Afternoon News Brief

At a campaign rally in Perinton, while speaking before the crowd, gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin was grabbed by an attendee who walked up on stage and assaulted. Last night, the man identified as 43-year-old David Jakubonis yelled, “You’re done Lee” and grabbed Zeldin by the arm as they fell to the ground. Zeldin’s aides pulled him away safely and he was not injured in the incident. Afterward, Zeldin said he was more resolved than ever before to make New York State safe again. Jakubonis was charged with attempted assault and released on his own recognizance.

 

 

Rochester Regional Health has made the decision to close the Batavia Urgent Care at the Jerome Medical Center, which will take effective August 1. This is in preparation to offer what they are referring to as re-imagined urgent care services in the Batavia Medical Campus on Oak Orchard Road, opening in the spring of 2023. Every staff member from Batavia Urgent Care is moving into another position within their system while the organization works through the Urgent Care redesign. In the coming days and weeks, patients will receive letters with more information and there will be new signs at the Batavia Urgent Care site about the changes. Primary care offices remain open, and providers aware of the changes ahead are prepared to see any patients with urgent needs.

 

Public Works Director Brett Frank tells us that the second phase of the roof replacement is just the beginning of the revitalization of the City Centre Mall. The vision for the mall is to have the entrances completely redone and once they are made more attractive and the water buckets inside are gone they hope more people will want to come in and more stores will want to set up shop inside. Money for the entrance project is coming from a 1 million dollar downtown revitalization initiative grant.

 

Just hours after the city of Rochester declared a state of emergency, 2 police officers were shot, one of them fatally, on Bauman Street. At around 9:15 last night the officers were conducting a detail and a man approached them and opened fire. Both officers were hit; a woman was also shot and treated at the scene. Officer Sino Seng was shot in the leg; both officers were rushed to nearby hospitals; Officer Anthony Mazurkiewicz, a 29-year veteran of the Rochester Police, was later pronounced dead. Police are asking anyone with information on this case to dial 911 immediately. These shootings happened just hours after Mayor Malik Evans declared a gun violence state of emergency in the city.

 

The Genesee County Chamber of Commerce will be a few dollars short for the new branding initiative the former president had proposed. The county’s Ways and Means Committee voted this week to rescind the $139,500 advance payment due to a material change in the original proposal, which had been requested by Erik Fix. Shortly after, Fix resigned his position. He had initially requested $240,000 from the county to establish a branding initiative that would meet American Rescue Plan Act requirements, which were intended to help businesses and organizations that lost revenues due to the pandemic. County Manager Matt Landers said that due to the change in terms from the chamber, county legislators and he agreed to terminate the contract. Decreasing expenses in the amount of $139,500 will amend the budget, to be offset by a decrease in federal aid in the same amount.

 

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand is calling on federal agencies to investigate airline practices. The New York Democrat wrote a joint letter to the Department of Transportation and Federal Trade Commission to request that they review whether airlines are engaging in unfair or deceptive business practices. Gillibrand says more flights were canceled in June of 2022 in the United States than any other June in previous years, while other customers dealt with severe delays and lost luggage. Some airlines are also accused of scheduling flights they know can’t be staffed.

 

Most of our region saw a beneficial rain on Monday that dropped nearly 1″ of rain in many areas. The rain helped, but our rainfall deficit for the month of July is still nearly 1″ and for the year most of the region is 3-4″ below normal. During a more typical season, that’s about a month’s worth of precipitation.

 

 

 

Garth Brooks is going to be in Orchard Park tomorrow night, and the Erie County Sheriff’s Office says his concert will lead to a traffic pattern change near Highmark Stadium. Beginning at 4:00pm tomorrow, Abbott Road in front of the stadium will be shut down in both directions until after the show is finished. All parking lots at the stadium will open up at 5:00pm and people are asked not to park their vehicles on the side of the road. Seats for the concert are still available and can be purchased through Ticketmaster.

 

With the start of the regular season just a few weeks away, the Buffalo Bills are kicking off training camp this weekend. The team’s first practice is scheduled for Sunday at Saint John Fisher University. All tickets to see the defending AFC East champions up close there have already been claimed, however tickets for a practice at Highmark Stadium on August 5th have been made available. The Bills start their 2022 campaign against the defending Super Bowl champion Los Angeles Rams on September 8th.

 

The Elmira Pioneers beat up on their host, the Batavia Muckdogs last night…the final score was 13-5. Batavia is now 25-12, still in first place in the West Division, with the Utica Blue Sox nipping at their heels. The Muckdogs are off to Auburn for a game tonight against the DoubleDays; and then they’re back home for the weekend. Tomorrow they host the Tarp Skunks starting at 7:00 and then on Sunday, it’s a 4:00 start time against the Niagara Power.

 

Lotto players will be lining up to take their shot at winning two big jackpots that are going to be up for grabs over the next couple of days. The prize for whoever picks all the winning Mega Millions numbers ahead of tonight’s drawing will be at least $660,000,000. Meanwhile, tomorrow night’s Powerball jackpot is sitting at $119,000,000. The cost of a ticket for each game is two-dollars. The Mega Millions and Powerball drawings will both be streamed live online. Please play responsibly.