Poet M.J. Iuppa reads "Looking For Hamlin"

Burying the Past
What a disappointing twist yesterday’s Hamlin Heritage Day event took. Promoted as a celebration of both town history and the contributions of important residents, it immediately turned into a long, annoying political promotion.

The concept for Heritage Day was first proposed by Town Historian Mary Smith as a way of recognizing residents, living and dead, who had made significant contributions to the development of Hamlin as a community. This was a worthy idea.

However, Town Board member Shirley Hollink seemed to wrestle control of the event away from the Historian and transform it into a local Republican “Love Fest.” Publicly, Hollink made much of the fact that no one on the dias was up for reelection. This turned out to be a mere technicality. The crafty Hollink managed to have incumbent Supervisor Warner lumber up on stage three separate times! Amazingly, he received an award, held up an award and give out an award.

The Heritage Day concept is good. It should have been an opportunity for residents to celebrate their collective past and learn something about the early contributors to Hamlin’s modernization. Instead, that goal was sadly overshadowed by Warner’s heavy-handed transformation of the event into a long, tedious self promotion. Rather than focus on past contributors, Hollink and Warner subtly switched the theme to “Supervisors” which allowed Warner to ponderously dominate the proceeding.

It’s really too bad. Another good idea buried under a load of self-interest.

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Bright Spot

The highlight of the event was an original poem written for the occasion by local poet and teacher M.J. Iuppa. Entitled, “Looking For Hamlin” the poem shifts through time and space reflecting on the past and present of our community.

The poem is posted here with the kind permission of the author. It is reproduced here in the “Broadside” form that was made available to the public.

"Play Ball!" cries Umpire Cookie.

From the Department of Clownish Ideas


You never know what to expect when you go to a meeting in the Town Hall- as the story below about the deadly fungus demonstrates.

The Supervisor is campaigning that he “communicates” with the public, but that just isn’t so. Take the $8000 dollar sign for the front of the Town Hall. The first time it was mentioned publicly was when it was brought up for a vote! The public had never heard about the sign before and yet this costly outlay was going to be voted on immediately. The only reason it wasn’t was because Councilman Rath asked about the warranties on the two proposed signs (only two, by the way.) The advocate/proponent of the sign purchase was Supervisor Warner who, not surprisingly, had no idea about the warrantees. The vote was put off. But not for long- the TB held a “special” meeting on July 28 when they voted to spend the money. Some communication.

Which leads me to the real topic of this story- the outrageous, clownish proposal to install old, used RGRTA bus shelters as baseball dugouts for our kids! Has anybody in the public heard about this whacko idea?

Nope. This is one of those concepts that has been denied public scrutiny. Sometime, somewhere this ridiculous thought was presented to our elected officials and they ran with it.

Our poor children! Oh, how the kids who play baseball for Hamlin are going to be mocked! Our baseball program is already faced with huge obstacles. Now this! We will be the laughingstock of the entire westside athletic community.

Can you imagine? Stupid looking, outsized bus shelters?

Used no less. Used how? As spitting posts, graffiti slates and ashtrays? Where are these things coming from? Have they been cleaned, are they safe? Who knows?

The Town Board won’t discuss it in public. We have to assume that this is the brainchild of Councilman Todd who works for the RGRTA. He obviously is connected and would be in a position to lobby for the bus company's garbage.

The Recreation Department and parents of ball players have been begging the town to build dugouts- for years! The Rec. Dept has sought out private contributions in supplies and labor, but they must have town approval to build on town property. As usual, the Town Board never gets around to dealing with the issue. Put it off, put it off. Ignore it and maybe it will go away.

But used bus shelters? Who in their right mind would consider subjecting our kids to the inevitable, ruthless ridicule that will be heaped on them by the teams, with real dugouts, who come to Hamlin to play ball? How could the TB have overlooked such an obvious reaction? The idea is so clownish, so far out in left field, that one really has to wonder if any Town Board member is in touch with anything in our community.

Supervisor Warner claims Hamlin has a $200,000 surplus. This is enough money to afford an $8000 photo-op for himself, but no money to build real dugouts for our kids. Instead of allocating some funds to upgrade our ballfields, the Town Board proposes to humiliate the kids by sticking them in used bus shelters. What Bozos.

Not For The Salad!

Fungus Alert

According to members of the Hamlin Zoning Board a home on Benedict Beach Road will be torn down and removed due to an infestation of fungus. The house, numbert 7016, has been infected by Aspergillus Niger fungus that can cause numerous infections in humans, some can be fatal.

This is all the information I have now (and it comes c/o the ZB!) I will post more as it is revealed. (Please remember this website posting the next time the Hamlin Supervisor claims to have, "improved communications.")

For further information on this fungus and the steps recommended to mitigate it visit:

http://www.dehs.umn.edu/iaq/sop.html

Counting the bones


Dem Bones, Dem Bones...

Wow. The preliminary accounting is in for the fund-raising effort of the new Hamlin Democrats at the Fireman’s Carnival and it’s pretty impressive.

The Dems collected and contributed over $1200 dollar worth of prizes, gift certificates and donations from local individuals and businesses. They raffled off 20 beautiful gift baskets and 40 gift certificates! The merchants from Hamlin and Brockport were incredibly generous and supportive.

For their efforts, the Dems managed to collect over $700 to be used mainly in the upcoming elections. That is an impressive rate of return, about 60% on the donations! Ida Miller, treasurer of the Hamlin Democratic Committee was thrilled by the success. “For a brand new organization to raise that much money in their first effort is amazing!” she said. “More importantly, the public relations value of our presence at the carnival was worth far more then the revenues. It raised our profile in the community immeasurably.”

“We are extremely grateful to the many people and businesses which helped make the carnival such a huge success for us,” added Frank Delapa, Chairman of the Hamlin Democratic Committee. “We couldn’t have done it without them!”

A Sign in Every Pot

Sign of the Times

Well folks, they did it. In a Special Town Board Meeting, allegedly held to discuss a water district, Hamlin’s leaders voted unanimously to spend $8000 to replace the sign in front of the Town Hall. While I agree that the existing sign has some problems and could use an upgrade I KNOW it can be done for less than eight grand!

The old one will be removed and a new one constructed in it’s place. The replacement will still be somewhat cheap and old-fashioned however. While the sign is lighted, the lettering will still have to be placed by hand! That is a staff person’s hand. My, my- eight thousand dollars doesn’t buy what it used to, I guess.

Of course, we politically savvy Hamlinites know what the real motive is. Austin Warner wants a photo-op. If the sign can’t be erected prior to the primary, maybe Austin will distribute a photo of himself signing a phony contract, like an old FDR portrait.

Don't Be Afraid!

Campaigner Frightens Locals

After numerous reports of a strange man in a lighted suit going door to door in Harper Park investigators discovered that there was nothing to be alarmed about. " It's just a local politician on the campaign trail," said Tom Westfield who looked into the matter for the trailer park association. " It seems he rented a 'Dynamo' suit, you know the character from the Schwarzzaneger movie- 'Running Man.'" "I guess he figures looking like somebody from an Arnold movie couldn't hurt him- you know with the California election and all," the man added.

Logo of the All Hamlin Party

Indie Nation

There is finally a place for Independent voters to pull the trigger this year in Hamlin elections. Local candidates filed the independent All Hamlin Party with the Board of Elections today. The new party is a blended ticket with two candadates who are registered as Democrat and two who are non-affiliated or Independent (NOT IndependenCE.)

Independent voters are the second largest voter group in Hamlin and have long been ignored in local government. The All Hamlin Party was organized to recognize the Independent voter and, as the name says, be a political choice for all residents of Hamlin who are seeking a voice in local decision making.

Good news for Hamlin.

Frightened child reacts to monsterous hand (photo by Topper Bott)

Candidate Disfigured By Campaign

Hamlin, NY- Democratic candidate for Town Board, James B. Martin, has suffered a permanent, disfiguring injury as a result of relentless campaigning. The damage is the result of shaking hands. “The farmers and fireman out here sure have strong grips!” moaned the candidate as he held up the hideous maw for inspection. Much of the harm occurred at the recent Hamlin Fireman’s Carnival, “Friday night, in the beer tent, there were guys who just wouldn’t let go of my hand. I mean, I’d shake with them but they would just hang on and keep pumping my hand for what seemed like hours!” explained the distraught politician. “Usually these guys act pretty normal. You know, they shake your hand for a second or two and let it go. I don’t know what happened, it was like they were all under some kind of spell or something.”

The injury is serious. “It hurt so much on Sunday morning that I had to down to Lakeside for x-rays.” wept Martin, “They said every bone was broken and there was no hope of a return to normalcy!” “Look at this thing!” shouted the candidate as he wagged the giant, floppy mess in front of this reporter’s face, “It’s like a huge raw turkey, only sunburned!” Indeed, the monstrosity did look like a hunk of red, uncooked poultry. “I just thank God that I always drove my bulldozer with one hand, otherwise I’d be out of work,” sobbed the candidate.

The injury has not hindered Martin’s political determination however. “I will persevere!” he exclaimed too loudly, perhaps due to various painkillers. “I will go forward,” he shouted as he tried to point a gross, flopping finger into the air. Starting to giggle, and shake the horrible, fleshy lobster-like hand, he said, “I’m going to change my campaign slogan to- ‘Giving Hamlin a Helping Hand’” Mr. Martin then began laughing loudly and teetered away, ending the interview