Don’t know much about the Livable Communities Initiative? Bet you know even less than you think. You can stop looking for that pot of gold at the end of the LCI rainbow. Not only is there no gold. There’s no rainbow, either. “Bill Nojay [former Rochester Genesee Regional Transportation Authority chairman] basically sold […]
Christine Carrie Fien (FORMER)
Posted inNews & Opinion
Home-school advantage: choice or segregation?
The best school for your children may not be the one within walking distance. Instead of being theoretically tied to their neighborhood school, city kindergarteners next school year will have a choice of several schools. The schools available to them depend on which zone they live in. The city school district has been divided […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Check your gut
What is the price for disloyalty in Steve Minarik’s Republican Party? Maybe he has you replaced as local party chair. Maybe he revokes a promised county job offer. Maybe he vows not to support your next bid for higher office. Maybe. “I want to tell you something: 12 years, being […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Culture club
Would it surprise you to hear that the cultural district downtown does not include the Rochester Museum & Science Center, Strong Museum, Memorial Art Gallery, or Geva Theatre? “We’re going to be forming a committee to look at that whole issue, whether it makes sense for us to expand the boundaries more,” says City […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
The disappearing GOP
No incumbents? No problem. People just shaking off the last bits of holiday reverie might be surprised to find that the person representing them in the county legislature is not who they elected to serve. Nearly a third of the 16-member Republican caucus will consist of appointees before too long. The slow leak […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Busting up the ghetto
Crime.
Poverty. Drugs. To talk about the problems facing certain areas in the city of
Rochester in 2004 is to talk about what has been eating steadily away at the
community for years.
Posted inNews & Opinion
Hungry and fighting
It took fencer Felicia Zimmermann a while to recover from a disappointing performance at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta. “I’m like, ‘I suck so bad! I suck!’” she remembers now with a self-deprecating laugh. “I was lost for a long time. I was really upset.” But Zimmermann, who lives in Rush and trains […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
No union at ECH — yet
The Episcopal Church Home and the National Labor Relations Board have reached a settlement over allegations that ECH used unfair labor practices to prevent the home’s 235 employees from unionizing. Employees at ECH initially approached 1199 SEIU Upstate because of dissatisfaction with benefits, staff turnover and shortages, lack of a clear pay scale for […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Roads to nowhere?
Roads, unquestionably, tie a community together. And no more striking example exists of the division between city and county in this community, say Democrats in the county legislature, than the lej’s decision to stop pavement-marking services in the city. “It’s more evidence of the county and the suburbs basically treating the city as a […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Under the big tent
Instead of griping about the property tax increase, maybe Democrats in the Monroe County legislature should send the GOP flowers. By most accounts, the brutal budget process that just finished has given Democrats the upper hand. After swearing up and down that they wouldn’t raise taxes and after running a county executive candidate on […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Saul revisited
Like Saul on the road to Damascus, hard-line Republicans came to accept that they could not cut $42 million out of the county budget, says Republican legislator Ray Santirocco. “They [the cuts] just weren’t there,” he says. “Despite [Republicans’] philosophical orientation, they have to take into account reality, and Bill [Smith, majority leader] is […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
The Empire’s new digs
The future of PaeTec Park and the future of Empire Precision Plastics are indelibly linked. The oft-delayed ground-breaking for Rochester’s soccer stadium will not happen until the parties involved have found a new home for Empire. And, more importantly, until it is decided who is going to pay for the relocation. “We’re working on […]
