LEGISLATURE STUFF

Agreeing to Agreements

By Michael Ryan

CATSKILL - In the season of doing niceties through the goodness of the human heart, there are also many bureaucratic necessities needing attention by the Greene County Legislature.

Lawmakers gave preliminary okays to several routine resolutions during a County Resources committee meeting, this week, awaiting full board approval later this month.

An agreement is being renewed with the Greene County Agricultural Society for backing of the annual Greene County Youth Fair.

The legislature has been a strong financial supporter of the Youth Fair for many years, significantly increasing the amount for next summer.

Funding will be raised from $24,284 to $40,000 in an effort to continue expanding the fair and keeping it a free admission event.

The fair celebrates the efforts of children from throughout the county in raising livestock, growing crops and agriculture-based arts & crafts.

Kids and their families gather at Angelo Canno Park in Cairo, along Joseph D. Spencer Lane, for four days in late July, setting up tents and RV’s, settling in for Blue Ribbon competitions, farm fun and a carnival.

The fair flowed down from the mountains, originating in the town of Ashland in 1949 under the guidance of Alfred Partridge.

Partridge was the leader of the Ashland Blue Ribbon 4-H Club, holding the maiden event at the one-room Sutton Hollow schoolhouse.

Lawmaker Harry Lennon (District 8, Cairo) has been particularly passionate about upping the county’s contribution, remembering the fair from his own youth, wishing to keep the tradition intact for future generations.

In other actions:

—An annual contract will be renewed with Community Action of Greene County for $49,500, getting increased from $45,000.

The dollars are earmarked for assisting with conducting and administering programs addressing the needs of the poor in the county.

—A contract will be renewed with Cornell Cooperative Extension of Greene and Columbia counties for $244,090, an increase of $10,000 from 2023.

Cornell Cooperative Extension connects people with information they need on topics such as commercial and consumer agriculture; nutrition and health; youth and families; finances; energy efficiency; economic and community development; and sustainable natural resources.

—Lawmakers agreed to sustain their financial relationship with the Greene County Federation of Sportsmen, a non-for-profit organization.

Authorization was preliminarily given to provide $5,265, the same total as last year. The group was formed for the protection, propagation and distribution of fish, game and natural resources within the county.

—There will be a $2,100 increase, going up to $36,000, in yearly support of the Greene County Libraries Association, aiding the numerous book rooms in the valley and on the mountaintop.

—Funding support will be sustained while staying the same, at $129,798, for the Greene County Soil and Water Conservation District.

It is specified the money is to be dispersed in proportions of $16,200 for stream revitalization and $113,598.00 for district operations.

Greene County Soil & Water is a county level, political sub-division which is dedicated to the management of natural resources, their website states.

The agency has been in existence since 1961, founded in order to facilitate the implementation of a major federal flood control project in the town of Windham, establishing a network of flood-control dams.

C.D. Lane Park, one of those dams, was established in 1974 in the Big Hollow region of the town, in the outskirts of the hamlet of Maplecrest.

The dam is made of an earth embankment, a low-level outlet pipe and an emergency grass spillway which, while performing its intended function, suffered extensive flooding damage during Hurricane Irene in 2011.

It has been restored and the park now includes countryside walking trails, kayaking, a picnic pavilion, playground and pristine 26-acre lake.

In a related action, lawmakers will renew a second annual agreement with Greene County Soil & Water Conservation District for $124,740.

The funding remains unchanged from a year ago, helping advance state-of-the-art watershed management projects, policies and programs.