Two Jamestown men are accused of trafficking methamphetimine and heroin following a raid on the city's westside late Monday morning....
Jamestown Police Captain Bob Samuelson says members of the Jamestown Metro, and Southern Tier Region Drug Task Forces executed a search warrant at 135 Sprague Street shortly after 11 AM and, arrested 39 year-old Richard Brown, and 30 year-old Timothy Blakeslee inside. Samuelson says they also found 2.1-ounces of crystal meth and, several bags of heroin, along with $1,300 in drug proceeds. He says Brown faces second and third-degree criminal possession of a controlled substance counts, as well as criminally using drug paraphernalia. Blakelsee is charged with criminal nuisance. The state Police K-9 Unit assisted. Both men are being held pending arraignment.
State Assemblyman Andrew Goodell is now sounding off on the just-approved, 2019-2020 state budget....
The Jamestown-area Republican calls Governor Andrew Cuomo's $175.5-billion spending plan, adopted by the legislature, a "mixed bag." Goodell says one of the positives is a nearly $7-million increase in education aid for Chautauqua County schools.
Goodell says another positive included restoration of library funding to last year's levels. Meanwhile, he was critical of Cuomo's criminal justice reforms. In fact, Goodell says he was debated on the Assembly floor over one of the reforms that he opposed. He says it amends the state penal law to reduce the number of days you have to serve the maximum for a Class-A Misdemeanor. Goodell says, cutting that by one day, will help illegal immigrants avoid deportation. Goodell also criticized an election reform that provides for an expansion of paid time off from work for voters, calling it a "huge new burden" on all employers across the state.
There's not as much state aid as they had hoped for in New York's 2019-2020 budget but, there are new resources to help districts save money in the coming year....
Those are the feelings of New York State School Board's Association Executive Director Tim Kreamer, who says -- overall -- the state's public schools are actually receiving less funding than last year. Kreamer says there's a realization the state doesn't have as much money to go around this year.
Kreamer says there are a handful of areas where schools will be able to save money, including the ability to "piggyback" on other districts contracts that have better deals for transportation costs. Back to the school aid picture, he says the poorer or "high needs" district -- like Jamestown -- did better when it comes to Foundation Aid. Kreamer says the school board's association isn't happy about the Governor and legislature's decision to make the 2-percent property tax cap permanent. However, he adds they never thought it was going away, either.
Chautauqua County Executive George Borrello has received double the number of signatures on petitions to run for the state Senate on the Republican, Conservative and Independence Party line.....
Borrello says a "major outpouring of support from residents across the Southern Tier and Western New York" allowed him to submit double the number of mandatory petitions to the New York State Board of Elections. The second-year county executive says "I would like to thank each and every person who signed. I'm honored to have received double the required amount of signatures from voters in the Republican, Conservative and Independence parties and I'm truly encouraged by this strong start to my campaign."
The changes in New York State election law continue to stream out of Albany with the passage of a new budget......
Chautauqua County Election Commissioners Norm Green and Brian Abram are keeping track of the sweeping changes. Among the reforms, is expanding paid time off from work for voters.
Another major change, is the use of electronic poll books for early voting to better track people during the process, to make sure they don't try to vote again. Green says the changes also include uniform statewide 6 AM to 9 PM polling hours for all primaries statewide starting in 2020 and mandated online voter registration by 2021 on all County Board of Elections websites.
Gasoline prices in the Jamestown-area are on the upswing, having increased by 4-cents a gallon for regular, unleaded fuel to begin the week...
However, some places in the area have seen another increase over the past day of about six-cents a gallon. On Monday, the Triple-A's Gas Price Report said the cost was just under $2.70 a gallon. However, the price at some locations has now jumped to about $2.76 a gallon. Triple-A says that's due to a decrease in national gasoline stocks, and prices have begun spiking with the Summer driving season not far away. Nationally, the average price for a gallon of regular, unleaded is up seven-cents to $2.69.
