ROY, JONES RETAIN LP VILLAGE BOARD SEATS

The incumbents retained their seats on the Lake Placid Village Board Tuesday in the only contested race in the area on village election day.

Republican Peter Roy and Democrat David Jones won the two four-year terms in what was a relatively quiet race.

Roy collected 405 votes and Jones 328.  Republican Andrew Quinn, a former Keene councilman making his first run for office in Lake Placid, had 254 votes.

After the totals were announced last night in the North Elba Town Hall, Roy said he was pleased with the results. “I worked hard on it and David did too,” he said.  “I think the general public appreciates what we do as community leaders.  It shows at the polls.”

Roy said he’s looking forward to tackling a number of important issues the village is facing including union negotiations and finishing work on the wastewater treatment plant and the River Street project.

He said it was good that Quinn ran and made it a contested race, but there were few major issues that came up during the campaign.  “This was kind of a quiet election,” Roy said.

David Jones said he was thrilled to gain the support of the voters for another term. “I’m very lucky,” he said. “I did a nice mailing and I worked the phones today and it paid off.  I want to thank everybody for getting here.  It was a pretty good turnout for a non-mayoral year – almost 600 people voting in a village election and that’s a huge turnout.”

Jones said some of his top priorities include parking and upcoming improvements to the Main Street corridor.  “It’s a very exciting time to be a part of village politics,” he said.

Quinn had said during the race that he would bring a different perspective to the village board.  After the results came in last night, he admitted he could have campaigned a little harder to get his message out.

“I gave them an option,” he said.  “If there happy with the board, that’s fine.  They worked hard.  The people have spoken and that’s fine.”

The only other position on the ballot was a village justice seat. Incumbent Margaret Doran, running unopposed, collected 364 votes.

LP BOND PROPOSAL PASSES ON THIRD TRY

Taxpayers in the Lake Placid Central School District approved a $1.3 million bond proposal Tuesday night.

It was the third time in the past year that district officials asked for voter approval for a series of upgrades to athletic facilities, school buildings and grounds.  The previous two attempts were defeated.

The scaled-back project ok’d by the voters last night included two separate propositions.

The first, totaling $1.3 million, will cover the cost of upgrading athletic fields, repairs to sidewalks and a retaining wall, generator upgrades, and a new athletic building.  It was approved with 612 voters in favor and 304 opposed.

The second proposition is a $660,000 plan for an eight-lane all-weather running track.  It was approved by a count of 523 to 342.

School Board President Dan Nardiello said he was “overjoyed” with the results. “It’s great to see the message we were trying to get out to the voters that this is a worthwhile project,” he said.  “It will be a great asset to the Lake Placid Central school and the community.” 

The first two proposals, which were defeated by the voters in March and November of last year, totaled $3 million and $1.8 million, respectively.

The project approved last night has a total cost of nearly $2 million, but the district will only need to borrow $1.3 million.  The rest will be made up through state aid and contributions from the U.S. Olympic Committee and other donors.

School officials have maintained that the project will not increase the tax rate – the interest on the bond will be paid off annually by state aid.

Nardiello said the individual projects are critical.

Other teams would not compete on the district’s track because it was in such poor condition, he said. “The retaining walls and sidewalks are things that have been deferred for years,” he said.  “Just like anything, the longer we wait the more it will cost.  This was really the time to do it.”

Nardiello said they would have brought the proposals back to the voters for a fourth time if they had been defeated again.

Much of the architectural and design work for the various projects is already done.  Nardiello said they hope to open bids this spring in order to take advantage of the summer building season.

GRANNIS HEARING TO CONTINUE NEXT WEEK

The controversial nomination of Manhattan Assemblyman Alexander “Pete” Grannis as the next commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation came before the Senate Environmental Conservation Committee on Tuesday.

After fielding tough questions for more than an hour, Grannis was told to come back later for a further grilling on his nomination.

The unusual move was necessary, said Republican Carl Marcellino, chairman of the committee, because so many senators had questions and there were just too many other things going on Tuesday to continue the hearing.

Marcellino apologized to Grannis for the delay and said nothing should be read into it as far as the fate of the nomination was concerned.

Some sportsmen's groups are in opposition, claiming the Manhattan liberal is anti-hunting and anti-gun.

And, a leading environmental activist supporting the Grannis nomination, John Sheehan of the Adirondack Council, said he believed the Grannis nomination had “been taken hostage as a bargaining chip” by the Senate's Republican majority, which is currently involved in a heated state budget battle with Spitzer.

Mark Hansen, a spokesman for Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, denied Sheehan's claim.

Grannis sought to deal with the anti-hunting charge immediately at the hearing, noting he had grown up in the Midwest and as a youngster “regularly went hunting.”  “I enjoyed hunting,” he said. “I just don't do it anymore.”

During his testimony on Tuesday, Grannis said increases in hunting and fishing license fees had to be discussed given the declining revenue from them available for the state's Conservation Fund.

Among other things, Grannis said all terrain vehicles “have ripped up thousands and thousands of acres” across New York and present more of an environmental danger than snowmobiles.

Grannis also supports continued acquisition of state land in the Adirondacks but is open to discussing expansion of hamlets within the park.

The Environmental Conservation Committee hearing is expected to resume next Tuesday. The Senate Finance Committee will take up the Grannis appointment today.

TL POLICE CHIEF SAYS OFFICERS, COMMUNITY ARE SAFE

Tupper Lake is a safe place to live and a safe place for local police officers to work.

That’s what Tupper Lake Police Chief Tom Fee told village board members Monday night.

Fee was responding to last week’s assault of Police Sergeant Eric Proulx by 18 year-old Stephen Paul Whitley.  Proulx got in a wrestling match with Whitley and suffered a broken finger while trying to arrest him for a probation violation.

The incident came nearly a year after a group of teenagers assaulted Police Officer Jason Amell outside an underage drinking party.

“It is upsetting that another incident has occurred in which a youth was involved in the assault of a police officer,” Fee said. “It makes it sound like Tupper Lake is a dangerous place to be a police officer or for that matter a citizen.”

But such incidents, Fee said, are the nature of the police business. “It’s an unfortunate business but it happens,” he said. “This department arrests hundreds of people each year – most come peaceably some don’t.”

Fee said it’s true that Tupper Lake does have a drinking and drug problem. “But what town does not,” he said.

The chief said his appeal was to make people, especially the media, aware that such incidents, though inexcusable, do happen. “We’d just like to move on,” he said. 

In other news from its Monday meeting, the village board scheduled two meetings for April, the first to have Village Clerk Mary Casagrain deliver the tentative village budget, the second to hold the first of two required public hearings on the budget.

MCHUGH PROPOSES 60 DAY REPEAL OF FEDERAL GAS TAX

North Country residents have witnessed a steady rise in gasoline prices in recent weeks.  And the trend has caught the attention of Congressman John McHugh.

McHugh, in a news release, said he’s proposing legislation that would immediately repeal the federal excise tax on gasoline for 60-days when prices rise above $2.75 a gallon.

“After a fairly late but brutal winter where New Yorkers’ pocketbooks certainly felt the brunt of high home heating bills, we’re already seeing gas prices surge upwards towards $3-a-gallon,” said McHugh. “We simply must take more aggressive action to address this problem and provide some immediate relief.”

The Gasoline Tax Relief Act would reduce gas prices by more than 18-cents a gallon. After the 60-days, the tax would be reinstated provided the national average price is below $2.75 a gallon.

The bill also requires ongoing price monitoring and if prices climb above $2.75.

Currently the federal excise tax on gas goes into the Highway Trust Fund for repairs to bridges and roads and other highway programs. The revenue lost as result of McHugh’s bill would be replenished by funds in general revenue.

The national average of a gallon of gasoline is currently at $2.56.

JUDGE UPHOLDS CLOSURE OF ROADS TO ATV’S

A state judge has upheld the state Department of Environmental Conservation's 2004 decision to close 54 roads in the Adirondacks to all-terrain vehicles.

State Supreme Court Justice Joseph Teresi rejected the challenge by the Black River Valley Four-Wheeler Club to DEC closing 54 roads on state land in Lewis, St. Lawrence, Herkimer and Oneida counties to ATVs.

Teresi concluded the DEC's decision was “rationally based” and within its authority.

The agency closed the roads after finding ATV riders were damaging forest preserve lands within the Aldrich Pond, Independence River, Black River and Watson's East forest areas. The agency had allowed five of the roads in the western Adirondacks to stay open temporarily and seasonally to ATVs.

Teresi noted that DEC found that trees had been cut down for ATV passage, wet spots along the roads had been turned into ruts, and riders were also avoiding the ruts and going onto adjacent land.

POLICE AND FIRE REPORT

Saranac Lake Police investigated a report of a two-car accident Tuesday on Main Street in front of the Hotel Saranac parking lot.  Police say a 2000 Dodge Stratus, driven by Angela Romeyn of Saranac Lake, was attempting to turn right out of the parking lot around 3:53 p.m.  Her view was partially obstructed by a parked vehicle but Romeyn continued turning onto Main Street, into the path of a 2003 Saturn being operated by Katie E. Seleni of Paul Smiths.  Romeyn complained of neck pain and was transported to the emergency room of Adirondack Medical Center by the Saranac Lake rescue squad.  She was treated and released.  No tickets have been issued but the accident remains under investigation.

Lake Placid Police charged 48 year-old Michael J. McCormack of Milford, Massachusetts with driving while intoxicated at 3:07 a.m. this morning.  Police say McCormack was stopped for vehicle and traffic violations and subsequently arrested for DWI.  He was released on cash bail to appear in court at a later date.

Lake Placid Police charged 52 year-old Charlene A. Borden of Lake Placid with four counts of third-degree forgery.  Police say Borden is accused of signing another person’s name to receipts for payment of services and submitting them to the Adirondack ARC.  She was processed and released to appear in court at a later date.