Morning News Brief
Written by Tom Tharp on February 15, 2022
A push from the minority party in the NYS Senate Monday to end the mask mandate in schools will most likely fail. Republican Senators say the state is following political science instead of regular science. They introduced an amendment Monday, February 14th to try to get the school mask mandate lifted. Their effort was not expected to be successful. Governor Huchul has stated that she will look at lifting the school mask mandate at the beginning of March.
New York State has a new office and officer in Kimberly Hill. The reason this new office is important? Hill is the first State Chief Disability Officer. The primary task of the office is to advocate on behalf of people with disabilities and implement laws that prevent discrimination against the community. This new office will also represent the disabilities communities on issues like homecare and nursing facility transition and emergency preparedness and disaster response. This is a prerequisite for what is to come for the state’s disabilities community as Governor Huchul said she plans to invest, with the support of the legislature, a $25 Billion affordable housing plan with thousands of units for supportive housing.
65 year old Warsaw resident Duane Hamill is charged with Grand Larceny, Burglary, Robbery in the 2nd and 3rd, criminal possession of a weapon, and menacing in the 2nd degree after an incident that lead to a chase from town to town. Hamill allegedly stole from a business in Pembroke and was followed by an employee. He confronted the employee and took their keys and a rifle from them and fled through Darien. Wyoming county deputies caught up with him and pursued eventually taking him into custody and handing Hamill over to Genesee County Sheriffs.
The Batavia City Council is joining in with an effort started in Oneida County to petition the State to provide money for updating baseball stadiums across the state. City council President Eugene Jankowski added his name to the letter being sent to Governor Hochul asking for 250 million dollars to be spent on stadiums including Dwyer stadium after an authorizing vote from the council. Jankowsi’s name would be included along names from at least 18 other municipalities. The rationale for the request is that the state is ready to spend over a billion dollars on the new Bill Stadium and over 100 million on the Lake Placid Olympic facility in preparation for the 2023 World University Games.
The New York State Teachers Union is predicting a massive shortage of teachers in the next few years. They say over 87 thousand teachers are preparing to retire in the next 5 years. About 33 percent of all teachers in New York. And there aren’t nearly enough new teachers to replace them. Over the next 10 years 180 thousand new teachers would need to be hired to keep up with student to teacher ratios. Teachers in New York earn higher wages than any other state but because of the education and certification process they earn less than people with similar level of education and training in other professions.
20 Family Dollar stores in western NY have applied for liquor licenses in a bid to expand their sales of alcohol in the area. The first stores started applying in 2020 and 17 have licenses now. The licenses allow to go beer and wine cooler sales.
