Tuesday, September 7, 2010

2:00 PM & 7:00 PM     Oneida Rotary Club Meeting of August 31, 2010 with Steve Goodfriend

2:23 PM & 7:23 PM     Town of Sullivan Board Meeting of September 1, 2010

3:31 PM & 8:31 PM     CMS and You

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

2:00 PM & 7:00 PM     Oneida Common Council Special Meeting of August 31, 2010

2:05 PM & 7:05 PM     A Ride through the Countryside with John Taibi

2:35 PM & 7:35 PM     A History of Gerrit Smith Miller and his Holstein Herd with Dr. Milton Sernett

Thursday, September 9, 2010

2:00 PM & 7:00 PM     Tomorrow’s World

2:30 PM & 7:30 PM     Heaven Bless the Little Ones with Thom O’Connor

3:00 PM & 8:00 PM     Understanding Reverse Mortgages

(Cazenovia, NY) Best-selling author, editor and radio host Kurt Andersen will discuss the recent financial crisis and its impact on our society at the Cazenovia Forum on Friday, Sept. 10 at 7 p.m. at the Catherine Cummings Theatre, 9 Lincklaen St. in the village. The event is free of charge and no reservations or tickets are required.

The title of Andersen’s lecture, “The Great American Reset: How We Got Here and What Happens Next,” is based on his recent bestselling book “Reset,” which explains why the current economic crisis is actually an historic moment of great opportunity to get ourselves and the nation back on track.

Anderson, who is described as a brilliant analyst and synthesizer of historical and cultural trends, is also the author of novels “Heyday” and “Turn of the Century.”

Heyday was a New York Times bestseller that the The Los Angeles Times called “a major work.”  It was included on several best-books-of-the-year lists, including the New York Public Library’s, and won the Langum Prize as the best American historical novel of 2007. The New York Times called Turn of the Century “wickedly satirical” and “outrageously funny” and one of its Notable Books of the year, while The Wall Street Journal called it a “smart, funny and excruciatingly deft portrait of our age.”

He has founded and/or edited numerous well-known magazines. He co-founded the transformative independent magazine Spy, which was nominated for two National Magazine Awards, and increased its circulation almost tenfold and made it profitable after just three years. He also served as editor-in-chief of New York magazine during the mid-90s, presiding over its editorial reinvigoration and record profitability.

Andersen has also written for film, television and the stage. During the 1990s he was executive producer and head writer of two prime-time specials for NBC, How to Be Famous and Hit List, starring Jerry Seinfeld and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and a creator of three pilots for ABC and NBC.

Andersen graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College, where he was an editor of the Lampoon. He received an honorary doctorate from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2005, and in 2009 was Visionary in Residence at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena.

He is the brother of Cazenovia Town Councilperson Kristi Andersen.

This is the 16th event in the Cazenovia Forum lecture series, which was founded in 2006 to promote discussion and understanding of critical issues facing our nation and the world today. Previous speakers have included best-selling author and military correspondent Tom Ricks, Fox Newschannel Correspondent Jim Angle, pollster John Zogby, architect/author Sarah Susanka and New York state capitol correspondent Susan Arbetter. The Forum’s events are made possible by large and small donations from local residents and foundations.

Further information can be found on the organization’s website at www.cazenoviaforum.com.

I loathe school shopping. My teenage daughter has trouble fitting into the “latest” fashions, which causes friction when shopping. Of course we will never agree on what she “should wear,” and I don’t want to control that completely, but I want to make the experience enjoyable and spend some quality time with her. It seems every year we battle at the stores.

Also, with the economy the way it is money is tight and the family is just unable to spend as much on school clothes and supplies as years past.

Do you have any advice on finding that happy medium when it comes to school shopping?

I get tired of hitting the stores over and over again. I’d like to get it all done in one day. When is a good time to do this?

I’d also like to purchase just the basic necessities. What do you suggest and how do I find the best deals?

Signed,

Can’t keep up with the Jones’

Dear Can’t Keep Up with the Jones’:

School shopping can be quite frustrating, especially on a tight budget. We all want to give our kids the best and all they want. When your budget is tight, it’s important to remember the essentials first. New clothing etc. is not an essential unless your child has outgrown everything. (Remember, too, birthdays, and holidays are a great time to let family members know your kids’ clothing sizes.) If your child goes to school and doesn’t have the essentials for learning, then you’re in trouble as it could reflect in her grade. Plus it’s embarrassing if kids (teens) are given supplies by their teacher, and the kid may feel like a charity case.

You need to sit and have that conversation with your teen that there just isn’t a lot of extra money to play with this year, so there will be essentials bought for school and perhaps instead of four or five new outfits, just one or two. It doesn’t have to be a fight, just a serious heart to heart.

I start often with my daughter (who’s 5) and say, ”Ya know if I could I would buy you everything in the world, but I can’t so here’s the deal…” Then we talk about what she can have, for example she’s now so excited to be getting her new Barbie backpack and lunch bag (essentials).  You can even make those essentials sound good! Say it with love and not too “matter-of-factly.”

Oh goodness!  Where to shop? This may be hard to say considering style, but Walmart usually has it all and at great prices. I wish I could advocate for smaller home owned businesses, but I really don’t know of any who has it all AND are inexpensive. You can also try online for buying clothes. Many stores often have free shipping and great sales at this time of year. The only problem… ya can’t try them on until you receive them, and then returning them isn’t always a fun or easy process. But, it keeps you out of the stores if you hate shopping.  You can always hit the malls too… many stores, one roof! There are also thrift stores to buy clothing from, maybe not a popular choice, but they will have different clothes, new to them, and no one knows where you got them or how much.  I have a friend who does this every year. Her kids don’t know where she got the stuff nor do they care because she chooses fashionable items that look new.

My last thought on this is to sit down with paper and pen and the Sunday paper, snag the fliers for the stores sales, circle what you NEED and prepare a list of necessities. Stick to your list (and your budget), then choose a day and go shopping at those places for those items.  However, there are some us who get things along the way… I am guilty of this. It just doesn’t seem to cost as much when I do this. I have young children, so I haven’t really hit the costly back-to-school items, yet! But instead of blowing $35 to $40 on ONLY school supplies in one shot, I buy as I go along throughout the summer. I’ll pick up the tissues and crayons one day and then the backpack and pencils another day, etc… until all is done! You can do this with clothing too. Tell them they get one new outfit now, then one every pay day throughout September, for example! Set your own parameters here.

And to heck with the Jones Family; they are probably having the same issues too, maybe on a different monetary scale or on a different life issue. The focus is your family! You can only do what you can do. Besides if it wasn’t the Jones family, then it’d be the Brown family or the Clark family or the Smith Family. And if it wasn’t school items and clothing, it may be housing, or vacations, vehicles, or spouses. Be blessed with what you have! The Jones family has their share of problems too.  (I think I answered a question for them in the past too. LOL!)

Live Happy! Stay Healthy!

~Reva

Dear Reva has a degree in teaching and child psychology. Her views do not necessarily reflect the views of staff at M3P Media LLC. To contact Dear Reva, email madnews@m3pmedia.com.

(Hamilton, NY) Summer is here and the time is right for…. road trips.  This has been an American tradition since the beginning of our fascination with automobiles, more than 100 years ago.

The summer vacation is characterized by loading up the car with the family, the pet, tons of luggage, picnic lunches with packed coolers and heading out. Usually for some set destination, but often just going where ever the wind would blow you.

As the gas crunch has altered our driving habits some, the traditional summer road trip still happens, but now we are a bit more circumspect about putting on tons of miles. Although the “staycation” mentality isn’t as much in the forefront as in the past few years, when the gas prices were really high, it is good to try to pick more local destinations that don’t involve as much driving. As great as it is to get out on the open road and just put miles on, there is something to be said for finding a good spot closer to home. There is just as much adventure and relaxation, just not as much of a gas bill when you get back home. Being here in the northeast of the country, there are many destinations within a four or six hour drive – beaches at lakes and the ocean, the mountains, theme parks and even the big cities, if that is what draws you as a vacation spot.

When you get out on the road, there are a few pointers that can help keep that gas bill down and your miles per gallon high. Make sure your vehicle is tuned up and the tires are inflated to the correct pressure. Try to drive at a steady speed. Some cars have those miles per gallon gauges, which tell you exactly what your fuel economy is.  If you don’t have that, just keeping an eye on your tachometer will do basically the same thing.  Just try to keep your rpms (revolutions per minute = the amount of work the engine is doing) constant.  That means trying to keep the foot on the gas pedal smoothly and not varying speed too much. Pushing down and seeing the tachometer kick up into the higher gear means you are using more gas, lowering your miles per gallon; trying to stay at a consistent speed helps too. (Cruise control can be good here, if you don’t mind using it.)

Most people go faster than the allowed speed limit and it may feel uncomfortable to go slower than the traffic flow, but the optimum speed on the highway is between 55 and 60 miles per hour.

Another way you can try to save is by being judicious in your use of the air conditioning.  This is a debate that has been going on for a long time. Better mileage with or without? We could go for days on that one. Since the belt that runs the air conditioner is connected and going around all the time, it would see that it wouldn’t matter. (This could be a good experiment to try when you take your summer trip this year.) This may have been more of a concern with older cars, but cars nowadays are designed so efficiently that using the air conditioning shouldn’t cut into your fuel economy. Maybe around town it is better to go without. On long hauls, besides being more comfortable with the air conditioning on, keeping your windows open will definitely cut your fuel efficiency by creating more wind drag. The car is more aerodynamic with the windows up. (Around town, with slower speeds, this doesn’t come into play.) Whether you use the air conditioning or not both have good and bad points so it may be a moot discussion.

So get out, enjoy the open road, but try to choose a more local destination, if you can.

Jim Bona is a technician at Colgate and also a Trustee of the Village of Hamilton. He can be reached at:  jbona@mail.colgate.edu.

Martha E. Conway

(Hamilton – June 10, 2010) Bruce Selleck, Ph.D., a geologist and member of the faculty of Colgate University, and Supervisor James Goldstein (D,C,I – Lebanon) were the featured speakers at the June 10 presentation of the Hamilton Forum.

The pair has become Madison County’s foremost authorities in the subject of natural gas geology, land leasing, exploration, drilling and impacts in this area.

Selleck gave an overview of the shale formations which contain the gas, their locations and how the gas is extracted from each.

Selleck said New York state consumes a lot of natural gas, but only 4 percent of the demand is produced here. He said that makes the area ideal for gas well development, as it drastically reduces transportation costs to get the goods to market.

“There is a significant demand for energy in this area, Upstate and Central New York,” Selleck said, adding that the location is convenient to major metropolitan areas such as Boston, New York City and others.

According to Selleck, a “retail” value of $5 million worth of natural gas was produced in Lebanon alone in 2008.

Hydrofracking in and of itself is not the concern it has been made out to be, Selleck said. He said it’s what happens at the surface with the water that poses the environmental risk.

“Casings need to be complete, cured and stable,” Selleck said. “It’s where the water comes from and where it goes. [Casings] do fail, and it is those failures that result in environmental damage. That’s the risk we take in developing natural resources – whether it is natural gas, coal or oil. The deep part of the system is not what is a concern.”

Selleck said while people are concerned about the proprietary nature of the chemicals used in hydrofracking, the high salt content is more problematic than the chemicals.

“Yes, those are chemicals you wouldn’t want in your drinking water, but the salinity is 15 times drinkability levels,” Selleck said.

Further, the economy could be fueled by gas well development activity, Selleck said, something Goldstein said he has been advocating for economic development targeting the industry for some time.

Goldstein said natural gas exploration and development comes with risks and rewards. He said the key is to be prepared for the potential impacts to mitigate the negative impacts municipalities can and will face.

Goldstein said in an ideal world, municipalities would know when “landmen” came to town to begin shoring up leases.

“But what happens in reality is that you get a call from someone who says, ‘What do you mean my property is going to be taken by eminent domain?’” Goldstein said.

Goldstein said he had spoken to someone who compared landmen and their leasing tactics to used car salesmen.

“But really, they are worse because there is no Lemon Law for a bad lease,” Goldstein said, explaining that many people signed prematurely. “Don’t sign [right away]. See an attorney. Join a land coalition. There’s no hurry.”

According to Goldstein, the New York State Farm Bureau is the best resource for information on the process and landowner rights.

“They play an enormously helpful role in all this, and they will tell you there’s no such thing as a standard lease,” Goldstein said.

Goldstein said he has been an advocate for more regulation in the industry, especially since municipalities are not permitted to regulate those areas. He also is advocating for a local fuel production tax on natural gas that is based on the actual sale value of the fuel, not the convoluted formula used by the state Office of Real Property Service.

“We have an industrial park, fuel production… this is an opportunity for economic development, something for which I have been an advocate for some time,” Goldstein said, explaining that the recipe existed in Hamilton to support a natural gas auto dealership. “Why couldn’t we do that here?”

Among physical impacts, Goldstein cited seismic testing, which sends sound waves, or sometimes explosives, into the ground to find fractures in the rock formations, which aids exploration, identifying where the gas likely resides and the most appropriate places to drill.

“This information is not made available to landowners, and the gas companies use that data to negotiate the leases with those landowners,” Goldstein said.

Goldstein expressed frustration that the gas exploration and drilling companies use town infrastructure – namely its roads – and has been told over and over again that they could not do anything about them using the road rights-of-way.

He said drill permitting, compulsory integration and well spacing are among the issues municipalities will face as drilling expands around the county.

“If 60 percent of the landowners in an area sign leases, the remaining 40 percent will be compulsorily integrated,” Goldstein said. “They will get no signing bonus and will have no say in [what royalties are paid to them]. So what can and should municipalities do?”

Goldstein read off a list of news stories where negative environmental impacts have occurred around the country, many of them in neighboring Pennsylvania. He said pre- and post-development testing of water wells in the area should be at the top of the list; he said that is only one item in what should become standardized best practices for the industry.

Right now, the industry self-reports on its production and on incidents, Goldstein said.

“This self-regulatory capacity…we are relying on the companies to report to the government, even if there is an incident, the DEC is relying on it,” Goldstein said.

Goldstein said he has been trying to get the county to establish a natural gas advisory committee, as has been done in other counties.

“That’s not been done,” Goldstein said. “We are trying to do something now that is not connected to the county. We are getting pushback for some reason that I won’t speculate on, though I have information that some of our supervisors are meeting with people in the industry privately. Other counties are putting up resolutions on this. Other legislators are doing something…taking action. We’re just sitting here.”

Home sales and mortgage applications now are being impacted by the activity, Goldstein said, with some lenders refusing to grant mortgages on properties where leasing and drilling activity has occurred or is pending.

“I’m not pro- or anti-drilling,” Goldstein said. “My only concern is that constituents people are treated properly, that their environmental and cultural needs are respected. Those who are in agreement [with leasing] have their needs protected, and this process does not do that.”

Martha E. Conway is vice president of M3P Media LLC and managing editor for the Madison County Courier. She can be reached at 315.813.0124 or by emailing martha@m3pmedia.com. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/marthaeconway or become a friend on Facebook at facebook.com/meconway.

The Rotary board of directors acted in response to numerous inquiries from citizens who expressed concern over the disappearance of a popular forum that had served the community well for nearly 10 years.  The last forum two years ago hosted Central New York’s acclaimed academic public affairs panel of the weekly Ivory Tower Half Hour program on WCNY-TV.

The next forums have been scheduled for the early morning of June 10 and Thursday evening of September 2, both at the Colgate Inn.  The first presents a discussion of gas well developments in southeastern Madison County; the second introduces Colgate University’s new president Jeffrey Herbst to the wider community. All forums encourage audience participation.

The Hamilton Forum will not compete with other organizations and established programs but aims to serve other distinct public purposes.

*Offer a platform to national, state and local public officials and arrange for competing presentations by candidates for elected public office

*Introduce new leaders of the community’s major institutions to the general public, such as the new president of Colgate University

*Present symposia on public issues of current community concern, such as the development of gas wells in southeastern Madison County

*Offer a platform to groups and organizations that wish to launch projects benefiting the community and seek public feedback

*Sponsor free presentations on topics of broad public interest by well known visitors to Hamilton and compelling local speakers

The planning group represents local citizens from the business community, not-for-profits such as educational and medical institutions, and local government.  It includes Larry Baker, Joanne Borfitz, David Craine, Jerry Fuller, Carolyn Gowan, RuthAnn Loveless, Tom Lutsic, Charlie Naef and Gwen Parry Werner.

(Wampsville – April 27, 2010) Madison County officials say the Second Circuit Court of Appeals has rendered a decision in the foreclosure cases pending against the Oneida Indian Nation Corporation.

According to Madison County Board of Supervisors Chairman John M. Becker (R,C,I – Sullivan), the decision confirms that taxes are owed by the Oneida Indian Nation on properties purchased that are not part of the original 32 acres territory; however, it also disallows the county from foreclosing on them for back taxes.

“The Oneida Nation is pleased with the Court’s decision,” said Director of Media Relations Mark F. Emery. ” We regret, though, that it took litigation to resolve it when the preferred path is negotiation.  Now that the Court has resolved the issue once and for all , it is time to move forward and put the disputes behind us.”

“This doesn’t come as a surprise, and we have had our contingency plans ready to go,” Becker said.

Return for updates as more details become available Wednesday.

I have always been a little suspicious about the nutrition labels on most food containers and wrappers. I realize that they are just an approximation, but you tend to rely on the information so that you can make good choices about what you eat. I often wonder how accurate those listings are and how they arrive at those numbers. I do know that the fat grams are slightly flexible. If there is less than a gram of fat per serving, the label is allowed to say “zero” grams of fat, which is slightly misleading, especially if you are buying or wanting to eat something that is supposed to be “fat free.”

In the same way, it has recently been found that many appliances that sport the “Energy Star” approval rating, really don’t offer any considerable energy savings at all. How this has come to be is still a mystery, but it seems that just about any company that requested the approval for a device received it. For many years, people have been trying to buy appliances rated for low energy consumption and actually weren’t buying appliances that were low energy users at all. You would think that if a label stated an average year’s usage and the device might save you a certain amount of electricity, it would be a pretty fair indication that the approved device could do so. So as with food labels, these energy star ratings will have to be taken with a grain of salt (sorry for the bad pun).

Bottom line: you have to do your homework yourself and not rely on someone else to do it for you!  If you are going to buy an expensive, high energy consuming device, you have to do your research and ask questions.  Salespeople can be very helpful, but remember that they are trying to make a sale, so they may tell you things that you want to hear so that they can close the deal. As difficult as it is to figure out watts, amps, ohms and all that electrical stuff (can you tell I don’t know much about them?) you really have to do some work to figure out which devices are most green. Even basic comparison of a model’s basic energy stats with other models that are right there in the store would be better than relying on a label that is conveniently stuck to the appliance.

Appliances have been designed over the years to cut down on how much energy they use, but it is best not to take it for granted that they are efficient. Some are better than others. Something as simple as going to the web and doing some comparison shopping or going to the library and reading a recent edition of Consumer Reports before you go shopping would be better than going to the store and doing your research there. Over the lifetime use of an appliance like a refrigerator, which is running continuously, doing your homework will make a huge difference in how much money (and energy) you can save; best not to rely on something as easy as a sticker that might not be as truthful as we have been lead to believe it to be.

Jim Bona is a technician at Colgate University and also a Trustee of the Village of Hamilton. He can be reached at jbona@mail.colgate.edu.

Martha E. Conway

(Brookfield – April 3, 2010) The Brookfield Town Council voted four to one Saturday to postpone acceptance of the results of a recent property revaluation until the 2011 tax roll.

Councilman George Cowen was the lone dissenting vote, saying postponement of the reassessments was only delaying the inevitable. He urged members of the public to go through the grievance process available to them.

Councilman Dewitt Head said he felt a lot of inequities happened in the current revaluation.

“I’m not happy with it,” Head said. “Nobody is. I’ve got a lot of pictures of parcels with structures that have fallen down or burned as much as 20 years ago, and she needs to address those. I’m for postponing it and asking [Assessor Rhonda Weigand] to come back in here and do the job we hired her to do. I don’t think we got our money’s worth.”

Other elected officials involved in the same Coordinated Assessment Program as Brookfield said they don’t know if the vote was at best appropriate or, at worst, illegal.

“They will have to drop out of the CAP, in my opinion,” said Supervisor Russell Cary of Fenner, one of the three other towns in the CAP. “And they may have to refund money to the state because they got paid for going into the CAP.”

Smithfield and Nelson also are in the same CAP.

According to Eaton Supervisor Priscilla Suits, whose town is not involved but who served as assessor for several towns for many years until shortly before her 2007 election to the Madison County Board of Supervisors, the state’s CAP – Coordinated Assessment Program – was an attempt to more consistently assess property and assure all landowners were paying their fair share of property taxes.

“If they are not going along with the requirements of the CAP, they will have to get out of it,” Suits said, explaining that the towns must share an assessor, residential assessment ratio, equalization rate and other factors. “If one opts out [of any of those components], they have to get out of the CAP.”

Cary, Suits and Smithfield Supervisor Richard O. Bargabos all agreed that Brookfield could drop out of the CAP at any time, with appropriate notice to the state; however, all involved believed that 45 days’ notice is required, and the tax rolls become tentative May 1, Suits said.

“I would say that’s a violation of the CAP agreement,” Bargabos said. “Municipalities in the CAP have to give the state 45 days’ notice to withdraw from the CAP; it will be past deadline for the tentative roll. The horse is out of the barn. There’s no backing up that process – all these new values have been entered.”

Bargabos said if a mistake was made, residents should grieve.

“Present your information,” Bargabos said. “If you don’t get the relief you believe you’re entitled to, go to your grievance day.”

After that are the board of assessment review and small claims court, Bargabos said.

According to Brookfield Supervisor John Salka, Saturday’s vote could force an arbitration, though he was unsure whether that arbitration would be among other member towns in the CAP, with the state or with the town’s assessor. He said any move to withdraw from the CAP or change assessors would be left to the discretion of the board.

“I think we may reconsider participating in this CAP after researching what is best for Brookfield,” Salka said. “We have a very large group of residents who are protesting what appears to be an arbitrary and unfair method of assessing property values.”

Salka said he was disappointed that Weigand was unable to attend the meeting, as he felt she would have been better equipped to answer some of the questions posed by residents.

None of the other town supervisors reported the furor seen in Brookfield, though Cary said one phenomenon jumped out at him.

“I was shocked by [the hike in assessment for] vacant land,” Cary said. “I spent 90 minutes on the phone with the state having them explain the spreadsheet they sent out.”

Head said he also did his own research, which included calling assessors in several locales throughout Central New York. He said he felt farm and pastureland tripled in some areas because of high proportions of road frontage and the potential for future development.

“I say if it gets developed, then take another look at it then,” Head said, adding that neighboring municipalities threw out road frontage when calculating recent revaluations.

“That’s why having agriculture values is so important,” Cary agreed.

According to Cary, a CAP arrangement is beneficial for small towns where real estate transactions are few, and one sales anomaly could drive up everyone’s property values. He said there was a year when two such sales occurred, where property sold for much more than it would have been appraised at because there was intrinsic value to the buyer.

“Property values are gauged on sales,” Cary said. “When you have more sales to compare against, you are in a better position to demonstrate true property values than [on an assessment based on a deviant sales spike in a small town with few sales].”

“This is simply delaying the inevitable of doing a reassessment so that fair and equitable assessments may be applied throughout the towns,” Bargabos said. “It’s never going to be perfect, and that’s why the process is in place to get three bites at the apple to get those assessments addressed. It’s been my experience that once people get over their anger and fully understand the process, they are able to take a much more rational approach to grieving their assessments. If something clearly unfair is found, the assessor and the board of assessment review usually take it under consideration.”

Salka said the town is in uncharted territory.

“We are going to need to take it step by step from here,” Salka said. “It seems obvious that the state is willing to work with the town, but they have a different philosophy about how to handle these affairs.”

“I think the policy we’ve had over the years of keeping the equalization rate near 100 percent is a good policy,” Cowen said.

Cowen said his wife owns property in the town of Columbus where the equalization rate was allowed to drop to 40 percent. When revaluations were finally done to bring the equalization rate up to 100 percent, Cowen said his wife’s assessment went up 700 percent.

“It’s not a good policy to let it slide way down,” Cowen said. “It could take us from where we’re shocked this year to super-shocked next year. I think those people who think they have been assessed poorly should do their homework and go through the grievance process. There are good cases to be made. Dewitt has photos of properties assessed with structures that have been gone for years.”

“When this town board agreed to go along with this reval, the decision made from the heart that it would be something that was good for the town,” Salka said. “I see a lot of discontent and would vote to put it on hold, but there will be implications. We could get a letter from the state lowering us again, giving us less [aid] to work with, and it may mean a tax increase come budget time.”

A lower equalization rate also means the town will receive less sales tax revenue from the county, since that money is distributed according to assessed value.

As of press time, Nelson Supervisor Roger Bradstreet was unable to be reached for comment.

The arena will be named the Lewis “Spike” Holmes Western Riding Arena during the event, which is open to the public.

Holmes retired last year after teaching for nearly 20 years at Morrisville State College in the equine science and management, western (stock seat) program.

A resident of Delphi Falls, Holmes grew up surrounded by horses on a family farm. A revered judge in the equine industry for more than 30 years, Holmes holds many judge cards and has earned numerous equine-related accolades.