batavia

There was a minor accident in the city -- reportedly no injuries -- at Main Street and Dellinger Avenue just before 4:30 p.m. One lane of traffic was blocked for about 20 minutes. No further information available.

Betty Sommer, a resident of Williamsville, worked in Batavia for five years, driving passed a former drive-thru bank location on East Main Street near Clinton Street thinking every day, "that would make a great coffee location."

"Finally," she said, "I decided to do it."

Sommer opened Kick-Ass Coffee nearly two weeks ago, on the same day sewer line construction began on East Main, cutting down on her visibility, but she said new customers have been finding her shop. It is a kiosk in East Town Plaza, standing alone, across the parking lot from Aldi's.

The coffee, she said, is fresh brewed from Latin American beans roasted in Buffalo and all of the ingredients in her breakfast sandwiches and subs are fresh. She bakes her own biscuits and muffins.

"Everything tastes just like you made it yourself at home," Sommer said.

Oscar Donaldo Ramirez-Castanon, 33, of Lewiston Road, Batavia, is charged with forcible touching. Ramirez-Castanon is accused of grabbing the breasts of a woman and trying to kiss her against her will. Ramirez-Castanon is currently jailed on a rape, 1st, charge.

Lori E. Connolly, 54, of 8819 Batavia Stafford Townline Road, Batavia, is charged with DWI and unsafe lane change. Connolly was stopped at 7:42 p.m., Monday, on East Main Street, Batavia, by Officer Kevin DeFelice.

Rachel Emma Pitz, 19, of Market Street, Attica, is charged with petit larceny. Pitz is accused of stealing $67.49 worth of merchandise from Kmart. 

Ashley Marie Budziszewski, 25, of Broadway Street, Oakfield, is charged with petit larceny. Budziszewski is accused of stealing $40.45 worth of merchandise from Kmart. 

Stephen Theron Ferry, 20, of Knowlesville Road, Oakfield, is charged with trespass. Ferry is accused of trespassing on Allen Foods property.

Jason Lee Cramer, 27, of Central Avenue, Batavia, is charged with petit larceny. Cramer is accused of shoplifting from Kmart.

Lamar Ateef Randall, 26, East Park Street, Albion, is charged with unlawful possession of marijuana. Randall was taken into custody on a warrant issued by Batavia City Court. Upon a search during his arrest, Randall was allegedly found in possession of marijuana.

Rather than mob a mall, golf enthusiasts mobbed local golf courses the day after Thanksgiving to take advantage of unseasonably warm weather.

Lisa Fickel, director of marketing for Terry Hills, said the course buzzed like a spring day this morning with golf carts zipping all over the place.

Above, Tim Braunscheidel watches his shot fly down the first fairway at Terry Hills. Braunscheidel was out for a round of golf with his father, Dave and their friends Scott Gibson and Dan Grefreth.

Nobody mobbed local stores today. There were no big sales. It was pretty much business as usual, and the shop owners we spoke with said business was pretty good.

"Black Friday is really about the big box stores," said Erica Caldwell, owner of Present Tense Books. "Our big weekend was our holiday open house last weekend."

The Christmas shopping season is still important to Present Tense, Caldwell said. There will be a lot of presents bought in the store, but no one-day big event will drive sales.

It's the same at Valle Jewelers where Mary Valle said so far they've sold one Christmas present. The rest of the sales -- and sales have been good of late, she said -- have been for birthdays, weddings and anniversaries.

Neither Caldwell nor Valle have big expectations for the nationally promoted "shop local" effort scheduled for Saturday.

"I'm curious to see if it has an impact," Valle said.

When you are ready to shop local this holiday season, check out the list of sponsors of The Batavian in the left rail (or just look at the ads on the page). There's a ton of great gifts to be found at local shops and a gift certificate from a local restaurant makes a great stocking stuffer.

By the time I made it out the shopping center on Veterans Memorial Drive, the Black Friday crowds had subsided, but the mall's developer, Cor Development Group, had brought in a horse-drawn wagon for customers. Santa was supposed to show up later in the afternoon and the company is planning a fireworks show for this evening.

I've had a couple of conversations recently that reminded me how fortunate we are to live in Genesee County.

The first was with a gentlemen who came into Delavan's on Friday night. He's from Ohio but visits Batavia regularly for business. He's decided to buy a small home here rather than always packing for a hotel stay.

"I love Batavia," he said. "It's a great little city. The people are friendly, the crime rate is low, there's a lot beautiful old homes around and it's a nice area."

The other conversation was with Jeff Stephen, the dairy industry expert. Stephen had no idea I was from California when we started to talk, but he began to compare Batavia to the so-called Golden State. Batavia, he said, was a great place for a company to set up business compared to California. We have good schools, the cost of living is so much lower, it's less crowded and people in Western New York, unlike California, he said, really appreciate their jobs.

San Diego, my hometown, can call itself America's Finest City, but I think where I live right now has it beat hands down.

There's a lot of advantages to living in Genesee County that are easy to forget as we go about our day-to-day business. Every community has its problems, and it's easy as we struggle to solve them to let them become bigger in our minds than they actually are, or to forget about all of the good things around us.

All of us in Genesee County have a lot to be thankful for, from the place we live, to the neighbors who are always ready to help, to the friends we stand by and who stand by us, to the families we cherish.

On behalf of myself, Billie, Lisa Ace and our correspondents, we want to thank both our readers and our advertisers for making it possible for us to live and work in America's Finest Little City. We wish you and yours the very best. Happy Thanksgiving!

Project Wave -- which we now know is being pursued by PepsiCo -- will be the largest yogurt plant in North America, according to an industry expert with more than 15 years in the field.

Jeff Stephen, a consultant with Productive Partners, said in an interview today that what Pepsi is planning is impressive and will be a huge benefit to the community and the local dairy industry.

"Pepsi isn't the kind of company that is going to go anywhere," Stephen said. "They're not going to cut back because of any shortage of money. This is everything you could ask for in a local community. They are going to be successful. Not everything will go to plan, but they will succeed. This is a major global commitment."

Based on industry reports, Pepsi wants to get into the yogurt business. The multinational firm is planning a merger of sorts with Theo Muller Group, a German company that makes seven different yogurt products.

Stephen said companies for years have been trying to crack the U.S. yogurt market in the belief that American consumers don't buy as much yogurt as they should. Europeans consume five or six times as much yogurt as Americans, Stephen said.

The key to the U.S. yogurt market, Stephen said, is to make yogurt with more body and texture, a yogurt that can be consumed as a meal or a key ingredient in a meal. Growth in the U.S. yogurt market has been thwarted, Stephen said, because too much of the product available in the U.S. is what Stephen called "crappy dessert yogurt."

The key to the U.S. market is Greek yogurt, which has more flavor, is more filling and has greater nutritional value.

That's the kind of yogurt that will be the basis of Alpina's product line. Alpina was the first big signing for Genesee County Economic Development Center in the new ag park. Alpina is building an initially 10,000-square-foot facility that will employ 50 people.

Pepsi's plans begin with a 300,000-square-foot facility that will employ 180 people, with a build out by 2033 of 16 production lines and 600 employees.

There is no yogurt plant in North America that's close to that size, Stephen said.

When Stephen saw what was being planned for Project Wave, as first reported on The Batavian, he figured Pepsi, whose plans with Theo Muller had already been reported by the Wall Street Journal, was a likely prospect for the property. A project of that size would almost certainly be a plant for a large corporation moving into a new product line. 

The deal bringing Pepsi to Batavia hasn't been signed yet, but construction has begun on the facility and Pepsi is clearly eager to get its new product to market by 2013.

Stephen just hopes Pepsi is planning a yogurt line based on Greek yogurt and not "crappy dessert yogurt," which he doesn't think will help Pepsi or other yogurt makers expand the U.S. market.

Whatever Pepsi does, he doesn't see the Pepsi products competing directly with Alpina, which will be producing a slightly higher end yogurt and going after niche markets.

Pepsi's main competitors will be Dannon and Yoplait.

Dannon, based in White Planes, is a pure dairy company and between its two main brands, controls about 38 percent of the yogurt market. Yoplait, owned by General Mills, has another 6 percent. The rest of the market is shared by regional players and store brands, some of which, Stephen said, are very good.

Another potential local player in the yogurt market is O-AT-KA Milk Products, which is owned by Upstate Niagara Cooperative. 

The rumor is that a current expansion at O-AT-KA is for the local plant to start making yogurt ingredients.

It's unknown who the ingredients will be sold to, but Upstate purchased a 100-year-old, one-line yogurt plant in Watertown about a year ago.

Charitably, Stephen said, the Watertown plant is "historic," but it shows Upstate's intention to move into the yogurt business.

Whatever product Pepsi brings to market, Stephen said, will be thoroughly researched and well marketed.

"I have very high respect for Pepsi," Stephen said. "They are efficient in manufacturing and production and very good marketers. They are not the kind of company that gives up."

It's unknown whether Pepsi will purchase its dairy products through O-AT-KA or directly from farmers (those are discussions that probably haven't even taken place yet, Stephen said), but as for farmers, Stephen said they will be happy working with Pepsi.

Pepsi, he said, takes an approach that being easy to work with helps lower costs.

"I think the farmers will want to do business with them," he said.

As for milk supply, the market will probably be shaken up for awhile initially, but the big farmers have little trouble adding capacity (more cows) and there should be an ample milk supply in Western New York to meet the needs of Pepsi, Alpina and O-AT-KA, and any other players that enter the market at the ag park.

Perhaps the worst news for other dairy businesses, Stephen said, is that if Pepsi wants to hire an employee, they will hire that employee. They will spend what it takes, he said, to get the best employees, especially in key positions.

But it's a great pool of employees that is attracting Pepsi to Batavia, Stephen said.

For years, he's been telling dairy companies to stop manufacturing in places like Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia because the standard of living is so much better in smaller communities.

Employees can actually afford to buy a house in a place like Batavia. That isn't true in larger population centers. And, Stephen said, the schools are good, and that's attractive to a major employer.

"You have a pretty high quality of life," Stephen said. "It's a pretty attractive place to put people who are going to work for you for a long time."

A 22-year-old Medina man accused of shoplifting Tuesday at Kmart allegedly resisted arrest and fled from a deputy, leading to a 17-minute manhunt that ended with his arrest on Batavia Downs property.

Jailed on $2,500 bail was Shawn Richard Wisniewski, of West Avenue Street, Medina.

Wisniewski was accused of trying to steal doe and buck urine.

Deputy Patrick Reeves responded to the store at 3:25 p.m. after the alleged attempted theft was reported and Reeves interviewed Wisniewski. When Reeves tried to arrest Wisiewski, Wisiewski allegedly resisted arrest and fled the store.

Assisting in the manhunt were Batavia PD and State Police.

Wisniewski was charged with petit larceny, escape, 3rd, resisting arrest and criminal possession of a controlled substance, 7th.

No information available on what the alleged controlled substance may have been.

A driver pulling out of the Walmart parking lot at 4:03 p.m., Tuesday, on Veterans Memorial Drive apparently didn't see an oncoming car before pulling out in front of the other vehicle.

The two-car collision sent four people to UMMC for evaluation and treatment of minor injuries.

Cited for alleged failure to yield the right-of-way was Patricia A. Derleth, 72, of Clinton Street Road, Batavia.

Besides Derleth, injured in the crash were the driver and two passengers in the other vehicle: Kara L. Diltz, 18, of Kent Road, Kent, and Steven T. Peckenpaugh, 19, and Derquile R. Qualcen, 22.

The accident was investigated by Sgt. Greg Walker.

(Initial report)

The staff and volunteers at the Batavia Youth Center served a traditional Thanksgiving dinner Tuesday night to about two dozen youngsters who are participants in youth center programs. Most of the meal, turkey and fixings, was prepared by Gail Stevens.

Press release:

On Monday, members of the Le Roy Moose Lodge donated a dozen plush stuffed moose toys to United Memorial Medical Center’s Emergency Department. The Tommy Moose program is a national initiative started by the nonprofit Moose International. The toys are distributed to children in crisis by police officers, firefighters, emergency responders and hospitals. The friendly looking toys comfort and distract children in traumatic situations.

The toys donated to United Memorial were purchased by Moose members Judy Mills, Catherine Campbell, Shirley Schutt, Malinda Dykstra and an anonymous donor to the lodge. More information on the Tommy Moose program can be found at www.MooseIntl.org.

Pictured in the photo from right to left are Catherine Campbell, UMMC registrar, Bonnie Bezon, Emergency Room nurse manager, and Judy Mills.

Bernadette Smart sent in this photo of her son Brandon and his friend Jeryll Cherry at Tops Market on Monday where they were bell ringers for the Salvation Army. Bernadette said their video game character masks were a big hit with shoppers.

If you would like to volunteer to ring the bell for Salvation Army, contact Major Robert at 343-6284.

A two-car accident with injuries is reported on Veterans Memorial Drive in the area of Office Max and Walmart.

Town of Batavia Fire and Mercy EMS responding.

UPDATE 4:10 p.m.: Three minor injuries reported. One person with chest pain from airbag deployment and two with facial injuries.

Press release:

Join in the holiday spirit at the first “Taste of the Holidays” on Friday, Dec. 2 and Saturday, Dec. 3 in the Holiday Tent at Jackson and Main streets.

Friday, Dec. 2 (5:30 - 9 p.m.):
5:30 p.m. - Lighting of the community Christmas tree and singing of carols. Tree is next to Bank of America on Main Street.

In the Holiday Tent (6 to 9 p.m.): More than 10 great area restaurants will be providing a tasting of their menu specialties. They will be handing out coupons and selling gift certificates for the holidays. For entertainment, the OHMS Band will be performing. The cost is $5 per person and children are free.

Community bonfire on Center Street (across from Adam Miller Toy)

Saturday, Dec. 3 (11 a.m. - 3 p.m.):
In the Holiday Tent: Free holiday activities for the children, i.e. decorating ornaments and other holiday crafts). Holiday gift items for sale by local organizations. Entertainment: Bart Dentino & Kevin Huber and the McMahon Irish School of Dance.

Horse & Wagon Rides on Center Street (12 - 3 p.m.): Rides cost $1 per person with proceeds going to the Donny Carroll Toys for Kids fund.

Hosted by the Batavia Business Improvement District.

For more information visit: www.downtownbataviany.com or Facebook: downtown Batavia Business Improvement District.

The driver of a minivan allegedly ran a red light this morning, according to Officer Dan Coffey, causing a three-car accident that sent all three drivers to UMMC by ambulance for treatment and evaluation.

Coffey was in his patrol vehicle, westbound on Ellicott Street, waiting to make a left-hand turn when he saw the van go through the intersection.

His view was obstructed at the point of impact, but the southbound van hit one northbound car, causing it to spin around and strike another northbound car not once, but twice.

Coffey said the driver of the minivan will likely be cited for an infraction, but had not yet completed his accident report.

None of the injuries are believed to be serious.

Kurt Hamilton Hawkins Jr., 18, of State Street, Batavia, is charged with assault, 2nd. Hawkins, an inmate at the Genesee County Jail, is accused of assaulting another inmate at 4:26 p.m., Thursday. The alleged victim was treated at ECMC where he was held overnight for observation.

Sandra Louis Chilano, 51, of Dodgeson Road, Alexander, is charged with petit larceny. Chilano is accused of stealing $100 while employed at Alexander Deli as a clerk.

Ryan Christopher Riggi, 16, of Ridge Road, Lyndonville, was arrested on a warrant issued by Batavia City Drug Court. Riggi was jailed on $100,000 bail.

Samual Christopher Dilcher, 28, of Lewiston Road, Oakfield, is charged with harassment, 2nd. Dilcher was arrested following a complaint of harassment at 2:10 a.m., Sunday on Park Road in Batavia.

Samual Christopher Dilcher, 28, of Lewiston Road, Oakfield, is charged with criminal mischief 4th. Dilcher is accused of smashing the driver-side window out of a pickup truck during an argument at a location on Park Road, Batavia. He is is also charged with trespass. Dilcher was allegedly involved in an incident Nov. 20 in the Batavia Downs parking lot. Upon further investigation Deputy Joseph Graff came to believe that Dilcher had been previously banned from Batavia Downs property.

Christopher Jordan Rhodes, 41, of Transit Road, Wyoming, is charged with DWI, aggravated DWI and failure to keep right. Rhodes was stopped at 2:01 a.m., Sunday, on Lewiston Road, Batavia, by Sgt. Brian Frieday.

Zachary Michael Rebert, 20, of South Pearl Street, Oakfield, is charged with unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, 2nd, and harassment, 2nd. Rebert is accused of getting into a domestic dispute with a woman, pushing her several times and then taking her car without her consent. Rebert was jailed on $5,000 bail.

John Edward Bird, 70, of Barrville Road, Elba, is charged with DWI, driving with a BAC of .08 or greater, failure to stop at a stop sign, moving from lane unsafely and driving left of pavement markings. Bird was stopped at 9:43 P.M., Saturday, on Chapel Road, Byron, by Deputy Jason Saile.

A two-car accident is reported at Batavia-Elba Town Line Road. Seven people are reportedly in one of the vehicles. Mercy medics and fire personnel are responding to the scene.

UPDATE 8:07 p.m.: Several minutes ago, two more ambulances were dispatched. The roadway is blocked. One vehicle is completely disabled.

Downtown is being transformed into a more festive holiday mood with Christmas lights in one of the parks, next to HSBC, and snowflakes hanging from the street lamps.