JESS LANZA CO-OWNS KATE’S UPSTATE
New Chamber President
Has Main Street's Pulse
By JIM KEVLIN • Special to www.AllOTSEGO.com
COOPERSTOWN – During down times at Kate’s Upstate, Jess Lanza, new president of the Cooperstown Chamber of Commerce board of directors, sits on one of the turquoise chairs out front, chatting with tourists, customers and other businesspeople who happen to walk by.
“We’re right in the center,” said Lanza, the first merchant to lead the Cooperstown chamber board since 2007, when Riverwood’s Rick Gibbons passed the mantle to Inn at Cooperstown proprietor Marc Kingsley. “”We have the pulse of what’s going on.”
Jess and his wife, the former Kate Whitney, were both born in the Northeast – he in Fort Lee, N.J.; she in Sidney – were raised in Florida.
They met at Stetson College – it was founded by John B. Stetson, who developed the famous cowboy hat – in DeLand, Fla. “We had classes together,” said Jess, who double-majored in poli-sci and business administration, “and a lot of mutual friends.”
