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The cure for cabin fever
Posted on April 3, 2008 Last week I fulfilled a long-time ambition by staying in our family’s Wyoming cabin in the winter. My Dad built the cabin in the Sunlight Basin north of Cody back in the 1970s and since then I have stayed there many times, but always in the summer.

 I hate to say “I told you so,” but . . . 
Posted on April 1, 2008 Today’s news, that Neuman Development is pulling out of the Geneseo Gateway project, was a surprise to many people, but not to me. Bill Lofquist and I have been saying for years that the whole concept of the PDD law was a poor fit for this project. I’m glad that Neuman finally realized that we were right, but I do wonder why it took them so long.

Sizing up the 26th
Posted on March 26, 2008 In a seismic political event, the shock waves of which were felt around the nation, our once-powerful local Republican Congressman Tom Reynolds announced last week that he will not be seeking re-election. As a certified political junkie, I have watched the coverage of the scramble to find a replacement candidate...

5 years in
Posted on March 19, 2008 It’s an article of faith among the left-wing of the Democratic Party, and a growing number of Republicans, that the Iraq War has been an unmitigated disaster. Although the five years of war that we commemorate today have been difficult, I am one of the dwindling number of Americans who continue to support our government [...]

Ad hominem
Posted on March 11, 2008  I went down to the college last week to catch Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s Farewell Tour on Wednesday. Of course nobody knew it would be his last visit at the time. What a monster!
Oh, I forgot. We’re not allowed to use that term in politics anymore, after Obama adviser Samantha Powers was forced to resign last week [...]

Now the "fun" begins!
Posted on March 5, 2008 Hillary Clinton’s “comeback” “victories” in Super Tuesday II now set the stage for an historic opportunity for the Republican Party. I put quotes around those two words because, first, Clinton had been ahead in both Texas and Ohio polls for most of the last year, and secondly, it remains to be seen whether she will actually pick up any net gain in delegates [...]     

Shame on you Hillary Clinton!
Posted on Feb. 27, 2008 I think it’s fair to say that as a white, middle-aged, male, heterosexual Republican, I don’t fit into any of the known Pander Zones of the so-called Hillary Clinton demographic. In fact, like many of my  peers, I heartily despise her! [...]

Crunching the numbers
Posted on Feb. 19, 2008 Clarion Call Blogs Editor Corrin Strong reflects on the meaning of the growth in readership of the blogs and what it augers for the future of the Lowe's PDD proposal and the community of Geneseo. [...]

It’s never too late to do the right thing!
Posted on Feb. 12, 2008 Yesterday morning, Bill Lofquist and I sent an e-mail letter to the Geneseo Town Planning Board asking them to provide an opportunity for public comment on the new material that Newman Development has submitted to supplement its Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS). We have, as of yet, received no answer to our request, [...]

Collective amnesia Posted on Feb. 5, 2008 It is one of the great ironies of Geneseo that a community that enjoys the rare privilege of being designated a National Historic Landmark has such a poor memory of its own recent history. This is the inescapable conclusion drawn from reading Bill Lofquist’s four-part series on Gateway District Zoning which concludes later this week. [...]

Sticking to my knitting Posted on Jan. 29, 2008 In the last three election cycles I have run for office in Geneseo, but this year I am going to sit one out. There are a number of reasons for that, but the most important one is that I want to concentrate on getting my new graphic design and printing business, Genesee Graphics, off the ground. [...]

Following Cousin Billy  Posted on Jan. 23, 2008  On Friday night I will be traveling to Cleveland to see the third professional basketball game of my life. The first was my hometown Philadelphia 76ers in 1965, a team that featured Wilt Chamberlain, Chet Walker, Hal Greer, Luke Jackson and sixth-man rookie Billy “The Kangaroo Kid” Cunningham. [...]

1852 deja vu?
Posted on Jan. 16, 2008
After three different winners in the first three presidential contests in Iowa, New Hampshire and now Michigan, the fractures in the Republican coalition have never seemed more fragile. As stated before in this space, I am a McCain supporter, but I’m beginning to wonder if John is just too honest to win a modern political nomination [...]


The Clarion Call sells out! Posted on Jan. 8, 2008 Long-time readers of the Clarion Call Blogs will have noticed a more commercial look to our home page recently. It started with the addition of a small number of local advertisers who I approached in December. Thankfully some of them said yes and I was able to add a little cash flow [...]

Big shoes Posted on Jan. 4, 2008 I called my friend John Zmich last night to give him the bad news that he had been dumped from the Town of Geneseo Planning Board. I can’t say that John, who is on vacation, was surprised by the decision –after all, to the victors go the spoils.  [...]

The incredible shrinking newspaper Posted on Jan. 1, 2008 It's been over 9 months since I closed my weekly newspaper and people sometimes ask me if I miss it. No way! The economics of a small-town newspaper were bad enough, but I firmly believe that the newspaper era (and for that matter the print era in general) is rapidly coming to an end.  [...]

Halftime report Posted on Dec. 25, 2007 Although today is Christmas, it is also a Tuesday, and so I feel compelled to write a column, something I have done practically every Tuesday for the past 18 years. Traffic to the Clarion Call Blogs has slowed to a crawl in the lead-up to the Holiday, but 54 people have responded to the Lowe’s poll posted last Thursday, so I thought it was time for a half-time report. [...]

Almost Full Disclosure Posted on Dec. 18, 2007 332 people were sent an e-mail newsletter from me last Saturday afternoon promoting the clarioncall.com blogs. As of this writing on Tuesday evening, 185 of those (or about 55.7%) opened that e-mail. Of those who did, so far 119 (or 64.7%) actually clicked on at least one of the links to look at a blog. [...]

Negotiations bring progress on PDD controversy Posted on Dec. 12, 2007 Geneseo, N.Y. After a marathon three-hour negotiating session Wednesday, progress appeared to be made on a solution to the Lowe’s controversy that has bedeviled the Town of Geneseo for over two years. Representatives from all interested parties including Newman Development, Lowe’s, the Geneseo Town Board, Please Don’t Destroy Geneseo (PDDG), Keep Geneseo Growing and Vibrant (KGVG) and the Smart Growth Coalition participated in the meeting [...]

Presidential Follies Posted on Dec. 5, 2007  I was so busy with my own campaign for most of the year that I didn’t spend much time monitoring the national election. In fact, the first time I saw a Republican debate in October I didn’t even recognize half the candidates! Now with the local elections over, and the weather turning nasty, I’ve spent the last couple of weeks catching up [...]

Black, white and grey Posted on Nov. 27, 2007  In a continuing effort to bring you tomorrow’s news today, I am publishing below my commentary that will appear in this week’s LC News. (If it doesn’t make it in, you will have an exclusive!)
Consensus is possible on Lowe’s, but not simple

Truth in the age of Youtube Posted on Nov. 22, 2007 This column is being written two days past deadline on Thanksgiving Day, Thursday, Nov. 22. The date explains the delay. For those not old enough to remember, today is the 44th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I’m running late because I’ve spent the last three days getting bleary-eyed reading JFK conspiracy web sites [...]

Signs Posted on Nov. 13, 2007 Now that the election is beginning to recede into memory, inquiring minds are wondering how Supervisor-elect Will Wadsworth will deal with the thorny issues surrounding the Newman PDD application. Although Will campaigned as a pro-Lowe’s advocate, he was remarkably quiet on the process issues of how to get there. [...]

Synchronicity and Yorick’s Skull Posted on Nov. 9, 2007 In early October, at the insistence of Liz Porter, I attended the opening of the Richard Beale Exhibition at the Lockhart Gallery. I didn’t really want to go, because art openings are not my scene and the cost was $35 a ticket, but I decided to splurge for the sake of the campaign [...]

Parts 2 & 3
Posted on October 31, 2007 As the crowd had dwindled from over 200 to about 50 by the time I got to give Part 2 of my remarks at the public hearing Monday night, and since it was ruled by the two chairs, Wes and Dwight, that I could not have a Part 3 even though the meeting adjourned a half hour before its scheduled time, I thought I would revise and extend my remarks here. [...]

PDDG’s finest hour
Posted on October 23, 2007 I was very pleased by both the turn-out and the tenor of last night’s Town Meeting. [...]

My so-called flip-flop Posted October 17, 2007  Some of my friends in the group I founded, Please Don’t Destroy Geneseo (PDDG), tell me that they are surprised by the positions I have taken lately as a candidate for Town Supervisor. Although I have been careful to say that these positions are my own, and I am not speaking for PDDG, they don’t seem to want to grant me that right. [...]

Two years of PDDG Posted October 10, 2007 Please Don’t Destroy Geneseo (PDDG) was born two years ago last month to oppose the Newman Development Group’s Gateway Town Center proposal. I have identified myself as the founder of PDDG because I penned the phrase “Please Don’t Destroy Geneseo” and had it painted on a protest sign that I carried outside the Planning Board meeting of Sept. 26, 2005 [...]

In the belly of the beast Posted October 2, 2007 Today Bill Lofquist and I spent two hours poring over the “client’s file” at the offices of Underberg and Kessler, the attorneys for the Town of Geneseo. UK is located on the third floor of the new world headquarters of Bausch and Lomb in downtown Rochester. The client in question, of course, is Newman Development [...]

Inside the KGVG  Posted September 25, 2007 - In the last week a new grass roots group has surfaced in support of the Geneseo Lowe's project calling itself Keep Geneseo Vibrant and Growing. The public face of the group is Ted Universal of Booher Hill Road who has signed a long letter that was printed in the Livingston County News and published as Pennysaver Ad [...]

Happy Birthday General Wadsworth! Posted September 18, 2007 - Next month will mark the 200th birthday of my great, great, great grandfather, Civil War General James S. Wadsworth. Although he was actually born on October 30th (making him a Scorpio), there will be a celebration at Hartford House, the house he built, (and where I live) on Oct. 7th. [...]

Civil Disobedience Posted September 11, 2007 - Monday night, for the second time in my life, I was willing to go to jail for a principle. The first time ocurred during the Great Avon Garbage War of 1993. (That episode is recounted in my collection of columns, Writing for Myself: And ticking everybody else off! available at fine books store everywhere!)  [...]

The more things stay the same Posted September 4, 2007 - Feeling the need for a quick vacation before plunging into the final two hectic months of the campaign, I took advantage of a trip to take my daughter back to college in Boston last week to slip away for a couple of days to North Haven Island off the coast of Maine. [...]

Fear and loathing in Geneseo Posted August 28, 2007 - As if it hadn't already been obvious, last night's meeting of the Geneseo Planning Board brought further confirmation that there is something seriously wrong with the process in the board's review of the Newman PDD proposal. The meeting started with a lecture from Newman attorney Tom Greiner about how the DEIS should not be a public record [...]

Catching up Posted August 22, 2007 - For the next two weeks, I will not be actively campaigning. It's been a busy summer with over 1,000 doors knocked on, and only a few days off, and I need a break. Labor Day is the traditional start of the fall campaign season and most people don't really start paying much attention until October anyway [...]

Little things Posted August 14, 2007 - Sometimes you can tell a lot about a person by the way they deal with little things. For instance, little things like obeying the law. My problems with Geneseo Supervisor Wes Kennison started a few years ago over what some might consider a little thing. [...]

Time passes slowly up here in the mountains Posted August 7, 2007 - On Sunday, I repaired to the Adirondacks for a few days of R & R after the frenetic run-up to Saturday's caucus. Everything was so busy last week that for the first time in 17 years I had an unscheduled failure to publish this column. Sorry about that, but that's the way politics can be! [...]

The Political Hack’s Playbook Posted July 25, 2007 - It's summertime and the living is easy, but the writing is hard. This morning (a day late for this weekly column already) I was surfing around the Internet and stumbled onto a web site called Clout City: Chicago's Political Blog. I started reading a blog post about how Mayor Daley had received an environmental award (funded by Wal-Mart no less) [...]

A farewell to farewells Posted July 18, 2007 - For many years The Clarion newspaper took the third week of July off from publication. If I were still publishing the paper, this would be the column in which I explained to my readers that we would be gone for a week. Ah, the good old days . . . [...]

An inconvenient truth Posted July 13, 2007 - The always trenchant Jim Allen suggested at the traffic access public hearing Wednesday that the consultants from SRF Associates had engaged in "magical thinking" in putting their plan together. That criticism is entirely too kind. [...]

Trading places Posted July 11, 2007 - This week Bill and I are trading deadlines. His column is already up here and mine will not be posted until Thursday. This allows me time to complete the move of my business out of 38 Main Street and into 94 Main Street which is going well, but is also exhausting! [...]

Pool time Posted July 3, 2007 - Like any certified silver spooner I have a swimming pool in my yard. This was a gift from my grandfather Jerry Wadsworth to my mother on the occasion of her purchase of Hartford House from her Aunt Eleanor in 1975. Sometimes I think it was a curse put on me by my grandfather! [...]

Mistaken identity Posted June 26, 2007 - One of the most comical (to me) elements of our recent Article 78 lawsuit against the Town of Geneseo was the court's confusion over my role. Although I officially retired from the practice of law in 1986, I did draft the petititon that started this action, (although I certainly didn't get paid for it!) [...]

I can't keep up! Posted June 20, 2007 - It is now Wednesday morning at 7:30 a.m. and I am just getting around to this weekly column which is advertised to be published every Tuesday. I've been up since 5 a.m. this morning writing two other blog entries and I'm just about out of ideas. [...]

Remember the core!  Posted June 12, 2007 - Last night I attended the Town of Geneseo Planning Board meeting at its new location at the Millennium Road complex. I've heard many town employees talk about how much happier they are in the new, more spacious digs, but I've also heard many residents complain about what a pain it is to have to drive there [...]

City of dreams  Posted June 5, 2007 - You may not have heard that much about the City of Oneida, N.Y., but you are about to. Oneida has been selected as a community that is comparable to Geneseo and is being studied for the soon-to-be released Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) being prepared for Newman Development's proposed Lowes project. [...]

Keeping it all straight  Posted May 30, 2007 - For the past 17 years I've written this approximately 500 word column every Tuesday. For the last five days I've written a 500 word column every day! Please excuse me if I don't make 500 words tonight, I'm tired! The daily columns are blog entries in my new campaign diary which can be found on corrinstrong.com [...]

A short retirement Posted May 22, 2007 - Today marks exactly two months since I sent the last Clarion newspaper to press. In a perfect world, I would have preferred to enjoy my retirement a little while longer before jumping into my next major venture, but time waits for no man. I've known for a while that Town Planning Board member Patti Lavigne was planning to run for the Republican nomination for Geneseo Town Supervisor. I've also known that I would run as well, [...]

Share the wealth! Posted May 15, 2007 - Last week's 14-2 vote of the Livingston County Planning Board to give a thumbs down to the proposed new Village of Geneseo Master Plan may have come as a surprise to some, but only if they were not paying attention. The Village Plan was only the latest casualty in the ever-widening Big Box War that [...] 

Closing the Gray Gap - Posted May 7, 2007 - As I travel about I frequently run into people who mention how much they miss the newspaper. This is gratifying to hear and I usually try to steer them in the direction of this web site and blog. If the person is significantly older then my 56 years (as most newspaper readers are), however, I [...]

Learning Curves - Posted May 1, 2007 -I bought my first computer in January of 1986. It was a Compaq Deskpro with a 286 processor, what we used to call a IBM compatible. It ran on DOS at a blistering 20 Mhz! That seemed pretty fast at the time, but today's new computers run at over 100 times that speed. For software I [...]

Downsizing - Posted April 24, 2007 - It's been over a month since I retired from the weekly newspaper business, but I'm still very busy downsizing my life. Many who have seen me in person lately have also commented on my new downsized body. My weight loss is now approaching 30 pounds since last fall and I have already managed to lose [...]

Making the deadline - Posted April 18, 2007 - This is not the column I had planned to post this week. After spending 8 days with my son on a motor tour of Major League ballparks, I had planned to write a light-hearted account of life on the road. All that changed for me, and for so many others, in just a few minutes [...]

Peace in our time? - Posted April 9, 2007 - Of all the ironies in Geneseo these days, the most marvelous is the complaint made by Supervisor Kennison that PDDG's recent lawsuit is a violation of the spirit of cooperation of the upcoming 175th Anniversary of the Village starting on April 21 and the so-called Peace Banquet, which has now been officially scheduled for [...]

Going pro se - Posted April 4, 2007 - Last week I drafted an Article 78 petition to challenge the Town of Geneseo's failure to deliver documents requested under a FOIL request made by my fellow columnist Bill Lofquist. Bill has been relentlessly pursuing the release of these documents since last October. At first, I must admit, I thought he was a little nutty to [...]

Busier than I ever was! - Posted March 28, 2007 - You've probably heard of people who retire and then find themselves busier than they ever were. I am the poster boy for that right now. The last week, since I folded my newspaper tent, has been a whirlwind. Of course, getting the new Clarion Call Blogs up and running has been job one, but there's a [...]

Is there life after newspapering? - Posted March 26, 2007 - The question I am getting a lot now is, “What next?” The simple answer is I don't know and I'm not in any hurry to decide. After 18 years on deadline, I'm ready for a little time off. Newspaper publishing is a very intense lifestyle and I definitely will need some time to decompress. On the [...]