For example, the skate park issue. I live on that street. When the neighbors had concerns we all called one another, met together and discussed what concerns we wanted the board to address.

It all starts with small groups of people, meeting together and then bringing it to a public forum. That is what the board is there for. Or should be anyway.
What has left a bad taste in my mouth is the sniping, name calling and vicious language people have thrown at eachother in the past. This accomplishes nothing and causes division.

If you have a group of Democrats, Independents that have issues you would like addressed bring it to the meeting. It is open to you, all of you, take advantage of it.
Perhaps there are alot of you out there that have felt closed off in the past but I believe fresh air is being breathed into a dead soul here and you can help it along greatly.
Realisticly I know I will never please everyone but I can at least attempt to motivate effective dialogue.
And please note that if I disagree with you on an issue I am not AGAINST you, I am simply taking a stand on what I think may be right.
We have a new Mayor (a wonderful choice I might add). We have fresh faces, new ideas, and hopefully a better way to communicate that will lead to less frustration.

On my binder that I carry to the meetings I have a quote written on it:
” Never doubt that a small group of citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has” – Margaret Mead

If you would like to grab a cup of coffee sometime and meet me, I would be happy to do that.

By the way everybody, your public officials are available to you at anytime, you can call them. You can email us, go to the Village of Trumansburg website and all of our email addresses are posted. Public information on issues you have concerns about are available at the village office. The (FOIL) Freedom of Information Law allows you to have access to the documents you want to see.

Hope to see you at the next board meeting!

we will see… how you cover… the recent events.

In the three years I’ve been here, I have never once backed away from a conversation with someone that disagreed with the way we do things here. And if we can adapt to make the paper more alluring to new readers, we’ll do it. If you want to see differing viewpoints represented, I encourage anyone posting here to send in something for the guest opinion section. Outside of potential libelous writings, I’ve never once turned down printing a viewpoint, no matter the view.

Maybe a “meet the paper’s staff” forum similar to what the Journal offers would be in order, give everyone in the community a chance to get together and talk with the staff of the Free Press and ask pertinent questions. If there’s interest, I’ll set something up in the near future.

I think you wear your bias quite openly, which in my mind negates it and allows me to parse your writing knowing where it is coming from. I think this is a good thing.

The free press is not as up front about their bias, even going so far as to deny it in these forums.

I didn’t back a candidate in the election. I didn’t endorse anyone. I did host Chris Thomas and David Filiberto at a coffee in my home, because I was asked to do so, and I did end up voting for them, in large part because I discovered that Rordan Hart hadn’t bothered to vote in a previous village election, even though he was registered to vote.

I used to be a Democrat, but last autumn I re-registered as an independent – affiliated with no party. However, I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with people being partisan here in Trumansburg. Let people be honest with their opinions, without everyone pretending to be moderate or centrist. I find that those terms tend to cover up partisanship.

I just don’t believe anyone who says that they don’t have an agenda. I don’t buy the idea that anybody – not Gandhi, not Mother Teresa – is selfless. I think that we can try to work with other people to find common ground so that more than one agenda can be satisfied, but I find it hard to even begin a discussion with someone who says that they’re just interested in doing what everyone else wants. Until I know what someone wants, I can’t meet them halfway – they’re still holding their cards to their chest.

Here’s what I want:

- I want to live in Trumansburg for the rest of my life
- I want the village and town to keep a unique character that is reflective of the people who live here, and doesn’t blend in to the generic national culture
- I want my kids to have rich resources and opportunities here
- I want to have interesting businesses within walking distances that bring me something I can’t get elsewhere
- I want open spaces preserved in the village
- I want to keep on getting to know more people (and I can’t stand the statements by people who have been here a long time that when new people move in, no one knows each other any more – it’s absurd)

Marcia, if you really want to show that you’re willing to represent both Democrats and Republicans, I’d like to help you. Why don’t you and I work together to set up a chance for you to meet with some Trumansburg Democratic voters, so we can get a more specific idea of what you want to do on the village board, and you can hear what’s important to us?

I appreciate the praise for Finding Ulysses, but keep in mind that this isn’t meant to be journalism. It’s something else, more interactive, more spontaneous, more personal, even more argumentative. I don’t think that the word “blog” really carries it all. “Forum” is a great deal more apt.

The Free Press articles certainly have their bias. You should keep in mind that so do I. For that matter, so does everybody.

I still have my subscription to the Free Press, and I still look at the Ithaca Journal, because they have people who have the time to report a lot more information than I do. Nobody who writes here at Finding Ulysses gets paid for it. We’re just ordinary residents of the town of Ulysses who put in our two cents when we can.

That said, it is good to see more people writing articles for Finding Ulysses, and I’d like to keep that momentum up, with more new writers. With more people writing, we can cover more aspects of life in Ulysses – and even disagree with each other.

If I had some idea of who you are, X, I could offer you the ability to write here.

It’s an open invitation to anyone living in Ulysses: Drop me a line at jonathan@ashwellinsights.com, and we’ll talk about whether you’d be a good fit to write here.

Makes you wonder why we need a “hometown newspaper” anymore. I’ll be curious to see what their reaction to the recent events will be (although with a weekly, the news will be a bit stale)

This “direct reporting” with real-time reaction from the community is definately the way to go, as opposed to the politically biased moderation that exists in the Free Press.