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Earlier today, Chemung County Treasurer Jennifer Furman announced that the county currently has a General Fund surplus of $14.7 million for 2021, as well as favorable results across all other governmental funds combined. Furman says the two biggest drivers of the 2021 General Fund surplus are $8.7 million in favorable gross sales tax revenue versus budgeted expectations, and approximately $7.7 million in combined favorable payroll and employee benefit costs, including $3.5 million in health insurance. The County’s 2021 sales tax results are in line with statewide sales tax results for 2021 and the inflationary economy, while the payroll and benefit savings are tied to vacancies and targeted management efforts to control these costs. In the last decade, the largest General Fund surplus prior to 2021 was $6.8 million in 2011. Also of note, Chemung County spent less in the General Fund in 2021 than it has since 2015, spending $158.6 million in 2021 as compared to spending in excess of $160 million in each year from 2016 to 2020. According to Furman this level of fund balance puts Chemung County in very solid financial position, with improved liquidity and cash flow positions, and it also affords sufficient excess fund balance to endure the impact of future economic uncertainties. In addition, Chemung County also operates several Enterprise Funds, including the Chemung County Nursing Facility and the Elmira Corning Regional Airport. Unlike the governmental funds, Furman says that the Enterprise funds follow full accrual accounting and are operated and financed in a manner similar to private business where the goods and services provided are intended to be supported via user fees and charges rather than taxes. For the Nursing Facility, the county expects to report a surplus of $1.2 million dollars for 2021, while a deficit of $2.2 million is expected for the Airport. The Airport has over $100 million invested in capital assets that are being depreciated over time, so a $5.3 million-dollar annual depreciation expense is the variable that causes the Airport deficit in the financial statements. Without deprecation and other full accrual adjustments, the airport essentially ran a breakeven operation in 2021. The Nursing Facility also benefited in 2021 from several large favorable liability adjustments, including for pension and other post-employment benefits, as well as a substantial Medicaid rate adjustment settlement from prior years. Chemung County Executive Christopher Moss released a statement applauding the "tremendous job" done at the County Treasurer's Office as well as by other county department heads. "I would like to thank Jennifer Furman and her staff, as well as Deputy County Executive, David Sheen, Director of Budget & Research, Steven Hoover, our department heads; employees, County-wide elected officials, (District Attorney, Sheriff, County Clerk), for all of their efforts in realizing these year-to-year favorable financial results," Moss said. "Just imagine if the County Legislature would get on board, what we could achieve." Moss added that he feels some County Legislators have been "missing in action", and only now stepping forward to take credit for the county's financial situation. "As this is an election year for the entire Legislature, many Legislators are quick to attempt to take credit for cost saving initiatives, day-to-day operations, as well as other County related functions that they have had little or nothing to do with," he wrote. "Several of these Legislators have resurrected social media platforms simply to politicize several of the goals that they played no role in achieving. It’s important to remember that the majority of the Legislators were missing in action for almost two years due to the pandemic and now appear front and center asking for your vote. In a little over two months, the residents of Chemung County will have the opportunity to elect new Legislative representation." Moss encourages voters to "...do your homework" prior to voting in the upcoming elections.

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I’ve studied stadium financing for over two decades – and the new Bills stadium is one of the worst deals for taxpayers I’ve ever seen Buffalo Bills owners Kim and Terry Pegula received a sweetheart deal from the state to finance their new stadium. Brett Carlsen/Getty Images Victor Matheson, College of the Holy Cross After New York lawmakers blew past the deadline to approve the state budget, they finally came to an agreement on April 9, 2022, that included a US$850 million subsidy for a new stadium in Buffalo for the NFL’s Bills. As a sports economist who has studied stadium deals for over two decades, I am not exaggerating when I write that the New York Legislature has managed to craft one of the worst stadium deals in recent memory – a remarkable feat considering the high bar set by other misguided state and local governments across the country. Study after study has shown that stadiums are terrible public investments. The taxpayers financing them rarely want to pay for them. So why are governments willing to subsidize them? A return to the bad old days There were many things to dislike about the Bills stadium project. At $850 million, it is the largest taxpayer handout for a new stadium in U.S. history even before additional subsidies such as annual maintenance costs, property tax exemptions and tax exemptions for municipal bond interest are considered. These factors could easily drive the total government price tag well over $1 billion. With taxpayers footing over 60% of the $1.4 billion price tag, it also runs counter to the trend of the past decade toward lower levels of public funding for stadium construction. State and local governments on average had covered roughly two-thirds of stadium construction costs during the first wave of the modern stadium boom that began in 1991. During the Great Recession, however, government leaders found it politically unpalatable to hand over hundreds of millions of dollars to billionaire owners as they were laying off teachers and firefighters. Over the past decade, my ongoing research has shown that public subsidies have fallen to only one-third of building costs, on average. In fact, the most recent Super Bowl was played in the entirely privately financed SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles. The Bills deal evokes the bad old days. Stadium subsidies in general are terrible public policy, and this arrangement is no exception. The Bills and their owners, Terry and Kim Pegula, don’t need a handout. With a net worth of $5.8 billion, Terry Pegula ranks as the ninth-richest owner in the NFL. The generous revenue-sharing structure of the NFL means that even playing in one of the league’s smallest markets, the Bills have earned over $300 million in operating income since the Pegulas purchased the team for $1.4 billion just seven years ago. And since then, the value of the Bills has risen by another $900 million. The Pegulas have earned enough on their investment in just seven years to pay for the entirety of a new stadium on their own. But the only thing better for a team owner than a new stadium is a new stadium that someone else pays for. Indeed, the new stadium is likely to further drive up the value of the Bills far more than the $350 million the Pegulas are contributing to the stadium’s construction costs. Stadiums make poor neighbors These taxpayer-funded deals are often pitched as an investment in the local economy, but two decades of academic research on the topic have conclusively shown that stadiums and franchises have little or no impact on local economies. The Bills are not likely to be an exception. For one, most of the customers at a sports venue are residents of the metro area who would simply spend money elsewhere in the local economy in the absence of the team. Second, stadiums often make poor neighbors. NFL venues, like the Bills’ current home, Highmark Stadium, are huge facilities that are rarely used: The Bills play eight home games each year in the regular season. This creates little incentive for investing in the surrounding neighborhoods. The Buffalo Bills’ current home, Highmark Stadium, sits perched upon an island of concrete. Claus Andersen/Getty Images And don’t think that NFL stadiums typically host a multitude of other events. Over its 50 years of existence, aside from a pair of annual high school football games and a few miscellaneous competitions, Highmark Stadium has hosted a grand total of 30 major concerts, three college football games and two large hockey games. And Buffalo’s venue is not out of the ordinary for any large, outdoor stadium. Rather than creating a dense area of housing, retail establishments and restaurants, Highmark Stadium instead sits alone as an island of concrete in a sea of parking lots. The threat of relocation The stadium project is deeply unpopular, with one survey finding that 55% of New Yorkers are opposed to the plan, versus only 22% in favor of it. So why did it get included in the state budget? For one, stadiums are a perfect example of the classic special-interest problem. For a handful of passionate fans in Buffalo, a new stadium may determine which candidate gets their vote. But for the rest of the state, a small increase in their tax burden is unwelcome but not problematic enough to compel a voter to switch sides. Teams have also gotten smart about minimizing transparency, which is bad for public policy but good for team owners. The Bills stadium proposal was added to the state budget and dropped on unsuspecting taxpayers just days before a final vote was scheduled in the Legislature. With such a short timeline, it was impossible for lawmakers to fully analyze the issue, and there was little time for public interest groups to mobilize against the handouts. The Pegulas were essentially able to extort New York taxpayers by threatening to relocate the team if they didn’t pay up. Buffalo is only the 49th-largest metro area in the U.S. At least half a dozen cities across the U.S. without NFL franchises are both richer and at least twice as populous, including San Diego, St. Louis, Portland and Austin, not to mention the possibility of a franchise in London. With their current lease expiring in 2023, the team had already indicated that the 2022 season could have been its last in Buffalo. [Like what you’ve read? Want more? Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter.] This threat was a slap in the face of loyal Bills fans who have supported the team for over 60 years through subzero temperatures, lake-effect snow, four straight Super Bowl losses in the 1990s and more losing seasons than winning ones. The NFL has long kept the number of teams lower than the number of cities that could profitably support a franchise. So as long as owners are willing to use the threat of relocation, I don’t believe any city’s fans – and any state’s taxpayers – are safe. Victor Matheson, Professor of Economics and Accounting, College of the Holy Cross This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

by Abigail Kramer, THE CITY Mental health programs for children and adolescents will get a major infusion of funds in New York state’s new $220 billion budget, which passed Saturday after contentious negotiations over criminal justice issues. Legislators approved significant reimbursement rate increases for community-based mental health programs, as well as bonuses for frontline workers. The budget also includes $10 million to address staffing and capacity shortages at state-run psychiatric hospitals, though it does not earmark funds to reopen beds that were shut down under a “Transformation Plan” rolled out by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo. A measure proposed by the state Senate that would have committed New York to restore 200 state-run beds died in budget negotiations. As THE CITY and ProPublica reported in March, New York has closed nearly a third of state-run psychiatric hospital beds for kids since 2014. Children in mental health crisis sometimes wait months for admission to the remaining beds, our investigation found. “Governor Hochul has made addressing mental health issues a major priority for her administration,” wrote Jim Urso, a spokesperson for the governor, in an emailed statement. “With this level of meaningful and targeted investment, we can get those struggling with mental health issues the help they need.” Some lawmakers say the investments do not go far enough. "Kids are languishing in emergency rooms or in acute care hospitals, waiting for the state beds," said Assemblymember Aileen Gunther, who chairs the state Assembly's mental health committee. “We were flush with money this year,” Gunther continued. “We spent it on ‘Let’s give some money to the Buffalo Bills stadium before we make sure that every child has access to mental health care.’” In all, the new state budget for the fiscal year through March 31, 2023, allocates $4.7 billion in operating funds to the state Office of Mental Health — a bump of nearly $800 million from the previous fiscal year. Funding will go up for a wide range of programs that serve children and adolescents, including residential treatment programs, crisis intervention teams for kids experiencing mental health emergencies, programs that bring mental health care into kids’ homes and a statewide initiative to integrate mental health providers into pediatricians’ offices. The new money is intended to fill deep holes. In February, Gov. Kathy Hochul echoed what mental health care providers and advocates have contended for years: “For too long our mental health care system suffered from disinvestment,” she said. As a result, mental health programs face chronic staff shortages, and children often sit on long waitlists for basic treatment — a problem that started before the COVID-19 pandemic but only grew worse as demand for kids’ mental health care spiked, our investigation found. In a major shift, the budget makes hundreds of thousands of kids newly eligible for services like in-home therapy and planned respite care. These programs have historically been available only to low-income children on Medicaid, but will now be expanded to the nearly 390,000 kids on Child Health Plus, which covers children and adolescents whose family incomes are too high for Medicaid or who aren’t eligible for Medicaid because of their immigration status. In theory, the expansion of eligibility is a big win for kids, said Alice Bufkin, the associate executive director for policy and advocacy at the advocacy group Citizens’ Committee for Children of New York. But nonprofit mental health providers have struggled to serve the children who were already eligible, and they’ll need a lot more financial help to hire staff and serve additional kids, Bufkin said. “We are at such a deficit in terms of capacity after years of underinvestment in the mental health system. We absolutely want to work with state leaders to build on these new investments and to recognize that there is a lot of work to be done to make sure kids can actually access the services they need,” Bufkin said. “We’re on Life Support, and We Need to Be Resuscitated” Like other health care providers, mental health programs in New York have faced critical shortages of staff during the pandemic. As THE CITY and ProPublicareported, state-run psychiatric hospitals are so short on nurses and social workers that many beds sit empty for months, even as acutely ill kids wait to get in. Meanwhile, outpatient and community-based mental health programs — which struggled to stay fully staffed even before the pandemic — have seen an exodus of employees in the past two years. “We’re on life support, and we need to be resuscitated,” said Harvey Rosenthal, the CEO of the New York Association of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services, at a New York State Assembly hearing on the mental health workforce in November. That’s in large part because public and nonprofit providers can’t pay competitive salaries to clinical and other frontline staff, providers say. For many positions, community-based mental health organizations say they’re competing for employees with — and losing out to — fast food restaurants and retail outlets. The new state budget attempts to stanch the bleeding, in part by doling out one-time bonuses to frontline health care workers, including mental health providers. Hochul proposed these spending measures as part of herplan to increase the size of the state’s health care workforce by 20% over five years. “So to stop the hemorrhaging of health care workers,” Hochul said in her budget deal announcement Thursday, state officials need to stop talking about how “we owe them a debt of gratitude and pay them some of that debt. That means dedicating in this budget $1.2 billion for frontline health care worker bonuses.” The budget also includes a measure, long sought by mental health agencies and advocates, that will provide a 5.4% cost-of-living adjustment in payments to service-providing agencies licensed by the state, including mental health and addiction programs. Under New York law, agencies that provide such services under contract with the state are supposed to receive a COLA every year, tied to inflation. However, the state budget has deferred the COLA nearly every year since the law was enacted in 2006 — a fact that has infuriated mental health advocates. “For every year of his tenure, former Governor Cuomo robbed State-contracted human services workers of their mandated statutory COLA, depriving these workers of over $700 million in raises, and balancing the budget on the backs of low-wage workers and nonprofit community organizations,” the Human Services Council, which represents dozens of New York City nonprofits, wrote in January. In response to a request for comment from Cuomo, Rich Azzopardi, a spokesperson for the former governor, sent the following statement: “Every budget is defined by the revenue you have and — if you intend to be fiscally responsible — reasonable growth that can account for future economic downturns and avoid fiscal cliffs. We never had bags of money from the federal government that enabled billions upon billions in new spending in an election year budget. I wonder what will happen once the Washington gravy train dries up?” In her January budget proposal, Hochul said that the 5.4% COLA, which is primarily intended for employee recruitment and retention, would provide “immediate fiscal relief” to mental health providers, “enabling them to offer more competitive wages to their staff.” Advocates say that the COLA and workforce bonuses are a great start, but it remains to be seen how big a dent they will make in the workforce crisis. “I know of an agency that has 270 job openings,” said Andrea Smyth, the president of the New York State Coalition for Children’s Behavior Health. “Right now, they post them and they get no one to apply. Does this amount of money get 270 people to apply — or does it get 15? That’s undetermined.” Smyth added, “That said, this is more than we’ve gotten in decades.” Some of the funding increases in the budget were made possible by an influx of federal COVID-19 relief money. An additional $111 million came from a financial maneuver that advocates say Cuomo could have made use of but didn’t. Under its Medicaid contracts, the state can claw back money from managed care insurance plans that fail to meet minimum spending requirements on mental health and addiction treatment for Medicaid recipients. In this year’s budget, the state will use two years’ worth of recouped money to fund increased reimbursement rates for mental health and addiction treatment clinics. Advocates for community-based mental health providers hope the recouped funds signal an intention by the Hochul administration to increase oversight of managed care plans that participate in New York’s Medicaid program. “The state needs to step up surveillance, monitoring and enforcement of all the provisions that are in place to protect Medicaid beneficiaries and to guarantee access to care,” said Lauri Cole, executive director of the New York State Council for Community Behavioral Healthcare, which represents more than 100 mental health agencies. “It’s about oversight of benefits that save people’s lives,” Cole added. “There should be nothing complicated about that.”

Elmira Police arrested an Elmira man after a domestic incident. On Wednesday, April 13, 2022, a woman went to the Elmira Police Department to report that she had been involved in a domestic incident at her home the day before. The woman told police that during this incident she was attacked and threatened with a firearm. On Wednesday, she was repeatedly threatened with further harm. The woman also advised police there was more than one weapon in the residence. The suspect was identified as 44 year old Timothy Cameron from Elmira. Officers responded to the residence on Bonview St. to take Cameron into custody. When Cameron answered the door, he told the officers to leave and then retreated back inside of the residence. Due to the knowledge of firearms being inside of the residence, and threats to use them, officers retreated and a perimeter was established around the residence. Additional resources responded to the scene to assist. A dialog was established and a short time later Cameron exited the residence and was taken into custody. A search warrant was obtained for the residence. A shotgun and two .22 rifles were recovered from within the residence. As a result of this investigation Timothy Cameron has been charged with Criminal Possession of a Weapon 3rd, a class D felony offense. He was also charged with Menacing 2nd and Criminal Obstruction of Breathing, both class A misdemeanors. Cameron is being held in the Elmira City Lockup pending arraignment on Thursday.

EPD has released more information about the April 12 incident:

On April 12 at approximately 9:30 pm Elmira Police responded to a report of shots fired on West Hudson Street.

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In an effort to increase user interaction, we've made some changes to what content is available to the public and what content is only for those who join the site and participate. As a result, the following sections are now restricted to registered members only: Reviews Random Chat Election Day 2022 - Chemung County Also, with the exception of "Nation and World", the Photo Galleries section will now be restricted to registered members as well. This is a measure against content created by this site being spread around on social media without proper attribution. ( It's actually copyright infringement but at this time we will not be pursuing the matter. ) Additionally, due to the high amount of SPAM emails, the "Contact Us" feature at the bottom of the page will no longer be shown to guest users. If a guest user wishes to contact this site, you can do so by emailing twintiersliving@gmail.com

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An interesting take on the matter: Will Smith’s slap shows ‘honor culture’ is alive and well A culture of honor is more likely to develop in areas where law enforcement is inconsistent or nonexistent. 20th Century Fox/Hulton Archive/Getty Images H. Colleen Sinclair, Mississippi State University After witnessing the “slap heard around the world” during the 2022 Oscars, I wasn’t surprised when the internet split into two camps: #TeamWill and #TeamChris. As a social psychologist who studies aggression, I also wasn’t surprised to see support for Will Smith – who slapped comedian Chris Rock after Rock joked about Smith’s wife’s alopecia – involve similar justifications: namely that the actor was “doing what needed to be done” to protect his wife, and that doing so made him “a real man.” These defenses contain elements of what social scientists call a “culture of honor,” which is prevalent in certain regions, ethnic groups and subcultures around the world. How cultures of honor flourish Cultures of honor require men to aggressively defend their reputations against insults or threats, and this imperative extends to protecting their spouses, children and property. To not lash out at slights makes one less of a man. This concept can be confused with “toxic masculinity” – which is a brand of anti-feminist hypermasculinity that promotes independence, emotional blunting and aggression to establish dominance over men and women. In fact, recent research finds the two concepts are distinct, with a culture of honor more closely tied to benevolent attitudes toward women and notions of chivalry. However, these two concepts can overlap, particularly in more traditional cultures. Researchers argue that cultures of honor flourished in communities where law enforcement was inconsistent or nonexistent – such as the 19th-century American frontier and herding communities that lived in Africa and Latin America. This work has also been used to understand violence in certain inner-city communities where the police are less trusted. In these places, a man’s reputation becomes his first line of defense. If it becomes known that slights against him or his family won’t go unpunished, it makes transgressors less likely to push their luck. When some see violence as acceptable Research on this topic can be traced to the work of social psychologists Richard Nisbett and Dov Cohen, who sought to explain why homicide rates were significantly higher in the U.S. South and West than in the rest of the country. Comparing crime statistics, Nisbett was able to show that the difference in homicide rates was due to the South and West having a higher rate of homicides tied to arguments. The country’s different regions were similarly intolerant of violence, more generally, on questionnaires. However, respondents in the South were more likely to say violence was justified when a man – or his family – was insulted. In subsequent studies, Cohen and Nisbett randomly sent one of two job applications to businesses throughout the U.S. Accompanying each application was a cover letter in which the applicant sought to explain a felony conviction, chalking it up to a misspent youth. In half of the letters, that felony conviction was a car theft. In the other half, it was manslaughter spurred by an insult. When the employer was from states where a culture of honor is more predominant, the researchers found that the hypothetical murderer actually received more responses – and with a far more understanding tone – than the car thief. In the same study, Cohen and Nisbett recruited college journalists from around the country and randomly assigned them to write up a story about either an insult-related murder or a felony-related murder. Researchers found that the journalists cast the insult-related murder in a more favorable light when the journalist was writing for a paper in a state with a culture of honor – places like Texas, Alabama and Montana. In other experiments, researchers have been able to show that after being insulted, people who adhere to an honor ideology register higher levels of testosterone and cortisol – two hormones tied to aggression and stress. They were also less willing to forgive a transgressor and had a tougher time calming down after being slighted. Finally, in questionnaires they were more likely to exhibit anger and shame when recalling a recent insult. People who adhere to an honor ideology are more likely to justify violence as a response to insults directed at themselves or family members. Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images No remorse In the real world, places that adhere to the honor belief system are more likely to have school shootings. In these same states, convicted murderers were less likely to express remorse ahead of their executions. It’s important, however, to exercise caution around making definitive conclusions about statistically rare events like school shootings and executions. After Will Smith accepted his Best Actor Oscar for his role in “King Richard,” he praised Richard Williams for doing everything he could to protect his family. To many viewers, Smith was summoning virtues like honor and chivalry to justify his actions earlier in the night. Off the Oscars stage, you can also see a culture of honor being used to explain the Ukrainians’ dogged defense of their country against a more powerful Russian invader, with Ukrainians praised for honorably defending home and hearth. Certainly, cultural differences aren’t the only factor influencing the way people responded to the slap. For instance, you’d expect fellow comedians to defend Chris Rock out of solidarity. And racist reactions were bound to emerge. But while many people were quick to declare that “violence is never the answer,” for others violence can, in fact, be the answer – and that’s due, in part, to the fact that honor culture is alive and well. H. Colleen Sinclair, Associate Professor of Social Psychology, Mississippi State University This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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Yesterday, Governor Kathy Hochul announced an agreement to address key priorities in the Fiscal Year 2023 New York State Budget. This bold and fiscally responsible plan makes historic investments in communities across the State that will bring relief to New Yorkers recovering from the pandemic and launch New York's economic comeback. The State's reserves in this plan will increase to a record level of 15 percent of State Operating Funds spending by FY 2025, as proposed by the Governor in her Executive Budget. "As we make our comeback from the COVID-19 pandemic we are embracing this once-in-a-generation opportunity to usher in a whole new era for New York, with a bold budget that brings much-needed economic relief to New Yorkers and looks to the future with historic investments in education, health care and infrastructure," Governor Hochul said. "This agreement brings us closer to an enacted budget and makes good on our promise of a stronger, safer, more inclusive and more prosperous New York State. I thank Majority Leader Stewart-Cousins and Speaker Heastie for this collaborative process. I look forward to continuing to work with my colleagues in state government to enact a budget that delivers for all New Yorkers." The budget will include major priorities that the governor's office says will "deliver for New Yorkers", including: Tax relief for middle-class New Yorkers and small businesses; Suspending fuel taxes to tackle the high cost of gasoline which has surged in recent months as a result of the war in Ukraine; Helping to support small businesses most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, like restaurants, by authorizing the sale of to-go alcoholic beverages; Billions of dollars to rebuild the health care workforce, support home care workers, and build the health care system of the future; A historic investment in education to strengthen our higher education institutions and support our teachers and school employees; Increasing funding for and access to child care; A historic investment in pandemic recovery funding; A comprehensive housing plan to make living in New York more affordable; A record-level investment in a five-year transportation infrastructure plan; A record investment in clean energy infrastructure, climate resiliency and preservation; Improving ethics oversight and restoring trust in state government by replacing JCOPE with a new Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government; and Moving forward toward a safer, more just New York by cracking down on the trafficking of illegal guns, stopping the cycle of repeat offenders, protecting the victims of domestic violence and hate crimes, and investing in mental health infrastructure. With a conceptual agreement in place the legislative houses are expected to pass bills that will enact these priorities.

Let's switch up the conversation just a little bit. Open chat: What are some of the pressing issues you want to hear from candidates about here in Chemung County this election cycle? Chemung County Nursing Facility? Crime? What else?

Bees feeding in monoculture fields of single crops such as sunflowers crowd together and pass parasites to one another at high rates. Lauren Ponisio/University of Oregon, CC BY-ND by Hamutahl Cohen, University of Florida It’s springtime in California, and bees are emerging to feast on flowering fields – acres upon acres of cultivated almonds, oranges and other fruits and nuts that bloom all at once for just a few weeks. Farmers raise these lucrative crops in monoculture fields, each planted with neat, straight rows of a single type of crop. The agricultural heart of California is the Central Valley, one of the most productive agricultural regions in the world. I recently drove north through the valley on Interstate 5, a 450-mile (724-kilometer) stretch of monoculture farms and agricultural land that runs from Bakersfield to Redding. Flowers were blooming as far as the eye could see. There is so much bloom here that commercial beekeepers truck in over 2 million colonies of bees in spring to ensure that every last flower is pollinated. As a bee biologist, I study why bees are dying. Although monoculture blooms provide food for bees, scientists know almost nothing about how temporary mass-bloom events influence bee health. I wondered whether bees in these monoculture fields were getting sick in the same way a crowd of hungry people with unwashed hands can get sick by converging at a brunch buffet. Imagine not washing your hands after picking up the tong for hash browns – hundreds of times in a row. I found that bees foraging in monoculture pick up parasites at high rates. Disease is a leading cause of bee decline, so my research indicates that monoculture blooms are a threat to bees. However, I also found that farmers can reduce this threat by taking a page from backyard gardens and planting hedgerows with diverse mixes of flowers. Adding flowering plants to their fields is an effective way for farmers to support bees. Interacting bees can spread disease Bees’ main goal in life is to collect pollen and nectar to feed their young. But as bees forage, they are exposed to bacteria, fungi and viruses, which can spread among bees via flowers. For humans, social interaction or touching shared doorknobs in highly trafficked office buildings can spread viruses and other pathogens. Bee scientists joke that, for bees, flowers are the dirty office doorknobs. Artificially providing animals with food can affect the spread of diseases in two ways: It can dilute them or amplify them. When a monoculture crop blooms in a landscape that’s otherwise void of food for bees, it offers an attractive pulse of pollen and nectar. When bees cluster together, disease may be more likely to spread between infected and noninfected bees. But that’s not automatic. Flowers can feed bees and prop up their immune systems, making them less vulnerable to disease. Disease spread is also hampered if many different bee species are attracted to flowers, because not all bee species harbor all parasite species. As the mix of bees in the community becomes more diverse, parasites are more likely to encounter unsuitable hosts, breaking up the the chain of transmission. This suggested to my research team that mass blooms could help bees under the right circumstances. Beehives next to an almond orchard in California’s Central Valley. MyLoupe/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Diagnosing disease In a study that colleagues and I published in late 2021, we examined whether monoculture blooms attracted bees, and whether this process resulted in more disease or less. We then examined whether adding diverse flowers to monoculture farms helped to promote healthy bees. We studied bees in sunflower fields in California’s Central Valley. Sunflowers are grown for commercial oil manufacturing and rely heavily on pollinators such as honeybees, bumblebees, sunflower bees and sweat bees. Some of our sunflower study sites were grown as traditional monocultures, while others were grown adjacent to hedgerows, which are flowering strips of perennial plants such as California rose, Mexican elderberry and perennial sages. These hedgerows turn monoculture farms into more diverse systems. Our team of professors, postdoctoral researchers and students walked through each site with aerial nets, cajoling bees into tiny sterile tubes. Back in the lab, we tested each bee for seven parasites commonly implicated in bee declines using molecular techniques. A hedgerow planted near monoculture sunflower fields provides bees with other flowers to pollinate. Lauren Ponisio/University of Oregon, CC BY-ND Bees really like mass-bloom events. We discovered 35 different bee species visiting sunflowers, with their abundance highest at the peak of sunflower bloom. Places with historic legacies of growing sunflowers hosted more abundant bee populations than sites where sunflowers had been planted only recently. Even at farm sites with hedgerows, bees were consistently found foraging on sunflowers at higher numbers than on hedgerows. But apparently, bee gluttony comes with a cost. We found that these increases in bee abundance were subsequently associated with higher rates of parasitism. Of the individuals we screened, almost half had at least one parasite, and about a third had multiple parasites. The more bees in sunflower fields, the more parasites. Sunflower blooms were aggregating bees, which in turn was amplifying disease risk. Nearby hedgerows help bees We also found something encouraging: When bees had access to hedgerows that contained many different kinds of flowers, they had lower rates of parasite infections. This suggests that in the presence of many flower types, bees disperse and spread across resources, reducing each individual bee’s likelihood of encountering an infected individual. Flower diversity may also provide immunity benefits to bees through other mechanisms, perhaps by enhancing nutrition. Agencies, organizations and researchers are working to promote hedgerows and other forms of bee habitat. For example, the nonprofit Xerces Society offers farmers a certified “Bee Better” eco-label, which indicates to consumers that the farm has dedicated 5% of its land or more to pollinator habitat. And land-grant institutions such as the University of California, Cornell University and the University of Florida are teaching local communities about plant choices that work best for bees. As an agricultural extension agent, I believe that together, efforts like these can help bring back healthy pollinators by promoting habitat conservation. Hamutahl Cohen is the Extension Agent at University of Florida This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

The New York State Police will participate in a national crackdown on distracted driving as part of April’s National Distracted Driving Awareness Month. The enforcement effort, called Operation Hang Up, will include increased patrols and checkpoints targeting drivers using electronic devices while behind the wheel. This year’s enforcement detail will run from Monday, April 4, through Monday, April 11. Troopers will be using both marked State Police vehicles and Concealed Identity Traffic Enforcement (CITE) vehicles to more easily identify motorists who are using handheld devices while driving. CITE vehicles allow the Trooper to better observe distracted driving violations. These vehicles blend in with everyday traffic but are unmistakable as emergency vehicles once the emergency lighting is activated. New York State Police Superintendent Kevin P. Bruen said, “Distracted Driving continues to be a leading factor in motor vehicle crashes. Yet, the deaths and injuries caused by distracted driving are 100 percent preventable. Drivers must be aware of their surroundings and consciously reduce distractions and behaviors that take their attention from the road. State Police will continue to work toward making New York’s roads safer and we will hold distracted drivers accountable.” According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), 3,142 people were killed in the United States in distraction-affected crashes in 2020. To help prevent more tragedies, NHTSA recommends the following for motorists: • If you must send or receive a text, pull over to a safe location and park your car first. • If you have passengers, appoint a “designated texter” to handle all your texting. • If you can’t resist the temptation to look at your phone, keep it in the trunk. Current New York State law includes the following penalties for distracted drivers: • For a first offense, the minimum fine is $50 and the maximum is $200 • A second offense in 18 months increases the maximum fine to $250 • A third offense in 18 months results in a maximum fine of $450 • Probationary and junior drivers face a 120-day suspension of their license for a first offense, and one-year revocation of their permit or license if a second offense is committed within six months

This afternoon Elmira Police Chief Anthony Alvernaz released more information about the shooting that took place last night on Luce Street on Elmira's Southside. Alvernaz says the victim of this shooting is a 31 year- old male Rochester resident. He is currently on Parole in Rochester for a 2014 home invasion robbery where he subsequently plead guilty to Burglary 1st before the Honorable Judge Hayden in Chemung County Court on November 24, 2014. The victim and his associates are refusing to provide any information about the shooting however the preliminary investigation indicates that the victim was specifically targeted. This is the first incident in 2022 where an individual has suffered injuries from a firearm discharge and only the third time officers have responded to a report of gunshots in the city. Chief Alvernaz noted that by this time 2021, the department had responded to 10 shots fired calls, two shootings with injuries and three homicides caused by shootings. The Elmira Police Department has been in contact with the Elmira and Rochester Parole offices. It was learned that the victim is not supposed to be in Elmira per his conditions of Parole and had been ordered back to Rochester by his Parole Officer several times prior to this incident. The victim has refused to cooperate with Parole or follow the conditions of his Parole. At this time, he is refusing to return to Rochester on his own. The Elmira Police Department is familiar with the victim as he has been arrested by the department 17 times since 2009 and he has had 15 orders of protection filed against him since 2008. The Elmira Police Department was advised that the violations committed by the victim are technical in nature and not easily enforced or mitigated with the implementation of New York State’s new “Less is More” initiative. At this time, the victim remains in an area hospital for treatment. Anyone with information about the incident is encouraged to contact the Elmira Police Department or the anonymous tip line at (607) 271-HALT.

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According to Elmira Police Chief Anthony Alvernaz, the Elmira Police Department has adopted a departmental flag. Chief Alvernaz says this new standard will represent the Elmira Police Department and the pride and honor the department has serving the people the city. The design was presented during a March 26th City Council workshop and approved through resolution number 2022-108 at the regular March 28, 2022 City Council Meeting. April 1, 2022 marks the 146th anniversary of the founding of the Elmira Police Department. The department chose to unveil its first flag on this date as to prepare for the banner’s first official duties on Memorial Day, Monday, May 30, 2022; where it will be raised at the Fallen Officer’s Memorial in Wisner Park and carried along the parade route by the department's Honor Guard during the annual Memorial Day Parade. The flag is modeled after the United States and New York City Police Department’s flags, according to Chief Alvernaz. The six white and brilliant green stripes represent the Elmira City Council Districts. The color green has long been associated with police. It celebrates the history of New York law enforcement and can be traced back to 1658, when the New Amsterdam Night Watchmen, New York City’s first form of police, carried lanterns of green glass while on patrol and would hang them outside the watchman’s stations to signify that a watchman was on duty. "The white is emblematic of peace and the moral, ethical and spiritual purity each officer strives to foster," Alvernaz wrote in a media release. "The middle stripe mirrors police mourning bands that are typically worn over badges following a line of duty death. This stripe serves to honor those who have given the fullest measure of their devotion while representing the brave men and women who presently stand in the gap, holding the line between good and evil; order and chaos." The field of deep blue represents the uniform worn by the officers of the Elmira Police Department. The Elmira’s City Seal is a replica of the original 1907 design and is slightly different from the current official seal which was updated in 1944. The City Seal is set in Elmira’s official gold color and includes the year the Elmira Police Department was established, 1876. The three stars that join the two years together represent the three settlements that were eventually incorporated into the City of Elmira in 1864; Newtown, Wisnerburg and DeWittsburg. Chief Alvernaz says the Elmira Police Department Standard shall serve as a visible reminder that the department will always be here, protecting our neighborhoods, and doing everything possible to keep our community safe. He added that is something that will never change and remains the foundation of pride upon which the flag will be

On March 31, 2022 at approximately 10:29 PM Elmira Police Officers responded to the 400 block of Luce St. for a report of gunshots. Officers became aware that a victim was taken to Arnot Ogden Medical Center by private vehicle for a non-life-threatening gunshot wound. The victim is currently stable and receiving treatment. The investigation is ongoing. Anyone that witnessed this event or has video/information of the event is asked to contact the Elmira Police Department at 607-737-5626.

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