A resplendent peacock is reportedly in the roadway at Tower Hill and Cole Roads in Bergen. Law enforcement is investigating.
The officer was unable to locate the bird and is moving on to his next assignment.
UPDATE (by Howard): The peacock above may or may not be the same one reportedly seen in the Tower Hill area. This picture was taken by Laura Scarborough on on Cole Road near Route 19, Le Roy, not Bergen. A friend of Laura's describes the bird as very tame and has been knocking at her door for days. Laura said she's afraid the bird will get hit by a car. It stands right next to the roadway. Laura said the friend has called every agency she can think of and each says a tame, loose peacock isn't their issue.
The Batavia Youth Center at 12 McArthur Drive was broken into over Friday and Saturday, with burglars stealing a pair of 37-inch flat screen TVs and video games.
The forceable break-ins occurred between Friday at 6:30 p.m. and Saturday at 3:15 p.m.
Besides the TVs, the thieves stole a Wii console and several Wii games.
The TVs and games are used by children who attend the youth center.
The Batavia Police Department is asking for the public’s help in solving this crime. If anyone has any information about the burglary, they are asked to call the Batavia Police confidential tip line at 345-6370.
A reward is being offered for anyone who will provide information that will lead to the arrest and conviction of the person(s) responsible.
Two of Batavia's young officers recently attended their formal graduation from the Monroe County Basic Police Academy, according to Chief Randy Baker.
Officers Eric Dibble and Jason Ivison graduated together on Friday.
In order to graduate, the recruits completed classroom instruction, firearms training, defensive tactics and on-the-road field training for 16 weeks.
The academy, founded in September, 2010, trains officers for Batavia, Rochester, Greece, Gates, Monroe County and East Rochester.
Both officers received awards for their performance in the academy, Baker said.
Officer Dibble received the class Marksmanship Award for maintaining the highest average score during handgun firearms qualification. Officer Ivison received a Leadership Award for serving as a platoon leader during the academy.
Both officers are currently assigned to different shifts and working on their own.
Independent Living of Genesee Region hosted a picnic for more than 60 people today at Dewitt Recreation Area celebrating the 21st anniversary of passage of the American with Disabilities Act.
After a lunch of hot dogs and hamburgers, some of the guests enjoyed the park, chatted in the pavilion or played Frisbee.
A tire blew up when a 60-year-old man was pumping it up at Memorial Park on Route 19 in Bergen. He has a hand laceration. The location is a bench by the railroad tracks.
A caller reports smoke coming from a wall at 100 Pearl St., Batavia, Paris Repairs.
City Fire Department is responding.
The first unit on scene reports nothing showing.
UPDATE 3:33 p.m.: A firefighter on the roof reports nothing showing. The breaker has been shut off and the smoked stopped. "It appears to be an electrical problem," says a captain.
Jamie Scott Schlonski, 39, of Vine Street, Batavia, is charged with grand larceny 4th, criminal mischief, 3rd, possession of burglar tools and trespass. Also charged, Joseph Allen Hogan, 42, of Bank Street, Batavia. Schlonski and Hogan are accused of breaking into a location on Clinton Street Road, Bergen, at 2:05 a.m., and stealing the windows of the residence. The pair was arrested at 2:40 a.m. Schlonski and Hogan were issued appearance tickets. The case was investigated by Deputy John Weis and Deputy Jason Saile.
Grant A. Sundown, 47, of Skye Road, Basom, is charged with criminal contempt, 1st, reckless endangerment, 2nd, and criminal mischief, 4th. On July 3 at approximately 3:18 p.m., Sundown allegedly drove a vehicle into a set of stairs at a residence on Skye Road, Basom, while a person was standing on the stairs. There was allegedly an order of protection in place barring Sundown from having contact with that person. Sundown was jailed without bail.
A 29-year-old meth cook from South Byron accepted a plea bargain today that could lead to a three- to five-year prison sentence, rather than the maximum 10-year sentence he was facing.
Matthew Zon pleaded guilty to criminal possession of a controlled substance, 2nd, for his part in the meth lab operation at 6319 E. Main St., South Byron (inset photo from the search).
His accomplice, Tricia Tundo, 24, of Byron, also entered a guilty plea, admitting to a lesser felony count of unlawful disposal of methamphetamine lab material.
Tundo faces a passible one and a half years in prison and a year of supervised release.
Lead investigator Sgt. Steve Mullen said at the time of the arrest that the trail that led to Zon and Tundo weaved its way back through a series of related meth lab busts starting with one -- the first one in Genesee County -- Nov. 12, 2009, in Alabama.
The South Byron raid uncovered a working meth lab and an amount of completed product.
Today, Zon satisfied multiple counts pending against him with his guilty plea. He is being held without bail and will remain in jail until his sentencing Aug. 24.
Tundo's guilty plea also satisfies a number of pending charges against her as well as charges that Asst. District Attorney David Gann said could have been filed against her. Gann indicated the Sheriff's Office has sufficient evidence to charge Tundo with all of the counts laid against Zon.
Tundo remains on release under supervision pending her sentencing Sept. 27.
Both Zon and Tundo face a possible $5,000 fine each as well as the suspension of their drivers' licenses.
A 52-year-old Batavia man barricaded himself in his residence, claimed to have a hostage and tried attacking deputies with knives and a sword during a standoff on Pine Hollow Drive on Monday.
The incident started at 8:30 p.m. when law enforcement was dispatched to 8 Pine Hollow Drive to deal with a subject who had allegedly threatened to stab two occupants of the residence.
When State Police and Sheriff's Office deputies arrived the suspect barricaded himself in the home and, according to a State Police press release, "threatened police with various cutleries, including a sword."
During the standoff, the suspect, Jody Blaine Gillett, claimed to have a hostage.
At one point, Gillett allegedly lunged at a deputy through a window attempting to stab the deputy.
After about two hours of negotiations, the State Police press release says, Gillett was "forcibly taken into custody."
Gillett was charged with menacing a police officer, criminal possession of a weapon, 3rd, and two count of menacing.
He was arraigned in Town of Batavia Court and jailed on bail of $50,000 cash or $100,000 bond.
There were no reported injuries related to the incident.
Monday, Batavia Downs opened its 2011 harness racing season. Like last year, I spent some time in the stables and the grandstands taking a few pictures of the big day.
Adam Miller Toy & Bicycles, 8 Center St., Batavia, NY: Feel like a kid in a toy store again, or treat your kids to the greatest toy store they will ever see. We have a $25 gift certificate for $12.50.
Alli's Cones & Dogs, 7063 Lewiston Road, Oakfield, NY: Full breakfast, lunch and dinner menu; all-you-can-eat salad bar; ice cream served year-round; eat-in or take-out. We have $20 gift certificates for $10.
Blue Pearl Yoga, 200 E. Main St., Batavia, NY: Exercise your soul as well as your body in a friendly and relaxing atmosphere. We have a gift certificate for three weeks of yoga, three classes, a $30 value, for $15.
Cookies & Milk, 28 City Center, Batavia, NY. Cookies & Milk offers a wide selection of delicious cookies, cakes and pies. Now offering a full lunch menu that includes soups, salads and sandwiches. Stop by for something sweet! We have $10 gift certificates available for $5.
Clor's Meat Market, 4169 W. Main St. Road, Batavia, NY: For the best, most flavorful, juiciest chicken or hamburger in town, hands down, stop by Clor's. Oh, and the steaks are great, too. And the sausage. Clor's also serves lunch and dinners from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. We have a $10 gift card for $5.
Pudgie's Lawn and Garden Center, 3646 W. Main St. Road, Batavia, NY: it's finally time for spring gardening. Pudgie’s has everything you need, from bird bathes and flowers of every variety to mulch and fertilizer. We have a $25 gift certificate for $12.50.
Settler's, 353 W. Main St., Batavia, NY: Settler's has a 25-year history of serving great, affordable breakfasts, lunches and dinners to Batavians. We have a $20 gift certificate for $10.
South Main Country Gifts, 3356 Main St. Road, Batavia, NY: Handcrafted items, gifts with a regional flair, candles, teas and spices -- South Main has a wide selection to please most any interest. Decorate your home or office for summer. We have a $20 gift certificate for $10.
Spirits, 78 Lake St., Le Roy, NY. Le Roy's favorite sports bar, where fun and good food are always on tap. We have $20 gift certificates for $10.
Stafford Trading Post, 6173 Main Road, Stafford, NY: Lunch or dinner, Stafford Trading Post offers a variety of fresh, homemade meals, as well as snacks and drinks. Now in a new, expanded location. We have a $25 gift card for $12.50.
SOLD OUT
Note: if you've never bought Deal of the Day before, or are otherwise unfamiliar with the rules and process, click here.
Out on Starr Road in Pavilion, on 125 acres of farmland with a view, Randy Starr farms his way.
He's not making a political statement, riding an organic trend -- Starr Farm is not organic -- or trying to reach for some idyllic, romanticized agrarian lifestyle. He just farms according to his own idea of how farming should be.
It's a little bit old school, a little bit high tech, and without the headaches that go with larger operations, but still all the frustrations of a two-person farm using older equipment.
“Once in a while I’ll have somebody say, ‘hey, if I was ever going to be a farmer, I’d be a farmer like you,’' Starr said. "And I think, 'Yeah, but you ain’t doing it, are you?'"
Starr was born to be a farmer. It's all he's even known and what he went to college to study. He's never given a second thought to doing something else.
As the fifth generation to plow and plant the hills along Starr Road, Randy is just pursuing the family tradition.
The farm was started by Noah Starr, Randy's great-great-great grandfather, a Dutch immigrant who bought 270 acres in what's now Pavilion from the Holland Land Office in 1818.
Noah built a log cabin high atop a ridge, married four women during the course of his life (three divorces, one death) and fathered 10 sons.
One of Noah's sons built the first version of the house (about 1890) that Randy and his wife Cindy live in, and it's been added on to and taken away from so many times over the years that now "it's just an old house," according to Randy.
Randy and Cindy both attended Pavilion High School (Cindy was four grades back from Randy) and met when Randy's older brother married Cindy's older sister.
Starr graduated from Alfred College with an agricultural degree in the late 1960s. He said of the couple hundred ag students in his class, only a handful became farmers.
"For some foolish reason I wanted to be a farmer all my life and now here I am. I’m 61 years old. Was that the right move or not? Who knows?"
The Starrs married in the early 1970s and moved into the farmhouse in 1974.
Son Chris, 37, and daughter Sarah, 33, are also farmers. Chris and his wife own a farm on West Middlebury Road, Wyoming County, and Sarah and her husband own a farm off Route 63 in Pavilion. Both Chris and Sarah also work other jobs, and both have children who might some day become farmers.
The Starr Farm sits on rolling hills above Pavilion with a clear view far into Wyoming County. The farm's white house, red barns, glistening silos and well used farm equipment could fit on a picture postcard depicting agricultural life in Upstate New York.
Starr said his son Chris has an even more picturesque farm, but like Chris told him one time, he said, "You can't pay your bills with a view."
No doubt about it, the Starr Farm is a working farm. Cindy helps out as do Chris and Sarah, but Randy does most the work.
On the 125 acres, Randy grows wheat, barley, hay, oats and black beans. They also run about 80 head of cattle -- mostly steers bought as calves from a neighboring dairy, and sold for meat after 18 to 22 months of raising.
Cindy takes care of the hogs, which also go to market.
“Divide that into 125 acres -- we don’t have a lot of anything."
Irrigation is rainwater, so when it was too wet in May, it was hard for Starr to plant, but for the past few weeks, he's been praying for rain.
Life on the Starr Farm certainly has its frustrations.
Just about all of the farm equipment Starr runs is decades old, some of it he bought decades ago (or his dad bought), some of it he finds at auction.
Starr's father, who died 22 years ago, taught him that equipment may become obsolete, but if well maintained, it will run forever.
What Starr needs to buy, he said, he can get at a pretty good price. The equipment he needs is too big for the hobbyist looking to tinker with old farm machinary and too small for the mega-operations.
“It’s an area where you can find things sometimes that nobody else wants. My combine is a good example. It's got a 12-foot grain head and 3-row corn head. It’s a good little combine. I picked it up for $1,400. Sometimes if you’re at the right place at the right time you can get the equipment I need at a reasonable price."
The big operations, of course, are spending $150,000 to $200,000 on a single piece of farm equipment. The plowers and planters are guided by GPS to make perfectly straight rows over dozens of rows.
Big or small equipment breaks down and it's just a different kind of headache.
"My tractor breaks down and their tractor breaks down, theirs is maybe a $50,000 fix and mine is a piece of baling wire and something I can keep it going with."
Why does he farm the way he does? Can't really say. His operation just kind of evolved that way.
When he was young, he said, it seemed like any time he bought a bigger truck or bigger piece of equipment, something would go wrong.
"I can’t be real specific, but it just seemed liked any time I’d jump ahead, I’d got slammed against a wall. It was like, ‘OK, slow down and do it my way.'"
He also watched some of his fellow farmers try to take on too much and it often didn't work out well for the farmer or their suppliers.
He's never going to get rich farming his way, Starr admits, but he'll also be able to keep farming.
"Nothing ventured nothing gained, perhaps, but that’s the way I’ve always been," Starr said. "I’ve seen people go too big too fast and the people they did business with got hurt financially. They file for bankruptcy and these people who put their trust in these farms, building, equipment, whatever it would be, and they lose it all."
Starr's way isn't a complete rejection of technology. He owns a new hay baler because they're now easier to get supplies and parts for, and he grows, for example, genetically modified corn to help control pests and disease (which keeps the farm from being certified as organic).
The reason Starr doesn't spray his crops with a lot of chemicals, has nothing to do with trying to be organic, he usually doesn't see much of a need.
If there was a need, he says he would spray.
He doesn't spray for weeds in his wheat, for example, because the wheat grows so fast, it smothers out the weeds.
As for insects, he tells a couple of stories about what he's learned about using pesticides.
First, there is the story of the army worm.
"A few years ago the alert went out, look out for army worms, and the guys, they had their sprayers and were just flying, but we didn’t spray," Starr said. "I went out looking to see if I could find army worms. I went through all my fields – I had a grand total of I think 40 acres of wheat that year – and I found one little army worm about a quarter of an inch long. It didn’t do any sort of damage at all. We didn’t need to spray."
The second story goes further back and is about a salesman visiting the Starr Farm.
"I had a guy come in years ago and say, ‘I went through your field’ – and I didn’t even know he’d done that -- and he said, ‘Oh, man, have you got insects. We’ve got to spray.’
"Now this was years ago," Starr said, "and I said, 'How much will that cost?' and he said, 'How many acres do you have?' I told him. He said that will probably cost you $3,000 to $4,000. I said, 'Oh my gosh, I haven’t got that kind of money.' I said, 'What would happen if I don’t spray?' He said, ‘Oh, by the time the frost comes, it will kill them all and it won’t be a problem.'”
Starr laughs and adds "He almost got me."
Typical of Starr's demeanor, he's quick to add that he's not criticizing the salesman for trying to make a living or the farmers who think spraying for insects is necessary. He just does it his way for his own reasons.
"I always thought the old-timers knew what they were doing. Work hard, keep your nose clean and you’ll be all right. This is just the way we go. It’s the way we do it. I wouldn’t recommend it to anybody else in the world, but it seems to work for us all right.”
City of Batavia, New York (Pop. 15,600) seeks an experienced professional to join the management team in the capacity of Assistant City Manager/ Director of Administrative Services. Salary: $98,642-$119,642 DOQ. Reporting to the City Manager, the Assistant City Manager/ (ACM) will oversee the functions of Assessment, City Clerk/Treasurer, and IT. This position assists in the implementation of the City’s strategic plan; annual operating budget and capital improvement program; will participate in labor negotiations; and present information to the public, advisory committees and commission, City Council, and outside agencies. In addition, as the ACM, this individual shall assist multiple committees as well as serve as a liaison to various major projects and neighborhood groups. Must have the ability to exercise considerable independent judgment in planning, implementing, overseeing, and reviewing major projects; and the ability to develop and recommend policies and projects. MINIMUM QUALIFICATIONS: Graduation from high school or possession of an appropriate equivalency diploma recognized by the New York State Department of Education, AND EITHER: A. Graduation from a regionally accredited or NYS Registered College with a Master's Degree in Public Administration, Business Administration, or a closely related field and two (2) years of full-time paid experience in a responsible governmental administrative position; OR: B. Graduation from a regionally accredited or NYS Registered College with a Bachelor's Degree in Public Administration, Business Administration, or a closely related field and four (4) years of full-time paid experience in a responsible governmental administrative position; OR: C. Graduation from a regionally accredited or NYS Registered College with an Associate's Degree in Public Administration, Business Administration, or a closely related field and four (6) years of full-time paid experience in a responsible governmental administrative position; OR: D. Eight (8) years full-time paid experience in the private sector, non-profit, and/or government management sector with progressively more responsibility. OR: E. Satisfactory equivalent combination of the foregoing training and experience. To be considered, submit your cover letter, resume, and contact information, including email addresses for five work-related references to Gabrielle Kolo, Human Resources Director, One Batavia City Centre, Batavia, New York 14020 or gkolo@batavianewyork.com. First review of candidates to begin 7/3/25. Background check, personality assessment, and drug testing required. City residency is required within one year of appointment. EEO A full description and list of duties can be found at www.batavianewyork.com under the Human Resources tab.
As the fifth generation to plow and plant the hills along Starr Road, Randy is just pursuing the family tradition.
No doubt about it, the Starr Farm is a working farm. Cindy helps out as do Chris and Sarah, but Randy does most the work.
