New Yorkers looking for a socially distanced scare this season are in luck as the annual Haunted Capitol tours will still be held virtually each week leading up to Halloween. The New York State Office of General Services will be hosting these virtual ghost stories at 1 p.m. this Thursday, […]
Month: October 2020
Cuomo signs law making Juneteenth a state holiday
On October 14, Andrew Cuomo signed legislation making Juneteenth an official state holiday. The designation will make June 19 a paid day of leave for state employees. Juneteenth, also known as Freedom Day, commemorates June 19, 1865, when the news of liberation came to Texas more than two years after […]
State will withhold funding for local governments and schools if they don’t enforce COVID rules
Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Wednesday that New York state will withhold funds for local governments and schools in COVID-19 cluster zones if they fail to enforce public health laws. The state Department of Health will send a letter warning local governments in cluster zones that they will lose state funding […]
Groups plea with Education Commissioner to suspend all school testing this year
On Sept. 30, the Alliance for Quality Education and two dozen other groups released a letter to the New York State Interim Commissioner of Education, Betty Rosa, asking that she consider suspending all forms of mandatory state testing for the 2020-2021 school year. The letter states that the focus for […]
Publisher’s Corner: Spare me the hypocrisy
There are considerably more than 200,000 people in the United States who have died because of the coronavirus and its complications. The United States is a world leader in deaths due to that virus. One of the prime reasons for that is that the President of the United States, Donald […]
Students react to two-week pause at Binghamton and Cortland campuses
A surge in COVID-19 cases caused SUNY Cortland and SUNY Binghamton to suspend in-person classes and activities and transition to remote learning for at least two weeks. These campuses join the two New York state colleges that have faced closures so far this year: SUNY Oswego, which just ended their […]
Governor names New York team that will screen any vaccines approved by the feds
As several drug makers scramble to find a vaccine for COVID-19, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced he has assembled an independent Clinical Advisory Task Force which will review any federally authorized vaccines before they are distributed to the almost 19.5 million people living across New York state. “There are polls that […]
‘Uncle’ Joe Bruno, Senate leader and champion of upstate, dies at 91
Joseph L. Bruno, the former New York State Senate majority leader and champion for the Capital Region, has died at 91. Bruno not only served as a state senator, he also served in the Army as an infantry sergeant in the Korean War, and was a prominent local businessman. “When […]