8 p.m. | Center for the Arts of Homer, 72 S Main St.

8/14 Friday Hangtime Concert Series featur-

Betty’s Ghost appears | 6 p.m. | Boatyard Grill

ing Dunes and the Del Tunes |

Hangtime Concert Series featuring Dunes and the Del Tunes | 6 p.m. | Treleaven Wines, 658 Lake Road | Free

Road | Free

8/15 Saturday Rachel Beverly Live | 4 p.m. | Brewers Taproom, 10 Pinckney Rd.

8/16 Sunday Summer Sundays Music Series — ft. Michael Francis McCarthy | 1 p.m. | Wagner Vineyards, 9322 State Route 414

6 p.m. | Treleaven Wines, 658 Lake Devon Allman’s 20 Years Strong Tour | 8 p.m. | Center for the Arts of Homer, 72 S Main St.

Crystal City SummerFeast 2026 | 1 p.m. | Corning Nasser Center Plaza [Skating Rink], 500 Nasser Center | $25.00 Bluegrass with Carter & Cleveland | 8 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Robinson Pavilion at Anyela’s Vineyard, 2433 W

8/19 Wednesday

Lake Rd. | Two of the most decorated

Motors & Music at The Glen | 5 p.m. | Watkins Glen International, 2790 Co Rte 16

forces! Jason Carter is a three-time

THISWEEK

Some Like it Hot | 1 p.m. | Auburn Public Theater, 8 Exchange St. Pure Prairie League | 8 p.m. | Center for the Arts of Homer, 72 S Main St.

8/19 Wednesday Stories with Music: Bats in the Band | 2 p.m. | Waverly Village Hall (Waverly, New York), 22 Ithaca St.

8/15 Saturday

and dynamic bluegrass fiddlers join GRAMMY Award winner and veteran bandleader. | $48.00 - $70.00

8/18 Tuesday

Stage Little York Lake Theatre & Pavillion | 2 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | Little York Lake Theatre & Pavillion Address, 6799 Little York Lake Road | July 29 – August 14 Book by Thomas Meehan Music by Charles Strouse Lyrics by Martin Charnin Leapin’ lizards! Annie is making her CRT debut!

Shakespeare in the Gardens: The Taming of the Shrew | 6 p.m., 8/13 Thursday | Seward House Museum,

Elmira Little Theatre Presents Mel Brooks’ YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN | 7:30 p.m., 8/14 Friday | Clemens Center, 207 Clemens Center Parkway | Mel Brooks’ madcap comedy collides with Mary Shelley’s classic monster tale in Young Frankenstein. | $28.00 - $35.00 Comedy Improv Show starring the Puzzled Players | 8 p.m., 8/14 Friday | Puzzled Players Comedy Improv Theater and Training Center of Greater Binghamton, 19 Madison Avenue | The Puzzled Players present the premier comedy events and the ONLY Comedy Improv Shows in the Greater Binghamton area. Zany, interactive and fun! | $15.00

Art TCPL Tours: Ithaca Murals Walk with Caleb Thomas | 10 a.m., 8/13 Thursday | Tompkins County Public Library, 101 East Green Street | Join us for a guided walking tour of public art around downtown Ithaca, with a focus on literature-inspired projects!

Pamela Drix: of vines and fences exhibit at The Gallery at South Hill | 12 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | The Gallery at South Hill, 950 Danby Rd. South Hill Business Campus | Pamela Drix one person exhibit “of vines and fences” at The Gallery at South Hill for the month of August. Open Thursdays

ITHACA ARTIST MARKET FRIDAY, AUGUST 14, FROM 12:00 P.M. TO 7:30 P.M. Steamboat Landing | Join us for the 34th Annual Ithaca Artist Market on August 14th, 2026. Learn more, register, and view the full list of participating artists at artspartner. org. Discover the work of 80+ local artists at the 34th Annual Ithaca Artist Market, a juried show and sale featuring outstanding fine and functional art from across the region.

Enjoy live music by the East Hill Jazz Group while exploring the market, and treat yourself to delicious food, wine, beer, cider, and desserts from local vendors. (Photo: Provided) https://artspartner.org/content/view/ ithaca-artist-market.html

14 t h e I t h A c A t I m e s / A u g u s t 1 2 – 1 8 , 2 0 2 6

TRACES : Masha Ryskin + Jennie Wilde | 4 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Corners Gallery, 903 Hanshaw Rd. Suite 101A Suite 101A | TRACES: Masha Ryskin + Jennie Wilde opens Sat. Aug. 15, 4–6 p.m. | Free Puff and Paint | 7 p.m., 8/16 Sunday | NRE Space , 402 W. State St | Unleash your creativity at our Puff and Paint event! Join us for an evening filled with painting, puffing, and good vibes. With all supplies included and infused snacks available, this is the perfect event to unwind and have some fun. Don’t miss out — grab your tickets now! | $50.00 - $80.00

Film Summer World Cinema | 1:30 p.m., 8/18 Tuesday | Lifelong, 119 W. Court St. | Experience different cultural viewpoints through the lenses of a collection of directors from around the world prefaced by an informed and interesting introduction to each film by film aficionado Ron Krieg. | $10.00 - $40.00 Cinemapolis 120 E Green St, Ithaca New movies opening the week of August 12. Contact Cinemapolis for showtimes and continuing films.

SIX: The Musical Live!| Henry VIII's six wives—Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anna of Cleves, Katherine Howard, and Catherine Parr—hold a singing competition to see who had the worst time with their larger than life ex, ultimately deciding to rewrite their own stories. (Filmed at the Vaudeville Theatre in London in June–July 2022.) | PG-13 91 mins The Rivals Of Amziah King | Deep within the backwoods of

rural Oklahoma, charismatic and musically gifted Amziah King herds a bluegrass-playing band of misfits while overseeing the premier honeymaking operation in town. When Amziah’s estranged foster daughter unexpectedly returns, Amziah leaps at the possibility to renew connection and create a family business. But the honey game is ruthless, and Amziah’s rivals threaten to destroy everything he has built. | R 130 mins The Wrong Girls | Two codependent best friends living paycheck to paycheck and bong rip to bong rip get caught in a case of mistaken identity that throws their lives into chaos. | R 99 mins The Kidnapping of Arabella | Holly spends days at her dead-end job fantasizing about holes in the space-time continuum and wondering where her life went wrong. When she meets Arabella, a seven-year-old rebel hoping to run away from her self-absorbed author father, Holly becomes convinced their meeting is a cosmic sign, and that Arabella is, in fact, her past self sent back for a second chance. The two embark on an unconventional road trip between two lost souls who might be exactly what the other needs. | NR 108 mins Summer World Cinema | 1:30 p.m., 8/18 Tuesday | Lifelong, 119 W. Court St. | Experience different cultural viewpoints through the lenses of a collection of directors from around the world prefaced by an informed and interesting introduction to each film by film aficionado Ron Krieg. | $10.00 - $40.00 Family Movie Night | 4 p.m., 8/10 Monday | Cortland Free Library, 32 Church St. | Join us for movie and popcorn here at the library. We will be watching The Good Dinosaur. Rated PG. All families welcome. Run time 1 hr. 33 min. Registration required.

Teen Movie Night on the Big Screen | 4 p.m., 8/13 Thursday | Crown City Cinemas | Join us at Crown City Cinemas to watch a movie on the big screen! Movie still to be determined by teens. Ages 12-18. Registration Required.

TRACES : MASHA RYSKIN + JENNIE WILDE SATURDAY, AUGUST 15 FROM 4:00 P.M. TO 6:00 P.M.

Corners Gallery | Join us for the opening reception of TRACES, featuring work by Masha Ryskin and Jennie Wilde. TRACES features work that instills an intriguing sense of deja vu, as exemplified in Jennie Wilde's seemingly ancient textures and organic forms juxtaposed with Masha Ryskin’s sensitive washes of painted color and drawn line. (Photo: Provided) https://www.cornersgallery.com/exhibits

Special Events

Mini Golf Course! Enjoy a fun filled evening of music, mini golf, and great memories with family and friends.

Mindful Birding at Sapsucker Woods | 12 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | Cornell Lab of Ornithology, 159 Sapsucker Woods Road | Join us for a peaceful mid-day break for Mindful Birding at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. | Free

Books

Latino Civic Association Community Picnic | 12 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Stewart Park large pavilion, 1 James L Gibbs Dr. | Join the Latino Civic Association of Tompkins County for a summer afternoon on the lake!

Bring your family and friends to enjoy a beautiful day of music and community. All are welcome! This year is NOT a potluck, and instead we will be enjoying food (courtesy of the LCA) by Zocalo! | Free Conscious Conversation & Meditation with Sheila Applegate | 3 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Auburn Public Theater, 8 Exchange St. | An afternoon event with Sheila Applegate at Auburn Public Theater.

YMCA Carnival for a Cause | 12 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | West Family YMCA, 740 Main Street | Carnival for a Cause Saturday, August 15 | 12:00-3:00 PM West Family Y A Community Carnival with a Purpose Join the YMCA of Broome County for Carnival for a Cause, a funfilled afternoon for | Free Signal Boost festival | 12:15 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Point Bible Church, 2938 U.S. 11 | Point Bible Church of Whitney Point, NY is hosting Signal Boost Music Festival Saturday, August 15 from 12–10:30 p.m. | $15.00 $35.00

A Guided Generative Poetry Workshop | 4 p.m., 8/19 Wednesday | Buffalo Street Books, 215 North Cayuga Street | Join Barbara Regenspan for a free guided generative poetry workshop for non-poets and experienced poets! | Free Drag Story Hour | 11 a.m., 8/16 Sunday | Buffalo Street Books, 215 North Cayuga Street | Drag Story Hour @ BSB! | Free WORD (updated) | 5 p.m., 8/18 Tuesday | Auburn Public Theater, 8 Exchange St. | Join Auburn Public Theater, Jim Ellis, and Bobbie Panek for an open poetry night at APT. Bring your original poetry, or your favorite poem to recite, to share — or just enjoy the parade of poets!

Kids Lilypad Puppet Theatre | 11 a.m., 8/15 Saturday | Lodi Whittier Library, 8484 S Main St. | Lilypad Puppet Theatre will be joining us at the Lodi Library for the silliest puppet show around! | Free Science Connections: Little Bunny Foo Foos | 2 p.m., 8/16 Sunday | Sciencenter, 601 1st St. | Come to learn all about domestic rabbits from the Tompkins County 4-H Little Bunny Foo Foos club. They will bring rabbits to pet and answer questions and put on a rabbit hopping demonstration.

Notices

Cornell Women’s Soccer vs Monroe University — Scrimmage | 6 p.m., 8/15 Saturday | Berman Field | Cornell Women’s Soccer vs Monroe University — Scrimmage

Solar Eclipse — Sound Bath | 12 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | This inaugural August gathering aligns with the New Moon and Leo solar eclipse, making it an especially potent time to release what no longer serves you.

Rock N Putt | 5 p.m., 8/19 Wednesday | Eldridge Park, Eldridge Park Road | Join us for Rock N Putt as we rock our way through Eldridge Park’s 18 hole

Crochet and Connect | 2 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | Mental Health Association in Tompkins County, 511 W Seneca St. | Come create, connect,

and enjoy the company of others, one stitch at a time. | Free Business After Hours at Timeless Hearing | 4:30 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | Timeless Hearing, 832 Hanshaw Rd. | Join us at Business After Hours! We are excited to invite you to an evening of celebration and connection with our host, Timeless Hearing! | $10.00 - $20.00 Volunteer Day at Groundswell Center | 6 p.m., 8/12 Wednesday | Groundswell Incubator Farm, 100 Rachel Carlson Way | Groundswell Center for Local Food & Farming invites volunteers to help with farm improvement projects at the Incubator Farm while supporting local agriculture and connecting with the community. | Free Ithaca Urban Renewal Agency Neighborhood Investment Committee Mtg | 9 a.m., 8/13 Thursday | Common Council Chambers, 3rd Floor City Hall 108 E Green St. | Golden Hour Yoga & U-Pick (with Lara Green) | 6:30 p.m., 8/13 Thursday | Jenny Creek Flowers, 7048 Durling Road | Breathe, stretch, and unwind with a peaceful yoga session on the flower farm, then linger in the fields or add an optional U-pick to gather your own bouquet to take home. | $20.00 - $35.00 Karaoke with Elephant Sound | 8 p.m., 8/13 Thursday | 23 North Restaurant and Bar, 23 Cinema Dr | Show off your singing chops every Thursday night during “Karaoke Night” at 23 North in Ithaca! Great food, great drinks, great FUN! | Free “Queeraoke” | 8 p.m., 8/14 Friday | The Rhine House, 632 W Seneca St. | Ithaca’s original “Queeraoke” night is back! Come hang, sing and make new friends...cheers, queers!

Yoga with Lindsay | 6 p.m., 8/18 Tuesday | Hopshire Farms & Brewery, 1771 Dryden Rd. | Lindsay Graham teaches classes that focus on healthy skeletal alignment and creative sequences led by the breath, that cultivate a fun and challenging practice.

Pride Night | 5 p.m., 8/19 Wednesday | Danby Food and Drink, 1843 Danby Rd. | Free

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR contin u ed from page 6

Langworthy, you are complicit in dishonest conduct and untruthfulness. WBNG, you misrepresented this situation.” — Rosanne Van Wie, Waverly NY

Support for Congressman Josh Riley and His Staff

“

Over the past 18 months, Congressman Josh Riley has worked tirelessly to represent farmers, working families, seniors, children, and others hurt by the Trump policies codified in the ‘Big, Beautiful Bill.’ Riley is a workhorse who continually tours our district and listens to our concerns.

Do I always agree with him? Of course not, but the perfect should not be the enemy of the good. Congressman Riley is a good, thoughtful, and compassionate man.

Another factor explains why Congressman Riley deserves another term. The dedicated staffers in his district offices devote themselves to solving problems for district residents. Earlier this year, the IRS blocked my income tax return for review. DOGE cuts have made the IRS understaffed and underfunded. When I finally was able to contact a person by phone, she could give me no information and told me to wait for a letter within six months. At wit’s end, I contacted Congressman Riley’s office. Within a month, my case was before an IRS representative who resolved the issue. Within five weeks, I received my return. Lisa Pina, the staff member responsible for solving my issue, was a model of courtesy and competence.

Staff members like Ms. Pina are another reason Josh Riley has more than earned another term as Congressman.” — Ann Sullivan

Rural Suicide Prevention Council Legislation Must Be Signed

“

‘WHY WON’T ANYONE HELP ME, DAD?’ Suicide rates in rural New York are double that of non-rural areas; Governor Hochul must sign the unanimously-passed Rural Suicide Prevention Council legislation Bi-Partisan legislation to establish the Rural Suicide Prevention Council has passed in the State Assembly (A8434) by a vote of 140-0, and in the Senate

Leadership Sends Mixed Messages Regarding Climate Change

“

A recent analysis found that governments continue to pour billions into meat and dairy subsidies despite their outsized role in climate change (Euronews, Feb. 23, 2026) and planet degradation. It’s a striking contradiction.

We’re told to recycle, drive less, and conserve energy—yet public funds still prop up industries that generate significant emissions. That’s not climate leadership; it’s mixed messaging.

Imagine if even a fraction of those subsidies supported plant-based innovation, sustainable farming, or food access programs. The impact could be transformative. With a nutritious alternative to meat, dairy, and eggs readily available, there is no reason to make choices that harm the environment.

Addressing climate change isn’t just about individual choices—it’s about aligning our policies with our priorities.

Right now, they’re clearly out of sync.” — Addison Chantz

DRAG STORY HOUR

SATURDAY, AUGUST 16 FROM 11:00 A.M. TO 12:00 P.M.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 15 AT 7:00 P.M.

The Cherry Arts | Come worship at the altar of Danielle Saint Velvet and Tessa TrueHeart as we honor another trip around the sun with a spectacular showcase of talent and tease.

Dress to impress, embrace your inner star, and prepare for a night that’s truly written in the stars. (Photo: Provided) https://thecherry.org/cherry-events/heavenly-bodies/

Buffalo Street Books | Join our Drag Story Hour with fabulous hosts: Tilia and Coraline. (Photo: Provided) https://buffalostreetbooks.com/ event/2026-08-16/drag-story-hour

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HEAVENLY BODIES: TWO LEO QUEENS BURLESQUE BIRTHDAY BASH

(A3610) by a vote of 60-0. The legislation now awaits Governor Kathy Hochul’s signature. The Rural Suicide Prevention Council would identify barriers to mental health and substance use treatment and prevention services and other policies, practices, resources, services, and potential legislation that aim to reduce death by suicide and suicide attempts and acknowledge the demographic and cultural differences in rural communities.

In 2024, Governor surprisingly vetoed similar legislation, but this year she has the opportunity to rectify that action. The suicide rate in rural New York is nearly double that of non-rural areas. Passing this bill will not only save lives but will lessen the number of individuals who have lost loved ones to suicide and have to live with the pain, sadness, grief, and guilt every day . . . and I assure you, it never goes away! My son, who died by suicide in 2021, asked me many times ‘why won’t anyone help me Dad?’, and I never had an answer for him. It’s now time we find answers to that question!

Call Governor Hochul, (518) 474-8390.

Give your name, location, and encourage her to support and sign Bill A8434, S3610, the creation of the Rural Suicide Prevention Council.” — Joseph Tobia, Corning NY

It h Ac A t I m e s

A15

125 N. Fulton Street Ithaca, NY 14850 (607) 273-4611 • (877) 273-2328 www.alternatives.org

A Loan That Never Gets Smaller Sponsored Content After a divorce and bankruptcy, she needed a reliable car to get to work and was turned down everywhere she tried. When Alternatives Federal Credit Union finally said yes, she put it simply: "Alternatives is the only one that gave me an opportunity."

She's been a member ever since.

Her first no is common. So is what a lot of people do next: go to a dealer who says yes to almost anyone, no questions asked.

Here's what can happen after that yes.

A dealer offering its own financing, sometimes called "buy here, pay here," doesn't need a bank's approval to lend, which is exactly why it can say yes so fast. That speed comes at a price. A Federal Reserve research note published this year found these dealers charge subprime borrowers an average interest rate of 25.4%, compared to 14.6% for a similarly subprime borrower going through a traditional bank or credit union. Same credit, same risk tier, still a ten-point gap in what it costs to borrow.

To keep that rate affordable enough to sign, the loan often gets stretched out over more years. The payment looks

manageable. But for a long stretch of the loan, very little of that payment touches what's actually owed. Most of it is interest, not principal.

This isn't a small corner of the market. Americans now owe $1.69 trillion in auto loans, and subprime delinquencies just hit their highest level in 32 years, according to Fitch Ratings. It also isn't just a big-city problem; it shows up anywhere a car gets sold on a payment plan.

These loans also tend to come with weekly or biweekly payments instead of monthly ones. That's not a convenience.

It's more chances to miss one.

And when a payment gets missed, buy-here-pay-here dealers repossess far more often, and far faster, than traditional lenders, in the most recent data, about 5% of their loan balances were in active repossession at any given time, compared to under half a percent at banks and credit unions.

A missed payment and a repossession don't just cost someone a vehicle. They're some of the most damaging marks a credit report can carry, and they shape what every loan after this one will cost. A borrower who might have handled a fairly priced loan just

fine can get pushed into default by a payment structure built to strain them, then pay for that default for years afterward in worse credit and higher rates. The loan doesn't just reflect risk. For some people, it creates it.

That's the business model. It isn't a knowledge gap on the borrower's side. It's usually a correct bet that a dealer's yes will come faster, and with a lot less scrutiny, than a bank's.

People who've been denied before don't always end up at the dealer with the worse deal by accident. They're avoiding an experience: the paperwork, the credit check, the chance of being told no again. A dealer who says yes on the spot skips all of that. The cost of skipping it usually shows up later, in a balance that won't move.

Alternatives Federal Credit Union is a certified Community Development Financial Institution. Fewer than 1 in 10 credit unions are. In 2025, 84% of its personal and auto loans went to people in low-income households and communities.

It looks at more than a credit score. It exists because most people have never been offered a straightforward yes, and most have never heard the word CDFI at all.

If you already have a car loan,

three questions are worth asking yourself: What's the interest rate on my loan? How many years are left on it? Has my balance actually gone down much, or mostly just the calendar? If any of those catch you off guard, that's not on you. It's on how the loan was built.

Talk to the loan team at Alternatives. They'll look at your loan with you, no pressure, no sales quota, and tell you plainly whether refinancing would help. A lower rate on the same loan can mean thousands of dollars staying with you instead of your lender, without changing the car you drive.

If this isn't your loan, you can still be part of the fix. A strong base of loans from members like you is part of what lets Alternatives keep saying yes to people other lenders turn away. Fewer than 1 in 10 credit unions are certified CDFIs, a certification that comes with a documented commitment to lending in communities that need it most. Bring your next loan here. Your business becomes the reason the next fair loan is possible for someone else.

Alternatives Federal Credit Union | (877) 273-2328 | alternatives.org

This article was sponsored by Alternatives Federal Credit Union

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Prime Times RESOURCES FOR 55+ PROMOTING HAPPY, HEALTHY LIVING

Lifelong Offers New Fall Programming

By Mik ayl a Ro ve nolt

L

ifelong Community Center will release its fall catalog on Aug. 17. The catalog features a variety of activities, groups, classes, and travel for people 50 years and older living in Tompkins County.

Lifelong is a community center for adults 50 and older;” whose mission is to “enhance the lives of older adults in Tompkins County Located at 119 West Court Street, Ithaca, Lifelong has served the county since 1952. In addition to their seasonal offerings, Lifelong is also a provider of free tax preparation services, Medicare counseling, and technology support. They also have satellite locations for Health & Wellness programs in Brooktondale, Lansing, and Trumansburg.

A group daytrip to Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge (Photo: Provided)

Lifelong is a membership based organization with sliding scale membership fees starting at $20 for the full year. There is also a family membership option for couples. Executive Director Liza Burger said that there are also programs open to the public for people to “dip their toe into programming before deciding to become a member.”

“Some folks come and have a cup of coffee in our lounge area between classes,” Burger said. “They might flip through our catalog or newsletters and visit with other people in our space, as they determine what programs might be of interest to them.”

Year round drop-in offerings include Health & Wellness programs such as Tai Chi, yoga, strength training and fitness classes offered in Ithaca and at the satellite locations.

More than 15 social groups and support groups also meet year round.

In addition to year round offerings, Lifelong puts out 3 catalogs every year which include Lifelong Learning classes, which are semester based and fully volunteer lead The fall catalog runs Sept. through Dec. and Burger said there are usually around 50 different offerings so that there is something for everyone. Some offerings featured this fall include: Get Empowered: Embrace Your Mental Wellbeing Skaneateles Lake & Lunch Excursion Opera: Watch, Listen, and Discuss Reintroducing Shakespeare How to Protect Yourself from Your Computer Rightsizing Retirement Days: Essential Tips from Lifelong Retirees Library Trainings and Learning Fall Fling (Event with Radio London), Sept. 11 Line Dancing Evening Live Music with Dark Wine, Oct. 23 Holiday Pop-Up Market, Nov. 14 Info Session with Collette Travel featuring trips to: Ireland, Rhine River cruise, and Greece Island Hopper There are also scholarship funds available for eligible individuals that provides $250 to put towards whatever the recipient chooses; social group, activities, classes, or day trips, to name a few.

“We try to create something for everyone,” Burger said. “As people age there tends to be a possibility to become more socially isolated, and the variety of programs Lifelong provides gives people something from which to choose.”

There is also the Play It Again Theater Troupe that meets each semester to develop and tell stories about their lives around different themes. There are also live music and dance parties at various times throughout the year. Some of the larger events are held in the community room at Library Place next door to Lifelong.

The daytrips offered by Lifelong have pickup at the center and take people around

Lifelong offers a variety of classes, such as mixed media arts. (Photo: Provided)

the fingerlakes for a multitude of different activities and sight seeing. They also offer Bucket List Trips by partnering with Collette Travel to help people plan larger trips both nationally and internationally.

“The Collette tours take a lot of the worry out of travel, as pretty much everything is done for them,” Burger said. “Travelers just then have to show up with their bags ready to go.”

Around 16 different social groups also meet throughout the year. There are men’s groups, Bridge groups, Canasta, to name a few, and there are three different language conversation groups: French, Hungarian, and Spanish.

Some of the support groups offered throughout the year cover topics such as caregiving, chronic pain, and Parkinson’s.

“For each individual, the reason why they come to Lifelong can be very personal,” Burger said. “For some people it is more of a social thing, for others it’s purely educational. Many of our members find a sense of community once they start getting involved in some way at Lifelong.”

One of the cornerstone offerings of Lifelong is their free tax preparation program with services offered at locations in Ithaca, Trumansburg, and Dryden. Each year, Lifelong helps around 1,000 people throughout the county with their tax returns. It is a fully volunteer lead program with around 30 certified volunteer tax preparers .

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The other cornerstone program helps people navigate their Medicare coverage through health insurance counseling for people eligible for Medicare. Lifelong helps people navigate picking a plan and how to save money on healthcare costs, understanding deductibles and copays, and more.

Medicare’s open enrollment period starts Oct. 15 so Lifelong will be offering walk-in clinics for people to get assistance from certified Medicare counselors. Appointments are also available year round.

The fall catalog will be available online at Lifelong beginning Aug. 17, and hard copies of the catalog are mailed to current members and available at Lifelong after that time.

Registration for semester-based classes and some events is required due to space constraints, and people can sign up for classes online, by phone, or in-person. Health and wellness classes, social and support groups are drop-in welcome. See more online at http://www.tclifelong.org/.

“Occasionally we will have people come in who have a parent who is maybe in their 80s and they come in looking for programming for their parent and then they realize that we have programs for people 50 and older,” Burger said. “There’s something for everyone and even if you’re a person who is 50 years old, you may find that there are programs that are very interesting to you.

Don’t rule it out as just for someone who is retired.”

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Arts&Entertainment Arts& &Entertainment Theatre Incognita’s ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’ Keeps Spirits High

A

B y K i r a Wa l t e r

t the Kitchen Theatre, the Theatre Incognita team performs Oscar Wilde’s play “The Importance Of Being Earnest” from Aug. 7 to 16. In 7 p.m. evening showings and 2 p.m. Sunday matinees, the cast portrays the light-hearted laughable tale of men who lie to get what they want in love and are no sooner caught for it. The small but powerful eight-person troupe of actors delivers witty punchlines in Victorian English accents and dress, transporting the audience to the 1800s in three acts. All this was done with an impressively short rehearsal period of three to four weeks.

Starring Daniel Menendez and Casey Silidjian as male leads Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff, respectively, banter about ongoing dishonesty between the pair directs the play’s fun, fast-paced energy. Menendez is terribly relatable as orphaned Jack, constantly trying to get himself out of trouble. Silidjian, meanwhile, plays a clever, conniving counterpart, masquerading as Worthing’s false brother Ernest.

Whereas intense emotional performances are often expressed through pauses or musical numbers, there is never a still or quiet moment through this rendition of Wilde’s writing. Female leads Lindsey Cahoon and Rebecca Rivera take on Gwendolyn Fairfax and Cecily Cardew with similar mood swings and “dramantics.” Having studied at the British American Drama Academy, Cahoon plays a perfectly posh Gwendolyn, a wealthy city girl who juxtaposes her co-actress. Rivera presents an innocent infatuated country ward on her Uncle’s property.

All four stars have acted together in Ithaca Shakespeare Company’s “The

Winter’s Tale,” and their on-stage chemistry is obvious through jokes, jabs, and playful betrayals.

As viewers step backward from present day to the 19th century, they are presented with a world of cigarette cases, fur stoles and cucumber sandwiches. On a small but not confining stage, all the props come out to mock the morality of Victorian aristocrats, with pretend whisky and school books. Costume Designer Gwendolen Fairfax (Lindsey Cahoon) and Cecily Cardew (Rebecca Rivera) discuss engagements in The Importance of Being Earnest. (Photo: Ross Haarstad) Elizabeth Kitney and Stage Manager Elizabeth and Moncrieff, who wish to be chrisnell, the fiercely opinionated mother of Fresquez bring Wilde’s vision to life with tened with the name Ernest. delightful authenticity thanks to costumes. Gwendolyn who denies Jack her daughWith characters after riches, vanter’s hand on account of lacking parentA lot happens in two hours with two ity, and literally false titles, Wilde’s play age. With an extensive repertoire of local intermissions, whether transitioning from is commentary on not only the shallow plays at the Kitchen and Hangar, Veaner urban to rural landscapes, canceling enlaughability of the upper class but the gagements or taking on new names. Based plays a character who makes every final ridiculous whims of love. From Gwendecision for young lovers with absolute in the city, the first act introduces Worthdolyn’s original obsession with the name conviction. ing and Moncrieff, two sincere friends Ernest to Cecily’s pre-chronicled engageSwitching to the country, with transiwith less sincere missions to lead a double ment to a stranger, romance is unfounded tions by Lighting Designer Rosa Maasen, life in the countryside or escape social and nonsensical. Still, famously described rolling hills and lush trees were projected obligations. Moncrieff lies to relatives as a “A Trivial Comedy for Serious People,” about an imaginary friend called Bunbury, onto stage. The following two acts are a serious underlying suggestion about the animated by Miss Prism and Reverend always in poor health and in need of his narrative is that truth typically comes to Chasuble, who innocently court each care. Meanwhile, Worthing is Uncle Jack light in matters of the heart. That being other amidst their young lying comat his out-of-town estate, assuming a new said, no lover suffers too long in flighty afpany. Elizabeth Livesay, who has been identity as Ernest while he goes about a fairs, as both women forgive their suitors in several Theatre Incognita produccity lifestyle. in an instant of comedic absurdity.

Griffin Brahler performs city opulence tions, from “Macbeth” to “The Dodgson Theatre Incognita’s latest production inGirls,” is Cecily’s stern yet accomplished and fine society at the play’s beginning directly encourages its audience to indulge governess. As Cecily also comes onto the with his take on Algernon’s butler Lane love with less doom and gloom, laughing scene in the second act, she is scolded with a silver platter. A sophomore at at human mistakes along the way with and banished to German lessons by Ithaca High School, Brahler has been a slight caution about honesty. A happy Livesay’s character, who would rather acting since his middle school years. He fake headaches to walk with the reverend. ending and surprise identity reveal for the appears again in Acts II and III as Jack’s parentless protagonist is heartwarming Played by director and Theatre Incognita server Merriman and delivers closing this summer amidst the rise in comical founder Ross Haarstad, the reverend is remarks at the finale. Also defining the theater. hilariously sent for twice by Worthing first act is Karen Veaner as Lady BrackA u gu s t

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Arts

Factory Stories & A SouthWorks Mural Walk: Expanding Community Projects M

B y K i r a Wa l t e r

any younger Ithacans know the Old Morse Chain Factory as that abandoned 90 acre lot up on Southill, some graffitied city where not to trespass, miraculously visible from every spot in town. Newer generations were too young to see the site in action before its 2010 closing, but now after 16 years of silence and reconstruction, 2026 has returned the space to action.

With Found In Ithaca’s winter relocation to 620 South Aurora Street, foot traffic has ended the property’s stint as a ghostland.

Now, more is coming with the completion of a SouthWorks mural walk and the release of a book that features the factory’s past.

Written and photographed by Tompkins Cortland Community College professor Harry Littell, the publication of “Factory Stories” was celebrated with a launch at Found on Thursday, Aug. 6. Combining contemporary pictures of factory campus with former employee interviews and portraits, the book is more than a photo anthology, as it dives into the faces behind the development.

“I hope “Factory Stories” will give people an appreciation for a time when Ithaca was more of a manufacturing town,” Littell said, “with many people employed at places like Morse Chain, Ithaca Gun, and National Cash Register. It’s important to pay tribute to the people and industries that built the community we live in.”

Now the SouthWorks Artist in Residence, Littell became involved with the site after years of bringing students to use it as a photography subject. After Community Outreach and Leasing Coordinator Sarah Barden noticed his proclivity for exploring, she gave him his own set of keys. She also advised that Littell connect with local retirees who once worked at that factory, inspiring a dramatic pivot in the book’s direction. “ ‘Factory Stories’ surprised me in that I thought it was going to be a book about the empty factory spaces at SouthWorks, but instead it ended up being very much about the stories of the people who worked at the plant,” Littell explained.

At first, he doubted his interviewing skills but insightful conversations with former Employment Supervisor Larry Siany and Maintenance Operator Tommy Whittaker set him on a detective’s trail of narrative discovery. Now, the volume of photos includes staff standing in their former place of work alongside their personal stories.

“A lot of changes have happened in the last 60 years,” Whittaker said. He looks forward to his sixth decade at the Morse Chain factory this coming October, and his sixth decade as a Brooktondale fireman in a year or two. Whittaker’s impressive roots in the area began when his grandfather moved from England, raising his father on a farm where he now resides.

The former maintenance operator still helps with projects at 620 South Aurora from time to time, also grabbing breakfast with old co-workers every six weeks.

Amongst fellow employees at the book launch was previous foreman Paul Laue, who also earned a book feature with his Morse Chain career that began in 1977. Looking around Found’s furnished interior, he voiced that returning certainly brought back old memories.

“I used to live in Fall Creek for five or six years,” Laue said. “Coming up this way I was trying to tell my son, I used to walk this hill! Can’t do it anymore.”

Now retired in Trumansburg, Laue’s son visited all the way from Portland, Oregon, to witness his father in publication.

He expressed how pleasantly surprised he was to see an entire page dedicated to him.

As “Factory Stories” united its subjects to cherish a shared past, Barden spoke to other projects at SouthWorks, aimed at helping the Ithaca community. Working at SouthWorks since March of 2024, Barden has a special connection to the position as her grandfather got his first job out of high school at Morse Chain. Regarding new openings, she spoke to the site’s history and why inviting change is significant.

“There are folks who used to work here, spent their whole careers here,” Barden said. “It feels very meaningful to be part of the team, ushering it into a new chapter.

It's a big honor to be part of envisioning a new neighborhood.”

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Factory Stories is a collection of experiences from people who have spent time at the now SouthWorks site. (Photo: Provided)

Barden also mentioned a few other initiatives, that with approval from the planning board, will be the SouthWorks team’s next focus. Among them is an empowerment center in the building at Turner’s Place that will serve as a construction workforce incubator and daycare. Ten years of construction on the site will be used as a learning opportunity for people interested in tradework. There is also movement with an affordable housing project, Beacon Communities.

Both ideas wait for approval as Barden and her co-workers also plan a leasing space where startups can grow their manufacturing capabilities. Barden explained that many new companies struggle to find a place for pilot testing with tall ceilings and loading docks.

When asked about the charitable theme across current and incoming projects, Barden’s associate Susan Holland, the site’s grant and partnerships manager, spoke to development at SouthWorks being rooted in the Ithacan attitude. Also on the team since 2024, she described that locals care more about what moves into their space.

“One of the things that’s unique about Ithaca is that principles that our developers have are community based and more organic than what other developers might be,” Holland said. “They’re thinking about sustainability and place making while be-

ing able to include the entire community in that thought.”

Town meetings have been vital to the process of deciding how SouthWorks is utilized. Meanwhile, open houses and mural jams have invited many to explore changes and get a better feel for the space’s potential.

Actively involved in the community paint last October was Audra Linsner, a Finger Lakes muralist out of Aurora, who commutes to Ithaca to expand her work.

Linsner is responsible for the big Found In Ithaca hand, which points those seeking the vintage depot in the right direction.

It took her four to five days to complete using the scissor lift onsite, and now she looks forward to this year’s paint jam.

“We’re planning for this coming year’s mural jam. That’s gonna be up towards the main entryway,” Linsner said. “Last year’s was really spread out, but this year’s is going to be less artisan and more condensed, which I’m excited about in a different way.”

Whether artists prepare for the next allinclusive town paint, or abandoned spaces are photographed empty for the last time, a transitional phase at SouthWorks is coming to fruition.In community acts and artistic endeavors, a peak into the Old Morse Chain Factory is revealing another world of possibilities for Ithaca.

News

Ithaca’s Alex Colket Creates Connection Through KinClub

By Grant Te r w il lige r

C

ity of Ithaca resident and Cornell neuroscience graduate Alex Colket created the KinClub app over the last two years to connect families across the world through learning games, a family chat room and other tools.

“I think one of the things we want to do is make it easier for families to connect across distances,” Colket said. “And stay close through fun shared experiences without actually being in the same household all of the time.”

Colket, the founder and CEO of KinClub, has lived in Ithaca for 25 years, working in the computer science and game design field, according to his bio included in their press kit. Colket said that one of his more well known projects before KinClub was an app called Swidjit, a community hub for local commerce and connection, similar to Nextdoor, but with an emphasis on commerce.

Several of his projects throughout the years have helped inspire KinClub, including an app he created called Play with Your Mind, a brain training platform, and Pathways, an event site that was added into KinClub.

The app is a family business, with Colket’s sister Caroline Stevens Colket serving as the co-founder and the chief financial officer.

Colket discovered the need to make the KinClub app after his personal experiOWNER SETTLES LAWSUIT contin u ed from page 5

to stay away from the family for two years.

Whittaker vandalized David’s car again the following month despite an order of protection. He later used a pellet gun to shoot out a security light on her chicken coop. Whittaker eventually pleaded guilty to second-degree criminal contempt for the shooting and order violation, leading to a new protection order. The harassment continued into the summer of 2024 with Whittaker shouting racial slurs loud enough According to Ithaca Times’ 2024 coverage, David captured Whittaker’s verbal insults on video. However, because Whittaker did not explicitly state David's name in those recordings, authorities

ence with his sister and nephews growing up in Grenada in the Caribbean, and the difficulty of staying connected with them over unsatisfying video calls.

“We'd be on a call and the kids would just lose interest in a couple of minutes and act up so our calls as a family are so much more fun now, having some activities that kids look forward to,” Colket said. “They have games they request. Everyone is laughing and having felt like they had a really neat and full family bonding experience.”

The family chat has twenty five multiplayer games that can be played in the thread. Users can add animated messages, draw on images, and organize images into a scrapbook. There are also multiplayer games available for living rooms and video calls.

There are over 150 learning games and activities, and new additions each week, according to Colket. The app features over 20 creative and management tools for the family, and has parental settings available to help set healthy screen-time limits. For creative kids, there are over fifteen features for making art, music, videos and stories.

Some family tools include a shared calendar, a chore manager, a shared document hub, an AI parenting chatbot, homework helper podcasts for grades four through six and a curated library of parenting content.

“We’re really trying to build an ecosystem of content for families,” Colket said.

“And try to take all the best parts of the

internet, and kind of bake them into one private safe family network.”

Plans include the adventurer plan and

the trailblazer plan. The app is now available in the Apple Store, Google Play Store and on the web.

initially determined the footage lacked sufficient evidence to prove a protection order violation.

The 2024 Ithaca Times report says Whittaker denied the allegations when speaking to the publication, offering his own grievances regarding David’s property.

He expressed frustration over loud music, bright farm lights, and frequent crowds at David’s business, while also raising concerns about pastures and chicken coops close to his property line.

Kirchner said settlement discussions began during mandatory mediation in October 2025, yielding an agreement that omitted civil injunctive relief because David had already relocated and a full stay-away protective order remained active through criminal court.

“In the event that future harassment

occurs, we are confident that it can be addressed through the criminal court system, as appropriate,” Kirchner said.

Although David’s legal team believed the severity of the harassment warranted a higher payout, they agreed to the $100,000 sum to avoid the risk that a larger judgment might prove uncollectible or significantly harder to recover.

“Even if Ms. David prevailed at trial, pursuing a larger award would likely have required protracted litigation,” Kirchner said. “We believe the settlement sum of $100,000 was appropriate, given the circumstances.”

Kirchner noted that the case’s impact reached beyond a single family.

“It disrupted a community space that provided connection to land, education, and cultural healing — resources that are

already harder to access for many communities of color,” Kirchner said. “It was truly inspiring to see community members rally in support of her, whether by appearing at the criminal proceedings against Mr. Whittaker or contributing financially to help cover her relocation expenses. Their solidarity demonstrated a shared commitment to rejecting hatred and supporting those harmed by discrimination.”

Kirchner said the case was unique because it involved neighboring homeowners rather than a landlord and tenant. He explained that getting a court to restrict a neighbor’s actions is harder when both parties own their homes, since judges rarely force homeowners to move. However, he noted that the court’s ruling confirmed the Fair Housing Act still protects all homeowners from racial harassment.

Mockup of KinClub app features. (Photo: Provided)

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