Six lawyer have come forward to succeed County Judge Brian D. Burns.
COOPERSTOWN – Attorney Michael E. Trosset, Cooperstown, who announced Friday afternoon he is seeking to succeed Brian D. Burns of Oneonta as Otsego County judge, has a lot of company.
County Republican Chair Vince Casale said a few minutes ago that, in addition to Trosset, five other lawyers have contacted him about succeeding Burns.
COOPERSTOWN – Bassett Healthcare Network today announced the departure of Dr. Steven Heneghan, the network’s chief clinical officer and a key player in recent successful efforts to limit the coronavirus locally.
Dr. Bill LeCates, Bassett Hospital president, will assume interim responsibilities of chief medical officer for the hospital and the network on an interim basis.
COOPERSTOWN – Attorney Michael E. Trosset, principal at Trosset Group Attorneys in Fly Creek, today announced his intention to seek the Republican nomination for county judge if the current judge, Brian D. Burns, is nominated for state Supreme Court Tuesday.
“I’m putting my name in to replace the irreplaceable Judge Burns,” said Trosset.
If Burns wins the nomination Aug. 11 at the judicial convention in Binghamton, he will remove his name for consideration for county judge, a position he has held since 2000.
ONEONTA – A list of nine proposed members of a Community Advisory Board to review OPD rules and procedures was contained in the agenda for the upcoming Common Council meeting, released a few minutes ago.
Council, which will act on Mayor Gary Herzig’s recommendations, meets at 7 p.m. Tuesday in City Hall.
The mayor said the list includes “people from a lot of different perspectives.” He expects the commission, which will choose its own chairman, to convene in late August or early September, since it includes two college students.
Among the members are two speakers from recent local “Rallies for Justice” that followed the May 25 death of George Floyd while being taken into custody in Minneapolis:
COOPERSTOWN – The Bassett Cancer Institute today announced the installation of a TrueBeam linear accelerator that will treat complex cancers much more quickly.
Dr. Alfred Tinger, the institute’s chief and medical director, called the TrueBeam “a game changer in terms of cancer treatment in this region.”
“Some cancers can be hard to reach and precisely target,” he said. “The TrueBeam changes that. It is an advanced radiotherapy system with functionality that allows us to treat cancer anywhere in the body as precisely as possible. It offers greater accuracy, speed and comfort for patients.”
COOPERSTOWN – MacGuire Benton announced a few minutes ago he is resigning as assistant Democratic elections commissioner at the Otsego County Board of Elections to join Cooperstown Distillery.
Benton, a Cooperstown village trustee, said he’s joining the growing company as the New York Brand Ambassador, working on strategic sales to expand the distillery’s brands across the Empire State.
He said he will continue to live in Cooperstown, “and plan on continuing my service to the village.”
COOPERSTOWN – Dr. James Dalton, MD, Bassett Hospital’s Medical Education director for 18 years, has been awarded the Healthcare Network’s most prestigious recognition for a physician, the Walter A. Franck Physician Excellence Award.
The award was established to honor of Dr. Frank, the rheumatologist who retired from Bassett in 2015 after more than four decades of service, to a doctor who emulates his service to patients, students, colleagues and the community. Bassett physicians vote on the choice.
A memory page has been set up for photos and reminiscences of Celeste Brown Thomas, 61, an editor at the New York Times and, for a period, Hometown Oneonta & The Freeman’s Journal, who passed away June 20, 2020. To share your memories, click here. In this photo, she is watching a sunset with her son Chase on the Cornell campus, where he is studying.
SPRINGFIELD – Town Assessor Shari Falcone was in quarantine for the coronavirus and it was feared other top town officials may have been exposed, according to the minutes of the July 13 Springfield Town Board meeting, distributed today.
However, this afternoon Mrs. Falcone said she is out of quarantine and is fine, and another town official said the others are fine as well.
According to the minutes, there were fears Town Supervisor Bill Freeland, Planning Board Chairman Rob Freeland, and Tax Collector Ann Magruder may have also been exposed to COVID-19, since they were in proximity to Falcone at the ZBA meeting the night before.
John and Jenella Mulhall of Oneonta were looking for toys for young John, 18 months, at the Frear family’s Main Street yard at the Community Yard Sale Day in Milford Saturday. The annual community event was also held in Cooperstown. (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)
For the third year in a row, Donna Gage, who operates the Great Reflections Hair Salon across Route 28 from Springbrook, opened her summertime hotdog stand this morning, featuring Oscar Meyer all-beef franks. Next to Goodyear Lake, it’s a lovely country setting, too: While she was serving a customer, a deer ran across the backyard. (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)
Armed with a laptop, a Census worker helps Roseanne Acain of Cooperstown, left, fill out her 10-question Census form this morning at the Cooperstown Farmers’ Market. The service will be offered until 2 p.m. today, and again 9 a.m.-2 p.m. next Saturday, July 25. According to the League of Women Voters, Cooperstown chapter, Otsego County is running 12 percent behind; a full count ensures the county receives its share of federal funding. (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)
Mike Brown, local sportswriter and editor in the 1980s, will be in the county tomorrow and Wednesday promoting his new book, “The Umpire’s Bunkhouse: Baseball Stories from Cooperstown’s Dreams Park.” From working for a local newspaper, Mike went on to found his own local sports newspaper, “The Sporting Edge.” Moving away to pursue other opportunities, he ended his career as spokesman for the Ohio Board of Regents, and the past few years has umped at Cooperstown Dreams Park, which inspired his new book. At 3 p.m. Tuesday, Mike will be at F.R. Woods’ Book Nook, 61 Main St., Cooperstown, discussing his book informally with patrons, and will continue to do so 4-8 p.m. at The Otesaga. Wednesday morning, he will be at the Green Toad Book Store, 198 Main St., Oneonta. See an excerpt from “Umpire’s Bunkhouse” in this week’s editions of The Freeman’s Journal and Hometown Oneonta. (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)
COOPERSTOWN – Dr. Tommy Ibrahim began his tenure this morning as president and CEO of Bassett Healthcare Network.
He succeeds Dr. William F. Streck, who served as president and CEO from 1984 through 2014, then returned on an interim basis in 2018 after the resignation of his successor, Dr. Vance Brown.
Ibrahim comes to Bassett from Integris Health, the largest not-for-profit health-care system in Oklahoma, where he was executive vice president and chief physician executive. He was a hospitalist – an inpatient physician – before moving into administration.
Jim Belleau shows off two views of Notre Dame de Paris, which he has used in developing his computerized schematic of what he calls “Mary’s Plan” for the iconic cathedral. (Jim Kevlin/AllOTSEGO.com)
Inspired by a 2017 visit to the shrine at Lourdes, France, a devout Jim Belleau of Oneonta prayerfully offered to organize seminars to explore the meaning of the Virgin Mary’s 18 appearances in 1858 to a 14-year-old peasant girl, Bernadette Soubirous, “unless you have somethng better for me.” Belleau believes that “something better” is coming to pass.
By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com
ONEONTA – “It was an amazing moment.”
It was October 2017, and Jim Belleau was in his third or fourth night of his second visit to Our Lady of Lourdes Shrine in France.
A procession at Lourdes, photographed by Jim Belleau in 2017.
“We witnessed this procession,” the Principally Prints owner recalled the other day. “It was a warm night. The moon was out. And, for an hour, I had just witnessed 12,000 people singing the Rosary and holding candles.”
St. Mary with crown, the statue in the Lourdes plaza.
He had attended a mass, in Italian, at the Grotto, and was walking back to the hotel, crossing the 124-acre main square – it can accommodate up to 100,000 visitors; now it was completely empty – with the cathedral-like chapel behind him.
“I turned toward Mary,” he said, a famed statue of Our Lady of Lourdes, crowned, “and I got down on one knee. And I placed the rest of my life at her service. I said literally that.”
