Citizen's Report: April 2025 Corning City Council Meeting
- sterlinglynn26
- 6 days ago
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Citizen’s Report
on
A Meeting of the Corning City Council
April 7, 2025
A
The Council for the City of Corning, New York held its regular meeting at 6:30 p.m. at Council Chambers, Civic Center Plaza, Corning, New York.
All Councilmembers attended the meeting. Counting City of Corning employees, 11 members of the public were in the audience.
Announcements – Cannabis Enforcement
Mayor Boland gave the following remarks, which this reporter reprints here without edits:
“At both the February and March 2025 City Council meetings, Mr. Azarelli spoke to the Council about his concern that unlicensed cannabis retail sales operations within the city have not as yet been permanently shut down. At our last meeting, I assured Mr. Azarelli that the issue is being actively worked on.
While I am not at liberty to be more specific at this time, I can once again assure the public that the City of Corning and Steuben County are actively pursuing putting in place the tools needed to effect full and sustainable enforcement of the law.”
New Business – The Prayer Resolutions
Background: In 2006 the Council adopted a resolution making it mandatory for the Council to invite clergy to give an invocation at every meeting of the City Council. Only a few of the nine members of the Council are asking clergy to attend to give an invocation. When, as often happens, there is no clergy at the meeting, the City Clerk reads a “fallback” prayer that the Council adopted in 1962.
The Council unanimously:
Repealed a resolution adopted by the Council in 1962 requiring a specified prayer be read before each Council meeting.
Adopted a resolution creating a new invocation.
Amended a resolution adopted in 2006 making it permissive, not required, that councilmembers invite a representative of the clergy to offer an invocation before each regular meeting of the Council. If a member of the clergy is not in attendance, the clerk or a designee is to read the new invocation.
The newly adopted invocation reads as follows:
"Let us take this moment to reflect on the purpose that unites us all gathered here - City Council members, visitors and City staff. May we approach our work with open hearts, clear minds, and a shared commitment to the well-being of all in this community. May we listen with respect, speak with integrity, and act with wisdom as we strive to serve the greater good. May our efforts bring solutions that foster unity, hope, and progress for all. Let this meeting be guided by compassion, understanding, and a spirit of service."
New Business – City Parks
Background: According to The Leader of September 22, 2022, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) says environmental cleanup is necessary at Corning's McKinney Park and William Street Park, which includes nearby Hillvue Park, after initial soil sampling showed chemical contaminants alongside ash, brick, and glass materials.
According to the article, when the DEC discovered the contamination, it was unclear who will foot the bill for cleanup.
The Council unanimously:
Authorized a transfer of $50,000 from the contingency fund to the fund for consultants to enable the city to engage in park planning.
The City Manager explained that DEC came to the city to offer remediation of the McKinney, Hillvue, and William Street parks at no cost to the city. In 2025 the DEC will finish its soil characterization survey. In 2026 the DEC will remediate the parks down to two feet. And, if the city has a demonstrable need, documented by an approved park design, DEC will excavate further to implement the design. The DEC will do that at no cost. There is also a possibility that the DEC will provide some hardscape, like cement pads, if the plan calls for them. This means that the city should have a plan in hand to be ready for excavation in 2026.
The $50,000 allocation simply “front loads” the expense of planning for the future of these parks, enabling the city to take full advantage of this DEC offer. The City Manager assured the Council that the park planner will request and incorporate as possible, neighborhood input.
In sum, the city intends to implement the plan in the year following remediation, 2027, resulting in three essentially new parks for its residents.
New Business – Office of the Aging Lease
The Council unanimously:
Authorized the City Manager to execute an agreement with Steuben County for it to continue to lease office space for the Office of the Aging at the Corning Senior Center through December 31, 2029.
The City Manager explained that this resolution extends a favorable lease to Steuben County because the agreement is not about making money but, rather, bringing needed services as close as possible to the city’s senior population. This agreement continues a longstanding partnership with Steuben County where the city provides the physical facility and the county offers a broad range of services through its Office of the Aging.
New Business – Other Business
The Council unanimously:
Authorized a transfer of $15,000 from the contingency fund to the tree maintenance fund.
Other Announcements – Sakura
Mayor Boland announced that, on April 16, from 12 noon to 12:45 p.m. the Corning Rotary Club, the City of Corning, and the Kakegawa Sister City
Committee will sponsor Sakura (“blossoming” in Japanese) at the Kakegawa Grove in Corning’s Dennison Park. The grove, planted in 2023 to honor Corning’s sister city, Kakegawa, Japan, is along the Rotary Cherry Blossom Trail, itself planted in 2021. The event will be informal, and Mayor Boland invited all members of the public to celebrate the trees and the spirit of renewal that they represent.
If the trees are not in bloom, the sponsors will cancel the event on the 16th and may reset it.
Visitors’ Comments
Hilda Lando, one of two Steuben County Legislators representing the City of Corning, was unable to attend the meeting. Ms. Lando sent a written report which this reporter reprints here without edits:
Cornell Cooperative Extension's Veggie Van will be starting soon with 3 farmers selling their vegetables within the county including Corning. It has been a very successful program and has increased from one farmer to 3 in just 3 years. This program has been a model for 3 other counties and Cornell has been doing studies on this model. It is funded by Fidelis, Excellus, Guthrie, Corning Inc, Cornell University, SNAP Ed and Office of the Aging.
Instead of spending money to do a staffing study for the Road Patrol, the County Sheriff's office presented a plan to add additional personnel to provide better coverage across the county. The Legislature will be reviewing this in addition to other options since this proposal would add $700,000/year for 3 years. Legislators agree that something has to be done to provide better coverage.
It was agreed to send a letter to the governor to allow the county to hire officers who were terminated because of the strike to cover several of our vacancies in the jail.
The Public Safety committee agreed to work with the state court system to renovate 4 of the 6 county courtrooms to update the needed technology. Currently there is a 6 month wait list - the county cost will be $60,000/courtroom with the state picking up the $120,000/courtroom.
Land Bank is still looking for properties either donated or purchased to rehab or demolish.
For the first 2 months of the year - there were no fatal overdoses. However, in the first few days of March there were 6. Since this looks like a "spike", I questioned who handles this and it looks like no one really knows. Therefore, there is now an effort to get several groups together to develop a plan on how to handle situations like this. We need to make sure EMS, law enforcement and AMR are accurately reporting overdoses.
The county is finalizing plans to take over the EMS/Ambulance services in Hammondsport and approved hiring 8 full time EMS and 4 full time paramedics personnel to help supplement EMS Services.
The meeting adjourned at 6:54 p.m.
NOTES
The writer of this report has presented items in an order different than that in which they occurred at the meeting.
The writer has, except as specifically noted, amended, or eliminated comments and attribution for them. Unless quotation marks are used, the comments reported are not verbatim.
For brevity, the writer has not included all items on the agenda of the meeting.
Some material has been added by the writer for context or clarity and where it is extensive, is labeled “Background.”.
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