Breaking News

Local Commentaries

We need a new generation of community leaders

From an early age, my father taught me the importance of giving back. As a postman in our city for nearly 30 years, he saw the needs of our community that often went unnoticed—from seniors living in isolation to families waiting for housing support. He taught my brother and I that community isn’t something we simply live in; it’s something we help build. One of my earliest memories is accompanying my dad alongside an older gentleman he had befriended while delivering mail to Heritage Village. The man had no family in the area, no real connections outside of the group home he ...

Maintaining republic requires understanding its founding

CHAUTAUQUA - Let’s pick up where we left off 23 weeks ago, with a speech by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas at the University of Texas. Progressivism is a form of statism more commonly known in the United States as liberalism. Thomas explained that “progressivism”—the ...

The bridge is in a race with winter

It looks to me like construction activity has been increasing on the Chautauqua Lake Bridge as winter begins to close in. Will the DOT be able to beat winter and finish the two lanes on the southside before the construction season ends? I would say that the chances are “fifty-fifty,” yet, let’s hope that it can be done. The pouring of new concrete decking has been accelerating. There are now two concrete leveling machines in view on the bridge so that two sections of new deck can be laid at the same time. Instead of being continuous, some of the new deck sections are being ...

A proposal for downtown parking

I read with interest the recent coverage of the parking meter complaints being raised before City Council, particularly Councilman Bonfiglio's reference to a "yelling match in front of Pace's." Before anything else, I want to thank Councilman Bonfiglio for continuing to raise this issue and for the support he has shown Pace's throughout this entire situation. His willingness to bring this before the Council, more than once now, has not gone unnoticed, and we are grateful to have him championing this on our behalf. I also want to say, outside of this particular parking issue, that the ...

Oh Canada, we are sorry

On D-Day, June 6, 1944, as American forces stormed Omaha Beach at a cost of 2,800 lives, our Canadian neighbors and friends stormed Juno Beach at a cost of 381 lives. (Our population in 1944 was 130,000,000, more than 10 times Canada’s 12,000,000). Canadians served alongside our armed forces in Korea, Vietnam, Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm in Iraq, and in Afghanistan after the 9-11 attack on our Country. Until Donald Trump became President and treated Canada with no respect, as a non-nation that should be our 51st State, as something to be punished with punitive tariffs, ...

Humor can help transcend press hostility

CHAUTAUQUA—Do you know which national-news source is—according to polls—most trusted? Western New York native and Wall Street Journal columnist Jason Riley posed that question to the morning-lecture audience in the Chautauqua Institution amphitheater on July 1. Think about that ...