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– Ithaca’s 2024 budget to be presented minus Cornell funding – It’s municipal budget season. Ithaca Mayor Laura Lewis will present the city’s proposed 2024 budget at the October 4 Common Council meeting. It’ll be the first budget in over 20 years that will not include a contribution from Cornell. The Common Council postponed a vote on the negotiated annual pay agreement until October 11. On October 5, the Tompkins County budget will be presented at a public forum. The public can attend either meeting in person or view them live online. – Ithaca workers’ group says the working class will be hurt if Cornell doesn’t give city more in new funding agreement…
At fourteen, Julian Eagle started working at WRFI as the station’s very first Youth Radio volunteer. This week would have been his 21st birthday and this month was the one-year anniversary of his death from Fentanyl poisoning. WRFI’s JT Stone got his start in radio working with Julian. He filed a tribute to a young…
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The Ithaca artist known as Lost Cat died in April. His name was Gavin Mahoney and he was 55. Mahoney was best known for the many stick cat figures he painted around the city. Shortly after his death friends, admirers, and fellow artists put on a memorial art exhibition. And in July, a sculpture was installed downtown in his memory. I spoke with a few of his friends at both events. Here’s some of what they said about Mahoney’s life and how they will remember him.
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The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation divides the state into nine regions. Dereth Glance is the new Region 7 Director. It covers Onondaga, Tompkins, Cortland, Chenango, Oswego, Madison, Cayuga, Tioga, and Broome counties. Glance most recently oversaw the DEC Environmental Remediation, Materials Management, and Mineral Resources divisions. Before joining the DEC, she served…
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Felix Teitelbaum interviews New Orleans-based artists Quintron and Missy Pussycat on August 24, 2023. They’ll be appearing in Ithaca at the Cherry Arts, Sept. 11. The show is a benefit for WRFI. You can learn more about the duo and get tickets to the show here.
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The city of Ithaca will receive 1.7 million dollars in federal funding to improve its transportation systems. According to Senator Schumer‘s office, the funding will be used to develop a traffic signal priority system for school buses, fire trucks, and transit systems. The developments are aimed at making the local systems’s arrival and departure times…
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Village Election Results are in for Tompkins and Schuyler Counties Area village elections were held on Tuesday. In the Tompkins County village of Dryden, Democratic incumbents won re-election in three positions. Michael Murphy was reelected mayor with 61% of the vote over his Republican opponent Thomas Corey who got 39%. Jason Dickinson and Thomas Sinclair…
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Caroline Broadband Expansion Gets Boost The town of Caroline is taking steps to expand broadband access to its residents. The expansion effort was awarded more than $130,000 from the Tompkins Community Recovery Fund. Caroline is investing additional $330,000 of its American Recovery Act funds toward a feasibility study and partial buildout of broadband. At its…
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New Proposal Filed to Expand Ithaca’s Learning Farm The Learning Farm in Ithaca is planning to expand. The organization filed documents with the town’s planning board for a kitchen facility, guest housing, parking areas, and walkways. A proposed second phase would include a welcome center and a juicing and bottling building. According to the Ithaca…
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