genesee county

Moving forward with a proposal to change the scheme of County Legislature terms received a slight nod of approval at the Ways and Means Community yesterday.

County Legislature Chairwoman Mary Pat Hancock volunteered to bring a resolution to the next committee meeting that would authorize a public hearing on the proposal.

"If I can bring a resolution -- not because I'm sponsoring it, or because you're sponsoring it, but because that is the only way it will move forward," Hancock said. "To walk away from this would not be respectful of the committee."

The proposal would increase legislative terms from two to four years and stagger the terms so that entire legislature is not put up for election every two years. A committee charged by the Legislature to study a suggestion brought forward by a local resident made the recommendations.

There was no vote yesterday on Hancock's request, but also no objection raised during the committee meeting.

"I know it's not on your personal agenda, nor is it on ours, but it's out there," said Hollis Upson, committee chairman.

As Legislator Ed DeJaneiro spoke in favor of the specifics of the proposal, Legislator Annie Lawrence shook her head.

Asked later if she objected to the proposal, she said she might or might not support it, but now is not the time to deal with it.

"I don't think any of the legislators have heard any comments from any of their constituents," Lawrence said. "I think we've got bigger fish to fry this year than to bring this out."

Assemblyman Steve Hawley issued the following news release today after Albany passed its 11th "budget extender."

“After two and half months, and 11 emergency budget extenders, New Yorkers are still without a state budget. In that time, we’ve seen our schools, local governments, contractors, state parks, and small businesses left in jeopardy as their fates have been left in the hands of weekly budget extenders.

"Although the ‘good’ that has come out of these extenders includes the reopening of state parks, some contractual obligations being met, school districts receiving their state aid, and other essential state services remaining open, the ‘good’ has without a doubt come with plenty of ‘bad’ and ‘ugly’ costs.

“The bad consists of the simple fact that since April 1, the more than $9 billion budget gap has hardly been addressed. Instead, the most recent extenders have raised fees by nearly $4 million, raided $80 million from the Environmental Protection Fund, and introduced ‘savings,' rather than make the real cuts that are needed.

Additionally, this process does not allow schools, local governments, and businesses with state contracts to formulate their own budgets. Even uglier, because of the lack of a transparent budget process, the ‘three men in a room’ may close these budget shortfalls with more taxes, more state borrowing, and even more of the special-interest-driven backroom deals that put our state in this fiscal crisis to begin with.

“These budget extenders are simply laying the framework for another over-bloated state budget to be passed through a piecemeal process. I again voted against the budget extenders and ask that my colleagues in the Assembly and Senate majorities open up the budget process, allow needed input from rank-and-file members, and see to it that it is passed immediately.”

What Public Defender Gary Horton calls a "throw off line" in a recent court decision could create a headache for Genesee County.

New York Court of Appeals in May ruled in favor of a defendant on a case and mentioned that one of the problems with the defendant's conviction was that he wasn't given adequate representation at his initial arraignment.

It's common in upstate New York -- including Genesee County -- for defendants arrested in off-hours to be given an initial arraignment without their own attorney in court, even a public defender.

The arraignments are pretty routine -- the defendant learns the charges against him and what his rights are going forward -- but the court ruled, according to Horton, that the arraignment is a critical part of the process and defendants should have legal representation.

Horton said he's concerned that the Office of Court Administration will order that no arraignment should take place without the defendant having an attorney in court.

"I didn’t hire attorneys to be on call and basically you would have to have an attorney on call every night and on weekends," Horton told the County's Public Service Committee on Monday afternoon.

Many of the larger counties, according to Horton, have certified holding cells -- allowing the counties to keep arrestees behind bars until the normal business hours of courts and the public defender's office.

The ruling likely won't effect previous convictions, Horton said, because courts would find that a defendant's case outcome would have changed even if there had been a public defender at the initial arraignment. It would be a "harmless error," according to Horton.

Genesee county crews were hard at work on Pratt road this morning removing trees and branches that were a potential hazard to drivers.

In honor of Mother's Day, New York Farm Bureau is saluting the growing ranks of women that have recently entered into farming. Here's a news release from the bureau:

Women farmers are among the fastest growing sectors in agriculture, according to recent state and federal statistics. The most recent agricultural census, done in 2007, revealed that women were the principal operators of 6,688 farms in New York on 592,787 acres of land.

"The trend of women joining this industry makes sense," said Julie Suarez, public policy director for Farm Bureau and mother of two. "Women farmers can work where they live, alongside their children. It's the ultimate family lifestyle.

"Women farmers are also producing something of value for the community at large -- good food. The occupation offers tremendous job satisfaction, although not always as financially lucrative as other businesses.

"There's always been a strong female partnership in our state's family farms, but the recent trend is for farmers' daughters, and innovative women seeking new careers, to start up their own farm operation or initiate a new endeavor on the home farm."

Women are running more farms and operating more land, and producing a greater value of agricultural products than ever before. When compared to all farms nationwide, those with female principal operators tend to be smaller both in terms of size and sales. However, women are more likely to own all of the farmland that they operate.

"There are a lot of state programs out there that seek to help minority- and women-owned businesses with start-up, micro-loans or state procurement opportunities," Suarez said. "But farmers don't often think about these programs because their availability is not usually publicized in rural areas in a field that's stereotypically dominated by men.

"The reality couldn't be further from the truth as farm families know that women have always played an equal role in the farm family and business. However, when women seek to develop their own farm operations there aren't many development tools geared toward meeting the needs of women opening up a farm business in a rural area.

"We hope that by highlighting this growing segment of agriculture, and saluting our female farmers, we can encourage greater awareness of the need for minority- and women-owned business programs to consider the great potential that exists for women in starting new farm operations."

According to the map of power outages from National Grid, there are more than two dozen power outages in Genesee County at the moment.

None, individually, effect more than 20 customers.

Soon, Gensee County residents could have another convenient location -- and perhaps one of the more logical places -- to buy EZPass for Thruway tolls -- the local DMV office.

On Wednesday, County Clerk Don Read received approval from the Ways and Means Committee (the proposal must also be approved by the full Legislature) to establish a funding mechanism to buy EZPass stickers to resell at the DMV and County Clerk's office.

"We’d like to be the first one in the county where somebody could come in, know they’re traveling this weekend and pick up an EZPass and they can use it immediately," Read said.

The idea started at a meeting of the state's county clerks in Albany, Read said, when the Thruway Authority met with the clerks and offered to allow them to start selling the automatic toll passes.

Getting started takes some effort, according to Read, from getting funding approval -- the passes must be paid for in advance -- to filling out a tightly spaced eight-page application.

If the program doesn't work, though, Read said, the County won't be out any money. Any unsold EZpasses can be returned to the Thruway Authority for a full refund.

The camouflage overalls Scott Doll wore the night of Feb. 16, 2009 were stained with human blood, not deer blood.

His knees were so saturated that it soaked through his correctional officer work pants and stained his skin. One of the excuses he offered when questioned by a Sheriff's Deputy that night was that he butchered deer.

When first approached by a deputy, he was carrying a jack and lug wrench in his pockets, and offered contradictory statements about what he was doing walking on North Lake Road in Pembroke.

Late morning and afternoon testimony on the first day of Doll's trial -- over the killing of Joseph Benaquist in an alleged business-partnership deal gone bad -- put the accused in the vicinity of the murder scene covered with blood and unable to fully explain the situation to deputies.

Deputy James Diehl was dispatched to Pembroke after a report of a suspicious person. Doll was northbound on the east shoulder of the roadway, wearing overalls and a white firefighter's hood sock, which covered his face and head except his eyes.

Diehl testified that Doll had bulges in both pants pockets. The officer pulled up within 20 feet behind him and an object fell out of Doll's left front pocket, onto the ground in front of a mailbox.

It was a tire jack, but he made no attempt to pick it up and continued walking toward the deputy's vehicle as he was motioned to do. Doll pulled a tire lug wrench out of his right front pocket to show the officer, too.

Diehl asked the Corfu resident why he was out walking in Pembroke. Doll replied that he had parked his car at a nearby repair garage and was taking tools to a friend's house. He was walking there in order to get a cardio workout, because he had a doctor's appointment the very next day and needed to lower his cholesterol and heart rate. He wore overalls because it was cold.

The deputy noticed "what appeared to be wet blood marks" on Doll's clothing. When asked about the bloody overalls and white sneakers, Doll said "I butcher deer."

Doll retrieved the tire jack, emptied his pockets -- a wallet, a lone car key, some Seneca cigarettes, a green Bic lighter and a screwdriver. Doll asked to be taken back to his van.

Things weren't adding up, Diehl said, and he told Doll he was taking him into custody until there were some answers. The deputy cuffed Doll, put him in the back seat, and the tools on the front seat, so they wouldn't scratch up the upholstery.

They drove to where the van was parked. (It was actually his mother Audrey's vehicle, which Scott was driving because his daughter had borrowed his truck.)

Pulling into the repair shop, the deputy saw a red Ford Windstar mini-van, a blue van and a white van. He noticed bloody work gloves, palms up, on the hood of the blue van, blood spatters on the door on the Windstar and its driver's seat.

On cross-examination, attorney Paul Cambria asked if Doll tried to flee after the object fell out of his pocket on North Lake Road. Diehl answered no. Cambria asked if Doll retrieved the object when asked to -- "he didn't try to throw it in a field." Diehl said no, he retrieved it. When Doll was asked for identification, he provided it, correct? Cambria asked. Yes, Diehl replied.

Cambria asked if Diehl had noticed bloody footprints in the snow, blood on the front headlight of the Windstar, along the driver's side, to the back lights. Yes, the deputy said.

Cambria asked if Diehl heard Doll ask for an attorney. Diehl said no, but he was told that Doll had indeed asked for one. Cambria asked if, when cuffing Doll and putting him into the patrol car, he had read him his Miranda warnings? No, was the answer.

(The Miranda warnings are a recitation of a person's Constitutional rights once taken into custody.)

Next on the witness stand was Deputy Patrick Reeves, a 13-year veteran of the Sheriff's Department and a Pembroke native. He knows Doll, used to work for the Doll family at the Super Duper and later the Jubilee Market. Reeves was shift commander the night in question and met up with the two men at the car repair shop.

Reeves said there were no lights on in the parking lot. Doll's coveralls were unzipped and his hair was disheveled. He asked Doll were he was headed and Doll said to see friends, but couldn't say where they lived. He told him about doing cardio, but Reeves noticed his shoes, which were so worn out they were practically soleless, were not appropriate for that activity in that kind of weather.

Reeves shined his flashlight on Doll and saw flecks of blood on his cheek, nose and on his knees, which Doll said was "old blood." The officer knows the Pembroke area intimately, knows about hunting. He pressed Doll about butchering deer and Doll said "It's not deer blood."

At that point, Reeves said his heart was pounding.

"I was getting scared," Reeves said.

He asked Doll if there was someone out there who was injured and needed an ambulance.

"Pat, you know me better than that," Doll replied.

Reeves then noticed various "dings and dents" around the bloodied vehicle and a single set of footprints and called an investigator to the scene.

"Things weren't adding up in my mind," Reeves said. "I thought maybe he was afraid of killing a deer out of season and losing his hunting license. I told him not to worry about that. Who cares?"

Doll replied, "Listen, I got three months to retire, Pat, I don't want to talk about it."

Reeves observed blood marks on the bottoms of Doll's shoes.

"It was clear to me that there was more to this, so I walked him back to the patrol car," Reeves testified.

District Attorney Lawrence Friedman asked if Doll said he wanted an attorney.

"I don't want to talk about the blood anymore," Reeves recalled Doll told him. "... Do what you gotta do."

So Reeves asked if there was anyone he wanted to speak to and Doll said an attorney. But because Reeves remained concerned there might be a person needing immediate medical attention, he continued his line of questioning without getting Doll an attorney, and felt legally justified in doing so.

Cambria asked if Reeves and Diehl later searched the roadways looking for any evidence. They had, Reeves said, noting they looked off the shoulders, in the ditches, in nearby brush and, in some places, up to the trees.

Cambria asked if Reeves was aware, that the few houses that were in the rural area had their garbage cans out. Yes, said the deputy. Did you look in any of the garbage cans for evidence? Cambria asked. No, only in front of one house, Reeves replied, and nothing was found.

Did Reeves recall being asked if Doll said "I didn't do it"? Reeves, said no, he couldn't recall that.

But Cambria produced testimony from Reeves on a pre-trial transcript, page 100, where Reeves states "He told me he didn't do it."

Under questioning, Reeves acknowledged that he concluded the bloody footprints were Doll's.

When Doll asked for an attorney, Cambria asked, "did you give him a phone?"

No, said the deputy.

"Did you give him any opportunity to get an attorney?"

No, said the deputy.

"The request was ignored, was it not?" Cambria asked.

"At that time," Reeves replied.

Doll, who turns 48 on May 16, was flanked by his attorneys during the testimony and appeared calm and attentive, wearing a charcoal-gray, pinstriped suit. The jury of five men and 12 women were equally attentive.

Courtroom sketch from today's proceedings depicts D.A. Lawrence Friedman questioning Investigator Kris Kautz about blood evidence. The sketch was drawn by Colin Dentino exclusively for The Batavian. To view a larger version of the sketch, click here.

While the crime rate in New York went down from 2000 to 2009, both for violent and for property crime, in Genesee County, the crime data is more of a mixed bag.

In Genesee County, from 2000 to 2009, the crime rate dropped 8.4 percent, with 1,634 crimes reported in 2000 and 1,496 reported in 2009.

But violent crime increased during the same period, going from 85 violent crimes in 2000 to 92 in 2009, an 8.2-percent increase. All of the increase is in the category of rape, which jumped from 9 reported rapes in 2000 to 17 in 2009.

Property crimes dropped from 1,549 reported crimes in 2000 to 1,404 in 2009, a 9.4-percent decrease. Motor vehicle thefts saw the biggest drop, going from 51 to 37, a 27.5-percent drop.

From 2008 to 2009, crime in Genesee County increased 3.7 percent, with total reported crimes increasing from 1,443 to 1,496. 

Violent crime, year-over-year, however, was down 18.6 percent, with 92 reported crimes in 2009 compared to 113 in 2008.

Property crime in Genesee County rose 5.6 percent last year, over the 1,330 crimes reported in 2008.

Statewide, from 2000 to 2009, violent crime dropped 30 percent and property crime fell 24 percent.

Rather than hire a new county employee to replace John Demske, who retires May 14 as director of the Genesee County Nursing Home, a county committee is recommending the Legislature approve a contract with a consultant to provide nursing-home supervision.

The Legislature is being asked to vote on a contract with Insource Healthcare Solutions, out of Buffalo, at a special meeting at 5:30 p.m., Wednesday.

The contract would authorize the county to pay Insource $11,000 per month -- the same cost as a full-time county employee being placed in the position, according County Manager Jay Gsell.

"We felt this was a very good way for us to get new administration in place," Gsell said.

By state law, a licensed administrator who has been approved by the state Department of Health must supervise the nursing home every single day its doors are open, so the county must have Demske's replacement in place on May 15.

Gsell said there never really was a search for a full-time county employee to replace Demske. With the county currently studying its options for the future of the financially troubled nursing home, it made more sense, Gsell said, to have an administration firm handle those duties for now.

"Because we're in the process of studying what our options are, for us to go through the process of hiring another employee and all the things that involves, that right now, getting a licensed administrator ... is a good way for us to have a fairly seamless transition," Gsell said.

The actual administrator Charles Rice, is an employee of Insource currently working at a private facility in Jamestown.

If the Legislature approves the contract with Insource on Wednesday, Rice's credentials would be submitted to the state for approval. Gsell said that process takes about a week.

By law, the initial term of the contract cannot be longer than the term of the current Legislature, so the contract with Insource is for 18 months. Gsell said it will contain language allowing for renewals on an annual basis for another three or four years.

Not too long ago, a young Genesee County mother beat her 18-month-old child with a belt for what most of us would consider a typical toddler's action.

Ed Minardo, director of Genesee Justice, was recently injured while attempting to break up a fight between two high school girls -- both cheered on by nine other youths -- outside of one of Genesee Justice's satellite offices.

In November 2005, Lisa and Bill Fickel were settling in for a typical Thursday night at their Oakfield home, when suddenly a truck pulled into their driveway; the driver then pulled out and parked across the street. Thinking that perhaps this person was interested in buying their van (which Lisa said they were trying to sell at that time), Bill went outside to meet him/her.

After a while, Lisa realized she had waited an awful long time for him to come back. She hadn't heard any conversation outside the whole time -- just the sound of the truck backfiring. Impatient to have her husband back inside so that they could watch "Survivor," she stepped out into the night...and found that the truck was gone.

She saw Bill's flashlight lying on the ground -- which was unusual, because Bill was always very careful with his tools and such. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she caught something lying on the side of the road. She looked closer, and saw that it was Bill.

At that moment, she knew that the noise she had mistaken for the sound of the truck backfiring was the gunshot that killed her husband.

Yes, Genesee County is better off than other places -- particularly urban communities -- when it comes to community violence; but clearly, violence is a very real and pressing concern for Batavia and the surrounding area.

A newly formed "Coalition," which has not yet chosen a formal name, has resolved to address and rectify this problem. The Coalition's members include:

William Privett, the regional coordinator for the international Catholic peace movement Pax Christi.

Left to right: Captain Robert Kurtz of the Salvation Army, Fickel (who is GCASA's Drug Free Communities coordinator) and Minardo.

Jackson Elementary School Principal Shawn Clark, Batavia High School Assistant Principal Julia Rogers, and Genesee County District Attorney Lawrence Friedman.

The Coalition held its first community forum last night at the Batavia YWCA. Privett started by identifying the group's mission, which is to develop and implement their shared vision of Genesee County being the first explicitly nonviolent -- "peaceful" -- community in the U.S.

"We're not naive, though," Privett said.

To prove this point, he proceeded to read the State Division of Criminal Justice Services' statistics on the county.

In 2008, the county had:

• 113 violent crimes

• 1,329 property crimes

• 14 robberies

• 1,031 larcenies

• 43 stolen vehicles

In addition, reports from the YWCA indicated 751 cases of domestic violence and sexual assaults in 2009.

"Each of these incidents represents a person, a story," Minardo said. "Sooner or later we have to ask ourselves, 'How dare we not get involved in this?'"

The type of involvement the Coalition calls for is not the kind of pedantic finger-wagging you might think of. One of their objectives is to reach out compassionately to both the victims and the perpetrators of violence.

During the question-and-answer session, an attendee stressed the importance of support systems for stressed parents and others who might be at risk for violent behavior instead of "targeting" them as enemies. This is one example of the type of outreach the Coalition wants to adopt and inspire.

Another is, in Minardo's words, to "develop a clearer image of what it means to be a nonviolent community.

"This takes the ability to navigate through the complexities of conflict, and to understand and respect people who commit acts of violence," Minardo said.

The Coalition understands "acts of violence" to be a broadly inclusive term. Privett offered the following definition of violence (in roughly these words): "Any physical, emotional, verbal, sexual, institutional/structural, or spiritual action that violates the dignity and value of others."

In his testimony, Captain Kurtz talked about how he literally "poured violence down (his) throat and put it up (his) nose" during his days as an alcoholic and a drug addict. He considers his alcohol and drug usages to have been acts of violence toward himself, and his journey of recovery has motivated him to help perpetrators and victims alike.

Of major importance to the Coalition is early intervention -- that is, targeting thinking patterns and influences that lead to violence and nipping the problem in the bud.

As school administrators, Clark and Rogers are especially privileged in that regard. Both have been involved in implementing programs to promote positive behavior in a generation of children who, in Clark's words, "are exposed now more than ever to violence in the media, and just in general."

One tool that Rogers and Clark have found useful is V.A.D.I.R. -- Violent and Disruptive Incident Reports -- which keeps track of different types of violence in the schools. In Batavia, V.A.D.I.R. data has pointed to certain commonalities in each school building. These form the starting point for administrative interventions.

"I believe that if we address the little things, the big things will take care of themselves," said Clark, who started serving as principal at Jackson last year.

He has spent most of his career working with underprivileged children in the Rochester schools, and has worked closely with students, teachers and parents on topics such as gang awareness, bullying, etc.

"What I find," Clark said, "is that a small group of children are bullies, a small group of children are the victims of bullies, and then the majority are kids who want to help the victims of bullying but don't quite know how. The problem is that empathy drops over time, so we really have to get to them early."

One of the interventions Clark has implemented in the past year is the Peaceful School Bus Program. Jackson has the largest population of bus riders in the Batavia City School District, and last year Clark received 120 referrals for problems that occurred on the bus. This new program for students, teachers and bus drivers has helped the children learn how to help each other and solve problems they may encounter on the bus.

"It's had a huge impact," Clark said. "I've only had 52 referrals for bus incidents, which is less than half what I had last year."

Rogers, who has also worked closely with faculty, staff, families and students on promoting positive behavior, talked about the challenge that modern technology presents in this area.

"When I was in school, we used to pass notes," she said. "Now you have kids texting each other and communicating on online sites. They can badmouth their schoolmates on these sites, and the kids they're talking about will have no knowledge of what they're saying about them. So parents really need to be monitoring what their kids are doing on the computer."

Privett echoed Rogers' call for parent involvement in his invitation to the whole community, including schools, churches, nonprofit organizations and ordinary citizens. Likewise, Minardo stressed that the coalition is about getting involved with the problem of violence at all age levels and at every stage of its progression -- whether prevention, response, or otherwise.

"The schools can't do it alone," said Privett. "We all need to make this of the highest priority. Otherwise, what will things be like 10 years from now?"

This is actually the reason the Coalition did not give itself an official name. They wanted to wait for people to join them, so that the public could help to determine their mission and their title.

The Coalition's next meeting will be held at 4 p.m. on May 10 at the First Presbyterian Church, 300 E. Main St. in Batavia. Please call William Privett at 599-3366, or e-mail <wprivett.paxchristi@gmail.com>, for more information.

Genesee County isn't the only county in New York struggling with what to do with its nursing home in an era of skyrocketing costs and dwindling resources.

All 36 counties in the state with nursing homes are facing the same issues, according to a press release from the New York State Association of Counties.

“We need to address following questions. Should counties be in the long-term care business? If the answer to that question is yes, then we need to develop funding formulas or financing mechanisms that do not require annual property tax increases to keep them open,” said NYSAC President Tom Santulli.

The NYSAC statement says:

Counties are in a crisis and are confronted with unique challenges with the health and fiscal stability of public nursing homes. Those challenges include complying with the unfunded mandates such as Wicks Law and contributing to growing public employee pension rates and healthcare costs.

To help counties address the issues, NYSAC is hosting a nursing home summit May 25 in Ulster County. The summit will address:

• Long term care reimbursement and the NYS budget crisis,
• The current fiscal health of county nursing homes in New York State,
• Challenges of operating a county-owned nursing facility,
• Analysis of the state’s population demographics, relative to housing needs, and
• Alternatives to institutional long-term care including home/community-based alternatives.

The press release concludes:

“County-owned nursing homes are in state of transition. The state’s indecisiveness about the role of counties in long-term care, and their temporary fixes are not solving the problems we are facing. They are Band-Aids but they are not addressing the structural deficiencies,” said Stephen J. Acquario, executive director of NYSAC.

A Rochester-based home-healthcare provider has completed its purchase of Genesee County's home nursing care program.

Home Care of Rochester, HCR, received what's known as a "certificate of need" from the State Department of Health, which is required for it to provide both long-term and short-term home nursing for Genesee County patients.

Since March of 2009, when HCR acquired the program from the county for $1.5 million, HCR has been operating in Genesee County under the county's certificate of need.

With the purchase, HCR replaces the county-owned program. HCR will now handle all acute, longer-term, therapy and home health-aide services for patients receiving insurance coverage via Medicare or Medicaid.

HCR also provides care through private insurance.

You know if I'm out in the towns, I'm going to be looking for barn pictures.  This one I found on Bethany Center Road.

After the jump are more pictures I took today as I drove between Batavia and Genesee County Park.

City and county officials were heading up Earth Day/Arbor Day activities at three locations in Genesee Park. At Austin Park, the city hosted a park clean-up day. At Dewitt Recreation Area, volunteers and children were out to clean up the park, plant trees and post birdhouses, and at Genesee County Park, volunteers were on hand to clean up the trails.

After the jump are more pictures:

The judiciary should take over administration of probation departments in New York, especially juvenile programs, New York's top judge told a gathering of Genesee County's legal community today at the County Courthouse.

New York State Chief Judge, Hon. Jonathan Lippman, said studies show that the state's juvenile facilities -- where young offenders are housed -- are making the problems of juvenile crime worse, not better.

"The results of those investigations are that those facilities become high schools for crime," Lippman said. "In these detention facilities, kids who didn’t necessarily commit a very high level of crime, not the equivalent of a felony, but a kind of misdemeanor, and you send them there and they come back criminals."

In response to a question from Julie Smith, head of Genesee County's Probation Department, Lippman went further and said not only should juvenile probation be administered by the judiciary-- a change which is already being debated in the State Legislature -- but adult probation, too.

Lippman said the state judiciary wants to ensure that probation leads to better outcomes. He used the judiciary's experience with drug courts as an example of how judges are trained to work with defendants to guide them toward reform rather than a life of crime.

"A judge oversees their recovery from their addiction(s) and makes them useful citizens again instead of having them come into court over and over...until they commit a real serious crime and then we throw away the key," Lippman said.

Among other reforms Lippman discussed is giving the state's judges their first raise in a decade. He said if members of the judiciary don't get raises, it will be harder to attract top-notch legal minds to the bench. 

Lippman also said it's important to keep funding levels up for legal representation for indigent people involved in civil cases.

In lawsuits where a person's very well-being is at stake, such as potentially losing a house, a court-appointed attorney is vital for those who cannot afford one. Lippman says that that person's legal representation is just as important as it is for indigents needing counsel in a criminal-defense case.

In previous years, the state's fund for civil legal services was financed from interest on various investment accounts, but with the dip in the economy those funds have dried up.  So Lippman said the judiciary is setting aside $15 million from its budget to fill the gap.

Below, Stephen Wieczorek receives an award, with his grandson in attendance, from Judge Lippman.

More pictures after the jump.

City Court judges Robert Balbick and Michael DelPlato.

Attorney Bob Fussell asks a question.

Center, District Attorney Lawrence Friedman.

Genesee County Sheriff Gary Maha.

Genesee County Probation Director Julie Smith asking a question.

From left: Hon. Michael Coccoma, Deputy Chief Administrative Judge, Courts outside NYC; Hon. Robert J. Balbick, Batavia City Court Judge; Hon. Paula Feroleto, Administrative Judge, 8th Judicial District; Hon. Eric R. Adams, Genesee County Family Court Judge; Hon. Jonathan Lippman, Chief Judge, New York State; Hon. Robert C. Noonan, Genesee County Court Judge; Hon. Sheila DiTullio, Erie County Court Judge; Hon. James P. Punch, Orleans County Judge.

There's now a time line in place for the Center for Governmental Research to conduct its study on the future of the Genesee County Nursing Home.

It starts with meetings of key stakeholders at the nursing home and ends with a final report delivered to the County Legislature in September.

During the process, CGR consultants will meet regularly with the legislature's steering committee.

The full time line is available here (pdf).

When the interlock-device provision of Leandra's Law is implemented on Aug. 15, there may be only one local auto-service shop certified to install the devices on the cars of convicted drunken drivers.

Bill's Auto at 101 Evans St., Batavia, is an authorized service agent for Des Moines, Iowa-based Intoxalock, one of six manufacturers certified by New York to sell the devices under court-mandated penalties for DWI. So far, no other Genesee County repair shop has apparently become certified to install interlock devices for any of the other manufacturers.

Business might be booming soon for Bill Ruffino -- with an estimated 300 to 400 cars in Genesee County required to get the device in the next year -- but Ruffino isn't sure that's a good thing.

Devices must be installed on every car a convicted drunken driver might drive. Once installed, a monthly inspection is required for each device, so for some drivers that might mean multiple trips to Bill's Auto.

Ruffino also figures that some people will be just flat embarrassed that they were convicted of DWI.

At the end of the day, some convicted drunken drivers may not have a warm-and-fuzzy feeling about Bill's Auto after going through the process.

"They’re not going to be happy people coming in here if they have to have it on multiple vehicles and get it inspected," Ruffino said. "It’s going to be a hassle. I’m not sure how happy they are going to be to see me."

Leandra's Law was passed in November in a rush following the death of Leandra Rosado, an 11-year-old passenger in the car of an allegedly driven drunken driver. It stipulates that interlock devices be required for six-months or longer on the cars owned or operated by convicted drunken drivers.

Ruffino said he isn't sure how it's all going to work -- the state has yet to produce guidelines, but he does know his shop is going to be doing a lot more installations and monthly inspections.

Yes, monthly inspections. Each car with the device will be required to roll into the shop for a visual inspection, and a piece of the device that contains a data chip will be taken out, put in a box and mailed to the manufacturer. Then technicians there download the data and provide it to Genesee County officials.

Currently, Bill's Auto has only two clients with interlock devices installed, so he said he really isn't clear how his shop, the county and state will work together on the new program.

"I never actually spoke with the county when I signed up for this," Ruffino said. "It was just a rep from the manufacturer itself who got a hold of me and asked me to do it, but until this came through, I’d never spoken with anybody (from the county) about it."

Earlier this week, Genesee County officials raised concerns about the lack of details from the state on how the new program will work and who will pay for administration of the program, but a spokesman for Intoxalock said many of the county concerns are already taken care of by state law.

For example, county taxpayers will not be burdened with the cost of the devices for so-called indigent convicts.

Brad Fralick, director of government relations for Intoxalock, said that New York already requires manufactures to cover devices for convicted drunken drivers who can't afford the devices. 

While the state is working out a scheme for an assessment to be charged to convicts who can afford the devices, that sort of arrangement isn't unusual. Fralick said in other states, such assessments are used either to pay for device installations, or for administrative costs.

A press release on the Intoxalock website says that interlock devices reduce repeat offenses by 64 percent.

Even though New York's installations are expected to jump from 2,500 to 25,000 under Leandra's Law, Fralick said his company is prepared -- already ramping up production -- to handle the increased business.

The cost for a convicted drunken driver, will exceed $1,000. On each car, the convict will be required to pay $65 per month, plus $19 to Bill's Auto for monthly inspections, and $112 for the initial installations and $40 to have it removed once the monitoring period is over.

Fralick pointed out that the cost is a lot less than the $10,000 to $15,000 a second DWI conviction would cost the driver.

Fralick doesn't expect county taxpayers to take on the cost of installation and monitoring of the devices. He said it's already New York law that the manufacturers provide the devices for drivers who can't provide them. And negotiations are under way to create an assessment on those drivers who can afford the devices, to pay for those who can't.

In all, 47 states have some type of law requiring interlock devices, Fralick said.

In related news, the county's Ways and Means Committee passed a draft resolution Wednesday asking the State Legislature to amend Leandra's Law to give local court judges discretion on whether a convicted drunken driver would be required to install interlock devices.