This week's Dryden Courier takes the recent uncontested elections as a good reason to take a close look at the Village of Freeville, how it operates, and what it provides to residents.
There's also a piece on Dryden Central School's ParentCONNECTxp program for connecting parents more directly to their children's performance through a web site, and a story on TC3 student Keri Szymanski's successful campaign for president of Phi Theta Kappa, an honor society for students at two-year colleges.
Posted by simon at April 7, 2004 8:47 PM in Dryden Courier , Freeville , TC3 , schools (Dryden)
I have not read the Dryden Courier's comments about Freeville and the recent uncontested election so I will not comment on that specifically although I will say that the Courier generally takes a dim view of Freeville. I venture to say that since Freeville incorporated in 1888, at least half of its elections have been uncontested. This is due to a limited pool of people who are willing to give the time to serve in public office. In addition to the office of Trustee and Mayor, we also have to fill seats on a planning board and a zoning board.
Also, the Freeville tax levy will be increasing by 10.8 % this year but the tax RATE is increasing by 3.4 %. This is the number that most people care about because it translates to dollars and cents. What this means in cost per thousand is .12 cents per $1,000 (tax rate will increase from $3.30 to $3.42/$1,000). I wish the Journal headlines had been less inflammatory.
Rachel Dickinson
Village Trustee
I've only been reading the Courier on a regular basis recently, so I don't know the history, but I think you'll find this a pretty friendly article. It combines a profile of Lotte Carpenter with a description of what the village does.
(I was happy that someone covered the Freeville changes at all, as the default position for papers seems to take no contested election to mean no story.)
On tax levy versus tax rate, I've been trying to use levies consistently, as changing assessments make rate changes less meaningful as an indicator of what's changing in government as opposed to what's changing in real estate. I've updated my story to include information on the tax rate, which I'd left out.