A non-political day

The political sign has been removed from in front of my house and my campaign truck is parked around back, as we prepare to celebrate the 200th birthday of my great-great-great grandfather, General James S. Wadsworth today, at the house he built. The Wadsworth Guard re-enactors will be arriving soon to set up camp on the valley side of the house, with the general public invited to attend from noon to 5 pm.

The admission charge of $5 per person (or $10 per carload) will be donated to the General Wadsworth Statue Fund, which has been raising money to erect a local replica of the General’s statue that stands at Gettysburg. Since the total cost of that project approaches $100,000, we are hoping for a good turnout.

The highlight of the day will be a commemorative ceremony at 3 p.m. which will include remarks by SUNY Geneseo Historian (and Geneseo Democratic Party Chair) Judith Hunter and a recitation of the Gettysburg Address by another descendant of the General, my cousin Sidney Symington. One person who will not be giving a speech is me, although I will be leading house tours throughout the afternoon.

People of all political faiths and supporters of all local candidates (and even the candidates themselves) are invited to attend. Just leave your politics at home.

My bypass plan

Over the 2005 Christmas break, I took some time to work out a proposal for a bypass of 20A traffic around the south side of the village. This is an idea that has been floating around for many years, but which never seems to go anywhere. I thought if I could make the plan more specific, perhaps I could bring it closer to reality.

I drove around and figured out the best routes and then studied tax maps to see who owned the property. Then I talked to some of the landowners including Austin Wadsworth, Stan Rutherford, Ken Book and Peter Bruckel. I even paid a visit on the late Walter Kingston who assured me that there was no traffic problem in Geneseo, and that a bypass was not needed and would never be built.

Undeterred, I produced a map of the proposed route and presented the idea to the Geneseo Town Board on Jan. 2, 2006. (That was the same meeting in which the board called me into an executive session to discuss whether I was enough of a team player to be re-appointed to the county traffic safety board, but that’s another story.)

Town Board member Mike Tenalio showed some interest in the idea and asked me to write it up. I subsequently produced a three-page narrative description of the idea. (I have now posted both the map and the narrative on my campaign site.)

I then presented the idea to a number of interested parties including County Executive Nick Mazza, County Highway Superintendent Don Higgins, the Traffic Safety Board and the Village Board. The idea even got mentioned in a newspaper story in the LC News before it was put on the shelf. To be fair, whatever interest there might have been, was effectively scared off by the gathering storm of the Lowes War.

And so the idea has remained dormant for over a year, although it is occasionally mentioned as something that might be considered in an expanded Access Management Study. The idea was brought back to mind by comments made by a resident of Hawthorn Circle who had attended the Access Management public hearing.

“What this town needs is a bypass,” Kenneth Kranz told me when I banged on his door during my campaign. As he started to describe his idea, I told him I had already designed such a plan a year and a half ago. I sent Ken a copy of my plan and he encouraged me to post it on my web site. I hope maybe the idea will catch on, but I’m not wildly optimistic.

This little incident is a case study in why I am running for Supervisor. It’s nice to have ideas, but in order to move them forward, you actually have to have some control over the agenda. If I am elected, perhaps I can make sure my ideas are taken a little more seriously.

BTW This particular plan would put my competitor Will Wadsworth in an awkward position if elected. With the bypass across the back of his father’s Homestead property, a key part of the proposal, he would have trouble promoting it without being accused of a conflict of interest.

Moscow on the Genesee?

In an editorial in today’s issue of the LC news, it was reported that when I was writing in The Clarion I had compared Supervisor Kennison to Stalin. An extensive search of the Clarion archives failed to find that reference.

On Dec. 15, 2005, however, I did write a column titled “Geneseo Yes, Geningrad No!” In that piece I characterized Wes’s performance at the infamous Dec. 8 Town Board meeting as “the most stunning display of totalitarian technique since the fall of the Iron Curtain” and a “tour-de-force of falsehoods, half-truths, distortions and demagoguery.”

Those are strong words, but allowing for a certain amount of hyperbole, not far off the mark. As I pointed out in my column Wes has mastered one of the trademarks of totalitarian regimes, the Big Lie technique.

This concept was actually introduced by Adolph Hitler in his biography “Mein Kampf,” who defined it as,” a lie so colossal that no one would believe that someone could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously.”

The same idea was put forth by George Orwell in his classic book “1984,” in which he defined the word blackwhite in the so-called Newspeak vocabulary. “It means the habit of impudently claiming that black is white, in contradiction of the plain facts.”

A good demonstration of blackwhite is also on display in the news pages of this week’s paper. In response to allegations that the Conservative Party petitions that he submitted to the Board of Elections were fraudulently witnessed, Wes claimed that, “this kind of scrutiny can be done to any set of petitions,” and that challenging such illegal activity is, “not the way you should play the game on the local level.”

So according to this version of Geneseo reality, it is normal to break the law when circulating petitions and it is wrong to question such lawbreaking. Actually I have come to expect no less than this kind of twisted logic from Wes, but the more interesting question is why do his fellow members on the town board allow him to get away with it? That is something members of both parties should ponder as they vote on town board nominations in the next week.

For future quoters of this blog, please note that I have not compared Wes to either Stalin or Hitler. I have merely said that as Supervisor, he uses some of the same techniques that totalitarian rulers typically employ.

Endorsements are odious

I’ve never liked the endorsement game and I generally refused to play it when I was in the newspaper business. Since people know I am pretty much a straight-line Republican voter, I never saw the point in making formal endorsements. I believe in the 18 years that I published The Clarion I only made political endorsements in four races, and only two of those were local.

The first time was during the height of the first Wal-Mart battle during the early 90s. It may surprise some people to know that I was pro-Wal-Mart in that more innocent time. I didn’t so much endorse a candidate as say that people shouldn’t vote for incumbent Republican Mike Bishop since he had been abstaining from key votes because he owned land next to the proposed site.

I felt the 2-2 deadlock on the village board at that time needed to be broken. I don’t really regret that decision, although I did oppose the move to a Super Wal-Mart a dozen years later, when Wal-Mart had mutated into a much different company.

Two years ago, I broke party lines again to endorse Democrat Butch Curry over incumbent Mike Tenalio for Geneseo town board. This decision was again also based solely on the Big Box issue, but by that time I was firmly in the Smart Growth camp. I knew that Butch couldn’t win, but it was a matter of principle because I also knew that Mike was planning to fast-track the Newman proposal.

Incidentally, I also endorsed Patti Lavigne in that race. I believe my judgment in that case has been borne out by her excellent work on the Planning Board, and I would happily endorse her again, (for town board!)

I was somewhat disturbed, however, when reports reached me that Patti was claiming to be endorsed for Supervisor by the Geneseo Republican Committee. I knew that wasn’t true because Chairman Paul Schmied had assured the candidates that the committee would not make any endorsements before the caucus.

When I challenged Patti on this she responded that she believed she had the support of the majority of the committee, although she admitted that no formal endorsement had taken place. While I have no doubt that Patti may have supporters on the committee, it is not right to claim an endorsement where none has been made.

When Chairman Schmied was apprised on the situation, he issued the following statement:

“The Geneseo Republican Committee will not endorse any candidate until after the caucus. I believe the committee has encouraged all of the candidates to continue to campaign actively, contact registered Republicans and urge them to express their choice with their vote at the caucus… The Republicans, not a small committee, should make the choice for the Republicans.”

Amen, brother.

Seeing both sides

It is very difficult running a campaign in which the community is so polarized over the Lowes issue. Each side brings their own set of assumptions and prejudices about the other. Here are a few I’ve heard:

1. Opponents of Lowes are rich elitists who don’t understand the struggles of middle-class people and small businesses. A lot of them are pointy-headed professors who don’t know what real work is. They are against all growth and want Geneseo to stay the same as it never was. Of course they are not real Geneseoans and will probably move away soon after causing all this trouble.

2. Supporters of Lowes are selfish people who just care about saving money and don’t care what a Big Box store will do to other small businesses or our traffic. A lot of them are the same greedy landlords who have destroyed our residential neighborhoods with student housing or millionaire developers who just want the highest return on their investment. They don’t care about the community.

Often these allegations are made with a great deal of emotion and I’ve learned that it is very difficult to get people to let go of such strongly-held prejudices. And yet I believe it is important to try to see both sides.

In the last couple of days I have made it a point of visiting people who I know to be strong supporters of Lowes. I have no illusions that I will win their votes, but at least I would like to soften their anger by listening. Communication is the first step to healing the wounds that are damaging our community.

Former Supervisor Harold Stewart made an interesting point that reveals where a lot of frustration may be coming from on the pro-Lowes side. He started by asking me why there was so little opposition to the Super Wal-Mart. I admitted that it was because the leadership of the village had been asleep at the switch and had not changed the zoning to prohibit Big Boxes from coming in, so that there was nothing opponents could do to stop it.

Harold then admitted that the town board had also been “asleep at the switch.” He says he knew that the zoning on the Rt. 20A frontage in the Gateway needed to be changed to allow bigger commercial uses, but he never got around to it during his term. In the first five years of the Kennison administration no rezoning took place either.

It was only when the town was approached by Newman Development that the PDD law was quickly cobbled together to allow the project to go forward. That approach has proven to be a disaster because it threatens to set a precedent that would be much more far-reaching than a simple rezoning ever would have been.

Harold’s frustration is “knowing” that the Lowes is within the long-term plan for Rt. 20A, even though the underlying zoning does not allow for it. Those of us who regret the Super Wal-Mart should at least be able to understand the emotion.