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Climate change: extreme farming
This is the second in an occasional series on climate change. So much of farming depends on the weather. Too much rain in the spring can delay crop planting. Cows respond to high temperatures by producing less milk. And cold winters keep crop pests and diseases in check. Weather varies from year to year: a…
NEWS BLOG: Gay marriage a year later
Driving home yesterday evening, I was stopped at a light when two attractive young women crossed the street in front of me. They were probably in their early 20’s, and they were holding hands. When they reached the other side of the street, the blonde leaned into her girlfriend and kissed her. It wasn’t a…
NEWS BLOG: Rochester district’s website gets a new look
The Rochester school district has an unenviable communications challenge The Rochester school district has an unenviable communications challenge. School officials have a slew of audiences, many with different needs and interests. And the district’s website hasn’t been a particularly helpful communications tool. But the website has been given a much needed makeover. The site isn’t…
“WallTherapy” update: Progress as of Monday, July 23
Artist update: Belgian artist ROA is due to arrive today. San Francisco-based artist Siloette will arrive early this week (update to follow). **CLICK HERE for City’s original feature on “Wall/Therapy.** Though England’s Ben Eine had to back out of participation this year, he has told Wall\Therapy organizers that he intends to visit and paint a…
ACTIVISM: Protestors denounce police response to march
A group of protestors say police used aggressive physical force and “chemical weapons” to break up a march, even though, they say, the officers hadn’t asked anyone to disperse. An informal group of protestors – not an Occupy Rochester contingent, as police and some media erroneously reported – held an anti-capitalism march Saturday. The procession…
WallTherapy update: getting started, block party, and Martha Cooper
Wall\Therapy kicked off with a reception for the visiting and local artists on Friday, July 20, at 1975 Gallery’s elegant new spot on Charlotte Street, providing Rochesterians with the opportunity to speak with several of the artists before they began work early Saturday morning. Missing from the reception were ROA and Siloette, who will arrive…
NEWS BLOG: The guns in Aurora
What would compel a 24-year-old to walk into a movie theater armed with four guns and open fire What would compel a 24-year-old to walk into a movie theater armed with four guns and open fire? The suspect in that horror this morning is a college graduate student, so presumably he knew exactly what devastation…
NEWS BLOG: Romney, release your darn tax records
Mitt Romney and his Republican backers are trying to pass his tax-records shell games off as transparency. This is the same party whose members have been passing legislation requiring multiple forms of photo identification to vote, but don’t want us to know the financial history of their candidate. Romney has not broken any laws by…
EDUCATION: Urbanski will wait and see on Malgieri hire
One day after news of Patricia Malgieri’s hire by the Rochester school district leaked out, Rochester Teachers Association President said Malgieri is no friend of public education. Urbanski was reached by phone this afternoon. Malgieri has been hired as chief of staff to Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas. Urbanski said his experiences with the former…
NEWS BLOG: On climate change, media needs to connect the dots
The news stories about drought, record temperatures, wilting crops, and freak storms – seriously, who ever heard of a derecho before the past few weeks – are piling up. The stories raise, or should raise, questions about how these events tie in with climate change, yet many of them don’t. I’m beginning to share the…
POLITICS: Aldersley appointed to Lej
County Legislature President Jeff Adair has appointed Democrat Stephanie Aldersley to a seat that, as of tomorrow, will be vacant. Aldersley takes over for Democrat Vinnie Esposito, who resigned to take a job as deputy regional director with Empire State Development. Aldersley is an Irondequoit Town Board member who previously served in the Legislature for…
NEWS BLOG: Angry Blog part 3- boy scout bigotry
Words fail. A committee studying whether the Boy Scouts of America should let gay children be Scouts and gay and lesbian adults be Scout leaders has wrapped up its work – begun in 2010. And yesterday, it announced its decision. The Scouts will continue to discriminate. No gays and lesbians allowed. The decision puts the…
NEWS BLOG: Angry Blog part 2- Paterno
I’m still angry about the adulation and deference being given to the Penn State hero, the late Joe Paterno I’m still angry about the adulation and deference being given to the PennState hero, the late Joe Paterno. And I’ve sided with critics calling for PennState to remove the big statue to Paterno that stands in…
CONCERT REVIEW: Vans Warped Tour 2012: Yellowcard, Taking Back Sunday, Lostprophets, Polar Bear Club
There are only a few days a year I brave the sun for extended periods of time, and Warped Tour is one of them. It somehow manages to always be the hottest, dustiest, and otherwise most uncomfortable day of the whole summer. Yet there’s a reason that it continues to draw such a crowd, year…
ARTS NEWS: Inaugural Rochester Fringe Festival schedule announced
This morning the organizers of the inaugural First Niagara Rochester Fringe Festival announced the schedule for the new arts & cultural event, which will feature more than 180 performances of 120 shows in 21 venues in downtown Rochester. Shows range from theater to music, visual art to comedy, dance to family-friendly fare, and will take…
NEWS BLOG: Poll may not be best predictor of New York Senate control
The Siena College Research Institute has released the results of a new statewide poll, and 54 percent of the respondents support a Democratic majority in the state Senate. That seems like good news for Democrats, but they’re received similar results before. And it didn’t work out so well. In the July 2010 Siena poll, 34…
NEWS BLOG: Angry Blog part 1- Rochester’s test scores
It’s hard to start your day angry, but that was me this morning. News from several quarters had me in a froth before I could finish breakfast. And so, a blog in three parts: Angry Blog 1: Yesterday this region got yet another release of really bad news: The Rochester School District had the worst…
NEWS BLOG: Son of a litter bug
As I was driving my mother south toward the Pennsylvania border last week to visit her brother, she did something that stunned me. She reached down and grabbed a handful of trash – a paper cup, used tissues, and some candy wrappers – that had gathered at her feet. Then she rolled down the passenger…
Facing facts on violence
“As violence in Rochester increases, the police will try to do their job. But that does not deal with the cause.” Rochester is more than a decade into an epidemic of violence – a specific kind of violence: young black men shooting at, and too often killing, other young black men. Can we talk about…
Feedback 7/18
Send comments to themail@rochester-citynews.com, or post them on our website, rochestercitynewspaper.com, our Facebook page, or our Twitter feed, @roccitynews. Those of fewer than 350 words have a greater chance of being published, we edit selections for publication in print, and we don’t publish comments sent to other media. MCC downtown: Sibley or Kodak? If floor…
The insect and the reptile
Judging by the latest entry in the popular comic-book series, Spider-Man will never run out of enemies (or sequels), as long as his creators mine the rich material of mad scientists, brilliant technology, and unusual human-monster conjugations. After such super-villains as the Green Goblin and Doctor Octopus, in the new movie, “The Amazing Spider-Man,” the…
It takes a Village Gate
The next chapter in the ever-evolving tale of 274 North Goodman Street — better known as Village Gate — is underway, with the recent opening of the airy new space now home to California Rollin’ (it formerly held record store The Bop Shop). Anchored by a sushi bar on one side and a bar of…
In between things
Love is grand. But commitment? That’s kind of terrifying. And it’s not something movies typically dwell on, preferring instead to document the thrill of the chase rather than the complexities of the capture. A smart storyteller, however, understands that few things lend themselves to dramatic conflict better than the shoehorning of two free wills into…
Surf-a-go-go
Over the years I’ve had the pleasure to meet and play with some of my guitar heroes. Some of them are original cats from rock ‘n’ roll’s first wave, like Ike Turner, Ronnie Dawson, Bo Diddley, John Lee Hooker, Chuck Berry, Link Wray, and Friday night’s star attraction at Water Street Music Hall, surf-guitar innovator/godfather/legend…
Passing it down
Rich Thompson will never forget the time when trumpeter Clark Terry’s quintet visited his high school in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. It was his first taste of world-class jazz and he absorbed all he could from the veteran players. “I was blown away,” says Thompson. Two decades later, he was drumming with the Count Basie Orchestra, a…
Dazzleville or bust
I have no idea why Anne Harvey’s hair is so short, but I can guess. This close-cropped, tattooed, 1,200-horsepower — the engine on her old motorcycle — get-on-or-get-out neighborhood warrior is transforming Beechwood, one lot at a time. Hair is for wusses. “I’m a visionary,” she says. “I can’t dance or sing. I can’t act.…
Monroe to lead sustainability effort
A $900,000 state grant will fund the development of a sustainability plan for the Rochester region, and Monroe County officials will lead the effort. The plan is part of the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority’s Cleaner, Greener Communities program. The idea is to get local governments and communities thinking about energy issues…
The Mt. Morris miracle
Mt. Morris is no stranger to hard times. The “Best Town by a Dam Site” was once a thriving community with retail shops, restaurants, and its own movie theater. But by the 1990’s, Mt. Morris, like many small towns in Western New York, was gripped by a slow, steady decline. Main Street had so many…
School 16’s fate unclear
The long-term future of School 16 on Post Avenue will be decided in the context of a comprehensive inventory of the Rochester school district’s facilities. In the short term, however, School 16 will likely close and all students and staff relocated because of what Superintendent Bolgen Vargas says are pressing problems with the building. Those…
Shaw’s syncopated season
America’s characteristic sound is restless and just off the beat, especially in the loose, driving textures of ragtime, jazz, and the blues, shrewdly borrowed by the musical chameleons of Tin Pan Alley. The U.S.A. in the 20th century came to be syncopation’s natural habitat. This summer, though, the Shaw Festival, just over the border in…
These boots were made for talking
The concept could not be simpler: women talking about clothes. Except they’re not really talking about clothes. The items in question — that first training bra, a heinous birthday-gift outfit, the robe worn by a dearly departed mother — are merely touchstones, relatable details to draw the audience into the personal stories of everyday people.…
Urban Action 7/18
This week’s calls to action include the following events and activities. (All are free and open to the public, unless otherwise noted.) The Rochester Police Department and several county and state law enforcement agencies will host a Project T.I.P.S. meeting in the Pulaski Park neighborhood on Friday, July 20. The project begins with door-to-door visits…
