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Times of Ti
April 25, 2020
suncommunitynews.com
• EDITION •
Ti faces pandemic
School receives grants and chocolate bunnies
Normal board meetings no longer normal By Tim Rowland STAFF WRITER
TICONDEROGA | Spaced far enough apart that they had to speak up to be heard, the Ticonderoga Town Board met last Thursday, speculating about the future and trying to figure out how to run a small government in the age of COVID.
Photo provided
Children’s playground in Bicentennial Park is roped off to prevent social gatherings.
Photo by Tim Rowland
Some aspects of life will go on. The board recognized Reale Construction Co. Inc. as the low bidder for a sewer and water project on The Portage. Reale’s bid of $8,065,071 slipped in at just $45,000 lower than the other bidder. Despite being advertised as far away as Albany, the project attracted just those two bidders. The bid reflects costs savings that include the deletion of a couple of add-ons, including sewer lines on Defiance Street and sewer and water lines on Battery Street — those options can be added back in depending on how the projects overall costs shake out, said Supervisor Joe Giordano. Other town services, such as the potential opening of the town beach, are more tentative. To open it to the public, the town needs to hire lifeguards and a summer camp director, but it’s unknown whether the state will even allow the reopening of public places by the time warm weather arrives. The board ultimately decided to advertise the jobs in hopes things will be back to normal by the summer. The board also decided to indefinitely postpone its annual May cleanup week. “As things develop, we can re-evaluate,” Giordano said. The senior bus, meanwhile, has been repurposed to take residents out for groceries and to the pharmacy. Board member and interim bus driver Dave Woods, said the route has attracted as many as seven riders — who seem just as glad for the social interaction as the food. Woods said it will be good to get the regular drivers back, because the seniors have developed a sense of kinship and trust with them. Finally, the board considered how to hold future meetings, which will likely have to go to a remote video format. The meetings are shown live on local cable, something not everyone has access to. And that is only a one-way communique. “Public participation is something we’re going to need to talk about,” said board member Mark Russell. A potential solution, said board member Tom Cunningham is GoToMeeting, a video conferencing format that costs $16 a month for up to 250 participants. “That would allow more community participation, which is really what we want,” he said. ■
TI KIWANIS FEEDS COMMUNITY Backpack program gets backing of Stewart’s, IP By Tim Rowland STAFF WRITER
TICONDEROGA | With help from Stewart’s Holiday Match Program and the International Paper Foundation, the Kiwanis Club of Ticonderoga has been able to send weekend ‘backpack” meals to 280 eligible children from seven local area schools, a program that has become even more critical as work has dropped off due to the coronavirus pandemic. As access to nutritious food becomes an issue for many families, Kiwanis is also planning to help feed the community through a drive-by food bank on Wednesday, April 29 from noon to 3 p.m.. Pallets of food will be delivered to the bus drop-off area of the Ticonderoga Middle School. Members of the community will be able to drive by with their trunks open, and Kiwanis volunteers will fill them with groceries. The Kiwanis backpack program started by helping 30 kids in 2013, and from that modest beginning it has grown to provide over 9,300 weekend backpacks (or plastic bags in the era of the coronavirus) a year with nutritious foods. That’s the equivalent of 56,000 meals. The program serves the communities of Ticonderoga, Crown Point, St. Mary’s, Putnam, Schroon Lake, Moriah and Peru. The meals are designed to be a weekend supplement to the daily breakfasts and lunches that children typically receive at school. With schools shut down, meals and backpacks are currently being dropped off by bus, said school board and Kiwanis member John Bartlett. Through its Holiday Match Program, Stewart’s Shops matches customer donations made in all of their shops from Thanksgiving through Christmas. The program raised $1.79 million in 2019 and has donated over
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$30 million to local area nonprofits since the program began in 1986, all for the benefit of local area children under the age of 18. The BackPack Program sends young children from local area schools home for the weekends with backpacks filled with nutritious, shelf-stable, and easily prepared foods throughout the school year. The backpacks also include Stewart’s Milk Cards good for one gallon of 1% milk and Stewart’s Egg Cards good for one dozen large eggs at any of the Stewart’s stores. The $1,750 grant funding will be used to purchase food for the backpacks from the Regional Food Bank of
children’s health, health and wellness, and disaster relief. “We are extremely grateful for Stewart’s and International Paper’s continuing support of our efforts to help local kids,” said Program Coordinator John Bartlett. “The hope is to be able to continue to grow and expand this program and to provide additional food for more and more young children. One hundred per cent of all donations are used to purchase the food to fill the backpacks and donations to this very worthy cause are tax-deductible.” The cost to sponsor one child for an entire school year is only $183. For more information, con-
The Ti Kiwanis backpack program has become more crucial during economic shutdown.
File photo (taken prior to the COVID-19 virus)
NE NY which plans the menus for the weekend, orders the food, and delivers the food to schools throughout the North Country. Meanwhile, the International Foundation provides millions in grants annually to nonprofit organizations that address critical needs in the communities where its employees live and work. The Foundation’s signature causes are children’s hunger,
tact Bartlett at jbartlett1@nycap.rr.com. Ticonderoga Kiwanis is an all-volunteer community service organization that supports a variety of community initiatives with its number one priority being young children. Through its various projects and support for other community organizations, Kiwanis strives “to help make a difference in our communities.” ■
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